Konoha: Sage Body

The following day, at around 4am, an emergency meeting was quickly held in the village of Sunagakure.

After receiving the notification, many of the elders of Sunagakure got out of bed and quickly made their way to the round table room in the Kazekage Building. Along the way, they subconsciously asked everyone they knew what emergency had occurred.

Unfortunately, none of them had any idea what was going on.

However, when they arrived in the round table room, they realized that the three of them, Sandaime Kazekage, Chiyo, and Ebizo, were not there, and they suddenly realized that this situation was somewhat serious.

In order to be prepared for the upcoming meeting, they all subconsciously looked at a middle-aged man with blue hair and strange oil paint patterns on his face in the meeting room.

Sayun, currently the strongest puppet master in the village of Sunagakure besides Chiyo and Ebizo, is good at using his family's unique puppet secret techniques, the Curse of the Puppet Technique and the Sand Puppet Technique.

In the village of Sunagakure, the Suna Clan, the family behind Sayun, is the largest landowner in the village of Sunagakure, controlling one-third of the village's commerce and trade. The Suna Clan is also the backbone of the village's puppet masters, supplying the village with many highly skilled puppet masters and puppets.

In terms of strength and status, Sayun is definitely the highest under the three Sandaime Kazekage, Chiyo, and Ebizo, the three Kage-Level powerhouses. He is also the leader of the conservatives and is in constant conflict, both overtly and covertly, with the martial arts faction led by Chiyo.

Unfortunately, due to their strength, the conservatives, led by Sayun, are often at a disadvantage in their encounters with the martial arts faction.

Sayun saw everyone looking at him, but instead of speaking some insider information as everyone expected, he remained composed as usual, sipping tea and saying nothing.

But although he appeared calm on the surface, inside he was already in a state of great turmoil.

In fact, he was actually at a loss as to what had happened, except that something very big had happened in Konoha. It was so big that when Sandaime Kazekage received the news from the spies in Konoha, his face immediately changed, and he immediately summoned Chiyo and Ebizo for a private meeting.

"Damn it, the Suna Clan has worked hard for the village of Sunagakure for so many years and has made countless contributions, but we still can't enter the final decision-making level. The actions of the Sandaime Kazekage are really unfair. I must protest afterwards."

Sayun looked at the other people in the meeting room out of the corner of his eye and thought very unhappily in his heart.

In the village of Sunagakure, although this roundtable room is said to be where the senior management of Sunagakure make collective decisions, it is clear to anyone with half a brain that this roundtable room is merely a place to discuss some less important decisions. The actual location for high-level decisions is not here.

The members who can participate in the real high-level decisions are the advisory group headed by the Kazekage, that is, the Kazekage faction.

Every major decision in the village of Sunagakure is announced after the Kazekage and the two Kazekage advisers have discussed it in advance, and then they come to the round table room to announce it. The elders who come to the round table room are just executors who follow orders.

Over the years, Sayun has always wanted to participate in high-level decisions, not only for his own personal gain, but also for the gain of his family and the conservative faction behind him.

Unfortunately, he has been suppressed by the militant faction led by Chiyo and has not been able to do so.

Fortunately, the Sandaime Kazekage has the mind to balance the forces in the village, otherwise the conservatives would have long been crushed by the militant faction and their morale would have collapsed.

"After all, their strength is not enough. One family with two shadow levels is outrageous. Does that mean most of the luck of the Sunagakure has fallen into the hands of this old woman's family? Moreover, all the talented young people in the village have been brainwashed by these martial arts faction people and have been drawn into their camp early."

Sayun felt a pang of sadness in his heart when he thought about the current situation of the conservatives.

The power of the conservatives was actually not weak, because there were still a lot of ninjas in the village who did not want to fight, or were tired of war.

People are like this. As long as they can get by, who wants to fight and kill? Wouldn't it be nice to live a stable life?

Therefore, the conservatives have a tenacious foothold in the village of Sunagakure.

The conservatives basically control the economic lifeblood of the village, which allows the conservative ninja to occupy nearly 50% of the ninja in Sunagakure. Among them, the jōnin who support the conservatives are not less than the martial arts faction.

However, the conservatives lack sufficient top-level strength.

The lack of Kage-Level powerhouses has always been a thorn in the side of the conservatives in Sunagakure.

Since the establishment of Sunagakure, many Kage-Level powerhouses have been born in the village, but without exception, these Kage-Level powerhouses are all martial artists, and they are all ambitious for external expansion.

It is precisely because of these martial arts Kage-Level powerhouses that Sunagakure has been in constant conflict with Konoha and Iwagakure.

Of course, it is also because of them that they have created many powerful ninjutsu for the Sunagakure village, and the Sunagakure village has been able to develop step by step to become one of the five major ninja villages in the ninja world.

Over the years, the conservatives have always tried to cultivate their own Kage-Level powerhouses, but there are only a handful of talented young people in the Sunagakure village, and they are simply unable to compete with the martial arts faction, which controls the core military power of the village.

Talented ninjas like Rasa, Pakura, Karura, Yashamaru and Sasori, who have recently emerged in the village, have all been taken away by the martial arts faction in advance.

"Now that the Hawk Faction has the child Rasa and no longer has to rely on us for funding, the conservatives are afraid that they are going to have a hard time for a long time."

Sayun worriedly thought.

Rasa is the source of the Sunagakure's current abundant funds. He has awakened the Bloodline Limit of Magnet Release, and the Magnet Release he has awakened is actually the manipulation of the precious metal sand gold.

Because of this, Rasa has been accepted as a personal disciple by the Sandaime Kazekage, who is also a Magnet Release ninja, and has received intensive training from the Sandaime Kazekage. In return, he has become the strongest gold miner in the Sunagakure's martial arts faction, providing sufficient funds for the martial arts faction to support the war.

However, due to the large amount of gold entering the market, the price of gold in the market has dropped very significantly.

This is not a long-term solution.

Due to the absence of the Sandaime Kazekage, Chiyo, and Ebizo, the three people presiding over the meeting, the atmosphere in the round table room was noisy, with everyone exchanging information or spitting a few words at some political enemies they usually didn't like.

Sayun ignored this, closing his eyes as he contemplated the future path of the conservatives.

Although the economy of Sunagakure has not collapsed due to the appearance of Rasa, and it can continue to support the war, the situation has begun to deteriorate significantly since the appearance of the White Fang squad.

In less than a week, one fifth of the supplies sent to the front line have been intercepted by the White Fang squad, and as many as ten jōnin have been killed.

These killed jōnin were not just any jōnin, but ninjas familiar with the terrain of the Devil's Desert and capable of getting out of the Devil's Desert in a short period of time.

Their existence was actually more important than the lost supplies.

Because of this, the supply of goods to the front line began to become unstable. If the Sunagakure no longer came up with an effective way to deal with this White Fang squad, sooner or later the Sunagakure's supply line would be destroyed by this White Fang squad.

By that time, the frontline will run out of supplies, and sooner or later, the war will be lost.

Sayun certainly doesn't want Sunagakure to lose the war, but he feels that the conservatives he leads need to think ahead about what to do after Sunagakure loses the war, such as seizing more power and making the conservatives' voices in Sunagakure louder.

If the radical hawk faction, with its radical ideology, is allowed to recklessly fight Konoha to the death, Sunagakure will end up going under sooner or later.

He didn't think Konoha would always be so tolerant. The reason Konoha was so tolerant now was probably because the other side's Sandaime Hokage was weak and didn't have enough power.

The Sunagakure that was currently fighting against Konoha was still far from Konoha's full strength.

Because in this battle, the Uchiha clan and the Senju clan, the two major Konoha clans, basically didn't send many people to participate.

This shows that the Sandaime Hokage was not a person of outstanding ability. He did not have enough ability and breadth of mind to control these two major ninja clans for his own use.

However, if Konoha were to be replaced by a powerful Hokage in the future, one who was even capable of subduing the major ninja clans within the village, then the Sunagakure village, which had once provoked Konoha, would definitely face a maddening retaliation from Konoha.

At the thought of Sunagakure possibly encountering this situation in the future, Sayun felt very uneasy inside, and became increasingly dissatisfied with the martial arts faction.

Suddenly, the original noisy sounds at the scene disappeared, and Sayun immediately opened his eyes and turned his head in the direction of the door.

He saw the Sandaime Kazekage, Chiyo, and Ebizo enter the room in turn, followed by three young ninja in their teens, Rasa, Pakura, and Karura.

After the Sandaime Kazekage, Chiyo, and Ebizo took their seats, Rasa, Pakura, and Karura stood behind them.

"Hmph, so they've already arranged the succession."

Sayun thought sourly as he watched Rasa, Pakura, and Karura being brought in by the Sandaime Kazekage and the others to sit in.

"I'm sorry to have asked you all to come at such a late hour to attend this meeting, but the situation is urgent, and we must make some new decisions as soon as possible to deal with the new situation in Konoha and internationally. Please read the following information carefully."

After Sandaime Kazekage took the main seat, he swept the others with his sharp eyes and then said with a serious face.

As soon as he finished speaking, Rasa behind him manipulated the sand gold to quickly distribute the information in his hands to the elders present.

The elders were amazed at Rasa's ability to manipulate more than ten groups of sand gold at the same time. They sighed that Rasa was worthy of the title of Kazekage, and it was not an overstatement to say that he was a genius in terms of his current ability to manipulate sand gold.

However, their attention was quickly drawn to the intelligence on the table in front of them.

When they read the contents, they all had shocked expressions on their faces, and many of them also looked surprised.

Ebizo saw the expressions of the other senior management members.

In the end, his gaze fell on a young elder in his thirties whose right eye was covered by a black eye bag with a sealing technique on it.

When Ebizo saw this person, detailed information about this person quickly surfaced in his mind.

Kurokusa, 31 years old, male, an elite Sunagakure jōnin, from a commoner background, cultivated by the conservatives, skilled in wind release ninjutsu, his strongest record was single-handedly killing a Uchiha clan jōnin, with a Three-Tomoe Sharingan implant in his right eye, thus possessing the ability of illusion techniques, and is currently the most promising person among the conservatives to advance to the rank of shadow.

The reason Ebizo paid attention to this person was not only because the other party was the seed of the shadow level among the conservatives, but also because the other party had just read the intelligence in his hands and a slight abnormal expression appeared on his face, an expression of surprise mixed with fear.

As the intelligence chief of Sunagakure, he has met countless people and understands human expression changes far better than ordinary people. He definitely did not misread it just now; this guy named Kurotsuchi just felt fear.

He just didn't know where this fear came from.

"Lord Kazekage, is this intelligence true? If it is true, then we should immediately launch a full-scale attack on Konoha. That dog Danzo is no more, and Konoha's intelligence system will definitely be hit hard as a result. This is our chance to defeat Konoha."

Soon, an elder of the martial arts faction said excitedly.

"Yes, this is our chance to quickly end the war."

"And the Sandaime Hokage was also defeated by that mysterious Kage-Level powerhouse. If we spread the news to the Konoha ninja at the frontlines, it will definitely deal a heavy blow to their morale."

"That's what I was thinking too, Lord Kazekage. Give the order, let us, Sunagakure, defeat Konoha, and become the strongest ninja village in the world."

...

The other Hawk faction elders also seconded the motion, expressing their strong desire to attack.

"Ahem..."

Seeing that the Hawk faction elders were about to go crazy, Sayun suddenly coughed, instructing the conservatives to pour cold water on these people to cool them down and wake them up.

"Lord Kazekage, you must not listen to these hot-headed people. You should know that the front line is currently in a defensive position due to the urgent need for supplies. How can we launch a full-scale offensive? If we launch a full-scale offensive without adequate preparations, we will suffer greatly."

The next moment, a highly capable conservative elder immediately stood up to object.

"Well said. War cannot be fought with just passion. You must also consider your actual situation. Our comrades on the frontlines are starving. Do you want them to fight the well-equipped Konoha ninja with empty stomachs and insufficient supplies?"

"Exactly, and you only consider whether you can win, but not whether you will lose. Once our full-scale attack fails, the result will soon be the loss of the war, and all the land and resources we have so painstakingly captured will be lost."

"Also, that mysterious Kage-Level powerhouse is not from our village, Sunagakure. He can attack Konoha, and he can also attack our village, Sunagakure. Our village's defenses are currently very weak, and if this person takes advantage of our full-scale attack on Konoha to attack us, the consequences will be unimaginable."

...

Other conservative elders also stood up one after the other to oppose the views of the Hawk faction.

How would the Hawk faction give up launching an attack on Konoha just because the conservatives had reasons? They immediately found new reasons to convince the Sandaime Kazekage.

So, the two factions once again engaged in a fierce war of words in the roundtable room.

Some hot-tempered elders even argued so fiercely that they were about to have a real fight in the room.

The Sandaime Kazekage watched the two factions argue so fiercely that they were about to fight, his face expressionless, but his eyes revealing a playful expression.

Suddenly, a coughing sound made him quickly gather his eyes and become cold again, before he lightly tapped the table.

Although the sound of the table was small, the people from the two factions quickly stopped arguing and then turned their attention to the Sandaime Kazekage, waiting for the Sandaime Kazekage to make a final decision.

It was actually useless for them to argue, and the real decision-maker was still the Sandaime Kazekage. The reason they argued was just to provide some references for the Sandaime Kazekage, so that he could draw on collective wisdom to make up for some loopholes in his decision-making.

"I understand everyone's thoughts. Indeed, after the death of the Konoha ninja Danzo, this is a good opportunity for us from the Sunagakure to attack Konoha, which has lost its intelligence advantage. However, there is an objective shortage of supplies on the frontlines, which is a very important issue that we cannot ignore.

There is also the issue of the mysterious Kage-Level powerhouse. This person is very dangerous and is likely related to the Senju clan. If the Senju clan really has some kind of close connection with this person, he may become Konoha's secret weapon against us in Sunagakure. We in Sunagakure have to guard against this.

Therefore, we in Sunagakure must take this opportunity to restore the supply of supplies to the front line as soon as possible and strengthen the village's defensive capabilities. In addition, we must also take advantage of this opportunity to send elite troops to attack Konoha and strive to achieve victory in small-scale battles.

Chiyo and Ebizo will discuss the specific implementation plans for these decisions with you later, and then assign tasks for implementation."

When the Sandaime Kazekage saw that everyone had quieted down, he pondered for a moment before slowly beginning to speak the decisions he had reached after communicating with Chiyo and Ebizo earlier.

These decisions were the best results they three had reached after a long discussion based on the current situation of Sunagakure.

Among these decisions, solving the immediate shortage of supplies on the front line is the top priority.

The group of elders present did not voice any objections when they heard the decisions made by the Sandaime Kazekage, tacitly agreeing to the decisions made by the Sandaime Kazekage, and then looking at Chiyo or Ebizo one by one.

Needless to say, the next step was to decide how to distribute the cake, and it was up to these two.

In no time, the many elders in the roundtable room left one by one, leaving only the Sandaime Kazekage, Ebizo, and Chiyo.

"Advisor Chiyo, are you really confident that you can destroy that ninja squad led by Konoha White Fang?"

At this time, Sandaime Kazekage suddenly asked Chiyo.

"I don't want to repeat the answer to the same question. I can only say that I will do my best, and I have recently unexpectedly obtained a good sealing technique. Give me a little more time, and I should be able to create a powerful weapon against this White Fang squad."

Chiyo answered confidently, his voice revealing a strong sense of confidence.