After arriving at the camp somewhat tired, I was greeted by the ninjas on guard duty.
"Miss Miyu, you're finally back," one of them said.
"Yes, I have news to give the unit commander. Take me to him," I requested, nodding in response.
Without wasting any time, they led me to the main camp.
Pedumaru was there, looking somewhat annoyed; I couldn't tell if it was because I was here and hadn't continued his experiments or if something bad had happened.
"Child kidnapper, I'm back from my mission," I announced.
It's worth noting that there were other people in the room besides Pedumaru. These words will imply that I knew about the kidnappings in the future, and if asked, I'll simply say that it was common knowledge in F4, that everyone there knew Orochimaru was conducting experiments of this nature, and that they only acted when they were discovered.
Hehe. I already have my words ready to play the victim and deflect any suspicion.
"I see you arrived... alone," the Sannin said, seeing me without my escorts.
"Well, it's a long story."
*Flashback Jutsu*
I dodged A's unrestrained attack in my direction.
To the naked eye, he looked like a mindless, rampaging bull, but that didn't diminish his considerable battle IQ; I was struggling to hold my own with only the basic skills of a jonin.
"Ice Release: Yamata no Orochi," I said with three hand seals, unleashing eight ice serpent heads that crashed into A, destroying a large part of the stage and leaving the ground covered in frost.
A emerged from the smoke, barely injured.
I just snorted at this.
"YOOOO, free until you think they can't bind me or kill me," Killer Bee rapped, free from my wood release jutsu, the eight-tailed beast's chakra emanating from his body.
Not far away, I saw that all my escorts had been dispatched or taken down, leaving only four enemy ninjas surrounding me. A, Killer Bee, and two other Kumo ninjas.
"Surrender, you don't stand a chance," said one of the Kumo ninjas.
I just smiled at him, which scared the guy.
"Is that a challenge?" I asked, my eyes wide with anticipation of a challenge worthy of me.
*End of Flashback Jutsu.*
"So you couldn't kill the jinchuriki, but you took him down, leaving the Raikage's son critically wounded," he summarized my fight with Kumo's AB combination.
"This aligns with the information we obtained from our spies: that A, the Raikage's son, was critically wounded with a fatal injury but is still alive," reported the head of the unit's intelligence division.
"But we knew that two days ago. What were you doing during the battle until you arrived now?" Pedumaru asked, somewhat annoyed.
"I went to change my clothes, eat a proper meal, take a shower, and enjoy my beautifying nap—something a sewer snake wouldn't understand," I explained as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, and to me, it was.
The snake sannin could only sigh. I couldn't control myself, nor could he, nor Danzo, nor even Hiruzen himself.
Now, with my reputation, influence, economic power, and brute force, I was someone no one could mess with without suffering the worst consequences of their lives.
You could say that, as an individual, I finally reached the point of being almost untouchable—not completely, though, because if I let things continue, Danzo and those old men, along with their families, could hatch a plan against me with the Daimyo's help.
They probably wouldn't amount to anything because they're all utterly useless, but that doesn't mean they won't be incredibly annoying and cause losses.
If my plan with those two in the lawless zone works, then I'll have power over the economic, social, military, and political spheres simultaneously, with slightly less control over the latter two, but from my perspective, that doesn't diminish my influence.
With this, I could say that it won't matter who the Hokage is, because I'll technically be the one governing the village.
(Note: Remember that these are the protagonist's thoughts, not real life. She even sees comments saying things like what she writes doesn't make sense. Just because she writes it here doesn't mean it will work that way or that it will actually happen.)
"You know what? That's more than enough for me; you can go back to your unit and never come back," Pedumaru ordered, rubbing his temples as he sat down.
"What you don't know is that I always come back, hahahahaha," I said mockingly, leaving the camp.
...
After that, I returned to the border between Suna and the Land of Rivers.
My small achievement of defeating the elite AB team was recognized enough to earn me a Kumo bingo net, adding another 20 million ryo to my already high bounty.
During this time, the front line between Suna and Konoha had been stalled, opting for a more defensive stance and trying to hold onto what they had.
That changed when word got out that I had left, so the Third Kazekage would send more forces and launch a stronger attack, deploying more elite ninja, such as Chiyo or Rasa himself.
(Note: Rasa leaves much to be desired, but if he was chosen as a Kazekage candidate, then he must be at least an elite jōnin ninja, in my opinion; now, whether the position is too big for him is another matter.)
But they hadn't anticipated Tsunade's good management; If that weren't the case, she wouldn't be the director of Konoha Hospital or have done such a good job as Hokage.
(Note: I reiterate, I'm not talking about strength here, but rather administration and resource management.)
Also, no Suna ninja expected my mother to do the same as me and go and give Suna a hard time to calm them down a bit during their skirmishes.
Anyway, all that ended, since I returned and proved that, no matter how good Tsunade's administration is, spies still slip through the net. The very first day I set foot in the Land of Rivers, the Suna ninja took a step back.
I could only laugh, since Suna's fear of me was understandable, because with just one of my jutsu I could neutralize any formation and go straight for the commanders or division leaders and defeat them with simple ease. Although they didn't know this last part, it was pure logic, since the achievement of defeating the two Kumo brothers in open combat is something very significant.
During this time, I didn't do much, other than practice my coordination as a division leader, almost like a war game, but without treating my subordinates like disposable pawns. Sometimes I had to make sacrifices, but it was all for the good of Konoha.
That's a lie. It was all based on strategy, and whenever I was going to sacrifice my subordinates, I would warn them beforehand and provide their families with a good compensation. So far, a year into the war, I've only done it twice, and everyone agreed, since most of them don't have families or anything to return to.
I've gone to the front lines twice now, once because of Pakura, who wreaked havoc with a strategy using her scorching element, so I had to go urgently to stop her and put a stop to it.
The other encounter was with Chiyo, who had created a new poison unknown to anyone. I had to go and scare her off, since I was the only person in all of Konoha who could ingest the old woman's poison and continue fighting for at least a whole day.
All thanks to Hashirama's cells—or rather, my own cells; it's just a habit.
After that, I haven't had to return to the front lines, not because I don't want to, but because there hasn't been a real need, and I'm interested in continuing my research.
Since I couldn't continue with biological research, I decided to focus on botany. Using the Wood Release, I can cultivate different plants with pheromones, parasites, or spores that can affect people or the environment.
While I was battling a carnivorous plant I'd nourished with my own chakra, which had gone berserk trying to feed on me, a ninja from the backup unit wandered in.
When he saw my private camp overgrown with vines and spores that made you dizzy and me trying to subdue a giant carnivorous plant, he froze.
"Oh, what do you need?" I asked the guy.
"Ah, oh," he said, staring at the whole scene, and one of the things that affected him most was the spore. If I hadn't taken the antidote, I'd be even dumber than this guy.
While I was fighting the plant, a tube containing that spore had fallen and flooded the place.
"How about you wait outside while I finish up here?" I ordered him. The guy nodded and left, staring into space. "At least it's super effective," I said as I continued my fight with the plant.
...
"So, what brought you here?" I asked, looking more composed.
The ninja, now in his right mind, looked at me and handed me a report.
I simply took it and read it.
Once I finished, I could only click my tongue and hand it back.
"I'll leave as soon as I've left someone in my position and I have all my things ready to move," I told him, to which he nodded and left.
I could only sigh and curse the old monkey for not wanting to leave me alone.
The report informed me that, due to my efficiency and my power to control tailed beasts, I had been transferred. I went from Tsunade's unit to the Radiance Unit, which was commanded by Hiruzen from his comfortable room.
I had to inform Tsunade about this as soon as possible.
According to the report, there was a reason for this: the Iwa jinchuriki had already begun to wreak havoc.
The eyepatch was me.
They weren't asking me to defeat the jinchuriki but rather hoping that my presence would calm the situation.
And if that didn't work, well, then violence could erupt.
"I think I'll leave all my research at my residence," I said resignedly.
...
I've spent three months on the border against Iwa and Kusa, and I've never felt so bored and frustrated in my life.
In front of me were two tailed beasts, firing their Tailed Beast Balls at me, while I, in my Sage Mode, already had my hand seals ready for my next attack; I wasn't planning on defending but on attacking.
To understand how I got here, you first need to know what happened when I arrived at this base.
Basically, nothing.
The Nara, Yamanaka, and Akimichi are the most cowardly people I've ever seen.
Not in the sense of lacking courage, but their risk-reward tactics meant they wouldn't take any risks, mostly out of fear that Onoki was still alive and could wipe out the entire front with a single jutsu.
Right now, you could say it's a battle between Metapods, and apparently, Onoki was also bored, hence unleashing the tailed beasts to wreak havoc on the front lines.
My arrival triggered something in the ninjas: the jinchuriki spread out across different areas. Technically, I had to go after one while the other did his own thing, playing cat and mouse with the third.
And that's what went on for the next three months.
Searching for and finding the jinchuriki, confrontations that never materialized, and endless back and forth.
Finally, in my great wisdom, I decided to ignore Shikaku's orders, and instead of going after the tailed beasts, I attacked a base inside Iwa; from there, I moved on to another and another.
I even fought Onoki's son, defeating him and taking him captive.
That's why Onoki had no one to face, being alone; he sent Roshi and Han.
Seeing the large chakra ball traveling toward me, I launched my attack.
"Wood Release: Komainu," I said, and a giant lion-headed dog formed to swallow the Tailed Beast Ball.
The Tailed Beast Ball didn't explode. This astonished the Four-Tails and Five-Tails.
I had created this technique for only one purpose, and this was it.
"Wood Release: Komainu, Expulsion," with that said, the Komainu opened its mouth and returned the Tailed Beast Ball, imbued with a bit of natural energy, causing it to explode in their faces.
I had created this jutsu to store other jutsu on a large scale and be able to return them.
"What a huge explosion," I said, taking in the sight.
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Hello, I hope you're all well.
I want to say two things: first, I felt the story was moving too slowly, so I decided to speed things up a bit.
Second, regarding the confrontation between Miyu and A and Killer B. I'm sure some people were expecting that fight, but I decided not to write it, both because of the first point and because I want to save the fight against Kumo for a more spectacular one. To avoid being repetitive, I decided to leave this fight out to build more suspense for the other one.
With all that said, I hope you enjoyed the chapter. See you later.