Peace

"...Roots buried underground could never bathe in the sunlight like leaves. Danzo's actions are pointless."

Hyuga Hane shook his head and said calmly, "If you were worried, you wouldn't have come here."

"...That's true." Minato rose with a smile. "All I need to do is win this war alongside my comrades in the village."

The clans could bargain only as long as the Hokage was willing to play by their rules. When a powerful Hokage refused to play, the clans had no way to stop him.

Did the First have a head for politics?

No, but every clan had to follow his rules.

The Shinobi World's unchanging law was ultimately this: the strong ruled!

Yes, the strong ruled...

"All right. Before the village's shinobi forces assemble, we'll sweep away the Mist Village troops wandering nearby."

Hyuga Hane glanced at Kushina, who was practically bursting with excitement, then sighed and looked at Kakashi and Uchiha Yakumaru beside him, as if asking:

We're the Shadow Guard. What are we doing abandoning the Hokage to go on a mission by ourselves?

You're asking me? Who am I supposed to ask?

Uchiha Yakumaru rolled his eyes, gestured toward Kushina, then glanced at the command room and held up two fingers at different heights. Kushina's finger was higher, Minato's lower, making his meaning perfectly clear.

It's obvious who's in charge at Lord Hokage's house. What can we do, fight back?

Was this another kind of rule by the strong?

The Fourth Hokage was henpecked. Hyuga Hane had never even considered it before.

But Kakashi stood there, reading his Little People Book with a calm expression, as if he were already used to it.

Kushina-sensei was just tired of spending so much time alone in the village and wanted to "let loose."

"What are you waiting for?"

Kushina had already walked some distance. She looked back at the three of them, each wearing a different expression, and saw that they hadn't followed. With her hands on her hips, she smiled and asked, "Aren't you going to follow the team leader's orders? I already talked to Minato."

"Let's go." Hyuga Hane shook his head, left a Shadow Clone outside the command room, and followed her.

Seeing this, Kakashi and Uchiha Yakumaru exchanged a glance and followed.

With the support forces yet to arrive, Minato had to remain at the command center. The plan to deal with the Tailed Beast forces would have to wait.

After all, Orochimaru, who had gone to gather intelligence, hadn't returned yet. Some plans required more detailed information before they could be carried out.

Jiraiya, however, had already headed to the front lines.

The battlefield is much worse than it was when I was here before.

An hour away from the command center, Hyuga Hane used his Byakugan to survey the surrounding forest and thought to himself.

Blood and discarded ninja tools littered the forest. Some bodies hadn't been retrieved. Clearly, as the Mist Village reinforcements arrived and the fighting grew more intense, they no longer had the spare manpower to take care of such things.

They went farther ahead without encountering any enemies. At the front of the group, Kushina raised a hand to signal them to stop, then told them to rest for a while.

They were all Jonin, but if the intelligence was accurate, the Mist Village had already committed seven thousand shinobi to the battlefield and was still sending reinforcements. Another two thousand would probably be deployed soon.

Although Genin and Chunin made up most of the cannon fodder, there were still powerful fighters among them. Their squad was strong, but if they let their guard down and got surrounded while exhausted, they could still suffer casualties.

"The Mist Village has gone crazy. We've only seen numbers like this when the Third Tsuchikage surrounded the Third Raikage. How many defenders does the Land of Water have left?"

Uchiha Yakumaru took out his canteen and drank some water, then asked in confusion, "The Five Great Shinobi Villages have to defend most of the Five Great Nations. How did the Daimyo of the Land of Water agree to let the Mizukage take so many forces to attack us? Do they really think the Mizukage can win?"

Under the one country, one village system, most of a nation's military strength was shouldered by its shinobi village. The Daimyo also controlled some forces, but they were insignificant compared to those commanded by the village.

"The Land of Water is isolated overseas. To attack it, you have to cross a vast stretch of ocean. Most shinobi can't manage that, so they'd have to go by ship."

Kushina glanced at him and smiled. "As long as they control the coastline, it's very difficult to invade. Were you bad at geography?"

"I know," Yakumaru said, pouting. "I just don't understand. Every time there's a Shinobi World War and the other villages see Konoha weakened, they come after us. Why not attack the other great nations? The Land of Water's defenses must be weak right now. Even if they couldn't conquer it, they could at least take something."

"There's nothing much to gain from that. The Land of Fire occupies far too good a position."

Hyuga Hane used his Byakugan to examine a direction and spoke up. "The Land of Fire borders the sea to the east and south, and small nations surround it. According to the Shinobi World's current maps, it's near the center, making it an important transportation route and economic hub."

"Besides, because of its climate and terrain, it produces more food than most countries. Attacking it—even just crossing the border—can bring considerable spoils."

"And Konoha has always shown the greatest potential for war among the great nations. If they don't suppress us, they won't feel at ease."

"..."

Uchiha Yakumaru fell silent. It wasn't that he hadn't thought of these things; he was just worried about where it was all leading.

In all three Shinobi World Wars, Konoha had to fight several villages. What would happen if, one day, Konoha had no one to carry it forward, no powerful figure who could turn the tide?

Its destruction seemed all but inevitable.

"Can't we just wipe them out? We win every time, but I don't see Konoha gaining anything substantial from it."

Yakumaru murmured, "The First distributed the Tailed Beasts to them, and now they're using them to attack us. They're so ungrateful. They've shattered the peace the First longed for. When will we ever see true peace?"

No one present answered. Hyuga Hane narrowed his eyes and remained silent, too.

True peace... There had never been such a thing.

As long as people were alive and had desires, conflict would never end.

Even the world he'd lived in before hadn't achieved peace. Those weapons of overwhelming power merely forced nations to show restraint when necessary and wage different kinds of war through economic and political means.

Many countries hadn't given up on acquiring those terrifying weapons, even when research into them was banned.

In the end, power could make others afraid, but it could also stir their greed.

Hashirama's power had been studied, and so had the Uchiha's, because people like Madara Uchiha and Hashirama Senju had appeared—people capable of matching a great shinobi village on their own.

Many feared them, but given the chance, they would all want to become one of those two!

In the Shinobi World, lasting or even eternal peace through individual power alone would probably require reaching the realm of the so-called God of Otsutsuki. Otherwise, peace brought by force would sooner or later be undone by even greater force.

Even ordinary Otsutsuki weren't enough. After all, plenty of Otsutsuki had been killed by the Shinobi World or sealed away in the future.

The Shinobi World had the means to fight the Otsutsuki.

But if you set aside the premise of individual power and sought only temporary peace, a peace without war, then you didn't need to be that powerful...

Konoha could achieve that now.

Hyuga Hane's expression shifted. "There are enemies one kilometer straight ahead."