"Wow… that old puppet hag has guts. Isn't she afraid I'll keep hammering the Land of Wind?"
Hanzo of the Salamander received the news immediately, and a playful smile tugged at his lips.
Sagawa, kneeling on one knee, asked at once, "Hanzō-sama, are we going to attack the Land of Wind next?"
"No." Hanzo's gaze turned deep. "That old woman is backing off—and warning me."
"In this war's probing phase, the Land of Wind has already lost completely. If they weren't one of the Five Great Nations—and if we and the Land of Earth weren't helping split the Land of Fire's forces—they probably would've withdrawn on their own."
"Yet they haven't withdrawn. Instead, the puppet hag who's been sitting on the border base shifted fronts and struck the White Fang line. That's clearly an attempt to break the current stalemate—forcing Konoha to redistribute manpower and creating an opening for us."
"If we seize that moment to hit Konoha, but also keep pressuring the Land of Wind, they'd be forced into a two-front war. At that point, they might just ride the slope downhill and declare all-out war on us… and even deploy—"
Hanzo's eyes showed a trace of apprehension. "A jinchūriki."
"The Land of Wind's jinchūriki… most people have forgotten his real name. They just call him 'Shukaku.'"
"For decades, no one's seen him fight. No one knows whether he's reached the legendary level of a true jinchūriki."
"If he can fire a Tailed Beast Bomb with his mind intact, the Land of Wind—pushed to the brink—might actually use that strategic weapon."
As if another thought occurred to him, Hanzo's smile returned. "The main battlefield is in our Land of Rain. That gives us an enormous advantage in supply. But it also comes with a drawback."
"When their supplies run short and they can't replenish in time, they'll inevitably come for us."
"I was planning to break the stalemate myself in a little while."
"But since someone's decided to help us along, I can't disappoint that puppet hag."
Hanzo suddenly bit his finger, formed seals, and slammed a hand to the ground.
"Summoning Jutsu!"
With a poof, white smoke billowed.
When it cleared, the salamander didn't appear—instead, an oversized scroll did.
Hanzo didn't reveal his plan. Cautious as ever, he cast a genjutsu and pulled Sagawa into it.
"—Yes, Hanzō-sama."
When Sagawa's awareness returned, he lowered his head and answered immediately, then left with the clearly special, super-large scroll that could be summoned.
The Land of Rain moved. Earth and Fire didn't stay still either.
Just like the White Fang line being pressed and the old "standoff balance" breaking—
Unless Konoha could still feed that line enough heavy forces to counter a Sunagakure that had gone from two-front pressure back to a single front,
they'd have to pull manpower and elite fighters from the other two lines.
That would weaken the defenses and combat power on those fronts.
If they refused to move and tried to sit back and watch tigers fight, then the Land of Wind could simply throw up its hands and withdraw—turning the Land of Fire's three-front grind into a two-front fight.
And once that happened, neither the Land of Rain nor the Land of Earth would have any hope of biting a chunk out of the Land of Fire.
So the three battle zones along the Rain–Rivers–Grass borders began to feel suffocating—like the heavy black clouds hanging in the sky.
One crack of thunder, and the storm would break.
"The orders from Sarutobi-sensei are here."
At the Land of Fire's border base, Orochimaru held a scroll and spoke to Tsunade—who, after arriving at the battlefield, had swapped her deep-blue cardigan back into armor. His tone was grave.
"Tsunade, you'll go reinforce Sakumo-senpai at the White Fang line. The village will mobilize another batch of troops to support you afterward."
"No one's better suited than me," Tsunade said without surprise, a blaze of intent in her eyes. "An assassin type like Hanzo counters me hard. But my style of taijutsu ninja is exactly the kind that counters that puppet grandmother."
"Chiyo's poison is unknown—medical teams there can't crack it," Orochimaru warned. "You'll have to shoulder that burden again."
"Don't worry about Sunagakure activating their jinchūriki. Intelligence is already reading Ebizō's memories. We'll have key Suna intel soon. Recon and Anbu will keep eyes on every move Suna makes."
Jiraiya couldn't help asking, "Did Ebizō's memories mention the One-Tail jinchūriki? People just call him 'Shukaku'—is he already a perfect jinchūriki?"
"Perfect or not doesn't matter," Orochimaru said with a confident smile. "Even if Suna deploys him, they won't dare fire Tailed Beast Bombs recklessly."
"Using a Tailed Beast Bomb against a nation with Flying Thunder God… the great nations learned that lesson at a terrible cost back in the First War."
Jiraiya's eyes went wide. "Wait—Flying Thunder God can transfer even a Tailed Beast Bomb?!"
Tsunade shot him an exasperated look. "Of course it can. We can teleport living targets with chakra—why wouldn't it work on a Tailed Beast Bomb, a technique made of condensed chakra?"
"Even if Yoru can't do it yet, they won't gamble on it," Orochimaru sneered. "They should be grateful Yoru and Kushina haven't fully matured. If they had… that pairing would make the entire shinobi world tremble."
As their teacher, no one understood better than Orochimaru just how terrifying Gojo Yoru and Uzumaki Kushina's potential—and growth rate—really were.
By adulthood, it would be their era.
Tsunade suddenly remembered something and asked, "If I'm being shifted to the White Fang line, who replaces me here? Did Sarutobi-sensei finally get those clan heads to commit someone?"
"They won't move unless a line is about to break," Orochimaru said with a smile. "The replacement is younger than any of us. You can probably guess who."
Tsunade and Jiraiya both froze, eyes wide.
Tsunade blurted, "D—don't tell me it's Yoru?"
"Correct."
Jiraiya couldn't help it: "He's still only a Special Jōnin. Sarutobi-sensei's giving him command authority now?"
"Special Jōnin? He won't be for long," Orochimaru said, a playful edge in his grin. "Has anyone in our generation completed a super–S-rank merit? This shift in momentum—Yoru engineered it."
"His intellect, his strength, his record… he already meets the conditions for special promotion."
"Two special promotions in a year—from Genin to a command-authorized Jōnin." Tsunade clicked her tongue in amazement. "That speed and that record—no one will touch it for decades."
"We took years and countless high-level missions, with repeated brushes with death, to climb from Genin to Jōnin… and he catches up in a single year. It's almost absurd."
Jiraiya, surprisingly, analyzed it calmly. "No one wants war. But you can't deny it—war really is the only shortcut for a civilian shinobi to rise fast."
"The village needs him. So they have to place him where he fits."
Then Jiraiya grinned at Orochimaru. "At this rate, by the time this war ends, your student might be a Fourth Hokage candidate—and your strongest rival."
Orochimaru only smiled, unreadable. "I told you. Hokage isn't Yoru's endpoint."
Tsunade and Jiraiya both paused—remembering that secret Yoru was hiding. Curiosity prickled hard, but they also knew Orochimaru wouldn't say more.
With this promotion, Yoru would no longer be just a "special ops piece." He'd have command authority—stationed at the border base, ready to enter battle at any moment.
If he fought on the front line, his secret wouldn't stay hidden for long.
Maybe it wouldn't be long before they found out what he was really hiding.
"…They think that highly of me? Or is this because the Hokage's aide isn't here—so resistance is lowest, and the Hokage's power is highest—so he wants to promote 'his line' as fast as possible?"
Gojo Yoru walked out of the Hokage Tower, genuinely dazed for once.
Jumping from Genin to Special Jōnin had already been shocking.
But thinking it through… that rank actually fit.
Because a Flying Thunder God user really is someone with extraordinary space-time aptitude.
If he spent his space-time chakra, his strength became the most "undefined" thing in the shinobi world.
He could be a Genin—or a Jōnin—an "Kage level" threat—or even higher.
Even the current Five Kage, even a Ten-Tails jinchūriki… if Yoru's blade touched them, they'd break—maybe die.
Kakashi's "50–50" was fake. Yoru was the real 50–50.
But besides Orochimaru and the Slug Sage, no one knew his space-time powers yet—not even Kushina.
To Sarutobi, he was "just" a solid Chūnin who had Flying Thunder God and "Black Lightning," with the ability to kill above his weight.
And yet Sarutobi was promoting him to a full-spectrum Jōnin and handing him command authority.
That was… insane faith.
But when Yoru tried viewing it from Sarutobi's angle—thinking about his upcoming mission to send Tsunade to the White Fang line—it clicked.
After two moments of worldwide fame, and the super–S-class feat of instant-killing fifty-five Suna shinobi, Yoru was no longer suitable as a mere "surprise trump card."
Konoha needed the "man who wounded the salamander" to sit on the Rain-facing border line—together with Orochimaru and Jiraiya—to weather the four-nation conflict's escalation.
And Sarutobi also feared something else:
Some petty idiots—people who had clawed their way to power only to be overtaken by Yoru in a few months—might develop dark thoughts in wartime.
So he promoted him again.
Only full-spectrum Jōnin are recognized as core pillars with legitimate command authority.
The "privilege scroll" Sarutobi granted Yoru months ago was to protect him from those idiots; giving him command authority now was also to protect him from those idiots.
Sarutobi really did know about the academy's bullying and stupidity.
People who dared bully clan heirs as children—who knows what they'd do as adults?
Having sorted it out, Yoru realized: another butterfly effect.
The "Konoha Sannin" title probably wouldn't exist as a "loser's label" in this world.
In canon, Rain lasted less than two years before Hanzo—seeing no path to victory—spared the Sannin and withdrew.
During the three years Jiraiya trained Yahiko's trio, Konoha mainly fought Suna and Iwa.
Tsunade naturally got assigned to the Fire-vs-Wind line because her taijutsu and medical talent countered Chiyo's puppets and poison.
Dan stayed on the Fire-vs-Earth line and later died.
In canon, Chiyo only shifted fronts after her son and daughter-in-law were killed by the White Fang.
Here, Ebizō's death triggered Chiyo's rampage early.
Her poison—deadly like Hanzo's—was a nightmare for close-range fighters like Sakumo.
Without antidotes, one scratch meant death.
And the only person in Konoha who could crack that kind of poison… was Tsunade.
Hanzo-type assassins counter Tsunade.
Tsunade counters Chiyo-type puppet masters.
So Sarutobi's move was inevitable: Tsunade to the White Fang line, Yoru to fill her slot.
Yoru went to Kushina and told her.
"I might be stationed on the battlefield for a long time. I won't be coming back often."
"Same as before—don't train out in the wilderness. This is when the village's defenses are weakest. No one knows if other villages will send infiltrators into Konoha."
"If you're training, use Tsunade's courtyard or the academy grounds. Don't go to that abandoned training field."
"Mhm."
Kushina nodded rapidly, strangely obedient at times like this.
After he finished, she suddenly hugged him around the waist and looked up, her voice soft with warning.
"Yoru… be careful. And remember what I told you—don't push yourself."
"Okay."
Yoru ruffled her round cheeks, then grinned mischievously.
"Oh, by the way—I got promoted again. I'm a core, full-spectrum Jōnin now."
"So amazing!"
Kushina played along—still missing what he meant.
Yoru had to spell it out.
"Sixth-year cadet Uzumaki Kushina… how many months until you graduate?"
"Next March. Why?" She blinked, still not getting it.
Yoru thumped her shoulder, dead serious.
"Then you'll need a powerful Jōnin to be your squad leader, won't you?"
Kushina's eyes widened—finally understanding.
Her hair practically lifted with anger.
"You wish, trashy-mouth Yoru! I'm not being your student! I'm going to be Orochimaru-sensei's student!"
Just imagining Yoru as her squad leader—teasing her about it forever—made her shiver.
"If you're my student, you can stay with me all the time," Yoru coaxed.
"Don't think I'm stupid! We can still do missions together as teammates!" She raised her fist in threat. "Say that again and I'll punch you."
"Tch. What a waste." Yoru sighed, failing to bait her.
Then he did something bold—turning Kushina from furious red pepper into a shy little tomato in an instant.
Mua~
He latched onto her round cheek like it was a mochi dumpling and gave it a loud kiss, leaving a clear bite-mark and saliva.
Then he laughed. "I'm going. Remember to miss me every day."
And with that, Yoru vanished—leaving Kushina bright red and steaming.
"Yoru—be careful."
Yoru reached the border base and immediately delivered Tsunade to the rear of the White Fang line.
Looking at Yoru—seemingly a little taller again—Tsunade shoved a prepared storage scroll into his hands, her expression grave.
"Your Flying Thunder God and your ability to hide your chakra signature are fully exposed now. If Hanzo's still targeting us, next time he moves, he'll come fully prepared so your tricks won't work."
"This scroll contains antidotes I prepared for you. Keep several vials on you—always—in your pouch and pockets."
Yoru blinked, then smiled. "Don't worry. I'm the strongest."
Then he warned her right back.
"And you—be careful. Until you've cracked their toxins, don't throw yourself into danger again. Don't be that careless. I won't always arrive in time."
"If you need help, send word—immediately."
He patted her shoulder firmly… and vanished.
Tsunade's lips curled faintly—
then her expression snapped into irritation.
"That brat… he's definitely thinking about that again!"
~~~
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