Led Astray, Iwagakure Took the Bait

"Well, there's just one last bit."

After those Cloud Ninja killed your ninjas, they encountered the Uchiha from the Land of Whirlpools on their way out.

I followed them from a distance and saw them fighting fiercely. The Uchiha recognized them as well.

Stone Marten spoke again, delivering another sharp blow to the already suspicious Kumogakure.

Upon hearing this, Ōnoki was shocked. "!!!"

His distrust of Kumogakure was already evident, and now an alarm bell rang in his mind.

He wouldn't have believed these words so readily if they had come from someone else.

But the Stone Marten is just a Summoning Beast; who would specifically target a single beast to frame someone?

(Feng: You're framing people with inanimate objects that seem plausible but aren't. Have you ever thought about it? Wouldn't a beast that can speak human language be more suitable than an inanimate object?)

"Grandpa, the day afterward, the Land of Whirlpools also issued a notice saying that a group of Cloud Ninja had been wiped out."

Their announcement and what Stone Marten said matched perfectly in terms of time, place, and identities of the people involved. And the Uchiha wouldn't stoop to exaggerating their achievements.

Kurotsuchi Soil delivered the final blow at just the right moment.

But what is the reality?

In the past, the Uchiha disdained exaggerating their battle achievements, but now, if Uchiha gives the order, not only would people not exaggerate their achievements, but they would also line up to commit suicide in the street.

All I can say is... information needs to be up-to-date, otherwise, blindly relying on traditional experience will lead to being severely misled!

This attack enraged Ōnoki on the spot. "Outrageous! A reckless man is indeed a reckless man. To abandon such a great opportunity to deal with Konoha because of old grudges is simply incomprehensible!"

He was a suspicious person to begin with, and now that he had finally trusted the Kumogakure, he was betrayed and killed by hundreds of elite ninjas he had trained for many years.

This was something that Ōnoki, who had been the head of Iwagakure for decades, could not tolerate.

"Kitsuchi, Kurotsuchi, you should rest well."

Bunya, bring over the cooperation agreement you signed with Kumogakure.

Akatsuchi, assembling a demolition team and a surprise attack force.

Since they are unjust, they shouldn't blame us for being unjust.

Therefore, he immediately began to assemble his troops, preparing to launch a fierce attack on Kumogakure.

"Wait, Lord Tsuchikage, please reconsider. There's no need for us to take action ourselves."

However, several advisors from Iwagakure stopped Ōnoki and the others on the spot.

"What do you mean?"

Ōnoki was extremely displeased upon hearing this and questioned him fiercely.

Iwagakure has always been his personal fiefdom, and he is known for his stubbornness, rarely listening to advice. Even Roshi, one of the village's "nuclear weapons" and the Four-Tails Jinchūriki Rōshi, had a falling out with him and left the village because of this, which shows just how stubborn he is.

Right now, Ōnoki, who is furious about the betrayal by Kumogakure, is even more intolerant of others questioning him.

Fortunately, the current advisors are all veterans who have worked with Ōnoki for over ten years, and they know what they can and cannot advise him on.

That's perfect, this is the kind of situation that can be addressed with advice.

"Lord Tsuchikage, don't let anger cloud your judgment."

We previously coerced the Kusagakure to cause trouble in Konoha, and now the Kusagakure is almost reduced to ruins by the Fifth Hokage, Tsunade.

Now she's even stationed a large army in Kusagakure, guarding us.

If we rashly assemble a large army, we might end up fighting Konoha before even engaging Kumogakure, and the casualties would be considerable.

There's no need for that! We can learn from the Kumogakure, use their own methods against them, and leak their information to Konoha and the Land of Whirlpools as well.

After all, we are enemies of Konoha and the Land of Whirlpools, but isn't Kumogakure also an enemy!?

In this way, we can avenge ourselves without losing a single soldier, without escalating the conflict with Konoha, and without causing unnecessary casualties.

This is the most advantageous situation for our Iwagakure.

The advisors began to speak slowly, and the more they talked, the brighter Ōnoki's eyes became.

After he finished speaking, he couldn't help but nod in approval, "Hmm! That's right, that makes sense!"

"Ippan!"

"Lord Tsuchikage."

Ōnoki summoned a young ninja with short, dark black afro hair.

"Take a team of liaison ninjas and secretly go to the Land of Whirlpools. Tell them that whatever the Kumogakure can do, the Iwagakure can do too. We can give them all the information about the Kumogakure free of charge."

Having been completely misled, Ōnoki issued a new order.

So, a few days later...

"Master, someone from Iwagakure has come and says they have something very important to discuss with you."

"Hehe, I know, we've been waiting for them for a while. Tell them to wait in the reception room."

When someone reported to Feng in the Land of Whirlpools, Feng smiled and nodded.

"Master, you just said you'd been waiting for a long time. Did you anticipate they would come?"

Behind Feng, the young Gaara voiced the question that had been lingering in his mind.

Not long ago, Feng used the Mangekyō One-Tail talk to Shukaku inside him. Now, Shukaku no longer goes berserk and can sleep and rest like a normal person, and he can properly learn from Feng.

Hearing this, Uchiha Izumi and Mei Terumi, who were dealing with a lot of trivial matters nearby, also cast inquiring glances at Feng.

The two women were well aware of all the purge activities carried out by Uzumaki Ayaka, Uchiha Kazue, and White Zetsu, as many orders were issued through their hands.

They still can't understand why their Master only arranged for someone to put on a show with a Summoning Beast in Iwagakure, and then went on to wipe out the Iwagakure ninjas, while giving other enemies a way out.

Even though the Uchiha Iwagakure so much, the other party took the initiative to come to their door, and it's clear they're not here to cause trouble, but rather to discuss some kind of cooperation.

This is... unbelievable, incomprehensible!?

"Hehe, I expected that."

Feng looked at his three subordinates, who were bursting with curiosity, and nodded with a smile.

"Why?" Mei Terumi frowned and pressed for an answer.

As someone who was originally trained to be the Mizukage, she always had a habit of delving deeper into matters involving ninja villages and the Kage.

"It's very simple. First of all, we always try to wipe out the people of Iwagakure, but we always show mercy to other forces."

Anyone would suspect something was amiss, and since the Tsuchikage Ōnoki was a naturally suspicious person, this planted the seed of doubt in Ōnoki's mind.

Afterwards, we deliberately put on a show for a Summoning Beast in Iwagakure. In the subconscious of an ordinary person, there would be no doubt that their Summoning Beast would cooperate with the enemy to deceive its master.

In addition, we also left some corpses in Iwagakure that were killed by Lightning Release but whose traces were deliberately covered up with Fire Release.

When the people of Iwagakure discover this themselves, because they found it all through their own investigation, they will have more faith in the answers they actively discovered when comparing them with other things.

The Tsuchikage Ōnoki, is also a stubborn person; once he has an idea in his mind, he becomes more determined than the average person.

Finally, Iwagakure and Kumogakure already had a deep-seated grudge, especially after the incident involving the Third Raikage. The entire Ninja World knew that Kumogakure would seek revenge against Iwagakure sooner or later.

So, put yourself in their shoes and think about it. You have a motive, and you have both human (Summoning Beast) and physical (corpse) evidence. All of this wasn't given to you by someone else; you found it yourselves.

So, should you believe this? And how should you handle it?

Feng, who was originally about to leave to meet the envoy from Iwagakure, thought about it and decided to stop and explain things to Mei Terumi and Gaara first.

After all, these two were personnel he planned to send to govern a certain area in the future. Explaining it to them now would help them know how to deal with similar situations in the future.