Survival

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A despondent look instantly overtook Uchiha Kei's face. The boy, still going through puberty, began telling his story in a low voice.

These days, nobody had it easy just trying to put food on the table!

"O ninjas who yearn to distinguish yourselves and achieve great things! You've long forgotten that this kind of war, confined within certain rules, has only existed for forty-seven years!"

As he spoke, Kei's tone grew more accepting, as though he were trying to comfort himself.

"That's true. Forty-seven years is long enough for one generation to replace another. There's no room in this new era for those old, rotten relics."

Telling stories of the past to those the times had left behind was the surest way to win their approval.

At that moment, the retired old ninjas stared blankly at Kei, seeming to hope that he would tell them about the once-grand careers they'd had as ninjas.

But the newcomers who had survived the battlefield felt uneasy.

"Lord Kei, as far as I know, today's ninja wars are on a much larger scale than the clan-based wars of the Warring States period!"

Kei shook his head.

"But to those old folks, a war constrained by rules seems like a childish, laughable ninja game."

"Ah, Kei, don't say any more. Things are pretty good these days."

"That's right. Back then, they killed the able-bodied, abandoned the elderly, preyed on the young, and raped the women. That was how one ninja clan after another was wiped out, only for another powerful clan to rise in its place. There was no mercy in those wars!"

"Children, do you know why the life of a ninja is always full of possibilities?"

Before Kei could continue, the elderly ninjas, most of them in their seventies or eighties, began telling the youngsters around them about their past, their voices tinged with both pity and pride.

"Why is that, sir?"

"Because when you're fighting another ninja clan, you can never be sure whether the clan that's friendly with you is slaughtering your people behind your back."

Those words stunned the young ninjas around them, who had always thought of themselves as righteous.

"Ah, why would they do that?"

"To survive, child!"

The crowd grew noisy again.

"Exactly. Over the thousand-year history of the Shinobi World, less than fifty years have been spent fighting over inexplicable causes."

"But what exactly do you mean? Shouldn't we be fighting to defend the Land of Fire?"

Kei shook his head, as though he had already weathered a lifetime of hardship despite being only a teenager.

"Because ninjas have possessed great strength from the moment they first appeared. Naturally, they could claim a greater share of society's resources. And unlike the nobles, they weren't granted that right by the Daimyo.

"The Daimyo, who rule the world, clearly don't want a group of people who are born to seize power from them to exist.

"So from the moment they appeared, ninjas were different from ordinary people. They were outcasts, a group that others could not accept. The Land of Fire has never considered ninjas to be its own people.

"They only want us outsiders to perish in wars where we slaughter one another."

The ninjas, who had little education, were clearly fascinated to hear for the first time about the origins of ninjas and their relationship with the Daimyo.

Kei had no choice but to go on.

"But ninjas are still people. They didn't just appear out of nowhere; they were born among ordinary people. And people naturally have connections with one another, along with family ties they can't bear to abandon.

"To control or even eliminate ninjas, the Daimyo of each country used ordinary people's emotions as a bond and the supplies needed for survival as leverage. They made one clan after another attack each other in the name of missions, breeding hatred between them."

"The Daimyo hoped that, in the end, ninjas would wipe out other ninjas."

"And so it went on for a thousand years."

"Unfortunately, even the weakest ninjas were more than ordinary soldiers could handle. The Daimyo kept information from them, leaving them no time to think about the causes of the tragedies unfolding before their eyes. But the emotional exhaustion of the long Warring States era made the ninjas want to end the wars.

"Heroes are made by their times. When that exhaustion became unbearable, all it took was a powerful force for everyone to help break the old world.

"Two powerful figures appeared at that time: Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama."

"And so the war ended. They used their strength to bring everyone peace, and that peaceful time gave people a chance to catch their breath and reflect."

"People banded together for warmth and established ninja villages. Those villages were never granted any legitimate status. They were simply a concession from the Daimyo, who couldn't deal with us at the time. When all was said and done, we were nothing but an illegal band of violent thugs."

"Ninjas, we never fought for the Land of Fire before, and we won't fight for it in the future. If we have to risk our lives in battle, then it will be for survival."

Kei thought he'd made a convincing case, but not everyone was willing to see the confusion that would come over the village's ninjas once their wars no longer seemed righteous.

To Kei's surprise, the first to oppose him was Fugaku.

"Even so, Kei, you can't deny that ninjas are tools for carrying out missions."

"Kei, whether you love the village or not, the Daimyo pays us. We fight for him to survive. Take back what you said. Don't disgrace the ninjas. I can pretend that what you said was just a young man making excuses because he's afraid to go to war."

Uchiha Fugaku hadn't said what he truly meant. He had agreed with his son's words, but at the same time feared that Kei might say something even more shocking.

That would only deepen the rift between the Uchiha and the village. Fugaku wanted Kei to understand that, no matter what he himself thought, a person shouldn't try to challenge the established order.

But Kei clearly wasn't going to take his advice.

"Don't give me that nonsense, my dear clan leader. The little money the Daimyo gives us is just to keep us from causing trouble. You could call it protection money, and you wouldn't be wrong."

"How could that little money possibly support a ninja village this large? Or does Lord Fugaku think that's enough to make ninjas risk their lives for him?"

Fugaku fell silent. Some things could be said but not done; others could be done but not said. He couldn't understand why Kei, who was usually so cautious, had done something so ill-timed today.

Seeing that Fugaku wasn't responding, Kei raised his chin slightly and continued.

"Exactly. The Land of Fire is the Land of Fire, and Konoha is Konoha. If the Land of Lightning invades the Land of Fire, the Daimyo should be the one to worry. If he wants us to risk our lives, that can be arranged; after all, it's been the tradition for a thousand years.

"But first, he has to pay enough. Enough for us to die in battle and for our families to survive afterward."

"Not just toss out a few careless words and expect me to send my beloved clansmen to the battlefield. I'm an elder of the Uchiha Clan, and I have a responsibility to my people."

"Survival is the prerequisite for every bloody struggle. Without it, there's nothing to discuss."