~Soutarou POV~
Naori's shoulders eased. Tsunade studied him for a long moment, then ruffled his hair roughly. Though it was more like a scolding older sister than anything, but there was also a hit of something before she whispered into his ear softly with a grin, "Good boy. Now move."
Soutarou's eyes lit up slightly, but he feigned a scowl and thought, 'This woman! She's making it sound like she would be on top! Damn you!'
[*Ding!* …As expected of you.]
[*Jingle~* … Your choices never change…~]
[*Boop!* … Is this what they call a tsundere…?]
Soutarou's gaze darkened and he hatefully stared at the slightly different blue screens appearing in his vision. Naori watched Soutarou carefully and out of nowhere pulled out a notebook from seemingly her boobs and jotted down,
Soutarou didn't notice, but the system sure did.
[*Ding!* Where did that notebook come from?]
[*Jingle~* Such a dangerous and intelligent threat…]
[*Boop!* Bravo Naori-chan!]
[*Jingle~* Heh. Of course you wouldn't know, Manager.]
[*Boop!* Heh. As expected of you Manager.]
[*Ding!* …]
Soutarou glanced back in confusion, before he understood, 'Is the manager… Flat-?'
[*Ding!* Warning Issued! The user is not to think malicious thoughts about the System Manager!]
Soutarou whistled before Tsunade stared at Soutarou and he looked a bit confused, and she said, "What are you standing there cluelessly for? Move it!"
Soutarou grumbled and thought, 'Does the system really think I like force? Of course I don't! I want to be in control! Yes indeed. After all, women are truly scary when they're the ones in control. Just look at what Hinata did in the Genjutsu! Nope. Nope. Though maybe we can switch around if I love them enough and they respect my boundaries…'
[*Jingle~* … Warning Issued! The user should not be delusional and compare real life and mere genjutsu that the inherently evil Uchiha make.]
[*Jingle~* It's propaganda. I believe this Hinata to be quite a respectable person.]
[*Boop!* Reward Issued! The user should continue to be wary of evil Hyuga women!
Reward: Chidori Series Jutsu and Lightning Chakra Mode.]
Soutarou stared with confusion at the Y/N panel infront of him and shrugged clicking accept
'Don't mind if I do…~ Still... Ah how I miss the good old days when the system was so simple. You guys have fun fighting each other I'm going…'
[*Ding!* I also miss those days, host. Good luck.]
[*Jingle~* Be safe.]
[*Boop!* Have fun.]
Soutarou thought all of this and read the system prompts one by one as he stuffed his ninja pouches with tools, premade seals, and special made chakra pills that Mito had in reserve for herself and him. Meanwhile Naori and Tsunade were already ready in standard ANBU gear with each holding a mask.
Making Soutarou's face become questioning. Tsunade sighed and said, "What were you planning on using a massive Wood Human or were you planning on using Susanno to storm the walls?"
Soutarou slowly nodded and Tsunade's face turned increasingly annoyed and she said, "You think so much, and you get lost in your thoughts pretty often, but you didn't think about the repercussions of that? Worse didn't you say you wouldn't kill civilians?"
Soutarou's face turned confused and Naori sighed and said, "Soutarou… Iwagakure has a massive barrier and it's one of the strongest out of all barriers after Konoha's own barrier. Meaning they could just turtle up and then the whole world knows Konoha just tried to completely destroy Iwagakure. Which might be seen as an affront to the Earth Daimyo and all of a sudden we're told to retreat from Iwagakure by the Fire Daimyo to maintain the status quo of Daimyo power."
Soutarou thought for a moment before nodding and sighing and saying, "Which fool put those incompetent idiots in power in the first place."
Tsunade looked awkwardly and said, "Technically Naori is right… But the Fire Daimyo is my Second Uncle so I doubt there'll be an issue. The Fire Nobility is largely made up of Senju descendants and the inner court is just the Senju Branch which had been renamed to hide it… Second, Grandpa did it to protect the Senju in the worst case scenario… Though honestly none of them train, so whether they can truly be considered Senju or not is questionable. But the fact remains that the Fire Daimyo will back Konoha under most circumstances."
Soutarou raised an eyebrow and said, "I see… Then let's get to it."
Naori tossed Soutarou a mask which he slipped on to his face and the trio flickered out of the tented barracks that they resupplied and geared up at.
Soutarou asked as the trio moved at extremely high speeds, "If Iwagakure has a barrier how are we going to get around it?"
Naori quietly answered, "It's easy. Iwagakure still doesn't know anything has happened nor have we retracted our peace negotiators, yet. So we break through the gaps in the not yet fully activated barrier system that Iwa has in place."
Tsunade added on, "Not only that… We're going in disguised as Kumo ninja-"
Soutaoru's eyes lit up and he said, "Is that so..? Then I guess this'll be pretty useful."
Lightning lit up across Soutarou's body in dazzling fashion. Tsunade's eyes and Naori's eyes turned confused. Tsunade just clutched her head before saying, "When did you learn Lightning Chakra Mode?!?"
Soutarou scratched his chin and acted like he'd just figured it out saying, "Just a few minutes ago."
Naori deadpanned and Tsunade simply said, "Take the lead transform into a Kumo Shinobi."
Soutarou instantly had a puff of white smoke wash over him as he transformed into a tall dark skinned man and said in a gruff voice, "Let's move."
Tsunade glanced over at Soutarou and raised an eyebrow and said, "This is the Raikage's son?"
Soutarou flashed her a grin and said, "Maybe."
Tsunade began to say something before Soutarou suddenly said, "Tsunade-nee, Naori-nee, what if instead of dealing with their shinobi we instead turn them against Kumo?"
Naori instantly caught on and said, "You want to blame the killing of Onoki on Kumogakure?"
Soutarou smiled deeper and said, "Not only that, we need to steal secrets and forcefully send them to Kumogakure. Ideally through our channels in the ROOT so the information "naturally" reaches Kumo around the same time we make our accusations, along with a proper dignity breaking attack of Iwa's sacred grounds and their Tsuchikage Office."
Tsunade furrowed her brows and said, "That's… Dirty…."
Soutarou smiled and said, "The main thing is neither of you want me to get my hands too dirty isn't it? Then someone else has to… Why not use our enemies themselves?"
Naori smiled a bit and said, "It's worth a shot, if nothing else the remnants of Iwa will have a narrative to follow."
Tsunade tapped her chin in contemplation as the trio stopped and hid to discuss their plan. Tsunade sighed and said, "We should have thought about this before we left-"
Soutarou scratched his chin in thought and said, "Let's go thinking too much now will hurt our chances, the longer we wait the more chances are that Iwa will catch a whiff of our intentions and realize Onoki is dead."
Tsunade sighed and said, "Alright."
The trio nodded to one another before Soutarou showed Tsunade who to transform into and showed Naori her transformation target as well.
Tsunade raised an eyebrow and said, "Is this really a Kumogakure Shinobi? This just seems like a worse version of me… Blonde… Bi-... I mean brown eyes and this horrendous bob cut."
Soutarou said, "Hey! She's pretty-"
Soutarou felt a chill run down his spine as Naori, now disguised as a silver haired, light brown skinned woman, said, "Say that again Soutarou."
Soutarou coughed into his fist and said, "Ehem I meant she's conventionally attractive exactly because she looks similar to Tsunade-nee."
Naori's eyes narrowed and she said, "We need code names, what should we go with?"
Soutarou scratched his chin and said, "Just call me Ai, that's the name of the raikage's son, we'll go with Mabui and Samui for you two."
Naori nodded and Tsunade shrugged before both of them pulled out Kumo headbands. Just as Soutarou reached into his Ninja pouch he muttered, "Ah… I forgot to bring a disguise headband…"
Naori sighed and Soutarou then said, "I guess it's fine… I mean in the eyes of Iwa if I'm not from Kumogakure and I used Lightning Chakra Mode it would be more believable that Danzo was actually a good guy."
Tsunade glanced over and had a question mark on her face while Naori nodded and said, "Inherently evil Shimura!"
Soutarou and Tsunade looked back at Naori thinking, '
Soutarou shook his head and said, "Anyways… Like I was saying… let's not waste anymore time shall we?"
~Narration~
Travelling at extreme break neck speeds through the edge of the Land of Grass border with the Land of Earth the trio made their way towards Iwagakure with one objective. To throw the Four Great Shinobi Village Alliance into disarray.
~Soutarou POV, sunset~
Soutarou sighed deeply as the trio halted for the night, deciding to begin their assault early in the morning as they were still a bit aways from Iwagakure. Soutarou thought, 'We're still a bit away from Iwa… But an attack in the morning, early morning is the best. We'll be able to deal with targets rapidly and silently and cause chaos amongst the Iwa ranks…'
'Still why am I getting this feeling…?'
Soutarou's brows furrowed and as the trio set turns for watch. Soutarou unfurled his sleeping bag and set it down next to Tsunade who was on watch saying, "Wake me up if my pulse starts going up."
Tsunade raised a brow and then furrowed her brows and gently nodded, intertwining her fingers with Soutarou's as if to reassure him. As Soutarou closed his eyes, he once more found himself in an endless black sea. Except…
Except this time there were no ringing voices, no demented future or inverse versions of him whispering in his ears. Just black. Endless rippling black.
'No it's more like an extremely deep purple… There's still a slight tint… It's… Raven…?'
Soutarou glanced around to no avail, he called out for no voice to ring out, not even his own. He didn't panic and instead sat down on the gently rippling water taking a meditative position and closed his eyes trying to understand what this space was.
As he did, he came to one conclusion… It was tied to his sharingan somehow?
'The sharingan… The eyes to or of the soul… A reflection of it… The concept is quite similar to how a Shinigami from the next door series' Zanpakuto is a reflection of their inner self… So then what is this space… It's like an extension of my mental plan formed from Yin Energy…?'
'Hmm… Then what were those beings… It said it was my greed? My lust? My corruption? Is it a manifestation of my Yin energy? Is the part of me I'm rejecting? Or is it something else? Is it something Kiyome modified? Has my spirituality been changed?'
'So many whys… Why… Why…'
Soutarou sighed a deep breath out and calmed himself and quickly came to a conclusion, 'This thing is affecting me no matter what… So I must remain calm… Remain restrained… and most importantly I must remain careful.'
Soutarou forcefully broke himself out of the mental plan by waking himself up and riling his chakra and his sharingan.
'For now… I just need to focus on one thing… Iwagakure's Collapse. Everything else comes later.'
Soutarou's now awake eyes glinted and Tsunade glanced at him and tried to urge him to go back to sleep which he finally did reluctantly, this time sleeping much better. Though he didn't notice a small voice that whispered…
{... Did you think I'd have to show up…? Whether or not I say anything… We will always make the right choice… So ravage Iwa… Swim its blood… Let corruption take you.}
[User has been afflicted with ርዐዪዪ፱የፕጎዐክ. System message has been redacted.]