Chapter 108: From Now On, It’s The Land Of Stars【subscribe】
Capital City of the Land of Bears, inside the Hoshigakure Base.
In the courtyard of the Uzumaki House, laughter and joy filled the air as White and Kimimaro accompanied Karin in playing the game of eagle catching chicks.
Karin, who rarely got to play with peers her age, had a brilliant smile blooming on her face.
Uzumaki Kushina sat on the veranda, watching the scene with a contented look in her eyes, feeling very relaxed and at ease.
One year ago today, she had been trapped in Kusanagi Village, forced to act as a “human blood bag,” providing treatment to the injured ninja of Kusanagi Village.
The compensation she received was merely a place to stay and some food to fill her stomach. At that time, Karin was malnourished, skinny and bony, let alone receiving any proper education.
Her life now was already immense happiness for her.
“Once the new school is built next year, the children can start attending.” A familiar voice suddenly came from beside Uzumaki Kushina.
She quickly stood up and bowed: “Lord.”
“No need to mind me.” Menma waved his hand signaling Kushina to sit, then he himself sat down on the veranda.
With the Land of Bears and Hoshigakure on the right track, construction of the Ninja Academy could also begin.
It was not only about systematically training combat ninja, but also medical ninja, research ninja, artisan ninja, and other technical branches.
It wasn’t just the Ninja Academy; Menma planned to establish a comprehensive education system in the Land of Bears, setting up schools for ordinary people in villages and towns, implementing compulsory education, discovering commoner children with ninja talent, and enrolling them in the Ninja Academy for systematic training.
Of course, with the Land of Bears’ current financial situation, it couldn’t yet afford nine years of compulsory education, so at this stage Menma planned to implement a six-year compulsory education system, with schools and teacher resources handled by the government.
“Lord, I saw the new policy you wrote earlier; isn’t six years of compulsory education too long?” Uzumaki Kushina cautiously raised the question.
As the executor of the new policy, she was well aware of its massive scale.
Although the Land of Bears was a small country, it had around one million people. Under Menma’s six-year compulsory education system, children from six to twelve years old would receive compulsory education, and then additional education would be provided to those from twelve to sixteen.
In this war-torn ninja world, children matured early, and at twelve years old, they were already an important labor force.
“The most important thing to eliminate poverty is to eliminate illiteracy.” Menma deeply understood the importance of education.
In the ninja world, a transcendent realm with chakra systems and nature energy systems, educational resources were basically tilted toward Ninja Academies, and ordinary people in various countries had very little access to education.
“We can gather children with ninja talent and have them study at the Ninja Academy.” Uzumaki Kushina still didn’t quite understand.
Just the children from six to twelve years old numbered eighty to ninety thousand across the entire Land of Bears! And additional education and night classes for those under sixteen, encouraging literacy eradication, could push that number beyond 150,
Educating such a massive number of people would be an enormous project!
“You’ll know in the future.” Menma didn’t rush to explain the purpose of universal compulsory education to Uzumaki Kushina.
The ninja world was a very cruel place; those without ninja talent remained ordinary people their entire lives.
The compulsory education Menma promoted was mainly cultural education for commoners, with only Ninja Academies teaching ninjutsu and such.
During the compulsory education phase, commoner children with ninja talent discovered from the populace would be sent to the Ninja Academy at the Hoshigakure Base in the capital city for ninja training.
But compulsory education for ordinary people could greatly improve the quality of the citizenry.
The simplest example: the ninja tool production factory inside the Hoshigakure Base, producing kunai, shuriken, explosive tags, various ninja swords, and more.
Aside from a few master craftsmen who were ninja artisans, the other dozens of workers were ordinary people without ninja talent, their cultural level only slightly higher than average, and now they had night classes for cultural education every day.
“Lord!” An Anbu ninja landed in front of Menma, kneeling on one knee respectfully: “The envoy from the Land of Birds has arrived.”
Menma said to Uzumaki Kushina: “You go take a look.”
“Yes.” Uzumaki Kushina stood up and acknowledged the order.
In the living room, the envoy from the Land of Birds was initially trembling with fear.
“You are the new leader of Hoshigakure, the new ruler of the Land of Bears?” The envoy from the Land of Birds was dressed magnificently, but he had been shivering all the way, fearing he would be slaughtered by the other side; he had heard plenty about how the daimyo and nobles of the Land of Bears were massacred.
But upon seeing the red-haired woman seated in the main seat, the envoy from the Land of Birds was stunned, not expecting such a young woman to be in charge.
“I am not the leader.” Uzumaki Kushina shook her head, looking at this scrawny envoy who had shifted from tension to haughty arrogance: “Whatever you have to say, I can convey it on your behalf, and I also have the authority to conduct diplomatic talks with you.”
The envoy from the Land of Birds muttered something under his breath, his eyes constantly sizing up Uzumaki Kushina.
Then he said with a smiling face: “Our daimyo hopes to establish good relations and trade with your country, and to recognize your new… daimyo.”
“The name of the Land of Bears can also be dropped; let it become history.”
The fall of a small country was common in the Warring States Period, and only great powers like the Five Great Nations could maintain relative stability.
Even in the fifty-plus years after the Warring States Period ended, two countries had been destroyed: the Land of Whirlpools and the Land of Sky.
The daimyo and nobles of other countries didn’t care about the extinction of foreign nations, as long as it didn’t happen to them.
The main reason the drastic changes in the Land of Bears caused a strong shock among the western countries on the Ninja Continent was that this time, it was Hoshigakure ninja who slaughtered the daimyo and nobles, breaking the previous employment relationship between daimyo, the noble class, and ninja.
And in the half-year since the drastic changes in the Land of Bears, Hoshigakure ninja had not expanded outward or attacked other countries, staying quietly within the Land of Bears’ borders.
The daimyo and nobles of surrounding countries then felt relieved, and even a narrative emerged that it was a private contradiction between the Land of Bears’ daimyo and Hoshigakure that led to the slaughter of the daimyo and nobles.
Thus, under the instigation of the Land of Earth daimyo, the Land of Birds daimyo sent an envoy to Hoshigakure in the Land of Bears to recognize the other’s new daimyo.
After the envoy from the Land of Birds conveyed their daimyo’s intentions, he stepped back to await a reply.
Menma walked out from the shadows.
“Lord, how should we reply?” Uzumaki Kushina asked softly.
The Land of Birds was just an ordinary small country without a ninja village, weaker in national power than the Land of Bears, and surely had a great power pulling strings behind it.
“From now on, call it the Land of Stars.” Menma planned to bide his time and see what these daimyo were up to.
