Ever since Suna had adopted a brand-new elite training policy for its ninja, the village's overall strength had shown signs of decline.
This so-called "elite route" referred to concentrating resources on nurturing ninjas who had demonstrated talent from a young age. As for those who hadn't shown any obvious talent, they either gave up the path of a ninja and returned to civilian life… Or they were left to fend for themselves, because the village would not invest any resources in them.
The term "elite route" sounded nice, but in reality, the plan had many serious flaws. The Third Kazekage knew this. Chiyo knew this. In fact, many people knew it.
But Suna had no choice.
First, the village lay deep within the desert, where the environment was harsh and economic development was limited. The village simply didn't have the resources to support large-scale ninja training, so it had to concentrate its limited resources on raising a few elites. After all, things like ninja school construction, teacher staffing, training facilities, and the purchase of various ninja tools and equipment were ongoing costs.
Second, the daimyō of the Land of Wind was notoriously stingy, and had always had a poor relationship with the Third Kazekage, frequently using all kinds of excuses to withhold funding.
With insufficient funding, Suna simply could not afford to train ninjas on a large scale like other villages. They were forced to invest what little they had into a small number of promising individuals. However, some ninjas showed great talent as children but grew up to be unremarkable. And others might seem ordinary in childhood, but later shone brilliantly.
This policy by Suna essentially strangled the potential of those who might have taken longer to grow, snuffing out their future while it was still in the cradle. That was why Chiyo valued talent so highly and was eager to nurture it.
She genuinely didn't want the village to lose talents like Pakura due to internal issues. But what she didn't know was, precisely because of her desire to protect and nurture talent, she had sown the seeds of future internal strife for Suna.
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Inside the Hokage's office, just after Fukuyama left, Danzō stormed in, furious. The moment he opened his mouth, he questioned Hiruzen angrily, "You owe me an explanation! What the hell is going on here?"
Seeing Danzō in such a state, Hiruzen was puzzled and asked, "What happened?"
"You still have the nerve to ask? Yesterday, I lost three full members and nine trainee members of Root. Don't tell me you knew nothing about this."
Faced with Danzō's almost man-eating glare, Hiruzen's heart skipped a beat, because he truly didn't know.
After all, Root was under Danzō's direct control. Aside from that one incident where he personally intervened to frame Shin, he never meddled in Root's affairs, nor did he have any intel sources connected to it.
"What exactly happened? Explain clearly!" he demanded.
Danzō gave a cold snort and then described how the group of ninjas he had sent to ambush Pakura had been completely wiped out.
After listening to the report, Hiruzen furrowed his brows deeply. By all logic, the plan should have been airtight, especially since they had an insider feeding them Pakura's patrol routes.
So how had it failed?
And worse, all they knew was that the Root team had been annihilated. Beyond that, they knew absolutely nothing.
Could it be Shin? he suddenly thought.
Ever since Shin had revealed his power, Hiruzen realized that Fukuyama wasn't the mastermind behind everything after all.
The real mastermind was Shin, the one who had toyed with him right under his nose.
He had collected and analyzed reports from the war in the Land of Whirlpools in great detail. And through countless baffling battles, he had slowly and carefully pieced together many bits of intelligence. Among them was one key piece: Shin likely fought on the battlefield in the Land of Whirlpools as well.
He had simply stayed hidden in the shadows, unknown to others.
Furthermore, based on what Genji and Yumi said after returning to Kiri, it could be inferred that if Shin really had been on that battlefield, he was likely an excellent sensory-type ninja. Otherwise, there would be no way to explain how Tsunade was always so precisely aware of the enemy's movements and could easily cut off their flow of intelligence.
After all, she was his disciple, and he knew very well that she wasn't a sensory ninja. There was no way she could sit safely in camp and know everything happening on the battlefield.
There had to be someone assisting her, someone gathering intelligence and directing operations from the shadows.
To monitor an entire nation so effortlessly, and use the intelligence gap to run circles around the enemy, this was something not even members of the Uzumaki clan could do, despite their reputation. Other ninja villages also had powerful sensory-type ninjas, after all.
Perhaps only Shin had both the ability and the motive to pull it off. And only he was trusted so deeply by Tsunade.
Orochimaru had even reported that, during that period, Shin frequently requested leave, using the excuse that he was too worried about Tsunade to focus on his research.
Moreover, the ninja he had sent to poison Shin had been discovered before even getting the chance to act, and subsequently vanished from existence.
All of this, clearly, could not have been coincidence. It was just that back then, he had severely underestimated Shin, assuming that a blind man posed no threat. So he never gave it serious thought. In hindsight, though it might seem like he was playing the armchair strategist, it had at least helped him finally see who his true opponent really was.
At that thought, Hiruzen hated himself for not eliminating Shin earlier. And when he recalled how the entire Root team had been wiped out in this recent mission, his hatred for Shin burned even deeper.
He had thought more than once about eliminating Shin. But Shin had mastered the Flying Thunder God Technique. If he really was a sensory ninja, as Hiruzen now suspected, then even traps and barriers would be useless against him.
Because Shin simply wouldn't fall for them.
In that moment, he felt like he was once again standing before his own teacher.
Back then, he also believed his teacher to be invincible. If not for the poisoning and the need to protect his disciples, Tobirama wouldn't even have been wounded during the surprise attack by Kinkaku and Ginkaku.
Even if he couldn't win, surely, he could have escaped.
"Hmm?" At this thought, a sudden idea struck him.
That was right. Tobirama was only gravely wounded because he chose to protect them. That was what ultimately led to his tragic end.
So, trying to directly target Shin wouldn't work.
Attack what he must protect. That was the only way to eliminate him. And the people who could be used to threaten him included: the Namikaze couple, Minato, Tsunade, Nawaki, Kushina, and Mito.
Among them, Kushina and Mito were untouchable. One was the current Nine-Tails jinchūriki, the other was the next successor. They were far too important to the village. So that narrowed down the targets.
Tsunade had taken Minato with her to the front lines. And now that Shin had also gone to the front, it would be difficult to act there. But the Namikaze couple and Nawaki were still in Konoha. Could something be done with them? And not just them, the more, the better. Perhaps Minato could even be lured away from camp and used as leverage?
The idea was certainly risky. But if executed cleanly, without leaving any traces, it might just be feasible. However, before taking action, the plan would have to be carefully thought through. Not a single mistake could be allowed. Because if there was even one more misstep… his days as Hokage would be numbered.