Danzo offering the Eight Trigrams Sealing Style (Hakke no Fuin Shiki) as a gift was definitely a calculated move to ensure a "good conclusion" to this whole incident.
As for the meeting request, it was nothing more than an excuse to get their stories straight.
Gisei thought about it for a moment and felt that it would be rude not to reciprocate. Manners are important, after all. He should prepare a gift for Danzo as well.
But what should he send?
Ninjutsu? No, ordinary ninjutsu wouldn't be presentable enough.
Secret techniques? He couldn't possibly hand over his own clan's secrets.
Forbidden techniques? Danzo certainly didn't lack those.
Speaking of which, when Danzo fought him, he never once used his right eye. If he already possessed a Sharingan, he wouldn't have kept it covered. Not using it meant that eye was still blind.
Give him an eye?
Hmm... Gisei felt that the one-eyed look suited Danzo better.
So, what exactly did Danzo lack?
Gisei frowned and pondered. After thinking for a long time, he finally had an idea.
Danzo had just lost a large number of his subordinates—thanks to Gisei killing them—so why not just send him some replacements?
Of course, Gisei couldn't possibly send his own clansmen for Danzo to ruin.
Didn't those clan heads keep trying to persuade him to reconcile with Danzo? Perfect. Let's use their clansmen as the meeting gift.
Presumably, Danzo wouldn't be dissatisfied with such a generous offering.
Before dawn, Gisei arrived at the agreed meeting place.
In a quiet forest just outside the village, Danzo walked out of the shadows shortly after Gisei appeared.
"Lord Danzo, I am very satisfied with your gift."
"Is that so? It's good that you're satisfied."
"Then what is the meaning of Lord Danzo asking to meet me?"
"Regarding this incident... after Hiruzen and I investigated, we found that Rain Ninja spies were making trouble in the dark."
Rain Ninja?
Gisei showed a meaningful look. "So that's how it is. I presume Lord Danzo must have already caught those who were making trouble."
"Of course. There is a meeting at the Administration Department at nine o'clock to give a formal account of this incident."
After Danzo finished speaking, he turned to leave, but Gisei stopped him.
"Lord Danzo, I have also prepared some gifts for you, hoping to eliminate any grudge between us."
Danzo stopped and turned back, staring at Gisei without saying a word.
Gisei said with a harmless smile, "In this conflict, I killed quite a few of Lord Danzo's subordinates. I felt a bit guilty about that, so I wanted to give Lord Danzo some manpower to make up for it."
Give me manpower?
Danzo looked at Gisei with uncertainty. After a long pause, he revealed a rare, somewhat kind smile.
"In that case, I will gladly accept it."
Danzo left an address and disappeared back into the shadows.
With a poof, Gisei released the Summoning Technique (Kuchiyose no Jutsu).
Naturally, he couldn't come to meet Danzo in his true body. With a person like Danzo, one could never be too careful. He didn't want to be the ship that capsized in the gutter because he got careless.
At eight o'clock in the morning, after Gisei had finished breakfast, an Anbu arrived to invite him to the meeting.
Arriving at the conference room and taking the first seat on the left, Gisei immediately sensed that the atmosphere was off.
Every ninja clan head belonging to the Third's faction looked at him with somewhat unkind eyes.
Gisei was stunned for a moment, then realized what was going on.
Most of Danzo's subordinates—the ones Gisei had slaughtered—were ninjas from these very clans. He had killed their people, so it would be strange if they didn't give him the evil eye.
Not long after, the four high-ranking officials also arrived.
After the Third Hokage sat down at the head of the table, he glanced at Gisei and began to speak.
"I presume everyone has some understanding of last night's incident, so I won't say much more."
The Third glanced at Danzo, and Danzo tactfully took over. "The incident last night was very strange. After my investigation, I found that Rain Ninja spies were causing trouble in the dark."
Danzo's blame-shifting was quite outrageous. To claim that a few spies could almost plunge Konoha into a civil war was simply laughable.
Of course, even knowing that Danzo was lying through his teeth, no one would expose him. This is politics.
As part of Konoha, they naturally had to safeguard the village's interests. As long as there was a passable reason, they had an excuse to explain things to the villagers.
But would Gisei accept this reason?
Everyone turned to look at the other protagonist of the incident.
Gisei scratched his head, pretending to be innocent. "Last night, someone passed me intelligence telling me to meet there. What happened next is just as you all know."
The Third asked at exactly the right moment, "Was the person who passed you the intelligence named Shinobu?"
Gisei looked thoughtful. "I don't know. The person used the Transformation Technique (Henge no Jutsu)."
The Third nodded and concluded, "The person has been caught, and this matter can be considered resolved. Everyone should know what to do; I don't need to say more."
After saying a few more empty, nutritious words, the meeting perfectly covered up the entire incident.
Gisei didn't stay idle after returning home. He immediately began sending messages to the various ninja clans.
He asked each of their clans to prepare five people to serve as Danzo's subordinates in Root.
Of course, Gisei did some tampering with these people beforehand.
Danzo definitely wouldn't trust them and would likely use cursed seals to forcibly bind them. It didn't matter. Under the surveillance of his butterfly species, he could gather intelligence on Danzo without anyone ever opening their mouths.
After finishing these tasks, Gisei became completely idle.
Regarding Orochimaru... before Gisei had time to ask, Orochimaru had already left the village to report to the formal troops. He could only wait until they met in the future to talk about it.
Konoha returned to its former peace, and Gisei didn't plan to cause any more trouble.
He retreated to the research lab beneath the clan grounds and began to work on his Star-Sucking Great Art in peace.
With the sealing technique given by Danzo, he now had a clear idea of how to design the formula for the jutsu. The rest was just a matter of time.
...
Two years later.
Restlessness stirred once again in Konoha, which had been calm for a long time.
The reason was the destruction of the Land of Whirlpools. A girl named Kushina Uzumaki was brought to Konoha.
Rie reported this news to Gisei in the underground research lab.
Gisei didn't say a word about it. The destruction of the Land of Whirlpools was a canon event, something that happened in the plot, and he didn't plan to interfere.
Anyway, it was none of his business.
Gisei had sent out a large number of intelligence personnel over the past two years, not only to help him collect information but also to capture experimental subjects.
Of course, intelligence was the top priority.
He had not only planted agents in the Five Great Ninja Villages but also sent quite a few people to various smaller villages.
The reason for this was naturally for his grand plan.
He didn't want the Ninja World War to end early.
Danzo had been causing trouble like crazy outside the village for the past two years. Not only in the Land of Rain, but according to Gisei's intelligence, Danzo was stirring up disputes in all the ninja villages surrounding Konoha.
Forced by Konoha's overwhelming strength, those small ninja villages dared to be angry but dared not speak out.
Seeing this situation, Danzo jumped around even more happily.
He now not only had the support of the Third's faction, but Gisei had also started cooperating with him.
Danzo provided the money, Gisei provided the people, and the village's policies also favored the Butterfly Users greatly.
In just two years, the number of his clansmen had already reached nearly five hundred.
This number wasn't from newborns, but rather from the Takenaka family beginning to intermarry with the Butterfly Users.
Of course, all of this was carried out under the specific instructions of Gisei and Anna Takenaka.
In short, the expansion of power was going smoothly.