State of Operations

With Nagato's matter settled and Amegakure joining the cause, Shiki's progress to his final objective took a great leap forward.

The Akatsuki and Obito were cornered to the point Shiki could directly force them to move along the paths he desired so long as he was careful of how he went about doing it.

As such, Shiki went to look for his other ongoing business. The Ama no Hoku was something that interested him greatly as its power was not really explored in the series and it was certain to be great but he would prefer that the infrastructure around it be built first for safety reasons.

The base of Mount Shumisen was progressing nicely in its construction and as soon as it finished it would become a second HQ. Shiki did not like to "have all of his eggs in one basket" as it were but most of his power and resources were focused and stored in the Desert Fortress alone.

While it would take a powerful Otsutsuki or two to breach its defences, Shiki was quite paranoid and, who could tell if the whole clan would get mad after he kills three or four of them and steals their secrets.

They could get royally pissed and send an entire army of Otsutsukis down to harrasm his poor self so he was adamant about building more main bases. One on Mount Shumisen and, if the Ama no Hoko proved to be great enough of an asset, one there too.

As for the two plots he had hatching in regards to the two movies, they were each progressing at their own pace.

The idiots from the Land of the Sky were far too incompetent so the construction of their sky fortress was getting late, farr to late for Shiki's tastes as he decided to change his plans a fair bit.

As for the business in the Land of Demons, that one was progressing quite well. The group led by Yomi, a criminal Medical Nin was in the process of unsealing the soul of Moryo, a powerful demon from another world.

Normally they would need for a few stars to align and whatnot but Shiki, while hiding his tracks of course, "kindly" provided them with the raw energy necessary to surpass that restriction and soon, the soul of the demon would once again be unleashed.

These two plots however, were not a chance for Mugetsu or the Reaper though. No, these were chances for Shiki as himself to start making his powerful savior reputation.

His character and goodness of his heart had already spread. Now he needed to prove his power to lend the necessary weight to his words and thoughts, otherwise, the true bigwigs of the world would never truly respect him and only make a show of it.

But they would still take a while though being just small fry. Shiki alone could have shattered that puny seal in seconds since it was not built to handle attack from the outside by a being with his scale of power along with his knowledge of sealing but that would defeat the purpose.

Those fools would stupidly unleash Moryo with their ridiculous notions that the demon will reward them for their effort for some reason or another and Shiki will swoop in and save the day, winning the heart of the Miko of the Land of Demons in the process.

On side, he would then secretly summon the souls of all the previous Miko and steal their power while pretending to destroy Moryo but sealing him and taking him away instead.

That simple plan was good enough due to the fact that Shiki was just that powerful so he could take care of the problem just like that.

Until the moment of truth came, Shiki would just be going around his domain, flirting with his girls, hanging with his newly made male friend he had been in desperate need of, and just inspecting the progress of his various construction projects in person even though Aion already took care of it, just to kill some time.

Meanwhile, his poor Soul Clones were hard at work doing research. As time passed, Shiki had realized that the soul clones simply did not possess enough of a vessel to hold his growing power. As such, while they were his equal in every way in the past, right now, they were significantly weaker.

Not that they were actually weak though, they could still take on pretty much anyone in the world in a one on one and win but they could no longer keep up with the godlike Shiki in his increases in power.

Still, while Shiki current actions could be misconstrued as laziness and complacency for doing needless things and just going around instead of training, it was not that at all.

Shiki had it a bottleneck and, with his power, mere training no longer did much, it did not increase his strength and his own mastery of his abilities was already pretty much perfect. What he truly needed, was enlightenment, a chance for a breakthrough.

A lot of sagely crap of his previous life spoke about experiencing the mundane life and draw enlightenment form that and stuff so Shiki was just trying his hand at that. Immersing himself in the normalcy as it were.

Even then, it was just something to try out in his free time. Once he had gathered all the pieces of his original chakra beast, made with the half he stole from all the tailed beasts among other things and fused it with himself, not just as a jinchuuriki but something deeper, then his true evolution would come.

For now though, he had to make due and search for alternate methods to get stronger. He even visited the White Sage Snake a couple of times and, seeing how close Shiki was to the ideal of a true dragon that all snake sages seeked, she immediately swore her loyalty to him under the Soul Contract so long as he shared those secrets.

SHiki saw no reason to refuse and started going more times to the Ryuchi Cave to converse with the old snake and fool around with the three snake sisters in their human forms.

He had to say . . . They were truly flexible like snakes and their tongue skills . . . Heavenly didn't even begin to describe it. As such, he became an even more frequent customer.

All the snakes of the cave served him with great reverence as well, calling him the Advent of the Dragon and treating him with the highest respect.

The experiences now freely shared by the White Snake Sage also helped him greatly to clear some of his doubts and make his path forward more clear. Her views on what a True Dragon should be also helped Shiki envision what he should aim for.

The days continued to pass and Shiki could see every part of his territory, whether officially his or secretly his, was modernizing at a rapid pace. Koyuki was swimming in riches due to the fact all modern infrastructure came from her government owned business.

Whether it were shady jobs for the Reaper and Mugetsu and proper Jobs from Shiki and other officiel entities, the money flowed in and the Land of Spring and Snow earned the reputation of lant of tourism and trade where everyone was welcome so long as no trouble was caused.

Of course, for this peace to be maintained, any and all troublemakers were swiftly disappeared regardless of strength of background, establishing the country as an inviolable neutral ground where no external conflict could be brought in. The strengthened Yukigakure Nin made sure of that.

Suna's underground railways were nearly done as well and soon they would become connected to Konoha, further strengthening their alliance and connection as two villages that would back up Shiki's actual identity and his words in the future.

As such, a strong united front of two villages enjoying massive benefits from Shiki's "connections" to the Land of Spring and Snow would be a great start.

The just mentioned Land of Spring and Snow could officially declare its support for him as well once its influence spread more but Shiki preferred it remained a truly neutral ground in every sense of the word so if no big changes occured, the would not "officially" support anyone.

As for who various different people within the country personally lended their assistance too, that had nothing to do with the country's official stance. They just needed not to be to obvious, it was just politics.

Eventually though, Shiki's days of peace ended as the time Moryo's soul was set free was upon the world and it was time for him to ready his act.

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P.a.t.r.e.o.n is officially up!

The link is: https://www.p.a.t.r.e.o.n.com/lusoba without the extra dots of course.

You'll get to read up to FOUR week ahead, a full month, but I'll still post here.

There's also my other novel Archon of DanMachi, do check it out!

I would greatly appreciate any support since this is going to be my breadwinner.