Main World, Konoha Year 16, winter.
The bitter wind swept fine grains of snow like knives across the wastelands along the Land of Fire's northern border, and across the taut nerves of the entire shinobi world. Years of friction, confrontations, border clashes, and struggles over resources had piled up like dry kindling until, at a moment no one could precisely predict, a spark-perhaps the assassination of a noble in a small country, perhaps an armed clash over a disputed mineral vein, perhaps merely a deliberate provocation by some ambitious schemer-set it all ablaze.
The First Shinobi World War erupted with a roar in a bizarre atmosphere in which every power had both "expected it" and been "caught off guard."
Unlike the chaotic war in Shinobi World No. 1, which had begun early because of Toyotomi Yinglang's interference and was full of uncertainties, this war in the Main World was closer to a product of "historical inertia." It was the eruption of the conflicts and swelling ambitions accumulated by the great nations and major ninja villages since the end of the Warring States period, and of their dissatisfaction with the fragile balance established by the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju. Most of its leading participants were the Second Kage-men who had fought through the final years of the Warring States period, inherited the last wishes of their elder brothers or teachers, and were now in their prime or at the height of their power.
Along the Land of Fire's border facing the Land of Frost, Kumogakure's "A" and "B" duo had yet to make a name for themselves, but the Third Raikage was in his prime. His physique and Lightning Release were unrivaled in the shinobi world, his temper was as fierce as fire, and he had long coveted the fertile lands