NARUTO: THE STRONGEST UZUMAKI

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[Sleeping in a sleeping bag restored all your HP and MP.]

[Sleeping in a sleeping bag cured all status effects.]

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Waving his hand in front of the holographic screen that appeared on his retina, Tanaka yawned as he got up.

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LV50 Umiko Mizukami

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"Good morning, Umi... Onika." Tanaka said somewhat sleepily, almost saying the name he saw above her head.

"Mm." She nodded simply, not caring about his slip of the tongue.

Passing by her, he went to the kitchen area and washed his face.

Not far away, Shiori and the rest were having breakfast.

With the map open, he pulled up a chair to sit and eat next to them.

'By the way, I am still unable to see Shiori's level, this must mean she is above level 71...' He thought as he bit into a piece of bread.

Another thing on his mind, even after waking up, was dungeon creation.

If possible, Tanaka wanted to create a dungeon at that exact moment. However, there wasn't enough explanation of how this would work, if he activated it and happened to stay in the same place when he returned... It was possible that he would have to run all the way across the water to reach Uzushiogakure.

Of course, this wasn't the most important thing, but rather, explaining the reason for his disappearance later. Not to mention, they might end up arriving in Uzushiogakure before him and when his sudden disappearance is reported, not only would the surveillance on him increase upon his return, but it would also worry his aunt and little cousin.

This was not something he desired, so as tempting as it was, he resisted while eagerly waiting to return to the village and test it in some isolated place in the village later.

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"Bang!"

The Third Hokage, Hiruzen, was full of rage as he slammed his fist on his office desk.

On the desk was an open letter with the seal of Uzushiogakure.

'A traitor?' He thought: 'Who the hell wants to sabotage our relationship with Uzushio?'

His biggest fear was that the Uzumaki would stop wanting to ally with them. Of course, he didn't think this would be enough reason to make it happen, but...

Considering that the very daughter of the current leader of the Uzushiogakure village was attacked twice while coming to the Leaf village, it was reason enough for him to be red with anger.

'Was it him?' Hiruzen thought of a particular person.

But he soon dismissed it, believing that if he did, 'he' himself should know that this would also affect the village. Just like him, although while he is the light of Konoha and 'he' the shadow, Hiruzen believes that 'he' wished for the well-being of Konoha just as he did.

'If it wasn't him, then who was it?' Hiruzen stood up, pacing back and forth in his office.

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Meanwhile, a meeting was held by the advisors and main leaders of the respective clans of the Whirlpool Village.

Among them was the former Uzukage, Toshiro Uzumaki, 49 years old.

The only reason he stepped down was that he never wanted to be the village leader and didn't feel he deserved it. He only accepted the position because his uncle, Ashina Uzumaki, passed away and at the time, everyone voted for him as the leader. Provisionally, he accepted the position.

After the current Uzukage, Masashi Uzumaki, demonstrated great Kage-level power and a sense of duty and responsibility to the village, Toshiro Uzumaki was more than happy to abdicate the position for Masashi Uzumaki to take over.

Putting that aside for now, Masashi's expression made everyone in the meeting room swallow dryly.

Everyone knew how much he loved the village and his family. Knowing that someone from the Leaf Village, who was their ally, plotted and nearly killed his daughter and several promising ninjas who were on the simple mission of delivering goods to help them in the war and were repaid with betrayal... It was hard to swallow.

"What we are going to discuss now is about the future of the village," he said in a grave tone. "Yes, you heard me right. I have thought long and hard about this. This is not a simple case of someone wanting the lives of our people, but someone of high rank in Konoha, as only someone like that would be capable of knowing ultra-secret information about the location of our people who were on the mission to deliver goods to them."

When he stopped speaking, the room fell silent.

He was not wrong in what he said, and this was not the first time it happened. However, the frequency with which someone from Konoha tried to sabotage them was increasing, and now they had reached the point of revealing the location of Shiori, who was leading some ninjas on the delivery mission.

To have this information, only someone of high rank in the Leaf Village would have access.

And, incidentally, the boy who was with Shiori also almost died in a strange situation, surviving barely after being ambushed near Uzushio Island.

If it hadn't been for Akane, who had a bad feeling and managed to find him in time, he would be dead now.

Now, the constant ambushes they were suffering from information leaks and all indications that it was someone from the Leaf Village doing this made them start to review the alliance they had with them.

"But, Masashi-sama," one of the counselors with short red hair said, "I think we can't just cut our alliance with the Leaf Village. Don't forget they are our biggest suppliers of supplements and buyers of Fuuinjutsu."

"Oh, that?" Masashi scoffed. "Who doesn't desire our Fuuinjutsus? Which village wouldn't be happy to become our partners? Any of the other four great nations, if they knew we wanted to make a large-scale trade deal, would be more than happy to do so."

His words had weight. They were not empty words since many times the villages of the other four great nations tried to form an alliance with them, whether commercial or even matrimonial.

The fact they didn't push was because, even though they didn't have the same privilege of being allies like the Leaf Village and receiving most of the Fuuinjutsu created by them, they still had a friendly trade exchange.

"The question is..." Masashi's eyes narrowed, and he said forcefully, "To what extent do we have to wait to be betrayed by the Leaf Village for it to be considered acceptable? Do we have to wait for 10, 20, 30, or 100 of our people to die by the schemes of who knows who from the Leaf Village!?"

What Masashi Uzumaki didn't know was that, among them, there was someone filled with sinister thoughts while listening to his words.

Masashi's expression softened a bit. "For now, we will reevaluate our alliance with the Leaf Village. If this time the Third Hokage doesn't give a satisfactory explanation and doesn't manage to catch the culprit who has been continuously harming us... then..."

He didn't finish, but everyone understood where he was going with that.

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The island of Uzushiogakure became visible to them.

So far, on the way back, there were no ambushes.

Perhaps because they didn't expect them to return alive?

Well, after facing more than 60 ninjas from Sunagakure, being outnumbered, and with only one being a Jonin, perhaps the person behind the attempt to kill them didn't expect them to have the 'luck' to survive.