You're Giving Me Too Much Face?

When Kagami Uchiha arrived at the Hokage Office, what he saw was Yuya standing by the window, looking down at the various figures holding banners below with a calm and relaxed air.

"Uh... that, shouldn't we send someone to chase those people below away?"

Seeing Kagami Uchiha, Yuya asked with some confusion why he had appeared here.

There was no need to question whether he was real or fake; the Uchiha clan didn't just sit around doing nothing. With them guarding Konoha, the person standing here was definitely the real Kagami Uchiha.

Kagami Uchiha explained the situation, and Yuya's eyes immediately lit up.

Although Senju Tobirama hadn't explicitly stated where the mine was, Yuya knew exactly what he meant the moment he heard it.

There was definitely a gold mine there, and it was certainly not a small one.

Dozens of tons for sure, and if it were hundreds of tons...

Never mind, I'll go take a look first.

Oh wait, I have to settle the matter here first.

Seeing that Kagami Uchiha was still confused, Yuya explained the situation to him.

As it turned out, ever since Yuya announced a while ago that all factory areas must strictly implement sewage treatment, the various merchants had been unwilling to comply.

Previously, they thought Yuya was just a mouthpiece for Senju Tobirama, and since there was no conflict of interest, they just let it be.

But that wouldn't work now.

Sewage treatment would cut their profits in half, although once the equipment was installed, they could expand production, and the profits would gradually increase. After all, with the sewage treatment in place, they could just connect the expanded factories to it, and the extra profit would surely grow over time.

Yuya had made his point very clear, appealing to their reason and emotion, but these merchants were still unwilling, insisting that Yuya was acting on his own authority.

Yuya was so angry he laughed.

Oh, when there were benefits, we were best buddies, but now that there aren't, you just say I'm being arbitrary? To avoid Senju Tobirama's reckoning, you even specifically claim I'm acting out of turn?

If it were just that, Yuya would have been willing to push it through slowly.

But to resist this policy of his, they directly closed their shops, textile mills, grain stores, ninja tool shops, and so on...

Yuya hadn't reached into the textile mills because the profit margins weren't high, they required many workers, and they were difficult to manage. The same logic applied to the others.

Yuya sneered inwardly; these merchants thought that by joining forces, they could oppose him, probably thinking they could give this little brat a bit of an economic shock.

Fine, fine, fine, that's how you want to play, is it?

Alright, since you've closed your doors, don't even think about opening them again!

Do you really think I can't do without you?

He turned directly and opened the Konoha granary.

The grain held by these merchants was all imported from other countries, or simply bought directly from Konoha.

Yuya directly cut off the Konoha granary route, prohibiting the sale of grain from the granary.

Then, he sent a letter to Iwagakure, ordering an initial purchase of ten tons of grain. Whether it was potatoes, rice, or wheat, as long as it was edible, Yuya wanted it.

Put the renovation plans for the hospital, school, and Hokage Office Building on hold; if I don't make you bastard merchants feel the pain this time, my name isn't Yuya.

You want to close your factories and shops, do you?

Then don't you dare think about opening them ever again!

The day after the grain stores closed, Yuya used the name of the Hokage Office to announce that a shop in the Commercial Street that originally sold drinks would now also sell grain. It was printed in the newspaper, and even if some people didn't want to buy the paper, they would surely panic when they saw their usual grain stores closed and had no food to eat; they would definitely ask others where they could buy grain.

And at that moment, someone would surely tell them that there was a grain shop on the main Commercial Street in the center of Konoha, and the price would be a little cheaper than what they had paid at the old stores.

Although it was only a little bit, perhaps a difference of five or ten ryo, as long as it was cheaper and there was grain to buy, Konoha Village wouldn't fall into chaos.

Yuya's top priority was definitely to solve the food problem; Konoha Village still had many people in the previous years, and it had only gotten a bit better in the last two.

However, Yuya had always been conscious of this, and his cooperation with Kirigakure was also primarily based on various fish catches.

In fact, those three thousand kilograms of fish had already been consumed. Three thousand kilograms sounded like a lot, but with Konoha's population of hundreds of thousands, it wasn't even one fish per person.

So, Yuya placed a second order with Kirigakure.

This time, it was double.

However, it was Kirigakure's turn to worry, because they didn't have ships that large and could only send a fleet to transport it at once.

After all, it was double the money, and they still wanted to make a profit.

As for Sunagakure...

Hmm...

Skip it, they needed to import their own grain anyway...

In short, because Yuya was only actually entrusted by Senju Tobirama to serve for two years, the grain stored in Konoha's own granary was only enough to feed the entire village for three months.

If he were given another year, Yuya could have filled the granary, enough to feed all of Konoha for a year, and by then, the granary should have been expanded as well.

Once the food problem was solved, Konoha wouldn't fall into chaos.

Afterward, Yuya directly arranged for people to go to Kirigakure and Sunagakure to make purchases.

Purchasing what?

So, your textile mill is closed, is it?

I'll just go straight to those two places and buy the finished clothes!

I'd rather let them earn the money than give a single cent to you!

It's a pity that the countries surrounding Konoha don't have a complete set of infrastructure, or rather, they don't have the factories that Yuya provided support for.

The factories Yuya invested in and built in Kirigakure and Sunagakure aren't just steel mills; there are textile mills as well.

Of course, the labor in both these places consists of locals gathering local materials.

Yuya only invested a sum of money in the first phase, and for the first two years, ten percent of the finished products go to Konoha, with the investment capital to be repaid over ten years; the control still remains in the hands of Kirigakure and Sunagakure.

Basically, these are very generous terms.

The management of these two villages isn't brain-dead either, although the Third Mizukage of Kirigakure hasn't been selected yet...

Hmm... rumor has it that their clans are currently discussing whether to just leave the position of Mizukage vacant forever, as it seems pretty good to have the major clans manage things themselves.

Yuya couldn't be bothered to care about what kind of tricks they were playing over in Kirigakure.

Who doesn't have problems within their own village?

If there is a problem, solve it.

If you can't solve the problem, solve the person who has the problem.

To be honest, Yuya was truly moved to kill this time.

After these factories closed, Yuya directly opened up businesses doing the exact same work as them.

How should I put it? On many things, Yuya is even losing money.

For example, with the business of importing clothes from Kirigakure and Sunagakure, there are definitely losses on the road and such.

Theoretically, the price should be marked up when transported to Konoha.

But Yuya doesn't mark them up.

He's willing to endure losses of millions per trip just to wear you profiteers down!

I won't build the hospital, I won't build the school, I won't renovate the Hokage Office; I'll just take the billions of ryo earned over the last two years and play with you. Come on, let's see who caves in first.

Of course, it's impossible for Yuya to only open competing shops; the workers from the closed factories are unemployed, right?

Yuya directly sent people over to reason with these folks.

You can indeed afford to eat every day right now, but if this continues in the long run, how will you support your families without a salary?

The workers looked confused: "Huh? What are you talking about? The day my factory closed, there were already plenty of people from the neighboring steel mill and beverage factory asking me to go work for them... that newly opened cement factory also asked if I wanted to go."

Yuya: ...

Damn it, the infrastructure he built in Konoha is too good, and everywhere is short of people. These workers are experienced, don't need much training, and are obviously in high demand everywhere.

How the hell did this boomerang back to hit me?

Yuya pondered for a while, then decided to send people to persuade them with benefits.

"Look here, the factory closed, and they didn't pay you for this week, right?"

"What? You don't want the few thousand ryo? No, how can you think like that?! If you don't ask for it, what happens when the bosses of those other factories see it and make you work for a few days, then kick you out without paying you?"

"You can't just look at the present; you have to think about the future."

The workers thought about it, and it seemed like that made sense.

Then, when they went out on the street the next day, they saw: "Whoa, the guy from next door is here to ask for his wages too?"

"Hey, what a coincidence! Come on, let's go together."

And that is the current situation.

Yuya pulled Kagami Uchiha aside and said, "Those merchants are already thinking about caving in, but I don't want to let them off that easily."

"They don't even look at what kind of pathetic state they're in, yet they dare to give me attitude."

"Let's go, I'm going straight to the front lines with you, and we'll leave these ignorant merchants hanging for ten days or half a month."

Kagami Uchiha was dumbfounded. Then he started to wonder...

Had the Uchiha clan ever offended this young man, Yuya?

And what Yuya didn't expect was that this trip to the front lines would not only last over a month, but he would even nearly lose his life there...