Pure Land --- Morning
Hashirama was looking at the chat archive.
He did this sometimes.
Not obsessively.
Just --- the scroll's records were accessible and he found them interesting to return to.
He'd been thinking about the rivals ranking.
He'd been thinking about it specifically because Naruto and Sasuke had been training in the same ground every morning for a week and the observation reports from Kakashi's check-ins painted a specific picture.
They are making each other better in real time, Kakashi had written, in the dry shorthand of someone who was choosing not to be emotional about it.
The perception layer reads Naruto's technique and identifies corrections. Naruto's attempts create data points for the perception layer to sharpen. The rate of improvement for both is above projected trajectory.
They are not competing, he'd written, on the second line.
They are compounding.
Hashirama had read that word.
Compounding.
He'd thought about it all morning.
Now he was looking at the rivals ranking entry.
He posted it.
Group Chat:
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: I went back and looked at the rivals ranking section.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: "Uzumaki Naruto and Uchiha Sasuke. Too early to rank. Come back in ten years."]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: I just wanted everyone to read it again.]
A pause.
[Second Hokage Tobirama Senju: ...Why?]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: Because it's different now. Reading it now is different from reading it the first time.]
[Second Hokage Tobirama Senju: ...Yes. It is.]
[Uzumaki Mito: What's different about it?]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: The first time I read it, it felt like a promise. Now it feels like a description of something already happening.]
People read it.
[Fourth Raikage A: The compounding observation from Kakashi's report. That's what it is.]
[Fifth Mizukage Terumi Mei: They're not building toward the ranking. They're already being it.]
[Third Tsuchikage Ōnoki: The scroll ranked them first because it could already see this trajectory.]
[Might Guy: IT'S THE POWER OF RIVALS!! THE ETERNAL BOND OF THOSE WHO PUSH EACH OTHER BEYOND THEIR LIMITS!! KAKASHI!! DO YOU SEE?!]
[Kakashi Hatake: I see it, Guy.]
[Might Guy: YOSH!!]
[Jiraiya: "Compounding." That's the word Kakashi used in the report. I keep coming back to it.]
[Jiraiya: Minato, when you and I worked together, did it ever feel like this?]
[Fourth Hokage Minato Namikaze: No. You were my teacher. That's different.]
[Jiraiya: Is it?]
[Fourth Hokage Minato Namikaze: ...]
[Fourth Hokage Minato Namikaze: Less than I thought.]
Uchiha Madara had been reading the exchange.
He'd been reading it the way he read things he was genuinely thinking about --- without commenting immediately.
Turning it over.
He thought about the rivals ranking.
He thought about his own.
Second place.
Below two twelve-year-olds who weren't even ranked yet.
He'd been furious about that at first.
He'd called the scroll broken.
Now he read it again.
Too early to rank. Come back in ten years.
He thought about compounding.
He thought about what it meant that the scroll had seen the trajectory and held their place for it.
He thought about ten years.
He sent a message.
[Uchiha Madara: Nine years and eleven months remaining.]
The chat went quiet for one second.
Then:
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: MADARA!! HAHAHA!!]
[Second Hokage Tobirama Senju: ...]
[Uzumaki Mito: That's the most Madara thing he's ever said.]
[Fifth Mizukage Terumi Mei: He's counting down.]
[Fourth Raikage A: He's COUNTING DOWN to see if they hit first place.]
[Might Guy: THE INTENSITY!! MADARA BELIEVES IN THE RIVALS RANKING!!]
[Uchiha Madara: I'm noting the timeline.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: YOU'RE INVESTED!!]
[Uchiha Madara: I'm being analytical.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: YOU'RE COUNTING DOWN THE DAYS MADARA!!]
[Uchiha Madara: ...]
[Uchiha Madara: HASHIRAMA.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: YES?]
[Uchiha Madara: The conversation is over.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: IT'S NOT OVER!! MADARA IS COUNTING DOWN TO THE RIVALS RANKING!! THIS IS THE BEST DAY---]
[Uchiha Madara: I will use the Ability Sealing Card.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: ON WHO?!]
[Uchiha Madara: I'll figure it out.]
[Second Hokage Tobirama Senju: ...He won't use it on you. He'd lose access to the Wood Release for the seal maintenance.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: TOBIRAMA!! PROTECTING ME!!]
[Second Hokage Tobirama Senju: I'm protecting the maintenance structure.]
[First Hokage Hashirama Senju: FROM YOUR HEART!!]
[Second Hokage Tobirama Senju: ...I'm going back to the research compilation.]
[Uchiha Madara: ...Nine years and eleven months,] he said again. More quietly this time. And I'll be watching every day of it.
He didn't send that second part.
He thought it.
He kept it.
He went back to watching the training ground through the Pure Land's ambient awareness.
Konoha --- Team 7's Training Ground
Naruto read the exchange during a water break.
He was on wind nature attempt eighty-three.
Eighteen-second hold.
Clean entry, controlled exit, precision arriving at the edges.
He read nine years and eleven months remaining.
He showed it to Sasuke.
Sasuke read it.
He looked at Naruto.
He looked at the ground.
He said: "We should get back to training."
Naruto looked at him.
"That's it?" he said.
"Yes."
"Madara is counting down to our rivals ranking and you say we should get back to training?"
"Yes."
"He's invested, Sasuke. MADARA is invested in our ranking---"
"I know."
"That's incredible---"
"Yes."
"That's the most incredible thing---"
"Naruto."
"WHAT."
"We have nine years and eleven months," Sasuke said. "The best way to honor that is to make it worth counting."
Naruto stared at him.
The specific stare of someone who has just been handed a sentence they can't argue with and is slightly annoyed about it.
"...That was wise," he said.
"Go back to training."
"It was mature AND wise---"
"NARUTO."
"Okay, okay---" He gathered the wind nature chakra. "I'm going. I'm going."
He threw the attempt.
Twenty seconds.
Clean throughout.
"Better," Sasuke said.
"Yeah," Naruto said.
He gathered for the next.
He thought about nine years and eleven months.
He thought about what compounding meant.
He thought about what they'd be at the end of it.
He didn't try to see it clearly.
He thought about it the way you thought about something worth moving toward.
He thought: yeah.
Obviously.
He kept going.
Group Chat:
[Uzumaki Naruto @Uchiha Madara: hey madara-san]
[Uchiha Madara: ...What.]
[Uzumaki Naruto: we'll make it worth the count.]
A long pause.
[Uchiha Madara: ...]
[Uchiha Madara: I expect nothing less.]
[Uzumaki Naruto: yeah]
He went back to training.
Pure Land
Madara read the exchange.
He said nothing in the chat.
He looked at the training ground through the Pure Land's awareness.
At Naruto and Sasuke working in the same space.
Not competing.
Compounding.
He thought about nine years and eleven months.
He thought about what he'd said.
He hadn't planned to say it.
He'd read the rivals ranking and thought nine years and eleven months and then sent it before considering whether to.
He thought about that.
He thought about the scroll saying well done. The next chapter is yours.
He thought about what his chapter looked like.
He still had plans.
The Fourth Great Ninja War was still in the sequencing.
The Kaguya problem had adjusted the timeline but not cancelled anything.
But.
He was also watching a training ground where two twelve-year-olds were making each other better in real time.
And he was counting down.
He thought about that.
He thought about Hashirama's word: invested.
He'd called it analytical.
He looked at the training ground.
He thought about the specific feeling of watching something become what it was always going to be.
...Fine, he thought.
To no one.
To the training ground.
To the word invested.
Fine.
He kept watching.
He kept counting.
Group Chat:
[Uchiha Izuna: Nii-san.]
[Uchiha Madara: What.]
[Uchiha Izuna: You're smiling.]
[Uchiha Madara: I'm not smiling.]
[Uchiha Izuna: You have the face.]
[Uchiha Madara: I don't have a face.]
[Uchiha Izuna: Nii-san. You have a face. I've known your face for a hundred years.]
[Uchiha Madara: ...]
[Uchiha Madara: Nine years and eleven months.]
[Uchiha Izuna: Yes. It's going to be worth it.]
[Uchiha Madara: ...]
[Uchiha Madara: Yes,] he said. It is.
He didn't send the second sentence.
He thought it.
He kept it.
He watched the training ground.
The morning was good.
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