Chapter 196: The Next Step?
Half an hour later, the group returned to the Sand Village’s army headquarters and officially announced their withdrawal from the battlefield. This meant that in this Great Ninja War, the Sand Village, as one of the Five Great Ninja Villages, was the first to break away entirely from active combat.
The other four villages were still locked in fierce fighting with no easy path to stopping.
Konoha had been under the weight of the situation, seemingly on the verge of collapse, which had ultimately forced Hiruzen to agree to the demands. Exchanging a forbidden jutsu for medicinal resources, and preventing the village from being placed in a completely passive position in the subsequent fighting against the Hidden Stone and Hidden Mist Villages, was still an acceptable outcome from Konoha’s perspective.
On the other side, as the Third Hokage, Hiruzen made a public declaration acknowledging the bloodline and official status of the Uchiha and Hyuga clan members within the Sand Village.
Of course, whether the two clans themselves would actually accept this acknowledgment was an entirely separate matter. But from a more objective political standpoint, as long as Hiruzen spoke the words as Hokage, the official position was established.
As for how the Uchiha and Hyuga clans would react to the idea, Yuji was essentially unconcerned with whether they accepted it or not.
What he was considerably more certain about was that this matter would make the already difficult conflict between Konoha’s senior officials and the Uchiha clan even harder to resolve going forward.
Because from the Uchiha clan’s perspective, even the Hokage had no right to agree to the Sand Village’s demands on their behalf. This arrangement was effectively equivalent to acknowledging that their clan had another branch family, permanently settled in the Sand Village.
To prevent any future default on Konoha’s part, a special contract scroll had been prepared and signed with Hiruzen. This scroll sealed the content of the negotiation in the form of memory images, making the agreement impossible to simply deny or reinterpret later.
Before departing, he also delivered a clear warning to the other side. The Sand Village and Konoha had agreed to a ceasefire. If in the future any member of Konoha’s Uchiha clan were to attack the Sand Village over the bloodline issue, or if Danzo’s clandestine organization made any moves against Sand Village interests, then the peace between the two villages and the validity of this contract would be immediately voided.
In reality, this was simply to ensure the Sand Village could enter a stable development period without disruption.
Looking back at the various great wars in the ninja world’s history, he understood clearly that a contract like this did not carry meaningful binding power over the long term. Once the war ended and each village recovered its strength, another conflict could erupt in various forms at any time.
But for the Sand Village, being able to restrain Konoha for a defined period was sufficient.
Shortly afterward, news of the ceasefire between the Sand Village and Konoha spread throughout the ninja world, along with intelligence about the Uchiha and Hyuga clan bloodlines having taken permanent root in the Sand Village.
Every nation and power reacted differently. However, apart from the four great ninja villages, no one else was particularly surprised. The other great villages had all seen through the Sand Village’s calculations at this point, and none of them were shocked to learn the Sand Village had once again extracted profit from Konoha.
The only genuine dissatisfaction came from the Hidden Stone and Hidden Mist Villages, who were unhappy that the Sand Village was now selling medicinal resources to Konoha, indirectly undermining their own battlefield advantages.
Onoki had apparently anticipated this. Even before the peace talks with Hiruzen and the planned sale to Konoha had been finalized, the Hidden Stone Village had already sent a letter.
The Third Tsuchikage pressed Yuji aggressively with pointed words and implicit threats, seemingly attempting to stir up a conflict and reignite war with the Sand Village. But Yuji shut him down with a single calm response, leaving him with nothing further to push against.
The method was straightforward. He simply provided the Hidden Stone Village with a batch of medicinal resources that required no payment and no ledger entry. Onoki understood the message perfectly. His displayed anger had been entirely performative. The real goal had been to force the Sand Village into making some kind of concession, and receiving a free batch of goods satisfied that requirement adequately. After receiving the goods, the Hidden Stone Village went quiet.
The Hidden Mist Village, having heard about the arrangement, naturally followed suit and accepted a free batch of their own. With two small gestures, both the Hidden Stone and Hidden Mist Villages had been placated and prevented from making any serious issue of the matter. Onoki felt he had not come away empty-handed, and that was enough.
Following the Sand Village’s arrangement with Konoha, the Hidden Cloud Village was now the only major village on the battlefield entirely lacking both the resources and military strength to sustain its forces.
This placed them, already the village that had suffered the most severe losses throughout the entire Great Ninja War, at an extreme disadvantage. The death of the Third Raikage, compounded by the fact that Sasori was still deploying the Raikage’s remains as a puppet on the active battlefield, made the Hidden Cloud Village’s position extraordinarily difficult.
All of this made it nearly impossible for the Fourth Raikage A to approach the Sand Village directly for negotiations.
However, the current situation had made the Sand Village’s medicinal resources essentially the baseline standard every major village needed to function. If the Hidden Cloud Village did not receive a supply, they would inevitably fall behind every other party.
The value of the medicines was not only their combat application but also their ability to dramatically increase the survival rate of ninja, ensuring that even after the Great Ninja War ended, each village would retain enough personnel to begin recovering its strength. This was the most crucial long-term consideration.
Although A was the Hidden Cloud Village’s Kage, he could not send a letter directly given that he was the son of the man Yuji had killed. The gap of personal enmity made direct correspondence impossible. But he found a way around this. He arranged for the Daimyo of the Land of Lightning and the Daimyo of the Land of Wind to conduct negotiations, purchasing the medicine in the name of the Land of Lightning rather than the village itself. This framing left no obvious grounds for the Sand Village to refuse without appearing unreasonable.
Like Konoha, the Hidden Cloud Village had finally been cornered into exactly the position Yuji had been waiting for.
Therefore, before agreeing to sell medicine to the Hidden Cloud Village, he added several conditions. The first was that the Hidden Cloud Village must unconditionally and publicly acknowledge full responsibility for the deaths of the Third Raikage.
Now that the Third Raikage’s remains had become one of Sasori’s puppets, and given the extremely strained relationship between the Sand Village and the Hidden Cloud Village, all of this had to be acknowledged as the direct consequence of the Hidden Cloud Village’s own actions and decisions. The Hidden Cloud Village was required to face the stain of this defeat directly and without deflection.
The Hidden Cloud Village was simultaneously required to accept peace talks and cease hostilities with the Sand Village as part of the arrangement. Unlike Konoha, the Hidden Cloud Village clearly only wanted to purchase medicinal supplies and had no genuine intention of negotiating peace. A almost certainly still harbored thoughts of eventually avenging his father when the opportunity presented itself. Naturally, Yuji was not about to simply allow that to happen.
After nearly half a month of stalemate, the Daimyo’s Mansion of the Land of Lightning finally sent a reply accepting the conditions. With that, this Great Ninja War officially had nothing further to do with the Sand Village.
Only the remaining four sides were left to continue their struggle for supremacy. The Sand Village had already entered a state of peace.
The time had also reached the fiftieth year of the Hokage era. In the original story, this was the point at which the Third Great Ninja War had concluded.
Outside the Sand Village’s secret headquarters, on a small sand dune.
In the past it had been just the two of them, Sasori and Yuji, meeting here in private. Now there was one more person, Shimizu. Far below the sand dune, Baki and Yura stood guard. The three of them gazed at the completely transformed village scenery in the distance, each feeling something different.
The Sand Village’s basic construction had been completed.
The war was entirely over. Many of the foreign workers and craftsmen who had been recruited had been sent back to their respective countries. All the village’s new agencies and institutions had officially begun operating.
The village had also opened itself to the outside world, no longer maintaining the semi-locked status it had held throughout the war period. In the final stretch before the Great Ninja War’s conclusion, the Sand Village had spent roughly a year gradually familiarizing itself with its completely new mechanisms and policies, accumulating practical experience.
Even with the departure of the many outside workers, the village remained bustling and prosperous. The Sand Village had once been almost entirely composed of yellowish-brown rounded buildings that blended seamlessly into the desert landscape.
But now a collection of buildings in somewhat different colors and heights had risen throughout the village. The tall stacked stone walls that surrounded the village had proven extraordinarily effective at controlling the wind and sand environment, and some green vegetation capable of adapting to the Land of Wind’s climate had even been cultivated and planted within the village boundaries, adding unexpected color to the landscape.
In short, the Sand Village now looked completely unrecognizable compared to what it had been at the war’s beginning. It appeared as though it had not been touched by the war at all.
"And then what?"
Sasori clasped his hands to his chest, gazing into the distance at the village for a moment before turning to look at Yuji and asking those three words.
Earlier, during their negotiations and conversations, Yuji had already made clear that his plan extended far beyond what had been accomplished. Regarding the transformation of the Sand Village, Yuji had clearly succeeded, and had done so with remarkable results. But from another perspective, while his wishes had been fulfilled, they had also in a sense lost their original goal now that it was complete.
"Ten years."
Yuji’s first words were accompanied by a quiet self-mocking laugh.
This year, he and Sasori had both turned eighteen. They had grown up. He had told Sasori long ago that the Sand Village was only the beginning.
Sasori’s words made Shimizu look at Yuji as well. He sensed a different weight in what was being said. What exactly was the Fourth Kazekage planning now? Although Yuji and Sasori had accepted him into their circle, and he had come to feel genuinely integrated into their relationship, there was always the feeling that the important news arrived slightly after the fact.
"How does it feel to always receive the news a step behind?" Yuji said with a slight smile, as though reading Shimizu’s thoughts.
"Conquest."
He rubbed his hands together slowly, his eyes sharpening as he whispered the word.
Conquest?
Sasori showed no visible reaction. But Shimizu’s expression changed completely.
He realized what was being implied. The Fourth Kazekage was planning a military expansion.
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