HSU: Ch. 352

The news that the Fire Daimyō would be coming to Konoha to attend the inauguration ceremony of the Fifth Hokage stirred up a whirlwind throughout the village.

Without exaggeration, in a world where clan politics run from top to bottom, the daimyō families are first-rate aristocratic houses. Konoha is the odd one out for having come up with an electoral system. Even in other ninja villages, clan politics are out in the open. So-called ninja clans, before the era of the nation-village system, could still be said to be merely a form of ninja organization. But after entering the nation-village era, within each country's system they effectively all belong to the aristocracy. The difference is that they deal not in administration, but in military power.

Take the Land of Lightning as an example: the Raikage's family, as well as the Yotsuki clan, are all great houses on equal footing with the daimyō family.

In Konoha, clan politics are somewhat obscured by the electoral system and thus appear less blatant. But once you reach the level of jonin, you can clearly feel the influence of those major ninja clans. The Land of Fire is a place where great houses are especially concentrated, one might even say overflowing. Even today, among Konoha's ninja clans, there are still three that can be ranked in the same tier as the daimyō family.

Yet in present-day Konoha, there are truly very few people who have actually seen the Fire Daimyō in person.

The Fire Daimyō stopped visiting Konoha long ago. As a result, even after a Hokage is elected, a special delegation still has to be organized to go to the daimyō's residence to inform him, an enormous hassle. As for the reason, everyone knows it. Why would the Fire Daimyō who hadn't budged for decades come this time? That was even clearer.

It was the value of the founding families.

Wasn't it the same back when the Senju were Hokage?

To put it bluntly, the daimyō only acknowledges the two founders and the clans behind them. A classic case of clan-based thinking.

The Hokage's sense of self may belong to Konoha, but the Fire Daimyō's sense of self has always belonged to the daimyō family. These people have never viewed matters from an individual perspective. They have no personal subjectivity, and compared to decades ago, they haven't changed one bit.

Unlike Konoha, which changes with each passing day.

As for the villagers, they didn't think that far.

A daimyō! A real, living one! Someone they usually only heard about and never got to see.

The villagers immediately felt how fortunate it was to be people of Konoha. That sense of happiness didn't come from seeing the daimyō himself, but from being able to look at him openly, without kneeling, and without having to line up in orderly ranks according to so-called social status and kneel properly.

People of Konoha do not need to kneel to anyone.

And so, on a bright, sunny morning, the daimyō's procession finally appeared on the yellow dirt road leading to Konoha's north gate. As the ruler of the world's foremost great power, the entourage accompanying the Fire Daimyō numbered nearly ten thousand.

This was actually a significant reduction.

Because the Fire Daimyō felt that too many people would cause trouble for Masashi, whom he valued most, this journey was the smallest-scale outing of any Fire Daimyō in history. Even before he arrived, the Fire Daimyō's complete trust in the Fifth Hokage could already be felt by everyone.

Even so, the Konoha ninjas stationed atop the high walls were still stunned by the long, serpentine procession winding in from the distance.

The visual impact was maxed out.

Konoha ninjas had also seen scenes where tens of thousands went to war, but ninjas would never form up in such a display.

On the walls stood Hiruzen, who had already been a former Hokage for many years, and Minato, who had only recently acquired the title of former Hokage. Both were watching the scene unfold.

"This is my first time seeing a daimyō travel," Minato said with emotion. As a former S-rank mission grinder, he felt deeply about it.

Back then, he had actually been someone who often saw the Fire Daimyō. But he could sense that the Fire Daimyō's friendliness toward him always had a layer of distance.

The Fire Daimyō valued Konoha, and he valued him, the Yellow Flash, but that was as far as it went.

"Yes," Hiruzen replied. His feelings were even more complicated.

As Konoha's original problem child, he had seen it twice. The first time, his memories were already very vague. The second time, he remembered it very clearly. But once he became Hokage, the Fire Daimyō stopped coming to Konoha. At that point, Hiruzen understood: in the eyes of the Fire Daimyō's family, the Sarutobi were not the same as the Senju, nor the same as the Uchiha.

Even though the Sarutobi and the Shimura were among the very first great clans to join Konoha. It was understandable. On the original alliance pact, written clearly in black and white, there were only three clan names.

Tobirama's administration did not get off to a good start, and that was also related to the decline in support from the Fire Daimyō. The relationship was still one of cooperation, but only cooperation remained.

As for the bond of master and disciple, the daimyō family acknowledged it verbally, but in their hearts, they did not truly recognize it.

Danzō, for his part, simply disliked the Fire Daimyō.

"Where's Masashi?" Hiruzen asked.

"Oh, he already went ahead to welcome him," Minato replied indifferently. He didn't have the same complicated inner thoughts as his former teacher. His mind was full of ways to slack off. "The Fire Daimyō likes him, after all."

"True." Hiruzen nodded. "The Fire Daimyō will invite him to travel together. The relationship between the village and the daimyō's residence can be said to have returned to how it once was."

"Huh? Weren't things pretty good before too?"

"They were good, but not that kind of good."

During the First Great Ninja War, the support from the daimyō's residence was proactive and timely, completely the treatment reserved for one of their own. If he had received that level of support during his time in office, he would have beaten the living daylights out of the other villages.

Setting everything else aside, just this kind of ostentatious show of support, if this occasion hadn't been so completely without suspense, everyone would be so awkward they'd be digging out a second Konoha with their toes.

While Hiruzen was feeling sour about it all, within the daimyō's procession the Fire Daimyō had already stepped down from his palanquin and was walking side by side with Masashi along the dirt road.

When he first did this, even though everyone knew how delighted he was that the Fifth Hokage bore the Uchiha name, they were still thoroughly startled.

Setting aside the fact that a daimyō was walking on bare earth, they weren't even inside Konoha yet. They were still outside. What if there were assassins hiding in the forest?

However, seeing Masashi at the daimyō's side put everyone somewhat at ease.

Not to mention that more than a hundred Konoha ANBU surrounded the daimyō, with even more members of the Police Force spreading out into the forest.

Especially that young Uchiha with the perpetually stern face, he was also accompanying them.

The daimyō's attendants remembered that stern-faced fellow all too well. This was the infamous "Killing Demon," and the reputation was well deserved. He was remarkably bad at social interaction and gave no quarter.

The moment he arrived, he took over the daimyō's close protection and even reorganized the entire procedure. One attendant merely muttered a complaint, and he had a blade at his throat while being subjected to a full Sharingan inspection.

Yet the Fire Daimyō didn't mind at all. On the contrary, he was quite kind toward the stern-faced young man, which left the attendants feeling very conflicted.

That stern-faced fellow, at least, behaved with some propriety in front of the daimyō, instantly switching into a well-mannered youth.

If the rivals of Konoha were the four great ninja villages, then the Fire Daimyō's rivals were not the daimyō of the other four nations. When ninjas faced their enemies, they confronted them openly and head-on. But between the Fire Daimyō and his rivals, things could never be so straightforward.

Precisely because of this, whether the Hokage bore the surname Senju or Uchiha was a matter of vital importance to the Fire Daimyō. When the Hokage's surname was Sarutobi, or some other name, the Fire Daimyō had to consider whether one day another alliance might emerge and replace his family's position.

That was by no means impossible. When Hiruzen took office, there were already ministers in the daimyō's court who, in front of him, the Fire Daimyō himself, politely asked him to hurry up and "agree" to the Hokage candidate.

As if he would actually say, "I refuse."

That sort of gesture had no real substance, but it was extremely unpleasant. To the Fire Daimyō at the time, it was even frightening. Those ministers were all carefully noted down by the Fire Daimyō in his little ledger, and in the years that followed, he found ways to deal with them one by one.

As for Konoha, although neither Hiruzen nor the later Minato maintained close relations with his ministers, what if one day a future Hokage failed to keep that distance?

After all, what Konoha needed was only the Fire Daimyō.

Walking along the road, as the procession gradually approached the gates of Konoha, the Fire Daimyō let out a deeply emotional sigh.

There was melancholy in it, but even more so, contentment.

"Masashi, if you think about it carefully, the last Fire Daimyō to come to Konoha was already my grandfather."

"So that's how it is," Masashi said with a smile.

He had met that former Fire Daimyō as well.

The current Fire Daimyō had a face that made people think at a glance that he was a good person, one that naturally put others at ease and made them feel comfortable. The Fire Daimyō back then had a face that made people instinctively want to adopt a defensive posture at first glance. Although his style was rather abstract, he gave off a strong sense of familiarity.

From that time until now, only three generations had passed in the Fire Daimyō's family, yet the change in looks had already broken through the dimensional wall.

Which just goes to show: when choosing a wife, it's better to choose a good-looking one. You won't lose out.

That way, even if your baseline is already at rock bottom, you can slowly climb back up.

"About what was written in the letter..." Masashi was very curious about what exactly Madara had said to the Fire Daimyō.

Coming out to welcome the daimyō was both a matter of etiquette and a matter of curiosity.

"Oh, that man," the Fire Daimyō said. "I was truly startled at the time. Worthy of a legend, his bearing was exactly the same as what our family records described."

Even so, he did not elaborate. There were too many ears around.

"Let us enter Konoha first. I can hardly wait to witness with my own eyes the grand sight my grandfather once saw."

"You're too kind. Your visit to Konoha is Konoha's honor," Masashi replied. Seeing the daimyō's expression, he knew it wasn't a good place to talk, so he continued chatting with him about trivial matters.

Ahead of them, the towering gates slowly opened.

The Fire Daimyō, under the protection of a group of Konoha ninjas, finally entered this great city into which his family had poured enormous effort for three generations.

Behind him stretched a dense procession of attendants, yet the Fire Daimyō did not spare them a second glance. From this moment on, his personal safety was guaranteed to the fullest extent.

To him, the safest place in the world was not the daimyō's palace, but Konoha.

Suddenly, he came to a halt.

Ahead of him, Hiruzen and Minato stood smiling as they welcomed him.

He laughed heartily and stepped forward.

"It's been a long time."

"You look as healthy as ever," Hiruzen replied, his smile as kind and gentle as it had always been.

He was older than the Fire Daimyō. When he succeeded to the position of Hokage, the man before him had only just taken over as daimyō, still inexperienced and not yet deeply shrewd. At their first meeting, the young Fire Daimyō's eyes, when looking at him, the Third Hokage, had been filled with barely concealed wariness.

He remembered it clearly. The first words the Fire Daimyō had said to him back then were, "Have the Senju clan and the Uchiha clan already declined?"

At the time, he had not felt displeased. Like the daimyō, he too had been pushed into his position, and he too had lost his greatest pillar of support. As such, he could well understand the young daimyō's confusion and fear. What he had failed to anticipate was that, as time passed, the Fire Daimyō's concerns arising from the Hokage no longer bearing the surname Senju or Uchiha not only failed to lessen, but instead continued to deepen, especially after Minato succeeded to the position of Hokage.

However, after the Uchiha clan regained its prosperity, the daimyō's attitude clearly shifted, and he no longer appeared so tense. To be honest, Hiruzen could not really understand this mindset.

A surname, was it truly that important?

"Thanks to your good fortune," the Fire Daimyō said. Now that his state of mind had settled and his sense of crisis was gone, he looked at the man before him, already greatly aged, a hero among ninjas, and recalled the days when he had received protection and support from him, both openly and in secret. A wave of melancholy welled up in his heart. "If not for your protection, I might have quietly died in the palace without anyone knowing."

"That goes too far," Hiruzen said, shaking his head repeatedly and refusing the credit. "You are an outstanding daimyō."

"You're still as modest as ever. Very well, let us not dwell on this," the Fire Daimyō said. "You must take care of your health. If possible, I hope that ten years from now, I can still drink tea and play board games with you."

"Haha, rest assured, I'm in very good health," Hiruzen laughed happily.

Not being able to earn this daimyō's sincere recognition had always been a regret of his. He had truly hoped to become a mutually supportive partner with him. But at this moment, he could feel it, the Fire Daimyō was now sincere toward him, with no barrier left between them.

Masashi watched this scene silently from the side. That Hiruzen could earn recognition from both the first and second leaders meant that he truly was not a bad person. Someone who bore the title "Hero of Shinobi" could not be an evil man, much less a petty one.

In the words of his past life, Hiruzen was a man full of chivalrous spirit. Among the Sannin, only Jiraiya had inherited that same ethos. Of course, teacher and student alike were also quite lecherous.

That said, Hiruzen did not truly understand the bond that existed between the daimyō family and the Senju and the Uchiha. The alliance of the three great families was not a simple union of interests.

Getting Madara to acknowledge a noble family was far more difficult than getting him to acknowledge a ninja.

Having reminisced about past hardships and joys with Hiruzen, the Fire Daimyō exchanged a few words with Minato as well. Between Minato and him, there was no reminiscing to speak of, after all, theirs was a purely professional relationship. After a few polite exchanges, the two Hokage joined the procession escorting the Fire Daimyō, and together they headed toward the main district of Konoha.