Only the Weak Lock Weapons in Cages

Hiruzen's lips moved, and his expression immediately turned extremely ugly.

Kushina's range of movement had long been restricted, and the covert surveillance over her had never stopped.

Konoha needed the Nine-Tails, so it had never truly given her a choice. Of all that protection they kept talking about, how much of it had really been for Kushina herself?

Hiruzen had no way around it. Every path of retreat had been blocked, and in the end, he could only nod with difficulty.

Madara threw back his head and laughed.

The laughter shook loose chunks of remaining brick and stone from the ruins. Even the pooled blood beside Danzo's corpse at the bottom of the crater rippled from the vibrations.

Hiruzen's face darkened, while the two advisors practically buried their faces.

The laughter stopped. Madara's gaze bored into Hiruzen's face, his eyes filled with mockery.

"A truly powerful shinobi village teaches its Jinchuriki to fully control the power of the Tailed Beasts and use it on the battlefield!"

"Only incompetent weaklings lock the weapons in their hands inside cages!"

Madara raised a hand and pointed at the armless corpse below, his cold gaze sweeping across the Konoha leadership.

"On one hand, you fear the power you cultivated yourselves and can't bear to let it go. On the other, you find yourselves a pretty excuse and dress imprisonment up as protection."

"You don't even dare face your own power, yet you call incompetence responsibility? Is this what you people of Konoha have been doing for decades?"

The hand clutching Hiruzen's pipe shook violently. His mouth opened and closed, then closed and opened, but he could no longer utter a single word in rebuttal.

Utatane Koharu knelt motionless amid the rubble, while Mitokado Homura could not even preserve a shred of dignity.

The ANBU