The Daimyō's Mansion of the Land of Fire.
"How's the investigation?"
The daimyō's lazy voice drifted out.
The advisors below didn't dare slack off in the slightest.
"Reporting, milord. The [Chinese Cuisine] restaurants spreading from the Land of Fields originated with an Uchiha from the Hidden Sound Village."
"The Uchiha clan… from Konoha?"
Although the daimyō wasn't too familiar with shinobi affairs, even he knew the name of the famed Uchiha clan.
"Yes, milord. Konoha also has Uchiha running this business. As for the Uchiha in the Land of Fields—are they a splinter branch of the clan?"
"A splinter? You mean defectors?" The daimyō perked up curiously.
The advisor wiped cold sweat and produced two reports.
"Milord, the Third Hokage and Shimura Danzō's statements differ. The Third insists it was simply a voluntary departure. Danzō, however, claims the Uchiha defected."
The daimyō accepted the two reports: one was a public statement from the Third Hokage, the other a private missive sent directly from Danzō.
But as soon as his eyes scanned the pages of densely written text, the daimyō's interest evaporated. With some irritation, he tossed both documents aside.
Whether the Uchiha had split away or defected—it wasn't something he cared about.
The Uchiha belonged under Konoha's authority. And Konoha, at least nominally, was a partner to the daimyō.
Whatever happened with the Uchiha was outside his jurisdiction.
Still, the fact that the Third Hokage allowed such discrepancies to exist made the daimyō snort coldly.
"So, all these restaurants were the Uchiha's doing?"
"Yes, milord," the advisor answered honestly.
The daimyō frowned in annoyance. Among daimyō, there was always a hierarchy of prestige.
The Land of Fields had once been nothing more than a backwater—poor, rural, insignificant.
To the Land of Fire's daimyō, his counterpart there was just a country bumpkin with wealth.
Two years ago, when the Land of Fields daimyō heavily supported this dining business, the Fire daimyō had laughed at him.
But in just two short years, [Chinese Cuisine] had spread across the entire Land of Fields, crushing all other eateries and unifying the food industry. Every merchant caravan that visited could only sing praises.
Amazingly, the food industry revitalized the entire economy of the Land of Fields. The Fire daimyō could hardly believe it.
Only when he read his advisors' statistical reports did he realize it was true.
The Fields' daimyō had grown rich, his nation's economy surged, and even their hidden village had risen to become the foremost outside the Five Great Shinobi Nations.
If not for their tiny land, sparse population, and limited resources, perhaps they would have entertained loftier ambitions.
Naturally, the Land of Fire's commercial guilds wanted to imitate the success.
But the franchise fees were set far higher than in the Land of Fields, and the slots were strictly limited.
To the Fire daimyō, it felt like petty revenge.
After all, big nations had long bullied the small ones. Now the small fry finally had a chance to get their own back.
At first, the Fire daimyō tried to copy the recipes. But even the seemingly simple stinky tofu turned out completely wrong—lacking both the pungent odor and unique fragrance.
As for other snacks, no matter how many seasonings they experimented with, the result never matched the original. Some dishes could be imitated, but there was no cohesive system.
The Fire daimyō was green with envy.
The Land of Fields had been a backwater—yet now it flourished thanks to food! If this could be replicated across the Land of Fire, the profits would be astronomical.
But the secret recipes weren't held by the shopkeepers.
They were controlled by personnel dispatched from the Hidden Sound Village. Those individuals were as immovable as stones in a latrine—both foul and unyielding.
Neither threats nor bribes worked. Even kidnappings ended with them biting down on poison and killing themselves.
The Fire daimyō was left speechless. Wasn't this just business? Why risk your life like this?
What he didn't know was that all these Sound Village operatives were Orochimaru's people—either fanatics brainwashed into absolute loyalty, or sealed with deadly restrictions.
Otherwise, they would never have been allowed out to run the business.
In the food trade, imitation was easy, but matching the authentic taste was another matter entirely. Without centuries of inherited culture and guarded core secrets, one could spend a lifetime and still fail to reproduce the original.
The daimyō massaged his aching temples and gave up thinking. "Have Konoha's Danzō handle this. He must secure all of the recipes."
—
Konoha, Hokage's Office.
The Third Hokage, bent over his writing desk, looked up to see Danzō walking in.
What shocked him most was that Danzō no longer carried a cane, and his right arm—once tightly bound in bandages—was exposed, appearing completely healthy.
"Danzō… your arm!?"
Danzō smiled reservedly, raising his hand. "It's healed. No more bandages from now on."
The Third frowned. He remembered that Danzō's arm had undergone… certain modifications, which was why it had always remained hidden.
Could it be that Danzō had restored it somehow?
The Third did not press the matter. After all, he had never truly known what Danzō had done to his arm.
"What brings you here?"
The Hokage's voice was calm. Though Danzō's ambition had once grown excessive and forced Hiruzen to strip him of authority, it had merely crippled him temporarily.
Hiruzen had cut off Root's funding and barred other clans from cooperating with them—Root must be destitute by now.
Still, after years of working together, Hiruzen knew he would need Danzō again one day.
As long as Danzō remained under his control, all his past deeds could be overlooked.
When the time came, he could always raise him back up.
"This is an estimate of the Uchiha's profits," Danzō said, producing a stack of ledgers.
The Hokage skimmed them briefly. "This much? Twenty million in just one year?"
"As always," Danzō's tone was steady, "that is only Konoha's numbers. Including the Land of Fields, it exceeds fifty million annually."
"Itachi and Shisui brought [Chinese Cuisine] there. Though the Land of Fields is poor, its entire territory is saturated with these restaurants."
"No one truly knows how wealthy the Uchiha have become."
He paused, then added, "The daimyō has seen how much wealth the Land of Fields has gained. He's ordered me to secure all of the recipes."
"So, Hiruzen, I need your cooperation."
A faintly smug expression appeared on Danzō's face as he handed over a sealed writ.
The Hokage's brows knitted as he opened it—authentic.
Hiruzen drew deeply on his pipe, exhaling a heavy stream of smoke.
He hadn't expected Danzō to leverage the daimyō's authority.
This complicated matters. As Hokage, he was responsible for countless expenses.
Konoha's strength had always come from wealth—wealth that could be endlessly converted into resources.
Population, food, materiel—all of it allowed Konoha to dominate every shinobi war.
Even against militarily stronger nations like the Land of Lightning or the Hidden Mist, Konoha dragged them into decades of grinding war until they begged for peace—simply because Konoha had deeper pockets.
Much of that wealth came not from Konoha itself, but from the Land of Fire's daimyō in the form of subsidies.
The Land of Fire, vast and resource-rich, relied on Konoha's supremacy in the shinobi world. Their partnership was mutually beneficial: Konoha crushed rival nations, and the daimyō reaped political and economic rewards.
But now… the daimyō's gaze had turned to [Chinese Cuisine].
And worse, he had bypassed the Hokage entirely to give his orders directly to Danzō.
Was this because of the Uchiha's "departure"?
It seemed his failure to report everything had planted seeds of mistrust.
---
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