Soldier Pills

With the Uchiha Clan's situation weighing on his mind, Tianyun Hyuga had no desire to talk to Naruto Uzumaki as they ate at Ichiraku Ramen. He hurried through dinner, then sent Naruto Uzumaki on his way.

After returning home, Tianyun Hyuga continued thinking about the Uchiha Clan's situation.

First, he needed to gather intelligence on the Uchiha Clan so he could pin down exactly when they would be wiped out.

Tianyun Hyuga thought this would be fairly simple. His Transformation Technique was now incredibly powerful, so he could turn his Shadow Clones into little birds and have them keep watch near the Uchiha Clan's grounds. That would give him the intelligence he needed, making the first problem the easiest.

Next, he had to prepare to obtain a pair of Uchiha eyes under the watchful gazes of Uchiha Itachi, Shimura Danzō, and Obito Uchiha.

That would not be particularly troublesome either. He only wanted an ordinary pair of Sharingan from the Uchiha Clan, not a high-level pair, and the clan had plenty of ordinary Sharingan.

Finally, of course, there was the question of how to get away with them. That was what Tianyun Hyuga found most troublesome, because Uchiha Itachi, Obito Uchiha, and Shimura Danzō were all people he could not afford to cross.

Getting the Sharingan would be easy; taking them away would not. Shimura Danzō was collecting Sharingan himself, and Uchiha Itachi and Obito Uchiha might not let anyone else take them either. This was the problem Tianyun Hyuga needed to study carefully.

He lay in bed thinking until the early hours of the morning before finally coming up with a decent idea. He decided to start sending Shadow Clones to monitor the Uchiha Clan tomorrow. At the same time, he needed to earn more money and strengthen himself in preparation for any unexpected developments.

"Money..." Tianyun Hyuga sighed and closed his eyes to rest. There were very few ways for him to make money right now, and earning it quickly was simply impossible. Thinking about it any further would be useless. He might as well get a good night's sleep and look for business opportunities outside tomorrow.

Tianyun Hyuga had only just lain down and closed his eyes when he suddenly... sat up in bed. Then he slapped himself hard across the face and cursed, "I'm so... stupid! How did I not think of something like this...?"

With that, he pulled the box of Soldier Pills Tiesheng had bought for him from beside his bed. His eyes gleamed as he stared at the pills, as though they were a pile of money.

Of course, in Tianyun Hyuga's eyes, the Soldier Pills really were a pile of money. All he had to do was enhance them and put them up for sale, and they would definitely fetch a high price.

He had slapped himself because he could not believe how stupid he had been. Weapons and medicine were clearly much the same sort of thing, yet the idea had never occurred to him. He could not help being furious at his own stupidity.

Holding the Soldier Pills in his hand, Tianyun Hyuga examined them carefully. He found that the ones Tiesheng had bought were indeed better than ordinary Soldier Pills. They probably cost a hundred thousand each, making them mid-range Soldier Pills.

He checked the enhancement fee and found that it was also around a hundred thousand. Tianyun Hyuga was not short of that much money right now, so he simply enhanced all ten Soldier Pills in the box Tiesheng had bought, spending a million.

After enhancing the Soldier Pills, Tianyun Hyuga immediately tried one as an experiment.

Five seconds after swallowing it, Tianyun Hyuga felt the chakra inside him begin to surge. His originally Chunin-level chakra skyrocketed, gradually rising until it had doubled before finally stopping.

Tianyun Hyuga was delighted. With effects this powerful, he felt that even a million would not be too expensive for one Soldier Pill. They would earn him more than selling weapons. He was so excited that he could barely sleep, and he sat beside his bed thinking about how to make money from the pills.

Ten minutes later, Tianyun Hyuga realized, to his frustration, that only a deal with the Third Hokage would let him obtain a large sum of money quickly. Other clans and individuals simply could not come up with that much.

With a helpless sigh, Tianyun Hyuga could only lie down and rest for now. Tomorrow, he would get another thousand Soldier Pills, enhance them, and strike a deal with the Third Hokage. The reason for his sigh was that the Third Hokage was a tough customer. He would definitely haggle tomorrow, and Tianyun Hyuga would have to engage him in a battle of words.

Thinking about how difficult the Third Hokage would be, Tianyun Hyuga hurried to sleep so he could conserve his energy.

Soldier Pills were among the medicines every ninja in Konoha needed to carry. Buying a thousand Soldier Pills would be easy for Tianyun Hyuga, but if he wanted a thousand Intermediate Soldier Pills, he would have to go to the Nara Clan. Only the Nara Clan's pharmacies had enough in stock.

Naturally, Tianyun Hyuga did not go to the Nara Clan to buy Intermediate Soldier Pills himself. Instead, he sent out dozens of Shadow Clones, having them repeatedly change their appearances and buy Intermediate Soldier Pills from the Nara Clan's shops. Each identity bought no more than twenty pills.

It took a full two hours for Tianyun Hyuga to buy all the Soldier Pills he needed. Once he had them, he headed toward the Hokage Building with the thousand pills.

In the Hokage Office, the Third Hokage had been suffering a terrible headache over the Uchiha Clan's situation lately. He had originally wanted to sit down and talk things over with them, but he had never expected the clan to send none of their children to school and even withdraw every child already enrolled. They were clearly showing that they had no intention of negotiating peace with Konoha.

With things having reached this point, there was nothing the Third Hokage could do about the Uchiha Clan. On top of that, Shimura Danzō was adamantly demanding that the matter be left to him, so the Third Hokage went along with it and handed the troublesome affair over to Shimura Danzō.

Although Shimura Danzō's methods were extreme, he was still working for Konoha, after all. Reconciling the Uchiha Clan with Konoha had become difficult, and the Third Hokage could only hope that Shimura Danzō would resolve the matter and keep Konoha, which had only recently grown strong, from falling into weakness again.

Just as the Third Hokage was brooding over the problem, he heard the office door open. He turned to see Tianyun Hyuga running over.

"What, you finally get five days off, but you can't sit still and want to take on a mission?" the Third Hokage asked directly.

"Who wants to do your lousy missions?" Tianyun Hyuga scoffed as he walked over. "I've got something to discuss. I'm here to talk business with you."

The Third Hokage was utterly speechless. He glanced at Tianyun Hyuga, who was carrying on without waiting for a reply, and took a puff from his pipe. "You really have no manners. You show me, the Hokage, no respect at all. Are you even a citizen of Konoha?"

Tianyun Hyuga casually picked a seat beside the desk and sat down. Curling his lip, he said, "Today, I'm here as a businessman to discuss a deal with you. Don't try to play the personal connection card, all right?"

"Fine, fine, fine. If you have something to say, hurry up and say it. Stop bothering me..." Somewhat helpless, the Third Hokage tried to send Tianyun Hyuga on his way.