Even before the destruction of the Uchiha Clan, before Shimura Danzo made his move on Uchiha Shisui, there had already been a Sharingan embedded in his eye.
What did that mean?
It meant Danzo's covetousness toward the Uchiha Clan's Sharingan was not a recent thing. And before Shisui, at least one Uchiha had already been killed.
For Uchiha Sasuke, who held the honor of the Uchiha Clan above everything else, the realization made his entire body shake with rage.
"Damn you, Danzo!"
Sasuke roared.
The feeling was the same as that night. The night he watched his clansmen fall one after another right in front of him.
His parents died before his eyes, and he could do nothing.
For the first time, a trace of hatred toward Konoha took root in his heart.
There was no doubt that Shimura Danzo was part of Konoha's upper ranks.
So did the higher-ups know about what he had done, or not?
Did the Third Hokage know, or not?
What secrets were buried in all of this?
"Shisui…"
Seeing what Uchiha Shisui had endured, Uchiha Itachi felt his chest tighten. He had known the ending. Shisui had told him about it before, but never in this much detail.
Now that he was seeing the process with his own eyes, the pain resurfaced.
After suffering all of this, Shisui had entrusted both the village and the clan to him, only for everything to end up like this.
"Shimura Danzo, you really deserve to die."
Jiraiya could not help but shout in fury.
The trust Shisui had placed in Danzo, revealing the secret of his dōjutsu, had been absolute. And how did Danzo repay that loyalty?
The moment they disagreed, he stole Shisui's eye.
Despicable. Absolutely despicable.
A man like that deserved no mercy.
Look at Shisui. Even when Danzo ambushed him and tried to steal his eye, Shisui only thought of restraining him with genjutsu and leaving. He never even considered hurting him.
And Danzo exploited that trust without hesitation.
Only now did Jiraiya finally understand why Kaede Kitahara had acted so decisively the moment he heard Danzo's name.
It was because he had seen this.
Anyone who witnessed a scene like this would never trust Danzo again.
Anyone who did had something wrong with their head.
If it were him, he would think the same way.
Hatake Kakashi let out a quiet sigh. This really was something Danzo would do.
At the same time, his wariness deepened. That Kotoamatsukami was far too dangerous. Now that it was in Danzo's hands, if he ever used it to control Kakashi's mind, that would truly be the end.
The video continued.
The sky had grown dark.
Under the moonlight, an Anbu removed his mask, revealing a handsome face.
It was Uchiha Itachi.
"So it really is him. Is he finally going to make a move on Brother Shisui?"
Sasuke clenched his fists. His entire body trembled.
But what followed, the conversation between Uchiha Shisui and Uchiha Itachi at the cliff's edge, made his whole body go cold.
"The Uchiha coup can no longer be stopped," Shisui said calmly. "If Konoha descends into civil war, other villages will definitely take advantage of it. I wanted to use Kotoamatsukami to stop the coup, but Danzo took my right eye. He does not trust me. He insists on protecting the village in his own way. I doubt he will spare my left eye either. Before that happens, I am entrusting it to you."
The calm in Shisui's expression shattered Sasuke completely.
He had never known any of this.
In his memories, his childhood had always been happy. Loved by his parents and his brother, right up until that night when everything vanished in an instant.
He had become the last remnant of a prestigious clan.
He had never known that the Uchiha Clan had once attempted a coup.
Everything he believed was collapsing.
Family. Village. Loyalty.
If this had not appeared in Kaede Kitahara's diary, he would never have believed it.
The Uchiha Clan was one of Konoha's founding noble clans. They had built the village alongside the Senju Clan.
Why would they betray Konoha?
Konoha belonged to everyone, but it also belonged to the Uchiha.
For a moment, Sasuke felt like he could barely breathe.
"How could this happen? This is impossible. The Uchiha Clan would never betray Konoha."
"…So in the end, the Uchiha were really planning a coup?"
He still could not accept it.
Jiraiya sighed.
He had not been in the village at the time, but he was not ignorant either. The turmoil caused by the Uchiha Clan back then had been enormous. Anyone with even a bit of rank had heard rumors.
Public resentment did not form overnight. The Uchiha Clan had not suddenly decided to rebel on a whim. Complaints had been festering for over a decade. And with little sense of secrecy, some hardliners even let shocking remarks slip when they were drunk.
The fact that the unrest reached the ears of Konoha's upper ranks said everything.
The Uchiha coup was less about ambition and more about outrage. They had served the village loyally and wholeheartedly, only to be treated like this.
There had been countless chances to step on the brakes.
None of them were taken.
And that only confirmed Jiraiya's earlier suspicions.
Uchiha Itachi's sudden massacre of his clan was likely done under orders from the higher-ups. And the most probable instigator was Shimura Danzo.
If that were true, it was a scandal of unprecedented scale. Forcing a bloodline clan into rebellion would devastate Konoha's reputation if it ever came to light.
"So Itachi bore the infamy of slaughtering his entire clan because of this…"
Jiraiya murmured.
The more he analyzed it, the more convinced he became.
Considering what he knew of Konoha's leadership, this outcome fit all too well. Combined with Danzo's arm full of Sharingan, the truth was practically screaming at him.
No matter how strong Itachi was, he could not have wiped out the entire Uchiha Clan alone without alerting anyone.
It was not about lacking strength.
It was about impossibility.
To leave not a single survivor except Sasuke, there had to be an overwhelming net cast around the clan. The number of people involved had to be enormous.
And for that many people to stay silent for so many years was abnormal.
Even Anbu could not suppress information to that extent.
Only one organization could.
Root.
Root shinobi were completely brainwashed. Only they could keep a secret like this for so long.
"So the price of bearing that hatred… was leaving Uchiha Sasuke alive?"
Everything suddenly fell into place for Jiraiya.
He could only let out a long sigh.
No wonder Kaede Kitahara showed such thinly veiled distrust toward Konoha's higher-ups in his diary. Anyone in his place would feel the same.
"Shisui!"
In the video, Itachi stared at his friend in shock.
Uchiha Shisui reached up and forcibly removed his left eye, holding it in his hand.
"I can only entrust this to you, my closest friend," he said. "Protect the village. And protect the name of the Uchiha."
In the end, Itachi accepted the eye.
"I'll take it," Itachi said. "What do you plan to do?"
"If I die, the situation should change," Shisui replied. "I've already left a suicide note."
Then he looked straight at Itachi.
"Do not stop me, Itachi. If you are still my friend."
With that, Uchiha Shisui threw himself off the cliff.
As his friend died before his eyes, Uchiha Itachi awakened his Mangekyo Sharingan.
The video ended.
Itachi took a deep breath.
He had prepared himself long ago, but seeing his friend die again still left his heart in turmoil.
Over the years, he had dreamed countless times of that cliff. Dreamed of Shisui's accusations.
Shisui had entrusted him with the village and the Uchiha Clan, hoping he would fulfill that wish.
And what had it become?
The Uchiha Clan erased from the world, leaving behind only Uchiha Sasuke.
Was this the future they had wanted?
"Shisui… if your spirit still watches from above, would you blame me?"
Back then, Itachi had not known what to do.
Annihilating the clan was an unforgivable outcome. But if the Uchiha carried out the coup, Konoha would be devastated.
The Uchiha could not defeat the entire village. In the end, they would still be wiped out, and Konoha would be left in ruins.
Caught between those two futures, he made the most painful decision of his life.
He slaughtered his own clan.
Regret was unavoidable. He regretted it almost every moment.
Yet if given the choice again, he did not know if he would have had another path.
Unless things had gone differently on the night of the Nine-Tails.
Unless the Uchiha had stepped forward to deal with the Nine-Tails, and unless the Fourth Hokage and his wife had survived.
He remembered that his family had been on good terms with the Fourth Hokage. Namikaze Minato had been a Hokage of immense charisma, and he held no prejudice against the Uchiha Clan.
If the Fourth Hokage were still alive, things would never have reached this point.
But there were no ifs in this world.
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