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Interestingly, this cold drink shop was run by the Sunagakure itself.

It could be described as a state-owned enterprise; or more accurately, a village-run enterprise.

For various reasons, this was the first cold drink shop in Sand Ninja.

In terms of national economy and people's livelihood, the Sunagakure, with its relatively scarce resources, is far behind Konoha and the Land of Fire. If it weren't for Konoha recently opening up ice exports— Yuki Haku doubled the ice-making efficiency of the Land of Fire, and if Sakura Haruno joined in, it could be increased tenfold—they probably wouldn't even be able to afford to open this ice cream shop.

It seems a bit strange to open a shop in the name of a village, but there's nothing we can do about it.

To paraphrase Gaara, when things are desperate, one must seek solutions. The Sunagakure isn't without precedent; the Fourth Kazekage even condescended to manufacture Gold Dust to supplement the Sand Ninja's finances.

The biggest concern for the Sand shinobi was whether this approach would be effective. After all, this world had only recently emerged from the chaotic Warring States period, and economic theories were still stuck in the feudal era of the previous world. Whether opening a shop in the name of the village meant taking profits from the people had been debated for a long time. In addition, some people believed that the ninjas and civilians in the village were very poor, and that opening such a shop would result in few customers and serious losses; others believed that the tradition of ninjas was to be frugal and simple, and that such a shop would foster a hedonistic mentality among the ninjas and erode their fighting spirit.

However, no matter how many reasons there are to oppose it, they cannot withstand a single reason to agree.

That is, the Sunagakure is very short of money.

Young people Gaara were more open-minded and believed that this would make money for the village and boost the economy, so the higher-ups agreed to let them try opening a shop.

The sugar water, carbon dioxide, and ice create a taste that's almost identical to the cola from Sakura's previous life. Add to that the unique shaved ice and other specialties, and if it weren't for the fact that most of the people in the shop were wearing ninja Forehead Protector, the girl would have a strange feeling of being back on Earth.

"Not bad," the pink-haired girl said, taking a sip of her cold drink and raising an eyebrow. "You guys put a lot of effort into this."

The Sand shinobi are capable of concocting sophisticated and potent poisons, so creating a unique and delicious beverage recipe would naturally be a piece of cake for them as well.

Sasuke also sampled some of the snacks and remarked casually, "Hmm, indeed, summer is just right for snacks like these..."

Sakura could sense a hint of disdain in his tone.

Sasuke has never been a big fan of sweets, a habit Sakura Haruno is well aware of. Sweet drinks are also something he avoids, so he only took a few bites of the snacks and drinks on the table and lost interest after just one taste. In contrast, Sakura in this life has a pretty high tolerance for sweets, probably because her taste has been influenced by her body.

Furthermore, while eating icy foods in summer is refreshing, ninjas skilled in Fire Style generally seem to prefer hot food.

Besides, the chattering girls around him were also a bit annoying...

The biggest reason is that Sasuke doesn't agree with ninjas enjoying too much. He's a traditional ninja with a puritanical streak, believing that an overly comfortable environment will corrupt his heart, and that hedonism is a wrong tendency for ninjas. This is the exact opposite of Sakura Haruno's thinking; she believes that ninjas are also human, and that always being too tense is not beneficial, and that a balance of tension and relaxation is the best way of life. As for Gaara, he has the same requirements for himself as Sasuke, being a very disciplined and simple person; however, he doesn't have the same requirements for others.

Gaara, unlike a young girl, didn't understand Sasuke and failed to grasp his hidden meaning, taking it as genuine praise.

He responded with a faint smile and said, "So the cold drink shop is doing quite well. It's opened up a new source of revenue for the village's depleted finances..."

To cultivate new talent and restore its strength, Sunagakure naturally had to increase its investment. It also had to pay war reparations and faced the predicament of insufficient mission orders and reduced fiscal revenue after the defeat. With expenses even greater than before, Sunagakure unsurprisingly fell into a financial crisis, which is why it allowed these shops, which were previously considered crooked businesses, to start up.

"Don't you plan to open more branches?" Sakura Haruno asked.

"We already have a few branches," Gaara nodded, "But there probably won't be any more. After all, we're ninjas."

There was no hint of regret in his tone, suggesting that the new Lord Kazekage also considered the cold drink shop merely a stopgap measure.

According to the business logic of my past life, a shop with high profits, a large market, and no competitors should open many branches and cover the entire Land of Wind. Obviously, ninjas and merchants use different logics. Ninjas believe in strength at their core. What's the point of making a lot of money and opening branches all over the Shinobi World? Without strong ninjas to protect them, it's just Utakata.

Moreover, in the eyes of the Sand shinobi, this way they were only making money from their own village and countrymen, and it was just a matter of spending effort to make the money circulate again. It was not very meaningful to continue doing it on a large scale.

Instead of focusing on making money, they should think about how to improve the village's fighting capacity.

Sakura Haruno didn't know whether to call them blockheads or overly insightful.

"That's right," Sasuke agreed. "These aren't things ninjas should be doing. Besides, we don't have time to focus on such things."

Gaara nodded in agreement.

"Once our generation solves Akatsuki's problems and peace is achieved among the Five Great Nations, perhaps the next generation can sit peacefully in this place without having to be constantly on guard against future battles!" Sakura changed the subject.

"War stems from the struggle for resources," Gaara said solemnly. "Ninjas accept and complete missions to obtain rewards and resources; this has been the practice for hundreds of years. However, it seems there is a new way now..."

The girl glanced at the new Kazekage with some surprise; he had noticed it too.

Indeed, those who can become film directors are not simple-minded.

"Yes, because now ninjas can also produce resources..." she said slowly, looking at the red-haired boy.

War is the most intense means of resolving the contradiction of resource scarcity in the ninja village.

Because mission orders are always limited, the method of earning rewards by completing missions is inefficient and fragile. Moreover, the advanced ninja village system, compared to the old tribal system, makes the training of ninjas easier. As the number and strength of ninjas continue to increase, ninja villages gradually become unable to bear the heavy responsibility of supporting so many ninjas, and thus can only expand outwards.

From a resource perspective, population growth means resource scarcity, necessitating expansion and leading to war. After war consumes a large number of ninja, the ninja village no longer needs to support so many people, reducing financial pressure and making resources abundant, allowing them to live peacefully for a while until the next population boom.

For the past few decades, the Shinobi World has been repeating this cycle, with world wars breaking out every few years, showing a tendency to prolong the tragedy for hundreds of years, much like the Warring States period.

However, things seem to have changed in recent years.

Konoha began to realize that, in addition to completing missions and earning rewards, ninjas were also excellent producers. Whether it was farming as the primary industry or running factories as the secondary industry, ninjas were many times more efficient than ordinary people. Of course, due to various internal and external events, this understanding was still very vague and was not studied in depth.

As a transmigrator, Sakura couldn't simply apply her past life's social development experience to this world. After all, this was a world with Chakra and Ninjutsu, where the potential of humanity was many times greater than in her previous life, and the Shinobi World had its own unique circumstances. But she at least knew that, in Jonin could support themselves without relying on mission assignments, and that resource shortages didn't necessarily mean they had to plunder others; they could also produce their own supplies.

The Sunagakure has been observing and learning from Konoha for the past two years, and naturally they have noticed this as well.

Their predecessor, the Kazekage, had also worked part-time at a Gold Dust factory, so the Sunagakure's understanding and acceptance of this matter was not low.

The part that Sakura Haruno and Gaara were discussing involved sociological topics, and although both of them were quite rudimentary in their understanding, Sasuke could only listen with a blank expression.

"So this is the foundation for future peace," Gaara said with a faint smile. "I believe that we will definitely live to see an era without war."

"It should be an era without world wars," the girl corrected.

Even with her imagination, she couldn't fathom what a day when humanity achieves complete peace would be like. In any case, even in her previous world, only a general peace was maintained; local conflicts and even wars were still commonplace. The nature of humanity was similar in both worlds; greed, ignorance, shortsightedness, and hatred were even more prevalent in this world. War-mongers were everywhere, and it was already a blessing if there wasn't a world war. Local wars or conflicts were impossible to eliminate.

"You're all talking about peace and peace," Sasuke shook his head impatiently. "Let's wait until the Akatsuki issue is resolved before we talk about that!"

"Ah..." Sakura Haruno sighed.

At a time when Akatsuki could unleash chaos in Shinobi World ninja world at any moment, or even destroy it, talking about future world peace is indeed a bit unrealistic.

The most urgent task is to deal with the threat posed by Xiao.

The girl paused for a moment, then continued, "After lying low for over a year, they're starting to stir again. I suspect they're about to officially launch their plan to capture the Tailed Beast."

Akatsuki shared all its intelligence with the Sand Ninja, so Gaara also aware of what was happening in the Land of Waterfalls.

"You must not let your guard down on your trip to the Land of Waterfalls," Land of Waterfalls Gaara gravely. "Oh no, you'll run into members of Akatsuki!"

"You should also be careful, Gaara," Sasuke said earnestly. "As the One-Tail Jinchuriki, you might very well be part of their plan too!"

"Surely Akatsuki wouldn't be so audacious as to attack the Kage of a village?" Sakura frowned slightly and said, "They're facing Sunagakure, one of the Five Great Shinobi Villages!"

Gaara calmly replied, "That depends on their objectives."

"If their plan requires gathering Nine Tailed Beasts to succeed, then I will definitely be one of their targets. Conversely, if they only want to gather enough power to threaten the Shinobi World, then it's not necessarily the case. The power of the One-Tail Beast is actually nothing among the Tailed Beast. Besides, it's not just me protecting the village; the village is protecting me too..."

In short, we should all try our best!

Sakura Haruno nodded solemnly.

The next day, Sakura Haruno and Sasuke left Sunagakure and headed north along the border with Konoha.

The destination is the second stop on this trip: the Land of Waterfalls.