Chapter 80: Stalemate with Suna, Hanzo's Frustration, and the Ninja World Eyes Konoha
However, to the surprise of the onlookers, after Amegakure's opening victory, the subsequent battles became extremely grueling. Because Chiyo, as a master of poisons, was naturally able to prepare antidotes in a short time.
Although Chiyo's antidotes couldn't fully immunize against Ibuse the salamander's poison, they greatly reduced the chance of her own people dying from poison. Some ninjas with mild poisoning could still fight normally. In this situation, the difference in personnel quality between a large ninja village and a small one became somewhat apparent.
It could be said that under this slightly weakened debuff suppression, Sunagakure could basically achieve a 1.5:1 exchange rate against Amegakure.
But this was also only possible because Sunagakure had antidotes. Hanzo the Salamander kept constantly updating his poisons.
The only thing that made Sunagakure feel fortunate was that Chiyo could always find an antidote to counter Hanzo the Salamander's poison in a short time.
And during the battle, Chiyo also discovered the salamander's fatal weakness: it could not release poison gas indefinitely.
After releasing all the poison gas in its body, it needed to use its own chakra and biological functions to manufacture new poison gas again, and this process took a full five minutes.
Originally, when Hanzo the Salamander had won the first major battle easily, he had thought he could take down Sunagakure right then and replace them as one of the five great ninja villages.
But now he kept hitting walls, which put Hanzo in a very bad mood—especially that Chiyo who kept cracking his poisons.
So he gave Chiyo the nickname "Puppet Granny," while Chiyo sarcastically called Hanzo "Old Man with the Breathing Tube."
Because although Chiyo could produce antidotes very quickly, whenever Hanzo used a new poison, she still had to let a batch of people die from poison first, then use her ninja subordinates to kill another group.
Plus Sunagakure was relatively poor, with very limited medicine reserves—antidotes could never cover all the troops.
So both sides continued to attrition each other while Amegakure maintained a relative advantage.
Until one day, both Sunagakure and Amegakure suddenly realized: if they kept fighting to the death like this, they would only benefit the other ninja villages.
First from Hanzo the Salamander's side: during his first major victory he had considered replacing Sunagakure to become one of the new five great ninja villages. But after prolonged fighting, he saw his side's personnel constantly being depleted—with no real benefit in continuing.
Even if he wiped out Sunagakure, Amegakure would be finished too. Forget about anyone occupying territory—other ninja villages would definitely swoop in to pick up the scraps.
Plus his original goal was to drive Sunagakure out of the Land of Rain. That goal had long been achieved. Now, let alone driving them out—the fighting had already reached inside the Land of Wind's borders. So Hanzo the Salamander didn't want to fight anymore.
On the other side, Sunagakure's own strength was already at the bottom of the five great ninja villages. If they kept fighting to the death with Amegakure, even if they repelled them, there was a high chance they would be swallowed by other ninja villages afterward.
Although their territory wasn't great, if they could get it for free, other ninja villages definitely wouldn't refuse!
Moreover, they had always been at a relative disadvantage!
The famous military strategist Li Yunlong once said: I don't do losing business!
For Sunagakure, fighting in the Land of Rain brought zero benefits—and they even got beaten into their own home by a small ninja village. It was truly a massive loss of face.
So the spineless Sunagakure wanted to sue for peace again. One had to admit—Sunagakure as a ninja village truly took shamelessness to the extreme. From the time of their First Kazekage during tailed beast distribution—not only refusing to pay but even wanting money—you could already see it.
In later Great Ninja Wars they were always the fastest to start and fastest to surrender. Mainly playing the shameless card.
This time was naturally the same—without any regard for face, they quietly arranged someone to find Hanzo the Salamander and propose a truce.
Hanzo the Salamander just happened to not want to fight anymore either, so both sides hit it off immediately and began discussing war reparations.
Later Hanzo the Salamander nearly died of anger. Clearly Sunagakure had come to him asking for a truce. But when Hanzo the Salamander proposed they needed to pay war reparations, Sunagakure not only refused to pay—they even wanted some money from him.
They said: this war caused Sunagakure heavy losses, and our village is quite poor. So for the sake of peace, Amegakure had better give us some compensation!
If Hanzo the Salamander hadn't already wanted to stop fighting, he would definitely have taught this shameless ninja village a lesson!
After Sunagakure and Amegakure ceased hostilities, both sides fell into a strange calm. But since the major nations' military forces hadn't actually consumed that much, the great nations still had plenty of fighting capacity left.
Until the news spread that Senju Nawaki had been severely injured and comatose for several months—then all the ninja villages turned their eyes back to Konoha like starving wolves.
Previously, the news of Senju Nawaki's dragon transformation had truly frightened several ninja villages. That large-scale Wood Release, while not comparable to what was recorded in documents about Senju Hashirama, could still be considered a "little Hashirama." So the various ninja villages had strangely ignored Konoha's existence.
Now that the news of Senju Nawaki's severe injury and coma came out, the ninja villages checked the intelligence again—Senju Nawaki really hadn't appeared for several months.
Later, black-market bounty hunters sold information: several months ago, Senju Nawaki had been carried back to Konoha on the backs of the Third Hokage's disciples—Senju Tsunade and Jiraiya.
This news further confirmed that the earlier report of Senju Nawaki's coma was likely true. But the ninja villages still weren't willing to stick their necks out first. Instead they tried every means to get the latest information or directly force Konoha to prove Senju Nawaki wasn't comatose.
Some even boldly demanded that Konoha no longer imprison Uchiha Naraku—Uchiha Naraku belonged to the entire ninja world. They demanded a fair distribution of all weapons forged by Uchiha Naraku.
Previously, what drew everyone's attention to Konoha was land. Now there was also Uchiha Naraku—this great forger—making the temptation even greater. Under such temptation, the patience of the other ninja villages could only be described as limited!
...
In the Hokage's office, Konoha's F4 was fully assembled. Shimura Danzō, Sarutobi Hiruzen, Koharu Utatane, and Homura Mitokado were arguing furiously.
Danzō struck first: "Hiruzen! Konoha has reached a critical moment. We must show our strength. Give me Nawaki's Teigu—I'll go to the front lines and teach those starving wolves a lesson!"
As soon as Danzō finished speaking, three "No"s rang out in the office.
Danzō stared wide-eyed at his three teammates, his look seeming to say: how can we do good politics with you insects!
Sarutobi Hiruzen gave the official explanation: "Nawaki is still in a coma and needs 'Incursio' to continuously purge the chaotic energy in his body caused by dragon transformation. Moreover, this Teigu 'Incursio' is even more picky about its master—even Tsunade couldn't bring out its true power completely! And if you just charge in recklessly like that, aren't you afraid of being surrounded and attacked by the other four villages?"
Hearing this, Danzō's eyes lit up for a moment, then returned to their original expression—as if the change had just been an illusion.
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