Konoha: Starting with Sage Mode

Why did the Uchiha clan refuse? Why didn't the Uchiha clan have many good friends in Konoha?

Possessing immense power yet isolated, lacking sufficient strength to advance further, and finding it unrealistic to leave, the Uchiha clan finds themselves in a dilemma—this is the predicament of the Uchiha clan in Konoha.

"The old order is being destroyed little by little. The Uchiha clan must seize the opportunity and take the initiative to participate. However, it is not enough to rely solely on Chizuru and those ambitious juniors. Some of the old guys in the Uchiha clan and I must also take the initiative to participate."

Thinking about the Uchiha clan's current situation in Konoha, Homura Uchiha gradually formed a plan in his mind.

The existing Uchiha clan is quite corrupt. If it wants to be reborn and revitalized, it must dig out the rotten roots, just like Konoha does now.

Although it was painful, it was time for him to make a decision.

The young man he favored was ruthless and cruel. Even his own granddaughter was siding with outsiders. If the Uchiha clan were to fall into his trap when that young man rose to power, they would surely suffer heavy losses.

Rather than being beaten, it's better to cut yourself.

"Since I don't have many years left to live anyway, I'll take on the role of the villain. It's better to leave fewer messes for future generations."

Uchiha Homura looked at the water, which had returned to calm, sighed, and then turned and went into the house.

Soon after, a black cat silently slipped out of Chizuru's house and disappeared into the shadows of the alley.

……

Meanwhile, inside the Konoha embassy.

Chiyo and the other envoys from Sunagakure gathered in Chiyo's room.

At this moment, everyone here had a very somber expression, and some of them had red eyes, as if they had been crying.

"Alright, everyone, cheer up. The Kazekage has already left. Those of us who stay in Konoha are destined for certain doom. There's no time for us to be sad. We must find a way to safely evacuate Konoha as soon as possible."

Chiyo, as the backbone of this delegation, was the first to break the silence.

The Sunagakure delegation did indeed have a way to communicate with Sunagakure Village over long distances. Some of them would use the Shadow Clone Technique before setting off and temporarily seal the shadow clones with a special sealing technique. In case of special circumstances, they would awaken the shadow clones and use the special property that the memories of the shadow clones would be transferred to the original body after the shadow clones disappeared to transmit messages over long distances.

Not long ago, some of them learned about the tragedy at the Sunagakure front headquarters and the death of the Third Kazekage through the memories of their shadow clones.

"These despicable Konoha ninjas actually used the pretense of peace talks to launch a sneak attack on our Sunagakure and even killed the Kazekage. We Sunagakure must make Konoha pay for this in blood..."

As Chiyo spoke, one of the young Sunagakure ninjas, his eyes red, spoke angrily.

He was very agitated, and his voice grew louder and louder.

"Shut up!"

Upon seeing this, Chiyo immediately rebuked him.

The young Sand Village ninja, his eyes red from crying, was reprimanded by Chiyo. His pent-up anger found an outlet, and blinded by rage, he no longer feared Chiyo. Pointing his finger at her nose, he yelled, "Why are you telling me to shut up? Aren't you even a little sad? Well, after the Kazekage's death, the next Kazekage will be…"

Before he could finish speaking, a Sand Village elite Jonin with an eyepatch over his right eye knocked him to the ground, knocking him unconscious. He then respectfully said to Chiyo, whose face was now icy cold, "Elder Chiyo, he was out of his mind. Please forgive him."

"Don't worry, Kurosa, I won't stoop to his level."

Chiyo spoke to the young, conservative elder of Sunagakure, but the murderous intent in her eyes remained undiminished.

As the head of the delegation and the leader of the Sand Village's martial arts faction, when had she ever been insulted like this by her own people? If she weren't worried that killing someone to establish her authority would backfire, she would definitely have made this arrogant brat understand the cruelty of disrespecting elders.

Kurosa said with a smile, "Please bear with us. Our top priority is to leave Konoha as soon as possible. This guy is a bit simple-minded, but he is the best sensory ninja we have here."

"Alright, that's enough. Let's get back to our previous topic: how should we leave Konoha? Let's all share our opinions."

Chiyo said impatiently.

The Third Kazekage is dead, and she, the last Kage-level shinobi of Sunagakure, is in Konoha. She knows better than anyone how dangerous this situation is, and she is under immense pressure.

Fortunately, Konoha still cared about its reputation and did not immediately attack her there. Instead, they deployed a large number of people outside the embassy to keep an eye on them.

Even so, their journey back to Sunagakure was fraught with difficulties.

As expected, Konoha will send a large number of powerful ninjas to hunt them down.

Being in the enemy's stronghold, even Chiyo herself didn't really have any good ideas, let alone anyone else. No one answered the question she had just raised.

The room fell silent once again.

"Perhaps we can call in outside help to get us out of this mess."

After a moment of silence, Kurosa suddenly spoke.

"Oh, do you have a way?"

Upon hearing this, Chiyo's eyes lit up, and she pressed for an answer.

Seeing that no one else spoke, she had originally planned to use these people as expendable pawns to cover her retreat, but she didn't expect that this conservative little guy seemed to have something up his sleeve.

She was particularly impressed by the conservative new elder named Kurosawa. He was a lucky guy who had the opportunity to steal a three-tomoe Sharingan from an Uchiha ninja on the battlefield and successfully transplant it, thus gaining the power of the Sharingan.

He also knows some sealing techniques, which allow him to temporarily seal the Sharingan, thus eliminating the need to worry about the Sharingan constantly consuming chakra because it cannot be shut down.

It was through the power of the Sharingan that he successfully completed several very difficult tasks and was promoted to elder.

However, judging from the current situation, this young elder from a commoner background is probably not as simple as she imagined. It seems that he also has a way to contact people from other ninja villages.

Chapter 223: A Strategic Retreat to Advance – The Sand Village's Tactics

"Actually, it's not exactly an effective method. I just personally believe that the people from other ninja villages won't sit idly by and watch our Sunagakure be destroyed by Konoha. Tohsaka Kirito is too terrifying. If we don't stop him, he might become another ninja god in the future and become a major threat to other ninja villages."

Therefore, other ninja villages need the strength of our Sunagakure. Even though our strength has been greatly reduced, our war potential still exists. As long as Elder Chiyo is still alive, Sunagakure can definitely become a powerful force that can restrain Konoha once again after a period of recuperation.

In short, Sunagakure still has value to other ninja villages.

Seeing that everyone was looking at him, Kurosa quickly spoke up.

Chiyo herself had no solution, so what effective solution could a mere elite Jonin like him possibly have? He could only try to survive by offering his opinions as much as possible.

However, he believed that his judgment was correct.

His years as a spy were not for nothing. Once upon a time, he was just an ordinary civilian ninja in Sunagakure. Although he was intelligent, his background was too poor. He was reduced to cannon fodder right after graduating from the Ninja Academy. Later, he was captured by Konoha Root during a mission and then took a liking to Danzo. From then on, he became a pawn that Danzo planted in Sunagakure.

He knew very well that as a spy, he would face certain death if he were discovered.

In order to survive, he lived cautiously, racking his brains every day to do everything to the best of his ability, so as not to give anyone any leverage.

In addition, he strives to become stronger and get rid of his status as a pawn as soon as possible.

For this reason, he has been secretly sending information to Danzo all these years. In addition, he has also obtained many excellent ninjutsu and training resources through Danzo, and has also used Danzo's power to help him complete various difficult tasks.

The Sharingan in his right eye was the one he had taken from an Uchiha ninja with Danzo's help.

Despite his humble origins, he achieved the strength of an elite Jonin at the young age of 25 and was promoted to the position of elder of Sunagakure. This was all thanks to his constant caution and his sharp mind.

After years of working as a spy, he had long since transformed into a top-notch spy, skilled in collecting and analyzing intelligence.

When he was promoted to the position of elder of Sunagakure and officially became a high-ranking member of Sunagakure, he gained access to a better and larger intelligence platform. He had a deep understanding of the situation in Sunagakure and Konoha, and even had a good understanding of the overall trend of the ninja world.

The death of the Third Kazekage tonight made him realize that the ninja world was changing from a five-power system to one superpower and many strong ones.

These changes all stemmed from a young ninja named Kirito Tohsaka.

This prodigy of Konoha emerged out of nowhere, pulling Konoha back from its decline.

In his view, Kirito Tohsaka has the potential to become the new God of Shinobi, and his killing of the Third Kazekage tonight further proves this point. With such a genius ninja, Konoha will sooner or later reign supreme in the ninja world, allowing Konoha to stand out from the top five and once again become the overlord of the ninja world, regaining the glory of the God of Shinobi when he was alive.

This is not what other ninja villages want to see. What they want to see most is a declining Konoha, not a Konoha that has regained its glory.

The current situation of Sunagakure is extremely dangerous. If Chiyo also falls at the hands of Konoha, Sunagakure will most likely never be able to recover, because Konoha and Sunagakure's enemies will not sit idly by and take advantage of the situation when Sunagakure is without a Kage-level protector.

He estimated that other ninja villages also had the idea of ​​taking advantage of the situation to divide up Sunagakure and strengthen themselves.

However, Sunagakure was too poor, so its remaining strength was still considerable. In addition, with Konoha watching closely from the sidelines, they had neither the interest nor the time to deal with Sunagakure.

Therefore, instead of dividing up Sunagakure, it would be better to give Sunagakure a helping hand now, so that Sunagakure can continue to have the ability to threaten Konoha, thereby relieving some of the pressure from Konoha for them.

As things stand, as long as Chiyo is alive, Sunagakure can still be saved. With some help, they can still cause trouble for Konoha in the future.

Upon hearing Kurosa's analysis, Chiyo couldn't help but express some admiration for him. Among the younger generation in Sunagakure, there are not many with such insight; most are just mediocre individuals who are brave but lack strategy.

It's truly rare to discover a young man as capable and intelligent as Kurosa at such a critical juncture.

But Kurosa was ultimately too young. What he just said made sense, but it was too idealistic and unrealistic.

So she decisively poured cold water on the idea: "What you just said makes some sense, but don't forget, the people from other ninja villages aren't philanthropists. Why would they risk their lives to help us? They won't do a losing business. And we Sunagakure are dirt poor right now, we simply don't have the money to pay the prices those guys are asking for."

Kurosa remained silent despite being splashed with cold water, patiently waiting for Chiyo to come up with a solution.

"Why are you only telling us half the story? If we want other ninja villages to help us, we need to contact them first. Don't you have any way to reach them?"

Chiyomi Kurosa remained silent, and tentatively asked.

She did admire Kurosawa, but Kurosawa was ultimately a conservative and had many suspicious points. His younger brother, Ebizo, had secretly investigated him, but before he could investigate further, he was gone.

"Elder Chiyo, you are joking. This is Konoha. How could I possibly contact people from other ninja villages? Even if this weren't Konoha, I wouldn't have any private channels to contact other ninja villages. If anyone here has that ability, it would have to be you, Elder Chiyo."

Hei Sha smiled wryly, his words perfectly watertight.

To be fair, he did have some private channels for contacting people from other ninja villages, but these private channels all ended up with Sunagakure. These private channels were actually spies from other ninja villages that he discovered within Sunagakure.

If you're in Konoha, the only other ninja village you can truly contact is probably Konoha.

Unfortunately, Danzo is dead, and this spy who had been in single-line contact with Danzo has now lost contact with the organization. He has not been able to contact Root for a long time.

However, this was actually good news for him. Although he lost Danzo's support, he also got rid of Danzo's control. As long as he cleaned up the remaining loose ends, he could openly become a high-ranking elder of Sunagakure and no longer have to live in fear and worry about his identity being exposed.

After all, that Sand Darkness was quite cunning. He had almost been caught red-handed several times, but even if he hadn't been caught, he was sure he was already on Sand Darkness's blacklist.

Fortunately, this Darkness of the Sand is dead, and all clues have been cut off.

Chiyo smiled without saying a word. After her younger brother Ebizo died, the work of the intelligence department almost all fell on her shoulders. All the spy forces that Sunagakure had placed in Konoha over the years also fell into her hands. Naturally, she had a way to contact people from other ninja villages from Konoha.

However, whether they can gain the support of those old foxes after making contact is hard to say.

She couldn't think of any way to get these old foxes to take such a huge risk to support Sunagakure.

As for money, Sunagakure definitely has none left. They do have some ninjutsu, but other major ninja villages probably wouldn't value Sunagakure's half-baked ninjutsu heritage.

If there's one thing Sunagakure can boast about, it's the Puppet Technique, a ninjutsu that Sunagakure is unparalleled in the ninja world.

However, puppetry is not easy to learn and consumes a lot of resources. Compared with various Five Elements Ninjutsu, its cost-effectiveness is really not high.

"With the One-Tailed Beast gone, the only valuable thing Sunagakure has left is its talent pool. But whether it's Rasa or Pakura, they are Sunagakure's hope for a future resurgence, and they absolutely cannot afford to lose them."

Chiyo carefully took stock of Sunagakure's resources and sighed inwardly, increasingly losing hope of gaining the support of other ninja villages.

"Elder Chiyo, we actually have a way to get support from other ninja villages, but this method is very risky, and telling you about it might make you very unhappy."

Seeing that Chiyo had indeed found a way to contact people from other ninja villages, Kurosawa felt relieved, then pretended to be troubled and said...