The Tailed Beasts, because of their immense power, were known throughout the ninja world as "walking natural disasters."
Even though they lacked a systematic form of ninjutsu, their vast chakra alone could crush any ninja below the Kage level.
Only the elite jonin of the great villages could barely put up a fight against them.
After being sealed within a Jinchuriki, a ninja could not only use the Tailed Beast's chakra but also perform ninjutsu with hand seals.
Although the power of most ninjutsu could not compare to the Tailed Beasts' ultimate attack, the Tailed Beast Bomb, due to their smaller size, a perfect Jinchuriki's strength was actually superior to that of the beast itself.
What's more, Mito Uzumaki specialized in sealing jutsu, which was a perfect counter to the Tailed Beasts.
Even if all the Jinchuriki from the other four great villages were to attack her at once, they would be hard-pressed to gain any advantage.
If the war were to truly reach that stage, it would be described as something far more than just a "Great Ninja War."
For Li Anshi, he didn't much care what happened to the ninja world, as long as it didn't affect him.
But Tsunade was different.
After so many years together, she had become an indispensable part of his future life.
If she were to be harmed in this war, it was entirely possible that Li Anshi would unleash an "apocalyptic war."
Yes, a war to single-handedly annihilate all the ninja villages and even all the ninjas in the world!
"Don't worry. Don't you trust me?"
"With my strength, even if I face Hanzo of the Salamander head-on, I'm not without a fighting chance!"
"Don't be careless."
Reaching out, Li Anshi rubbed Tsunade's face vigorously. "Tsunade, you're a ninja who has come through a war. You should know the serious consequences of being careless in battle."
"What's more, your 'Yin Seal' isn't fully charged with chakra yet, so your training isn't considered complete."
"Even if you do master it, it just makes you tougher and gives you a few more trump cards for survival. It's not for you to be reckless on the battlefield."
"Alright, alright, I know."
"The moment I'm in danger, I'll activate the spatial mark. After all, besides inheriting my grandfathers' will, I still have my own dreams to fulfill!"
A smile finally appeared on Li Anshi's face.
It wasn't just because of her promise. He also understood from her words that Tsunade had already divided her life's goal into two parts.
One was inheriting the will of her two Hokage grandfathers, which made her strive to become Hokage and lead Konoha to prosperity.
The other was her own will, which she had now separated from that struggle.
If the old Tsunade was willing to fight for Konoha's rise for her entire life, then the current Tsunade had surely added a time limit to that "fight."
Within that time limit, she was willing to go through fire and water for Konoha.
But after that time limit, her future would be her own to decide.
This was also an alternative kind of "promise" from Tsunade to him.
He had sensed this as well.
If anyone else had said it, he would have scoffed.
How long does a woman's youth last?
To dedicate the best years of one's life to the village, and then only want to get married when one is old and faded—what a nice thought.
But Tsunade was different.
Did he not understand the value of a "Master of Medical Ninjutsu"?
In the future, even when she was seventy or eighty, she would still look like a youthful maiden.
And she could change her size at will, appearing both young and mature.
Tsunade alone could surpass all the other women in the ninja world.
Whether he himself could break through to the Six Paths level and achieve immortality, he wasn't sure before he got there.
However, he was certain he could break through to the Xiantian realm and have a lifespan of over a hundred years.
In the ninja world, where the average lifespan was only thirty to forty years, in his eyes, only Tsunade could accompany him for a sufficiently long time.
In a few decades, when other beauties had become short, fat, or ugly, only his great Tsunade would remain as beautiful as a flower.
"Then I'll be waiting."
"But, Lady Tsunade, don't make me wait too long..."
He stood up, raising an eyebrow at her. "After all, as a medical ninja, you should know that a man's prime only lasts for so long."
"Don't come blaming me later when you can't enjoy it yourself."
His words left Tsunade stunned.
Although she was sixteen now, an age where many of her peers in the ninja world were already mothers of several children, her relationship with him had only gone as far as kissing.
But not having experienced it didn't mean she was ignorant of the matters between men and women.
She was, after all, a "Master of Medical Ninjutsu." Her knowledge of the human body, from dissecting no fewer than a hundred people, was as familiar as it could be.
But that didn't mean her heart was completely unmoved when she heard him say such things.
The sudden ambiguity of his words made her feel an unexpected shyness rise within her.
However, it was only for a moment.
She was, after all, the most famous female ninja in the world.
As a ninja, you could be ignorant of the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, Mito Uzumaki, but you could not be ignorant of the "Master of Medical Ninjutsu" who had brought the art to prominence.
Although the other villages lacked the conditions to train medical ninjas, and their existing ones were all trained from data stolen from Konoha, the ninjas who had survived and continued their careers because of medical ninjutsu all held a sense of respect for the one who had elevated it to its current height.
Therefore, Tsunade quickly composed herself and teased him back, "Heh, who do you think I am?"
"In my hands, if I say you can, you can. Even if you can't, you can!"
"Of course..."
Her eyes swept up and down his form, the corners of her lips curling slightly. "Whether your body can handle it afterwards, that's not within my consideration."
"Cough, cough..."
He had been admiring the blush on her face, but who knew such bold words would come from her mouth, making him cough repeatedly.
"Hahahaha..."
Seeing this, she burst into another round of laughter.
"Heh..."
He shook his head with a wry smile.
"Alright, I can't win against you."
"But don't be the one begging for mercy later. I'd like to see if you're still as stubborn as you are today."
"I'm leaving."
After waving to her, his figure disappeared in an instant.
Tsunade stared at the spot where he had vanished, her mind deep in thought.
Although Anshi was just joking with me today, she thought, what he said is indeed a problem.
A ninja's body, enhanced by chakra, is much stronger than an ordinary person's, but it will still gradually weaken with age.
After I complete my 'Yin Seal' training, I can collect the dissipated physical energy from my body, allowing me to maintain my current state.
If nothing unexpected happens, my physical condition will remain as it is now until I die.
But Anshi is different...
It seems I need to create a sealing jutsu for him, similar to the Yin Seal, based on its principles, to help him maintain his current state...
The thought of directly giving him the Yin Seal had crossed her mind.
But she also knew that his chakra couldn't be used for ninjutsu.
Let alone the five elemental releases, he couldn't even perform the most basic Three Basic Jutsu.
Up to now, the only ninjutsu she knew he had learned was the "Flying Thunder God Technique."
This meant that it wasn't that he couldn't learn ninjutsu, but that his chakra was not compatible with the prevalent "Five-Element Releases" of the ninja world.
Therefore, even if he knew the hand seals and chakra flow for a jutsu, he couldn't cast it.
Tsunade guessed that his chakra nature might be "space-time," and that he had already completed the nature transformation training for it.
That was why his daggers possessed such terrifying killing power.
Space-time ninjutsu was universally acknowledged as the "strongest" type.
One only had to look at the Second Hokage, who had created the Flying Thunder God Technique, to know this.
In terms of normal strength, he was not much different from the Kage of the other great villages.
In fact, in a head-on battle, the Raikage, who had mastered the Lightning Release Chakra Mode, was even a step stronger.
But when faced with him, who had mastered the Flying Thunder God, the Second Raikage had been killed during the siege.
No, not just the Second Raikage, but also the Gold and Silver Brothers.
Three top-tier Kage-level powerhouses had been taken down by him.
This showed just how terrifying he was.
However, I don't know much about space-time. Even after reading through the creative philosophy of the Flying Thunder God, I couldn't sense any spatial fluctuations.
Without sensing them, how can I create a space-time Yin Seal that is compatible with Anshi?
With this doubt in her heart, Tsunade turned and entered her tent, beginning to organize the herbs and refine them into the antidote for the salamander poison.
According to what he had said, Danzo would arrive here in at most a day or two.
Before that, she needed to create the illusion that she was not short on the antidote he held.
This was something she had learned from him.
It was a matter of "human nature"!
If someone knew that something they possessed was of great use to you, then even if that thing was useless to them, they would demand an exorbitant price to obtain something beneficial for themselves.
In fact, some extreme individuals might even prefer to destroy what they had rather than give it to others.
But if they knew that what they had was of little or no use to others, then they would not care so much about it and could give it away freely.
This perhaps echoed a saying he knew from his previous life—
This world was just one giant siphon effect.
Money flowed to those who didn't lack it.
Suffering flooded those who were already suffering.
As long as she made Danzo believe that she was not short on the antidote, and that everything that had happened before was just her retaliation against him, then he would not value the antidote in his hands so highly.
Otherwise, if he were to find out that the stronghold here did not have enough antidote to sustain a war, then their positions would be reversed.
It was undeniable that by exposing his plot and promising not to abandon everyone at the stronghold, Tsunade had won the allegiance of all the ninjas here.
However, she also knew that just as these ninjas could pledge their loyalty to her for saving them, if Danzo were to arrive on the battlefield with enough antidote, he could also use it to pull them over to his side.
It was true that the ninjas at this stronghold could not have a good impression of the man who had treated them as sacrificial pawns.
But no matter what, he was still a high-ranking official of the village, one of Konoha's only four elders.
In terms of status, he was second only to the Third Hokage.
And according to the rules of the ninja world, if the higher-ups were implementing a strategy that was beneficial to the village, they were fully entitled to sacrifice some ninjas as "bait."
In fact, some missions explicitly stated that the ninjas carrying them out were all "bait."
They had to perform their role as "bait" well, using their lives to protect the real mission operatives.
Once the mission was completed, all their sacrifices would have value.
After death, they could be buried in the "Memorial Stone," the resting place of the village's "heroes," and be remembered by everyone.
But if the mission failed, or if they refused to carry it out, they would be branded as "failures," and in more serious cases, they would be killed to prevent the leakage of mission intelligence.
If, before Danzo's arrival, Tsunade could have retreated to Konoha with these ninjas under the pretext of the village's inaction, now that the village had sent the one responsible for all this to the front lines, she could no longer do so.
Otherwise, it would be an act of treason.
Although her medical ninjutsu was superb, she was, in the end, only one person.
If, during a battle, only a few people were poisoned by the salamander, she could use the A-rank medical ninjutsu, the Mystical Palm Technique, to extract all the toxins from their bodies and heal them.
But once the number of poisoned people exceeded ten, reaching dozens or even hundreds, even she could not perform an A-rank jutsu that many times.
Therefore, she was determined to get the antidote in Danzo's hands.
At the same time, she was also considering how to make him "die for Konoha" in this war...