After returning from the forest.
Hashirama Senju became keenly aware of the importance of strength.
Madara Uchiha had once remarked in passing that the protests of the weak were little different from barking dogs. Adults would pay them no heed.
Those words proved true in no time.
Butsuma Senju might ignore Hashirama Senju's opinions as he was now, but he took Yanbai's opinions very seriously.
The reason was all too obvious.
Yanbai was strong, and he kept growing stronger for no apparent reason.
His brothers might not have felt it as keenly, but their father, Butsuma, surely had a sharper eye than they did.
That was precisely why Butsuma Senju valued Yanbai's opinions.
In fact, after returning from the forest.
Butsuma Senju had done much more than give Yanbai a private kitchen.
Hashirama Senju had received a mission and was preparing to leave with the clan elders. His other three brothers saw him off at the entrance, but Yanbai alone was absent.
In the past, Yanbai would always have been the first to stand at the entrance. Whether Hashirama Senju was injured or not, he would give him a round of healing.
Now, however, Yanbai always appeared before Hashirama Senju at night, because he no longer had any free time during the day.
Hashirama Senju gazed into the depths of the Inner Residence in silence.
Tobirama Senju sighed. "Big Brother, stop waiting. Yanbai can't come. Father is still talking to him."
Hashirama Senju frowned. "What's gotten into Father lately? What could he have so much to say to Yanbai about? How many days has this been going on?"
"Big Brother..." Tobirama Senju closed his eyes for a moment, then said, "Yanbai asked me to tell you to be extra careful and not to let yourself go hungry."
At that last sentence, Hashirama Senju's solemn expression instantly gave way to helpless amusement. "That really does sound like him. Don't worry about me. I'll be careful."
With that, Hashirama Senju cast another glance at the Inner Residence, then turned and left.
Morning light slanted into the Inner Courtyard.
Sunlight streamed diagonally down over the eaves, illuminating the narrow veranda in the courtyard.
In the morning light.
Butsuma Senju and Yanbai sat facing each other on the narrow veranda.
A tea set sat to their left, and Butsuma Senju casually reached over to pour himself a cup.
Across from Butsuma, Yanbai was leafing through thick dossiers and scrolls.
The courtyard was densely overgrown with summer grass. Morning dew clung to every blade, each drop glittering as though the sun rested within it.
Dragonflies and butterflies danced in the sunlight.
Butsuma Senju wore a long black robe. He held a teacup in his left hand, occasionally raising it to his lips.
They sat facing each other in silence for a long while before Butsuma Senju murmured, "Now that you've read these documents and learned about the great families we deal with, what are your thoughts? Do you understand why the adults fight and kill?"
Yanbai abruptly stopped turning the pages. He slowly raised his eyes to his father's expressionless face and said evenly, "I understand that those paymasters want us all dead."
A flicker of astonishment crossed Butsuma Senju's brow. "The paymasters?"
The dossiers clearly explained why the Senju of the Forest were enemies with those clans. What did the paymasters have to do with it?
Yanbai understood the look on Butsuma Senju's face.
Lately, Butsuma Senju had seemed possessed, dumping a mountain of things he should have handled and understood himself as clan leader onto Yanbai.
No matter how one looked at it, it seemed as though he wanted his child to understand how hard his father worked.
Yet he always ended up hearing strange remarks from Yanbai that somehow sounded perfectly reasonable.
"These 'storybooks' show that we didn't have much of a grudge against the Uchiha Clan at first. Our enemies were the Hagoromo Clan," Yanbai said. "And our conflict with the Hagoromo Clan arose from the missions assigned by our respective employers..."
The original Naruto storyline had been vague about the Warring States Period.
It had said little about the Hagoromo Clan, either.
But this virtual world was, after all, a complete world. Even everything the original story had never mentioned had to follow a natural logic, allowing all the "important figures" to appear in this world naturally, in accordance with their original destinies.
Every person and event needed, as far as possible, a reason and logic behind their existence.
And many details would begin to reveal themselves through experiencing everyday life in this world.
Setting aside all the messy domestic affairs within the great clans.
There were the conflicts between clans alone to consider.
Shinobi accepted and carried out missions as clans.
The relationships between shinobi clans were influenced by the needs of the paymasters who hired them.
Any clan opposing the Senju Clan was bound to have missions that conflicted with theirs.
In other words, while the Senju Clan was protecting something belonging to its employer, the Hagoromo Clan had been hired by its own employer to seize it.
Or it could have been the reverse, with the Senju Clan doing the seizing and the Hagoromo Clan doing the protecting.
Either way, conflict between the Hagoromo Clan and the Senju Clan was inevitable.
Conflicting interests led to clashes;
Clashes led to fights to the death;
Fights to the death left casualties on both sides;
If the confrontation dragged on, either one clan was wiped out, or both became sworn enemies and kept fighting.
That was the real reason the Senju Clan and the Uchiha Clan had fought to the bitter end.
Both were strong, and neither had managed to wipe out the other.
The paymasters paid them to fight while watching from behind the scenes, amusing themselves by counting the casualties of the two shinobi clans and achieving their goal of reducing the number of shinobi.
To Yanbai, this was utter nonsense. Couldn't they just live their lives in peace?
Those paymasters hiring the shinobi clans were the real culprits, paying to watch two clans put on a "cockfight."
"Right now, the Hagoromo Clan seems unable to match the Senju Clan, so their employer spent more money to hire the Uchiha Clan as well, leaving our Senju Clan fighting two against one. The missions are all a pretext. Their real goal is to thin the ranks of every one of our clans."
Yanbai said bluntly, "They're practically paying to take our lives. If this keeps up, none of us will benefit."
Hearing Yanbai's analysis, which bordered on outright insubordination, Butsuma Senju set down his teacup and folded his arms. He stared at Yanbai and could not help sighing. "What you say makes a great deal of sense. But what can we change?"
Shinobi did not engage in productive labor. They possessed strength and earned payment by accepting missions, making their living that way.
How many would willingly live like the struggling common folk?
The fighting between clans was, in truth, all rooted in competition for resources and conflicting missions.
With casualties on both sides, mutual suspicion was inevitable. To survive, everyone could only keep fighting.
Only through battle could their clansmen continue to grow stronger under the law of the jungle, where the fittest survived.
As for making peace with enemy clans, each side had already killed so many of the other's children. How could reconciliation possibly happen?
While you grew stronger, other clans grew stronger too. Even if you did not want to fight, others would still attack you. That was simply how helpless life in this world was.
Before you continue