At the border region west of the Land of Fire and adjoining the Land of Grass, a group of people appeared, clad in red flak jackets.
They moved swiftly toward the interior of the Land of Fire.
Clearly, Iwagakure intended to strike first before Konoha could react.
As the village that had suffered comparatively heavy shinobi losses during the Third Shinobi World War, Iwagakure had already come to understand something when it attacked Kumogakure.
When it came to shinobi losses, everyone had suffered heavily. With neither side much better off than the other, the gains Iwagakure had reaped after invading the Land of Lightning had simply been too great.
So this time, using the rumor that Kushina Uzumaki was the Masked Man as a pretext to launch a surprise war, Iwagakure intended to invade the Land of Fire first and replicate what it had done in the Land of Lightning.
Kitsuchi led the shinobi army this time, while Steam Ninja Han served as the vanguard.
They entered the Land of Fire in two groups.
The first group consisted of one thousand regular shinobi. They were responsible for launching surprise attacks on Konoha's outposts and establishing forward camps.
The second group consisted of three thousand shinobi. They were responsible for carrying supplies into the Land of Fire, then pillaging the country on a grand scale.
What they did not know was that every move they made had already been seen clearly by a red-haired shinobi.
The Mind's Eye of the Kagura had a detection range spanning dozens of kilometers. How could these shinobi have imagined that someone was watching them from so far away?
After intelligence spread through the Black Market that Kushina Uzumaki was the Masked Man, she had Minato Namikaze place Flying Thunder God Seals along every border of