Escape From Konoha

After six o'clock, the sky became much darker, and in the twilight, the frozen white sky in the distance was vaguely visible.

The weather in February is still very cold, and the Ghost Country is not a rich country. Only a few people in the city can use a heater. In the countryside, there is no need to think about using a heater for heating. Just find one in the house. In the open space, there was a pair of firewood piled up for warmth.

This is how the villagers of the Ghost Country here survive the winter.

In many small and poor countries, winter nights are sometimes more terrifying than ninjas during war.

Houses without winter heating equipment can easily freeze to death at night.

Especially homeless people living in war-torn areas.

Faced with the old woman's warm hospitality, Shiraishi and Ayane stayed for a dinner.

The cabin wasn't very pretty, but it was sturdy enough to provide shelter from wind and rain.

With the doors and windows closed tightly, you can only hear the whistling sound of the cold wind hitting the solid wood.

The dinner was very simple, only steamed buns and pickles, and very thin rice porridge.

Shiraishi could see that this was the best food the old woman could produce.

If it wasn't a guest visiting, I probably wouldn't be willing to take it out to eat.

The ingredients in the house are also wild vegetables and radishes that can be found everywhere. The life of an old man living alone may be simpler, but it can be seen that the living conditions in this village can only barely solve the problem of food and clothing.

The old woman's name is Ye Zi. She currently lives alone. Her husband died of illness a few years ago.

He has a son who works in a port town in the Kingdom of Ghosts. He is a sailor and has a family. Every year in December and January, he takes his wife and children back here to celebrate the New Year, and then returns to the port town to work.

"That's the statue of a miko."

While eating, Shiraishi glanced at the shelf in the room, where a clay statue of a witch was enshrined.

"It's Miko-sama."

A smile appeared on Grandma Ye Ye's face.

"I can see statues of witches in many places. By the way, this country is really devoted to witches."

Understanding it literally and experiencing it personally are two different feelings.

The faith of shrine maidens can affect even such remote and poor villages, and has been integrated into the daily life of the people of the Ghost Country.

"Of course, the reason why this country is peaceful is all because of Miko-sama. We have to thank Miko-sama for bringing us peace."

Granny Ye put her hands together and bowed in the direction of the clay witch.

While eating, Granny Ye told Shiraishi and Ayane the story of a witch slaying demons.

More than twenty years ago, not long after the First Ninja War ended, the Kingdom of Demons suffered a terrible disaster. A terrible monster emerged from the sky and spread death across the land of Demons.

"That's really scary, those terracotta warriors and horses..."

Grandma Ye Ye recalled the past events and spoke in a sighing tone.

Given her age, she has probably experienced that horrific nightmare herself.

"Terracotta warriors and horses?"

When Shiraishi heard this title, his voice suddenly became louder, as if he felt incredible because of this title.

"What's wrong? Is there something wrong with the name?"

Ayane was listening with interest and looked at Shiraishi in confusion.

"Ah, no, how do you say this name...it sounds a bit weird. Mother-in-law, please continue, what happened to those terracotta warriors and horses?"

Shiraishi didn't know where to start complaining.

Terracotta Warriors and Horses...this name is really special.

"Those terracotta warriors and horses are said to be stone monsters sleeping in the underworld. They are three meters tall and hold huge stone knives in their hands. They are an army of monsters that will not die. They are called the 'ghost army' by many people and are controlled by that monster. With death and disaster.”

Grandma Ye didn't pay attention to Bai Shi's increasingly weird expression and continued to tell her story orally.

“Aren’t the surrounding countries managed?”

Shiraishi looked curious.

"I remember that some ninjas came to deal with it, but it seemed to have no effect. Many people died because it was an immortal army."

Grandma Ye didn't know the specific situation, but she saw many ninjas trying to stop the ghost army. As a result, many people died. The road was full of corpses of ninjas, killed by the ghost army.

"So what happened in the end?"

"In the end? Of course it was the miko-sama who took action to put down this demonic chaos... But that seems to have happened during the previous generation of miko. I can't remember many things clearly. I only remember that after sealing the monster, the miko Your Excellency and the others died together."

Grandma Ye Ye said regretfully.

"I see, that monster's name is..."

"Sprite. That monster's name is Sprite."

Grandma Ye said the name of the monster that caused the disaster and remembered it very clearly.

After eating, Grandma Ye decided to take a rest.

After all, she is very old and her energy is far less than that of young people.

Shiraishi didn't bother, but borrowed a woodshed and went there with Ayane to rest for a night.

The two of them found an open space in the woodshed and sat down, lighting the firewood to dispel the darkness and coldness around them.

"I didn't expect that there are such interesting stories in the Kingdom of Ghosts. The battle between monsters and ninjas, and the witches finally calmed down the chaos..."

Ayane clearly regarded what Grandma Ye Zi said as a story in a picture book.

"It's not necessarily false. There are indeed records of similar events in the Konoha Library. A big disaster did occur in the Kingdom of Ghosts more than twenty years ago. It should be what Granny Ye said. Monsters are causing trouble."

"But isn't that a monster? There shouldn't be any ghosts in this world, right?" Ayane felt that the topic was a bit perplexing.

"There is a very mysterious natural energy surrounding Maitreya, but it seems to be different from the natural energy we cultivate, and something else is added to it."

"Something else?"

"I don't know what it is, but it's definitely not a magical technique after fusing chakra, but another special technique. It should be the inheritance of the miko."

Shiraishi said.

Shiraishi recalled that when he went to see the miko Maitreya before, the peace and kindness he felt was probably also the power of the miko affecting him.

"Besides, Toad's lair, Mt. Myoboku, even has the means to bring people back to life, so the miko's special abilities don't seem so hard to accept."

Baishi folded his hands on his chest. Although he couldn't believe everything Granny Ye said, the monster monster might be true.

It is a pity that he has only been in the Kingdom of Ghosts for a short time and does not know many things very well.

Moreover, the more core secrets related to the immortal demon should be in the hands of the miko herself. Most people only know so much.

"Is it true that Namikaze Minato is not dead?"

Ayane also heard Shiraishi talk about this and found it incredible. The dead can also be resurrected. If this is true, then Myobokuyama's ability is too great.

"There are people in Konoha Hospital who I arranged to go in. Afterwards, I asked Kado's people who stayed in Konoha to also investigate. Namikaze Minato, who received my fatal blow, is indeed still alive. After that Soon, an old green-skinned toad visited Konoha Hospital and took something from Minato."

Shiraishi said to Ayane as if he had witnessed that scene with his own eyes.

"That's really amazing. If you encounter it in the future, it seems you need to be more cautious."

"Don't worry too much. If there is such a method of resurrection from the dead, it can only be a forbidden technique, and the practitioner himself has to bear huge risks and costs."

Shiraishi doesn't believe in Myobokuyama's method of resurrecting the dead, and he can perform the spell at will without paying any price.

And at this stage, there is no need to worry about Konoha's pursuit. In order to deal with Sunagakure and Iwagakure, Konoha has almost tried its best and has no remaining power to deal with him.

The most important thing now is to strengthen the power in your hands.

"It's almost time to rest, Shiraishi-kun, I'm a little tired now."

Ayane yawned.

"You go to sleep first, I still need to think about something."

"Really? Good night, then."

Ayane naturally put her head on Shiraishi's knees, closed her eyes and slept, with a smile on her lips.

"It's too cold on the ground, so you can keep warm."

Ayane, who closed her eyes, went out of her way to explain something.

"I didn't say anything to you."

"Yes, because Shiraishi-kun is a big pervert. He comes to peek at my body while I'm sleeping."

"Don't worry, it won't happen."

Shiraishi said affirmatively.

"Don't you have any ideas in your mind?"

"Why do you say that?"

"Whatever you mean, it's about controlling my body. I told you a long time ago that I don't want to leave Shiraishi-kun. You can use it however you want."

Ayane said this.

"Don't worry, I won't abandon you."

Shiraishi said so, and sighed.

"Scumbag."

Ayane softly spit out these two words.

"Hello!"

Ayane shrank her body and her breathing became much lighter, as if she had fallen into a deep sleep.

Shiraishi looked at Ayane who had calmed down and sighed.

This is not the first time that I have had the idea of ​​making a promise to a woman.

But both people are irreplaceable to him. It would be too difficult and painful to only cherish the person in front of him.

Therefore, I feel indebted to Ayane and Liuli.

Sometimes I also wonder, am I a little too selfish?

◎

When I woke up the next day, the weather was still very cold, and my body was a little stiff when I first got up, and it got better after a little exercise.

Ayane went to help Granny Ye Zi make breakfast. After eating breakfast, her body became much warmer.

People in the village also get up early to work. People here live a very ordinary life, working at sunrise and resting at sunset, every day and every year.

Under the protection of the maiden, the comfort and peace of this country is something that many countries cannot envy.

Not only because of the Miko, but also because the strategic location is not very important.

A fertile land like the Land of Fire, coupled with Konoha's weak diplomatic attitude, will inevitably fall into an embarrassing situation of fighting everywhere.

Baishi began to investigate in this village, which has a combined population of about 200 people. They are all old people, women and children. There are very few young people left here. According to the chat, we can know that these young people have left the village and went to work in larger towns to support their families.

The general education level is very low, and most adults know limited characters, and there is no school in the village, and there is no unified educational institution.

Shiraishi also asked them insinuating what they thought about sending children to school. Most adults had a dispensable attitude.

Adults do not have that awakening consciousness and are economically backward. They do not need to be literate. They only need to be able to do farm work and work hard to have enough to eat and drink.

These are the only abilities they can teach their children.

"It feels like these adults are really backward in their thinking."

Ayane said this.

After following Shiraishi and visiting so many villagers, this was the only thought in her mind.

"This is the truest thought in their hearts. What they need is a job that can support their families, not how to read and learn some knowledge that is useless to them."

In this era of low productivity, the food and vegetables grown by ordinary farmers, after paying taxes, are only enough to eat.

In their subconscious mind, places like schools are places that can only be found in cities, and only nobles can study there. Farmers should do farm work well to support themselves and their families.

This kind of thinking, in Shiraishi's opinion, is naturally wrong, backward and ignorant. But based on the actual situation in the village, these farmers' ideas are correct.

Things in big cities don't fit their situation.

Just like ninja learning materials, ordinary people do not need them. If they are given to ordinary people, ordinary people cannot learn them and cannot apply them in practice.

"This is also the reason why I came to conduct the investigation. If schools are built here and the teaching materials are distributed uniformly, the villagers will definitely be disgusted and disliked, because the teaching materials in big cities do not teach the knowledge they need."

If something is not in line with the interests and needs of farmers, they will naturally be rejected and their thoughts cannot be unified.

"It sounds very troublesome." Ayane's head hurt, but seeing Shiraishi swearing so confidently, she felt that he was very masculine.

"Everyone has different needs, and the development of a force cannot be separated from talents from all walks of life. The future of the ninja world will definitely be based on talents. And the so-called talents are the result of the waves. I want more and more If we have more talents, we must expand the 'base'. The lifestyle of ninjas is not within the reach of ordinary people."

Therefore, Shiraishi wants to distinguish the education methods of ninjas from ordinary people.

Among ordinary people, due to factors such as region, education level, economic environment, etc., the schools set up and the teaching materials provided to students will vary greatly.

In poor places, we must teach them knowledge that can make them rich and quickly solve their food and clothing problems.

In wealthy places, there is no need to worry about food and clothing. Therefore, the probability of talents being born is far greater than in poor areas.

The current world is the age of ninjas.

The role of ordinary people is ignored.

After all, ninjas are also selected from ordinary people.

Paying attention to the development of ninja power while ignoring the ordinary people at the bottom is an arrogant mistake in itself.

Through this village, Shiraishi can roughly understand the living environment in non-urban areas of the Ghost Country. There are definitely a few wealthy villages, and most villages still struggle to have food and clothing.

Next, Baishi spent a few more days to learn more about the situation in the village, before bidding farewell to Grandma Ye Zi and heading elsewhere to conduct actual investigations.

It was a month later when we returned to the organization headquarters, which was the arrival of spring in early March.

During this month, Shiraishi spent some time in the cave with Ayane, and also spent nights in the homes of villagers.

There are many problems, but the advantages are also obvious, that is, there is no chaos and the order is stable. All that is left is to slowly find a way to solve the problem. For this kind of thing, Shiraishi feels that there is no need to rush.

When we returned to the headquarters, the ninja teaching area for training ninjas had been built.

This school can accommodate hundreds of people learning ninja skills at the same time. It has a large area and enough space for them to conduct actual combat training.

As for the source of students, Shiraishi plans to start from the Demon Country, and the other part will be children of appropriate age provided by the Uchiha clan, Hyuga clan and Uzumaki clan.

The last step is to find young orphans in the ninja world and bring them back for training.

Training ninjas with natural energy does not require any chakra qualifications.

As long as the body has no particularly serious defects, it can develop combat effectiveness. Even if it is difficult to use physical skills, it is not something ordinary people can resist.

The disadvantage is that the probability of cultivating top powerful ninjas is very low; the advantage is that quantity makes up for quality problems, and there will be no shortage of combatants.

After all, there are homeless orphans everywhere in the ninja world. If you just pick them up, you can bring back hundreds or thousands of orphans.

According to the report, there are more than 400 orphans collected so far, and ninja training will be officially conducted in April next month.

It will be officially put into use, no accident, it will be nine years later.

"Master Shiraishi, this is a letter from Konoha."

Shiraishi was observing in the school area when a man wearing a trench coat embroidered with asters appeared using the teleportation technique and handed a letter to Shiraishi's hand.

Shiraishi opened the letter and simply scanned it.

Last year, he asked the people here to negotiate a cooperation agreement with Konoha to train medical ninjas on his behalf.

Shionhua Company will pay part of the drug information, and Konoha will train some medical ninjas for them.

The official cooperation will be in April next month, which is also the time when Konoha Ninja School starts.

Now that we have just reached the end of March, we really need to arrange this matter.

The content of the letter probably stated that they were allowed to send twenty to thirty students with medical ninja talents, who would receive six years of medical ninja training at Konoha Ninja School, and six years of teaching materials, accommodation and other expenses. , Konoha will bear half of the cost, and Shiraishi will pay the other half.

However, Konoha will not bear the cost of materials used in the experiment, and Shiraishi will pay all of them.

Shiraishi nodded. The request was very reasonable and basically satisfied him.

"How many people are currently learning medical ninjutsu here at the headquarters?"

Shiraishi asked.

"Forty-one in total."

The man thought for a moment before answering.

"Select twenty-five people and send someone to deliver them safely to Konoha the morning after tomorrow. Take the sea route around to the Country of Tea, and then go to the Country of Fire."

Considering that the Rain Country, Grass Country, and River Country may all become war zones, it would be very dangerous to walk on land. If you accidentally get involved in a war, you will be in trouble.

"Yes. By the way, Master Shiraishi, there is a very strange rumor circulating in the ninja world recently."

Thinking of something, the man lowered his voice and spoke very carefully.

"Strange rumors?"

"The truth of this rumor has not yet been determined, but it is said that the third Kazekage of Sunagakure Village seems to have disappeared."

The man spoke in a low voice because this matter was too important. The sudden disappearance of a ninja, one of the Five Shadows, was not a small matter.

Shiraishi was immediately surprised when he heard the news.

"The Kazekage is missing?"

"Yes, and it seems that he disappeared at the end of January. The Ninja World War has broken out for more than a month, and the Third Kazekage has not shown up once, and has not even taken action. Now many people are becoming more and more suspicious of this news. It’s real.”

After hearing this, Bai Shi had a look of doubt on his face.

The Third Kazekage disappeared at the end of January, but Sunagakure launched war against Konoha in February. So, who was responsible for mobilizing Sunagakure's troops? Those senior executives of Sunagakure?

It was originally thought that the disappearance of the Third Kazekage happened after the war was launched, but now it seems that is not the case.

But...how could the Kazekage, one of the contemporary Five Shadows, suddenly disappear?

Could this be Sunagakure's conspiracy?

"Master Shiraishi, should we send someone to investigate this matter?"

Shiraishi shook his head and said: "No, this has nothing to do with us. Our current role is to sell medicine. Don't do unnecessary things. The ninjas fight and we are responsible for making money."

Although he was surprised that Feng Ying disappeared, Shiraishi thought about it carefully and realized that it had nothing to do with him.

Regardless of whether Kazekage is there or not, Sand Hidden Village will purchase medicines from itself, and cooperation will not be cut off just because Kazekage disappears.

If he rashly intervenes, he will expose his own traces and make Sunagakure suspicious.

During this war, selling medicine to make money was your job, and you didn't need to meddle in other people's business.

After the man went down, Shiraishi continued to wander around the school. When he was about to go back, the ground began to bulge, and the earth general began to appear in human form.

General Tu just handed a note to Shiraishi. Shiraishi looked at the content on the note and frowned.

"Did that strange white creature start to sneak into Konoha again and go to the Uchiha clan?"

General Tu nodded, indicating that this was indeed the case.

"It's really endless. What do these people want to do?"

Shiraishi was puzzled.

To be honest, Shiraishi was very afraid of the people behind this group of mysterious white creatures.

The pressure that Sharingan put on me was so terrifying that I still remember it fresh.

But this group of people must be planning something, otherwise they would not be able to sneak into Konoha again and again to investigate the Uchiha clan.

Against Konoha... no, the conspiracy against Uchiha is even greater.

Who is the target?

These are things Shiraishi doesn't know.

"This time you follow these people and see where they settle."

As he spoke, snake-like water suddenly emerged from Baishi's sleeves, attached to General Tu's body, and disappeared.

"Be careful. If you find something is wrong, leave immediately. Just determine where they are and try not to go too deep."

Shiraishi was very worried that when General Tu was investigating these mysterious guys, he would encounter the mastermind behind the powerful Sharingan eye, so he asked the water clone to follow General Tu to avoid being unable to escape in time when encountering a crisis.

General Tu nodded and dived into the soil again to investigate the group of mysterious white creatures.