Chapter 20 - 20. True Face Of Humanity

The leaves of the trees fluttered, but a strange sense of silence remained.

The tens of various shinobi around made sure the location was secured. But, Shiroken was already listening to everything, from outside the large window. ​​

Inside, 5 men were sitting around a table.

They were the leaders of the 5 strongest shinobi villages. Behind each of them was also someone, probably their assistants or security personnel.

Putting his whole focus on what was going on, he heard the names of all of them and their villages. From Konohagakure, it was Hokage Hashirama Senju. From Sunagakure, it was Kazekage Reto. Kirigakure had Mizukage Byakuren. Then there was Raikage A from Kumogakure and finally Tsuchikage Ishikawa from Iwagakure.

All these villages were not very friendly to each other and chased after more resources and profits for themselves. But, they also didn't want a war, hence they had gathered here to try to balance the power.

Hashirama talked first, "For the peace and prosperity of all our people, we must not fight. We are all newly formed villages and we need to focus on gathering wealth."

Kazekage Reto scoffed, "Huh, your concept of peace does not apply everywhere, Hashirama. Your village and your country sits on fertile lands, while ours is in a desert, where food and water are hard to come by. There is no profit for us in peace, we must make peace by fighting."

"Are you declaring war on us?" Raikage A sternly asked, his face looked serious and ready to fight.

Hashirama immediately tried to stop them and came to the main point, "Calm down, please. We are not here to fight but to find a solution. As you all know, Konoha now possesses the power of the mighty 9-tailed demon fox. I have a solution for you to not feel threatened by this. I will catch the rest of the beasts and sell them to you."

As soon as Shiroken heard this outside, a vein popped up on his head. ~S-sell? Sell my family? Tobirama lied to me, Konoha did have Kurama. They will pay for this~

Shiroken looked back inside after hearing the loud voice of Kazekage Reto.

"HUH! We don't need them."

"We have already caught the one-tail. Instead, we want something else. As a payment, you must give The Country of Wind a portion of the fertile land of the Land of Fire, as well as 30% of all the money you will get from selling the tailed beasts to the other villages." Kazekage demanded.

This enraged everyone in the room. Mizukage, Raikage and Tsuchikage stood up, fingers pointed at Kazekage, "We will declare war against Sunagakure then. This will teach you a lesson."

Hashirama voiced. "Calm down, let's talk first. I am sure we can come up with a reasonable solution. And yes, Sunagakure's demand is too outrageous. Remember, I am selling you all the tailed beasts in the captured state. I am strong enough to easily capture them with my Wood Release. But, if any of you were to try to capture them, many of your experienced shinobi will die in the process.

"You have the option of getting them peacefully. And my final offer to Sunagakure is an agreement for the sale of a limited amount of crops to you at the cost price. And for the next 3 years, we will send 100 tonnes of crops to you for free, so you can become self-sufficient in the meantime. I also offer the possibility of leasing land to grow crops on, the lease must get renewed every 10 years. And to the other villages, I will sell the tailed beasts." Hashirama mediated and offered them.

"Do you even know where they are?" Raikage A asked.

Hashirama nodded confidently, "I have some doubts about their location. But I assure you, I can find and capture them."

Slowly, each agreed. All villages were buying two beasts, except Sunagakure, as they did not have much money to buy them and currently needed food urgently.

There was still one beast left and it was decided that it would be given to Takigakure, a small yet strong Shinobi village.

Like the intelligent vultures they were, they decided the fate of ancient intelligent beings easily. They planned on enslaving them and trading them as goods.

For the first time in his life, Shiroken was face to face by the animalistic and barbarian nature of humans.

~What peace? What truce? They went from warring clans to warring villages and countries and now more bodies will be slain, more lives will be lost. They don't care about anybody except themselves. Their greed knows no bounds.

And they... Want to capture my family? Enslave them? Why is Hashirama so confident in catching them all?~

There were thousands of questions in his mind. He couldn't understand why they wanted to enslave the Bijuu. Wouldn't it be better to not touch them and let all villages be equally powerful?

He questioned himself about what he should do. He wanted to harm these men, he wanted to hurt them, and for the first time, kill someone. But he wondered if he was strong enough to beat all of them at once. They were the 5 strongest men of the 5 strongest villages.

Shiroken knew his powers were boundless, but he was not at the level where he could flick anybody to the side.

~What if they keep me busy and that Hashirama goes to capture them?~ he thought of the risk.

He remembered the words of Gyuki. "You never get into a fight you know you can't win. If you have a chance to avoid it, avoid it. Get stronger and beat them later."

Shiroken's face seemed blank, but cold and hidden anger appeared. He didn't seem like the happy and playful Shiro anymore.

*Woosh*

He jumped back from the rooftop and returned to Monari carefully.

Monari had hidden herself well there, but Shiroken easily found her. As they were in a jungle, full of Natural Energy.

"What happened? What's with that face? They didn't agree?" Monari asked him with a tensed face.

Shiroken denied, "I did not talk to them. Monari, they are worse than animals. Kurama was caught by Konoha. And now Hokage is planning on selling all other Bijuu to other villages as tools of wars, to be enslaved and imprisoned in a seal."

"WHAT?! Are they crazy? How will they even do that? All of them combined are very powerful." Monari asked in shock.

"I don't know. That Hashirama is very confident, he said he alone can catch them easily with his wood release. We need to hurry back to the village and hide everyone. QUICK!" He decided with urgency.

Monari agreed immediately. There were just two of them here. Fighting them was pointless right now as they will only be slowed.

They sped up at full speed towards the village. The sooner they returned the sooner they could start evacuating.

...

Hashirama did not know the kind of damage he had inflicted on a peaceful loving family. To him, all the tailed beasts were just giant monsters. His first and only interaction with a beast was with Kurama, who was known to show anger and had a superiority complex.

So, his belief that all the beasts were like this grew in his head. In his mind, he was just creating everlasting peace. He guessed that as long as he was alive, no tailed beast could threaten Konoha. And as Senju were known for their long lives, he knew he would live to see Konoha prosper.

"Then it's decided, I will immediately head out and capture the beasts. After 1 week, all of us will meet here again. You can bring the money, as well as the person you will be sealing the beast inside. The Uzumaki clan will help us in sealing the beasts." Hashirama said in his final remarks. With that, all the Kage left for their countries with a satisfying feeling. As all got something in return today.

Hashirama also donned his red armour, armed himself with his Senju Scroll, through which he could summon countless trees for his wood release and headed out.

...

Shiroken and Monari were just about to reach their home. They had ditched their excess luggage to increase their speed.

"That bastard Tobirama lied, we should have nabbed his neck right there." Monari was very angry right now. It seemed as if the whole world was against them.

All this for no reason, they had never tried to harm anybody. All the Bijuu and villagers just lived peaceful lives, never harming anyone.

Shiroken was not speaking. He was afraid that if he spoke, he would get angrier. And he wanted to stay level headed.

"Let's talk to Gyuki... He is the most knowle... WATCH OUT!"

Shiroken stopped speaking midway and leapt forward to grab Monari and jump to the side. He did not jump just a few metres, but a few hundred metres away.

Monari was shocked, unable to realise what had happened. But then she heard.

*BOOOOOM*

Something fell from the sky. It fell with such intensity that a huge crater formed on the ground, destroying countless trees in a large radius. The destruction was intensified by the strong wind formed by the impact, and with that, a big cloud of dust also formed.

*Cough Cough*

"WHAT WAS THAT? HASHIRAMA?" Monari wondered loudly.

"I don't know, but I feel a very different aura from that dust cloud. It's much different from any ninja. It's closer to Kurama and all." Shiroken muttered, confused himself.

*FWOOOSH*

All of a sudden a big tornado formed in the destroyed crater and it sucked all the dust, with that the field became clear and everything was visible. Just one man was standing in the middle. He had white long hair, white skin, and horns on his head.

"That's not a human," Shiroken felt. He was having a very ominous feeling now. So he whispered into Monari's ears.

"Quickly, run to the village and tell them to evacuate as soon as possible. I will hold this person, I don't think he came here for the Bijuu. But, if this large destruction was just from his landing, I can't imagine his full blows. The village might get destroyed by his attacks."

Monari nodded, knowing the lives of everyone in the village were at stake, "Just... don't die, please."

Shiroken smiled at her, "Of course, I still need to learn about that special goodbye you were talking about."

"YOU KNEW WHAT IT WAS?" She exclaimed with widened eyes.

He chuckled, "I may be naive, but I'm not a fool, Monari. I have eyes and have lived for more than thrice your current age."

Monari just lightly punched his chest. But she felt something different about him. Where was the innocent Shiro? Why was he acting so differently? She wondered if the mental fatigue caused this change.

She came close to him and kissed his forehead. She loved this little brother dearly.

"Go now." He pushed her away.

Once she was gone, Shiroken focused on the weird human. He did not go towards him though, as he felt a little nervous. He had not felt any kind of threat from any shinobi yet. Not even Hashirama. But from this person, he was feeling danger.

Then to his surprise, the man started flying in the air and slowly hovered towards him.

"HAHAHA... You have no idea how many galaxies and realities I searched for you. You thought you could run away from us after taking the source?

"HUH... The only reason for your existence is so that you can be dissected and researched upon, for my people to get stronger. You caused me too much shame in front of my clan. I was going crazy to redeem myself.

AND I HAVE FINALLY FOUND YOU!"

[A/N: Before any of you start raging in the comments, read this. It's from Naruto Fandom page.

"Hashirama's Wood Release also granted him a method of subduing and controlling the tailed beasts. ... He acquired several tailed beasts in this way and was able to maintain control over all of them at the same time"]

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