Vermin Are Everywhere in the Land of Fire, Damn It!

"But, Your Highness, that may be true..."

"Lord Madara already believes in Hashirama Senju and has accepted the Senju Clan's peace proposal. The Uchiha clansmen have accepted it as well."

Uchiha Makoto went on at length.

In short, the Uchiha Clan and Senju Clan had stopped fighting and made peace. The matter was already settled.

The Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire felt worse and worse the more he listened, and his expression grew increasingly grim.

Uchiha Makoto observed the Daimyo's expression.

The time was right!

He had finally warmed up the Daimyo's cold stove!

"But I absolutely won't sit around and wait for death! I can't just watch helplessly as the Uchiha Clan walks into a pit of fire!"

"Your Highness, since Hashirama Senju wants to win over the shinobi clans and establish a shinobi village, I can certainly do the same. To be completely honest, I left the Uchiha Clan precisely for this reason."

"But winning over the shinobi clans and establishing a shinobi village... sigh, if only I had enough money!!"

Uchiha Makoto raised his neck, tilted his head forty-five degrees, and let his eyes grow moist as he glanced at the Daimyo from the corner of his eye.

His meaning was already so obvious.

Damn it!

Daimyo, hurry up and give me money!!

I know you're loaded, I say!

Watching Uchiha Makoto's "genuine outpouring of emotion"—his masterful performance of being willing to die for the sake of his clan—brought tears to one's eyes.

A smile finally returned to the Daimyo's face.

He wasn't afraid that Uchiha Makoto would make a request of him. He was afraid that Makoto would simply resign himself to fate.

Because of the Hashirama Senju Threat Theory, the Daimyo had already begun making associations almost inevitably.

The Uchiha Clan had now made peace with Hashirama Senju and the Senju Clan. But what if all the other shinobi clans in the Ninja World also joined forces because of Hashirama Senju, and the Ninja World produced a super-sized shinobi village made up of shinobi? Hashirama Senju, today you want to unify the shinobi world. What will you want tomorrow?

Even Uncle Deng, who had trained in the Invincible Wind Fire Wheel, knew that "organizations need balance."

How could the Daimyo not understand this principle?

"Hahaha, how difficult could that be?"

"I already understand the Uchiha Clan's predicament. If you also want to establish a shinobi village, Makoto, I can represent the Land of Fire and provide you with a sum of funding."

Hearing the Daimyo's words, Uchiha Makoto straightened his clothes, smiled, and firmly clasped the Daimyo's hand. He had finally, finally secured the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire as his sponsor—or rather... his angel investor!

"Your Highness, the Uchiha Clan will never forget your help today!"

"I will steadfastly, resolutely, and unwaveringly support Your Highness!"

As Uchiha Makoto spoke, his words struck straight at the Daimyo's heart, making him feel comfortable all over, as though his blood had begun to flow upward.

This young man really knew how to play along!

The Daimyo clasped Uchiha Makoto's hand as well. Everything was understood without words.

The alliance between the two was formally established.

Uchiha Makoto needed the Daimyo's financial support.

The Daimyo needed Uchiha Makoto to serve as his vanguard, keeping the shinobi clans divided as much as possible and preserving the appearance of the Warring States Period.

After their conversation ended, the Daimyo specifically kept Uchiha Makoto behind to eat with him. No, that was putting it too casually—to dine with him.

Uchiha Makoto gladly accepted the Daimyo's invitation. He had barely eaten anything that day. He had spent his time in the reception room drinking tea.

The tea did taste excellent, with a rich fragrance and a sweet aftertaste. But drinking tea alone really couldn't stave off hunger. Besides, during this period, in order to reach the Capital of the Land of Fire and meet the Daimyo as quickly as possible, Uchiha Makoto had eaten nothing but Ration Pills along the way. Everyone knew what Ration Pills tasted like: absolutely terrible. When they had been invented, flavor had never even been taken into consideration.

Inside the palace.

At the Daimyo's command, one delicious dish after another was continuously placed before Uchiha Makoto.

At the same time, music and singing began. Row after row of young women in revealing clothes entered the room and began to dance gracefully.

Uchiha Makoto was a free-spirited man. Faced with such a scene, he chose to stare openly—not because he was lecherous, but because the flowers were in such splendid bloom that failing to admire them would seem uncultured.

But one had to admit, the Daimyo's life was truly comfortable, and the food was genuinely excellent (the food was what he meant here).

The Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire sat leisurely in the seat of honor and took a small sip of fine wine.

Wine could dispel sorrow.

Especially on rainy days. Holding a cup of fine wine and quietly gazing at nature's beautiful scenery could bring immense relaxation to both body and mind.

"Makoto, if only everyone could be as trouble-free as you."

The Daimyo suddenly sighed with feeling. Ordinary people couldn't understand his mood at that moment.

Being a Daimyo in the world of Naruto was not an easy job.

Although the Daimyo was nominally the leader of the country and held the highest authority in the Land of Fire, a thousand years of entrenched class divisions had caused the Ninja World's aristocratic clans to band together for warmth and recklessly carve up the power in his hands. By his generation, bureaucratic politics had already flourished, to the point where the situation was impossible to manage.

These days, aside from handling a small number of major matters of state, he spent most of his time playing games and hunting.

The Land of Fire's daily affairs were basically handled by the ministers.

It wasn't that he didn't want to expand the power in his hands. He simply couldn't.

When he was young, he had also been ambitious. He had wanted to break through the constraints of the tightly bound bureaucratic system, open the windows and let in some fresh air, eliminate all the tedious formalities, and revitalize the creaking old bureaucratic machine of the Land of Fire. The Daimyo had had enough of a shadow government. He wanted a Transparent Government of his own!

Then, that very afternoon, the ministers sent him a white paper.

The white paper was titled "Transparent Government"!

What followed were execution documents filling archive boxes stacked into four or five small hills, all requiring his attention. They were filled with obscure... clauses.

"As for the implementation of legal provisions, abnormal and irregular situations between the various responsible departments fall under the Administrative Department."

There were also countless memorials that had piled up over many years, interspersed with all kinds of meetings. Even if the Daimyo worked himself to death, he couldn't handle so many matters.

Besides the exhausting affairs of state, when the Daimyo asked about advancing the implementation of the policy to reduce the civil service establishment—

"Can this policy actually be carried out?"

—the ministers under him could only helplessly spread their hands and say:

"Your Highness, if you insist that I explain it plainly, I can only say that, given the current circumstances, after surveying the overall situation, examining history and the present, considering the average standards of every department, and conducting analysis and summary, perhaps it may be concluded that, in summary, generally speaking, you will most likely find that, although it may not sound pleasant, no matter how one looks at it, the prospects are delicate—in the current stage, this is the only expectation we can have."

"Just tell me whether it will work or not!"

"It will work, and it won't!"

The small move by bureaucratic politics left the Daimyo deeply shaken.

In the end, the Daimyo still chose to lie flat.

Fortunately—

after so many years of lying flat, nothing major had happened to affect the Daimyo's position.

In the still-agrarian Land of Fire, setting aside the issue of the shinobi, the ministers only needed to do one thing.

"Keep the beasts of burden half-dead."

Unfortunately, times had changed.

The shinobi clans that had once focused only on missions and generational vendettas seemed to have begun...