Akaseki did not listen to Sunagakure's terms. Unless they involved outsourcing, no amount of missions ceded from the Land of Wind would satisfy him, so there was no point in hearing them out.
Besides, now that the Land of Wind had made peace with the Land of Fire, its missions were already open to Konoha!
That access might not last forever, but there was no such sweet deal as making "peace" and then taking back the compensation already paid.
After all, Sunagakure called it "making peace," but in reality, it was "admitting defeat"...
Faced with Akaseki's insistence, Pakura was furious, but she could only return and report to the Kazekage first.
"Sunagakure is still a major hidden village. Will they really agree to terms like these?" Ranwu asked uneasily.
Konoha had proposed "outsourcing" long ago, and Kusagakure and Yugakure had already set precedents. Akaseki had even overseen things personally, so he understood this better than anyone. Still, Sunagakure was different from those small hidden villages...
"That depends on whether the Third Kazekage really is rational... I think he will." Akaseki was not entirely certain either, and added, "They are the losers, after all."
Ranwu rolled her eyes at him. "That's hardly an answer..."
Of course they would only consider agreeing because they had lost... Who would agree to something like this after winning?
"What I mean is, defeat also makes internal upheaval more likely. Once internal problems arise, it's no longer simply a question of how much strength, how many reserves, or how much dignity Sunagakure has left," Akaseki said matter-of-factly.
After these years of fighting, half of Sunagakure's Eight Clan Heads were dead, and the Kazekage had lost more than half his authority...
Their resources would soon dwindle, and their opportunities to expand outward were gone. What did