The Land of Wind and Sunagakure weren't incapable of sustaining a prolonged war. After all, they were a Great Nation and a great ninja village. However, compared with the other great ninja villages, the longer the war dragged on, the more exponentially the pressure on Sunagakure would grow.
If possible, Sunagakure absolutely didn't want the war to drag on.
"Considering our forces, influence, and supplies, Sunagakure is at its strongest right now. If we can't seize the initiative in the war, our chances of controlling the battlefield will only decrease as time goes on."
"Indeed. But we still need to be cautious. We can't act rashly. We need to find a way to break the stalemate and seize an opportunity to strike a decisive blow."
"Winning as quickly as possible is in Sunagakure's best interests."
"Indeed. But how, specifically, do we do that?"
"Who do we target?"
"There's no point targeting Amegakure. Hanzō is all they can rely on. A small ninja village can't control the course of the war."
"Our only targets are the Great Nations. Iwagakure or Konoha?"
"It can only be Konoha. Iwagakure's change of route is aimed at Konoha. All we need to do is follow Iwagakure's lead."
"Ōnoki of Both Scales... That old Iwagakure geezer couldn't have been scheming against us while he adjusted Iwagakure's strategy, could he?"
"..."
"It's possible. Ōnoki really is a shrewd old schemer."
Iwagakure's approach wasn't complicated. It was barely a stratagem in the open. If Sunagakure showed even a little understanding, the two sides would end up jointly targeting Konoha on the battlefield.
"Outnumbered two to one, Konoha will barely be able to look after itself. Can it withstand that kind of pressure? We might be able to drive Konoha off the battlefield."
"Hand them a defeat, and maybe we could destroy Konoha... All right, that's unrealistic."
"Let's focus on the battlefield first."
"The opportunity is right in front of us. The question is how to make use of it."
"Create an opening. Draw Konoha's ninja out. Feint to the east and attack from the west: use a small but impossible-to-ignore target to draw Konoha's attention and redeploy its ninja over a wide area. Then launch a sudden attack from another direction... and rout them in one fell swoop."
"Redeploy them?"
"We'll have to send out a powerful ninja. There are only a handful of people in the village who can handle this task."
"Then I'll go."
"Third? No, you can't go..."
"Sending out the Third Kazekage would be too reckless. You're the current Kazekage. None of the villages have sent their Kage to the battlefield yet. We have to hold steady."
They couldn't let the current Kazekage risk his life. If anything happened to him, the loss would be unthinkable.
"Besides the Third, who else can take on this task? Could Bunpuku do it?"
"According to the reports from Amegakure, Iwagakure has already deployed its Jinchuriki."
"Bunpuku? No. For one thing, he's a monk who believes in not killing. He'd be willing to defend the village, but taking the initiative and attacking goes against his wishes. Even we couldn't force him. For another, he's not well known. Even if he appeared on the battlefield, he wouldn't draw Konoha's attention right away."
"What about Tailed Beast Transformation?"
"What if he loses control?"
The group went around discussing it. Although they hadn't decided who would serve as bait, they'd more or less narrowed down the candidates.
Just then, someone gave a soft cough, followed by an old voice. "I'll go. I'm just the right person for the job. Konoha probably hasn't forgotten my face yet."
Konoha was a little slow to catch on. The command center hadn't realized yet that Iwagakure and Sunagakure were targeting them together. They were caught in a blind spot.
Relations between Iwagakure and Sunagakure were worse than either village's relations with Konoha. How could they possibly work together against Konoha?
And Amegakure lay between them, too.
For now, Konoha's frontline command center only recognized the situation as a reason to strengthen its defenses and surveillance against Sunagakure.
Meanwhile, Yuzuru's Eleventh Squad assembled and immediately headed into the Land of Rivers.
"Captain, how many scouting squads will be deployed in the Land of Rivers?" Yuzuru asked the squad leader on their way there.
He was somewhat prone to judging people based on their position. Back when he was in Torifu Akimichi's squad, Yuzuru rarely asked questions. For one thing, he'd held the fourth position in the team and had no real say. For another, Torifu was a reliable, experienced jonin, and people instinctively trusted him.
But this squad was different. Its captain, Kiba Inuzuka, was only a Chunin. He couldn't compare to Torifu. By contrast, Yuzuru's standing in the squad had risen somewhat; he was practically the second-in-command... Shinnosuke Kohinata aside, Might Duy might be a good fighter, but he was only a Genin.
Since he wasn't entirely confident, Yuzuru wanted to learn more.
"I'm not sure exactly how many squads will rotate through, but there should be twenty-four squads carrying out missions at any given time," Kiba Inuzuka said.
"Twenty-four..."
So they were supposed to guard against Sunagakure's movements with fewer than a hundred people? The number of ninja Konoha had deployed seemed decent, but when Yuzuru thought about it, each squad was likely to have only one scout with sensory abilities. And some of them were "dead weight" like Kiba Inuzuka.
Could twenty-four scouts see through Sunagakure's plans? Yuzuru had his doubts.
He looked at his own squad again. With Might Duy there, at least they could hold their ground or retreat as needed.
He didn't realize that thinking We've got this in the bag was actually quite dangerous.
The Eight Gates was a powerful Taijutsu technique that demanded an extremely high level of its user. In a sense, any ninja capable of opening a gate could definitely be considered a prodigy.
Of course, even the same forbidden technique could produce different results in different hands. When it came to the Eight Gates, the most talented was the later Might Guy, who had absolutely surpassed his predecessor.
"Don't worry. We're on a reconnaissance mission, not a combat mission. Our first priority is to make sure information gets through, not to fight the enemy... If we spot a major Sunagakure advance, we need to send a signal immediately and then withdraw quickly," Kiba Inuzuka said.
"Captain, given the makeup of our squad, Konoha's layered reconnaissance and sensory network must have put us right at the front, hasn't it?" Shinnosuke Kohinata promptly punctured the captain's comforting words.
A dog's nose was only useful if it was out front. What could it scout from the rear?
In a position like this, how could they possibly be safe if Sunagakure's army advanced?
The Eleventh Squad was like a squad meant to take the first hit. Two Chunins and two Genins: they could be sacrificed when necessary, as long as they didn't die without making a sound. They had to make enough noise for their allies to know the enemy had invaded.
"Ahem. Don't overthink it. Kurotsume's nose is very sharp. If we're downwind, it can sense things from several kilometers away," the captain said, looking a little awkward.
As soon as Kiba Inuzuka finished speaking, he and Yuzuru both turned to look at Shinnosuke Kohinata.
Too bad you don't have the Byakugan, huh?
Shinnosuke: "..."
Before you continue