"Why exactly are we here?" Ao asked as he looked around the lavish meeting room in the castle of the Water Daimyo.

The civil war in the Land of Water was still in its starting phase and so far, probing attacks was all both sides were willing to use. Thanks to that, Rei didn't have to worry about large-scale battles erupting anytime soon. Hence, he and his girls had time to make and enact a good plan. ​​

"We are here to meet with the Water Daimyo, duh." Rei nonchalantly replied, causing Ao to scowl.

"Obviously..." He quietly grumbled and gave up on getting a proper answer. Rei was already working with Resistance for a month and Ao quickly learned that if Rei didn't want to reveal something, it was useless trying to figure it out.

Rei, on the other hand, was also fed up with the Resistance. Or rather, with their leaders. They wanted him to win a war for them and so this last month, Rei threw idea after idea on them only to have each one rejected.

He couldn't just go to Kirigakure and openly deal with Yagura because the clan heads didn't want collateral damage.

He couldn't have Yagura secretly assassinated because apparently, the clans wanted it known it was the Resistance who was behind the deed.

He couldn't simply defeat the Kiri ninjas in outposts across the country in order to diminish the Kirigakure's forces and draw Yagura out because the clan heads didn't want the number of Kirigakure's ninjas to be too small once they took over the village.

He couldn't do this nor that...

Honestly, after the past month, Rei was considering Mei's idea of going for an indiscriminate rampage and destroying both the Resistance and Kirigakure alike. If only Kirigakure wasn't in such a good strategic position...

Only frequent visits to his wives and their foxes in his dimension alongside occasional check-ups on his village made Rei calm enough to not go nuts. Plus he had to admit that Pakura did a marvelous job of running the village in his absence.

'Heh, there's an idea...' Rei hummed before the memories of the past month made him broody again.

There were so many ways to win the civil war fast and somewhat cleanly but every single one of them needed some form of sacrifice the clan heads were unwilling to make. With the amount of rejected proposals, Rei quickly began to see that this job would take years if he did things according to the wishes of the clan heads. Years, he was unwilling to put into the job.

Needless to say, Rei quickly put his foot down and threatened to simply scrap the contract. Sure, the current opportunity to install Ringo as the Fifth Mizukage was almost irresistible but it was not worth years of their effort. Not by a longshot. At worst, Rei could go back home and pull together another scheme to make Ringo into the Mizukage.

Fortunately for both Rei and the clan heads, a new contract was signed after a practically loud argument. Well, there might have been one or two threats of joining the Kirigakure side if they pissed him off too much...

Anyway, this time, the clan heads stipulated that as long as Rei gets rid of Yagura without 'unnecessary' bloodshed... somehow Rei didn't believe the old geezers yet realized they were at war... and without collateral damage to the village, its forces, and its outposts, he was free to do his job as he deemed right without the clan heads having any say in it.

They basically asked him to win the war without doing any damage. Frankly, even the ever-serious Ao facepalmed after reading the new contract. For Rei, it was all fine though. He only wanted freedom of action.

As for their complaints at a later time... Who cared?

For this clause to be added, the clan heads in return asked for a massive monetary reimbursement in case Rei decided to abandon the contract. Yet again... Ao actually dropped his head on the table with a thud and groaned in disbelief in front of every clan head while Rei signed it with a bit too amused smile.

He simply wondered how they would even go about demanding the payment from him if it came to that... really.

And so... this was where the situation led them. Straight into the Water Daimyo castle. A place where Rei could FINALLY start his plan of winning the ever-annoying civil war.

"The fatass is really taking his sweet time." Mei mumbled, not liking having to wait for the Daimyo who she was sure was making them wait only to feed his ego.

"That's why I signaled Ringo to retrieve him." Rei light-heartedly said while shrugging amusedly, which caused Ao to snap into attention as his eyes instantly widened in pure horror and started hurriedly looking around the room for any sign of Ringo. He was too distracted to notice her leaving the room but now that Rei informed him... he could only fight back a forming headache as he imagined Ringo manhandling Daimyo into the room.

And surely enough...

"Unhand me! Do you know who I am, woman!? No! Don't put my smelly sock into my m...mphhhffff!?"

Ao whimpered when he recognized the terrified voice of the Water Daimyo and saw the door to the meeting room open with a bang while Ringo dragged the plump wriggling man by his right ankle while his hands were tied together on his chest and his mouth was stuffed by a sock. Then suddenly, the Daimyo's head impacted the door frame with a loud bang, causing a whimper to leave the plump man's lips as he instantly quieted down while his tied arms shot to his head.

"Here you go. One Water Daimyo delivered." Ringo indifferently stated as he lifted the man up by the scruff of his robes and sat him up behind the head of the table, ignoring his tearing up expression. She then proceeded to dutifully stand behind Rei, giving the sitting Mei a small whack to the back of her head to make her put her feet down from the table. "Be more respectful to the Daimyo, Mei!" She reproached, earning herself a deadpan stare from the younger woman, Ao, and even the Daimyo himself who still had the sock stuffed in his mouth.

Realizing the situation, Ao quickly stood up and pulled the sock out of the man's mouth, and untied his hands. Surprisingly enough, the Water Daimyo didn't dare to open his mouth again and Rei alongside Mei were greatly amused at how he was shooting Ringo unsure and terrified glances.

"Yeah so... as you probably already heard from your servants, I am Rei," Rei started talking, pointing at himself before snapping his thumb at Mei, "that is Mei, and the woman who dragged you in is Ringo. The dude to your right who is shooting you worried and mothering glances is not important." Rei nodded towards Ao who gave him a brief stink-eye before his gaze returned back towards the Daimyo.

Seeing the Daimyo unsurely nod at him, Rei mentally grinned, 'There is no better way to shut these self-important pricks up than a healthy dose of fear.' He glanced at Ringo with the corner of his eye, well aware that she most likely swiftly took down every guard she encountered while dragging the Daimyo towards the meeting room. After all, there was a reason why they were not interrupted by hordes of guards by now. 'And I gotta admit Ringo learned quite well how to threaten somebody without even saying anything.'

"We are here to request you putting a trading embargo on Kirigakure." Rei smiled at the Water Daimyo whose eyes bulged at the request.

Next to the Daimyo, Ao's jaw dropped. This was the first time he was hearing about it and sure, he knew it would be a very effective strategy since, unlike Konohagakure, Kirigakure was not all that self-sufficient but he also knew the Daimyo would never do this. Rei could as well ask the Daimyo to slit his own throat and be done with it.

"I can't do that!" As predicted by Ao, the Daimyo shrieked in fear after hearing Rei's proclamation, "They will kill me!"

Rei lifted an eyebrow at that and looked at Mei who looked at him with the same half-confused, half-deadpan way before both turned back towards the Daimyo in a very effective but also creepy way.

"Right..." Rei slowly nodded, "let me rephrase that." He paused and Mei snapped her fingers, causing the Daimyo to quickly start choking on the air and gnawing at his throat. "The Kirigakure ninjas are not here. We are."

And at that moment, Ao had to take a step back when he saw the completely disregarding way Rei and Mei smiled at the Daimyo while Ringo simply indifferently stared at the ruler of the Land of Water.

'This is utter madness!'