"It wasn't easy for you to come to Akatsuki Village..."
"Senju Tobirama, you just had to come to this place."
"This is really causing me trouble!"
Uchiha Makoto complained.
However, although he was complaining, his face showed no sign of it, instead displaying a look of pure delight.
Yes—this was the Ninja Academy.
While Uchiha Makoto and Senju Tobirama were strolling through Akatsuki Village, they happened to pass by the Ninja Academy.
And when they passed it, Senju Tobirama had a sudden whim to visit the Akatsuki Village Ninja Academy.
It wasn't exactly a secret location.
The Ninja Academy, unlike Akatsuki Village's high-tech industrial park with its many restricted laboratories, was a place even ordinary villagers could occasionally enter to deliver clothes or food to the students. So, showing Senju Tobirama around was no big deal.
And then...
Uchiha Makoto was surrounded by students the moment he entered!
The Ninja Academy had a very interesting ritual. Around 9:30 in the morning, all teachers and students had to gather in the school's courtyard and swear an oath to a portrait of Uchiha Makoto—"Pledge loyalty to Lord Light Shadow!"
Because of this, every student at the Ninja Academy knew Uchiha Makoto and saw him as their highest idol... because of Lord Light Shadow, they had the chance to live a life they had only seen in their dreams.
So, a large group of adorable students gathered around Uchiha Makoto.
They surrounded him, hoping for a rewarding head pat or a cheek pinch from him.
"Tch~ this evil brat..."
Senju Tobirama heard Uchiha Makoto's show-offy voice from the side. He was quickly pushed to the periphery of the crowd, and a look of displeasure appeared on his face.
The children of Akatsuki Village were so impolite... they should at least greet him.
However, he only disliked Uchiha Makoto, not these children. Senju Tobirama hadn't reached the point of taking his anger out on kids.
The look of displeasure quickly vanished.
Looking at the rosy, smiling faces and the light shining in the children's eyes, a smile appeared on his face as well.
This was the original intention behind the founding of Konoha!
The reason Senju Hashirama wanted to establish a ninja village was so that ninjas would not have to kill each other forever, hoping that one day children could study, play, and grow under the village's protection, instead of experiencing the cruelest battles as children like their generation did.
Even someone as strong as the First Hokage couldn't protect all his brothers, leaving only Senju Tobirama.
And Uchiha Madara was left with no brothers at all.
If it was like this for Senju Hashirama and Uchiha Madara... what about others?
These battles were enough to destroy the tender will of children and their aspirations for the future, turning them into walking corpses.
So both Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama went "mad."
One became pathologically obsessed with so-called peace, "protecting" for the sake of "protecting," and in the end, "protected" nothing.
The other was deceived by Black Zetsu's crude Eye of the Moon Plan lie, ultimately living a tragic life.
Senju Tobirama was also a survivor of that era. He was a bit better off; he didn't go "mad," but he did become a single-race discriminator.
Of course... he also knew how precious this scene was... even if these were the children of Akatsuki Village.
They were delayed for quite a while.
The class bell rang, but the students were unwilling to leave.
It wasn't until a teacher from the Ninja Academy noticed something was wrong—the classroom that should have been full of students was empty today—and rushed out to check the situation, saw Uchiha Makoto, that the group of students was finally led back to the classroom by the teacher.
"Ha, my apologies, my apologies. I came by unannounced today."
"Just carry on with what you're doing. Don't let me disrupt the normal order."
Uchiha Makoto said with a gentle attitude, sending off the students and teacher, and then breathed a sigh of relief.
"Are you done showing off?"
Senju Tobirama's grim face returned. He spoke coldly to Uchiha Makoto, his tone filled with envy, jealousy, and hate.
"What showing off? I told you we shouldn't come. You're the one who insisted on taking a look."
"Hmph... of all the paths we could have taken, you just had to take the one by the Ninja Academy. I think you did it on purpose... You knew I would..."
"What a ridiculous argument. Then I'll use a Transformation Jutsu... Although class has started, there are still students in outdoor classes... being constantly surrounded is also very troublesome."
Uchiha Makoto had no intention of arguing with the completely unreasonable Senju Tobirama over such boring issues.
After all, there was a reason for Senju Tobirama's hostility.
Originally, his reputation in the village was quite good, but because of Uchiha Makoto, it had become mixed.
The Konoha higher-ups knew Senju Tobirama's difficulties; as the village's nominal number two and actual number three, he was already doing an excellent job.
But it was hard for others to understand the intricacies. In any case, the Uchiha children probably didn't like Senju Tobirama very much.
So Uchiha Makoto immediately used a Transformation Jutsu to end the topic... He was afraid Senju Tobirama would get angry and pull out a kunai.
If the two of them started fighting at the school, it would be too disgraceful!
Senju Tobirama might not care about face, but he did!
Afterward, the two wandered around the school for a while. They chose not to disturb the students in their indoor classes and came to a huge square field.
The sun was shining brightly.
As far as the eye could see, many students were having outdoor classes in this area.
Senju Tobirama looked at these students and skillfully estimated their number, about four hundred in total.
This was a truly terrifying number.
The newest class enrolled in the Konoha Ninja Academy was only a little over six hundred, close to seven hundred.
The students here already made up a large portion of that number.
At the same time, almost subconsciously.
Senju Tobirama recalled the intelligence he had on this aspect of Akatsuki Village.
The number of students in the Akatsuki Village Ninja Academy had been maintained at a terrifyingly high level since its second year, from the initial three thousand... it had been continuously expanding in the past two years, and there was another large-scale expansion this year.
In any case, this was terrifying news.
The situation was very grim.
The only good news was that the number of students Akatsuki Village initially recruited normally was about the same as Konoha's, no... it should be less than Konoha's.
The students recruited in the subsequent continuous expansions were actually a bunch of wastes.
Literally wastes.
This type of student was usually called garbage by ninja village academies, the kind they wished they could just persuade to drop out, with no need for training at all, as they would only waste precious educational resources... These students couldn't become qualified ninjas; even becoming a Genin would be a struggle.
At first, Senju Tobirama thought Uchiha Makoto had gone crazy again, and even felt a sense of schadenfreude—maintaining such a large student body was a considerable burden on a ninja village's finances. Perhaps Akatsuki Village's treasury would be dragged down by this.
But as the two became more familiar, Senju Tobirama already knew that Uchiha Makoto was a famously cunning old fox who never made a losing deal.
Since he insisted on recruiting a large number of students who would have difficulty becoming qualified ninjas, spending such vast resources, there must be a reason.
"Why these waste students... Tobirama, the way you talk is as unpleasant as ever."
"Since you've asked so sincerely, I will graciously answer you. To prevent the world from being destroyed, to protect the peace of the ninja world, to carry out love and true evil..."
"Speak human language, dammit!"
Senju Tobirama's brow furrowed.
He knew that Uchiha Makoto sometimes liked to say things that were baffling.
It was the same that day when they were discussing the future of the ninja world.
"Perhaps one day we ninjas will venture into the starry sky. At that time, the problems we encounter may be far more numerous than now, for example..."
"Slaves are not happy, how to make slaves happy?"
"Why are forced labor and processing mutually exclusive?"
"Why is the output of criminals completely negative, don't they pay taxes?"
"If there are too many unemployed people, can the Human Federation directly cleanse its own planet?"
"..."
A whole list of things that made Senju Tobirama feel like he didn't understand at all, but at the same time felt was very profound.
This was not a good feeling.
It made Senju Tobirama feel like a fool in front of Uchiha Makoto.
"Hmm... alright, to put it simply, remember what I told you about making ninjutsu a part of daily life..."
"I remember, but you can't possibly be counting on these students to help you achieve that, can you? They probably struggle to even use a D-rank ninjutsu."
"That's true, but it's enough."
Uchiha Makoto pointed to a student not far away who was painstakingly forming hand seals.
The sealing process took a full three minutes.
Senju Tobirama was dumbfounded. The student formed over a hundred seals; his own Water Dragon Bullet Jutsu only had forty-four.
And even then, Senju Tobirama felt the Water Dragon Bullet's seals were too cumbersome and needed further improvement.
Otherwise, in a ninja battle, it could easily be interrupted by an enemy, causing the jutsu to fail.
However, the jutsu was eventually successfully activated.
But its effect was very mediocre. In Senju Tobirama's eyes, it couldn't even be called a ninjutsu. It had no offensive power at all, only causing a piece of land about two meters wide and over twenty meters long to be slightly disturbed, as if it had been plowed once.
So Senju Tobirama wore a "That's it?" expression—I thought you were going to show me something big, but you just dropped a turd.
What's the use of this kind of ninjutsu!
"Still don't get it?"
"As we all know, in pursuit of victory in battle, ninjas usually simplify the number of hand seals to speed up the activation of a jutsu. But this is a test of the user's chakra control and consumption. In contrast, the more hand seals there are, the lower the requirements for the user, which can greatly improve the jutsu's stability and operability, and the chakra consumption is also greatly reduced... This jutsu is used for farming. Even someone with ordinary talent can master it with diligent practice... There are also other corresponding infrastructure ninjutsu... building a small road is no problem."
"Perhaps they can't participate in ninja battles, but they can truly change this ninja world with its low productivity."
"Think about it, every year in the future, thousands of these ninjas, whom you just called wastes, will graduate from the Ninja Academy and go out to change the world!"
"This is the responsibility ninjas should bear, not like the ninjas of the past who ran around with kunai for those high and mighty figures, killing complete strangers and creating endless slaughter and hatred."
"The ninja world shouldn't be like this!"
Uchiha Makoto's Mouth Release Jutsu had reached the pinnacle of perfection. The ultimate romance for a man is—the world shouldn't be like this!
Even Senju Tobirama was quite moved. He had once thought that the grand promises Uchiha Makoto had made to him were just empty talk... he never expected that he was truly practicing his ninja way.
The new generation of ninjas had already been mobilized by him!
But in the next second, Uchiha Makoto's tone changed: "So... sooner or later, I'm going to slaughter all the Daimyo and nobles in the ninja world!"
Senju Tobirama's expression changed. The bit of goodwill he had just developed for Uchiha Makoto vanished.
"That's too extreme. I can support the actions you just mentioned... but killing all the Daimyo and nobles... you're simply insane!"
"I want ninjas to rule the ninja world. They are the stumbling blocks for the ninja class. What's wrong with me kicking them aside... This isn't a dinner party; it's a cruel, life-or-death struggle."
"Are the Daimyo and nobles more noble than us ninjas... Can he use Lord Hashirama's Sage Mode... or possess the Uchiha clan's powerful Kekkei Genkai, the Sharingan? They have nothing!"
These words had always been unspeakable, a taboo.
Even Senju Tobirama had only occasionally thought about these things in his mind but had never said them out loud, nor had he ever acted on them... The relationship between ninjas and the Daimyo and nobles was very delicate, not a simple relationship of cooperation and dependence.
But Uchiha Makoto was not afraid. This was his territory!
And even if the Daimyo of the Land of Fire heard it, so what!
Could the Daimyo rush into Akatsuki Village and put Uchiha Makoto on trial... he could do nothing!
This only proved that Akatsuki Village had freedom of speech!
In this free ninja village, ninjas and ordinary people could freely vent their dissatisfaction with the actions of the Daimyo and nobles!
Senju Tobirama clutched his head.
He really had no way to answer Uchiha Makoto's question.
The constraints of traditional ninja thinking made him feel that Uchiha Makoto was a madman.
He had seen too many Uchiha like this, clamoring that this ninja world was wrong, then going on a killing spree, ultimately making a mess of things and harming others as well as themselves.
But Uchiha Makoto was different. Although he also went mad from time to time, he was truly doing things to change the ninja world, to make it develop for the better.
So, a voice deep inside Senju Tobirama responded... Uchiha Makoto was probably right.
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