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Tonan put down the teacup to spread out the scroll and made hand signs to undo the seal.

Bang!

After a smoke cloud dissipated, more than a dozen boxes appeared in the open space in front of them. Tonan asked Ao to open each of them. The boxes were filled with either gold, silver, and jewelry, or antiques and land deeds. Expectedly, there was also cash and banknotes. This was Shimokawara Shota’s savings over the years.

Tonan nodded with satisfaction, “Are these all his assets?”

Ao quickly took out an account book and handed it over with a bow, “Yes, this is the account book. You can please check it.”

Tonan took the account book and examined it for a while.

“This guy’s total assets are worth about 200 million Ryo! It’s enough to buy the land for the welfare institution. This trip was worthwhile. That Shota character really… died well.”

“A mere vice-captain can accumulate almost 200 million in savings. Fire Capital deserves to be called Ninja World’s most prosperous city. Just the entry and exit tariff paid by the caravans should be astronomical. Deducting a bit of profit is enough to cover an A-ranked mission.”

Suddenly, Tonan inquired, “What about his family?”

Ao replied while pouring tea, “He has seven directly-related family members including both young and old. I’ve arrested and detained them under the North City Guard’s temporary custody.”

Tonan nodded. He was satisfied with this newly acquired subordinate, who matched a bit of his own style. “Keep them for now, and send one corpse plus five million Ryo to the Supervision Minister Residence every month.”

Ao nodded and asked lightly, “Do we need to write a report?”

Tonan shook his head with a smile, “Masaki-sama will write it for us. This is his political achievement. Oh yes, from now on, you’ll manage the North City Guard for me. Smuggling, tax fraud, bribing, and what was collected earlier should all be continued. We must not break rules, lest the other three City Guard guardian lords feel uneasy.”

Ao was overjoyed, and respectfully replied, “I understand.”

Tonan picked up his teacup, and lightly asked as he took a sip, “By the way, if asked, who instructed you to do these things?”

Ao’s eyes flashed with a smile, “Tonan-sama was busy with training. The others and I deceived you to embezzle money, it was our arbitrary action.”

Tonan chuckled and waved his hand, “Withdraw.”

……

Three months later, Tonan had completely consolidated his position in the Fire Capital. Every month, North City Guard would give him a grey income of almost 20 million Ryo. Five million Ryo from this was used to pay a tribute to the Supervision Minister.

The past North City Guard captains paid a tribute to the Guardian Residence chief too, hoping to gain a chance at promotion. But Tonan was here just for a mission. Regardless of how well he did, he wouldn’t get promoted.

Even if he made a mistake, only his nominal employer, the Daimyo, was qualified to dismiss him.

The Guardian Residence chief couldn’t control him. Only if someone reported him to the Supervision Minister, and then he reported it to the Daimyo, was it possible to shake Tonan from his position.

In that case, too, the result was just a failed mission, and he would be sent back to the village. Tonan, hence, didn’t bother to appease the Guardian Residence and instead directly pulled the Supervision Minister into his camp.

Of the remaining 15 million Ryo, Tonan distributed about two million to his subordinates. Being a boss, one must know how to win people’s hearts. And to be an upright person, one must share.

During these three months, Sarutobi Shinnosuke visited Tonan several times, trying to win him over. Shinnosuke’s control methods were too crude, he couldn’t compare with Sarutobi Hiruzen.

However, in order to reduce his guard, Tonan tried his best to cater to him. In one of the conversations with him, Tonan learned that Sarutobi Asuma would leave the Fire Capital in two months to take the graduation exam in the village.

This gave Tonan a sense of urgency. After Asuma returned to the village, it would be very difficult to make a move against him…

At night, the full moon flickered under the cover of the dark clouds.

“Don’t hit me… lord, please spare my life… lord… please spare my life… ah”

Tonan was reading under lamplight in the night. While flipping through the books he purchased at the Fire Capital’s largest bookstore, he listened to heart-breaking wails in the newly built dungeon in the backyard, using Wind Communication.

Although these books were not related to ninjas, they contained knowledge of all trades and professions. People keen to self-improve must use leisure time to supplement and enrich their knowledge.

Especially Tonan, since he was very interested in the Ninja World history. In fact, he had the same confusion as Asuma — why couldn’t the Hokage rule the country despite the military power?

Now, Tonan knew the answer to this question. The reason was very simple. Hokage came from the military field and was not adept in matters concerning people’s livelihood. Training ninjas needed money. Assuming ninjas couldn’t earn money from missions, what were their options? Business or farming?

Then, what would be the difference between a ninja and ordinary people? Moreover, ninjas might not necessarily be able to do it as well as ordinary people. Besides, with great strength, who would be willing to do such things?

Some people might think that ninjas could just make a living by robbing civilians. Many ninjas in the past did exactly that. They didn’t engage in production activities and relied on looting to obtain resources.

However, civilians weren’t stupid. They attached themselves to powerful ninja clans and handed over a certain amount of resources for protection. This situation finally led to almost every ninja clan being affiliated with civilians.

The consequent resources imbalance led to war. And in the war, the ones fighting were still ninjas. This was how the Warring States Period started after the end of the ninja sect era.

As for why the Hokage cannot become the Daimyo, and directly control common people — this involved the basic human nature of class-climbing.

Hokage is a ninja, and in a country ruled by a ninja, all higher-ups must be ninjas. Since no one wanted to be in the low rung, people would spare no effort to groom their next generations as ninjas.

This would lead to a large number of people refining chakra and learning ninjutsu from childhood. Most people would become ninjas, which meant a lot of money spent on training them.

The social productive force would decrease rapidly, and ninjas would eventually have to engage in business and farming like ordinary people. What would then be the difference between this state and the ninja sect era?

People progress, not regress. The ninja village system was to separate ninjas from ordinary people and avoid conflict.

From another perspective, the country was the ninja village’s estate, where ordinary people worked hard to produce. The Daimyo was the estate’s manager, responsible for producing and accumulating wealth, then handing it over to the ninja village in the form of funds and missions.

While supporting the village, he also seeks its protection. The true bigwigs had already seen through this point.

Therefore, in recent few years, the Land of Fire’s wealthy and powerful continuously immigrated their younger family members to Konoha, to let them win at the starting line. This was also one of the reasons why Konoha’s land prices skyrocketed.

Hokage, therefore, didn’t rule the country that had to be run with a separate government. Ninjas and civilians must be in two worlds. If they were placed together, various problems would arise due to power imbalance. As for whose status was higher between the Hokage and Daimyo, that depended on person to person.

Since Hokage had absolute military force, his right to speak outclassed the Daimyo. However, the Daimyo had absolute authority in the common people’s hearts and had economic power. Now, in the time of peace, when the economy was growing rapidly, the people’s right to speak surpassed the military force. But the capital could only contain military force, it was incapable of flipping the table.

While Tonan was thinking, Ao knocked on the door and reported, “My Lord, he has fainted five times already. If we continue beating him, he’ll die.”

Tonan put down the book, took a sip of tea, and said, “That’s miserable, what did he do?”

“When he was handing over money today, he hid three hundred Ryo.”

“Three hundred Ryo…”

Tonan sighed, “Ao, you know me. I’ve always hated evil like an enemy, and I hate people who take bribes and bend the law the most. In the North City Guard, the rules I set are the law. Since he violated my rules, that’s breaking the law, and it’s a crime.”

“Although it’s only three hundred Ryo, we shouldn’t judge evil by the number. It’s his heart that’s already filthy. Once there’s a first time, there’ll be more, and we can’t catch him every time. To prevent him from making grave mistakes again, it’d be better to kill him and send him to Masaki-sama.”

“Yes.”

“By the way, what about the human trafficking organizations I asked you to pay attention to.”

“As per your instructions, I’ve figured out their hiding places. It’s just that they seemed to have hired wandering ninjas.”

Tonan nodded and narrowed his eyes hearing this information, “Gather people tomorrow night. I’ll personally lead the team to raid them, and save those poor children.”

“My Lord is truly benevolent,” Ao flattered Tonan.

Tonan instantly looked gentle and solemnly said with righteousness, “As the North City Guard captain, I should punish traitors and eliminate evil for the benefit of common people. You don’t need to praise me, it’s my duty.”