Chapter 57.5- One Thousand Hands

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“Did you see that?” I asked Uraume now that we had retreated to my office. “That girl, she has no understanding of time and place. To challenge me like that in front of all the Jonin. What the hell was she thinking?” I ranted, feeling frustration take over. I honestly had way too much on my plate— between training, working on m side projects, and preparing the village for invasion while looking like I was doing nothing but whiling away the time as the spies form other villages were left confused and unable to understand what was happening. All that had to be placed on a hold while I fought Uzume, because going at her with anything less than—

“She was thinking that you needed a reputation boost with the other jonin to get them to respect you” Uraume cut into my thoughts as she spoke.

“What?”

“You heard me. You’re not the Hokage. You’re the head of the Clan Council. Instead of our military village being headed by a military dictator— the strongest in the village, it is now headed by what some of the jounin view as a glorified paper pushing nepo baby” She said.

“What? I killed the fucking Gobi” I said, looking at Uraume like she was insane. My kill list shouldn’t leave anyone with doubts about what I was.

“And everyone who witnessed that is dead. The same with the thing with the Raikage where everyone who saw it seems to have been sworn to silence. There’s no one spreading your legend in the village, and a sizeable chunk of our forces think you’re all hype.”

“And challenging me to a spar in front of everyone was going to accomplish that?”

“She thinks you’ll win” She said, almost like she was just realising something.

“I know I’ll win” I pressed. I’d seen Uzume and knew what she had to offer. Even with her mangekyou, sage mode gave me enough of a buff to drag our fights into a stalemate. Harming her was impossible with her mangekyou ability but that didn’t mean the I couldn’t force her to use it as many times as possible to make her run out of chakra and secure my win.

“That’s why she challenged you. Doing it like that means there’s no chance you guys won’t have an audience. Chances are every jounin and even most of the chunin will be there watching. If you win in front of everyone then no one can doubt your strength” She said.

“Because Uzume’s been winning in the league?” I asked. Uraume nodded. Bringing all the jounin into the village had left many of them bored and seeking entertainment. That had led to the Jonin sparring league. I’d heard of it and knew Uzume was in it and had some sort of record but hadn’t paid much attention other than that.

“She trounced Jiraiya three days ago. He didn’t even manage to scratch her” Uraume said, and I whistled.

“Okay, so beating someone that everyone knows is strong is going to make them accept me as strong” I said, drawing a scoff from my cousin.

“Uzume isn’t just known as strong. She’s undefeated. People call her Konoha’s strongest Jounin.” Uraume said.