Naruto Karyuden

Chapter 80: Interlude II - Grand Discoveries

Hidden Leaf Village Conference Room

With the advent of peace and cooperation, there've been several advancements already. The first major one was enhancing the Hidden Rain's pods with the Hidden Leaf's advanced medical knowledge to create a more efficient and portal method of reliable healing, although their clunkiness is still something that needs to be worked out. Storage scrolls are very handy but even they can barely handle more than one or two pods- they were never meant to store such large objects.

The next big advancement would be the ease of communication. Once again utilizing the Hidden Rain top engineers, with a lot of aid from the Hidden Cloud, long distance conferences are now much simpler and require much less electricity than before. It was always reserved for emergencies because of how unstable it was, typically between the Hokage and the Daimyo, but now it's easier than ever to connect to the leaders of the foreign lands.

Tsunade sits at a special desk, connected to more wiring than any other place in the Leaf could possibly need. Behind her, as always, is her most trusted aid, Shizune Umino, with Kakashi Hatake and Shikamaru Nara standing to the side to listen in.

In front of the desk is a video camera, a device that bears resemblance to a bulkier than average photo camera, easily bigger than Tsunade's head.

Surrounding the camera are a total of eleven large television sets, ordered in a two-layer semi-circle. Each TV is marked with the symbol of a Hidden Village.

The top six TVs belong to the Sand, Cloud, Stone, Mist, Rain, and Waterfall, while just under them are the ones marked for Frost, Mountain, Star, Dream, Moon.

Tsunade waits patiently as her team ensures everything is connected correctly. They've run tests before, of course, and while the technology has improved, it's still not perfect. On top of everything, there're two additional signals that weren't present during the last tests.

After several minutes, the team give Tsunade the sign that all's clear. On her signal, they activate the camera and all the TVs switch on where the other village leaders appear. The team stays behind for a moment longer to fix any remaining static before taking their leave.

Ay clears his throat. "To start things off, I'd like to welcome Tsukino of the Hidden Moon and Enzo Tenrō of the Hidden Dream. Thank you for accepting our invitation."

Enzo bows his head. "We owe our lives to the Hidden Leaf, after all. It'd be unbecoming to not repay that as best we can."

Tsukiyo bows her head, as well. "Likewise, we would most likely not be standing if it weren't for the Shinobi Union's cause."

"I don't see any others, though." Tsunade notes. "Are the Hidden Moon and Dream the only new members?"

Gaara nods. "The Hidden Valley Village decided to remain neutral at this time."

Ōnoki crosses his arms. "The Hidden Rock Village, as well. They held onto the fear that as a smaller village, their wants would be pushed aside in favour of our own. I'd like to call them paranoid, but..."

"That'd be a bit hypocritical, wouldn't it?" Ay chuckles. "I regret to say that the Hidden Lock Village has also declined our invitation."

"As has the Nadeshiko Village." Mei Terumī chimes in. "Although they have always separated themselves from our matters. It was a longshot but we at least tried." She shrugs.

Enzo leans back in his chair. "We were the same but it seems that was not in the cards for us. We were shown that isolating ourselves made us vulnerable to manipulation."

"I imagine they're all observing us closely." Konan says. "They're not yet certain what the Shinobi Union plans and wish to see how we'll proceed."