---Konoha - Village Center---
The village of Konoha was not just a collection of buildings; it was a living organism that healed with terrifying speed. Two days prior, giant snakes had crushed walls, and a Tailed Beast had leveled a forest. Now? The village was already coming back to life.
The main street was busy again. Vendors shouted prices for fresh vegetables and grilled fish. Children ran between stalls, laughing and chasing each other. The smell of sawdust mixed with the smell of yakitori cooking over open flames.
Scaffolding stood against a few cracked walls. Workers hammered nails and carried wooden beams. Chunin jumped from rooftop to rooftop, delivering supplies in big bundles. The damage was there, but it was small. No whole districts gone. No empty streets full of grief.
People talked in low voices about the fight. They mentioned the Sandaime's stand. They whispered about the man in the crimson coat who took down legends. But mostly, they just kept working. Life moved on.
Jiraiya stood at the main gate. Dust covered his sandals from the long road. He carried a big scroll on his back. He looked up at the Hokage Monument. The faces were still there, even if some stone had chipped.
He had rushed back the moment his spy network delivered the news. Orochimaru. Invasion. Resurrection of the First and Second.
It sounded like a nightmare scenario… the kind that ended villages.
Yet, here he was, walking through the gates, and the village looked... fine.
"Unusually fast," Jiraiya muttered, scratching his chin as he walked down the main thoroughfare. "Even for Konoha. The morale is high. The damage is minimal. It's almost suspicious."
He recalled the intel from his toad summons. A man in a crimson coat. Defeated the First, Second, and Orochimaru alone.
"Alaric Jonathan Kenway," Jiraiya tested the name on his tongue. "According to my intel, he's a merchant who fights like a god. Sarutobi-sensei certainly found an interesting wild card."
'I knew he wasn't normal…'
Jiraiya adjusted his course. He needed a place to stay. Usually, he'd crash at an inn or sneak into the hot springs, but given the political climate, he needed an official base of operations for at least two weeks while he gathered intel on this new player and helped the old man stabilize the council.
He walked deeper into the village. People nodded at him. Some smiled. A few kids pointed and whispered, "That's the Toad Sage!"
Jiraiya waved back, but his mind was elsewhere.
---Konoha Village Administration Building---
The building was quiet inside. Cool air. Wooden floors that creaked under his steps. A few clerks worked at desks, sorting papers.
Jiraiya pushed the door open. He planned to ask for a long-term rental permit.
He stopped dead in his tracks.
Standing at the front counter, leaning casually against the wood with a lit cigar in his hand, was a tall man in a high-collared crimson coat. He radiated a lazy, confident energy that seemed to suck the oxygen out of the room.
"Good afternoon, mister!" The civilian clerk, a young man with glasses, beamed at Alaric. "What may I do for you today? Are you looking to rent or lease a place?"
"Yeah," Alaric smiled back, twirling the unlit cigar between his fingers before bringing it to his lips. "I'm looking to buy a huge lot to build a compound. Preferably away from the populace."
The clerk blinked, then cupped his chin thoughtfully. "Hmm... that's… tricky. As you know, the village is a military state, not a free-market city. Our administration only offers rent or sale for pre-built houses and apartments within the approved zones."
"...Well, that's unfortunate," Alaric sighed, a small flame dancing on the tip of his index finger to light his cigar. He took a puff. "I really want an unused lot. I was willing to pay cash."
"There is... one place. If you really want a huge area," the clerk said, lowering his voice professionally. "The Uchiha Compound."
Alaric stopped mid-puff. "The Uchiha Compound?"
"It's been for sale for a while now," the clerk continued, glancing around to ensure no one was listening. "With the owner being Sasuke Uchiha."
"That compound's for sale? Where does the young Uchiha live then?" Alaric asked, genuinely curious.
"Yes, it's been for sale for at least four years already," the clerk explained in a hushed tone. "Most just don't have the capacity to lease the area, and some... don't want the place for its history. Sasuke Uchiha is still settled within the compounds but is ready to relocate to a smaller apartment once the papers are signed. The upkeep is too much for a single Genin."
"..." Alaric took a long drag from his cigar, blowing a smoke ring toward the ceiling.
He stood there for a moment, weighing the options. The Uchiha Compound. The site of the massacre. A place soaked in blood and history.
"What do you think, Jiraiya-san?" Alaric spoke suddenly, turning his head slightly to the left. "Should I buy the place?"
"!!!"
Jiraiya widened his eyes. He had been suppressing his chakra to a near-imperceptible level, hiding in the blind spot of the entrance. He was a Sannin, a master of infiltration.
"Since when did you notice me?" Jiraiya stepped out of the shadows, his guard dropping slightly.
Alaric smiled, turning fully to face the white-haired sage. "I've sensed you long before you passed the village gates. You have a very... loud chakra signature. Like a toad singing in a quiet pond."
Jiraiya stared at him for a moment, then relaxed his shoulders, letting out a short, incredulous sigh. "So it's not a lie that you caught a certain serpent."
Alaric only offered a simple chuckle.
Jiraiya stepped up to the counter, earning a flustered bow from the clerk.
"Good afternoon, Jiraiya-sama!"
Jiraiya acknowledged the clerk with a nod before turning his attention back to the anomaly. "If you want to buy a place, buy it. You've clearly got the money. And you'll have a family one day, why not prepare for it with a large compound? It's good to have roots."
Alaric looked at Jiraiya, confused. "Huh? I already have a family though. I have a wife and a son."
"Huh?" Jiraiya blinked, looking at Alaric weirdly. "I thought you said to the Old Man that you were an orphan and didn't have a family?"
"Yes I did, and that was true," Alaric smiled, tapping the ash from his cigar into a tray. "I didn't have a family growing up. But I never said I don't have a family now."
"...I don't understand, you look too young to have a family," Jiraiya jabbed, though it was also a pang of jealousy on his part. He was fifty, alone, and still chasing a woman who would never love him back. "I mean... why didn't you bring them here? In Konoha? It's the safest place in the nations."
"Well..." Alaric hummed, looking out the window for a split second, his expression softening. "I'll bring them here soon. Just not at the moment. The... travel… is complicated."
The Sannin observed Alaric for lies… searching for micro-expressions, shifts in heartbeat… but found only calm honesty.
He was about to reply when the air in the room shifted.
WHOOSH.
An ANBU with a Cat mask body-flickered into existence between them.
"Jiraiya-sama, Jonin Alaric," the ANBU stated, his voice devoid of emotion. "Hokage-sama has requested both of your presence inside the Konoha Council Chamber for a trial tonight."
Jiraiya's face suddenly turned serious. A trial. That meant that Orochimaru will be trialed and will be held to start talking.
Alaric stayed the same, taking another drag. "A trial? Sounds boring. Do they serve snacks?"
"I will be there," Jiraiya nodded to the ANBU.
Alaric waved his hand. "Me as well. I'll just take care of business here then go over there."
The ANBU nodded once and vanished.
The clerk stood frozen behind the counter. He didn't know what to do. The Sannin and the mystery Jonin were talking about a certain"Serpent", family, and now a Council Trial. He felt like he was overhearing state secrets.
Alaric turned back to the trembling clerk and smiled warmly. "Well, I'll buy the place with a clause."
"Yes!" The clerk jumped, relieved to be back on familiar ground. "What would your clause be?"
Alaric didn't hesitate. "I'll buy the place with straight-up cash. But I'm going to demolish it."
"Demolish?" The clerk's jaw dropped. "But... the architecture... the history..."
"The history is exactly why," Alaric said firmly. "I'm razing it to the ground. Purifying the soil. And rebuilding my own. New foundations for a new legacy."
"..." The clerk was surprised, but a sale was a sale. And the commission on a property that size was retirement money. He immediately scrambled to the back room. "I'll get the paperwork!"
Minutes later, Alaric signed the contract with a flourish.
"How much?" Jiraiya asked, peering over his shoulder.
"One hundred seventy million Ryo," Alaric said casually.
He rolled up his sleeve. On his shoulder was a complex storage seal tattooed into his skin. He pulsed chakra into it.
POOF.
Stacks of ryo bills, bound in gold bands, appeared on the counter, piling up like bricks until they obscured the clerk's view.
Jiraiya's eyes nearly popped out of his head. He had seen money before—he was a bestselling author, after all—but Alaric dispensed wealth like it was water.
"You know what, Alaric?" Jiraiya said, looking at the mountain of cash. "I was about to rent a place... but I'm thinking of crashing at yours for a few months. A landlord this rich must have good sake."
"Really?" Alaric raised a brow, tucking the deed into his coat. He chuckled, patting the Sannin on the shoulder.
"Be my guest, Toad Sage. Just don't peek on the neighbors."
.
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