In Konoha's eighth year, summer was almost upon them.
The smell of fresh paint had yet to fade from the Konoha Military Police Force's East District branch building, but the people coming and going already carried themselves differently from those in the older branches nearby. Their backs were straight, their footsteps heavy. One sweep of their eyes over the streets made everyone, from wealthy shopkeepers to humble street vendors, think twice.
On the third floor, beside the branch chief's office, a small meeting room had recently been cleared out. Yinglang sat at the head of the table, with seven or eight people seated below him. Some were familiar faces in police uniforms; others were new, but all had bright eyes and sat straight.
"From now on, we need to make our rules in the East District more firmly established." Yinglang tapped the tabletop, speaking unhurriedly. "The people we already have aren't enough. Our reach isn't long enough, and our eyes aren't sharp enough."
His gaze swept over the unfamiliar faces. They were all young Uchiha whom he had ordered Yutian to secretly screen and observe over the past six months before transferring or "poaching" them. Their families were either peripheral offshoots of Elder Xuan's faction, or they had suffered at Yuanguang's hands and were dissatisfied with how the clan currently operated. What they shared was that they could fight, dared to put themselves on the line, and weren't stupid. Most importantly, they had stood up to testing and had some interest in "Branch Chief Yinglang" himself, or in the future he could offer them.
"Jian, Long, Deng." Yinglang named several squad leaders who had already been serving in the East District. "Each of you gets two new people. I picked them from the clan's other squads and the training grounds.