Can't underestimate them...
What did that mean?
Was he angry, or wasn't he? Was he going to deal with Kusagakure, or not? What exactly did the Third Hokage mean? Listening to the Third Hokage's rather cheerful words, Hada Ryuhiko was already drenched in cold sweat.
Though, from the sound of it, there was no anger at all in the Third Hokage's voice. He even seemed quite cheerful, as though he was magnanimously overlooking that idiot Kazuha's actions.
But was that really the case? Wasn't it simply because this was the Chunin Exams, and Konoha could not conveniently "make a fuss" with Kusagakure or appear "petty and lacking the bearing of a major village"? Right. Though the Third Hokage did not seem angry at all right now and even appeared rather pleased by the situation, that did not mean he truly did not care.
Nor did it mean Konoha did not care.
There was something called settling accounts after the autumn harvest. Though Hada Ryuhiko was not very old, he knew that much.
Konoha might not show anything now, but once the Chunin Exams ended, they could start dealing with Kusagakure from every angle.
It might not be out in the open, but Konoha had no shortage of underhanded methods.
Besides, Kusagakure's current situation was not particularly optimistic. No, it was not merely less than optimistic. Things were already quite terrible.
Kusagakure was originally a small shinobi village. Though the Land of Grass controlled some fertile territory, it was not much. And because of its long-term isolationist policies, the shinobi village had been unable to accept missions. Now, after so long without taking missions, many mission channels had already been firmly seized by other shinobi villages.
Even some commercial activities had been more or less taken away by other shinobi villages