After Jiraiya's heartfelt explanation, Naruto decided to join the resistance.
"Naruto, Kushina's ANBU are spread all across the Land of Fire now. She has eyes everywhere, so Orochimaru and I can barely move around freely."
Jiraiya reached into his clothes and handed Naruto a token.
"There's one mission we can only entrust to you. Find the Fire Daimyō and show him this. He'll tell you what to do after that. Just follow his instructions."
"Leave it to me!"
Naruto thumped his chest confidently, then turned around and left the Fire Temple without another word.
After rushing along for most of the day, Naruto finally caught up with the Fire Daimyō, who had fled back to his residence in a panic.
"Oh, Naruto!"
The Daimyō's initial surprise turned to delight the moment he discreetly spotted the token Naruto was carrying.
Suppressing his excitement, he casually asked,
"Have some free time? Want to go take a dump together?"
"Huh?"
Naruto scratched his head.
"Oh. Sure."
It was a strange invitation, but Jiraiya had explicitly told him to follow the Daimyō's instructions after showing him the token.
Besides, Naruto had been traveling for a day and a night.
He genuinely needed the bathroom.
The Daimyō led Naruto into a private restroom, where the two sat facing each other on separate toilets.
"Naruto…"
The Daimyō immediately began choking up.
"Do you know what life is like for me now? Uzumaki Kushina may call herself the Hokage, but she's practically a bandit wearing the title!"
"This entire residence is filled with her informants. Only here, seated upon this toilet, do I truly feel like the Daimyō of the Land of Fire…"
He paused.
Then sniffed.
"What is that smell?"
Naruto looked confused.
"Uh… didn't you invite me here to take a dump?"
"…"
The Daimyō's mouth twitched.
'You actually started?!'
Still, after thinking about it, he decided this might be even better.
If the smell drifted outside, Kushina's spies would be even more convinced that the two of them really had only come here for that.
"Naruto."
The Daimyō forced himself back into character.
"I know you're a kind child. You have your own sense of justice."
His eyes filled with tears.
"Think about how my son Ikkyū died. Is that truly something a Hokage should do?"
"This world shouldn't be like this!"
"I believe that somewhere, perhaps in another world, there must be a Hokage who is kind, upright, loyal, and trustworthy."
"Not this tyrannical woman ruling us now!"
The Daimyō continued his tearful performance.
Unfortunately…
No matter how badly the Engraved Tsukuyomi version of Kushina treated the Daimyō, neither Naruto nor the real-world viewers found it quite as horrifying as he expected.
The reason was simple.
In the real shinobi world, the Daimyō system had practically collapsed.
And it wasn't just the Fire Daimyō.
Of the Five Great Nations, only the Lightning Daimyō had peacefully surrendered his political authority.
The Daimyō families of the other four nations had all somehow met sudden, disastrous ends—
Not merely the rulers themselves, but entire households and bloodlines.
Compared with that, Engraved Tsukuyomi Kushina had only executed one heir.
And that heir had actually participated in a conspiracy to overthrow her.
Seen from that perspective…
This Kushina almost looked restrained.
Naruto still disagreed with her methods, but hearing the Daimyō complain only reminded him that the real world's Daimyō system was barely even alive anymore.
His expression became awkward.
"Wait a moment, Naruto."
The Daimyō pulled down a strip of white silk, bit his finger, and began writing on it in blood.
"Naruto, this is my formal edict calling for the defeat of the traitor."
"Take it with you."
Naruto nodded seriously.
"Got it. I'll deliver it to Orochimaru and Per—Jiraiya."
"No."
The Daimyō shook his head.
"I want you to personally deliver it to Princess Tsunade."
"Tsunade-baachan?"
Naruto blinked.
"She'll help us too?"
"She will."
The Daimyō nodded confidently.
"Naruto, you're still young, so you may not know this, but the First Hokage and Uchiha Madara originally represented two fundamentally different ideals…"
"I know."
Naruto answered immediately.
"Peace through love versus peace through power."
"No."
The Daimyō shook his head solemnly.
"It was gay-type shinobi versus furry-loving shinobi."
"…"
Naruto stared at him.
'The one time I finally gave a serious answer, and you hit me with that?'
What the hell!
"To be precise, the conflict goes all the way back to ancient times."
The Daimyō lowered his voice.
"This is a secret known only to the Daimyō of the Five Great Nations."
"The Sage of Six Paths didn't merely possess every chakra nature."
"He also possessed every possible… preference."
Naruto's face slowly went blank.
"Yes."
The Daimyō nodded gravely.
"The Sage of Six Paths was simultaneously a bond-type shinobi and a furry lover."
"He discriminated against nothing and embraced everything."
"His two sons inherited his Sage Body and Sage Eyes respectively."
"And just as they inherited different aspects of his power, they also inherited those two sides of his preferences."
"Those bloodlines eventually became the Senju and the Uchiha."
Naruto continued staring.
"Ninjutsu itself was invented by Indra."
The Daimyō continued.
"And anyone who practices ninjutsu can only learn senjutsu by forming a bond with animals."
"That was a hidden mechanism Indra deliberately left behind to guide future shinobi toward furry appreciation."
"Only the Senju, descendants of Asura, had any real chance of resisting that influence."
"However, precisely because Indra invented ninjutsu, his philosophy dominated the shinobi world throughout the Warring States Period."
"That only changed with the rise of Senju Hashirama—the First Hokage."
"Hashirama and Madara met when they were children."
"They were among the rare few capable of genuinely understanding one another."
"At a time when the Senju and Uchiha were locked in bitter conflict over whether bonds or furries were superior, Madara openly expressed his affection for Hashirama."
"And Hashirama, in turn, declared that he wanted to use Wood Release to restrain the Nine-Tails."
"So each of them appeared to accept the philosophy of the other's clan."
The Daimyō sighed.
"But in reality, the First Hokage only looked simple and honest."
"He was actually terrifyingly calculating."
"He exploited the Uchiha clan's naturally kindhearted nature and pressured Uchiha Madara into helping him establish Konoha."
"During that process, the ninja hound Madara loved most—Uchiha Inuna—was killed by Senju Tobirama."
"Madara completely lost the one creature he most wanted to protect."
Naruto's expression became increasingly complicated.
"And strangely enough…"
The Daimyō continued.
"Legend says Indra once owned a little dog too."
"Originally, Indra and Asura could understand one another perfectly well."
"But one day, Indra's dog was turned into a dog-meat hotpot by a bond-type shinobi."
"Devastated beyond measure, Indra decided the entire shinobi world had to be remade into a furry world."
"Asura, determined to stop his brother, responded by swinging to the opposite extreme."
The Daimyō coughed.
"But we're getting off topic."
"In any case, by the time Uchiha Madara finally realized that Hashirama had been subtly reshaping the shinobi world into one dominated by bond-type values, it was already too late."
He leaned toward Naruto.
"I've explained all of this so you should understand now, right?"
"Tsunade is the First Hokage's granddaughter."
"She naturally inherited his will and stands on the bond-type side."
"And the thing Kushina hates most is bond-type shinobi."
"The two of them have been enemies for years."
"In fact, when Tsunade left Konoha, she wanted to take Shizune with her as her personal attendant, but Kushina forcibly kept Shizune in the village under the excuse of protecting her from Tsunade's influence."
"So there's already plenty of bad blood between them."
The Daimyō gave Naruto a confident look.
"Find Tsunade."
"She'll agree."
"Even if she won't do it for me…"
"She'll do it to get Shizune back."