The Weakened Five Great Nations (Thanks to Alliance Leader "I Really Haven't Been in Love")

Face was sometimes more important than anything else, especially to major powers.

Thus, although the major villages had successively suffered attacks from the Unknown Force, they had tacitly chosen to block the news and keep the intelligence restricted to their upper echelons.

It was an incredibly unbelievable matter. Four of the Five Great Nations had already lost their Tailed Beasts, yet so few rumors had spread throughout the Shinobi World about something this significant.

Konoha naturally knew about it. After all, while Danzo was still alive, he would occasionally send back bits of information regarding the Akatsuki Organization's movements.

Although Danzo was now dead, Hiruko had taken his place. Unlike Danzo, he would not hide things away and only send irrelevant information back to Konoha.

Therefore, every move made by the Akatsuki Organization was within Konoha's grasp.

Precisely because they knew so clearly, Chen, Minato, and the others unanimously concluded that the four villages were nearing the end of their patience.

In other words, news of the lost Tailed Beasts was about to become impossible to suppress.

The reason was simple. Six of the Nine Tailed Beasts were now in the Akatsuki Organization's hands. Even if the villages wished to conceal such earth-shattering news, the other villages would gradually learn of it.

Once the other villages discovered that they were not the only ones who had lost a Tailed Beast, saving face would become a secondary concern.

Tracking down the culprits would become the primary concern.

After all, every village had not only lost the vital strategic asset that was a Tailed Beast, but had also suffered attacks to varying degrees.

This debt... had to be settled!

Hidden Sand Village was comparatively fortunate. There was only one Shukaku in the village, and after Sasori and Pakura invaded once, they would