Jiraiya descended from the sky, landing heavily before Uchiha Yuan. He scratched the back of his head with a look of mild annoyance.
"Aiyaa… kids these days really have guts, huh? You've gone and made Gamabunta really mad this time," he sighed.
After giving Yuan a quick once-over, Jiraiya's expression suddenly grew serious. "Listen, brat—remember this. From now on, you are never to eat frogs again. If you do, I'll be very, very angry."
With that warning, he vanished with a Body Flicker.
The battle had left Konoha's camp in ruins. Under the Cloud ninja's surprise assault, they'd suffered heavy casualties.
Though the fighting had ended, Jiraiya still had to handle the aftermath—tending to the wounded, re-establishing the camp's defenses, and redeploying his forces.
"Really, we owe you and your squad a great debt," said a voice as a Konoha ninja landed beside Yuan. "If your reinforcements hadn't arrived when they did, we might've been completely overrun by the Cloud's surprise attack."
Yuan turned toward the speaker—a bearded man smiling warmly at him.
Seeing Yuan's glance, the man grinned. "I'm Sarutobi Shinnosuke, captain of the Third Division."
The name made Yuan pause. A moment later, he realized—this was none other than the eldest son of the Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen.
"Uchiha Yuan, captain of First Squad, Support Unit," Yuan introduced himself calmly.
"Captain Yuan," said Shinnosuke, his tone turning grave, "you'd best be careful on the battlefield from now on. I suspect the Fourth Raikage already has his eye on you."
"I understand," Yuan replied evenly. "Thank you for the warning, Captain Shinnosuke."
Shinnosuke frowned slightly. "Don't take it lightly. The Fourth Raikage is a monster—practically a tailed beast in human form. If you ever encounter him, don't even think about fighting. Just run. You can't win against him."
Yuan's stern face softened slightly. "I understand. Thank you, Captain Shinnosuke."
That night, a crescent moon hung high in the sky.
The shattered ground had been leveled once again by earth-style ninjutsu, and Konoha's camp was rebuilt atop the flattened terrain.
Inside, the atmosphere was still chaotic—the groans of the wounded mixed with angry curses directed toward the Cloud shinobi.
In the command tent at the camp's center, every squad captain and higher-ranked officer had gathered. Jiraiya, supreme commander of the Cloud front, presided over the war council.
There, he announced the casualty reports and the new restructuring of the army.
Yuan's Support Unit had not been disbanded but reorganized as the Fourth Division.
During the meeting, Yuan finally understood just how carefully this Cloud ambush had been planned.
Compared to the Sand front, the situation here was far more complex—a three-way struggle among Konoha, the Cloud, and the Stone. Each village was fighting on two fronts simultaneously.
Here, on the main battlefield in the Land of Hot Springs, Konoha's forces were facing the Cloud army led personally by the Fourth Raikage.
By his side was another top-tier powerhouse—the Eight-Tails' jinchūriki, Killer B, known as the "Man-Killer Bee."
Earlier that day, the Cloud forces had launched a massive frontal assault. The Eight-Tails had even transformed partially, forcing Jiraiya and the other elite fighters to engage directly.
What no one had expected, however, was that the Cloud would pull their other high-level asset—the Two-Tails' jinchūriki—from the Stone front to strike at Konoha's main camp.
Had the Support Unit not arrived when it did, Cloud's ambush might have completely crushed Konoha's position in this theater.
Later that evening, Jiraiya received confirmation from the Konoha base fighting Iwagakure: the Cloud forces on that front had been unusually quiet for days, launching only small-scale harassment raids. The pattern revealed the Cloud's entire strategy—the ambush had been planned long in advance.
The Cloud's goal was to shatter the current three-way stalemate by destroying one of the three armies—Konoha's.
As to why they'd chosen Konoha, the reasoning was clear: Konoha currently had no tailed beasts or jinchūriki to counter the Cloud's.
Ordinarily, the only thing that could contend with a tailed beast was another tailed beast.
Even with Gamabunta's aid, Jiraiya had struggled to face the Eight-Tails' jinchūriki in full power.
Had it not been for the assistance of elite jonin such as Sarutobi Shinnosuke, the battle might have gone far worse—they'd barely managed to fight to a draw.
Even so, they'd been utterly battered by a single Tailed Beast Bomb from the Eight-Tails.
It was close to midnight when the meeting finally concluded.
Before dismissing everyone, Jiraiya looked around the tent. "Does anyone have anything else to add?"
Uchiha Yuan raised his hand slightly.
"Uchiha Yuan," said Jiraiya, turning toward him, "what is it you want to say?"
At once, all eyes in the tent turned toward the young Uchiha.
Those gazes were varied—some curious, some evaluating, others openly mocking or disdainful.
Every person present was a jonin-level captain, a key officer within Konoha's military.
Yuan was by far the youngest among them. But no one was particularly shocked—a ten-year-old jonin wasn't unheard of in Konoha.
After all, prodigies were everywhere.
Kakashi had graduated from the academy at five, became a chunin at six, and a jonin by twelve. He was now already leading a Konoha squad on the Stone front.
More recently, another Uchiha genius, Shisui, had begun making a name for himself on that same front—his lightning-fast Body Flicker had already claimed several Iwa jonin.
Information flowed between the camps, so everyone here knew: besides Shisui, yet another Uchiha prodigy had recently emerged.
Uchiha Itachi—eldest son of Clan Head Uchiha Fugaku—had been granted early graduation on his very first day at the academy, and reports said he was performing brilliantly on the Mist front, repelling multiple enemy assaults.
So, no—no one was surprised that Uchiha Yuan was a jonin.
What they did take issue with was the fact that he'd been placed in command of an entire unit.
Becoming a field commander required more than strength—it demanded experience.
And that was something Yuan, a rookie fresh from the academy, did not have.
Everyone knew, of course, that his appointment came through the personal trust of Orochimaru. Out of respect for one of the Legendary Sannin, no one dared question it openly. Still, there was an unspoken air of exclusion and condescension toward the young Uchiha.
Yuan met their gazes coldly—some filled with scorn, some with outright hostility. His face remained expressionless, proud.
"I believe," he said evenly, "that we should immediately pursue the retreating Cloud forces."
"Hmph."
A sharp snort cut him off.
A burly middle-aged jonin with a face full of scars glared at him impatiently. "I thought the little Uchiha might actually have something useful to say—but it turns out to be this foolish nonsense."
"Pursue the Cloud ninja? Did you not hear what Lord Jiraiya just said? One-third of our forces are wounded, and ten percent are dead!"
"With numbers like that, how exactly do you propose we 'pursue' anyone? What we need right now is to fortify our defenses and give our men time to recover."
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