Naruto: Starting with Tsunade

Chapter 380 Questioning: Why Not Reveal Naruto's Identity?

In an instant, everyone's eyes turned to the other person.

Hiashi Hyuga slowly closed his eyes. He naturally understood Aokiji's thoughts and pondered for a moment.

Fine, he also wanted to take this opportunity to ask the Hokage why he agreed to such an impolite and even shameless request from the Hidden Cloud Village.

Having made up his mind, Hiashi nodded, aligning himself with Aokiji on this point.

Aokiji's lips curled up.

Regarding this matter, Aokiji came up with a conspiracy theory.

The reason why Konoha's leadership agreed to Kumogakure's unreasonable demands was not, on the surface, for the sake of village peace, but rather for a much more insidious purpose.

After this meeting ends, Aokiji will personally visit Hiashi to inform him of this conspiracy theory, and then take the opportunity to win over the Hyuga clan and bring them to his side.

Aokiji is determined to take revenge on those four old men.

There are many ways, the simplest being to ignore everything and just go for it head-on.

Although he had the power, doing so would destroy the village and cause internal divisions. Aokiji didn't want Tsunade to be heartbroken and saddened when she was resurrected in the future and saw this scene.

Therefore, Aokiji chose to win over as many allies as possible, which would also be beneficial for subsequent management.

Hiruzen Sarutobi calmly explained, "At that time, Konoha suffered heavy losses during the Nine-Tails' Nightfall, losing both the Fourth Hokage and the Nine-Tails' Jinchuriki, making it far weaker than before. Rest and recuperation were the top priorities at the time. If war were to break out, it would inevitably cause even greater casualties. This action was taken out of necessity."

"Taking a step back will not bring you a brighter future; on the contrary, it will only encourage you to take an inch and then a mile."

Aokiji scoffed, "Besides this matter, I dare ask the Hokage, during the Third Shinobi World War, Konoha clearly won against Iwagakure, so why didn't you press your advantage? Instead, you made concessions and refused war reparations. Didn't you know that this gave the enemy a respite?"

Although Aokiji used respectful words, his tone revealed not a trace of reverence, but rather disdain.

The old story was brought up again, and everyone's eyes fell on Hiruzen Sarutobi, whose actions had caused great controversy in the village back then.

Hiruzen Sarutobi frowned slightly, looking puzzled.

Aokiji has only been back for a short time, how did he come to know so many old stories, and how is it that every single one of them is specifically targeting him?

Did you hear that from Fugaku?

Hiruzen Sarutobi glanced at Fugaku without revealing his thoughts, and calmly replied to the question: "When besieging an enemy, leave an opening; do not press a desperate enemy. Otherwise, the war will develop into an uncontrollable situation."

Aokiji retorted, "This peace is nothing but a false peace. Once Iwagakure catches its breath, it will launch another attack for the same reason. The First and Second Shinobi World Wars are the best examples of this."

"As the saying goes, things shouldn't happen more than three times. Hokage, this is the third time already. Don't you understand?"

Faced with Aokiji's barrage of questions, Hiruzen Sarutobi had no answer.

Soon, one of his trusted confidants, a young man in his early twenties, who was mingling in the crowd, seemed unable to stand it any longer and stood up to act as a shield:

"Lord Aokiji, aren't you being too aggressive with the Hokage? The Hokage had no choice but to do this; he even resigned from his position as Hokage because of it..."

Aokiji said firmly, "It's none of your business for a brat to interrupt when an adult is speaking."

The young Jonin was clearly taken aback when Aokiji suddenly started swearing at him; he was stunned and bewildered by the insult.

Coming to his senses, he looked at Aokiji's mischievous face and cursed under his breath, wondering who the real brat was.

Just as he was about to respond, he suddenly saw a pair of blood-red eyes looking at him, exuding an icy aura. He suddenly felt chilled and his body trembled involuntarily.

"Aokiji, what are you doing?"

Hiruzen Sarutobi couldn't bear to watch any longer, and a hoarse voice squeezed out from his parched throat.

Despite his advanced age, the Hokage, who was in charge of the village, could no longer tolerate this young man's insolence.

The superficial exercises and mutual probing between the two are now history.

Therefore, one side is no longer amiable, and the other side no longer hides its ambition.

"It is precisely because the village adopts this appeasement strategy that all sorts of nobodies and scoundrels come to trample on Konoha."

Facing Hiruzen Sarutobi's angry face, Aokiji ignored it, raised his arm, clenched his fist, and looked down at him arrogantly, saying word by word, "Strength is the most weighty language. What is peace? I can fight when I want to, and I can not fight when I don't want to. That is peace."

Hiruzen Sarutobi used the same tactics he employed against Danzo to suppress Aokiji: "Aokiji, I am the Hokage."

Aokiji scoffed, then suddenly seemed to remember something. The blood-red color in his eyes slowly faded, returning to normal. "Oh, right, Hokage-sama, I've been observing something in the village these past few days that has been puzzling me. Could you explain it to me?"

Aokiji's voice changed, becoming more relaxed and less aggressive than before.

But Hiruzen Sarutobi saw it differently; if he could, he really didn't want to answer that question.

"What's wrong?"

The audience watched silently as the two clashed.

While it appears that the two have a strong disagreement about the current village's policies, in reality, this is Aokiji using this excuse to vent his gloomy emotions and launch an attack on Hiruzen Sarutobi.

Aokiji slowly closed his eyes, his leisurely tone turning somber: "Why hide the identity of the Fourth Hokage's son?"

Hiruzen Sarutobi offered the common explanation: "This was to protect him."

Aokiji chuckled, "I've never seen anyone protect someone by isolating them."

"What are you trying to say?"

"What do you want to say?" Aokiji said, "I don't want to say anything, I'm just telling the truth. Everyone in the village knows that Naruto is the Demon Fox, plus he has the surname Uzumaki, and he has blond hair. I think anyone who pays attention can easily guess that Naruto is the son of the Fourth Hokage and also a Jinchuriki, right?"

"Four years ago, that Raikage ninja was able to evade the Hyuga clan's eyes and ears and accurately locate the main branch's eldest son, which shows that our Konoha's security has been thoroughly compromised."

"Isn't this a joke to protect it?"

"..."

Seeing that Hiruzen Sarutobi remained silent, Aokiji didn't hold back and continued to question him:

"As far as I know, the place where the Nine-Tails was finally sealed was in the suburbs far from the village. At that time, there were only a few people who saw Naruto, so it would have been easy to cover up the news. Then, changing Naruto's surname would have been much safer than taking the current approach, wouldn't it?"

After saying the above, Aokiji also made a bet on Hiruzen Sarutobi's possible next response: "I can come up with this method with just a little thought. I don't think the Hokage, with his intelligence, could possibly not have thought of it."

Hiruzen Sarutobi was somewhat bewildered by Aokiji's series of attacks.

He never expected that Aokiji would use this as a pretext to challenge his authority.

Just as he was thinking about how to respond, Danzo beside him remained silent for a moment before speaking, "After the Nine-Tails' night, the villagers' emotions are very unstable, and they need Naruto to stabilize them from the misfortune that has occurred."

Hiruzen Sarutobi was taken aback.

He looked at Danzo with an idiotic expression.

That look seemed to say, "Do you even know what you're saying?"

Although everyone understands this, it shouldn't be discussed openly.

Some things weigh less than four ounces when not weighed, but once weighed, they can easily weigh a thousand pounds.

By the time Danzo realized he had said the wrong thing, it was too late.

(End of this chapter)