Chapter 535: The Richest Battle Ever

At night, inside a hastily assembled temporary camp, many jonin from the ninja forces gathered.

The simple camp had no chairs, only a large stone table created by Earth Release, with a single map of the Grass Country and its surrounding regions laid out on it.

Muyue and Jiraiya stood side by side at the north side of the table, while Minato Namikaze and Kakashi each stood behind one of them, and the remaining jonin stood on the other sides of the large stone table.

"I believe many of you must have quite a few questions—why we regrouped so quickly after splitting up, and why Muyue is here," Jiraiya slowly began.

Some jonin nodded. With such a sudden major change and lacking intelligence, they found it difficult to make sense of everything.

"First of all, Muyue led a support unit to join us in dealing with Iwagakure," Jiraiya started explaining.

"Because the frontline situation was critical, Muyue selected elites from the support unit to reach the Grass Country at the fastest speed. So the main support force hasn't arrived yet; only the vanguard of fifty elite ninja is here."

A jonin's face lit up with joy, and he couldn't help asking, "Lord Muyue, how many ninja are there in the support unit?"

Since the elite force had already arrived, even if the main force was slower, it wouldn't be too late—he couldn't wait to wash away the shame of their last defeat.

"Including the elite force, there are a total of one thousand ninja," Muyue replied seriously.

"Excellent! With the support unit, our strength is no worse than the Iwagakure forces. This time we definitely won't lose!" The jonin who had just spoken grew even more excited.

After all, this was a reinforcement of a thousand ninja. In all his years of fighting, it was the first time he had seen Konoha dispatch such a strong reinforcement at once.

It wasn't that Konoha was stingy, but rather that among the many ninja villages, Konoha didn't have that many troops.

From its founding until now, Konoha had only a little over twelve thousand official ninja in total.

And with the war in the ninja world having already reached the Third Great Ninja War, the attrition from years of conflict, plus natural deaths, meant Konoha's active ninja were truly few.

If the number of ninja in each village weren't top secret, and there were an active ninja ranking, Konoha might be at the bottom of the five great ninja villages.

The other jonin also showed expressions of surprise, feeling they had never fought such a well-supplied battle—a full thousand reinforcements.

"As expected of Teacher Muyue—even his lies are this impressive." Watching no one in the room question it, Obito, who had been silent all along, silently praised Muyue in his heart.

White Zetsu, disguised as Hyuga Sa, also put on a delighted expression, silently memorizing the intelligence, ready to transmit it later.

"We dispersed earlier because we lacked combat strength and feared that our location would be discovered and we'd be wiped out. But now with a thousand ninja reinforcements, there's no need to keep hiding," Jiraiya continued.

The jonin nodded in agreement. When facing an equal number of ninja forces, Konoha had never feared anyone.

"Where do you think would be a suitable place to rendezvous with the support unit and set up a temporary headquarters?" Jiraiya began gathering ideas.

Each jonin carefully studied the map and gave their opinions.

After the strategy meeting concluded, Jiraiya specifically reminded them with a serious expression:

"There may be spies in our forces now. The contents of this meeting must absolutely not be leaked!"

Few people had seen Jiraiya's assassination attempt by Jonin Sarutobi earlier, and with Jiraiya deliberately concealing the information, the ninja force currently didn't know that the failure was due to a spy.

The jonin inside the camp all wore solemn looks.

"Don't be too tense. Everyone I called to this meeting is absolutely trustworthy," Jiraiya said with a smile.

"As long as nothing unexpected happens, this time we will surely turn defeat into victory."

The jonin exchanged glances and all felt Jiraiya was right. The jonin gathered here were mostly from ninja clans or veteran jonin with outstanding service—there was no way a spy could be among them.

And if this group had no issues, the information wouldn't leak, so there would be no surprises.

"I really want to cancel the Transformation Jutsu and let them see—it would be so interesting," White Zetsu laughed inwardly.

Hyuga Sa was indeed a trustworthy ninja, but the one present wasn't Hyuga Sa—it was White Zetsu!

Of course, White Zetsu only thought about it casually; he still had the task of transmitting intelligence to complete.

But it didn't matter that he couldn't reveal his true form now. Once Jiraiya and the others fell into an encirclement and were cornered, he would first burst out with a loud laugh and then slip away.

After the meeting ended, the ninja dispersed, including Jiraiya and Muyue.

However, after leaving, Jiraiya, Muyue, and Minato Namikaze quickly broke away, used Shadow Clones to disguise themselves, and then regrouped in a hidden spot.

The meeting just now was for misleading White Zetsu. The real strategy meeting had already ended, with only the three of them as participants.

"The bait is ready. Now we'll see if Iwagakure takes the hook," Jiraiya said, looking toward the northwest where the Iwagakure ninja were.

To fool the spy, very few knew the true battle plan—only Muyue, Jiraiya, their disciples, and the high-level personnel on the support unit's side.

"According to the intentions Iwa has shown so far, they definitely want to annihilate the Konoha forces in the Land of Grass in one go. They will certainly take the bait, but it's not easy for us to swallow this big fish either." Minato Namikaze thought.

The thousand-man reinforcement force that Muyue mentioned was just a lie to make Iwa take the bait. In reality, the combined reinforcement force and Jiraiya's force totaled only twelve hundred ninja.

Minato Namikaze didn't know the exact number of Iwa's ninja, but based on the numbers shown so far, it had to be over eighteen hundred ninja, at least six hundred more than Konoha.

Six hundred as a unit of ninja is quite a lot, enough to form a battalion.

"After all, the overall situation is still unfavorable for us. It will be very difficult to completely annihilate them. Let's aim to eliminate half." Muyue said after thinking for a moment.

Jiraiya nodded in deep agreement, "Half is already a good number. If word gets back to Iwa, it'll make Ōnoki upset for a long time."

Half of eighteen hundred is nine hundred. The resources needed to train nine hundred qualified ninja are enormous.

"If you defeat the Four-Tails Jinchuriki this time, you'll truly be the number one of Konoha's younger generation!" Jiraiya said cheerfully, patting Muyue on the shoulder.

During the battle planning meeting, Muyue volunteered, saying that his Water Release had made considerable progress recently and that he alone could handle the Four-Tails Jinchuriki and the ninja protecting the Four-Tails.

"Minato, you need to step up your game too. How about going to Mount Myōboku now for some training and learning Sage Mode?" Then Jiraiya patted Minato Namikaze.

Minato Namikaze looked helpless. "Jiraiya-sensei, don't joke. Going now wouldn't be in time. Besides, last time Fukasaku-sage said my chakra training wasn't sufficient."

As a special technique that can comprehensively improve a ninja's abilities, Minato Namikaze naturally wants to learn Sage Mode, but learning it requires powerful chakra.

And Minato Namikaze currently doesn't meet the 'powerful chakra' standard.

"Insufficient chakra is a real weakness. Otherwise, given your talent, under immense pressure, you might really learn it quickly." Jiraiya said, stroking his chin.

It took him a long time to learn Sage Mode.

However, Jiraiya's situation was special. When he learned Sage Mode, he didn't live in Mount Myōboku for intensive training. He practiced whenever he had time, so the total practice time wasn't particularly extreme.

Of course, compared to someone like Naruto Uzumaki, who is practically cheating, Jiraiya did spend much more time.

"The feeling is so different from last time." Obito, lying back against a tree and looking bored at the sky, muttered under his breath.

Although it was the same ninja unit, compared to the previous mission, their morale and spirit were much worse.

"After all, we experienced a heavy defeat." Kakashi replied.

"Hey, Kakashi, why aren't you asleep yet?" Obito asked in surprise, looking at Kakashi sitting on a tree branch.

They would be moving again soon, so they just found any place to sleep.

"So why aren't you asleep?" Kakashi asked back.

Obito scratched his head, then finally admitted, "I'm a bit worried about the spy in the unit, and also the atmosphere of this unit."

Obito had experienced quite a bit by now, but his unit had never suffered a major defeat, nor had there been any Konoha ninja betraying and becoming spies.

"There's really no need to worry. Since they've become spies, for whatever reason, they are already enemies of Konoha. As for the unit's atmosphere, once you achieve a great victory, the familiar feeling will return." Kakashi said indifferently.

"Ah." Obito wanted to say that what he really cared about wasn't the surface, but some of the essence revealed after the incident.

But he didn't know how to describe it, so he could only scratch his hair and sigh.

"So, Kakashi, why aren't you asleep?"

Obito remembered that Kakashi hadn't answered his question.

"I'm worried that you might accidentally leak information, so I'm keeping an eye on you." Kakashi answered without concealment.

They didn't have as comprehensive information as Muyue and Minato Namikaze, but they were among those who had the most information besides them.

Obito's face darkened. He wanted to scold Kakashi, but remembered it was late at night, so he had to swallow his words and glare at Kakashi.

"You naturally evil, despicable white-haired bastard! How dare you underestimate me like that." Glaring once wasn't enough to vent his anger, so Obito silently cursed again in his mind.

To prove his ability to keep secrets, Obito lay down and fell asleep immediately.

After Obito fell asleep, Kakashi activated the Transparent World technique to observe the surroundings, then soon closed his eyes.

Anyway, it will definitely be visible tomorrow.