Ch165. Yukigakure 1

Mei stood on a dune of snow, in the mountain range on the north of the Land of Snow where the Yukigakure was supposed to be located.

"This is really a well-hidden location." Mei frowned, seeing exactly nothing through the freezing snow hail that was ongoing through the entire year in these mountains. Her mouth then suddenly widened into a gleeful grin, "I can see why I was sent here!"

Mei's hands started going through various hand seals at breakneck speeds as her chakra was poured outside of her body. The temperature quickly rose and the piles of snow started melting at a visible rate under the influence of lava-natured chakra. It was not even the effect of the Jutsu yet, merely the chakra Mei was sending from herself through the snow around to deep underground.

As the chakra gathered in one spot, the ground suddenly pulsed and the world grew silent for a brief moment before a loud eruption of lava shook the whole area. The huge stream of orange superheated liquid reached high into the sky before its deadly searing droplets started raining back onto the snow-covered area, changing it into a massive pit of sizzling and hissing hot mist. The only thing safe from the excruciating heat was Mei alone.

The ninjas in Yukigakure watched with bated breath as the land in front of their village was rained upon by droplets lava. Every single one of them was certain this was not a natural occurrence. Which meant... they were under attack. Despite that, deep in their hearts, neither of them wanted to face the person capable of using such a powerful Jutsu.

Alas, desire or not, they were ninjas of Yukigakure and since a threat appeared so close to their village, not even an hour later, around thousand highest-ranked ninjas who were not participating in the battle for the capital of the Land of Snow, found themselves passing the gates of their village, heading towards the still sizzling area in front of it. Most were honestly hoping whoever threw that Jutsu into the wind would be already gone but everyone knew the chances of that was effectively nil.

The Yuki ninjas ran all the way towards their destination, taking extra care to not be ambushed. It took them ten minutes to reach the location where the Jutsu originated and look and behold, right in the middle of the now muddy plain that looked as if a war was fought on it, stood a woman clad in black ANBU clothes and blank white mask with kanji for ROOT on its forehead, impatiently waiting for them with her arms crossed on her chest.

Before their leader could even start questioning the mysterious woman, she spoke with an impatient tone. "Finally! You took your sweet time getting here!"

"Who a-"

"That's not important. What is important is that you have something the Roots of Konoha covets. I came to tell you to hand it over."

"Wha-"

"No, no, no, don't even think to disagree! You saw what I can do. Imagine what a war with Konoha would look like. Hand it over!"

The leader of the Yuki ninjas was really having a profound headache at the demands of the crazy masked redhead. Honestly, he had no idea what Konoha could want from them but judging by the chakra levels and the pressure the woman was continuously blasting them with, he had no plans to clash with her anytime soon.

"I-, I have no idea what you want from us. Is it the chakra armor? If so I am sure when the Yukikage returns, he will certainly talk about trad-"

"Chakra armors!? You mean the useless crap your entire force is wearing? Nah, you can keep that. I came for something else! Hand it over!" She stomped her feet onto the ground, creating cracks all around the place where she stood.

'At least tell me what the fuck do you want!' The leader of the Yuki ninjas wanted to cry.

...

Yukigakure was positioned in the snowy mountain range. Many would think there was only one path in and that was the plain in front of the village where Mei was currently trying and succeeding being annoying while stalling for time.

Konan on the other hand was using the universal entry path to any settlement above the ground, the sky. As Mei attracted the attention of the village, Konan flew inside through the very scarcely protected back of the village that faced a mountain. Nobody would expect such an attack but Konan was a ninja, something the Yukigakure defense designers forget to account for.

Konan had her clothes change into the attire of Yuki ninja. Her own Paper Transformation Jutsu was far superior to its genin equivalent. Then again, it was A-rank Jutsu since she first had to change her body into paper and then mold the paper to a new appearance. Now, however, she was using only the clothes variant and since her clothes were always made of paper, it didn't take even half of the reserves a normal Henge would.

Konan proceeded to create hundred paper clones in an alley that was out of the hand and with those, she started doing her job. Going around the half-empty village while putting tags with spying seals into the walls of important buildings, the Yukikage office, and even on the streets.

Rei decided to let Yukigakure off the hook. Part of the reason for his decision was the fact he didn't have enough ninjas. Uzushio currently had around three hundred of them but even with their superior seals and skills, Rei had no confidence in taking over Yukigakure without losing even one of them.

Well, he and his girls probably could do that with some massive ninjutsu, wiping huge parts of the village out of existence, but the only reason why the main combatants in the defense of the capital of the Land of Snow were ninjas currently staying in Uzushio and not Rei himself was to get his forces some experience and see how well they can work together. He did that because he was certain no one from Uzushio would be hurt, much less killed.

But attacking Yukigakure was a different matter. Konan knew Rei wanted to use Uzushio as cover. People that mattered knew of Yukigakure's existence and its dominance in the Land of Snow. Rei simply wanted this belief to stay alive. Hence, the village would survive in order to cast a shadow on the creation of Rei's new village.

After all, nobody would expect there would be two hidden villages in one nation. Yukigakure would certainly not allow that, right? Well, Yukigakure would have an existential crisis soon enough with most of their jonins and Kage killed. Not like they would find out about a new village rising in the Land of Snow anytime soon.

As such, Konan's clones were now making sure they had proper eyes in Yukigakure while the original was traversing the deep underground tunnels. These tunnels were the only thing the man captured a week prior didn't know about. The poor sod was simply a too low rank. Well, at least he knew they were there.

In short, if the group wanted to know what is deep down here, they had to send somebody to explore. And since Konan had a mission in Yukigakure anyway, she decided to take a little stroll.

Konan knew the strongest and highest-rankers of those who stayed in the village are right now being messed with by Mei. It was not like Mei could not troll her way through the Yuki ninjas for a few hours. Her chakra pressure was too big to not make these generic chunin chaps shitting their pants.

As such, Konan walked through the underground tunnels with an excited skip in her step, looking around searching for a treasure.

"Now then, let's see what do I find here..."