Just as Hashirama was feeling confused.
In the distance, a middle-aged woman in tattered clothes also hurried over in a panic.
She hugged the daring little girl, then apologized and begged for mercy with cold hands and feet and a trembling body:
"I am so sorry. I am so sorry!"
"It's my fault for not disciplining my child and causing her to offend some ninja masters! Forgive me, sirs! I will leave now and take my daughter away."
The woman hugged her daughter, prostrated herself, and admitted her mistake, while trying to escape quickly.
"Wait a moment!"
Hashirama called out to the mother and child.
The latter trembled all over, immediately knelt down, and begged for mercy again.
"Please don't harm me, sir! I truly did not mean to offend you!"
Her daughter did not understand, but her mother knew it clearly.
The ninja in front of her was a superhuman who could kill monsters tens of meters tall.
If they made such a person angry, there was no way they could survive!
"Don't be agitated. I don't want your lives, and I won't harm you and your daughter. I just want to know what this child just said, that I killed her father. What happened?"
Hashirama asked gently so as not to make the woman more afraid.
"No, that's not the case!"
The little girl's mother was clearly too afraid of the ninja to respond.
But the girl herself did not have much fear, perhaps because she was young and knew nothing.
She stared directly at Hashirama and accused him loudly.
"It's him!"
"Mom, you mean Dad died because of those ninjas?"
"Shh!"
The woman was terrified and immediately covered her daughter's mouth, quickly explaining:
"No, no! Child, you misheard! I never said that."
Tobirama frowned and directly scolded: "Just say whatever my brother asks, we won't harm you!"
"Tobirama, shut up!" Hashirama choked Tobirama.
Tobirama was even more terrifying than Uchiha!
"My brother is a bit radical. Don't worry, we won't harm you. Please tell me what happened. If it really has something to do with me, I am willing to do my best to make amends!"
"Really! I just ask the sir to let us go! Please!"
The woman still did not want to tell the truth, and it was unclear whether she was afraid of Hashirama and the others or had other concerns.
"Sigh…"
Hashirama sighed and decided that forcing her was not a good idea.
Judging from the situation, it would be difficult to get useful information.
So he looked at Madara beside him, hoping Madara could help.
With just one look, Madara understood what Hashirama meant. Although a bit reluctant, he would not refuse Hashirama's request.
So, Madara opened his Sharingan, only activating the basic three tomoe, and casually looked at the woman.
The latter immediately fell into an illusion and her emotions stabilized.
She began to tell the truth of the incident.
It turned out that this mother and child were just ordinary farmers living outside the Daimyo's Palace. When the Bijuu attacked some time ago, they tried to avoid the disaster.
Most farmers outside the city were forced to move into the city.
They thought this was a good deed done by the Daimyo's Prefecture to protect the people.
Finally, three days ago, the Bijuu was successfully driven away.
A large number of farmers joyfully left the city and returned home, but suddenly found that their homes had been looted and all their belongings were gone.
Not only that.
The city magistrate's henchmen, along with the farmland owners and group leaders, directly occupied the land of these ordinary farmers!
They claimed that the land had been voluntarily abandoned, so it was directly confiscated and handed over to the appointed regional rulers.
And that was not all!
Just yesterday, the noble soldiers found them and demanded they pay a large tax!
They called it something like Suppression Salary!
The Daimyo could not bear to see the people suffer, so he specially assigned Konoha ninjas to drive away the monster, and thus had to pay a large commission fee.
The Daimyo would not pocket a single penny from this suppression fee, all of it would be paid to the mighty Hokage of Konoha!
To express gratitude to the ninjas for driving away the monster and protecting the entire Daimyo's Palace!
The core issue: the amount of this suppression fee was very expensive, a full 2 million!
That was about 300 kilograms of food, equivalent to the annual food ration for two people.
This amount was almost 30% of their family's total annual income!
This was almost fatal!
Although the Warring States Period had ended, all countries, including the Land of Fire, basically still used the strict tax laws from the Warring States Period.
Ordinary farming households needed to pay various taxes and fees every year.
Including: annual tribute, share money, building money, labor service money, employee rice, banquet fees, etc.
Overall, there were more than ten taxes, and there were various duplicate tax items among them.
In more severe cases, about 70% of the family's total annual harvest could be directly confiscated!
That was equivalent to earning a thousand ryo, but only having three hundred ryo left.
Even so, it could only meet the living needs of himself and his family when the harvest was good; if there was the slightest disturbance, the family was almost certain to starve to death!
And now, this sudden demand for military salary even forcibly took the last 30% of their food.
This was almost equivalent to murder!
Of course, the woman's husband disagreed and argued with the soldiers who came to collect the tax.
The other side did not even bother to talk nonsense and directly hacked the farmer to death with a knife, killing the little girl's father, then took their food.
Such scenes did not only happen in their family, but occurred in almost the entire Daimyo's Prefecture and surrounding areas.
Over the three days, all the subordinate soldiers of the nobles forcibly collected taxes, even the Wakanagan, Fushoshidai, and Fujoshidai responsible for guarding the Daimyo's Prefecture joined in.
As a result, the little girl's father was killed and their food rations were stolen.
Then the little girl ran outside the city gate hungry to pick up garbage to fill her stomach.
When she saw the perpetrators who caused all this, the ninjas from Konoha Village.
The little girl was unconsciously overcome by anger and chose to attack the enemy with a stone. She did not understand the root of the problem, but she had heard her mother crying and complaining that these nobles and Konoha ninjas were the ones who killed her father!
◆━⊰✧⊱━◆
Hearing this, the truth became clear.
And Hashirama understood everything in an instant, his mind exploded!
It turned out that he was the one who killed the other's father!
It was the harsh suppression salary that killed the other's father!
Also, in these three days.
The nobles in the Daimyo's Palace did not collect their own money to pay the commission at all.
Instead, during this period, they frantically exploited the ordinary people, thus squeezing a large amount of fat and blood from them!
Even in the name of the Hokage!
The 2 billion silver in the convoy behind him and Tobirama was actually the precious money plundered from the common people in this city!
No wonder when they left the city today, everyone was filled with resentment, wishing they could bite him and the others to death!