Goddess Awakens

"Everything began just as I imagined. Letting go of hatred is difficult, but the fruits of peace are sweet."

"The alliance between the Uchiha and Senju, my cooperation with Hashirama—whether driven by fear of clan annihilation or a longing for peace, people gathered of their own accord, forming the first villages, which flourished."

"I once naively believed that this could change everything, preventing tragedies like those that befell my younger brothers during the Warring States Period from happening again."

"But soon, the situation reminded me that the fighting was far from over."

"Out of fear and for the sake of self-preservation, the countries outside the Land of Fire gradually formed the Five Great Villages after fierce and bloody competition."

"Without the threat of the other Ninja Clans from the Warring States Period, villages would now face threats from other villages."

Madara said, "Have you ever seen two villages upstream and downstream along a river clash over water?"

"Of course," Mimi said. "Many died. Put two different colonies of ants close together, and it will evolve into a war. Mountains of corpses and seas of blood—the ants' bodies would stretch on and cover an entire carpet. Quite spectacular. The cause might be a single grain of rice."

"But rice isn't that important, either."

"Because they're afraid. The ants don't know what the other side is thinking, so most of them strike first to eliminate potential threats to the safety of their nest."

What a strange metaphor.

Madara fell silent for a moment.

"My actions with Hashirama forced the war to escalate," Madara said. "The small-scale battles between Ninja Clans would evolve into large-scale wars between villages. As a result, belonging to a village would make a clan's losses even more devastating than they had been during the Warring States Period."

"Those