-----
-----
Hayato had no idea that because of him, tensions between the Land of Fire and the Land of Rain were starting to heat up.
Things had gotten so bad that Hanzo, the leader of the Hidden Rain Village, began sending ninjas to the border between the two countries. The atmosphere was tense, like something big was about to go down.
Hanzo did this because he had no clue what Konoha's intentions were. Why the hell had they sent so many jōnin into the Land of Rain? Even now, he still hadn't managed to track any of them down. (In reality, all those jōnin were already dead.)
Hanzo was afraid Konoha might attack the Land of Rain, or maybe even launch a full-on assault on Amegakure (Hidden Rain Village), so he had no choice but to send reinforcements to the border.
Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, knew exactly what was going on. The reason he had sent the jōnin to the Land of Rain was simple—he wanted to track down a ninja who had defected from Konoha.
He just hadn't expected things to spiral out of control like this. Now that Rain ninjas were massing near the Fire Country's border, Hiruzen was stuck.
On one hand, he tried to calm Hanzo down, but on the other, he had to send some of Konoha's ninjas to the border too—just in case.
Sure, he knew it was probably just a misunderstanding, but what if Hanzo suddenly lost it and decided to launch an attack? Sarutobi couldn't take that risk.
But the moment the already-nervous Rain ninjas saw Konoha sending troops to the border, they instantly thought Konoha was planning an invasion. The situation got tenser by the minute. Both sides were on edge, ready to strike at any moment.
The Second Great Ninja War was just about to erupt.
And where was Hayato—the guy who almost single-handedly triggered the whole mess?He was busy rebuilding his house.
Yeah, seriously. Because of the fight he had with Konoha's ninjas earlier, his home got completely wrecked—nothing left but rubble. So, Hayato had no choice but to start from scratch.
His choice of building material? Giant boulders. Yeah, massive rocks. He lugged them over himself, slammed them into the ground to form the foundation, and then built everything else on top of that. The house was simple—nothing fancy—but it was rock solid. Literally.
Every stone was personally cut and shaped by Hayato using only his bare hands and feet. You had to admit it—this guy had truly turned into a warrior. A samurai, even. Ninja? Yeah, right. Apart from having chakra, there was nothing about him that screamed "ninja."
Recently, he'd wiped out that gang who'd been using his name to scam and bully people. Then, in his fight with the Konoha shinobi, he went full-on Hulk mode again—transforming into the green giant and growing even bigger, almost 8 or 9 meters tall. That transformation made his "Green Demon" nickname even more infamous. People around him were even more scared to mess with him.
As for how people viewed him, Hayato didn't care. Even if they feared him more, so what? That was about all they could do anyway.
After that, Hayato went back into training. He felt like he still wasn't strong enough.When those Konoha ninjas attacked, despite all his years of physical training, he couldn't do anything until he went into that uncontrollable Hulk-like state. It was only thanks to that freakish bloodline power that he managed to survive.
That frustrated him. He wanted to get stronger—strong enough to win battles without relying on that power. Strong enough to crush his enemies without becoming the Green Giant.
But while Hayato was off training and chasing that strength, something went wrong at the border. A small mistake, one moment of carelessness, and boom—everything exploded.
Massive numbers of Konoha and Rain ninjas started fighting. And in just a short amount of time, there were already heavy casualties on both sides.
The Second Great Ninja War had officially begun.
"....."