They either didn't want to pick a side, or had no intention of fighting at all. But by the usual pattern, once the first two groups decided a winner, this silent majority would quietly submit to whoever came out on top.
"Have you all lost your minds?! Ameyuri!" Even with plenty of people backing him, Ao had no desire to start a fight. Instead, he shouted at Ameyuri in shock and fury. "At a moment when the village is facing life and death, how long are you going to keep messing around?!"
Ameyuri only had a few dozen behind him, but nearly all of them were core combat strength—if they weren't jōnin, they were veteran, elite chūnin.
Before last night, Kirigakure might barely have been able to endure losses like that given its overall size. But now, if they lost this chunk of strength too, the Land of Water's standing as one of the Five Great Nations would be on the verge of collapse.
Not to mention, if Ao's side tried to wipe out Ameyuri's group, Ao's own people would take horrific losses as well. At that point, forget holding onto Kirigakure's status—there was a real chance they'd fall below even villages like Kusagakure and Amegakure.
Ameyuri's expression stiffened slightly under Ao's accusation. Ao didn't want to fight—did Ameyuri really want to tear the village apart at a time like this?
If the situation was truly as awful as Ao described, he might end up becoming Kirigakure's sinner.
Just as Ameyuri was stuck riding the tiger—unable to back down—and Ao was equally constrained, afraid to act, Mei Terumi on the other side braved the rain and arrived at the temple where Genji lived.
Just as Mei had expected, Genji was already back at the temple. What she didn't expect was that besides Genji and his guards, there were also more than a dozen injured shinobi inside, receiving treatment.
"Genji, I would like to ask you…" Mei bowed her head respectfully, intending to ask for his support in becoming the Fifth Mizukage.
But to her surprise, before she could finish, Genji waved his hand at her, then gestured to his guards. They escorted the injured people—who had just been questioned by Genji—out of the room, leaving Mei and Genji to speak in private.
"Look at this, Mei." After everyone left, Genji shakily groped around in the shrine niche behind him and pulled out a scroll, handing it to her. "Read it first. Then we'll talk."
Mei frowned, but she took the scroll and opened it. With one glance, her expression changed—the contents were clearly intelligence about Uchiha Chizumi.
The person who compiled it was probably a Kirigakure spy embedded in Konoha. But the spy's rank seemed low, and their ability to gather information was limited, so most of the notes about Chizumi were based on hearsay.
Still, for Kirigakure now, this kind of intelligence was more precious than any secret art or forbidden technique. It had the potential to influence whether the village lived or died going forward.
As Mei read, the tight knot between her brows slowly eased. The good news was that Chizumi's way of doing things in Konoha wasn't much different from how he'd acted in Kirigakure. Even the Third Hokage's son had died by his hand after committing a grave offense. That meant Mei's greatest fear—that Chizumi had come specifically for Kirigakure—could essentially be dismissed.
And since Chizumi's methods were so crude and unrestrained, the plan she had fabricated earlier—meant to persuade, or rather fool, the other Kirigakure shinobi—didn't seem hopeless after all.
Of course, it wasn't all good news. The intelligence described Chizumi's strength in exaggerated terms—yet Mei had seen his power with her own eyes. The thought that the monster still had even more hidden cards made her feel weak all over.
Still, her expectations had never been high to begin with. Ao was dreaming about "settling accounts" with Konoha or even Chizumi himself, but Mei only wanted to preserve Kirigakure's future. No matter how strong Chizumi was, under pressure from the other four great nations, surely he would be forced to let the Land of Water go… right?
"…Keep reading." Seeing Mei's expression lighten, Genji knew she still hadn't reached the crucial section. He tapped his cane on the floor to remind her. "The part about Uchiha Chizumi's Mangekyō Sharingan abilities!"
"Yes—so he really awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan…" Mei answered quickly and respectfully. She skimmed past the personality analysis and went straight to the Mangekyō information. "…What is this?"
It hadn't been many years since the Third Shinobi World War ended. The great villages—especially a closed-off one like Kirigakure—weren't unfamiliar with the Uchiha clan's Sharingan, one of Konoha's two founding bloodlines.
At Mei's level, she also clearly knew there was something above the Sharingan: the Mangekyō. Considering Chizumi's strength, it was only natural that he had awakened it. Maybe the monster's endless stream of bloodline limits came from his Mangekyō ability…
But after Mei finished reading about Chizumi's Sharingan ability, the expression on her rain-soaked, beautiful face twisted. She looked up at Genji in disbelief, desperate to hear him deny it.
"…This old man will support you as the Fifth," Genji sighed instead, lifting his head with a bitter smile. "Right now, aside from you, there's no one left in the village who can bear the name of Mizukage…"
"I had Ao tell everyone to endure for now… that once Uchiha Chizumi becomes the shinobi world's public enemy, we can unite and drive him out of Kirigakure…" Mei's voice was low, her mood heavy—despite gaining Genji's support exactly as planned.
"A good plan," Genji said, sounding as if he were trying to comfort her. "Uchiha Chizumi… perhaps, like Uchiha Madara once was, is something that can be treated as a natural disaster. If Kirigakure can survive under his shadow at all, that alone is impressive. You'll be a capable Mizukage. Don't blame yourself."
"How can there be such an unreasonable ability?!" Mei burst out, emotions surging; even her ample chest rose and fell violently. "Judging sins from the past—even the future… doesn't that mean no matter what we plot, past or future, it's useless against him?!"
"And even if we somehow convince everyone to submit for now, with Uchiha Chizumi's personality and methods, there's no way he'll spare them!"
Just thinking about those fellow villagers who treated human lives as nothing made Mei feel like her head was about to explode. Letting those monsters—who had committed who knew how many crimes—show their faces in front of Chizumi was no different from sending them to their deaths!
~~~
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