The courtyard of the Daiji Clan buzzed with life as their shinobi cheered, faces bright with relief and greed. Raizen watched the chaos with his usual deadpan expression and gave a single nod. The spoils of the Kaguya clan had finally been distributed.
Most of the lesser clans got their share—on paper, at least. But Raizen knew the truth. What the Amamiya kept for themselves was worth several times more than what they'd handed out. The final victor of this war wasn't the coalition. It was them.
The Amamiya clan had devoured the Kaguya's entire economy in one clean strike. The forges, trade routes, and land titles—all absorbed like chakra into a hungry seal. Everything they'd lost in the last war would be restored and multiplied. For the first time in years, the clan's future wasn't just survival. It was dominance.
Once the division of spoils was done, Raizen issued new orders.
Every Kaguya property was to be seized immediately. No delays, no "oversight committees." The allied clans followed suit, sending squads to secure every outpost, mill, and mine once marked with the Kaguya crest.
A few stubborn Kaguya stragglers still clung to their posts in Zhonghai, guarding warehouses like ghosts who didn't realize they were already dead. The Amamiya and their allies swept through them with surgical efficiency.
Within days, every last Kaguya banner had fallen.
News of their annihilation spread across the Fire Country like wildfire, reaching even the borders of Lightning and Wind. The reactions were predictable: disbelief, outrage, and fascination.
The Kaguya clan? Destroyed?
By the Amamiya? Those nobodies from the north?
When did they get strong enough to challenge a great clan?
The world didn't have an answer. But the Amamiya's name was now carved into the history of the Warring States.
A boy barely twelve years old had taken a forgotten clan and turned it into a rising power. Raizen's legend—once dismissed as rumor—was becoming something every clan elder whispered about behind closed doors.
The coalition disbanded shortly after victory. The Katori clan, after long discussion, decided to relocate near the Amamiya lands, deep within the Shirohaku Forest. They saw what Raizen had built and knew where the wind was blowing.
Back in the Amamiya compound, celebration erupted. Lanterns burned bright across the night sky. Shinobi and civilians alike drank, laughed, and toasted Raizen's name. For the first time in their clan's history, no one could call them weak.
The Daiji clan, though they hadn't done much fighting, celebrated too. Raizen had gifted them generous shares of captured industries—symbolic, maybe, but enough to rebuild what they'd lost years before. Their patriarch wept when the documents were handed over.
Meanwhile, not everyone shared the joy.
The Hanabira clan—the ones who didn't join the alliance—sat in silence, their compound eerily quiet while fireworks echoed from neighboring villages. Their shinobi watched the festivities with resentment. They could have shared the glory, but their leader had hesitated. Now, they were outsiders in a new order.
Weeks passed. The Fire Country calmed.
Six clans—Amamiya, Daiji, Katori, Morishita, Mizushiro, and Hanabira—now lived under one loose alliance. The once-silent forest became a thriving settlement of more than ten thousand souls. Markets reopened. Blacksmiths sang over molten steel. The Amamiya Ninja Academy expanded again, now overflowing with children from all six clans.
The kids quarreled at first, then trained together, fought together, and slowly became friends. And just like that, the adults started lowering their guards too. The thing Raizen had dreamed of—a united alliance born from survival—was beginning to take shape.
One month after the fall of the Kaguya, the Warring States quieted. Even the great titans—Senju and Uchiha—entered a rare truce. For the first time in years, there was silence between the thunderclaps.
Then came the news.
Senju Butsuma's eldest son, Senju Hashirama, would formally inherit the title of clan head. The same for Uchiha Madara, son of Uchiha Tajima.
Raizen blinked at the report, then scoffed. "They're just now becoming patriarchs? Thought that already happened."
It turned out both had been acting leaders during wartime but hadn't held their official inauguration ceremonies—something like a feudal crowning. The wars had delayed it. Now that peace had temporarily settled, the two heirs would be formally recognized.
Raizen sent polite letters of congratulations—because diplomacy was a cheap investment—and went back to his paperwork.
He wasn't the awestruck outsider he used to be, the one who trembled hearing names like Hashirama and Madara. Power had changed his perspective.
He no longer waited for those "main characters" to shape the world.
He was doing it himself.
Every new alliance, every reclaimed territory—each was a step toward ending the Warring States on his own terms. The Amamiya would not be a footnote in someone else's legend.
Half a month later, the clan had fully recovered and begun absorbing smaller families. Their population and army doubled, their influence spread, and before anyone realized it…
The once "minor" Amamiya clan had become one of the great powers of the era.