Naruto: I Level Up by Drawing Cards

In front of the Buddhist shrine, incense smoke drifted, and the chanting ceased.

Under the announcement of the old head monk of the Fire Temple, the Obon Festival ceremony entered its next stage.

As the supreme leader of Konoha Village, the Third Hokage also made a grand appearance at this moment.

In previous years, Hiruzen Sarutobi would not have attended such festive occasions.

However, the past year had been the one with the highest number of Ninja casualties since Konoha entered the Second Great Ninja War.

Countless relatives and comrades of Konoha villagers had since laid to rest on the battlefield, and the Third Hokage needed to take this opportunity to step forward, soothe people's hearts, deliver a speech, and reignite morale.

After all, this protracted war had only eased up slightly in the past month or two, and there were no signs of it ending anytime soon.

If Konoha wanted to survive this great war, it needed to invigorate everyone once again to make even more sacrifices for the war.

"The Sandaime speaks so movingly."

Uchiha Mikoto sat beside Gen, her white, lotus-root-like calves extending from beneath her skirt, swinging back and forth.

The latter glanced at the Third Hokage, who was speaking passionately on the stage, and then at the beauty beside him, who was resting her chin in her hands.

"He is an excellent orator, and the Village needs such a person to unite all its strength to win this great war."

Uchiha Gen had his own firm worldview, cultivated from over a decade of education in his past life and several years of social work experience; he did not care much for the Third Hokage's version of the Will of Fire, which sounded noble and great but was hollow at its core.

Hiruzen Sarutobi is an excellent orator, an excellent politician, and even at this current point in time, his performance as Hokage is commendable, having led Konoha to its peak, but he is definitely not an excellent thinker.

Behind the success of any great ideology, what is needed is not only a great thinker but also for that thinker to be a great practitioner, so that theoretical ideas can be turned into practical guiding principles.

Hiruzen Sarutobi was trying hard to think, trying hard to do things in his own way, and was interpreting and filling the Will of Fire in his own way based on his own practical experiences and successful precedents.

He might truly possess some of the Will of Fire, but the Will of Fire he interpreted and filled was meant to better promote his own political philosophy and consolidate his own political position, with the goal of uniting all the civilians and Ninja clans of Konoha under his ideology.

When Hiruzen Sarutobi used the Will of Fire as a political tool, it was destined that he could not develop the Will of Fire to any great extent; being able to develop the Will of Fire, which was founded during the eras of the First and Second Hokage, into a framework that could achieve logical self-consistency, was already his limit.

However, at the very least, he was eloquent, could speak beautifully, possessed a certain infectiousness in his passionate speeches, and left no major flaws in his words, indeed achieving a good effect for the time being.

Things like carrying the ideals of predecessors and bearing the will of those who sacrificed themselves truly influenced quite a few people.

At least Uchiha Mikoto was somewhat moved by it, and the Konoha Ninja below, under the guidance of the Third Hokage, let their despondency fade away and reignited their morale.

During this period, throughout all of Konoha, only Hiruzen Sarutobi had the ability and prestige to achieve this.

The Third Hokage's political speech ended, but the Obon Festival ceremony was still continuing.

Monks led the crowd to worship the Buddha, praying for the Buddha to let the spirits rest in peace, and some people left the crowd to go to the Naka River to release river lanterns.

"It's over, Gen. We should go release our river lanterns. If you have anything you want to say to those who have passed away, just write it on these."

Uchiha Mikoto took out money to give to the monk, buying a few river lanterns made of bamboo strips and white paper.

"Okay."

Uchiha Gen took the river lanterns, picked up a small brush from the tray the monk was holding, pondered for a moment, and simply wrote words on two of the lanterns.

One was to comfort the deceased relatives of his original body, and the other was to pay tribute to the comrades who died in the war.

Seeing this, Uchiha Mikoto also silently picked up a brush and wrote her own words.

The bamboo strips were pushed open, supporting the white paper, delicately transforming into a small lantern.

On the bottom of the lantern made of banana leaves was a lid filled with lamp oil, and on the cotton wick above, a candle flame burned, enough to stay lit all night.

Uchiha Gen and Mikoto stood together by the river, very close, the former even able to smell the faint fragrance of hair coming from the latter, which was refreshing and heart-warming.

A few water lanterns were placed on the river surface by the two, flowing downstream, merging into the thousands of lights, carrying countless thoughts and hopes, drifting into the distance.

In the distance, the Great Elder, supported by Mika, leaned on his cane, watching the young boy and girl by the river, stroking his long beard, a faint smile on his aged face, quietly watching this scene.

Further away, Uchiha Fugaku, who was intending to find the Great Elder to discuss something, also happened to see this scene, so he stopped in his tracks, his expression uncertain.

Recently, the Second Elder and Third Elder had been probing frequently; it looked like the situation with his father, the Clan Head, could not be hidden for much longer.

If he could gain the support of the Great Elder, combined with his father's foundation and the prestige he had accumulated over the past few years, he had more than a sixty percent chance of securing the position of Clan Head.

And the key he hoped to use to bind the Great Elder was Uchiha Mikoto.

However, it seemed now that this apple of the Great Elder's eye had apparently already been spoken for by someone else.

"Uchiha Gen, I didn't expect you to rise so quickly."

Uchiha Fugaku watched the young boy and girl walking towards the crowd after releasing the river lanterns, still hesitating on the spot.

More than a year ago, he had thought very highly of Uchiha Gen and had thought about befriending this newly rising genius of the younger generation within the clan, to recruit him under his command, as in time, he would surely be able to provide assistance in his bid for Clan Head.

But now, Uchiha Gen had become the heir to the Great Elder's faction, and with him and Mikoto together, it was hard for anyone else to have a chance to intervene.

"Could it be another competitor?"

Furrowing his brows, Uchiha Fugaku took one last look at Mikoto and Gen, who were watching the Obon dance together in the crowd, and turned to leave without a word.

It was not just the Great Elder and Fugaku who were paying attention to Uchiha Gen.

Having left the Obon dance ceremony, Hiruzen Sarutobi, escorted by several Anbu, found a temporary place to review documents.

"Sandaime, this is the record of the text on the river lanterns of the key personnel you ordered us to focus on."

Just having taken off his Hokage robe and sat down, the Third Hokage soon saw the water lanterns that several Anbu had fished out of the water using Ninjutsu.

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