The Shopkeeper of Konoha

Adopting Naruto, teaching him new moves, the techniques that were supposedly exclusive to his family, and even making a powerful empire. His friends were powerful, to say the least, and Hiruzen wasn't stupid enough to not see his moves.

And until now, he was never politically motivated. So what was his plan? And there was another fact. For the first time, Aoto didn't show much respect for him. But he couldn't blame Aoto for that. His decisions had almost hurt Naruto, so he could also overlook it, but the fact that Aoto didn't seem to show him the previous respect did make him uncomfortable, but there was nothing he could do about it.

He deserved it anyways.

"You have done everything possible to make your name known to nearby villages and Konoha. I am sure you will be remembered for a long time. Maybe longer than me," Hiruzen said.

"Hokage-sama, we both know that you aren't here to talk if I was interested in political drama or not. You just want to know if I am supporting the Uchiha or not. Isn't that right?" Aoto straight away asked him. Hiruzen almost choked on the fluffy cake, hearing how clear Aoto was.

He looked deeply into the eyes of Aoto, trying to find if Aoto was trying to deceive him, trying to get the upper hand in the conversation and the situation that Konoha had found themselves.

"Do you support them?" Hiruzen asked.

"No. I owed Shisui a favor for helping us in the first process of using prosthetics. If Konoha wants to go after them, they can, and I have already washed my hands off it," Aoto said. This surprised Hiruzen, as he didn't expect that Aoto was only returning the one favor the Uchiha did to him so long ago.

Now the prosthetic business was quite a boom, and even surrounding villages have come forward to buy from them. This had also given Konoha quite the leverage, made Konoha stronger both internally and externally.

"The Uchiha will be a protected clan from now, and Danzo went above board, as I hadn't given any such orders to go after Shisui and the Uchiha clan," Hiruzen said, while Aoto nodded. They both knew what the whole story was, but none of them spoke about it. They just acted dumb to each other.

"But it can't be denied that your friends tried to hurt one of the people of Konoha. This can't be looked over," Hiruzen stopped after saying that. He wanted to see how Aoto reacted to it, and to the surprise of Hiruzen, Aoto was still calm.

"How do you wish me to compensate you?" Aoto asked.

"I am thankful that you understand the laws of Konoha. I want your friends to get evaluated as ninjas and work for Konoha," Hiruzen said. Aoto shook his head and replied. Hiruzen was quite happy that Aoto didn't outright reject. If he did, Hiruzen was ready to bring Aoto down, he was a genius but a genius needed to be under control or else it would turn sour pretty soon for Konoha.

"No. They will never be evaluated. At best, you can ask them for missions, and they will accept or reject depending on their mood. I will never force them to do anything," Aoto said.

"That is not enough. Many of the Root ninjas are in the hospital after what one of their own doctors did to them. This can't be overlooked," Hiruzen insisted.

"That is too much. How about the previous arrangement I suggested, and I owe you a favor. If you need help in any kind of bad situation, we will help you get out," Aoto proposed. These words surprised Hiruzen because he didn't expect Aoto to be that confident, where a day would come for him to ask for help from Aoto.

He didn't look down on Aoto or something, but he never felt like he would need help from him. But then the way Aoto's eyes looked at him made him feel as if Aoto was sure that he would be able to save him.

"You seem to be confident that I will need your favor," Hiruzen inquired. Aoto just smiled at him. Hiruzen took a deep breath and proceeded to nod, signifying that he would accept the deal.

"Good. They will be registered as ninjas from now on in Konoha. Since you don't want them to be evaluated, they will start from genin, and depending on the success of missions, they will be promoted," Hiruzen said. Aoto nodded, as he knew the whole process. But he still had a question.

"Hokage-sama, I just assaulted all of your friends, but how come you still trust me and my friends?"

"Because we old people need to get out and make space for the new ones. I really hope that you can be the next Hokage. Only then can Konoha prosper in peace," Hiruzen expressed, to which Aoto just rolled his eyes. Both of them spoke more about the missions they would be given and how they would have to work under a jonin.

Of course, Shikuro didn't need one as he was already a jonin and would be leading his own team.

"Kisuke might not accept many missions as he is the manager of our company," Aoto said. Hiruzen was a bit disappointed as he felt he would get a better gauge of his abilities, but he couldn't be a roadblock always.

Kisuke would be asked to do one mission every two months at least, while the others one to two missions in a month. Each mission not exceeding a week. This was enough. The starting missions would be D-level missions anyway, so Aoto knew that they would be easy, and in later stages, it was a question if Hiruzen would still be the Hokage or not at the time.

After this was done, Hiruzen asked for forgiveness for what happened to Naruto and also hinted to stay away from the Uchiha for a while as he needed to decide what to do with them. The Uchiha had recently calmed down a lot, but he was reluctant to trust them.

There was always a fear that they would rise up in the future and cause troubles for them.