Taking the Initiative!

Anyone who wasn't an idiot could tell Hikaru was mocking the Daimyos, but every one of them stayed silent. Hikaru dared to say such things; they did not. Pretending they hadn't heard him was the best choice.

Put nicely, this was casually criticizing the Daimyos. Put harshly, it was downright treasonous.

But if anyone dared to jump in front of Hikaru and say that to him, Hikaru would slap them to death.

"Just watch. We still don't know what the final outcome will be." As he spoke, Hikaru couldn't help thinking of that immortal old bastard, Black Zetsu. He wondered when Black Zetsu would begin acting. If it happened soon, then this Third Ninja War would end early.

For Black Zetsu and Nagato, creating the Six Paths of Pain wasn't too difficult. With Black Zetsu's help, those matters would be easy.

What Hikaru cared about was when they would begin acting.

The biggest problem now was that the war wasn't under Hikaru's control. Simply put, even if Hikaru wanted to stop the war, he couldn't, unless he single-handedly took on the others. But doing that would definitely provoke the enemy village's fury. What would happen then remained unknown. Going head-to-head with Konoha would be more trouble than it was worth.

But if the war caused excessive casualties, dealing with the enemy would become troublesome.

Hikaru frowned in thought. Seeing this, Hatake Sakumo and his two Elite Jonin companions could only remain silent and avoid disturbing him. They all thought Hikaru was considering how to fight Iwagakure, completely unaware that his thoughts had long since drifted far away.

Forget it. No matter what, the people of the Five Great Shinobi Villages would only be cannon fodder when fighting Madara Uchiha.

All they had to do was look at the original story.