Naruto: Rebuilding the Hidden Sand

"The Land of Rain?"

Fuma Kotaro had assumed that after joining the Sand Village, the next step would be the Fourth Kazekage assigning his clan their roles and responsibilities within the village structure. He had not expected that barely a few days after the clan had settled in, the village's first mission order would already be handed down.

And it was not an administrative posting.

It was a deployment to the front lines, asking them to participate in the Sand Village's ongoing political and military operations in the Land of Rain.

"Your clan has only just arrived. Although your members passed the assessments and received their classifications, you are all lacking in mission records. For ninja to take on significant positions within village departments under normal circumstances, a verified track record is absolutely required. Even as Kazekage, I cannot simply bypass that."

"Granting your clan members exceptional promotions to Chunin and Jonin rank has already drawn some quiet criticism from certain quarters within the village. If I were to place you directly into core administrative positions on top of that, I genuinely could not hold back the pushback.

You should understand that although I am the Fourth Kazekage and recruiting your clan was my initiative, I am not the only voice among the village's senior leadership."

Yuji let out a measured sigh and put on an expression of careful deliberation, as though he had been working hard on the Fuma clan's behalf behind the scenes.

These words reached Kotaro's ears with a slightly different flavor than their surface meaning.

Because what Kotaro actually heard was the words significant positions and core departments, and very quickly he pieced together what he believed was the full picture. In his reading, certain factions among the village's senior leadership were opposed to the Fuma clan. But the Kazekage himself was the key figure supporting them.

The blame for their current situation, if blame was to be placed anywhere, fell on the clan's own underwhelming performance during the assessment. That had put the Fourth Kazekage in an awkward position.

If the Fuma clan's demonstrated strength had been more impressive, their path to better positions would not have been blocked.

"I understand completely."

The moment this interpretation settled in his mind, whatever lingering dissatisfaction Kotaro had been carrying dissolved immediately. He nodded with a serious expression.

"This deployment to the Land of Rain is a perfect opportunity to silence those objections. As long as your people perform well, I personally guarantee that when you return from the battlefield, the treatment and standing you receive will be entirely deserved. No one will have grounds to complain."

Yuji said it with an encouraging tone.

"Thank you deeply, Lord Kazekage."

Kotaro's mood lifted visibly and he responded with genuine gratitude.

"Good. That is settled for now. I will have Shimizu pass along the relevant intelligence on the Land of Rain battlefield. Go back and prepare your people."

Yuji looked at him with an expression of warm expectation as he gave the instruction.

"Lord Kazekage, please have confidence in us. I will not disappoint you."

Kotaro replied firmly.

"Good."

Shimizu then led Kotaro out of the office.

The moment the two of them stepped through the door and their footsteps faded down the corridor, a figure slipped out from within the wall not far away.

Black Zetsu.

"Does he genuinely believe that with their clan's mediocre abilities, they can establish themselves inside the Sand Village?" Black Zetsu remarked with undisguised sarcasm.

On Yuji's desk, a document lay open.

Its contents were a written record of the Fuma clan's private internal meeting from the past few days, transcribed in full.

A White Zetsu body concealed nearby had monitored the entire meeting and recorded every word clearly.

Kotaro's intentions were completely transparent to Yuji. The clan head was currently keeping his posture deliberately low and instructing the clan to maintain a restrained profile. The actual plan was to wait until the clan members had successfully embedded themselves throughout the village's structure, and then begin creating leverage and presenting the village's senior leadership with the clan's real demands.

This kind of thinking made it entirely clear that joining the Sand Village was not a sincere commitment. It was a calculation made from the clan's own interest, with the village as a resource to be extracted from rather than a home to belong to.

"Where is Isamu?" Yuji asked.

"Fuma Isamu and several of the others were the ones who rejoined from outside the Land of Rice Fields and came to the Sand Village through the clan. Although they are among the clan's most capable members, they do not hold any standing within the clan's core decision-making circle.

Isamu in particular appears to have very little regular interaction with Kotaro. Their relationship is notably distant."

Black Zetsu replied.

Yuji waved his hand once. Black Zetsu read the signal and slipped back into the wall without another word.

A second later, a knock sounded at the office door.

"Come in," Yuji called.

Baki pushed the office door open and stepped to one side. Standing behind him was the person who had been summoned individually: Fuma Isamu.

"Send him in," Yuji said.

Baki stepped aside and gestured for Isamu to enter.

"Lord Kazekage."

The green-haired Fuma Isamu entered the room and offered a respectful greeting.

"You were working as a contractor for other ninja villages before this, correct?"

Yuji gestured for him to sit.

"Yes," Isamu replied, his expression composed and unhurried. He did not appear alarmed.

"Though I never became a formal member of any of them," he added calmly. "I simply worked for pay. In recent years the ninja world has been engulfed in war and instability. Even the smaller hidden villages became very guarded toward outside contractors. They did not trust us, and they certainly did not treat us as genuine comrades."

"What do you think of Fuma Kotaro as a person?"

Yuji smiled lightly.

"On the surface he appears clever and capable of restraint. But when you actually examine how he calculates things, every decision traces back to personal self-interest. With someone like that as clan head, any genuine revival of the Fuma clan is a distant hope at best."

Isamu said it plainly and without hesitation.

Yuji's mouth curved upward slightly upon hearing this.

"Why do you say that? I thought he was rather capable."

"The Sand Village is one of the Five Great Hidden Villages, and Lord Kazekage's reputation resounds throughout the entire ninja world. Compared to that, our Fuma clan, whether in terms of ability or in terms of what we bring to the table, falls short by a considerable distance. In other words, the Sand Village agreeing to accept the Fuma clan as part of itself, whatever the underlying reasons, is an honor and an opportunity for us."

"Given those conditions, the only response the Fuma clan can offer that genuinely reflects our understanding of the situation is our lives and absolute loyalty. That would demonstrate that we have the capacity to receive Lord Kazekage's trust and that we are sincerely committed to being part of this village."

"Kotaro's mistake is simply that he does not know his own position. He arrived hoping to extract more than he has any right to expect."

Isamu paused briefly before continuing.

"That said, I understand where people like him come from. They spent their entire lives surviving in the Land of Rice Fields. They have completed some missions, but they have never been genuinely immersed in the ninja world's actual warfare. They do not have a clear understanding of the outside world or of the current state of the ninja world's balance of power. I have trained and worked in several smaller hidden villages over the years. That makes me somewhat clearer-eyed than they are."

"Good," Yuji said, nodding with quiet satisfaction.

Then his tone shifted entirely, becoming flat and unhurried.

"Fuma Kotaro will die in the Land of Rain. You will accompany him to the Land of Rain battlefield. Perform well. After the matter is concluded, you will take on the role of clan head."

"What I want is a clan head who evaluates situations and develops the Fuma clan from the village's perspective rather than from a personal or purely clan-based one. Is that understood?"

Yuji looked directly at Isamu.

"Understood," Isamu replied.

He showed no particular surprise at the Kazekage's sudden shift in tone and purpose. Because he understood clearly that the man whose reputation echoed across the entire ninja world, who had single-handedly elevated the Sand Village to its current standing, was not simple in any sense regardless of his youth.

For a figure of this magnitude in the ninja world, the small calculations running through Kotaro's head were no more sophisticated than a child's game.

For the Fuma clan to have any future within the Sand Village, loyalty was the first and only real principle that mattered. At this stage, they had absolutely no standing to be making demands.

"Do not worry. The village will support you in establishing your standing within the clan while you are in the Land of Rain. Once you become clan head, think carefully about how to properly guide the people under you."

Yuji added this quietly.

"Understood," Isamu replied.

He turned and left.

"Well. That one actually has a head on his shoulders," Black Zetsu remarked, sliding back out after Isamu had gone.

"Have White Zetsu pass word to Sasori and Rasa. If any of these people fail to cooperate during the mission briefing or the early stages of the operation, remove them directly."

Yuji said it with complete calm.

"Heh."

Black Zetsu let out a quietly satisfied laugh and vanished from the office.

...

Stones PLzz

Read upto 80 chapters ahead@ keepsmiling818 p2reon