Battle Report That Shook the Ninja World, Danzo's Extreme Panic

Scalding tobacco mixed with sparks spilled out, instantly burning through the freshly drafted "Senju Sosuke Death Compensation Notice" on the desk. The smell of scorched paper spread through the spacious Hokage's office, yet no one paid it any mind.

Hiruzen Sarutobi shot to his feet, knocking the solid wooden high-backed chair behind him heavily to the floor. His age-spotted hands snatched the red urgent scroll held aloft by the ANBU ninja, his gaze sweeping frantically across the words like that of a starving wolf.

The words on the scroll had been imprinted with chakra. They could not be forged. Every word was like a sledgehammer smashing viciously into Hiruzen Sarutobi's heart.

"Wood Release: Deep Forest Emergence... altered the canyon's terrain... tore apart the Ten Puppets of Chikamatsu with his bare hands... suppressed the One-Tail Shukaku alone and forcibly extracted the tailed beast's essence..." Hiruzen Sarutobi's voice trembled more with every line he read. By the end, dizziness washed over him, and he had to brace himself against the desk with both hands to keep from collapsing.

Shimura Danzō snatched the scroll away. His sole remaining eye fixed rigidly on the intelligence report, its socket stretched painfully wide by his overwhelming shock and disbelief. Scarlet veins instantly spread across the white of his eye.

"Absurd! Utterly absurd!" Danzo snarled like a wild dog whose tail had been stepped on. He slammed the scroll onto the floor, while his cane punched deep pits into the hard wooden planks. "His chakra pathways were completely destroyed! How could he possibly use Wood Release on that scale? He even suppressed a tailed beast! This is fake intelligence spread by Hidden Sand! It's a lie fabricated by that old hag Chiyo to cover up her defeat!"

The ANBU ninja kneeling on the floor buried his head deeply between his arms. Cold sweat had long soaked through his inner clothes, and his voice shook uncontrollably. "Lord Danzo, the intelligence is absolutely true. Scouts along the route risked their lives to infiltrate the edge of the battlefield and witnessed it with their own eyes. Wind Canyon's terrain has been completely reshaped. Several miles around it have become an incredibly lush primeval forest. And..."

"And what? Speak!" Danzo roared.

"And Uchiha Fugaku accompanied him throughout the entire operation. The scouts reported that after the battle, Clan Head Fugaku's attitude toward Advisor Sosuke... became extremely humble. It could even be called... reverent. What remains of the Uchiha clan's security force now obeys Advisor Sosuke's commands completely."

Those words became the final straw.

Hiruzen Sarutobi collapsed onto the floor, not even bothering to pick up his pipe where it had fallen nearby. Every trace of color drained from his aged face. What kind of man was Uchiha Fugaku? He was the head of a powerful clan with arrogance carved into his bones! The only thing that could make a proud wolf lower its head was a terrifying monster capable of swallowing it whole, skin and bones alike.

"Hiruzen, what are you waiting for?!" Danzo lunged at the desk with a twisted expression, clutching the collar of Hiruzen Sarutobi's Hokage robes in both hands. "Did you hear that? He not only recreated the First Hokage's Wood Release, he has also subdued the Uchiha clan! Once he returns to Hidden Leaf with achievements enough to shake the entire ninja world, do you think he'll spare us? He'll tear this building down and bury both of us beneath it!"

Hiruzen Sarutobi closed his eyes. In his mind appeared Sosuke's refined, jade-like face, always wearing that gentle smile. In the past, he had always believed him to be a sickly weakling he could manipulate at will, someone useful only for placating Tsunade. Only today did he understand that he was a venomous dragon wearing human skin, one that had endured to the utmost limit.

If he did not act, that was one thing. But once he did, he punched a hole straight through the heavens.

"Hidden Leaf's hero... cannot die at the hands of his own people." Hiruzen Sarutobi's voice carried deep helplessness and apprehension. "Tsunade has already completely sided with him, and now even the Uchiha clan has become his dogs. If we make a move against him in the village, Hidden Leaf will immediately fall apart and erupt into a brutal civil war."

"A civil war is still better than letting the village fall into a tyrant's hands!" Danzo shoved Hiruzen Sarutobi away, his lone eye gleaming with desperate madness. "He is not Senju Hashirama! Hashirama was kind, but he is a complete lunatic! Have you sat in the Hokage's seat for so long that you no longer have the courage to cut off your own arm?"

Hiruzen Sarutobi fell silent. He looked at the rock carvings of the previous Hokage outside the window, his gaze shifting uncertainly in the shadows. More than anyone, he knew that Sosuke's rise meant the Sarutobi Clan's rule over Hidden Leaf would come to a complete end.

After a long while, Hiruzen Sarutobi slowly turned around, his back facing Danzo. "I have a headache today. I did not see any intelligence report. Handle Root's affairs yourself. But remember, the Hokage's name must not be implicated."

It was permission without any bottom line.

Danzo let out a cold laugh. It sounded especially sinister in the empty office. He said nothing more and strode away, the hurried, uneven tapping of his cane against the floor exposing the extreme panic he could no longer conceal.

Within Root's dark, damp underground base.

The eternal lamps on the walls flickered, stretching Danzo's shadow into a fanged, clawing evil ghost. He sat in a cold stone chair, his chest heaving violently, his breaths rasping like bellows.

He unwound the bandages around his right arm and stared at the pale skin beneath, where he had not yet had the chance to implant a single Sharingan. A bone-chilling cold spread wildly up his spine.

Sosuke was too strong. A monster capable of tearing apart even the Ten Puppets of Chikamatsu and a tailed beast with his bare hands—sending any number of Root's death warriors after him would only be sending them to their deaths. Conventional assassination no longer held any meaning. He had to borrow absolute power from outside forces, whatever the cost.

"Jia. Yi." Danzo spoke hoarsely, his voice like two rough pieces of sandpaper grinding together.

Two Root elites wearing blank masks emerged from the thick shadows and dropped to one knee.

"Immediately activate the highest-level classified communications channel. Contact the Hidden Cloud forces lying in wait along the Land of Fire's border." A vicious glint flashed in Danzo's eyes. "Tell them Hidden Leaf's eastern defensive line is weak. What they have always dreamed of is now theirs for the taking."

The Root ninja codenamed Jia suddenly raised his head, his eyes beneath the mask filled with unconcealable shock. "Lord Danzo, that is the village's strategic deterrent... If Hidden Cloud succeeds, Hidden Leaf's foundation..."

"Do it!"

Danzo swung his cane and smashed it savagely into Jia's shoulder. With a dull crack of shattering bone, Jia coughed up a mouthful of blood and toppled to the ground.

"As long as it lures that little bastard Senju Sosuke over and lets those Hidden Cloud barbarians kill him for us, what does the loss of one vessel matter? As long as this old man remains alive, Hidden Leaf's foundation will not collapse!" Danzo's face twisted to the extreme, spittle spraying through the air. "Go! Send them the map showing the gaps in the defense line! Tell them to move quickly!"

"Yes!" The two Root ninjas did not dare hesitate any longer. Their bodies turned into black mist and vanished in an instant.

Only Danzo's heavy breathing remained in the empty underground chamber. He walked to the deepest part of the secret room and stared at a Hidden Leaf deployment map hanging on the wall. His gaze passed over the bustling central district and locked onto a hidden barrier at the edge of Hidden Leaf, marked over and over in red cinnabar.

There, someone crucial to Hidden Leaf was being held under house arrest.

"Senju Sosuke, no matter how strong you are, you cannot possibly emerge unscathed from the siege of Hidden Cloud's elites. Especially when this concerns the Nine-Tails' top secret..." A cruel curve lifted Danzo's shriveled lips, while his fingertips dug deeply into his palm.

At the same time.

At the edge of Hidden Leaf, within a secluded estate surrounded by layers upon layers of sealing formulas.

The night wind passed through the dead trees in the courtyard, making a mournful whistling sound. A young girl with vivid red hair cascading down her back like a waterfall sat on the cold floor with her knees hugged to her chest. Clad in thin clothes, she looked at the pallid moon beyond the window, cut into fragments by iron bars. Her clear eyes were filled with longing for freedom and deep confusion over her uncertain fate.

She did not know that amid the filthy political dealings of the village's upper ranks, she had already become deadly bait meant to lure in a monster. A vast net woven from conspiracy and slaughter was descending upon her.

And at the distant border of the Land of Wind, the white-clad man who had just trampled a tailed beast beneath his feet was slowly making his way back toward Hidden Leaf across the yellow sands. The gears of fate were about to veer most violently amid the collision of blood and fire.