As things went back and forth, the gap in numbers between the two sides gradually widened. Quite a few shinobi, after learning what had happened, wanted to support Ao—but when they saw the familiar faces behind Ayuri, along with a headcount that was nearly more than double Ao's side, they couldn't help stopping in their tracks.
"Co stand with , Ao—the famous Byakugan Killer. Are you really willing to kneel and submit to so Konoha ninja?" Ayuri's gaze flicked rather heatedly toward Ao's eyepatch. Hidden behind it was the legendary Byakugan.
Ao had obtained it during the Third Shinobi World War, when he seized the chance to capture a main-branch mber of the Hyūga clan and take it as spoils. For that feat, he single-handedly crushed a mixed team of Hyūga chūnin and jōnin and earned the title Byakugan Killer.
The only pity was that the Byakugan of branch family mbers would be automatically sealed by the Caged Bird Curse Mark, and that main-branch mber hadn't forgotten to destroy his own eyes before dying. In the end, Ao had only managed to snatch one Byakugan.
That single eye was fairly well known even across the shinobi world. Konoha had even placed a special bounty on Ao because of it. The boost it gave to his combat ability was considerable, and the fact that Ao had beco one of the strongest among elite jōnin was inseparable from that eye.
So it was only natural for Ayuri to covet Ao's Byakugan. If a taijutsu-focused shinobi like him could obtain it, it wouldn't just make him stronger—it would elevate his combat power trendously.
But now wasn't the ti to sche for the eye. Ao's supporters might have been fewer in number, but besides Ao himself, there was still another elite jōnin among them. And with that troubleso woman, i Terumi, able to show up at any mont, Ayuri wasn't confident he could decisively crush these "weaklings" even if he started a fight.
He could mock them as cowards all he wanted, but in a real fight, no matter how weak an enemy looked, their blades could still kill.
"You people have no idea what you're doing!" Ao could no longer tell whether his clothes were soaked with rainwater or cold sweat. If he had known Ayuri's group would be this stubborn—so determined to drag every Kirigakure shinobi to their deaths—then even at the risk of civil war, he would have struck first and taken Ayuri down.
Furious and alard, Ao even proposed a one-on-one blood duel with Ayuri—a thod of settling disputes that had once been quite popular in the "Bloody Mist."
As long as both sides agreed, it could begin: a one-on-one fight to the death, with the survivor having no further need to argue with the loser.
But Ayuri had no intention of taking that risk when his side clearly held the advantage. He was indeed a genuine Kirigakure jōnin, but compared to Ao, the Byakugan Killer, he was still far inferior.
"So you really are asking Kirigakure's shinobi to kneel and surrender to a Konoha ninja, huh?" Ayuri clung stubbornly to the opposition between Kirigakure and Konoha. Even among the more than half of the Kirigakure shinobi who had chosen neutrality, many were now looking at Ao with open dissatisfaction.
Kirigakure shinobi, famous for their cold brutality, naturally looked down on Konoha's "greenhouse flowers." Even though Uchiha Chizumi had single-handedly trampled Kirigakure's pride into the dirt, it was still hard to change the self-righteous mindset of Kirigakure's shinobi in such a short ti.
"You cowards! If you don't dare face a Konoha ninja, then get out of the way—stop hindering us from avenging the Mizukage-sama!"
"I say we should just kill them outright! If not for weaklings like these dragging us down, how would Konoha shinobi ever have dared invade the Land of Water?!"
"Move aside, Ao! Are you really going to beco Konoha's dogs?!"
…
Before Ayuri could continue pressing the point, the conservative Kirigakure shinobi could no longer hold back and began shouting curses. A few of the hotter-headed ones had already drawn their ninja blades and were ready to attack.
Ao's side was no less defiant, pulling out their own weapons one after another. What had only been a tense atmosphere now crossed the line into a direct blade-to-blade confrontation.
"Lava Release: lting Apparition Technique!"
But just as the battle was about to erupt, a huge mass of highly corrosive acid ca pouring down from above. It splashed onto the ground between the two camps, forming sothing like a moat and completely separating them.
"Damn it!" Ayuri couldn't help cursing under his breath. A signature kekkei genkai like Lava Release ant one thing: the other side's reinforcents had arrived. i Terumi might have co alone, but with her wide-area destructive techniques, she was more than capable of tying down several jōnin squads by herself.
Just like that, the balance of power that had finally tilted in his favor was restored. Even if Ayuri wanted to take the risk and attack, he had to think about whether i and Ao would focus him down first.
"What happened here, Ao?" i Terumi, drenched from head to toe, landed beside him. With a single glance, she realized the situation seed even worse than she had expected.
"It's like this…" Seeing i arrive, Ao finally let out a breath of relief and quickly recounted the disagreent between himself and Ayuri. He didn't exaggerate, though—at their core, his and Ayuri's thinking wasn't actually that different.
The only real difference was that Ao believed Kirigakure currently lacked the strength to fight Uchiha Chizumi and needed to compromise for now, wait for an opportunity, and only then settle the score.
Ayuri, on the other hand, believed Kirigakure still had the power to drive Chizumi out on its own. That was why he rejected the idea of pretending to cooperate and instead wanted to lead the surviving Kirigakure shinobi straight into a suicidal fight against Chizumi.
After hearing Ao's explanation, i felt like her head was splitting apart. It was the classic case of conservatives thinking the reformists were too conservative. The whole story she had made up on the spot was only ant to lower the Kirigakure shinobi's resistance—but what she hadn't expected was that Ao had actually taken it seriously.
Even worse, that fake plan had still been flatly rejected by Ayuri and the conservatives. If they ever found out she intended to act as Kirigakure's "traitor" and hand over everyone who had committed unforgivable cris to Uchiha Chizumi for judgnt, then even Elder Genji's prestige probably wouldn't be enough to protect her.
"Hey! Gonbee—why aren't you staying by Elder Genji's side?" At that mont, one of the jōnin in Ayuri's camp noticed that i hadn't arrived alone. A bad feeling imdiately rose in his chest.
"Shall I announce it now, Lady i?" Gonbee ignored that Kirigakure jōnin completely and instead asked i respectfully for instructions. After receiving her approval, he carefully took the string of prayer beads from inside his robe.
"In Elder Genji's na, I hereby declare his support for Lady i Terumi as the Fifth Mizukage!"
The mont those words fell, the noisy clamor vanished completely. Every single person present stared dumbfounded at the prayer beads in Gonbee's hand. No one had expected Elder Genji—who had always remained above factional politics—to suddenly declare his support for i Terumi becoming Mizukage.
~~~
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