By dawn, just after the raid most of Konoha would never learn about, Danzō realized he no longer had a chance to act. He barely had time to think before Ashina's seals covered him from head to toe, red patterns drawn across his body, suppressing his chakra pathways so much he couldn't move without the Uzumaki leader's permission.
"You can blink. And breathe, I guess." Ashina gave him an explicit order as he stood before him, and finally, the old man managed to move his one remaining eye, inhaling through his nose, while the other eye socket lay bare and uncovered, as he was stripped down naked. "Yes, yes. I'm sure you have many things you would like to say." He added, looking into Danzō's angry glare. "But we don't care. We will find what we want, wherever you hid it."
"Is he ready?" A new voice came from behind him as Inomasa Yamanaka walked over and stood with Ashina.
"He is." The old Uzumaki nodded as the Yamanaka patriarch crouched before Danzō and examined his face, checking the Uzumaki drawings on him to see whether they would cause problems in the coming interrogation and interfere with the Yamanaka's technique.
Naturally, they weren't the only ones there; Fugaku stood by the wall, arms crossed, his Sharingan inactive, watching them with most of his attention fixed on Danzō. Shikudo, the Nara clan's current head, also sat in the corner, watching silently, while Chōhei, the Akimichi's current head, stood guard at the other end, just in case.
"We sensed no movements outside," Gōga, the Inuzuka clan leader, reported just then, coming in, shaking his head once, "I think we got all those... ROOT people. Still, my dogs are patrolling the village, so if we missed any, we will know the moment they catch a whiff of Danzō's chakra in them.
"We need to weed all of them out," Jiraiya muttered, standing nearest the door, leaving Sakumo as the only one missing. The reason was simple: he had left before they could regroup and personally protect the unconscious Hokage, because if something happened to him now, it would all be for naught.
"We should know soon enough how many he had," Inomasa said, exhaling as he prepared to invade Danzō's mind.
"He has seals in there," Ashina warned him, but Inomasa simply frowned, already aware of them.
"I know. I would have been surprised if he didn't."
"Self-destruction ones?" Fugaku asked suddenly. "We need him alive at least until we learn all he knows. Try not to give him the easy escape route..."
"If I were him, there would be, for sure, some very explosive death-seal in my head." Ashina said with a chuckle, "The possibility is pretty high. I might even add the option of full-on memory destruction to be sure. And something that attacks whoever enters my thoughts... Maybe an area-of-effect jutsu?" And at that point, Ashina looked toward Inomasa, who was trying not to twitch his eyes. "Don't worry. I'll try to help you from the outside and keep the protective seals from activating."
"That would be my pleasure." Inomasa sighed, suddenly very happy to have an Uzumaki master there to help him.
"..." Hearing that alone made Danzō's eye shift to Ashina, who simply smiled and patted his face like a jovial grandpa.
"Oh, don't look so depressed. You can kill yourself later..." He whispered as he leaned closer to his ear. "Sorry if I'm going to be rough... It has been a long time since I did something like this. I'm old, you see, and my control may not be what it once was. It may... really hurt."
"..." Danzō's eye hardened upon hearing him, but he still couldn't even open his mouth to speak, and he could do nothing but watch them start.
As Ashina began suppressing all the seals Danzō had put on himself, the Yamanka patriarch entered his mind, doing his best to extract every true piece of information while discarding the fake and fabricated memories.
"That brings us to the other problem," Shikudo said in the meantime, causing Jiraiya's expression to sour.
"Which one?" He moaned, rubbing his face.
"All of it," Shikudo stated, shrugging a little. "All of the other places got burned to a crisp."
"So it wasn't just the spot I went to...?" Chōhei leaned forward, sounding very disappointed. "But all of them? I thought I was too slow... Phew!"
"Not all," Shikudo answered, scanning the others in the room. "We interjected where we could, so some places managed to yield enough intact material to prove that somebody had been working there."
"Can we guess about what?" Fugaku asked, his eyes staying on Danzō.
"Not right now." Shikudo answered, "We will have to wait for what Inomasa finds. It will help us place the clues in place and reinforce his findings. But I can recognize medical restraints, preservation tanks, and blood storage units... Whatever they were doing was not good."
"Especially because my dogs smelled human remains." Gōga added darkly, "And Orochimaru's scent, but when we tried to follow it, it was leading outside of the village already. I have two of my tracking dogs following it, but I don't know if we can catch him. He is a Sannin after all."
"Tsk..." Jiraiya couldn't help but hiss and click his tongue, as everyone realized by now that the smarter of the two had escaped before being captured. They just hoped he wouldn't pop up at one of their enemies' camps and become their worst nightmare. "Not enough that Tsunade is gone; now him too... Damn it... I wanted to leave and live a little, yet here I am, stuck at home. Not just that, war had come again, and once again, I'm in the middle of it."
"At least, you got to train those two kids..." Gōga answered him with a half-smile. "Renjiro is interesting enough," he added, while Fugaku glanced toward him when hearing his words. "What? He is. He was right... and as I hear it, it isn't the first time, hm? He even knew about the bodies."
"Not exactly," Fugaku corrected him calmly, his eyes returning to Danzō. "He just suspected the issue since what he noticed at Uzushiogakure. If they went for their corpses, what says they wouldn't have already harvested our dead?"
"Still, he did so very accurately." Gōga argued, "How? Not even my dogs have a nose that good. He even accused them of experimentation. And what do we find? Clues that they were doing it. Too bad the Hokage's burial place is known only to the current Hokage... We will have to wait for Hiruzen to wake up and make sure they didn't defile them."
"Not exactly." Jiraiya said, furrowing his brows, "Homura and Koharu know it too... I just hope they didn't fall so low..."
"They did. What else would they need the bodies for?" Fugaku remained calm while answering, "Not for a tea party, and everyone knows the answer. Face it... The only reason could be the most obvious one: The one and only wood release. Who else could know more about that than us? Hashirama's closest allies... That may be also why Danzō appeared in Uzushio without direct authorization. That move was enough for Renji to use his brain and put things together."
"If so, he has a frightening intuition and deduction skill," Shikudo said, his eyebrows raised as he watched the working Ashina and Inomasa. "Maybe we should recruit him into the intelligence department."
"True," Fugaku gave the faintest nod, "But he would be wasted there. He has more in him than that."
"That is accurate." Shikudo agreed without arguing or taking it to heart. "His temperament is not fit for it either. Speaking of that... both he and the Namikaze boy need intense training, while we have a window to act. While the new Raikage and Mizukage are being elected, we can strike at them, cripple some of their key, strategic infrastructure, and buy us more time. If we can knock them out of the early war and focus only on the other two villages, we can spare the manpower to hold back and train our next generation. We will also have to speed up the process of producing genin and change the curriculum within the Academy."
"I hate hearing it being said out loud," Jiraiya muttered, and even if the others agreed, there was nothing else they could do.
"We will strike at them hard." Fugaku agreed immediately, already nodding. "Then, I will train Renjiro. I can take him with me on my missions, which will be the fastest way to give him ample experience."
"While you do that, don't forget to sometimes drop him down with us. His usage in Hiraishin needs work, and we can teach him how to place his own marks." Ashina said suddenly, clearly comfortable enough with his task to focus on both Danzō and their conversation, "Plus... Kushina is mine to teach. I can help train her to keep the Kyūbi not only in check, but to harness its immense powers. We have to prepare for our enemies trying to kill her, so the beast is released and wreaks havoc in our village. Unless someone with wood release shows up once again, I think we are the only ones who could tame that monster."
"..." Fugaku didn't say anything, but his Sharingan spun at that moment, unnoticed by everyone else.
"Try not to blow up the village." Jiraiya looked toward the old Uzumaki, but Ashina's eyes were locked on Danzō, his expression serious as he kept Inomasa safe. "But if that is settled, I will take Minato to Mount Myōboku."
"Oh?" Fugaku and many others looked at him when they heard that. "The toads?"
"Yes, I got permission for it."
"For how long?"
"I don't know that, but they allowed me to bring one of the two. So... I'm kind of happy you are taking Renji," Jiraiya added, glancing at Fugaku, "Because now I don't have to choose who to bring with me."
"Then I will draw up our plans for a surprise attack," Shikudo said, standing up, ready to leave the interrogation to the others. "I think we can copy their method, something they won't expect. I can prepare a few flying summons, and when you are ready, we will drop you in Kumogakure and Kirigakure. We will get you key targets and do as much damage as you can... then escape. I will make sure we have our allies help you get out safely."
"We have allies?" Chōhei asked, smiling to himself.
"We do." Shikudo nodded. "And we must work on having a lot more of them. The thing the others pulled will now show they can't be trusted. So, we will have to make sure all the smaller nations are on our side." As he explained, he scanned everyone else. "It won't be easy, but if we show that we are ready to defend them... we can make the others' lives a living hell for what they did to us."
"The other villages will have a harder time reaching us if they have to go through hostile territory." Jiraiya agreed, making Shikudo nod.
"More so if we use Renjiro's paper." Shikudo muttered, "He had some... dangerous ideas. I will make sure to inform you all of what I want to use from those examples. But we must be ready to put everything on the line, as we are facing the whole world. Hm... I think this could be our first proper decision as a wartime council, hm?"
"First of many," Fugaku answered, slowly deactivating his Sharingan, as even Ashina's expression softened, showing they had broken through all of Danzō's protection.
"I do hope so," Shikudo replied with a smile of his own. "The moment Inomasa has the information hidden in that head, we can present it to the others. Then, we can take away all power from Homura and Koharu... And finish cleaning house before the storm hits."