The first day of the Two Kage Summit ended without much progress, mainly because Konoha's side was somewhat distracted.
Both sides understood very well that negotiation itself was a matter of repeatedly wearing down each other's patience, probing each other's bottom line back and forth, and demonstrating their respective military strength again and again before finally reaching an outcome both parties could barely accept.
The more anxious one became, the less likely one was to obtain what one wanted.
Kirigakure had Rei Kaguya's power as their guarantee, so it was only natural that they could ask for a little more when putting forward conditions. But Konoha, as the side with stronger overall strength, could not possibly accept every condition Kirigakure raised like a small nation with no ability to resist.
It was foreseeable that both sides would still need to exchange opinions for several more days regarding the specific clauses of the peace treaty before a final version could be produced.
However, those matters had nothing to do with Jiraiya for now.
At this moment, he was drinking alone in an izakaya in a nearby town.
One mouthful after another.
One cup after another.
It was as if he wanted to use this method to drive away all the miserable things he had encountered today.
"Welcome. What would you like to drink?"
"One pot of sake will do."
"Understood. I will prepare it for you right away. Where would you like to sit?"
"Here."
"Eh? But, guest, there is already someone sitting there…"
"I came here to find him."
With the soft rustle of clothing, someone sat down opposite Jiraiya, who was drinking in gloomy silence.
The middle-aged white-haired man raised his head and looked over. When he saw that the person sitting across from him was a black-haired boy with a young, handsome, and spirited face, his expression instantly darkened.
"Don't think that just because Konoha and Kirigakure are currently negotiating peace, you can so openly use off-board tactics to affect my mental state, Rei Kaguya."
"The era where Konoha and Kirigakure started shouting about killing each other the moment they met has temporarily passed. Don't raise your hostility so high right from the start, Jiraiya."
Rei Kaguya picked up his own pot of sake and poured a cup. While taking a small sip, he spoke to Jiraiya, whose face was already full of alcohol, in the relaxed tone of an ordinary young man.
"There are just a few things I want to ask you, the person entrusted with a prophecy by the Great Toad Sage of Mount Myoboku."
"What good is being entrusted with a prophecy?"
Jiraiya gave a bitter smile and placed the cup in his hand down, his expression dispirited.
"I'm just a toad desperately struggling inside a dry well of failure, unable to jump out and see the wider world beyond the opening. I can't answer the questions of someone standing above the well like you."
"You're belittling yourself so seriously. Do you really not want to see Nagato getting involved with me that badly, Jiraiya?"
Faced with Rei Kaguya's question, Jiraiya turned his face away of his own accord.
As he poured out the remaining sake from the pot beside him, a lonely expression appeared on his face.
"Akatsuki came to the Land of Iron to accept the daimyo's commission and serve as guards for the Two Kage Summit because of you, didn't they?"
"I merely sent them an opportunity to accelerate the spread of their reputation. The ones who truly decided whether to come or not were still them."
Rei Kaguya placed down the cup of sake he had emptied in one drink, casually setting it aside together with that pot of bland sake. Only then did he speak unhurriedly.
"Students always grow up. Then, based on their own life experiences, they choose different paths in life. If you always hope they remain the same as they were in your memories, you can't really be called an excellent teacher, Jiraiya."
"You think I can't see that you're using Nagato to draw fire for you, Rei Kaguya?"
Jiraiya growled, unconsciously crushing the cup in his hand into fragments.
"You had them take responsibility for the guard work and witness the peace treaty signed between our two villages so that Nagato and his Rinnegan would attract the attention of the other three villages. That way, the other villages would be distracted by Nagato and Akatsuki's actions and wouldn't be able to focus completely on studying ways to defeat you and Kirigakure, right?"
"Then have you ever considered that Nagato and Yahiko might have cooperated with me despite knowing that I was using them?"
Rei Kaguya lightly tapped the table with his finger. Pointing at Jiraiya, who had been stunned by his words, he spoke slowly.
"Jiraiya, self-numbing and self-deception at a time like this is rather boring. Nagato and Yahiko are heroes who founded Akatsuki, an organization for peace, through their own will, and gathered a large number of like-minded companions around them little by little. Do you truly believe that people who started from nothing and came this far would be naive enough to think that the gift I gave them required no repayment?"
"…No."
Jiraiya clenched the sake pot beside him and answered one word at a time.
"Then doesn't the issue become very clear?"
Rei Kaguya dipped his finger into a bit of sake and began writing and drawing across the tabletop.
"I am using Akatsuki and Nagato's power to buy Kirigakure time for development and reform. At the same time, Akatsuki and Nagato are also borrowing my identity as the future Mizukage to obtain a chance to step onto a broader stage."
"Since everyone's goal is to make the shinobi world as peaceful as possible for the next ten or so years, what is wrong with making use of each other's resources?"
"I'm not like those people who say they'll entrust the task of bringing change to the shinobi world to the Child of Prophecy, then go off wandering on their own and never again concern themselves with how those Children of Prophecy are actually doing. When it comes to useful collaborators, I am very generous."
"Did you never consider that Akatsuki might not be able to withstand so many hidden arrows and spears from the shadows!?"
Jiraiya slapped the table, neither too lightly nor too heavily, and his head of white hair instantly stood up like an enraged lion's mane.
"Other than Nagato, most of Akatsuki's members are only shinobi with ordinary talent. If they are targeted by the hawks of the other three shinobi villages, those ordinary members will definitely suffer heavy casualties! Nagato is not an unreasonable monster like you. As a mere genius, he cannot deter everyone from the other villages!"
"No, you're wrong, Jiraiya."
Rei Kaguya raised one finger and gently wagged it.
"If there is anyone in this era who might temper themselves into possessing power capable of threatening me, then the only candidate is Nagato, who possesses the Rinnegan."
"You do not understand just how enormous the Rinnegan's potential truly is. Nor do you understand how crucially the Uzumaki clan's physique promotes the display of the Rinnegan's power. And you understand even less the world Nagato sees through those eyes."
"The world you see right now is one where the great nations are licking their wounds after the war while making no attempt to hide the fact that they are preparing for the next one."
"But what Nagato sees is a world that has already felt pain, experienced pain, understood pain, accepted pain, and is now beginning to comprehend how precious peace is."
"Everyone has shed blood. Everyone has experienced loss. People from every nation are longing for peace. For Akatsuki, as long as they can grasp this opportunity, every period of time they delay the flames of war will give the seeds of peace more time to sprout."
"And Akatsuki's ideal of achieving peace through methods other than violence will also take deeper root in people's hearts."
"For them, this is the best opportunity to convey their ideals to the entire world and influence every nation. Once they miss it, they can only bury their heads and work one step at a time in their own small patch of land, waiting until the next Shinobi World War ends before they can begin large-scale activities again."
"I believe the current members of Akatsuki probably do not wish to see their organization grow stronger because another war has broken out."
Listening to Rei Kaguya's analysis, which was so detailed it seemed as if he had been following Nagato and Yahiko, observing their every move, Jiraiya stood there in a daze for a long while.
Only after some time did he speak to Rei Kaguya unhappily.
"Orochimaru was like this, and now you're like this too. Why are people with snake-like vertical pupils all so good at bewitching hearts? Listening to you, even I almost started believing it."
"If I did not possess the ability to see through people's hearts, I would not be thinking of using other people's ideals to fulfill my own goals."
Rei Kaguya spread his hands, his face showing that this was only natural.
"Besides, isn't this because you're always trying to escape? You think that as long as you entrust the task of changing the world to the Child of Prophecy you found, you can simply let go and stop caring. You don't even know what they have experienced, what they dream of, or what they persist in. That's why I could so easily find the flaw and directly refute you, Jiraiya."
Jiraiya's old face reddened. He used the rising alcohol to cover it up, then cleared his throat and asked in a deep voice,
"Then what exactly do you want to ask me, or rather, what do you want to ask the Great Toad Sage of Mount Myoboku, Rei Kaguya?"
Rei Kaguya interlaced his fingers and propped them beneath his chin.
His gaze was calm as he spoke.
"The White Snake Sage once told me that she saw in me the possibility of turning the predetermined future and fate into chaos."
"I want to ask the Great Toad Sage, who possesses a prophetic ability that has never been wrong, whether the future he saw has already changed because of my activity."
"Or whether my activity itself is also part of the prophecy he saw."
"Uh, that… is really difficult to answer."
After hearing Rei Kaguya's question, Jiraiya, who had not returned to Mount Myoboku for some time, scratched his head and spoke with little confidence.
"But I definitely cannot answer something like this myself. When the Great Toad Sage has another dream about the future and calls me over, I'll find a chance to—"
Poof.
Before he could finish speaking, Jiraiya suddenly turned into a puff of white smoke without any warning and vanished from the izakaya.
"Reverse Summoning Technique? From Mount Myoboku?"
Rei Kaguya narrowed his eyes, instinctively sensing a faint trace of something wrong.