The Fractured Leadership
Deep within Kirigakure, the council hall stood shrouded in suffocating silence. Snowstorms raged beyond the thick stone walls, yet the cold inside the chamber felt far worse. A long obsidian table stretched across the center of the room, illuminated only by dim lantern flames that cast trembling shadows over the gathered shinobi.
Half the seats were empty.
Not because their owners were late.
Because they were dead.
Seven thousand shinobi had vanished in a single catastrophe. Entire divisions had been erased. Families shattered. The Hidden Mist, once feared across the world for its brutality and military power, now resembled a wounded beast barely standing on its feet.
At the head of the table sat the empty seat of the Mizukage.
No one dared touch it.
Because the Third Mizukage was dead.
And beneath that towering seat, occupying a far smaller chair, sat a child.
Yagura Karatachi.
His appearance looked almost absurd within such a room. Small body. Young face. Calm expression. Yet every person present understood one undeniable truth—
the fate of the Hidden Mist now rested on his shoulders.
The atmosphere inside the chamber was sharply divided.
On the left side sat the bloodline clans.
The Kaguya Clan.
The Hōzuki Clan.
The Yuki Clan.
Their eyes burned with pride and hostility. These were the noble clans who had dominated Kirigakure for generations. They represented power, inherited techniques, and violence refined through bloodshed.
Opposite them sat the exhausted remnants of the village's leadership.
Ao and the surviving elite shinobi.
Their faces were pale from sleepless nights. They had spent weeks counting corpses, organizing emergency defenses, and trying to stop the village from collapsing entirely. Unlike the clans, they no longer cared about pride.
They cared about survival.
Two sides sat at one table.
But unity no longer existed.
Only resentment.
Only blame.
Finally, Yagura spoke.
His voice was calm, yet every word carried weight.
"A letter has arrived from Gengetsu Hōzuki."
The mention of that name immediately drew everyone's attention.
Yagura continued.
"It contains the final decision regarding Kirigakure's academy system."
He paused briefly before saying the words that froze the entire chamber.
"The Blood Mist policy will be abolished."
For a moment, absolute silence filled the room.
Then the council exploded into chaos.
The Kaguya Clan leader slammed both hands against the table as he stood.
"What did you say?!"
His killing intent burst outward violently, causing several nearby shinobi to tense instinctively.
"Abolish it?" he roared. "After everything we sacrificed?!"
His voice trembled with fury.
"What about the children we lost?!"
"What about the system we built?!"
The room fell quiet again, but this time the silence was heavy with tension.
Because everyone understood the truth hidden behind his anger.
The Blood Mist was never simply tradition.
It was power.
For years, the graduation ritual had forced academy students to kill one another in order to survive. Officially, it was meant to create ruthless shinobi capable of enduring war.
But reality was far uglier.
Clan heirs entered the exams already trained by elite shinobi.
Civilian children did not.
The result was obvious.
The clans survived.
The weak died.
Generation after generation, the Blood Mist became a machine that preserved noble bloodlines while crushing ordinary people beneath them.
And now, someone wanted to destroy that system entirely.
Yagura quietly observed the furious clan leaders without interrupting them.
Because he understood something most of them refused to admit.
The Blood Mist had not originally been created out of cruelty alone.
Long ago, the Mizukage had designed it as a political weapon.
A way to weaken the influence of the major clans.
A method to force equality through fear.
If every child risked death equally, then no single clan could monopolize military power.
At least—that had been the original intention.
But over time, the system had changed.
The clans adapted.
Corruption spread.
What began as balance became oppression.
The strong turned the system into a weapon against the weak.
And now the blade had begun cutting apart Kirigakure itself.
Suddenly, the chamber doors burst open.
A shinobi messenger stumbled inside, breathing heavily.
His face was pale with terror.
"Emergency report!"
Every gaze turned toward him.
The man swallowed hard before speaking.
"Two academy graduation classes…"
His voice shook.
"…have been completely wiped out."
The room froze.
"…by their own students."
Several clan leaders widened their eyes.
The messenger continued.
"The survivors were Zabuza Momochi… and Chōjūrō."
Shock spread across the hall instantly.
Entire classes.
Massacred.
Not during war.
Not by enemy shinobi.
But by children.
Killing their own classmates.
For the first time since the meeting began, nobody argued.
Nobody defended the system.
Because this was the undeniable proof standing before them.
The Blood Mist had become insanity.
A system so rotten that even children were being transformed into monsters before becoming shinobi.
Then Yagura slowly rose from his seat.
The pressure in the room changed immediately.
His expression was no longer calm.
It was furious.
"This," he said coldly, pointing toward the trembling messenger, "is your Blood Mist."
His voice thundered across the chamber.
"Children murdering each other before they even become shinobi!"
He slammed a hand onto the table.
"Not dying for the village."
"Not dying in battle."
"But slaughtering each other like animals!"
The clan leaders remained silent.
Because there was nothing left to say.
Yagura stepped forward slowly, his crimson eyes sweeping across the room.
"You speak of strength," he said. "But what strength does Kirigakure still possess?"
"Seven thousand dead."
"The Tailed Beasts gone."
"Our leadership shattered."
"And even now…"
His voice became colder.
"You still want to fight amongst yourselves?"
Every word struck the council like a hammer.
The arrogance within the room slowly cracked apart.
Yagura stopped directly in front of the Kaguya Clan leader.
The distance between them was almost nonexistent.
"Tell me," Yagura said quietly.
"What exactly will you use to defend this village now?"
"Your bones?"
"Your bloodlines?"
"Your pride?"
Then his eyes sharpened completely.
"To fight them?"
No names were spoken.
None were necessary.
Everyone in the room understood exactly who he meant.
The Uchiha Clan.
Silence swallowed the council chamber.
Because everyone present knew the terrifying truth.
If the Hidden Mist truly faced the Uchiha—
they would lose.
For the first time that night, fear replaced anger inside the eyes of the clan leaders.
Because the discussion had stopped being political.
This was survival.
And survival did not care about pride.
If Kirigakure continued devouring itself like this—
the village would not fall to foreign enemies.
It would destroy itself from within.
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