At Uchiha Fugaku's words, Hiruzen Sarutobi's expression darkened despite himself. It wasn't as though he didn't know how powerful the Akatsuki had become, but he was also certain that if the shinobi villages truly united, they might still stand a chance against it.
Even a fallen giant was still a giant. The Four Great Shinobi Villages might have suffered terribly over the past few years, but their foundations were still there.
Even Sunagakure, widely acknowledged as the weakest, had old veterans like Chiyo and Ebizo besides its Kage, Rasa. That went doubly for established powerhouses like Kumogakure and Iwagakure.
Nagato might have broken Kumogakure single-handedly, but that only meant Nagato was too strong, not that the Cloud Ninja lacked powerful fighters. The once-inexperienced Fourth Raikage had already matured, and the young man who formed the A-B Combo with him was surely no weakling now, either. Besides, Kumogakure had more than one tailed beast. No matter how you looked at it, the village was far from weak.
Iwagakure had endured one setback after another over the years. First, Ōnoki had lost an arm and a leg to Chihane. Then Kari, the village's powerful Explosion Release ninja, had defected, and Han, the Five-Tails Jinchuriki, had died at the hands of the rogue ninja Obito. But none of that meant Iwagakure had fallen into complete ruin.
Ōnoki had never relied on taijutsu in the first place. He had dominated the shinobi world with his powerful kekkei mōra and the Light-Weight Rock Technique, which allowed him to fly. Losing an arm and a leg hardly affected him. With that bad back of his, all he normally did was hover in the sky and throw out ninjutsu anyway. Nothing much had changed.
Besides, Iwagakure still had a powerful figure who rarely drew attention: Ōnoki's Kage