The Land of Iron's exchange delegation, utterly defeated, did not linger in Kirigakure. You could even say they shouldered their luggage and fled overnight.
"Did you go a little too far this time?"
In the Mizukage's office, Karatachi Yagura and Araki sat opposite each other on the two sides of the sofa. "I heard you didn't just make the Land of Iron lose every match, but crushed them with one-against-two and one-through-three wipeouts. Fine, that's one thing, but in the end, even when their leading samurai personally stepped forward, you didn't leave him the slightest bit of face... You made them leave overnight."
The more Karatachi Yagura spoke, the more speechless he became. At last, he asked, "I remember you saying at the start that you wanted to build closer ties with the Land of Iron, didn't you? Is this how you build them?"
"Heh, I did say that. And ties naturally still have to be built. But the priorities here have to be made clear."
Araki picked up the tea from the low table in the middle and took a sip, saying without the slightest concern, "If we didn't beat them into complete submission, then even with Mihawk actively pushing things from behind the scenes, there would inevitably be people who couldn't recognize reality."
"But if you were that ruthless, aren't you afraid that Tōshirō will exaggerate things after he returns and make the people of the Land of Iron hostile toward us?"
"He won't. Tōshirō is something of an oddity among the samurai of the Land of Iron. Besides, whether our attitude counts as good or not can only be determined through comparison."
Araki said this with full confidence.
In the original timeline, Tōshirō had never appeared alive. Instead, he had been one of the powerful Impure World