Land of Wind, Sunagakure.
The blazing sun hanging in the sky scorched the earth like a furnace.
At noon, the heat waves rising from the desert meant few people moved about Sunagakure.
But today was different.
A figure was racing through the streets toward the enormous spherical building at the center.
Inside the Kazekage Building.
The atmosphere here was utterly unlike the deathly silence outside the windows.
Only a handful of people had gathered in the high-level conference room, and the air was filled with long-lost anticipation.
Several days had passed since the disastrous failure of the Konoha Collapse Plan. Since more than half the village's fighting force had been captured by Konoha, Sunagakure had not known a single peaceful day. They had remained on alert day and night, both within and beyond the village, leaving them severely weakened.
Only today did that crushing pressure seem likely to finally lift.
The agonizing negotiations had finally come to an end. The final price—five hundred million ryō.
Though enormous, it was still within the limits of what they could bear.
The people handling the handover had set out early in the morning. The news should have arrived by now.
"The contract was signed this morning. The news should be here, right?" An elderly Jonin with his face veiled broke the silence, his voice carrying an almost imperceptible tremor.
"Unless something unexpected happened," someone beside him quietly agreed.
The moment he spoke, both men turned their gazes toward the elderly woman seated at the head of the table.
There sat Advisor Chiyo.
With Fourth Kazekage Rasa dead and the village's elites all trapped in Konoha, this legendary puppeteer, who had long since retired, had no choice but to return and take charge of the situation.
At the moment, she sat with her head