Three Months

Three months had passed since the Iwagakure envoy had departed, and Takigakure was developing steadily.

The iron ore mining efficiency was quite impressive. After a month-long observation period, Ruri sent all the Fuma Clan ninjas and the surviving members of the Kubisaki Clan to work in the mines. The productivity of these ninjas was far beyond that of ordinary civilians. The Fuma Clan even had ninjas skilled in Earth Style, making the work far safer than it would have been for civilians.

This decision had met with fierce opposition from Fuma Kazama at first. He had thought the Fuma Clan would only suffer a little hardship in the early stages, so how could he have predicted that his clansmen would be sent off to mine? He immediately joined forces with some Jonin to submit a protest to Ruri, and even the Hagane Clan was persuaded to support them.

But Ruri remained unmoved. Where else could he find such excellent labor? Not to mention that he had a perfectly legitimate reason: the Fuma Clan were criminals bearing guilt! If he had to use ordinary ninjas to mine the ore, he would have been somewhat reluctant.

Of course, to make sure the Fuma Clan worked with all their strength, Ruri made certain concessions regarding their benefits. After three years, the Fuma Clan would be allowed to keep five percent of the mined iron ore for themselves.

Five percent might not seem like much, but even with ninjas doing the mining, the iron ore could last for nearly a hundred years. By then, Boruto would probably have appeared. Accumulated over so many years, that share would be considerable. The Fuma Clan also consumed a great deal of ninja equipment, so Ruri gave them a purchase quota for Thousand-Refined Steel as well.

Fuma Kazama was not a short-sighted clan leader. He had witnessed all the changes in Takigakure over the past few months. Based on his estimates, once the Fuma Clan returned to normal development, with that five percent of the iron ore, Thousand-Refined Steel, and Takigakure's series of brilliant policies, they might not be any weaker than Konoha's Ino-Shika-Cho after ten or twenty years.

Therefore, to make mining more convenient, the Fuma Clan simply moved their clan grounds beside the iron mine. Beneath the mine, Ruri had already built a considerable number of homes, and the relocated villagers had moved in as well, officially linking the waterfall, iron mine, rice paddies, lake, and Takigakure into one whole.

The area of Takigakure had doubled, and it was now roughly the size of Konoha.

Today happened to be the season for sowing rice. The paddies could finally be put to use, and to speed up the first planting, Ruri specifically dispatched a ten-man squad of Chunin to assist.

Water diverted from the waterfall flowed through the rice paddies as the new-style waterwheels turned. Since the fields had not been used for three months, some weeds had grown there, but that was easy enough to deal with. One Amaterasu from Ruri burned them all away. Thanks to Amaterasu's properties, none of the other objects suffered the slightest damage. It truly lived up to its name as a civilian version!

Ruri summoned the squad. The rice paddies that had been idle for three months were finally about to be put to use. He had purchased a large quantity of high-quality rice seeds through the Black Market Exchange. It was time to sow them.

Over the past few months, Takigakure's extremely high mission completion rate and good reputation had attracted more and more clients. They came not only from the small countries near the Land of Waterfalls; merchants from the border regions of the Land of Fire and the Land of Earth had also made special trips to Takigakure to post missions.

Sanjo Munetachi had traveled a great distance to come to Takigakure specifically to post a very important mission.

According to the Jonin responsible for mission assessments, this mission had reached the unprecedented SS rank since the village's founding. The village was short-handed, and anyone who wanted to accept it had to seek the Takikage's approval first.

However, their Takikage had gone to the rice paddies early that morning to farm with the villagers...

Therefore, eager to post his commission, Sanjo Munetachi went directly to the rice paddies. There, however, he witnessed a scene beyond his understanding.

Five Chunin were using Earth Style to till the soil. Tilling alone would not have been remarkable, but the five worked together with astonishing precision, dividing the land into one small square after another as they plowed. Even more incredible was how uniform the squares were, with not the slightest difference in size!

Then several villagers carried over a few bamboo baskets filled with the high-quality rice seeds they had purchased.

"Wind Style—Great Breakthrough!" The other five Chunin formed hand seals together. They had practiced this long in advance and worked in perfect harmony, even their hand-seal speeds matching to the second. Driven by the powerful Wind Style chakra, the bamboo baskets flew straight into the air above the rice paddies!

The five Chunin maintained the Wind Style while running in different directions. One of them suddenly increased his chakra output, causing the bamboo basket to tilt and move toward him, scattering seeds along the way!

Again and again, under the control of Wind Style, the bamboo baskets soon scattered seeds across the entire rice paddy. The Chunin using Earth Style did not remain idle either, using it to bury the seeds a little deeper.

Sanjo Munetachi stood to the side, dumbfounded. He had planted fields before, and his family also owned rice paddies, but when had he ever seen ninjutsu being used to farm? In only a short while, ten ninjas had completed work that would have taken the villagers several days?!

Ruri was very satisfied. At this stage, fields for direct seeding—without raising and transplanting seedlings—could only be created through ninjutsu. The surface of a directly seeded rice paddy had to be perfectly level, with the height difference between ridges no greater than one inch. Ordinary villagers had no tools with which to achieve such precise control, but for ninjas skilled in Earth Style, it was simple.

The ten Chunin had exhausted their chakra and were also physically drained, their heads drenched in sweat as though they had fallen into a lake. Still, they had no complaints. Instead, they said to the villagers nearby, "Then the rest is up to you!"

According to Ruri, all that was needed afterward was for the nearby villagers to watch over the fields carefully, and there would be a bumper harvest the following year. The villagers had been suspicious of this method of scattering seeds directly, but these Takigakure ninjas, who had long since worshiped Ruri as a deity, did not dare say a word against it.

"Um... Is that the Takikage?" Only after watching the entire sowing process did Sanjo Munetachi remember that he had come to find the Takikage. He hurried over to the person standing in the center.

"Hm? You are..." Ruri was famous throughout the village for being kind and approachable, so no one stopped Sanjo Munetachi. They assumed he was a newly arrived refugee.

As for assassins, that was impossible. Two months ago, Kusagakure had sent a Jonin to assassinate him. This Takikage had given him a single slash on the spot, then mercifully let him go. When the assassin returned to the village to report, he was split in two right in front of the leader of Kusagakure. Supposedly, the delayed blade intent that lingered for four or five days had scared the leader into wetting his pants. Since then, no one foolish enough had come to assassinate him again.

"I am the clan leader of the Sanjo Clan from the Land of Artisans. I have come this time to post a commission with Takigakure," Sanjo Munechika said solemnly. This concerned the survival of his entire clan.

"Tell me about it." Ruri gestured for the Chunin to return to the village first. He then used the Four-Pillar House Technique on the spot.

The commission important enough to bring Sanjo Munechika here was probably an SS-rank mission, or even higher, that the village's ninjas could not complete. Missions of that level were certainly not ordinary.