Returning to the compound, Jie Uchiha suddenly realized something was off.
Passing clan members on the street kept glancing toward his house, their eyes laced with worry. Even their usual greetings lacked their customary warmth. Frowning in confusion, Jie quickened his pace.
The moment he spotted the two animal-masked Anbu operatives guarding his front door, Jie understood. Hiruzen Sarutobi was here.
Stepping inside, Jie completely ignored the Third Hokage's dark, sinking expression. He handed baby Sasuke over to Mikoto Uchiha, then casually strolled over and took a seat next to Fugaku.
"What is the meaning of this, Uchiha clan? Why are you secretly making contact with the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki?"
The moment Mikoto took Sasuke into the back room, Hiruzen stopped suppressing his anger and immediately barked his accusations. "Are you trying to repeat the tragedy from three years ago?!"
Fugaku, completely oblivious to what had transpired, was thoroughly bewildered by the Hokage's words. Contacting the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki? As the Clan Head, how could he not know about such an order?
Jie sneered inwardly. Hiruzen's intelligence network was certainly fast. He had only just finished buying Naruto a meal, and the old man was already here to interrogate him.
"Lord Hokage, you can eat whatever you like, but you shouldn't speak so recklessly," Jie said calmly. "I merely bumped into the son of an old friend and invited him to a casual meal on a whim. How does that translate to 'secretly making contact with the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki' in your eyes?"
"What?!" Hiruzen's heart jolted. "Did you tell Naruto about his true identity?" he demanded frantically.
"Ah, that was an oversight on my part. I actually forgot to mention his parents. It seems I'll have to bring it up the next time we meet," Jie said, flashing a meaningful smile. "After all, falling from the esteemed son of the Hokage to a reviled demon fox... it's a tragic tale that would make anyone weep. Wouldn't you agree, Lord Hokage?"
Hearing that Jie hadn't actually exposed the truth to Naruto, Hiruzen breathed a massive sigh of relief. However, Jie's follow-up comment instantly caused the Hokage's anger to flare up once more.
"Are you threatening me?" Hiruzen growled.
"Threatening you? Where would you get that idea?" Jie chuckled mockingly. "I only wish to return a rightful identity to the descendant of a hero. Why would the Third Hokage see that as a threat?"
Watching Hiruzen's face turn a sickly shade of pale green, Jie knew he had pushed just enough. If he provoked the old man any further, Hiruzen might resort to extreme measures.
"Relax. For now, I have no intention of letting Naruto know who he really is. Our meeting today was purely coincidental," Jie stated flatly. "However, the Fourth Hokage once did me a favor. Now that I've crossed paths with the boy, I can't just stand by and watch him live like that. Even if I can't change how the villagers view him, he should at least know that not everyone in this village despises him."
To be perfectly honest, Jie couldn't comprehend why Naruto was so obsessed with becoming Hokage and gaining the village's acknowledgment. Putting himself in the boy's shoes, if Jie had grown up surrounded by such pure malice from the moment he could remember, he wouldn't be so forgiving. Over time, even if his mind didn't warp to the point of wanting to destroy everything, he would certainly turn a blind eye to any suffering the villagers endured.
For someone to endure that level of hostility and still desperately want to change the villagers' minds—Naruto was probably the only person in the world capable of such foolish optimism.
Jie even found himself suspecting that someone had cast Shisui Uchiha's Kotoamatsukami on Naruto right after he was born. Perhaps the ultimate genjutsu had planted the absolute ideals of loyalty to Konoha and its villagers deep in his mind, ensuring he would dedicate his life to the village.
But thinking about it, that seemed highly unlikely. The cooldown period for Kotoamatsukami was simply too long. It took over a decade just to recover the ocular power required for a single use. If Shisui had used it on Naruto back then, he wouldn't currently be planning to rely on it to fix the deteriorating relationship between the village and the Uchiha clan.
So, after mulling it over, Jie could only attribute Naruto's pure, unwavering heart to the lingering influence of Asura's transmigrating chakra. Or perhaps, it was simply the sheer power of protagonist plot armor.
Hearing Jie's declaration, Hiruzen fell into a heavy silence.
Ultimately, it all boiled down to one indisputable fact: Naruto's true identity absolutely could not be revealed to the public right now.
If the villagers learned the truth... If they knew that the Fourth Hokage, the man who sacrificed his life for Konoha, had left behind a child. And that this child had not only been denied the honor he deserved, but had actively been framed by the village as a demon fox, used as an emotional punching bag for the masses all these years...
The prestige of Konoha's upper echelon would shatter instantly. Hiruzen himself, as the Third Hokage, would be thrust directly into the eye of a furious storm.
More importantly, Naruto's mind was far from mature. If the boy realized that all the unjust suffering he had endured since birth was entirely orchestrated by the very village he lived in, turning to the darkness and abandoning Konoha would be the least of their worries.
If his emotions fluctuated violently enough to break the Nine-Tails' seal... Hiruzen shuddered involuntarily just imagining the apocalyptic scene.
'He was right. I really should have listened to Danzo back then,' Hiruzen thought grimly. 'If I had just thrown Naruto into Root to be trained by Danzo, I wouldn't be dealing with all this trouble now.'
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