The Transfer of Command of the Joint Forces and the Further Escalation of the Praise-to-Destruction Tactic

The door to Meeting Room Three remained tightly shut from beginning to start.

Inside the door, it was the final wrestling of three forces. Outside the door, it was the massive machine operating silently under the new order of Konoha.

Baishi's voice fell—not loud, yet like a boulder cast into dead water, the ripples it stirred slammed into everyone's heart.

Joint forces supreme commander.

This position was a hot potato, as well as a sharp sword hanging over the heads of Sunagakure and Amegakure. Who wielded it determined where the blade of this army would ultimately point.

The muscles on Chiyo's withered face twitched slightly. She instinctively looked at Baishi; was this young man actually going to take command in person? If that were truly the case, Sunagakure would no longer have any breathing room whatsoever.

The paper slips at the fingertips of Konan's hands, hidden within her sleeves, deformed slightly. She was likewise making a rapid judgment: was this position an extension of Konoha's internal power struggle, or another chess move in Baishi's external expansion?

Shikaku Nara lowered his eyelids, acting as though he were organizing the documents on the table, while in reality taking in every subtle expression of everyone present. He knew the good show had only just begun.

Amidst this silence where everyone harbored their own thoughts, Baishi suddenly stood up.

Instead of walking toward the head seat, he walked to the side of the conference table, coming to the side of Namikaze Minato.

This action caused everyone's gazes to focus over.

"Regarding the candidate for supreme commander," Baishi's voice carried an unquestionable solemnity, "in my heart, there is one most suitable, and the only, candidate."

He paused, his gaze sweeping across Chiyo and Konan, before finally landing on Minato beside him.

"That is our hero,