In Konoha's early days, the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, had been an idealist.
He had proposed transforming the Shinobi World through love, and so he had indeed once promised that people would be free to come and go.
But over the decades, Konoha had been the greatest ninja village, rich in resources and sheltering countless people. No clan had been foolish enough to leave of its own accord.
Now, faced with life or death, Hiruzen Sarutobi unhesitatingly invoked this protective promise from Hashirama Senju, trying to use the authority of the rules to restrain Gengetsu.
Listening to the three men's high-sounding roars below, Gengetsu could not help letting out a disdainful laugh from inside Susanoo.
"You want to leave Konoha? Fine..."
"If your three worthless clans want to get out, I, Uchiha Gengetsu, certainly won't stop you!"
Hiruzen Sarutobi and the other two looked delighted at Gengetsu's words. They had never expected him to relent so easily.
But before their smiles had lasted long, Gengetsu's next words froze their expressions.
"But... the people can go. Everything else stays."
"Every tael of silver you carry, every Explosive Tag, every kunai, even every ninjutsu you've learned and stored in your heads-all of it came from feeding off Konoha for decades!"
"If you're leaving the village, then cough up everything you gained from Konoha, down to the last scrap!"
"Leave all your treasury assets, surrender every secret ninjutsu scroll, and cripple your own chakra pathways and chakra! Do those three things, and I'll open the gates myself and let every member of your three clans leave, young and old!"
As Gengetsu's words fell, an uproar broke out among the three clans' ninja!
"You... what did you say?!"
"Cripple our own chakra pathways? Hand over all our resources? You're sending us to our deaths!"