Despite the sunlight pouring through the window, none of it seemed to touch the room. The warmth of the morning rays failed to reach past the glass panels, it's light unable to diffuse the gloom that gripped the place, rather it only seemed to deepen them as the shadows they created grew darker.
Beneath the shadows of his hat cold eyes peered out, the warmth they held just seconds ago missing, locked onto the door that the three children and a young man had walked through.
It was as if with their departure the grandfatherly old man that they had been talking to had departed with them, and now what sat in his place was someone entirely different. A creature infinitely more jaded and ever so very weary.
Nothing remained of the man that a little girl called Jiji.
Here sat the Third Hokage, the Sandaime, the God among killers.
And it was there, in that quiet empty room, that the Sandaime asked a question.
"Are you sure of this?"
There should have been no one left to answer.
Kakashi had long gone, taking his charges with him, and even his ever-present Anbu guards had left their post at a signal from the Hokage. There was no one left in the room but he.
Someone answered anyway.
"Of course."
It was like the slow ticking of a clock, the rhythmic tapping of his cane that heralded his arrival, the only noise from the otherwise silent intruder, leaving no question to his identity. With silent steps he drifted from the shadows, appearing in the room like a spectre, bandaged arm cradled in his robes.
"For this, we cannot send anybody else." Danzo hobbled over to the seated Kage, still playing the role of the cripple even now in the privacy of this office, away from prying eyes.
"There are others." The Sandaime contradicted, voice flat, not so much cold as sterile, "Perhaps not as suited or capable but-"
"-But nothing." Danzo lowered himself into one of the vacant seats before the Hokage's desk, the tip of his cane cradled in both hands. "Momochi Zabuza may not be the most powerful Shinobi the Mist has ever produced but he comes close.
As an assassin, he is nearly unparalleled. In the land of waves, surrounded on all sides by his element, in a terrain he has grown familiar with, any team we send will either be ripped apart or incur such losses that it will be little more than a pyrrhic victory.
If we desire any chance of flushing him out without suffering heavy casualties we need to send someone capable enough to both track and subdue him in a one-on-one confrontation. The only individual that suits our needs and is not currently involved in a crucial mission is Hatake Kakashi."
"I fear," Danzo carried on after a moment's pause, "that our failure to anticipate the recent developments at the Waves has left us ill-positioned to react to the situation. We have little other choice."
"What of your precious Root?" Hiruzen demanded, still not taking his eyes off the door. "Can they not take care of this?"
"No. I have none stationed in the Wave at the present. At least none that can hope to fight the likes of Zabuza and come out alive. The majority of my operatives are primarily infiltration specialists, Hiruzen, you know this.
They were never meant to engage in open combat and are ill-equipped to handle someone of Zabuza's calibre. The precious few that are, are currently stationed elsewhere, and I can't risk recalling them from their current assignments without compromising both them and their missions."
The words Danzo spoke were not something Hiruzen hadn't heard before. He had been told the same thing by the very same man himself a little more than a week ago when the situation was first brought to his attention. But if Danzo felt any disgruntlement at being forced to recite the information for a second time he showed no signs of it, his single working eye continued to observe his Hokage's stone-faced expression as he spoke, whose eyes had remained locked onto the door.
When he finally finished speaking, a silence drifted between the two.
Danzo, content to wait for the other to break it first, remained seated in his chair while Hiruzen appeared to not even have noticed Danzo had finished speaking.
At long last, what felt like a small eternity later, the Sandaime pulled his eyes away from the door and set them upon his oldest friend. "…And there was no one else we could have sent?" Though he already knew the answer, Hiruzen felt the need to ask anyway.
"And pray tell, who?" Danzo questioned plainly, "Who else is there? Jiraiya perhaps? Or maybe you'd like to call back Tsunade once again? The first is missing, again I might add, while the other is more likely to spit in our faces than agree to help. No old friend, there is no one else available to us."
"There is Tenzo." Though Sarutobi looked doubtful at his own suggestion. "Though I suppose we can't afford to risk exposing his abilities so early."
"No, we cannot." Danzo agreed. "Even if we were willing to, I'm not confident enough in his ability to accomplish this mission. Tenzo, powerful he may be, but the Demon of the Mist had survived far worse in the past. We need someone to guarantee success without incurring any losses, which is what makes Hatake so suited for the task.
Both S-rank ninjas and those who can fight them are rare even in the best of times, and these days certainly aren't. Hatake is one of the very few we have left, he is too valuable an asset to keep off the field for long. Already my spies tell me that his absence has been noted, and if he were to stay away for too long I fear that others may see it as a sign of weakness."
The illusion of Konoha's power, something that the two of them had spent almost every day of the last twelve years trying to maintain. Since the night the nine-tailed fox broke free from its prison.
It was impossible to completely convey the scale of devastation Konoha had suffered that day. It was the single biggest disaster the Leaf had ever suffered bar none and even today, over a decade later, the village has yet to recover from its wounds.
To put it plainly, Konoha had barely managed to survive as a nation afterwards.
The demon fox had killed so many of them, devastated so much of their population, that the Leaf simply did not have the numbers to sustain itself, not when they had yet to recuperate the losses suffered from the war. Had any of the other villages ever learned the true extent of the damage they had suffered, Konoha may very well have ceased to exist.
The only reason they managed to survive for so long was because the other villages were plagued with their own set of problems. The remainder of the Five Great Villages had also emerged from the same war Konoha had, suffering even greater losses than the Leaf, and even beyond that had their set off worries occupying their attention to pay much mind to what happened elsewhere.
The Mist were embroiled in a civil war and were far too busy killing each to take notice of their old enemy's weakness. The Sand were not only allies to the Leaf but they also suffered from their own internal issues.
A scarcity of fertile land meant they lacked the resources to sustain a larger population, keeping their numbers the smallest out of all the Great Villages. Coupled with deteriorating relationships with their Daimyo, along with troubles controlling their own tailed-beast, meant they could ill afford to take advantage of the weakness of others. The death of their Kage a couple of years back only exasperated their issues.
The Stone suffered the biggest losses out of all the villages during the war, and from the Leaf no less. And while eager to take revenge, they were also skittish, the lesson taught to them by the hands of the Yondaime the last time they pointed their blades at the Leaf was not so easily forgotten. So while they may have wanted vengeance, they were not willing to commit themselves to another war against the Leaf unless their victory was certain.
Out of the Five Great Hidden Village, it was the Cloud that presented the greatest risk to Konoha. They, out of all the Hidden Villages, were the only ones in the right position to take complete advantage of the Leaf's weakened state, and they almost had. It was only thanks to the back-breaking effort from the survivors of the Kyuubi's attack that managed to stop them from trying.
In the face of the devastation they suffered, the Shinobi of Konoha refused to show any weakness. Despite the steep drop in the numbers, the village continued to maintain the status quo.
After but a single day to recover, Konoha had resumed accepting missions, taking every assignment offered to them by clients, sustaining the same level of activity they had before the attack.
And though it took every Shinobi and Kunoichi left with four working limbs – sometimes not even that – working double shifts to make it work, they managed to pull it off.
All so that they may show the world that though Konoha bleeds, it was still strong.
And it had worked.
=================
AN :
After a long wait, I have finally started what I consider my best work so far. I have been preparing for a while before beginning to write it. This fanfic is called:
Naruto: Crimson Flash
Naruto was born with hair as red as his mother's but with the face and intellect of his father, the Fourth Hokage. Will the revolution he brings lead to the world's salvation or its destruction?
For now, it's available on P atreon, but it will be a while before I publish it on Webnovel.
Link :
P atreon.com/sybife