Konoha's main gate.
After rushing for two full days from Hōzuki Castle, Kakashi finally returned here. This time, he didn't say much. After registering at the gate, he hurried straight to the Hokage Tower.
"Tsunade-sama, this is bad!"
Tsunade was slacking off in her office when she suddenly saw Kakashi burst in. Her instinct was to pretend to be busy, but then she noticed his left eye—and the fact that he had returned alone this time.
Where were Kamizuki Hikari and Maito Gai?
With that thought in mind, Tsunade didn't care if her slacking was exposed. She quickly stood up. "ANBU, secure the perimeter! Without my permission, no one is allowed to approach!"
"Kakashi, what happened?"
Kakashi caught his breath for a few moments before speaking. "Hikari entered the Box of Ultimate Bliss and then vanished. I had Gai escort Temari and Kankurō back to Sunagakure. As for the Akatsuki... they've already captured Gaara. Their plan has begun!"
What!
Hearing this intelligence, Tsunade's mind went blank for a split second before she issued orders.
"Summon Shikaku and Jiraiya immediately!"
---
The ANBU moved quickly, as expected.
Shikaku and Jiraiya arrived promptly. Upon seeing Kakashi, both men instantly realized something serious had gone wrong.
"Kakashi, your eye?"
"It was taken by a masked man from the Akatsuki!" Kakashi reached up to cover his left eye. Thinking about that masked man now gave him an uneasy feeling.
He felt the masked man was strangely familiar.
"My situation isn't important. What's critical is that without Hikari's suppression, the Akatsuki is very likely to launch a large-scale capture of the tailed beasts. In my capacity as Hokage advisor, I'll have Kurotsuchi report to Ōnoki and convene the Five Kage Summit!"
Tsunade nodded. "That's fine—desperate times call for desperate measures!"
"The Five Kage Summit is a good proposal. I'll summon the Raikage and Mizukage next. As for the Kazekage..." When it came to Sunagakure, Tsunade didn't know what to say.
Ever since the Fourth Kazekage was killed by Orochimaru back then, Sunagakure still hadn't found a suitable candidate for Kazekage. This alone showed how severely short on reserve talent the village was.
"Forget it. Just send a message to Suna—they can send whoever they want; it doesn't matter."
Tsunade didn't think much of Sunagakure's strength. But when facing the Akatsuki, they needed to unite every possible force. No matter how small, Sunagakure was still an ally.
More importantly, Tsunade had to consider the possibility that this war might severely weaken the other shinobi villages. In that case, Sunagakure—which had avoided the fighting—would become Konoha's next enemy.
Preventing that in advance was a Hokage's duty.
"The problem now is how to deal with those Akatsuki members."
"The ordinary S-rank missing-nin are relatively easier to handle. It's the other one—Tobi, who excels in space-time ninjutsu—and Nagato with the Rinnegan. Those two are threats that even Hikari had to be wary of."
Thinking about it, even with Hikari's strength, he hadn't been confident of victory against the Six Paths of Pain. Tsunade didn't believe her own power surpassed his.
Originally, Konoha had Kakashi's Mangekyō Sharingan as an asset, but this time, the enemy had taken that too.
This was big trouble.
"Their goal is to collect the tailed beasts. How about I take Naruto to Mount Myōboku ahead of time? With his current strength, he's already capable of beginning to learn senjutsu." Jiraiya voiced his idea.
If Naruto was placed on Mount Myōboku, it wouldn't be easy for Nagato to find him.
However, doing so would essentially use the entire Konoha as Naruto's shield. This seemed somewhat unfair to Konoha, so he was hesitant.
"That's fine—let's do it!"
"The priority right now is to prevent the Akatsuki from collecting all nine tailed beasts. Otherwise, the entire world will have to submit to them. At that point, the shinobi world would truly be finished!"
The current system in the shinobi world had been maintained for many years. Tsunade wouldn't claim it was perfect, but she could say with certainty that Nagato's approach was wrong.
Imposing peace on the shinobi world through one person's power might indeed bring temporary peace.
But that kind of peace was far too fragile.
A proper system was the foundation of true peace. Relying on a single individual for it was utterly irresponsible.
"Effective immediately, Konoha enters Level One Combat Readiness. All shinobi on missions are to complete their tasks as soon as possible and return quickly. Every extra person means extra strength."
"Yes!"
No one objected to the proposal.
"Shikaku, do you have any other thoughts?" Tsunade asked.
Shikaku thought for a moment. "Tsunade-sama has covered everything thoroughly. But should we evacuate the civilians? If the Akatsuki comes, Konoha...?"
"No need for now. If trouble arises, we'll face it first. If we can defeat them, the shinobi world will naturally be at peace. If we fail, then the civilians' lives will be in their hands anyway—evacuating or not won't make much difference."
Tsunade rejected Shikaku's suggestion.
Evacuating civilians sounded simple, but Konoha had been established for many years. If the people truly left because of danger, would they come back?
Konoha wasn't just a shinobi village—it was a village with a large civilian population.
If they ordered civilians to flee before even seeing the enemy, wouldn't that clearly tell the enemy they lacked confidence in victory?
Tsunade couldn't say this outright, but it was what a Hokage had to do.
In her eyes, both shinobi and civilians were part of Konoha. Since shinobi could sacrifice for the village, civilians could too.
"If there's nothing else, pass the orders down."
"Wait a minute!"
A relatively young voice rang out. Tsunade looked behind Jiraiya and widened her eyes.
There, in the seat where Hikari often sat, a girl who didn't look very old was sitting with a serious expression, staring at them.
"You've talked so much, but you haven't said anything about how to rescue Hikari-senpai."
"And you, Kakashi—you left Hikari-senpai behind there and came back alone. That doesn't align with your ideals at all. Now I have reason to suspect you deliberately abandoned him and ran away."
Yakumo's voice echoed through the room, and everyone instantly grew wary.
Seeing how young Yakumo appeared, Shikaku glanced at the others and realized none of them knew her. Given her clear close relationship with Hikari, he wasn't sure how to handle the situation for a moment.
"Little girl, who are you?" Jiraiya asked with a grinning smile, trying to ease her guard with his friendly expression.
"Calling me a little girl? You don't have the right, you creepy old man." Yakumo glanced at Jiraiya disdainfully. "So ugly, always peeping in women's baths, and you call yourself a Sannin? I think Ero-sennin suits you better!"
Jiraiya clutched his chest—he felt like if Yakumo said a few more words, he'd have a heart attack.
This girl was so young, but how could her words be so venomous!