Chapter 119: The Five Kage Conference and the Two Major Organizations
This year's Chunin Exams were nothing like the old ones.
In the past, each village hosted its own exam in isolation, a formal tradition wrapped in quiet rivalry. But after the baptism of Moon Dream, the Five Great Ninja Villages, along with the two major borderless organizations, had begun to share intentions, trade goodwill, and speak openly about cooperation. So they made a decision that would have sounded absurd just a few years ago.
They would hold a joint Chunin Exam.
To ordinary academy kids, taking tests beside ninjas from every corner of the world might feel like a neat novelty, no more than that. But for the veterans, for the middle aged and elderly shinobi who had trudged through decades of blood and funerals, this "small" step was enough to make their eyes burn. Some even wept outright, as if they had finally seen a seed of peace sprout in the ruins.
This world had suffered too long under war. Even the brutal years of fighting Moon Dream now felt like a hazy nightmare half remembered. Yet facing that overwhelming external threat, the villages had done something no one expected. They united. They set grudges aside, fought shoulder to shoulder, and in the end, drove the disease out of the ninja world.
Three years. That was all it took for everything to look different.
The tense shadow of another Ninja World War had faded. The Kage of the five great villages, the leaders of smaller lands, and the heads of powerful organizations had gathered again and again to coordinate Moon Dream support. Those meetings slowly evolved into a real diplomatic stage. Situations that once would have erupted into full wars were smoothed down through negotiation and shared pressure.
No one could pretend to be grateful for Moon Dream. The deaths were too many. Almost everyone had someone they loved sleep forever inside that beautiful lie.
But even so, people had begun to believe in the future that Moon Dream's aftermath left behind.
A kind of belief called expectation.
A yearning for something better.
Now, with the joint Chunin Exams about to begin, every Kage was preparing to attend a shared conference inside Konoha's main hall.
It would be the first time in history that all villages held the Chunin Exams together. Even more boldly, they had agreed the exams would rotate, hosted in turn within territories controlled not only by the five villages, but also by the two great borderless organizations.
Every leader, great or small, was watching closely. Even Danzo Shimura, head of the Army Without Borders, and Sosuke Aizen, the mysterious leader of Las Noches, would personally appear.
Yes, it was now public knowledge that Danzo and Aizen, once Hokage elders and advisors, had left Konoha to carve out their own factions. Yet no one mocked Minato for "losing" them. After all, those two had caused enough waves across the world to make that kind of joke suicidal.
Two years ago, the Army Without Borders began using force to prevent wars before they ignited. The appearance of the Rinnegan, which crushed chaos wherever it rose, gave Root enormous prestige among civilians and shinobi alike. Their harsh doctrine, cold and uncompromising, resonated with people whose hearts had been smashed on battlefields. Broken veterans who still craved peace flocked to Root in droves.
Many of them were rogue ninjas from their old villages, once vital forces on the fringes of power. Under a new ideology, they fused into a terrifying single current. Other villages resisted at first, but resistance meant little against shinobi who had already decided to leave. Root could hide them in its own compounds, then teleport them away in a blink. By the time you raised your voice, they were already gone. Root moved faster than anyone else, just as its name promised.
As for Hueco Mundo, the research faction born from Aizen's hand, it was even worse. Nobody knew how they recruited people. They were ghosts.
A healthy person could vanish in broad daylight, and a day later a message would spread that Las Noches had taken in a new researcher. Other villages were furious, but fury did not solve anything. Las Noches did not follow quotas. Sometimes they recruited orphans. Sometimes celebrated scholars. More often, they pulled in people no one expected.
Yet one point never changed. Las Noches remained the most secretive organization alive, maybe the one holding the most truth in its shadows.
No one truly understood why Aizen abandoned power inside Konoha. The most accepted explanation was simple. Like Danzo, he had seen the ceiling of the village era. Both men chose to break away, founding the Army Without Borders and the Las Noches Research Organization, both claiming the world needed structures beyond villages.
And on the surface, that was hard to argue with.
Las Noches released papers freely, guiding scientific progress across the ninja world like a lighthouse. They would publish foundational breakthroughs, then step back, refusing to monopolize the next layer of development. Villages benefited immensely. Even those who distrusted Aizen had to admit that Las Noches pushed everyone forward.
Of course, there was another reason the villages tolerated them.
They could not beat them.
Hueco Mundo's Espada were infamous. Only the Gotei 13 in Konoha, who did not answer to the Hokage, could stand against that level of power.
The grudges between Root and Las Noches, their clashes and awkward truces, were constant hot gossip on the Chakra Network. And with two massive organizations formed from Konoha's own former elders, and Konoha still sitting as the world's strongest village, the whole story carried a strange flavor.
People whispered, half joking, half paranoid.
Root and Las Noches both came from Konoha. Was the Leaf hiding its wealth overseas?
In truth, the theory was nonsense. Those two factions had fought each other plenty. It was just that in the current era, their conflicts rarely ended in death.
Blut Vene armor had already been upgraded to its latest version. Ordinary ninjutsu could not even scratch it. Worse, weak techniques sometimes strengthened the enemy's Blut Vene, making them tougher and more resilient. Because of that, the mental training and kido methods distributed by Las Noches were spreading everywhere, slowly replacing the declining lethality of classic ninjutsu. A new kind of confrontation was forming.
The old age had not fully died. The new one had not yet arrived.
Everyone felt it.
At that exact crossroads, the Third Raikage, A, arrived first. He set down his Raikage hat and took the center seat with casual authority.
"Looks like I'm the first one here. These brats have no sense of time..."
"I was here before you, Ai."
A rough, hoarse voice drifted from the shadows.
A turned his head. Danzo stepped out, wrapped in bandages, his presence cold enough to thicken the air. The man who had built the Army Without Borders with his bare hands gave A a flat glance, then sat quietly in Root's seat.
Among everyone present, the Raikage and Root had the deepest conflict.
Kumogakure's hunger for expansion was notorious. They used any method, no matter how ugly, and Root had repeatedly crushed their attempts at annexation. Their clashes had spilled plenty of blood. After warnings were ignored, Root had even launched Shinra Tensei strikes directly into Cloud supply depots.
To call them enemies was not an exaggeration. Root saw the Cloud as a threat to peace. The Cloud saw Root as arrogant meddlers sticking their noses into other people's wars.
But in a diplomatic hall like this, A valued appearances. He laughed loudly and extended a hand in greeting.
"First time we've met in real life, right? The legendary uncrowned shadow, Danzo. Root's gotten a lot stronger lately."
"I only hope your Cloud shinobi remember how hard peace is to earn. Have you chosen your successor?"
A's laugh stayed big, but his eyes sharpened.
"Hahaha. The Cloud's A B combination is way stronger than your borderless successors. Don't be shocked when you see them on the battlefield."
Danzo's mouth curled into something that wasn't quite a smile.
"If sons inherit their fathers' positions with no way to rise, they become nothing but withered bones. No wonder Root has recruited so many from the Hidden Cloud recently. So much for your so called unity."
"..."
A stared at him for a breath, then scratched his head and exhaled.
"Don't hit someone in the face, and don't stab where it hurts."
It was not that A wanted to lock his village into a dead inheritance model. The truth was colder. The Cloud's old development path had reached a wall.
The Army Without Borders had strangled the Cloud's plundering model. A knew it could not last forever. But for now, the Cloud still needed the strongest spear and the toughest shield it had.
Aizen had beaten him once, head on. But Las Noches itself proved that Aizen's mind was not stable. There were even rumors that Aizen wanted to blow up the planet. Compared to that, the Raikage decided arguing with a madman was pointless.
Still, a new Lightning Release combat model was already being developed. When it surfaced, the world would have to adjust again.
"...Hmm. Looks like I'm not the last one to arrive."
Wind and sand swept through the doorway.
The Fourth Kazekage, Rasa, appeared in silence, lifted his hat, and took a seat without ceremony.
The man who pioneered the Sand and Stone joint defense system offered no greeting to Danzo or A. He simply sat down, gaze distant, clearly already sinking into the chakra network as if the room did not exist.
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