"I think I may have spotted a flaw in my cunning plan," Inoue-sensei commented as she examined the package delivered by the villagers as a reward for the clay-obtaining mission. The grateful villagers had rewarded the group with exactly four sets of fresh clothes—ones which perfectly fit Hazō, Wakahisa, Mori, and Inoue-sensei's teenage girl disguise.

"Normally I'd always have a cache with a change of clothes around when infiltrating as a kid," Inoue-sensei lamented. "Though I'd rather not infiltrate as a kid at all. In the long term, it's way more of a pain than acting as an adult woman—or man—and then you'd better hope it's not a seduction mission. There aren't enough baths in the world to feel clean after one of those."

The three genin shuddered, and did their best not to think about this.

"But forget that!" Inoue-sensei flicked her hands in the air as if shooing away an unpleasant thought. "I've been every kind of seamstress on my missions. Get me some extra cloth and I'm sure I can figure something out. In the meantime, you guys are going to cheer me up by impressing me with the vast amount of information you doubtless acquired while I was busy."

o-o-o-o

"Ninja?" The fishmonger asked with a wry smile as he carved up another piece of disturbingly purple meat. "We don't really see no ninja from one year to the next, and it's rarer than that for them to actually help out like you're doing, Heavens bless. 'course, what we do see from time to time is travellers coming in on their own from the wilderness without a scratch on 'em, all mysterious-like, and turning up their noses at everything they see. So, y'know, never hurts to be polite when someone is passing through. Now, since you're here 'n all, how about some bilecarp? Freshest catch, and I'll even give you an extra measure since you helped out my cousin."

Hazō studied the...thing in front of him. Its dead eye gazed balefully at him, as if to say "your stomach versus my flesh, one round, winner takes all."

"Th-Thank you, sir. Maybe another time."

o-o-o-o

"That's mighty kind of you, lass, but we don't need no opti-sation round here. We use good old-fashioned cow dung instead. Plough the soil, plant the seeds, season later we harvest. Gotta rotate what stuff you plant on each field each year, else the soil will go bad. Hard work the lot of it, even for a good iron-arm like meself, but we get paid back in full once reaping season rolls round. You stick around 'til then, you'll see it all. The stuffy old chief starts speechifying about how we've made it through another year, and giving thanks to the forefathers, and then right before everyone falls asleep, he finally shuts up and we get on with the music, and the dancing, and a great many fun things that you're too young to hear about."

o-o-o-o

"Currency? Ha. You're daft if you think anyone'll take Iron ryō, boy. No, we use hard Leaf ryō 'round here. National pride's for the soft men down south, not for honest folk as has to eke out a living however they can.

"Not that we see much trade in a little village like this, y'understand, roads being what they are. But once a year or so, the Baikan Caravan rolls by and we sell some pots, hides, dragonfly stings or deep-biter scales or what have you, and buy ore and coal, maybe a few luxuries. If we're lucky, maybe another caravan will turn up later, but only a fishbrain counts on luck.

"Anyway, easier to do trade in kind out here: a stack of ryō ain't much good to you when the snows pile high, but a good trading fur, on the other hand.... You bear that in mind if you want to go trading with those snooty Rachiganians up north, or the drunkards in Mina over past the hills to the east.

"The wildlife? Oh, it's not so bad. We're one of the safer regions. The drop-bunnies are no threat, they just burrow themselves into the earth soon as they smell a threat. Now the big dragonflies, they're more serious. You breathe in that green powder they shed, all your muscles seize up, and then they carry bits of you off into the treetops just like that. So if you don't want to end up with a bunch of eggs laid in you, you hold your breath and you run when you hear the buzzing.

"Oh, and then there's the black hunter in the woods, but no one rightly knows what that thing is. You go into the woods, you be careful, and you watch for the eyes glinting in the shadows. And of course there are the waterbugs what got poor Genzō. I told him not to go fishing on the northern side, I told him, but would he listen? When the lake water glints, the wise fisherman sprints. Children know that one.

"Say, boy," the healer's eyes narrowed as she moved onto a different train of thought, "I've got a daughter 'round your age. Lovely blonde hair, eyes you could lose yourself in, all her own teeth.... Now I know you're a mite young, but we're practical folk round here. What say I introduce you two?"

Hazō, whose dating experience consisted of some combination of zero, zip, zilch and naught, was at a loss for words. Fortunately, Wakahisa was quick to come to the rescue in his own inimitable fashion.

"Oh, don't worry about him, ma'am. He's not into girls that way."

The healer gave Hazō a funny look. Keeping his face perfectly straight, Hazō flashed some brief hand signs under the table to Wakahisa. You. Certain death. Imminent.

Fortunately, karmic justice was restored instantly. "Oh, dearie me. Well, I suppose you'll do just as well, redhead." The woman raised her voice. "Ayako, will you come over here?"

Mori's appalled face flashed across Wakahisa's mind.

"I'm sorry my mission told me I have to sharpen my instructor before the next kunai I have to go now!"

Wakahisa fled. Hazō stammered something incoherent and followed at maximum ninja speed.

o-o-o-o

Granny Yoshino fixed her good eye on the three visitors, and took another long draw from her pipe.

"Ah, you'll be the children everyone's been making such a fuss about. But I have no requests for you. No, I'm quite happy as I am, thank you," she said, letting loose an unhealthy-sounding rattling cough.

"We were told that you were, um, the village's best storyteller," Hazō said. "We were hoping to hear about the history of the Country of Iron."

Granny Yoshino raised her eyebrows. "Well, now. Curiosity's a fine thing in the young. Take a seat—mind the cat—and I will tell you the story as it was told to me by my mother, and to her by her mother, and to her by Old Man Kanda who always thought he knew everything."

Her voice took on a melodic, ritualised quality, ruined only by the occasional cough.

"The Land of Iron is harsh, but fair. To those who do nothing, she gives nothing, but to those who bend their backs in worship, she once gave all the riches of the earth.

"In time, those riches attracted the eyes of the cursed shinobi, who cannot see a thing without desiring it, and cannot desire a thing without at once taking it by force. For countless generations, we lived under their thrall, our daimyo nothing but a helpless puppet, all that was best in our land sent to the clans of the south as tribute to line their pockets.

"But one day he was born. Ashikage no Yōtarō, the Liberator. The Liberator was blessed by the Heavens with more of the magic called chakra than a dozen of the cursed shinobi, and he had a vision. Hidden away in the wastelands of the north, he devised a sword art that drew its strength from any man's chakra, be it as mighty as a storm or as feeble as a falling teardrop, so that no longer would all power be held by a few oppressors while the greater part of mankind suffered beneath their yoke.

"When the time was right, he came to seek disciples within each of the great cities. He told them that the way of the cursed shinobi was the way of spies, thieves and assassins, and preached of another way, a way for men of honour to serve their land. He taught all who wished it the art of the samurai, the honoured servant that carries out the will of the people. And when the cursed shinobi came to collect their due once more, the samurai cut them down like the dogs they were, and set their heads upon spears outside the great city of Konoma.

"But the armies of freedom were not ready. When next the cursed shinobi came, they came in force, an alliance of clans such as could not have been imagined in those early days. They slew the Liberator and hunted down every last one of his disciples. They burned all of the great cities to the ground to ensure that no trace of rebellion survived, and they placed cruel overseers so that we would never think to rise again.

"Now the Land of Iron is a shadow of what it once was. The cursed shinobi pillaged the land until there was nothing left, then left her for dead. But we know that the iron of our land is not only within the earth, but also within each of our hearts, and we await the prophesised time when the Liberator shall return to turn that iron into a warrior's steel."

Wakahisa said the first thing on his mind. "Aren't you afraid that the ninja will punish you for talking about them like that?"

Hazō tried to kick him in the ankle as subtly as possible. But Granny Yoshino didn't seem to think there was anything odd about the question."What could they take from us that they haven't taken already?" she said bitterly. "What have they got to fear now they've slain our warriors and broken our weapons? The only shinobi with any interest in us anymore are the missing-nin, and they are the enemy of our enemy."

She gave Hazō and the others a meaningful look, but said nothing more.