The first conference room on the third floor of the Hokage Building.
The hands of the clock on the wall ticked.
Tick. Tock.
Twenty-nine minutes and forty seconds.
The air was stifling, as if it were about to freeze.
Konoha's core leadership filled the seats around the enormous oval mahogany table.
During meetings, this room was usually as noisy as a marketplace. The major clans would argue themselves red in the face over a share of missions.
Today, no one spoke.
Hiruzen Sarutobi sat in the first seat on the left.
His head was lowered, his eyes fixed on the steaming cup of plain water before him.
He clenched his teeth until his jaw ached. The muscles in his cheeks bulged stiffly.
Half-dried mud still clung to his trouser legs.
Mitokado Homura took off his round-framed glasses and scrubbed them furiously with a white cotton cloth.
After wiping them five or six times, he put them back on.
His hands shook so badly that one temple of the glasses jabbed the corner of his eye. He sucked in a sharp breath of pain.
Utatane Koharu rested both hands on her knees.
All ten fingernails dug into her palms. Her lightly made-up face was now deathly pale.
Across from them sat the heads of the major shinobi clans.
Uchiha Retsu folded his arms, his fingers unconsciously scraping against the armor on his forearm with a grating clack.
Hyūga Tensō sat with his eyes closed like a wooden statue, but his legs trembled slightly and uncontrollably beneath his loose kimono.
No one drank. No one whispered to a neighbor.
Everyone kept the wall clock locked in the corners of their eyes.
The sight of Danzo being stepped on and dragged away through the muddy water remained seared into everyone's minds.
The ruins of the Shimura Clan were still smoking.
No one wanted to be the next person eating mud in the square.
Tick.
Twenty-nine minutes and fifty-five seconds.
The sound of military boots striking the wooden floor came from outside the door.
Unhurried. Step by step.
As if each step landed on the hearts of everyone in the conference room.
The footsteps stopped outside the door.
"Creak."
The heavy, iron-bound solid wood doors were pushed open.
Shu Shiraishi walked in.
He had changed into a clean, black, short-sleeved turtleneck. The wound on his left shoulder had been bandaged again.
But the pungent stench of blood seemed to cling to him, filling the entire conference room in an instant.
Shu Shiraishi wasn't wearing the Hokage hat. He casually tossed it onto the coat rack by the entrance.
He walked to the head seat at the far end of the long table.
It was where the First Hokage and the Second Hokage had sat.
Shu Shiraishi pulled out the high-backed leather chair. Its legs scraped across the floor with a dull sound.
He sat down.
His back rested against the chair. He raised his legs and crossed his left over his right.
His posture was as casual as if he were sitting on his own kang at home.
Not one of the high-ranking officials filling the room dared breathe too loudly.
"Is everyone here?"
Shu Shiraishi swept his gaze across the long table.
No pleasantries, none of that hypocritical talk about doing things "for the village."
"Since none of you died on the way here, let's begin."
Shu Shiraishi raised a hand and slapped a thick parchment scroll onto the mahogany table.
"Smack!"
The dull impact made Mitokado Homura's shoulders jerk.
"In the past, whenever something important came up at a meeting, the Jonin Commander would vote on it."
Shu Shiraishi leaned back and pulled a cigarette from the pack on the table. He didn't light it, only played with it in his hand.
"You could spend three months bickering over some bullshit military funding allocation."
"The corpses on the front lines were rotting and stinking in the mud, and you were still counting how many Genin your clans had sent and whether you were taking a loss."
Hiruzen snapped his head up.
The words were a slap in the face to every member of the traditional leadership.
But he didn't dare make a sound and lowered his head again. Beneath the table, his fingernails gouged a white mark in the wood.
"Too slow. Too stupid."
Shu Shiraishi broke the cigarette in two and casually tossed it onto the table.
Tobacco scattered everywhere.
"Starting today, the Jonin Commander voting system is abolished."
The words burst over the long table like a muffled thunderclap.
Mitokado Homura's eyes went wide as saucers.
"Abolished? Th-this won't do!" Homura stammered, his voice trembling. "This is the democracy Lord First established..."
Shu Shiraishi's gaze cut toward him like a knife.
Homura's voice stopped abruptly, like that of a duck being strangled. He hurriedly lowered his head, avoiding Shu's gaze.
"I'm not discussing this with you. I'm giving an order."
Shu Shiraishi leaned forward, bracing his elbows on the table.
"We're at war. Starting today, Konoha will be placed under a military dictatorship."
"No votes. I decide, and you carry it out."
"If anyone objects, you can leave now. There's still room for one more in the mud pit in the square."
The conference room fell deathly silent.
Not even breathing could be heard.
Using Danzo's fate as a threat was simple and brutal, but it worked without fail.
Hyūga Tensō kept his mouth tightly shut, terrified that the sound of his teeth chattering would escape.
Shu Shiraishi unrolled the parchment.
It bore the Hokage's bright red seal.
"Next, the second matter."
Shu Shiraishi tapped his finger on the parchment. It made a dull tapping sound.
"The Konoha heavy industrialization reform plan."
All the high-ranking officials present were stunned.
What heavy industrialization? Didn't shinobi take missions, kill people, and escort merchant caravans?
"The old model of village heads leading armed brawls has reached its end."
Shu Shiraishi picked up the tea mug on the table and took a sip of cold water.
"The shinobi villages of the four nations could counterattack at any time. How are you going to defend against them with the petty little skirmishes you're fighting now?"
"War is fought with steel, gunpowder, and Chakra energy."
Shu Shiraishi stood up.
He walked behind Uchiha Retsu.
Every muscle in Uchiha Retsu's body tensed instantly. His back went ramrod straight. Fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead.
Shu Shiraishi reached out and patted Uchiha Retsu on the shoulder.
"Uchiha Clan."
Retsu shot to his feet, his chair clattering to the floor.
"Present!" His voice was so loud it cracked.
"That Fire Style you're so proud of-spitting it at wooden posts every day, is that fun?"
Shu Shiraishi pressed down on his shoulder, forcibly pushing him back into his chair.
"Starting tomorrow, the Uchiha Clan will take over the steel mill in the west of the village."
"All Fire Style shinobi will enter the blast furnace area in shifts."
"I want your Great Fireballs smelting the hardest refined steel. If you can produce Amaterasu, use it as the main boiler."
Uchiha Retsu was dumbfounded.
The foremost noble clan in the entire Shinobi World, possessors of the Sharingan.
They were supposed to go do dirty labor at a steel mill as boiler workers?
Shu Shiraishi ignored him and walked over to Akimichi Chōza.
Chōza's enormous body was huddled in his chair, looking pitiful.
"Akimichi Clan. You use the Multi-Size Technique to fight over barbecue?"
Shu Shiraishi tapped the table in front of Chōza.
"Your entire clan will be assigned to the First Engineering Team. From now on, when the village builds high-rises or fortifications, you'll be the cranes. One person will do the work of ten machines. You'll get all the food you can eat."
The fat on Chōza's face quivered violently twice.
"Y-yes..." he stammered in agreement.
Shu Shiraishi walked around the long table.
With every step he took, another shinobi clan was stripped of its lofty mantle.
"Aburame Clan, stop taking assassination missions. Send all your bugs to the biochemical laboratory to extract neurotoxins. I want biological weapons mass-produced."
"Hyuga Clan, don't just use the Byakugan to stare into women's bathhouses. Form a geological survey team. Locate every iron and coal deposit on the borders of the Land of Fire within a month."
"Inuzuka Clan, wash those Ninja Dogs of yours clean. Prepare them for mechanical prosthetic modifications. I want an armored war dog unit."
The clan heads around the long table were numb.
How was this reform?
This was knocking shinobi completely off their lofty pedestals and turning them into unfeeling industrial workhorses!
The dignity shinobi clans had held for centuries was being ground under Shu Shiraishi's heel.
Shu Shiraishi walked back to the head seat and sat down again.
"All shinobi will stop receiving personal commissions from missions."
He dropped the final bombshell.
"All major shinobi clans will hand over seventy percent of the assets in their clan treasuries within three days. The assets will go into the village's central treasury."
"And all the secret technique scrolls each clan has been hiding away are to be handed over to the Hokage Building to establish a unified database."
Hiruzen finally couldn't hold back.
He gripped the edge of the table with both hands, veins bulging on their backs.
"Shu! You're insane! You're digging out the roots of every clan!"
Hiruzen lowered his voice, a beastlike growl rumbling in his throat.
"If we hand over our assets and secret techniques, what footing will the clans have left? You're forcing everyone to rebel!"
Shu Shiraishi looked at him coldly.
"Rebel?"
He grabbed the coarse ceramic tea mug from the table.
Without warning, he hurled it at Hiruzen.
"Bang!"
The mug shattered against the table's edge in front of Hiruzen.
Scalding tea and shards of ceramic splashed across Hiruzen's face.
Water ran down Hiruzen's chin and into his collar, scalding his skin red.
Hiruzen didn't even dare dodge. He kept his eyes squeezed shut.
"The Shimura Clan is already gone."
Shu Shiraishi's voice was like the King of Hell calling names from his register.
"If the Sarutobi Clan thinks its assets are more important than its lives, I don't mind paying it another visit myself tonight."
It was as if a great iron hammer had struck Hiruzen in the chest.
He fell completely silent. He slumped dejectedly into his chair, gasping for breath.
The plan, which exploited people to the extreme and treated them like beasts of burden, pressed against everyone's chest like a red-hot iron plate.
Hand over their secret techniques. Hand over their money. Their entire clans would become manual laborers.
Refuse, and die.
The atmosphere in the conference room was oppressive to the extreme.
No one dared voice an objection. No one dared stand up and say "no."
Fear spread along the long table like a plague.
Until the shrill scrape of a chair rang out.
"Screech-"
Utatane Koharu stood up.
Her body trembled violently. The bun she usually kept immaculately groomed had mostly come undone. Strands of gray-white hair clung to her forehead, which was slick with cold sweat.
She could no longer endure this humiliation.
She was a disciple of the Second Hokage! A senior advisor to the village!
Now, the tyrant before her was going to sweep away all her power and her clan's interests!
Koharu's eyes were bloodshot, red veins standing out at the corners.
She raised both hands and slammed them down on the mahogany table in front of her.
Bang!
The unfinished tea on the table splashed out from the impact.
It splattered onto Koharu's cuffs.
She pointed at Shu Shiraishi, her shrill voice piercing the deathly silence in the conference room.
"Shu Shiraishi! You're destroying Konoha's foundations!"
"I will never agree to this!"