Inside and outside the game

Once the policy of negotiating peace was settled, the Old Clan Leader wasted no time putting Shōgatsu's plan into action.

The logistical ninja from the Third Settlement immediately filled the gap left when the Fuma overran the Sixth Settlement.

The Third Settlement had originally been responsible for transporting supplies to the front. This would inevitably slow deliveries, but slower supplies were better than leaving a gaping hole in the Hagoromo defenses.

Shōgatsu had not scrapped the entire plan to lure the enemy in. Instead, he had revised its existing framework.

The Pentagram Formation remained active, and the Fuma ninja carrying food from the clan territory had already been allowed out.

The ninja subsequently drawn in by the food included fifteen members of the Fuma Clan and a three-man team of Blood Horse scouts coveting the supplies.

All of them were now trapped inside the formation.

On the Hagoromo side, the Old Clan Leader and five elders made six, while Izuna and the other two Uchiha Jonin made three-a total fighting force of nine Jonin.

Shōgatsu planned to separate the squads that entered the formation, using the five-layer labyrinth's shifts between reality and illusion to trap them in different spatial sections. Then the nine would concentrate their strength and defeat them one group at a time.

Unable to support one another, the enemies were easily captured in turn.

Next, he took the Hagoromo sensory ninja and the Uchiha Jonin on a thorough sweep of the area surrounding the clan territory.

The Hagoromo's Heavenly Eye handled broad-range detection, while the Uchiha's Sharingan pinpointed precise locations.

With the two visual techniques working together, the hidden enemy troops had nowhere to hide. They captured another nine Fuma sentries and one Blood Horse sentry.

Only after confirming that no spies from other ninja clans remained within their territory did Shōgatsu breathe a small sigh of relief.

Once all that was done, he selected one lightly injured Fuma ninja and one lightly injured Blood Horse ninja from the prisoners, took them to the edge of the Sixth Settlement, and sent each home with a letter demanding an explanation.

The letters made their position clear:

The three clans had been neighbors for centuries, and the Hagoromo had sheltered the other two for years. Now that the Senju had invaded, not only had those two clans failed to help repel them, they had stabbed the Hagoromo in the back.

There was no need to belabor the point that once the lips were gone, the teeth would feel the cold.

If the Senju really conquered the Hagoromo, the leaders of the Fuma and Blood Horse should know perfectly well who would be next.

Shōgatsu understood one thing very clearly.

Under no circumstances could they let the Senju disrupt the Hagoromo's relations with their neighbors.

If necessary, they had to persuade the Fuma and Blood Horse to stand with the Hagoromo again.

The Hagoromo now held quite a few Fuma hostages. Counting those captured in the formation and those killed earlier, the total came to forty-two.

For a small ninja clan like the Fuma, that amounted to losing more than half of their fighting strength in its prime.

As long as the Fuma clan leader had even a shred of reason left, he should understand the price of continuing to oppose the Hagoromo.

But that alone was not enough to bring the Fuma Clan into line.

At the end of his letter, Shōgatsu simply instructed the Fuma Clan to send their young clan leader to the Hagoromo Clan Territory to answer in person.

Between more than thirty captive clansmen and their young clan leader, the Fuma would surely know which choice to make.

Shōgatsu's arrangements were passed down one by one, each in orderly fashion.

Setsuna could not help glancing at him.

The moment the Fuma's young clan leader stepped into the Hagoromo Clan Territory, he would effectively be delivering himself into their hands.

They called it summoning him for questioning, but in reality, they were demanding that the Fuma send their young clan leader in as a hostage.

With him in their hands, even if the Fuma wanted to collude secretly with the Senju, they would first have to weigh the life of a member of the Main Family's bloodline.

It was an open conspiracy. If the young clan leader refused to come, they would be abandoning more than thirty lives from their own clan. Would those prisoners' relatives still trust the Fuma clan leader?

If he came, he would simply be delivering another hostage to the Hagoromo.

Shōgatsu looked like an amiable young nobleman, but his methods were far more ruthless than his appearance suggested.

As for the Blood Horse...

Shōgatsu's approach was much simpler.

The Blood Horse was a ninja clan organized as a single household, with only twenty or thirty people in all. Its numbers had always been small, and it had long been subordinate to the Hagoromo.

This time, it had followed the Fuma to fish in troubled waters purely because it had seen the Fuma seize food and wanted a share.

For a small clan like that, a slap followed by a little reassurance was enough. There was no need to make a major affair of it.

Even if the Fuma and Blood Horse could no longer remain allies of the Hagoromo, they absolutely could not be allowed to side with the Senju.

After hearing all of Shōgatsu's arrangements, the Old Clan Leader fell silent for a long time, sighing repeatedly.

He knew Shōgatsu had what it took to be clan leader-his battlefield instincts, strategic vision, and ability to coordinate and deploy forces placed him among the very best in the entire Warring States era.

But he also knew that Shōgatsu still lacked the most important thing needed to command the clan's respect-

The Heavenly Eye.

In the Hagoromo Clan, where bloodline reigned supreme, lacking a kekkei genkai meant lacking the ancestors' recognition.

Even clansmen with the Heavenly Eye who were weaker than Shōgatsu naturally considered themselves above him.

The resources Shōgatsu could command were always limited, and he could never muster even a full squad to take with him. It was not because he lacked talent, but because he lacked what the Heavenly Eye on the forehead represented.

The Old Clan Leader knew he was getting on in years. After Tensho's death, he had been forced to step forward again and take charge.

Shōgatsu was clearly the best candidate, yet he fell just one step short-if he had the Heavenly Eye, even a weak visual technique would have been enough.

Enough for him to legitimately inherit the position of clan leader, enough for the old man to entrust the Hagoromo Clan safely to Shōgatsu after his death.

But Shōgatsu simply did not have it.

Setsuna soon lost patience with the endless probing and wrangling between the Hagoromo and Senju.

What interested him were battles of annihilation or taking the initiative to attack-the kind of fighting that made his blood boil.

The two sides sat across a table testing each other's limits, sending an envoy today, releasing a prisoner tomorrow, and finding an intermediary to pass a message the day after. That slow, grinding pace was more agonizing than getting stabbed on an open battlefield.

He yawned.

His hands rose out of habit, fingers interlacing as he used the sunlight to form one shadow puppet after another.

His mental power had already reached level three. In theory, he should have crossed the threshold for sensing yin release chakra.

Yet sleepiness washed over him without warning. He blinked hard, trying to shake off that heavy feeling, but each time, his eyes were harder to open than before.

It made sense. This body was only five years old, and after a full day of running around, the child's body sank into utter exhaustion the moment it relaxed.

Izuna patted his waist, signaling for him to straighten his back and not embarrass the Uchiha.

Setsuna gave a drowsy grunt and instinctively tried to sit upright, but his back had barely stiffened before it sagged again.

Izuna and Shōgatsu had reached a crucial point in their deliberations-if Tobirama Senju learned that the Hagoromo were negotiating peace with the Fuma and Blood Horse at the same time, what would he do to sabotage the talks?

"Knowing that despicable bastard, he'll first have his lobbyists exaggerate the Hagoromo's persecution of the Fuma, planting that impression in the Fuma Clan's minds and stirring up anxiety."

Izuna pointed to a small road between the Sixth Settlement and the Fuma clan territory on the map. "Then he'll tell the Fuma Clan that letting him pass through their territory is their only way out."

"Not just that." Shōgatsu shook his head. "He'll also increase the pressure on the front lines at the same time, forcing the Hagoromo to..."

Before he could finish, he suddenly felt a weight settle against him.

At some point, Setsuna had slumped sideways, his fuzzy head resting against Izuna's waist, his full weight leaning into him.

His eyelashes were long, casting two faint shadows in the lamplight. A trace of defiance still lingered at the corner of his mouth, as though he were still competing with someone in his dreams.

Looking at Setsuna leaning against him, Izuna's usually stern face softened with a rare touch of warmth.

He raised a hand and stroked Setsuna's spiky, sea-urchin hair.

He gently laid Setsuna flat, took off his own dark robe, and draped it over him.

Shōgatsu lowered his voice. "Looks like this little demon has fallen asleep."

Izuna rolled his eyes at Shōgatsu. "He's still one of our Uchiha."

Shōgatsu could not help bursting into a chuckle. The corners of Izuna's mouth also lifted despite himself.

The atmosphere in the attic relaxed considerably.

The oil lamp's flame burned quietly in the corner, casting the three of their shadows onto the wooden wall: two adults with a tiny child curled into a ball between them.

Izuna lowered his voice and returned his gaze to the map. "If Tobirama wants to sabotage the peace talks between the three clans, his other option is..."

"The Blood Horse," Shōgatsu finished, his voice low as well. "They have few people, making them the easiest for him to swallow outright. Once he's taken them, the Senju could very well attack the Hagoromo from the Blood Horse clan territory."

Izuna nodded.

The two continued working through the possibilities, but they both spoke a little more slowly than before, their voices quieter still.