A few minutes later.
The door of the operating room slowly opened.
Rasa, still somewhat weak in body and spirit, slowly walked out.
Hearing the movement, Karura looked up and hurried forward to support him.
Following closely behind were Shimizu and Chiyo, holding the sealed box.
"Lord Shimizu, Lady Chiyo, thank you!"
"It's nothing. In the next few days, pay attention to supplementing your nutrition and don't rush to restore your strength with excessive training. Come back for a check-up in two days. If there are no rejection reactions during this period, your body will be almost fully restored to the level before the injury."
Shimizu looked at Rasa's expression, smiled slightly, and said.
Rasa had basically lost the possibility of competing with him.
From today onwards, Shimizu could be considered Sunagakure's "crown prince" in the true sense, rather than just a candidate as before.
Even if he was the number one candidate.
It was like the crown prince versus an adult legitimate eldest prince before the crown prince was established.
After leaving the Sunagakure Hospital, the Third Kazekage called Shimizu and Chiyo to go to the Kazekage's office together.
Just now, Ebizo had sent a message saying that he had gathered all the information about the people recruited by the daimyo and was waiting in the Kazekage's office after sorting it out.
"There are a lot of people in this batch. Under the lure of wealth, many rogue ninja and missing-nin go to the capital every day to try their luck. Although the daimyo doesn't necessarily accept everyone, as long as they are not swindlers and have some strength, regardless of their background, the daimyo wants them. In a short period of time, he has gathered an army of several hundred people, stationed outside the capital. At the current rate of increase, it is expected to exceed a thousand within this month.
The daimyo has now given this team a name, called the Daimyo's Guardians."
Ebizo took out documents and filled the Third Kazekage's desk, introducing the situation.
"Hundreds or thousands of people, this scale, humph, is the daimyo worried that he recruited too few people and we would destroy them too easily?"
Chiyo casually picked up a document, glanced at it, and snorted coldly.
With the victory in the Second Shinobi World War and the rapid growth of the village's economy and military strength in the years since the war ended, Chiyo had recently become very confident in the village's strength and looked down on these insignificant characters.
In her opinion, only Konoha was worth paying attention to, and the other four major ninja villages and a few individuals like Hanzo were worth taking seriously. The rest were all characters that Sunagakure could directly flatten.
"After all, it's the village's original annual military expenditure. With such a large sum of money, no one in the ninja world wouldn't be tempted. I think these people are mixed up. Maybe there are people secretly sent by the other major ninja villages, not to mention troublesome characters like Tsuruga Kyuichi, who can even cause Rasa to capsize in the gutter."
Ebizo pulled out a few of these documents.
"Tsuruga Kyuichi, we have limited information about him. Besides this name, there are only the records of Rasa's battles with him. As for the village's database and the information about the Tsuruga clan collected from various ninja clans, they are all from before the founding of the village. There is no introduction to this kind of cellular insect control technique. It is estimated that Tsuruga Kyuichi developed it during the decades he lived in seclusion, so it is not of much reference value."
"Besides the most troublesome Tsuruga Kyuichi, there are a few other people worth noting. Kiriate, a wandering ninja from the Land of Iron, once had the record of killing Zottoi, a Jonin from Kumogakure, and was issued a gold-level bounty order by Kumogakure. In recent years, he has been hiding in several small countries such as the Land of Gold, the Land of Birds, and the Land of Tea, and is a first-class bounty ninja in the underground world, second only to Kakuzu.
"Konoha A-rank wanted missing-nin, Yuiichi Shuuichi, twenty-four years old, was once a Konoha Special Jonin. Seven years ago, he seemed to have defected after offending Elder Utatane Koharu. He has escaped from the pursuit of Konoha's Anbu several times and has at least Jonin-level combat power. It is impossible to determine the truth of his defection."
"The Fire Temple's runaway monk, Nozawa, defected after stealing the temple's secret techniques…"
"Iwagakure A-rank missing-nin, Ishihara Jin, 17 million ryo bounty on the underground black market…"
Including Tsuruga Kyuichi, among the information collected by Ebizo, there were five people who had at least Jonin-level abilities, and there were more than thirty people with clear records of having Special Jonin and above combat power.
Considering Tsuruga Kyuichi's combat power, this force was already stronger than small ninja villages like Kusagakure.
"We can't let the daimyo continue to act recklessly. This group of people can't continue to exist."
The Third Kazekage said indifferently.
This group of people was created by the daimyo to disgust them, and their existence was a huge blow to Sunagakure's prestige.
The stronger they were, the more difficult it would be for Sunagakure to eliminate them, and they would likely seize Sunagakure's mission share.
"What name should we use to eliminate this group of guys called the Daimyo's Guardians? After all, this is almost declaring war on the daimyo. If it is not handled properly, will it attract the attention of other daimyo, leading to the intervention of other ninja villages?"
Chiyo pulled up a chair and sat down, saying in a deep voice.
This was the most difficult point to deal with.
The Third Kazekage turned his gaze to Shimizu.
"Shimizu, what do you say?"
"Don't worry so much, just attack!"
Shimizu said decisively.
"Now every daimyo and all the ninja villages are watching. This is no longer a conflict between the daimyo and Sunagakure, but a conflict between the ninja village system and the daimyo system. In the past, the two checked and balanced each other. The daimyo was worried that the ninja forces were too strong and difficult to control, so he used the purse strings to restrict the ninja villages. The ninja villages also definitely didn't want to become the daimyo's dogs.
Now these ninja villages are probably hoping that we Sunagakure can win, because they are even more afraid that their daimyo will follow suit, so at least until we win, they won't intervene. Even if the daimyo forcibly orders them to send troops, they will definitely find various reasons to delay."
"Then what about after the victory? Do you think they will kick us when we're down? Yes, that's a good reason to unite the major ninja villages against Sunagakure."
Ebizo twitched his eyebrows and said with a chuckle.
The Sand Village is a bit too strong right now. The Rock Village of the Land of Earth and the Leaf Village of the Land of Fire, located on either side of the Land of Wind, will definitely not give up any opportunity to weaken the Sand Village.
The Cloud and Mist Villages may also take advantage of the situation.
"If they want to come, let them come. With the daimyo settled and the village's current strength, I don't think we need to fear any challenge!"
Shimizu said straightforwardly.
He knew that if they had more time to develop, the Sand Village would become even stronger.
But the prerequisite was a sufficiently stable development environment.
A single punch to deter a hundred.
First, solve the troublemaking daimyo, stabilize the internal environment, then defeat the other ninja villages to obtain a peaceful external environment. At that time, with the resources obtained from the daimyo, the development speed of the Sand Village might even be faster.
"Then this incident will be entirely handled by you. I will arrange as many people as you need. There is only one requirement: resolve the daimyo's Guardian Ninja as soon as possible."
The Third Kazekage said to Shimizu with a serious expression.
"Not enough."
Shimizu shook his head.
The Third Kazekage's brows furrowed slightly.
Without a single mistake, one head, one shot, one inside, one content, one look!
"Besides dealing with the daimyo's Guardian Ninja, I also need another group of people to manage the capital and control the daimyo and related nobles."
Shimizu said.
"Don't rush the latter matter. Wait for Rasa to recover in two days before handling it. This is also giving him a chance to redeem himself. After you resolve the daimyo's Guardian Ninja, I will convene a Jonin meeting and appoint you as a Kazekage candidate."
The Third Kazekage said to Shimizu.
It's better to let Rasa do the dirty work.
Shimizu was slightly stunned, then nodded heavily.
Of course, in the ninja world, only the Cloud Village has the custom of establishing Kage candidates.
The Raikage lineage is a single line of four generations.
This family's genes are excellent. Each generation of A has the ability to serve as the Kage of a major country. In addition, due to the father-son relationship, each generation of A can often become a Raikage candidate in their early twenties.
Originally, the Second Raikage died in the rebellion of the Gold and Silver Brothers. The Third Raikage directly ascended to the throne without going through a Jonin vote or similar procedure. The current Raikage candidate is the Fourth A. If the Third Raikage dies in battle or announces his retirement, he can directly inherit the position of Raikage.
Now, the Third Kazekage is going to give the position of Kazekage candidate to Shimizu, which is tantamount to directly announcing that Shimizu will become the Fourth Kazekage.
The process of becoming a Kazekage candidate is basically the same as the Kazekage election. It needs to go through a trust vote at the Jonin meeting. Only with the consent of most of the village's Jonin can one be elected.
Such a thing can be done in the Cloud Village, where the internal centralization is relatively high. It can also be done in the Rock Village, but Onoki has not yet found someone who can take over the position of Tsuchikage. His son, Kurotsuchi, is barely strong enough, but obviously Onoki is not very satisfied with other aspects of him.
As for the remaining three ninja villages, Leaf and Mist, these two ninja villages are constantly fighting internally. Once they want to do this kind of Kage candidate thing, let alone whether they can choose one, serious internal strife will definitely occur anyway.
Then the internal affairs will be even more chaotic.
Now, the internal political environment of the Sand Village is basically stable enough to operate in this way.
The Third Kazekage himself supports it, Chiyo and Ebizo are Shimizu's teachers, the Rasa and Karura combination is basically determined to be defeated by Shimizu, the puppet unit, intelligence unit, sealing team, and medical team can all be regarded as Shimizu's core faction, and the remaining major ninja clans and Jonin have already begun to show goodwill to Shimizu from the moment he established his advantage, and even some small and medium-sized ninja clans have completely defected.
Although Rasa is the deputy head of the Anbu, the head is Ebizo, who has held this position for nearly twenty years. Moreover, as a unit directly under the Kazekage, the Third Kazekage's control over the Anbu is actually the most absolute.
The same is true for the administrative department, finance department, logistics department, and several major combat departments and other departments directly under the Kazekage.
This is enough to ensure that most of the Jonin in the Sand Village will vote for Shimizu in the Jonin trust vote.
The remaining neutral factions who are still watching will not be so unwise at that time.
Later, he may not remember very clearly who voted for Shimizu, but he will definitely remember who didn't vote.
Some ninja clans and Jonin who are still hesitating now may defect even more thoroughly.
No one wants to become a marginal figure in the future, or become a sacrifice in the politics and wars of the great powers.
But there are not many neutral factions now, after all, almost all of the Sand Village's active Special Jonin and above ninjas have learned Shimizu's breathing method and owe him this favor. Only a few old antiques who had disagreements with the Third Kazekage very early on are left.
Although they have the title of elder, they have long since lost any power or influence, and cannot influence others.
As for the lower and middle-level ninjas and civilians, it is even simpler.
The canal, the new puppet technique, etc., have allowed them to gain a lot of benefits in recent years. As long as we increase the publicity of Shimizu's past achievements, they will know who to choose.
Their influence on the Kazekage election is not as great as that of the Jonin class, but it cannot be ignored.
And what Shimizu has to do is to lead the Sand Village ninjas to victory in this military operation with an absolutely crushing advantage!
Logistics go before troops and horses.
Because it is a local battle, the pressure on logistics is not too great.
What is important is the deployment of personnel, striving for success in one battle.
Therefore, this time, the Sand Village mobilized a full thousand elite ninjas.
Such a movement could not be hidden from those spies, so the next day, the daimyo of the Land of Wind sent an order of reprimand, and said that everything could be discussed. As long as both sides made certain concessions and exchanged benefits, the relationship between the daimyo and the Sand Village could return to the past.
The higher-ups of the Sand Village originally did not want to pay attention.
But after Shimizu made a suggestion, Sand dispatched a delegation led by Ebizo, with more than twenty elites, all of whom were at least Special Jonin, to Kyoto.
They will first stabilize the daimyo, and after Rasa leads the team to Kyoto, they will cooperate internally and externally to directly control the capital.
And Rasa's condition recovered very quickly. The heart rebuilt with the Creation Rebirth Technique was strong and powerful, no different from the past.
Therefore, on the third day, a thousand elite Sand Village ninjas, led by Shimizu, set off quickly and surrounded the camp where the daimyo's Guardian Ninja were stationed.
On the other side, in the capital of the Land of Wind, Rasa and Karura, with cold expressions, led a group of Sand Village ninjas, cooperating with Ebizo inside, and captured the city gate.
