CHAPTER 355: CHAPTER 251 : AMEGAKURE IN CRISIS??

"Has Amegakure’s financial situation really gotten this bad? You’re even willing to sell something like this?"

Kakuzu was once again in Konoha to settle accounts and conduct a trade deal. This time, to everyone’s surprise, Nagato had personally left the Rain Village and come along.

Kagetsu stared at the item Amegakure had brought for trade. He was silent for a moment as he looked at Nagato, who stood stiffly and silently, and Kakuzu, whose expression was as dead as ever.

With visible confusion, he asked his question.

It was a black rod—about twenty centimeters long, about as thick as a thumb, with a sharp, pointed end.

It looked ordinary enough, but the moment Kagetsu held it, he clearly felt his chakra being affected.

This wasn’t the first time he had seen one of these black rods.

What shocked him was that Nagato was actually trying to sell them as trade goods.

"Haven’t you always been interested in the products of Yin-Yang Release?" Nagato rubbed his head awkwardly, his voice lacking confidence. "I can supply them in large quantities."

"What’s going on here?" Kagetsu ignored Nagato and turned to Kakuzu for answers.

"They overreached. Now the whole thing’s about to collapse," Kakuzu said bluntly.

"Explain. What have you people been doing? Sure, it’s not wartime, and yeah, there’s competition from Kumogakure, but the Healing Tag sales were doing fine, weren’t they? How did it get this bad?" Kagetsu asked, bewildered.

He knew how much Amegakure had profited from selling Healing Tags.

Most of that money had been spent on essentials from the Land of Fire—food, equipment, books, and other supplies.

Combined with the money Kakuzu had ’collected’ from the Land of Rain, it should’ve been more than enough to keep the village running.

Even he had heard rumors of the things Kakuzu did to gather funds.

"If those brats hadn’t gone overboard, I wouldn’t have been forced to target the nobles," Kakuzu grumbled, then launched into a list of Amegakure’s current expenses.

From the way the funds were being drained, their spending was now nearly on par with that of the major villages in the Five Great Nations.

Even the village’s financial expenses had exceeded those of Sunagakure before the Ryūmyaku vein Project.

It was simply outrageous!

Even the Kage from the other Great Ninja Villages, upon learning what Amegakure was attempting, were shocked by their boldness—while also laughing at their overconfidence.

Medical care, technology, education—three money-burning departments—and yet Amegakure had managed to build a working foundation for all three from scratch.

The first batch of carefully selected genin, trained under a formal ninja education system, were even about to graduate.

Although Amegakure had faced some suppression and subtle exclusion in recent years, with Konoha’s backing, their development had not been significantly hindered.

It was Yahiko’s first time serving as a Kage, and with his lack of experience, managing and planning a ninja village turned out to be far more complicated—and far more difficult—than running the Akatsuki.

Faced with three passionate youths who wanted everything and kept spending money to boost the strength of the Ame-nin, Kakuzu’s only option was to do everything in his power to keep the finances from collapsing.

When necessary, he even had to rob Peter to pay Paul.

After all, they had already come this far.

No matter how reluctant they were, they had no choice but to keep going. Otherwise, all their previous investments would have gone to waste.

When the village’s finances reached the brink of collapse—even Kakuzu, who was famous for his money-making skills—started to panic.

That finally snapped the three young leaders out of their feverish urge to buy and build.

Now, staring at the possibility of Amegakure becoming the first Great Ninja Village to go bankrupt thanks to its own leadership, the three of them were completely dumbfounded.

Konan considered producing more Healing Tags to sell, but those were only consumed in large quantities during wartime.

Right now, all the Great Ninja Villages were in a period of peace and recovery.

Even those who bought Healing Tags did so just like they did with explosive tags—on a scheduled basis.

Some were distributed to village ninjas, while the rest were stored as reserves for future wars.

It was a stable, long-term business, but not one that would see a sudden surge in demand during peaceful times.

If not for the fact that the safety of Amegakure still relied on the Rinnegan, Nagato would’ve sold those eyes a long time ago.

At the very least, Orochimaru and Kagetsu would’ve paid a price he’d be satisfied with.

Since he couldn’t sell the Rinnegan, Nagato looked through everything he had and realized that the only things that might interest Konoha—or more specifically, Orochimaru and Kagetsu, those two rich lunatics—were the unique abilities and creations granted by the Rinnegan.

Like Yin-Yang Release...

"Apologies. These black rods are indeed useful," Kagetsu said sincerely, "but we already have a whole set of alternatives. Even if we were to buy them, we wouldn’t need that many. That amount of money, while significant, would be nothing more than a drop in the bucket compared to a village’s overall expenses."

Nagato’s face turned pale after hearing this.

Kakuzu looked a little disappointed too, but he wasn’t surprised.

After all, he had worked with Kagetsu multiple times and knew just how stingy he could be when it came to money.

Kagetsu was a generous partner and a reliable one, but that didn’t mean he would sacrifice his own interests without a good reason.

If he ever handed you a piece of candy for no reason, you could bet there was something wrong with it.

Take his Modified Earth Grudge Fear technique, for example...

In the past, when one of his hearts was destroyed, all he had to do was find a strong shinobi, rip out their heart, and let Earth Grudge Fear absorb it.

Now, if he wanted to replace a lost heart, he had to purchase a custom-made Kekkei Genkai heart from Kagetsu.

The good part? He became even stronger!

The bad part? His life was now in someone else’s hands.

"But you can take on mercenary missions as shinobi. Konoha has spread itself a bit thin recently, and after the war, we’re short on manpower. The ninja of Amegakure are still quite capable."

Nagato had originally thought they would return empty-handed this time. He was already dreading how he would face Yahiko and Konan. But unexpectedly, the situation had taken a turn for the better.

In that moment, his trust and appreciation for Kagetsu soared once again.

He felt like Kagetsu was their group’s lucky star!

Every time they ran into a problem they couldn’t solve with their own strength, they’d come to Kagetsu—and Kagetsu always had a way to help them out.

It was like that with Yahiko’s health, like that when it came to settling in Amegakure, and now it was happening again.

"Are we going to war with other shinobi villages?" Nagato’s expression lit up for a moment but quickly turned stiff.

Under Yahiko’s leadership, Amegakure had almost completely avoided starting any conflicts with other nations.

If a major battle really did break out in the Land of Rain or nearby areas, he might even have to personally step in and force a ceasefire.

Their main goal was to maintain peace!

In that kind of situation, if someone tried to hire Amegakure shinobi to go to war against other villages, Yahiko would absolutely never agree.

"Don’t worry, it’s not a war," Kagetsu said, trying to reassure Nagato.

"Konoha discovered a chakra mine in the Land of Rivers. If you’re willing, the job is simply to protect the mine. But let me be clear—other great ninja villages could get involved at any moment. There will be casualties."

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