The sun was already bleeding into the western sky as the meeting room doors creaked open. In the twilight spilling through the tall stone windows, the light fractured against particles of dust that drifted lazily in the air—like time had slowed down, like the mountain itself was holding its breath.
Ōnoki hovered silently through the archway. His feet did not touch the polished stone floor, yet the weight of his presence filled the room. Despite his small frame and aged features, he radiated authority—the kind carved over decades of battle, leadership, and sacrifice.
The cloak of his Kage regalia, heavy with symbolism and expectation, flared slightly behind him as he moved. There was a tension in his face, a tightness around the eyes as if his thoughts were locked in battle just behind them.
He did not so much walk as glide toward his wide desk, an ornate structure carved directly from the heart of a single boulder. The veins of mineral still glimmered faintly beneath its surface—silent testimony to the strength of the earth and the will of those who shaped it.
Slowly, wordlessly, he shrugged off his cloak, letting it slip from his shoulders and drift gently onto a wooden coat stand with practised ease.
Without ceremony, he lowered himself into the Tsuchikage's chair, the sound of his joints barely muffled by the groan of the aged leather beneath him.
A long, heavy sigh escaped his lips, and he pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers. His shoulders sagged, his entire frame seeming to curl inward for a moment under the invisible weight of power.
A faint rustle broke the silence.
From the far corner of the room, as if moulded from shadow itself, a figure emerged. She moved without sound, her movement fluid, graceful—like silk on stone. Dressed in a muted Iwa shinobi jacket, the slender woman knelt without being summoned, her hands resting flat on her thighs and her head bowed low in perfect deference.
"Koari Inzaki," Ōnoki muttered, barely opening one eye to glance at her.
"Yes, Tsuchikage-sama," she replied softly, her voice even.
A beat of silence passed. The ticking of a small clock on the wall marked each passing second with a delicate click...click...click, like the countdown of a fuse.
"Report," he said, at last, his tone clipped and weary.
Koari inhaled once before beginning. "The auction concluded as anticipated. Most villages vied aggressively for the gold mine. Kumogakure, in particular, was keen. Kiri and Suna made token bids. But… Konoha surprised everyone."
Ōnoki's brow twitched. "How?"
"They conceded," Koari said, looking up, though her posture remained humble. "Jiraiya didn't just refrain from bidding—he loudly conceded. And more than that, he used a phrase in his offer… a phrase embedded with the ancient anagram you and Hiruzen once used during the border accords."
The Tsuchikage's eyes narrowed, his full attention now fixed on her. "The old cipher?" he muttered.
Koari nodded once. "Yes. The phrasing was subtle but intentional. He said, 'We bend before the mountain's weight because the stone remembers what the wind forgets.'"
Ōnoki's lips pursed. He sat in silence, digesting the words, the weight of memory tugging at the corners of his mind. That phrase—it hadn't been used in years. Not since the end of the Great Rock-Konoha Skirmishes just before the second great war, when Hiruzen and he had brokered a temporary peace along the contested mountain pass.
To hear it now, at an auction no less, was not just surprising—it was calculated.
"What else?" he asked, his voice low.
Koari reached into her pouch and retrieved a tightly sealed scroll. The paper bore Konoha's sigil, though the wax stamp on it was marked with the personal crest of the Third Hokage.
"Jiraiya handed this to me before I left. He said it was from Hiruzen-sama, meant only for your eyes."
Ōnoki took it carefully. His hands, steady as stone, cracked the seal. He unrolled the parchment slowly, his eyes scanning line after line in silence.
Minutes passed. The only sound in the room was the subtle rustling of paper, the flutter of a curtain as the wind snuck through a partially open window, and the ever-present rumble of distant tectonic groans from the mountains below.
As he read, the Tsuchikage's expression shifted—from neutrality to calculation, then to frustration, and finally to something darker. His hands clenched slightly, causing the scroll to tremble.
When he finished, he didn't speak right away.
Koari waited, still kneeling, her eyes trained to the ground.
With a flick of his fingers, Ōnoki gestured toward the door. "You've done well. Leave."
Without hesitation, she bowed deeper and disappeared into the shadows once more, the stone tiles not even whispering beneath her feet.
Ōnoki sat for a long moment, staring at the scroll in his hands. Then, in a sudden motion, a lattice of crystalline light erupted around the paper. It shimmered, humming with focused chakra before the entire scroll combusted into fine ash and vanished.
"fwshhh!"
"That entitled bastard..." the Tsuchikage muttered under his breath, the gravel in his voice like a crumbling stone. His fingers curled into fists. Hiruzen was always manoeuvring—always playing the long game.
====
Far to the east, amidst the iron clouds and jagged cliffs of Kumogakure, the tension was no less potent.
Inside the main hall of the Raikage's Tower, A—the Third Raikage—stood at the centre of a storm of voices. Advisors surrounded him, each speaking, gesturing, accusing, defending.
"I'm telling you, this is a move!" A's thunderous voice cracked through the din like a lightning strike. "Konoha conceded the mine. They let Iwa win without resistance. That's not mercy—that's alliance."
One advisor stepped forward, his face lined with scepticism. "Raikage-sama, forgive me, but we believe the concession was strategic. That bastard Sanin—Jiraiya—isn't known for politics. He's a clown. A skirt-chaser. He probably made a scene to distract from Konoha's real motives."
Another added, "This could be a ploy to isolate us. If Konoha appears weak, Iwa might lower its guard. The Leaf has always had its own agenda."
"Then why use coded phrases?" A snapped, slamming his fist down onto the stone table with a BOOM that sent scrolls flying. "Why speak in riddles only the old Kages would understand? No... no, this is deeper."
One of his senior advisors narrowed his eyes. "Even if what you say is true, if Konoha and Iwa are aligning... that's an unprecedented threat. But wouldn't they be more subtle about it?"
"That's just it!" A roared. "It wasn't subtle! It was loud, deliberate—meant to scare us. This was a power move, a message."
A tense silence followed, the weight of the implications sinking into everyone's shoulders.
Then, the doors burst open.
A young shinobi sprinted into the chamber, his breathing ragged, his head bowed low. "Raikage-sama!"
A turned, a snarl already forming. "This had better be good."
The shinobi didn't flinch. "Sir, we have new intel from our border scouts. Konoha has stationed a platoon of shinobi in Shimogakure. They've fortified an outpost and are setting up a long-term camp. We believe they've brought sealing experts and medical-nin as well."
The room froze.
Shimogakure—the Land of Frost. A neutral territory, small and politically quiet, but bordering both Kumo and the Land of Lightning directly. If Konoha was amassing a force there... it wasn't just a precaution. It was preparation.
"They're building a front line," one advisor whispered.
=====
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