The battle was over.
But the target of Shiba Seika and Konan's mission had died, too.
"Seika, you killed him again without hesitation." After folding away her paper wings, Konan drifted down to the ground and murmured dazedly.
Compared to before, though, her words sounded more like a simple statement than a reproach.
She could no longer bring herself to blame him.
The gift Shiba Seika had prepared for her had been remarkably effective!
Compared to empty debate, a living example really was more likely to knock some sense into someone.
What had all those years of striving for mutual understanding between people gotten them? Nothing could make the point more convincingly than Ando lying on the ground.
"Why? Was the teacher's ideal really wrong?"
The lines from using Paper Style had yet to fade from Konan's body. She looked utterly shattered, like a beauty made of cracked ice.
Unfortunately, Shiba Seika wasn't moved to pity. After all these days, he finally showed his "fangs" and unleashed the strongest jutsu in the Naruto world—Talk Style!
"Your ideal might be beautiful, but in the end, it's far too naive.
"Mutual understanding can only exist between people with similar positions, experiences, and identities.
"The Akatsuki Organization grew so rapidly over the past few years because most of the people you met were fellow victims of war. You had similar experiences and shared goals, so it was only natural that you'd huddle together for warmth.
"But there's never been just one kind of person in this world.
"While you struggle under heavy burdens, there are always people who enjoy peaceful, carefree lives in your place."
Shiba Seika spoke in a clear, calm voice, effortlessly stirring Konan's heart.
"People enjoying peaceful, carefree lives... You mean the great ninja villages?"
Shiba Seika smiled. "Konan, you're still looking at things too narrowly. You shouldn't keep limiting your perspective to the Shinobi World."
As he spoke, he held up three fingers.
"In my view, this world is divided into three kinds of people: nobles and wealthy merchants, led by the Daimyo; ninjas; and ordinary people at the very bottom, forced to toil like beasts of burden.
"The nobles and wealthy merchants exploit ordinary people to amass wealth. Then they take a small portion of it and pay the ninjas, buying the loyalty and services of the ninja villages. All the while, they tirelessly discipline the ninjas.
"Konan, you must have learned the ninja code, too, right?
"The so-called iron laws of the Shinobi World: the mission comes first; anyone who can't complete a mission is a failure; as long as the client hasn't lied about the intelligence, a ninja must never harm them, for any reason or in any way.
"Look at that! This is the greatest achievement of the nobles' decades-long effort to discipline ninjas!
"Under this system of rules, which treats ninjas like dogs to be trained, they can never raise a blade against nobles and wealthy merchants. On the contrary, as long as those nobles and merchants have money, they can enjoy the ninjas' services anytime, anywhere.
"The man lying there is the perfect example."
Shiba Seika stepped closer and nudged Ando's corpse with the tip of his foot.
"Even in a war-torn country like the Land of Rain, he could hire ninjas to serve him whenever he wanted, just by paying them. And even with our Akatsuki Organization recruiting so many of the local wandering ninjas, he could still get in touch with Iwagakure.
"If we hadn't killed him today, he might have contacted Sunagakure, Konoha, or even Kumogakure in the future.
"That's simply how this world works. Ninjas are expected to serve wealthy clients like him.
"All ninjas have to do is risk their lives and sacrifice their comrades to complete missions. But the wealthy clients who commission those missions have a lot to consider as they build their fortunes."
Even if Konan couldn't grasp the weight of the argument, she could easily hear the deep sarcasm in Shiba Seika's voice.
She didn't know how to refute him.
What Shiba Seika said was far beyond anything she'd understood before. Compared with the empty ideals she, Yahiko, and Nagato had inherited from their teacher Jiraiya, Shiba Seika's theory was on an entirely different level.
And he kept going.
"So as long as the old rules governing this world remain unchanged, people like Ando will never understand you.
"Those who benefit from the system have no reason to empathize with those who suffer under it.
"And ninjas can only pitifully repeat the cycle of periodic Great Ninja Wars, because they've been so thoroughly disciplined that they've lost the ability to question the rules!
"When a ninja village runs short of money, the only solution it can think of is starting a war to seize mission quotas from other villages. It never considers that, in every mission they've taken on, their efforts and rewards have never been equal!
"Take these Iwagakure ninjas, for instance. They traveled all this way to the Land of Rain, taking enormous risks to provide services to this merchant, Ando. But in the end, the pay for this job probably won't even amount to one percent of his total wealth."
Finally, Shiba Seika looked at Konan and delivered the finishing blow.
"So, Konan, do you understand now? This is the truth of this world! Peace across the Shinobi World can never be achieved through make-believe mutual understanding. To achieve true peace, we have to break the rules and overthrow the entire old world!"
In Konan's eyes, Shiba Seika's smile looked just like the smile of a devil tempting her into corruption. She wanted to run, but found she couldn't escape.
In truth, Shiba Seika might not yet have had any real ambition to overthrow the entire Shinobi World. But that didn't stop him from making his promise as grand as possible.
As Lu Xun once said, people always gravitated toward compromise. If you proposed opening a window, others would probably refuse. But if you suggested tearing off the roof, they'd most likely agree to let you open the window instead.
If Shiba Seika simply said that he thought their ideals were childish, Konan would probably resist the idea.
But if he started by proposing the overthrow of the entire Shinobi World, then perhaps, after a while, Konan would come around on her own and decide that mutual understanding really was too naive.
It was time to bring a little revolutionary shock to this rotten Shinobi World!
Besides, most of what he'd said wasn't made up. It was based on his genuine experiences over the past few months since crossing into this world, and had largely stuck to the facts!
He especially understood firsthand how ninjas had been subjected to years of discipline.
And right at that moment, Shiba Seika had no idea that not far away, near the border of the Land of Rain, a white-haired brat suffering deeply from the harmful effects of the ninja code was quietly carrying out his own infiltration mission.
Behind him, his teammate, another victim of the code, complained angrily.
"That Kakashi guy really gets on my nerves! What does he mean, the mission is more important than your comrades? Just because he became a Chunin early, he thinks he can say something that messed up? Damn it! I'll knock him flat one of these days!"
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