Naruto: Chronicles of a Fire Ninja - Chapter 335

Chapter 335: Chapter 331: Hope
While Konoha was taking their time enjoying their regained peace, at least on the surface, the other villages were not so idle

…

“Sir, both Iwa and Suna have brought back their forces from Fire country as well, and Konoha has already taken care of most of the bandits and rogue ninja we were able to plant in the Fire country. In a sense, they are now more safe than before,” Mabui said.

“So Konoha is back to their shell, I guess?” A asked.

“Yes sir, and according to the recent report from our spies, they have brought back most of their forces to recuperate, with only the border having the same number of forces as before. Hokage is not taking any chances in that regard,” Mabui continued.

“So what do you think, Mabui, is this much damage enough for Konoha?” A asked.

“Not at all sir. As far as damage is concerned, Konoha has not actually sustained any substantial damage at all. The most they have lost is just a couple dozen genin and some unfortunate chunin—a force insignificant to even weakened Konoha, let alone today’s Konoha which is going back to its prime at a rapid rate,” Mabui said.

“Yes, with the stunt they have pulled, it is a very light loss, and if they got away with such an easy price, they may get many more bold ideas in the future as well,” A said, leaning back in his chair.

“Sir, you are not thinking of sending our forces back to Fire country, right? Our losses are already on the higher side. We have lost 2 jonin and 5 chunin and many more genin during our plans to attack Konoha. With Shisui of the Body Flicker active, the losses have been mounting like crazy, and we can’t commit to an attack like that,” Mabui said.

“I know, but that will be the case if we took the same approach. How about this?” A said, passing a letter to Mabui.

“Sir, this will bring us very close to launching a full-blown Great Ninja War,” Mabui said.

“But Konoha will not start the war,” A said, shrugging his shoulders. Even though it was a known fact that Konoha was almost back to its previous strength, the key point was ‘almost.’ Like other great ninja villages, Konoha was also not in a condition to go to war either.

Sure, Kiri was in civil war and Sunagakure was an ally, but the situation would become completely different if an actual war started, because Suna would surely become an enemy in a jiffy—their alliance was forced in the first place anyway. With other two major villages ready to join at any moment as well, there was no way Konoha could start a war in any case. Understanding this, Mabui nodded her head in understanding.

“Send a letter to Onoki, tell him I am willing to cooperate with him for this plan if he is up for it,” A said.

“And what if he demands some form of compensation for this?” Mabui asked.

“Then there is no need to proceed with the discussion anymore. Tell him that if that is the case, then we will drop this plan altogether,” A said, because he knew like them, Iwa was also searching to show that doing stunts like the one they did had consequences.

“Sir, should we consult with elders for this?” Mabui asked.

“I have already informed two grand elders; rest of them will just complicate this further,” A said.

Mabui nodded her head and left the office. With her task clear, there was no time for her to waste anymore.

‘Let’s see how you react to this, Hiruzen,’ A thought.

…

With a letter in front of him, Onoki was sitting in front of Iwa’s councils.

“Sir, this is too risky, and if Konoha actually decides to attack, then the losses will be tremendous for us,” one of the elders said.

“And you think they have military strength to fight Kumo and us at the same time?”

“Also, two of their S-rank are not with Konoha anymore, with the third one dead.”

“Tsunade can be brought back if the situation becomes dire, and we don’t know if Orochimaru actually defected. It may very well be a ploy, and he can become a variable during the war.”

“Also, there is talk of Fugaku being an S-rank now. An S-rank Uchiha will be a menace on the battlefield, let alone two.”

“And do you think we are weak? So what if they have S-rank ninjas? We are not weak either. Also, we can’t allow Konoha to continue their earlier stunt; otherwise, we will lose much more than just some business partners.”

The discussion continued, but Onoki was sitting there with his mouth shut and his hands massaging his own back. After 10 minutes of hearing non-stop banter from the elders, Onoki finally sighed and said:

“We all know that we were planning something like this anyway. Now that we can ally with Kumo, there is nothing wrong with it. Even though I would have liked Kumo to take the initiative, they have made their intent clear that if we don’t participate, they will also fall back, which is a very bad outcome.

Because if that happened, we can’t attack Konoha on our own. Even though Kumo will also not want to give Konoha so much breathing room either, we can’t bet on Raikage’s volatile nature for this either. So we don’t actually have a choice in this matter. So why the hell are you guys taking so much time to reach such a simple conclusion?”

Being a fence-sitter for so long, the higher-ups of Iwa had become very mild in their approach against any enemy, which though having benefits in some cases, couldn’t always be used, and this was one such scenario.

‘I really worry about the time when I will not be here; these fools will be responsible for handling Iwagakure,’ Onoki thought.

“But Tsuchikage-sama, if we agree to this, then who are we going to send for this mission?” one of the elders asked.

“Kitsuchi and Deidara will lead the mission along with 5 squads of chunin, each led by an elite jonin, and 20 tokubetsu jonin and 3 medical ninjas.”

Everyone became shocked by this. Committing such a force for an attack was rare even during times of war, let alone in time of peace. If they lost this force, it would not be an overstatement that Iwa would be the one to suffer.

“Sir, both Deidara and Kitsuchi are irreplaceable assets of the village. We can’t put them up for such a dangerous mission. What if Kumo uses this chance to weaken us?” one of the elders said.

“Do you think Raikage or Kumo is so dumb that they will try to start a death conflict with us when our common enemy is getting powerful every second? A may be hot-headed, but he is by no means a fool. Also, Kitsuchi doesn’t need anyone’s worry—he didn’t become military commander of Iwa by playing safe in Iwagakure. As for Deidara, he needs some challenges to grow. With how much training he has been doing after coming back from the Chunin exam, I think this is the perfect opportunity to put it to good use,” Onoki said.

With such sound reasoning, there was nothing the elders could say anymore, and they agreed to the proposal. With this, an impromptu alliance between Iwa and Kumo was formed against Konoha.

…

“My mom has not recovered from previous healing, please wait some time and let her recover, please!” a small girl not older than 6 years cried. Her vibrant red hair, though messy, was strikingly full of energy.

“Move aside, girl. We don’t have time for this,” the ninja she was pleading against mercilessly pushed her aside and brought in three injured ninja along with him.

One of them was at jonin rank while the other two were of elite chunin rank, though it was by the standards of a minor village. If they were in any major village, even considering them chunin would have been a stretch.

But for a minor village, they were assets—though not strong ones, but still assets. That’s why they were here. All three of them had various injuries on their bodies, along with low chakra reserves.

In front of them lay a woman having striking similarity to the girl crying at the doors. With her red hair tied, she was sitting on her bed, but the vibrancy of life that accompanied those red hairs was missing in her. She was both low on chakra and utterly exhausted as this was the 12th time in a day she was going through this procedure.

Without wasting any time, the three injured ninja bit the arm of the lady, their injuries healing at a pace visible to the naked eye while their chakra reserves filled back in no time.

The lady’s face went a little more pale after that. Even though she had shared her chakra with more than 50 ninjas, it was not her chakra reserves that were empty. On the contrary, they were still more than half filled—it was her life force that was at its limit. Healing so many people continuously took a toll on her, and it was just going to get worse.

“Mom, are you alright? Please mom, let me heal you. I don’t want to lose you,” the girl came running back after the ninja left.

“I am perfectly fine, Karin, so don’t cry, my child,” Reina Uzumaki, one of the last surviving members of the Uzumaki clan, said, with her shaking hand wiping away the tears of her daughter.

“Mom, let’s run away from here. This place is very bad; all of the people here are so selfish,” Karin cried.

“We don’t have any place to go, my child. Now this is our home, and don’t worry—things will get better once this war is over,” Reina said. With their Uzumaki bloodline, they couldn’t go to any major village, because other villages would become wary of them and would try their best to eliminate them.

No village would want their enemy village to get a powerful clan like the Uzumaki clan among their ranks, so their best bet was to stay hidden here, hoping that things would become easier once the war was over.