"Hmph. And now you're not calling him Kakashi-senpai anymore?"
Hatake Kakashi raised a brow as he read the "fifty-fifty" remark Kaede Kitahara had written in his diary.
What a sly little brat.
But what truly struck him was something else entirely. It hadn't even been that long since Kaede Kitahara first obtained that diary, yet his strength had skyrocketed as if he'd strapped himself to a rocket. He'd gone from an ordinary chunin to someone who could rival a jonin, then to someone who could fight Kakashi to a standstill, and now even contend with Kage-level opponents.
And all of it had happened within just a few months.
Kakashi couldn't help but marvel at how absurd the Uchiha bloodline was. How long had it even been since Kaede awakened his Sharingan?
At the same time, Uchiha Sasuke had also awakened his Sharingan, and while his growth had been impressive, it was nowhere near this outrageous level. Comparing the two felt almost unfair.
Kaede Kitahara was different. There had to be something unique about him.
"Mangekyō Sharingan…"
Kakashi absentmindedly touched the scar over his left eye. Kaede had mentioned more than once that Kakashi's eye was a Mangekyō Sharingan, and he hadn't phrased it as something that would awaken in the future either.
But no matter what Kakashi tried, he simply couldn't activate this so-called Mangekyō Sharingan. Even though he suspected Kaede's words were true, doubt lingered in his mind.
More importantly, if he really possessed it, then how was it supposed to be awakened?
Kaede hadn't said.
With no answers to rely on, Kakashi knew he couldn't place his hopes on that mystery. The only real path forward was to push his Hatake swordsmanship to new heights.
Still, something else in the diary bothered him.
What did it mean by Obito reclaiming his title?
Could it be that Obito—who was already dead—would somehow return and take back the Sharingan?
Under normal circumstances, Kakashi wouldn't have entertained such a thought. But after seeing that footage of Orochimaru summoning even the First Hokage and Second Hokage, the boundary between life and death no longer seemed so absolute.
If that was possible, then one day… Obito might truly return from the underworld to the living world, just to reclaim what had once been his.
Kakashi let out a quiet sigh.
He couldn't reject the idea. In fact, he felt guilty.
Along with the Sharingan, Obito had entrusted Rin to him.
And yet, Kakashi had been the one forced to kill her. No matter how many reasons or justifications existed, he could never forgive himself for that.
If Obito were to demand the return of his eye, Kakashi knew he would have no choice but to give it back.
Still, there was one thing Kaede had said that resonated deeply with him. Even if the Mangekyō Sharingan were taken away someday, the swordsmanship he honed himself could never be stripped from him.
That was something that truly belonged to him.
"Kakashi-senpai…"
Inside the Akatsuki's base, Uchiha Itachi looked at the diary and found his thoughts drifting back to when he first joined the Anbu.
The one who had guided him then had been Kakashi.
Even at that time, Itachi had already been hailed as a prodigy, but Kakashi had shone even brighter. Becoming a jonin at the age of twelve, even accounting for the wartime conditions that had simplified procedures, was still a feat recognized by all of Konoha.
Later, however, Kakashi had stagnated, while Itachi surged ahead after awakening his Mangekyō Sharingan.
Now, it seemed Kakashi had finally found the right path for himself.
"Kakashi's finally on the right track."
Not far from a hot spring in Konoha, hidden behind an artificial rock formation, Jiraiya read the latest diary entry with a satisfied smile. Seeing Kakashi return to the proper path genuinely made him happy.
Truth be told, Jiraiya felt a trace of guilt regarding Kakashi's past. By all accounts, Kakashi could be considered his grand-disciple. But in the ninja world, the lines between teacher, subordinate, and disciple were often blurred, shifting depending on circumstances.
A subordinate could become a student, and a student could eventually become a true disciple.
Otherwise, Uzumaki Naruto would technically be Kakashi's junior fellow student rather than his pupil.
—
Inside the Uchiha Clan's ancestral compound, Uchiha Sasuke gave the diary only a brief glance before his mind returned to the battle from earlier that day.
More precisely, the fight had ended abruptly.
Kaede had wanted a clear assessment of their strength, which was why he arranged the sparring session. Once he had gathered enough information, there was no need to continue.
Sasuke couldn't accept it.
He was certain he could have kept fighting. Being knocked back by Rotation hadn't seriously injured him—after all, it was a defensive technique with limited offensive power.
But to him, it was still a humiliation.
He was the son of the Uchiha Clan's head, a direct heir to its legacy. Hyuga Keiko, despite belonging to a prestigious dōjutsu clan, was only from the Branch House.
Sasuke knew exactly what that meant. The Branch House lived under constant restrictions. Even in learning the Gentle Fist, they were denied its highest forms. For instance, the Main House could master the Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms, while the Branch House was limited to only Thirty-Two Palms.
So even though Hyuga Keiko was three years older than him, Sasuke had always believed he held the advantage.
Losing to Kaede Kitahara was one thing—after all, Kaede also carried the blood of the Uchiha Clan. But being held at bay by a Branch House member of the Hyuga Clan left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Were there really this many strong people in the world?
Even someone from the Hyuga Branch House could fight him to a standstill.
If he remained this weak… how was he supposed to kill Uchiha Itachi and avenge his clan?
Revenge.
For a fleeting moment, he had even considered that Kaede, who also bore Uchiha blood, shared the responsibility of avenging the clan. But the thought was crushed almost as soon as it appeared.
He refused to push that burden onto someone else.
"Do I really need to awaken the Mangekyō Sharingan…?" Sasuke murmured, uncertainty creeping into his voice.
Then he recalled something else.
In the original future, he hadn't awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan before killing Itachi.
And yet, he had still succeeded in his revenge.
That meant the Mangekyō Sharingan wasn't the deciding factor.
"My fundamentals… they're still too weak."
Sasuke remembered Kaede's evaluation of him earlier that day. Graduating as the top student from the Academy and improving rapidly in such a short time, his fundamentals couldn't be called poor. By any standard, they were excellent.
But there was always someone stronger.
Someone like Hyuga Keiko.
Or rather, all three members of Kaede's team were like that. In terms of raw talent, Class B couldn't compare to Class A, yet after years of relentless training, they had caught up to most of their peers.
Even Amakusa Ryuji, who constantly complained about how exhausting training was, had never once skipped it.
As for Kaede, he had surpassed most of Class A, becoming a chunin ahead of schedule purely through effort.
The Sharingan might surpass the Byakugan in terms of detailed perception, but in actual taijutsu combat, Sasuke found himself at a disadvantage.
For someone as proud as him, even a draw was a humiliation—especially against a member of the Hyuga Branch House.
Deep down, he felt he had disgraced the Uchiha name.
And ever since the clan's destruction, as its only known survivor, Sasuke cared about that pride more than anything.
—
In another timeline, Namikaze Minato returned home after a long day, exhaustion weighing heavily on him. From the bathroom came the sound of water filling as Uzumaki Kushina prepared a bath.
Tensions between the great nations had been escalating, with constant border conflicts flaring up. As a newly risen figure within Konoha's leadership, Minato found himself attending more and more meetings. Many times, he even had to speak on behalf of his teacher, Jiraiya, who had once again disappeared who-knows-where.
Though Minato's reputation was growing and he had begun to gather followers, they were still low-ranking. He couldn't yet be said to have formed his own faction, only serving as a representative of Jiraiya's camp.
Jiraiya himself had no patience for handling administrative matters and simply shoved everything onto Minato's shoulders. Between training and attending endless meetings, Minato barely had time to breathe.
He understood clearly that this was likely the prelude to the Third Great Ninja War. Although Kaede's diary hadn't explicitly mentioned it, the existence of the Fourth Great Ninja War implied that a third one must have occurred.
By his estimation, that war was imminent.
Only through such a large-scale conflict could he accumulate enough merit to eventually surpass Orochimaru and become the Fourth Hokage.
Without that, even with Jiraiya's full support—and the Third Hokage's quiet backing—it would have been impossible.
Their support could only tip the scales between two evenly matched candidates. It could never bridge a vast gap.
For Minato, the coming war was crucial.
He already knew that the Third Hokage would step down after this conflict. If he wanted to take over Konoha in the future, he needed to earn as much merit as possible.
Especially now that he had learned about the darker side of Konoha's leadership—how Shimura Danzo had nearly driven the Uchiha Clan to destruction.
If he wanted to prevent people like Danzo and the elders from continuing to harm the village, he would need far greater prestige than in the original timeline.
Political struggles and power plays were inevitable.
So Minato carefully assessed his side's strength. In terms of Kage-level fighters, he could reliably count on three: himself as the future Fourth Hokage, Uzumaki Kushina as the Nine-Tails' jinchūriki, and his teacher Jiraiya.
Tsunade's support was also something he could likely secure. After all, she would never side with someone like Shimura Danzo.
The existence of Root was simply too dark, and it had already ruined countless lives in Konoha. Could it really be that none of the Senju Clan had suffered under its shadow?