'Yotsuba Ren... it has a nice ring to it.' Ren thought as he arrived in front of a building on the main road with a signboard that stated, 'The Yotsuba Seals' above the entrance.
It had been a week since he established a clan, and the very first thing he did since then was to buy and renovate this building with the intent of opening a shop.
Clans in Konoha had many privileges, and tax evasion was one of them.
Well, alright. It was not exactly tax 'evasion', but they certainly didn't need to pay the same rates as the ordinary mortals.
Konoha had several ways of getting money. The first was the village's cut from the ninja missions. But the village only took a twenty percent cut, and that money was pretty much chump change.
For a single person, it would have been a fortune. For a military organization? It's nothing. It barely funds the relevant departments that do background checks of clients, and gather, investigate, and analyze the requested missions before they are put into the mission office.
The second way was simply selling the loot. Ninjas who destroy bandit camps... or civilian villages, but we don't talk about that... usually bring a nice amount of loot from their missions. Those who don't want to bother with selling the items themselves can hand them to the village, getting a nice, fat, but flat fee in exchange.
Most ninjas take that option, not wanting to spend weeks dealing with merchants.
The village has an entire department of office ninjas who do this. It's why there are so many merchants in Konoha. Scenes akin to straight-up from Storage Wars are common in certain parts of the village. Auctions are happening almost every day.
The only thing a merchant can't buy in Konoha is slaves... and even that is debatable and based on who you know.
Cough, Danzo, cough.
Because of all the merchants, the civilian industry and economy are booming. But even that is just a small part of the cake in comparison to the upkeep a military ninja village has.
Which leads to taxes.
And taxes in Konoha are low, for the most part. On one hand, that is to attract more merchants and trade. On another hand, it is because many residents are retired ninjas or families of ninjas or children of ninjas who died in service, and Konoha can't really tax these people to oblivion.
Keeping taxes low is a show of appreciation. And in return, it drives civilians who do not have ninjas in their family to send their children into the meat grinder in order to receive lower taxes.
Clans... are taxed even less.
They kinda do pay in blood by serving the village, though. So, the fairness of this is up for debate. A clan child does not have much choice in his or her future profession. It's not a question. It's ninja every time.
That was the downside of it.
And because of all this, the funding from the Daimyo is very important to the village. That is the fourth way the village gets money.
That's where the big money is coming from and how Konoha funds all these non-profit departments like T&I, the infiltrators, the saboteurs, the spies, the cryptoanalysis, the barrier corps, and many more.
The Daimyo sugar daddy provides.
That's why Konoha is daddy Daimyo's little bitch. It's economically dependent on his generosity, and he is generous only because the village is useful.
What happens when the Daimyo stops seeing the village as useful? Check Sunagakure.
They are not weak, per se. They are still overwhelmingly ahead of any minor ninja village as far as the military prowess goes. But they had to downsize their military in recent years to such a massive degree to simply survive the lack of funding, that Rasa is straight up considering something that might spark the next Ninja War.
Just so that his village could economically survive.
Ren gently shook his head, deciding to stop thinking about such heavy topics during a joyous occasion like this, and entered his shop.
Instantly, he saw Ino sitting behind the counter, reading... was that Icha-Icha?
Ren's lips quirked up into a small smirk as Ino's wide eyes met his amused gaze, and she yelped before she scrambled to hide the book.
"Yo, Ino. How is it going?" Ren asked, deciding to cut her some slack and not comment about the... oh, who was he kidding? Of course, he was going to comment! "Doing some research for our bedroom activities?" He asked and gave her a meaningful look that made Ino groan.
But the girl was a Yamanaka, so she bounced up from her embarrassment extremely quickly and grinned back at Ren.
"Yeah. There is this one scene where a naked female lead has her wrists bound together by a rope and is hanging from a high branch of a tree, just barely able to reach the ground with the tips of her toes. The protagonist has her at his mercy as he does her from the front, and it sounds so exciting! I'd like you to take me in that position." Ino excitedly rambled, adding a dreamy sigh at the end, and Ren kinda regretted asking as he embarrassedly laughed, his hand involuntarily rubbing the back of his head.
He... should have expected this from Ino. But she still took him off guard. He knew that she was half bullshitting to cover him catching her reading during her work. But he also knew that Ino was very kinky and open to experimentation in the bedroom.
So, who could really tell if she was serious? Not him. He gave up trying long ago.
Mentally screwing with people was a Yamanaka thing. At this point, it was a personality trait for them. Half the time, they did not even realize they were doing it.
Sighing fondly at her antics, Ren leaned forward and ruffled Ino's hair in just the way he knew she found annoying. It was his revenge.
"Hey!" Ino exclaimed and quickly ducked her head away from Ren's hand as she started to run her fingers through her locks in an attempt to fix her hairstyle while giving Ren a small, irritated glare.
But Ren only smiled. Both of them knew that she was fast enough to dodge his hand. She could see it coming. She could have evaded. But she didn't. She let him do it.
She enjoyed these little interactions as much as he did.
"You free right now?" Ino suddenly asked, doing some last adjustments to her hair.
Honestly, it was yet another thing she did just to mess with him. She had his hair jutsu and was way better at it than he was. She could just morph her hair into any preferred perfect hairstyle nearly instantly.
"Yeah, why?" Ren nodded as he picked up a small book from the counter that had all the seals the shop was offering, named and split between various categories.
"I could leave a clone here, and we could go to the back." Ino idly hummed before biting her lower lip, "The storage room needs some thorough... checking."
She rubbed her thighs together, and Ren owlishly blinked at her. "You are horny." He stated.
"Like you wouldn't believe." Ino whinily admitted with red cheeks and a small glare daring him to say something about it.
Ren's head went through several possibilities, and he suddenly smirked at the blonde. "Did you...?"
"Yeah." Ino grumbled and averted her gaze to the side, "I annoyed Hinata, and she mixed something into my morning tea."
Now. To be perfectly fair to Hinata, Ren knew she didn't do this shit for nothing. It would take Ino doing something that truly pissed Hinata off for her to bother mixing a bit of liquid revenge on Ino.
This was not the first time it happened. And Hinata was even courteous enough to let Ino choose. Either she could get diarrhea in a liquid form that would make her unable to stop hugging the toilet for a day, or she could get a pretty annoying aphrodisiac that would keep her exactly on that verge of horniness where she could control herself but she would really want to have sex.
And Hinata asked Ren not to have sex with Ino during these times because, well, it was supposed to be a punishment for the blonde from Hinata.
Both Ren and Hinata were in Ino's head enough times to know that she would never willingly cheat on Ren. Horny or not, she would just silently suffer through it, hating every second.
That's what made it a punishment on the same level as uncontrollable Diarrhea.
Ren briefly considered asking what she had done to piss Hinata off like this. It was rare as it happened only two times in the past several months.
But in the end, he decided it was not his business. The girls would deal with it among themselves.
Instead, he teasingly asked with a grin, "Had any Inuzuka customers today?"
"Fuck you." Ino groaned because, yes, she did have them. And it was awkward as hell when they could smell... yeah.
"You wish." Ren quipped back, and Ino huffed.
"I do!" She strongly exclaimed, and Ren chuckled before he leaned forward, his hands grabbing Ino's head before he smashed his lips against hers, and they made out for a minute.
When they separated, Ren looked at the slightly panting blond girl with a gentle gaze, "There. That should make it more bearable for you."
"One more kiss?" Ino 'innocently' asked. "Please?"
"No." Ren snorted. "You wouldn't want Hinata to decide to lengthen your punishment, would you?"
"Ugh. Fine." Ino grumbled but relented.
"There was this Inuzuka guy today." Ino sat back down in her chair and started to casually speak. "I had to punch him in the face and kick his dog in the balls because he just wouldn't take 'No' and continued his dog brand of forceful flirting with me after smelling my arousal." She let out a tired sigh. "Sorry if this causes problems between you and the Inuzuka clan or causes a bad reputation for the shop." She sheepishly apologized.
"Nah. Punch away." Ren shrugged. He doubted Tsume would complain about it. As for the reputation, his shop was built on offering special services and seals that the ninjas simply can not get anywhere else. Who cared about reputation when he had no competition?
People would come and buy his shit anyway. It wasn't an issue.
Besides, Ino was a good clerk. After her clan training as a Yamanaka, she could read people like an open book while barely trying. Her customers usually left satisfied because she simply knew how to deal with people and had a lot of experience from her family's flower shop.
Her mother was almost reluctant to let her go work for Ren. But there were other Yamanaka children whom she could hire to assist her in her shop, so it wasn't such a big deal.
Ino working for Ren, in the new shop of the Yotsuba clan, was a visible statement of their alliance and relationship. It was some political mumbo jumbo that Ren stopped caring about after Inoichi explained it.
He... didn't really remember most of it, to be honest.
He didn't mind employing Ino to help him with the shop. And for him, the shop was just a way to give Konoha's ninjas some good seals that could improve their combat effectiveness.
It was a small way to prepare them for the next Ninja War. To elevate their combat effectiveness and hopefully, make a little bit of positive change to the future.
He didn't care about the politics of it.
Ino wanted to do it, too, and that was pretty much the major deciding factor for Ren. It simply meant that instead of using one clone for the shop, there would also be either the original Ino or her shadow clone present in there.
Ino opened her mouth and was about to reply when the door to the shop opened, interrupting their chat. They both looked toward it, only to see Tenten enter the shop and curiously look around.
Ino sighed and slumped a bit with a small frown, now, while Tenten was not looking at her just yet, but she almost instantly straightened and donned a nice, professional smile.
Chuckling a bit, Ren put his hand on Ino's shoulder, getting her attention.
"Just take a small break. I can deal with the girl."
Ino let out a relieved breath. "Thank you. This girl was here yesterday, and she just can't shut up about seals. She is a very tiring customer."
Ren hummed. Now wasn't that interesting? Somebody who shared his passion for seals enough to make even Ino give up on them?
He glanced at the bun-haired girl and leaned on the counter as he beckoned her to approach.
She couldn't really be that bad, could she?