Land of Earth, Iwagakure.
This was a world of mountains. The village's buildings and the surrounding peaks had no clear boundary—everything was carved straight from solid stone.
The Tsuchikage's office sat at the very highest point of the village.
The Third Tsuchikage, Onoki, floated in midair behind his desk, reading through a stack of documents.
His body was short and stocky, comically out of proportion to the title of Tsuchikage. A huge red nose dominated most of his face.
His son, Akatsuchi, stood beside him, a massive figure like a walking wall. His granddaughter, Kurotsuchi, leaned against the far wall, staring lazily at the stone peaks outside the window, her expression somewhat bored.
"Father-sama," Akatsuchi rumbled, his voice low and heavy, "the 'Earth Dragon' squad has been inside the Land of Fire for over twelve hours now, and we still haven't received any message from them."
Onoki removed the stone pipe from his mouth and snorted.
"No news is good news. That means their operation is going smoothly and Konoha hasn't noticed them. Ever since the Fourth Hokage, Konoha's ninja have only grown softer and softer."
He narrowed his eyes impatiently.
"Recently they've been playing around with some economic tricks, but the foundation of a shinobi village is strength. Nothing else."
"Though…" Onoki continued, "our intel says someone used some… special means to resurrect the Fourth Hokage. Even after coming back, that man hardly cares about day-to-day Konoha affairs. It's still that old geezer Sarutobi Hiruzen pulling the strings."
"When 'Earth Dragon' brings back intel on their new technologies, we'll finally see what's really under Konoha's mask."
Kurotsuchi yawned, then cut in.
"Grandpa, you're way too cautious. Isn't Konoha's strongest ninja right now just that Copy Ninja Kakashi? A guy who only knows how to act cool can't be that dangerous."
Onoki was just about to scold his granddaughter for being careless—
When the office changed.
His desk, carved from a single massive slab of stone, weighed over several tons. Above the desktop, the air suddenly rippled.
A scroll appeared on the desk.
It hadn't been placed there.
It had simply… materialized.
The scroll's surface was covered in a strange formula-like pattern.
"What is that?!"
Akatsuchi and Kurotsuchi tensed at once, dropping into combat stances.
Akatsuchi moved his bulk to shield Onoki, his hands already starting to form seals. Kurotsuchi's hand flashed, and a kunai appeared between her fingers, eyes locked onto the scroll that had appeared out of nowhere.
Onoki's eyes went wide.
Others might not recognize it, but he did.
During the Third Great Ninja War, that formula had been the nightmare of every Iwa ninja.
Hiraishin no Jutsu (Flying Thunder God Technique).
He tried to shout a warning, but it was already too late.
A streak of golden light flashed.
A figure appeared in the most heavily guarded office in the entire village.
The newcomer wore a white ceremonial cloak, the words "Fourth Hokage" written boldly across the back. Short golden hair framed a face with gentle blue eyes and a warm, almost apologetic smile.
This man was supposed to have died years ago—
Yet he now stood here, resurrected through some unknown means.
A legend who had once suppressed an entire era by himself.
Onoki knew he would never forget him as long as he lived.
Back then, the Raikage had tasted humiliation at his hands.
This time, it was the Tsuchikage's turn.
"Nami—… Minato?!"
Onoki's stone pipe slipped from his lips and shattered on the floor with a clear crack.
The chakra keeping his body afloat scattered. His feet hit the ground hard.
Terror etched itself across his aged face, every wrinkle deepened by shock.
"You… how are you still alive?!"
Akatsuchi and Kurotsuchi stared at the man before them, their minds blank.
The Yellow Flash.
A man who had died years ago was now standing in their office. They'd heard of forbidden techniques like Impure World Reincarnation, but hearing about something and seeing the person in front of you were two very different things.
As the two of them started to draw on their chakra, an invisible pressure crashed down on them.
Akatsuchi felt as if a mountain had been placed on his shoulders. His fingers refused to move; the half-formed hand sign froze and crumbled.
Kurotsuchi's arms turned impossibly heavy. She couldn't even raise her kunai.
The Tsuchikage's office fell into dead silence.
Minato ignored their reactions.
He gently placed a black wooden box on the desk, right beside the scroll.
Still smiling, he spoke to Onoki, whose brain had nearly shut down.
Onoki was thinking furiously, running through possibilities at high speed:
If he used Jinton: Genkai Hakuri no Jutsu (Particle Style: Atomic Dismantling Jutsu), could he suppress the Fourth Hokage?
But the man in front of him was the one known across the ninja world as its fastest shinobi.
Could he really be faster than Minato?
The more he thought, the colder his back became. Cold sweat soaked his clothes.
"Lord Tsuchikage, there's no need to be so nervous."
Minato's voice was soft, almost apologetic.
"I was entrusted by someone to bring you something."
"This is something your village left behind in the Land of Fire. We were kind enough to help you retrieve it."
His gaze lingered briefly on the black box.
"In addition, there's a message someone asked me to pass along."
Minato's gentle smile didn't change.
But the words that followed sent a chill straight through Onoki's bones.
"'Keep your hands to yourself. Otherwise, next time… what gets delivered might be your own head.'"
Before Onoki could react, Minato's body turned into golden light once more and vanished from the room.
The scroll on the desk, which had served as the coordinate marker, disappeared along with him.
He had arrived without warning.
He left even faster.
The entire visit hadn't lasted more than ten seconds.
The office returned to its earlier quiet.
But that suffocating pressure seemed to linger, clinging to the walls.
Akatsuchi and Kurotsuchi sucked in deep breaths, their backs drenched in cold sweat.
Kurotsuchi stared at the spot where that golden figure had vanished, then turned to her grandfather's face—
A face twisted with a fear she had never seen before.
Even her stubborn, hard-headed grandfather didn't dare confront that man head-on?
So that was the legendary Yellow Flash.
Onoki reached out a hand.
It was shaking.
Trembling, he slowly opened the black wooden box.
There were no explosive tags inside, no hidden weapons.
The sender clearly hadn't bothered with such petty tricks.
If they wanted him dead, they would have done it directly. There was no need for traps.
Inside, four Iwagakure forehead protectors were arranged in a neat row.
Each metal plate bore the Iwa symbol—
And over each symbol, a deep horizontal slash.
The mark of a missing-nin.
Beneath the four forehead protectors lay a single, carefully preserved head.
The head's eyes were stretched wide, frozen in the overwhelming terror of a completely broken mind.
Onoki recognized the face at a glance.
"…The 'Earth Dragon' squad's captain… Ishida."
Onoki swayed, his body unsteady, old back suddenly aching with a familiar, stabbing pain.
He collapsed backward into his chair.
This was no simple provocation.
The warning was written as clearly as that cut across the forehead protectors.
The other side had easily wiped out his most elite spy squad.
They had then used a method akin to that of gods and demons to drop the man's head onto the Tsuchikage's own desk.
That meant the other side could take his life at any time.
The question wasn't "can they?"
It was only "do they feel like it?"
This Tsuchikage, known throughout the ninja world for his stubbornness and iron will, was drenched in cold sweat from head to toe in the face of this unimaginable "cross-border warning."
Every scheme he'd been nursing toward Konoha…
Was shattered, completely and utterly.
(End of Chapter)
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