"Chiyo, I deeply regret Ebizo's sacrifice. It's my fault for not being able to leave Sunagakure freely; otherwise, I would never have let him take this risk personally. However, the dead cannot be brought back to life. You must not let hatred cloud your judgment."
Upon receiving the intelligence from the border base, the Third Kazekage immediately used the Chakra TV, which was only activated for remote conversations with the Daimyo, to comfort Chiyo face-to-face.
"Kazekage, this old woman is very calm right now." Chiyo said coldly, "If I were clouded by hatred, I would have privately sought out Hanzo to join forces and attack the Land of Fire long ago."
The Third Kazekage didn't mind Chiyo's disrespectful words. This pair of siblings, along with Chiyo's son and daughter-in-law, were the dominant faction in Sunagakure's higher-ups.
Chiyo, skilled in puppetry, poison, and Medical Ninjutsu, had a reputation in Sunagakure even louder than Tsunade's future title of Medical Sage, with countless followers.
Just like Gengetsu Hozuki of Kirigakure, although Chiyo was only the Kazekage's Assistant, she was an existence on equal footing with the Kazekage.
If Chiyo had even a hint of dissent, the position of the Third Kazekage wouldn't have been his.
Fortunately, their entire family supported the Kazekage's lineage.
Seeing that Chiyo hadn't lost her reason, the Third Kazekage breathed a sigh of relief and asked, "Then why do you want Bunpuku to guard the border base?"
"This old woman wants to break the current situation." Chiyo stated a very cruel reality, "We lost the probing period of this war."
"My brother's death caused us to temporarily lose contact with all hidden lines, completely paralyzing our external intelligence agency."
"Without intelligence support, it's too dangerous for reconnaissance teams and Anbu to infiltrate enemy countries; instead, it creates more opportunities for the enemy."
"Once at a disadvantage in the probing period, it's equivalent to exposing our weaknesses to the enemy, making us increasingly passive."
"We have only one choice now, and that is to break the balance of this situation, forcing them to enter the next stage."
"Our hatred with Amegakure isn't deep; entering the game was entirely caused by Hanzo's raid. From beginning to end, facing Hanzo's aggression, we have only been passively defending. Now we take a step back, and this old woman will shift the battle line to deal with Konoha."
"If Hanzo is still so tactless as to act against us, let Bunpuku join the battle."
At this point, Chiyo's eyes were full of killing intent: "This old woman will focus on the Konoha battle line, making them pay a painful price for this calculation."
Although Chiyo's purpose was revenge, her words made sense to the Third Kazekage.
Unless their Land of Wind announced withdrawal, without an intelligence agency, they were now blind.
More fatally, everyone knew this.
If they chose to withdraw in this situation, they would be a cowardly blind man, potentially attracting more wolves.
Their already imbalanced economy would only worsen.
They had no room to retreat.
Now that Konoha's forces were divided by the Land of Rain and the Land of Earth, it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The Third Kazekage was also unwilling to give up just like that.
Thus, the Third Kazekage said decisively: "Good, I will order Bunpuku to head to the border base immediately. The battle line against Konoha is yours. Do whatever you want; even if something happens at the border base, I will take action personally."
"This old woman understands."
With the Third Kazekage's approval, Chiyo acted immediately.
She didn't even wait for Bunpuku to arrive at the border base. Handing over command to the adjutant team, she led a group of powerful high-level combatants to the battle line at the junction of the Land of Rivers and the Land of Rain to meet up with her son and daughter-in-law.
The arrival of a Kage-level powerhouse and a group of high-level combatants not only instantly boosted the strength of this defense line but also disrupted Hatake Sakumo's rhythm.
During the four-month probing period, both Hatake Sakumo and Chiyo's son and daughter-in-law had gained a preliminary understanding of the scale of each other's forces and the specialties of some high-level combatants.
While supporting reconnaissance teams and Anbu, they had also briefly engaged many times, knowing each other's strengths and weaknesses.
Both sides were just waiting for an opportunity to deliver a fatal blow.
Now, Chiyo's arrival suddenly changed Hatake Sakumo's opponent from an Elite Jonin and Jonin couple team to a Kage-level powerhouse capable of wrestling with Hanzo the Salamander.
Moreover, Chiyo didn't come to oversee the battle line and boost morale; she arrived as an avenger.
With the goal of breaking the current situation, she simply glanced at the intelligence collected by the reconnaissance team and Anbu, then personally led the combat unit to launch a surprise attack on the White Fang battle line.
Although he anticipated that the news of Ebizo's death might cause changes in the war situation, Hatake Sakumo never expected Chiyo to shift the battle line so decisively.
Wasn't she afraid that leaving the border base would give Hanzo the Salamander an opportunity to raid the Land of Wind again?
However, the one being raided now was the White Fang battle line.
Without this intelligence, the White Fang battle line was caught off guard.
Hatake Sakumo also experienced the power of a Kage-level powerhouse for the first time!
Hatake Sakumo, skilled in Lightning Release nature transformation and Nintaijutsu, should have been the nemesis of puppeteers. As long as he bypassed the opponent's puppets, he could easily kill the puppeteer whose movement speed and reaction ability would weaken while controlling puppets, even if not completely immobilized.
Even Chiyo's son and daughter-in-law, a couple team capable of coordinating puppets to make it difficult for Taijutsu and Nintaijutsu ninjas to approach, had such weaknesses in Hatake Sakumo's eyes.
Only Chiyo was completely different from those puppeteers.
Her Taijutsu was very powerful, and her speed and reaction ability could keep up with Hatake Sakumo's Lightning Release speed, completely unlike a woman in her fifties and a puppeteer.
Moreover, her puppetry had reached the peak of perfection.
The Chikamatsu Collection of Ten Puppets, created by the founder of puppetry, was Chiyo's strongest means to dominate the Ninja World. Known as "One Machine Matches a Thousand," it was stronger than a ninja squad composed of ten high-level combatants.
One of Chiyo's famous battles was capturing a city relying on these ten puppets.
The materials used for these puppets were very extraordinary. Without finding their weaknesses, even slashes covered with Lightning Release nature transformation couldn't shatter such puppets.
These puppets could also perform combination techniques similar to composite Ninjutsu, making Hatake Sakumo feel a fatal threat.
He wasn't fighting one-on-one but one against a group of high-level combatants, or even ace combatants, who shared a mind and seemed to share one brain.
Chiyo had also modified her hand into a puppet hand, not only enabling better control of the Chikamatsu Collection of Ten Puppets but also installing puppet mechanisms that could convert her own Chakra into a shield defending against everything.
Hatake Sakumo finally bypassed all the puppets and found an opening in Chiyo, launching a fatal blow at her, only to be easily blocked by the shield.
If not for his amazing speed, he would have almost been hit by the poison Chiyo also installed in the puppet hand.
Like Hanzo the Salamander and Gojo Yoru, Hatake Sakumo, an assassin-type ninja, instantly realized he was no match for Chiyo.
At the same time, he finally understood why this woman became Hanzo the Salamander's rival.
He didn't hesitate to lead the combat unit to scatter and retreat.
Even so, many Konoha ninjas died from Chiyo's poison after being accidentally injured by the puppets of the Puppeteer Squad.
Unlike the Salamander's large-scale poison smoke, this was a contact-kill poison applied to weapons and hidden weapons.
Against such poison, Hatake Sakumo was helpless and could only choose to request support from the village.
The frenzied Chiyo stole Gojo Yoru's limelight, becoming the most eye-catching existence on the battlefield.
After many years, this woman once again let the Ninja World feel the power of a puppeteer.
Weak puppeteers indeed had many flaws and were fragile existences when encountering opponents with attribute advantages.
Powerful puppeteers, however, had almost no flaws, an army in one person.
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