ZAN 127 (Patreon)

Chapter 127: Driving Me Mad? My Madness Surpasses Your Divine Artifact!

The Box of ultimate Bliss was indeed a remarkable object, possessing true and undeniable power, but it was equally perilous, often serving as a symbol that "the desire for war leads to destruction."

The Grass Country’s downfall because of the Box of ultimate Bliss was a bloody and undeniable reality.

For Kaede Tsukasa, however, the danger didn’t matter. As long as it could provide him aid, it was a priceless tool.

Sasori kept his head down, continuously writing and drawing on the unrolled scrolls. Then he looked up and said, “If there’s new action, I can’t help you. My primary task now is to turn the Third Kazekage into my human puppet.”

“I’m not planning to call you for assistance. Just continue with whatever you want to do. Remember not to reveal your movements lightly, or the villagers might surround you,” Kaede Tsukasa said.

Sasori relaxed and resumed his calculations, focusing entirely on harnessing the full power the Third Kazekage had wielded in life.

Ideally, he wanted it to become even stronger.

Kaede Tsukasa looked at the people before him. Once he acquired the eyes he wanted, they would all be valuable allies.

“I already know that Sunagakure has surrendered to me personally, but the village has no intention of discussing the next plan with me. Clearly, they hope to let this matter fade away. That’s within my expectations,” Kaede Tsukasa said.

“I’ve already arranged for a Zombie to issue orders to Sunagakure, instructing them to conduct reconnaissance. Now it’s time to see if the village will prove its loyalty. If they send someone to approach or recruit you, you already know what to do.”

Whoosh!

Kaede Tsukasa’s figure vanished.

Kakuzu looked at the snarling Zombie in front of him. “Gone, huh? That guy always says the weirdest things, all mysterious. So, do you guys want to come with me and make some money?”

Sasori set down the scroll and said coldly, “Although I haven’t spent much time with you, based on my understanding, the moment I leave Konoha, you would probably kill me.”

“That’s true, considering you’re Sunagakure’s top rogue ninja, your value is beyond imagination. Plus, the Third Kazekage in your hands is priceless…”

“Sunagakure is almost finished. Don’t expect them to offer much bounty.”

“That’s not the point. Sunagakure may be broke, but the Wind Country still has resources,” Kakuzu said excitedly. “At worst, other nations and villages would be willing to pay for you two.”

Despite the Wind Country being called poor, it was due to its large scale. Compared to small nations like the Grass Country, Rain Country, or Hot Springs Country, it was extremely wealthy in overall capacity.

Kakuzu urged, “And even if you die, I’d find a way to steal your body so Kaede Tsukasa could revive you. Then we’d get money for free. Just thinking about this excites me immensely.”

“Not interested. Besides, our team doesn’t lack money. The next room over has a literal money-printing machine,” Sasori found Kakuzu boring and noisy.

After all, he was someone who had mastered immortality, had attempted to assassinate the First Hokage, and had endured countless storms over the years. And the ultimate truth of life he derived was… making money?

What an absurd conclusion. Ridiculous.

Yet, Sasori kept his thoughts to himself, respecting the pursuit of skill in others.

Beneath his mask, Kakuzu’s expression twisted in excitement. “There’s no conflict. She keeps printing money while I make extra. From what I know, her enthusiasm for work is at maximum. She’s clearly someone who understands the value of money. Even if I forced her with violence, she wouldn’t produce more explosive tags in the same time frame.”

Although this immortal team hadn’t existed long, Kakuzu absolutely respected Konan the most. He held immense admiration and enthusiasm for anyone who had mastered the secrets of money.

Konan scowled, completely uninterested in dealing with the two. She wasn’t immortal, already out of place among them, focusing solely on completing tasks before returning to Yahiko and Nagato.

She didn’t know how things were going now, after the attack on Sunagakure… she probably could finally breathe. Sunagakure had already been repeatedly hit by Kaede Tsukasa, and its strength was shattered, unlikely to cause them trouble.

Konan considered this one of the few good things Kaede Tsukasa had done.

…

The Grass Country was a small, unassuming nation.

Situated northeast of the Rain Country, sandwiched between the Earth and Fire Countries.

Because the Rain Country was surrounded by three great nations, it often became a battlefield, drawing away much of the military attention and giving the Grass Country more breathing room—a stroke of luck for such a small nation.

But this luck was built on the strategic deployments of the great nations. One misstep, and the Grass Country could be crushed to dust, forced to jump back and forth between the Earth and Fire Countries, surviving only as a vassal state.

As the highest military authority of the Grass Country, Kusagakure would naturally not accept such a fate.

The citizens of a small nation toiled their entire lives, and after meeting their own survival needs, most of the value they produced was taken away, ultimately falling into the hands of the great nations.

The ninja of a small village were no exception. As a subordinate force of a great ninja village, the makeshift ninja units were often deliberately—or inadvertently—sacrificed on the battlefield.

Using the lives of small-village ninja to reduce casualties among one’s own comrades while increasing enemy losses was absolutely cost-effective. After all, the ninja of a small village were like wheat in a field—harvested again and again, always growing back.

Being a ninja was the noblest profession on the planet. Every commoner longed to become one. If an opportunity appeared, they would throw themselves into it recklessly, even if it meant becoming expendable to a great ninja village. They would never give up.

Whether they regretted becoming expendable the moment they were sent to die was another matter entirely.

Normally, as long as no Great Ninja War broke out, the situation in the Grass Country would remain relatively stable, at most dealing with some mountain bandits or thieves.

But now, things were different.

Sunagakure had sent a force that brazenly stormed into the Grass Country, seizing town after town, ruthlessly looting valuable items, leaving the wealthy destitute, and taking even the poor with them. If they encountered a resisting ninja, they would forcibly recruit them to join the plunder.

It was like a swarm of locusts.

Face? Sunagakure was already in this state—who cared about face? Opportunities like this didn’t come often.

“Wow, what’s going on? How did this town get stripped bare out of nowhere?”

“Sunagakure did it. They brought cart after cart of sealed scrolls into our country, claiming they were hired by Lord Kaede Tsukasa, the devourer of Konoha, to carry out missions in the Grass Country.”

“This is absurd! Konoha’s ninja assigning missions to Sunagakure forces—and those Sunagakure idiots actually accepted?!”

“Using the guise of mission execution, they’re actually conducting military—no, raiding operations. And they actually dared to accept this? Then openly admit it? Is this really a great ninja village?”

No one believed it.

It was normal for a nation’s ninja village to accept employment from outsiders; it was common in the ninja world.

For the same task, some villages charged cheap, some expensive. The employer couldn’t simply consider cost; they also had to consider the skill level of the ninja village taking the mission—what rank of ninja they could send.

But turning business into something like Sunagakure’s approach was unprecedented—shameless to the extreme. Accepting a mission that had already become a full-scale military operation? Impossible.

Still, the people of the Grass Country could see that Sunagakure had no shame. Having nearly fallen out of the top five villages, in terms of high-end combat power, it likely lagged behind Amegakure with Hanzo and Takigakure with the Seven-Tails.

Add in the fact that their middle- and lower-level ninja vastly outnumbered a small village, and financial pressure was immense. With Wind Country support declining sharply, Sunagakure had no choice but to find its own funding—it couldn’t rely entirely on Rasa panning for gold in the desert.

“Hey, Sunagakure? What kind of great ninja village is this? They’re done for. I think Wind Country should back a different ninja village,” some observant people had already thought this, and certain small villages were likely making plans.

Sunagakure is useless? Then disband it, bring in another village, rebuild the forces, reorganize secret techniques, and train new members.

As for Wind Country eventually annexing the Grass Country? Not impossible, but highly unlikely.

The current territories of the Five Great Nations had one clear feature: they didn’t share direct borders!

Between two nations’ borders, there was either the sea or a small country as a buffer zone—a default battlefield, a blood bag for the great nations to draw from. Otherwise, how could these small nations survive to this day?

Besides, the Grass Country lacked rare resources, powerful secret techniques, or tourist attractions like Hot Springs Country, offering little economic benefit. Wind Country would have little reason to annex it.

This sudden military action left the people of the Grass Country fleeing for their lives, completely baffled.

The most tense were undoubtedly the ninja of Kusagakure.

“What’s going on? Why is Sunagakure targeting us?”

“Could it be that the Four-Tails is being resurrected in our Grass Country? No, maybe the One-Tail… The One-Tail jinchūriki was taken long ago and has been missing ever since. Maybe they’re already dead.”

“Damn it, why does this have to happen right now!”

“The march route of Sunagakure has been confirmed—they’re heading straight for Kusagakure. All those towns along the way are just collateral damage, looted by Sunagakure as they passed through!”

The leadership of Kusagakure felt not only anger but panic.

Any small village directly targeted by a great ninja village would feel panic—don’t let Sunagakure’s apparent weakness fool anyone, even if they seemed devoid of any Anbu-level strength.

But it was precisely this bad timing: Kusagakure had no Anbu-level ninja either. Its leader was merely an elite jonin, completely incapable of confronting the thousand-strong force sent by Sunagakure.

“Leader, could it be that intelligence about ‘that thing’ was leaked, and Sunagakure found out?”

“No. Sunagakure claims they’re executing a mission issued by Kaede Tsukasa. They wouldn’t dare act recklessly under Kaede Tsukasa’s name on something like this.”

Who didn’t know that Sunagakure, once an arrogant great ninja village, had been dismantled bit by bit by Kaede Tsukasa?

It was said that they surrendered to Konoha, but now it seemed more like a personal surrender to Kaede Tsukasa. Kusagakure had no interest—or authority—to meddle in the political games between great ninja villages.

“Prepare for the worst. The weapons of the Six Paths Sage we painstakingly discovered and excavated during the Second Great Ninja War must never be handed over so easily!”

The leader of Kusagakure’s eyes gleamed with madness. “Sunagakure is unprecedentedly weak. This is our chance! There’s no need to help the Grass Country conquer other nations, or to invade the Wind Country. All we need is to replace Sunagakure and become the new ninja village of Wind Country.”

The longer they waited, the greater the risk that Sunagakure might acquire a new Anbu-level ninja—Rasa and Pakura were both famous prodigies with kekkei genkai. Combined with Sunagakure’s secret technique foundations and training systems, it wasn’t impossible.

To change Kusagakure’s status and destiny, they had to act now. Seizing Sunagakure directly had never been easier.

“Relay my order: activate the Box of ultimate Bliss!”

“But, Leader, according to the intelligence we gathered, activating this artifact requires living humans as sacrifices…”

“Fools! Sunagakure is already kidnapping people from this country. If outsiders can do it, why can’t our own people? We’ll take them too! Start with Kusagakure’s villagers, then the population of nearby towns, even ninja! One ninja is worth hundreds or even thousands of civilians!”

The leadership of Kusagakure sprang into action. Once a small village made a decision, their execution was formidable.

As countless screams and wails echoed, innumerable people were herded together by Kusagakure ninja and delivered to the Box of ultimate Bliss.

The Box of ultimate Bliss was like a massive black cube, breathing in and out according to its set rhythm, devouring countless living humans with each intake.

Send in a hundred people—nothing.

A thousand people—slight change, but minimal.

Ten thousand people—the Box finally responded, but it was far from enough!

Not enough! The Box of ultimate Bliss demanded more living humans!

At this point, there was no turning back. With Sunagakure pressing forward, Kusagakure was like a gambler blinded by losses, willing to stake everything for a chance to recover all that was lost, principal and interest.

But how could this be? If the Box of ultimate Bliss were so easily satisfied, it wouldn’t be the most forbidden and insidious artifact.

Thus, the people of Kusagakure grew even more frenzied, scouring for populations everywhere to feed into the Box.

So much so that when Sunagakure entered a town, they were often surprised to find almost no people left, only abundant property—apparently hurriedly evacuated.

“Something’s wrong.” Pakura, the commander of the unit, immediately became alert.

She was hot-tempered, but not stupid. She still had basic intelligence analysis skills.

“Kusagakure is relocating people too? That makes no sense. Moving populations won’t help—they’ll only provoke us, unless it serves some greater purpose.”

Pakura couldn’t figure it out. She knew that Kaede Tsukasa had them attacking Kusagakure for a reason.

Whether it was testing Sunagakure’s sincerity in surrendering, further reducing its ninja numbers, or creating new enemies, it all made sense and was understandable.

Pakura didn’t want to be part of such schemes, but she had no choice. She couldn’t give Kaede Tsukasa another excuse to strike Sunagakure again.

This explained why the invasion of the Grass Country had resulted in a slow advance accompanied by rampant looting.

But now it seemed that this offensive rhythm had triggered unusual actions from Kusagakure.

Unless… this was exactly the result Kaede Tsukasa wanted to see.

Pakura felt her intelligence rapidly improving. While she couldn’t compare to Rasa, she was already able to think independently and handle matters on her own.

Her guess was correct—this was indeed the result Kaede Tsukasa wanted to see, and more precisely, it was even better than he had anticipated.

Kaede Tsukasa had already entered the Grass Country, patiently watching Kusagakure in the distance, now unnervingly silent.

He was all too familiar with this deathlike quiet.

“So it’s begun. The timing of my intervention is just right.”

Kaede Tsukasa nodded to himself. Under normal circumstances, the Grass Country would face destruction because of the Box of ultimate Bliss.

But it would eventually be rebuilt. As a buffer nation, no great power would easily annex them, lest they alert other nations.

Kaede Tsukasa had ordered Sunagakure’s forces to attack the Grass Country to force Kusagakure to activate the Box of ultimate Bliss, keeping control of the tempo firmly in his hands.

He was observing, using the lives of Kusagakure ninja and Grass Country civilians to assess the danger level of the Box of ultimate Bliss.

Judging from the eventual destruction of the Grass Country, small nations were incapable of controlling the Box of ultimate Bliss. Kaede Tsukasa suspected that perhaps the number of people fed into it was insufficient.

“Kusagakure seems to have exhausted all options. Time to give them a hand.”

Kaede Tsukasa leapt, stepping directly into Kusagakure and approaching the Box of ultimate Bliss step by step.

Unlike the anime timeline, in the current manga timeline there was no such place as Hozuki City. Nor was there a demon named Goku inside the Box. The Box of ultimate Bliss was located within Kusagakure itself, an artifact easily overlooked.

Kaede Tsukasa strolled leisurely, without any attempt to conceal himself, resembling a casual tourist. This prompted the Kusagakure ninja to immediately surround him.

“Who are you?”

“I’ve never seen this guy before. Is he a Sunagakure spy?”

“Perfect timing. Capture him and throw him into the Box of ultimate Bliss! Every ninja is precious now—we should feed all the Sunagakure ninja to the Box!”

The Kusagakure ninja scowled, but one by one, they began convulsing, forcibly transformed into zombies by Kaede Tsukasa.

“Pathetic. Standing before me, and yet not even producing chakra to protect yourself… If this were Sunagakure’s guys, they’d never make such a mistake.”

The small village ninja were simply too honest; lacking toughness, they were easily consumed by Kaede Tsukasa.

Unlike Sunagakure’s ninja, who, after repeated punishment, gained experience and awareness, surviving with some cunning.

Yet given these Kusagakure ninja’s level, maintaining constant chakra protection consumed tremendous energy. Often, Kaede Tsukasa didn’t even need to act deliberately—the genin and chunin exhausted themselves, making them even easier to harvest.

As Kaede Tsukasa walked, his army of converted zombies gradually grew. The remaining few Kusagakure ninja were eventually gathered around him.

“What’s going on? Why aren’t you supplying more live humans? How can you be so negligent!”

The leader of Kusagakure erupted in fury. “Whoever fails this task jumps into the Box of ultimate Bliss themselves—who are you?”

“The one sending you into the Box of ultimate Bliss.”

Kaede Tsukasa answered, and in an instant, appeared behind the leader, pressing firmly on his shoulders to stop him from escaping.

“Konoha Devourer? Why would someone as important as you come to a small village like ours? Why did Sunagakure attack us for no reason…”

“It’s me,” Kaede Tsukasa replied. “I ran into some matters over in Konoha and gained a period of time whose length I can’t even be sure of. I didn’t want to wait idly, so I had to trouble you.”

Kaede Tsukasa shoved the Kusagakure leader toward the Box of ultimate Bliss.

The leader tried to resist, but even the most basic force and speed were meaningless before Kaede Tsukasa at this moment.

“Hmph, this thing seems to have come alive. No wonder it’s called the ninja world’s version of a wish machine—interesting.”

Kaede Tsukasa observed it closely.

He could feel the thoughts emanating from the Box of ultimate Bliss—still wanting more.

Along with these thoughts, a torrent of the most malicious, negative energies of human hearts surged, continuously gnawing at Kaede Tsukasa’s mind.

There were no demons inside the Box of ultimate Bliss—or rather, the artifact itself was a kind of alternative demon.

“Hmph. A weapon that absorbs chakra and human negativity to exert its effects, entirely different from things like the Amber Purifying Vase. No wonder it was discarded. And its appetite… it seems impossible to satiate.”

Kaede Tsukasa stepped forward, pressing a hand onto the Box of ultimate Bliss. A hundredfold surge of malice, wails, ugliness, and filth poured toward him like swarming bees.

It was enough to drive a person insane—a level of madness comparable, in some ways, to how the Uchiha went mad upon obtaining the Mangekyō Sharingan.

“Not bad. Too bad it’s useless to me, because… I went mad many years ago. My insanity far surpasses yours!”

Kaede Tsukasa snorted coldly, completely unaffected.

In terms of inner darkness and despair, he had endured over ten years of unending life-and-death struggles. A mere Box of ultimate Bliss was nowhere near capable of touching him.

“Your darkness is far too immature to fulfill my wish. Let me help you… starting with the ninja of the Grass Country and Sunagakure.”