Chapter 96: The Sacrificed Hero
Meanwhile, in the Land of Wind, Sunagakure.
The Kazekage's Office.
BOOM!!
With a loud crash, the heavy office desk was crushed into dust by violent gold sand. The gold powder filled the air, raging within the cramped space like a storm.
Rasa, the Fourth Kazekage, stood in the center of the ruins, his chest heaving violently. His habitually cold poker face was now twisted into a near-ferocious snarl.
Opposite him, several members of the Elder Council cowered in the corner, holding a bill identical to Konoha's, too terrified to even breathe loudly.
"They've gone too far! This is too much!!"
Rasa roared hysterically, crumpling the bill in his hand into a ball of scrap paper. "Is that old hag Chiyo made of gold?! And those Puppeteers... three million Ryo per head?! And they want us to buy back the wreckage of those broken Puppets?!"
The situation in Sunagakure was far more tragic than in Konoha.
Konoha was wealthy and had deep roots; paying this amount would hurt, but they would survive. Sunagakure, however, was already impoverished, scraping for food in the desert. Furthermore, the Daimyo of the Land of Wind was notoriously stingy, having just rejected all military funding requests a few days ago on the grounds of 'failure in battle.'
Even if Rasa sold all his tools used for refining gold sand, he couldn't even come up with half of the total on this bill!
"Lord Kazekage..." an Elder spoke up tremulously, "if we don't redeem Advisor Chiyo, the Village's Puppet Brigade will have no leader. Moreover, Elder Chiyo holds immense prestige in the Village; if we don't save her, I'm afraid..."
"I want to save her too! But where is the money?!"
Rasa turned sharply, staring at the Elder with bloodshot eyes. "The Daimyo won't give us a single cent! Am I supposed to sell my own blood?!"
The Elder shrank back, not daring to say another word.
A desperate silence fell over the office.
This was an unsolvable math problem.
They had to save the people, or Sunagakure's combat power would regress twenty years, dropping them out of the Five Great Nations and leaving them as easy prey. But the lack of money to save them was an objective fact.
Late at night.
Wind and sand battered the window frames, letting out a wailing moan.
Rasa sat alone in the ruins covered in gold sand. By the dim light of a candle, he smoothed out the crumpled bill.
His fingers, stained with a bit of ink, slowly traced over the names like a calculating butcher deciding which meat could be discarded.
"Chiyo... she must be saved. She is a Village veteran and a key to balancing the other high-ranking officials."
"This group of Jonin... they are the backbone. Though expensive, they must be redeemed, otherwise there will be no one to carry out missions."
His finger finally stopped on one name.
[Pakura (Scorching Release User): Price 40 million Ryo. Note: Possesses a unique Kekkei Genkai with extremely high research value. If Sunagakure waives redemption, Mr. Orochimaru has expressed willingness to purchase her personally.]
Rasa's finger paused.
Forty million Ryo.
This price was second only to Chiyo's.
Pakura... the female Ninja who possessed the Scorch Style Bloodline and was invincible on the battlefield. She was a hero of Sunagakure and an idol worshipped by countless young Ninja. Her prestige even showed signs of overshadowing his own as Kazekage.
Under the flickering candlelight, Rasa's eyes gradually became cold and deep.
He remembered the way Pakura smiled amidst the cheers of the villagers, and the rumors he'd heard of Elders privately discussing whether "Pakura is qualified to run for Fifth Generation Kazekage."
A hero?
Heh. To a ruler, a hero whose merit overshadows their master is often more dangerous than an enemy.
"If you come back alive, the Village's finances will collapse and my prestige will suffer," Rasa whispered to himself, his voice as cold as the desert night wind. "But if you die... you will be a martyr who sacrificed herself for the Village. Your death will ignite the villagers' hatred for Amegakure, and I can save this massive sum of money."
This wasn't just an economic calculation.
It was a political one.
Rasa picked up a pen and, on the draft of the reply form, drew a heavy, bright red 'X' next to the redemption option for 'Pakura'.
"Since you are a hero..." Rasa's voice was terrifyingly low, echoing in the empty room, "then for the sake of the Village's finances, sacrifice yourself one last time."
Rasa blew out the candle.
Darkness completely swallowed everything, along with the fate of the hero who had once shed her last drop of blood for Sunagakure.
The rain continued to fall, as if washing away the sins of this city, or perhaps masking the cries of a new order being born.
Homura Mitokado trudged along the slippery metal walkway, his expression darker than the storm clouds overhead. As a high-level Advisor of Konoha, he was used to drinking tea in the Hokage Building's conference room and watching envoys from small nations tremble before him.
But today, he and Ebizo from Sunagakure were like two plucked roosters, being "escorted" by two rows of Amegakure Anbu as they walked through the main street of Amegakure.
Instead of the refugee camps they expected, the roads were lined with countless eyes flashing with mocking glints.
"Is that the Advisor from Konoha or whatever?" a man who looked like an Amegakure merchant leaned against a doorway, tossing a gold coin. His voice was loud enough to be heard. "He doesn't look like he has any more heads than us. How did he get beaten like a dog by Lord Pain?"
"Shh, don't talk like that," his companion chuckled strangely. "That's a 'walking money bag.' Our Village's infrastructure funds for next year depend entirely on these lords redeeming their people."
Ebizo's perpetually squinted old eyes snapped open a crack, a sliver of malice flashing in his cloudy pupils. As the younger brother of that crazy woman Chiyo, he was second only to one in Sunagakure. When had he ever been insulted by such common rabble?
"Your Excellency Homura Mitokado," Ebizo lowered his voice, his tone icy, "Amegakure is trying to intimidate us."
"Endure it." Homura Mitokado pushed up his sliding glasses, his back teeth grinding. "Get the people out first. Once they are back, there will be plenty of opportunities to settle this debt."
Filled with rage, the two were led toward the central tower that pierced the clouds.
However, when the heavy doors opened, the solemn, oppressive, blood-scented interrogation room they expected did not appear.
What met their eyes was a spacious and luxurious open-air platform. An invisible barrier kept the wind and rain out. Instead of a musty smell, the air was filled with the aroma of expensive red wine, and the melodious strains of a violin echoed through the space.
Yahiko, dressed in a well-tailored black robe with red clouds, leaned lazily against the railing, gently swirling a glass of blood-red wine. Konan stood quietly by his side, holding a thick stack of folders like an efficient secretary.
This total lack of regard for the envoys of great nations made Homura Mitokado's carefully prepared diplomatic rhetoric feel like a heavy punch landing in cotton—powerless.
"Special Envoys, you've had a long journey."
Yahiko didn't turn around; he simply kept his back to them and raised his glass to the void. "Make yourselves at home. The drinks are self-service, don't be shy."
"Your Excellency Yahiko!"
Homura Mitokado finally couldn't hold back and stepped forward, trying to regain his footing through volume. "We are not here for a cocktail party! Konoha and Sunagakure, as two of the Five Great Nations, will never accept terrorist extortion! Your detention of high-level officials of allied nations and your demand for exorbitant ransoms is a serious violation of the Ninja World Convention!"
Ebizo also chimed in gloomily, attempting to apply pressure: "Young man, don't think you can do whatever you want just because you won a local battle. If you insist on that ridiculous one-billion-Ryo list, what awaits you will not be ransom, but the full-scale vengeful armies of two great nations!"
These words were delivered with force, carrying the momentum of the great nations' decades of accumulated prestige, as if as long as they shouted loud enough, the truth would be on their side.
Yahiko's finger swirling the wine glass stopped.
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