Conspiracy

Satsuki noticed something was wrong, too.

Strictly speaking, this was the first time Satsuki and Naruto had met the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire. Although the system required the Daimyo to acknowledge the Hokage, the Hokage did not have to attend that process in person.

At least during Satsuki's appointment as the Sixth Hokage, the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire had learned about her background, past achievements in battle, and political leanings through explanations from "the person selecting the Hokage."

And the person responsible for those explanations had, naturally, been Jiraiya.

The Daimyo before them had no air of authority whatsoever. It was neither "kindness put on to seem approachable" nor "cunning concealed beneath an unassuming exterior." From his expression right down to his core, he exuded a genuine guilelessness that made it hard to feel even wary of him.

His confusion was genuine confusion, his surprise was genuine surprise, and his ignorance of that letter seemed equally genuine.

Standing behind Satsuki, Naruto recalled the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire's almost nonexistent role in the original story.

When selecting a Hokage, the Daimyo had no position of his own. Essentially, whichever side persuaded him got its nominee approved.

Just like when they had selected the Fourth Hokage: the Third Hokage had recommended Minato Namikaze, while Danzo had recommended Orochimaru. The Daimyo had sat between them, looking left and right, finding both sides' arguments perfectly reasonable.

And the man's ability to think was practically nonexistent. Or rather, all his mental effort went into "making other people think he was thinking."

He listened to whoever spoke the loudest, thought whoever spoke gently was a good person, and... was quite adept at smoothing things over.

Naruto vaguely remembered that, in the original story, Danzo had failed to