The lavish, imposing carriage rumbled over the level gravel road. Its red-haired driver lashed the fine horses, steering not only the carriage into Konoha, but its passenger into an unknowable future.
Inside the carriage, a beautiful red-haired woman in sumptuous robes wore a troubled frown.
In the intermittent sunlight, her vivid red hair blazed like flames and blossomed like flowers, yet a faint sorrow tinged her downcast eyes.
Mito Uzumaki, princess of the Uzumaki Clan and the strongest of its younger generation, had to become a sacrifice to a political marriage at an age when she should have been carefree and proud.
She hated being caged, yet she had no choice but to accept confinement.
For generations, the Uzumaki Clan had inhabited an island off the coast of the Land of Fire. This natural barrier, isolating them from the world, had spared them the turmoil of the Warring States Period. Coupled with the clan's immense vitality and longevity, it made their little island nation seem like a paradise in the eyes of outsiders.
Following the one country, one village system pioneered by Hashirama Senju and Madara Uchiha, the Uzumaki Clan had established its own shinobi village early on. Unlike other nations, however, the Daimyō of the Land of Whirlpools and the Kage of Uzushio Village were the same man: Mito's father, Uzumaki Ashina, chief of the Uzumaki Clan.
In other words, unlike Konoha and the Land of Fire, or any other shinobi village and nation, the Land of Whirlpools actually operated under a one village, one country system.
Now, Mito Uzumaki was not only the princess of the Uzumaki Clan, but of the entire Land of Whirlpools.
Mito had once taken immense pride in her clan and country. As a young girl, she had been so proud that she thought