Hashirama Senju: Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire, I'm Coming, Dammit!

The weather grew increasingly scorching.

Uchiha Makoto's heart was as restless as the sun in the sky, and he and the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire were currently tallying up the profits of this Tulip Plan.

Dozens of accountants stood in front of the two of them, calculating incessantly. After a full half-day, this group of accountants finally arrived at the final figure.

"How much?"

"Around ninety billion Ryo!"

"In total?"

"No, Your Highness, this is your share of the profits."

Listening from the side, Uchiha Makoto bounced right off his chair, his face covered in smiles, and even began to hum softly. This time, he really made a killing, dammit!

Around ninety billion Ryo, dammit!

This far exceeded Uchiha Makoto's initial expectations. After all, there was more than one mastermind behind the scenes this time. As the plan progressed, with more and more participants involved, too many nobles of all sizes from countries across the Ninja World had joined in. With such a massive market, it certainly was impossible to manipulate it entirely relying solely on the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire and Uchiha Makoto.

There were all sorts of people mixed among them. Did they really think there were no heroes left in the world?

Therefore, the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire was also constantly pulling in powerful nobles close to him to join the manipulation, alongside numerous other nobles outside the plan distributed across the entire ninja world. They were all the masterminds behind the Tulip Plan, basically the supreme nobles at the apex of the pyramid. Some of them were familiar with one another, while others were complete strangers, yet they tacitly and unanimously pushed forward the progression of the plan.

The closer one was to the apex of the pyramid, the better they understood that this rare opportunity was a purposeful and organized harvest targeting large, medium, and small nobles throughout the entire ninja world.

When the market is big, more people get to eat meat.

This was a very simple logic.

Uchiha Makoto was still quite easily satisfied. The initial capital the Feudal Lord gave to Akatsuki Ninja Village was only one billion Ryo. Now, it was truly an upgrade from muskets to cannons—he had instantly gotten super rich!

With this huge sum of money, many plans that were previously only in his imagination could now begin!

The recruitment of ninja clans could also proceed smoothly.

Even though Akatsuki Ninja Village's speed in absorbing ninja clans was indeed much slower than Konoha's, Hashirama Senju's title as the God of the Ninja World was well-deserved, unlike the title hyped up for Hiruzen Sarutobi—the Strongest Hokage!

Not to mention that Konoha also had Uchiha Madara.

A man's reputation and a tree's shadow—these were advantages that no amount of wealth could match. It could be said that the two of them were Konoha's golden signboards, capable of extremely rapidly absorbing powerful ninja clans from the Land of Fire and surrounding countries and regions.

According to the intelligence gathered by the Feudal Lord, the Hyuga Clan, the Ino-Shika-Cho Three Clans, and various other ninja clans of all sizes had already negotiated with Konoha regarding their intent to join. Basically, all the major ninja clans that frequently appeared in the Konoha storyline had joined Konoha, and their clan relocations had already begun.

However...

The ninja world was so big!

Aside from Konoha...

There were still the other four great ninja villages currently being established, not to mention those small ninja villages. He could completely poach their members. Even for those who had already joined Konoha, Uchiha Makoto intended to try poaching them. Right now, even by simply smashing people with money, he could smash out a powerful Akatsuki Ninja Village!

The Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire beside him also found it hard to conceal his excitement. He eagerly ran over to Uchiha Makoto and high-fived him in celebration. Ninety billion Ryo could be considered a huge fortune even for the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire.

And what made Uchiha Makoto feel most physically and mentally refreshed was that the harvesting operation he had orchestrated himself had somehow ended up spawning a scapegoat at the very end!

Now, rumors were constantly spreading in the ninja world that Konoha had the ability to supply the ninja world with unlimited tulips. It was unclear whether Konoha had gone mad and released the news themselves, or if someone wanting to target them was intentionally spreading fake news. Yet Uchiha Makoto felt this news should be true, because Hashirama Senju possessed Wood Style, and with his ability, he could entirely mass-produce tulips to supply the entire ninja world.

However...

You didn't show up when it was time to eat meat, and only a little meat broth was left.

Konoha marched right over and drank all the soup in the pot in one gulp. How do you expect those nobles, whose grievances were on the verge of exploding, to feel?

"The situation really is not optimistic this time."

Tobirama Senju sat in the office chair with a melancholic expression. Just in these past few days, Konoha received a large volume of mission-cancellation notices. For ninjas, taking missions and completing missions was almost their only way to make money.

This was a major event that shook the foundation of the village!

With his sharp instincts, Tobirama Senju investigated the reason behind the cancelled missions at the very first instance.

It was because of tulips, dammit!

"Those damned profiteers use utterly unscrupulous means just to make money!"

"Now Konoha is taking the rap for everything!"

Tobirama Senju said through gritted teeth.

To recoup the five billion Ryo loss, he had Hashirama Senju mass-produce a batch of tulips, and then put these tulips up for sale in the major Tulip Trading Markets of the Land of Fire.

Considering the need for publicity, as well as the current pessimistic market conditions for tulips...

These spot goods had to be unloaded as early as possible.

Consequently, the merchants released news that they could supply a large amount of spot tulips, and a massive quantity of spot tulips did indeed appear on the market. Later, as it spread, it inexplicably turned into an unlimited supply of tulips—perhaps those leeks playing contract trading wanted to go short, or maybe someone intentionally leaked fake news...

The initial source of the news was untraceable.

Anyway...

This news just spread out like that.

An even more terrifying thing happened.

To confirm the truth of this news, the merchants of the Tulip Trading Market specifically placed large-scale tulip supply orders with Konoha. Tobirama Senju didn't sleep for a night in excitement, thinking he was about to make a huge fortune, and cheerfully agreed... Konoha really could supply tulips without limit!

Ultimately, a chain reaction of consequences unfolded.

At this point, the price of tulips actually stemmed from faith. Once faith collapsed, the price of tulips began to plummet in a straight line, the kind of unstoppable drop!

Everything came too fast, catching them completely off guard and leaving people with no time to react.

Those harvested leeks among the nobles successively pointed their spears at Konoha. There were even rumors that all of this was Konoha manipulating tulip prices behind the scenes, and that this current move was an attempt to profit from human tragedy once again—all sorts of rumors emerged.

Once yellow mud drops into your crotch, it's shit whether it's shit or not.

Considering Konoha's military might...

Those nobles indeed had no way to take any coercive measures against Konoha, but boycotting Konoha and employing methods to make Konoha extremely miserable were things they had in endless supply.

The massive cancellation of Konoha's missions now was just an appetizer, and even just from this, Tobirama Senju was already reaching his limit.

This disaster erupted during Hashirama Senju's tenure as leader. Once the Uchiha Clan got hold of this handle, it would be bad!

"Tobirama, what should we do now?"

Hashirama Senju appeared in the office for once. Even he realized the gravity of the situation. Konoha had absorbed so many ninja clans now; if these ninja clans couldn't get missions, they really might choose to withdraw from Konoha.

Even Hashirama Senju's reputation as the God of the Ninja World couldn't resolve this kind of problem—ninja clans needed to eat, after all!

"Let's go request an audience with the Daimyo."

Tobirama Senju wore a look of melancholy.

Right now, he had blocked the news within Konoha, but it couldn't be sustained for long. The best method at present was to directly have the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire support Konoha.