"Impressive teamwork."
Kakashi couldn't deny it—that final sequence the three of them had pulled off was genuinely brilliant.
The part in the middle had nearly given him high blood pressure.
"We did it! Woohoo~!"
Naruto was beside himself with excitement. Beside him, Sasuke turned to look at Hanabi.
For the audience watching, the scene cut to a "flashback."
Before they'd engaged Kakashi, Hanabi had already split off a Shadow Clone. Both Naruto and Sasuke—who'd been suspended in traps—had been quietly freed by that clone.
"Damn it, that jōnin was no joke." Sasuke frowned. He had his reasons for needing to become a ninja.
"We're going to make that guy eat his words," Naruto declared.
"You had a plan for dealing with Kakashi all along, didn't you?" Sasuke looked back at Hanabi, piecing it together. "Why didn't you tell us?"
Kakashi had been drawn away by Hanabi and still hadn't shown up—the window was open.
"Of course. The battle started the moment the assignment was handed out. I looked into everything I could find through open channels and everything through less open channels."
"If you knew, why didn't you just tell us earlier? We could've set traps for that guy right from the start!" Naruto had fallen into Kakashi's trap himself and was now fixated on returning the favor.
"That wouldn't have worked. All Kakashi would have needed was a little provocation—and you'd have walked right into it anyway, Naruto."
"Huh? If you'd told me in advance, I definitely wouldn't have—!"
"Because you definitely would have. Even if I explained it, you definitely would have."
"I'm not that—am I?!" Naruto looked to Sasuke for backup. Sasuke's expression said are you serious right now?—clearly enough to crack Naruto's composure entirely.
"So—if I'd told you to stay hidden, would you have done it?"
"No way, I don't hide from anyone!"
"Exactly. And there it is."
"Right, like that guy just needs one poke and he's off charging," Sasuke muttered, unable to hold back the remark.
"Then there's you, Sasuke. You're used to working alone—it never even crossed your mind to cooperate from the start. But as a ninja team, being unable to cooperate is absolutely unacceptable." Hanabi continued. "For someone like that, I thought the most effective approach was to let you see the situation for yourself first. Then you'd calm down and think."
—Besides, if the two of you hadn't gone off doing your own dramatic things, how was I supposed to earn any popularity?
"..." Sasuke fell silent. She was right. From the beginning, cooperation had never entered his head.
"So what were we supposed to do?!" Naruto scratched at his hair.
"Simple. First, put these on." Hanabi's Shadow Clone reached up and removed its own fox mask.
A Shadow Clone could "copy" equipment the original was wearing—sometimes even creatures attached to the user would copy over along with it. They'd dispel naturally once the chakra ran out.
The "flashback" ended. The audience collectively connected the dots.
[Got it—one hothead and one hardhead]
[Wifey is so smart. Let them both run face-first into the wall, and by the time they turn around they know exactly whose lead to follow]
[Total schemer. She just quietly took command of the whole team]
"That was quite something." While the audience had been watching the flashback, Kakashi turned his attention back to Hanabi. "Genjutsu I genuinely couldn't see through—that's remarkable."
"Ah, that." Hanabi smiled. "There was no genjutsu. Not from beginning to end."
Kakashi went still.
The viewers, who'd just snapped back from the flashback, went still alongside him.
The screen erupted with question marks.
"All there was—was Transformation Jutsu. Of course you couldn't have told the difference, Kakashi-sensei. From beginning to end, all I did was perform a play in front of you."
Kakashi couldn't have told the difference, naturally.
Because there had never been any genjutsu. Every figure had been Hanabi's Transformation. From start to finish, it had all been a live performance—a "real-life show" with Kakashi as the sole audience.
"Then the apparitions—those weren't genjutsu either?"
"Refraction of light. A lens formed from chakra, bending the light path to distort perceived distance—which is why the apparitions would disperse so easily. Chakra really is something remarkable, isn't it?"
Even the very first apparitions had not been genjutsu. What Hanabi had done was force light to refract using ice crystals and chakra manipulation. Strictly speaking, it still fell under the broad category of "genjutsu"—in the real world, an optical illusion was a form of sensory deception. So this was better understood as optical genjutsu rather than traditional Yin Release genjutsu. The jutsu compendium of the Second Hokage had documented techniques of this kind.
From the very beginning, Kakashi had been led to believe he was caught in a technique—which left him on the back foot at every turn.
"I said outright that this was 'lesson three for ninja: genjutsu.' That was to plant a presumption in your mind—to make you assume I was using genjutsu. But in reality, from start to finish, there was no genjutsu at all."
[Genjutsu without genjutsu—isn't that its own kind of genjutsu]
[Kakashi: I can't tell, I genuinely can't tell!]
[You'd fall for it too]
[Intelligence vs counterintelligence, deception vs counterdeception, the three arts of the ninja—these few chapters have been incredible]
"Extraordinary." Kakashi looked at Hanabi. "You're a jōnin—and an elite one at that. There's absolutely no way to beat you head-on. But our goal wasn't to beat you. It was to complete the task. So all we needed was to accomplish that. Before any of this, I'd already gathered information on you—and on your old teammates. As long as you were made to waver psychologically and make mistakes, that was enough." Hanabi continued.
Kakashi couldn't help but feel a grudging admiration. "Smart. That said—this trick is liable to get you hit. Not everyone is as easy to talk to as I am. If you run into someone with a short fuse, you might actually get killed."
Hanabi stuck her tongue out. "I only dared use this because it's you, Kakashi-sensei~"
Kakashi: "..."
[Kakashi: my reputation has been completely sabotaged]
[Heartless! Absolutely heartless! I feel like I literally just said this 2333]
[Hanabi: lol]
[Holy shit, turns out my wife is just here for chaos]
[lmao, all that deep analysis and she was just messing with them this whole time]
[This is literally just pushing your luck as hard as you can—as long as you don't get killed]
[Hanabi going full gremlin mode]
After a stretch of cheerful chaos, Kakashi finally composed himself.
"All right. Enough debriefing and joking around." He looked at Naruto. "So then, Naruto—who are you going to give the bells to? Only two people can pass."
"I—" Naruto faltered.
He wanted to pass. Desperately.
But Hanabi had done the most heavy lifting. Sasuke had played a crucial role. Naruto himself felt more like he'd shown up to collect the reward than earn it.
He wanted to pass—but did it feel right?
He looked at Hanabi. She just smiled.
He looked at Sasuke. He could see the hunger there—the need to become a real ninja. But Sasuke said nothing. Just watched him.
The choice was his.
"Then when exactly did your plan begin?" Kakashi decided to get to the bottom of it.
"From the moment Naruto set down the blackboard eraser."
"Huh?" Naruto pointed at himself. He'd barely understood anything, but apparently he was involved?
"First, I misled Naruto and Sasuke—built up an image of you as a vicious, scheming enemy so they'd stay on guard. That's where it started."
"Mis—misled?!" Sasuke's composure cracked.
"That's right. If I'd told you from the start that Kakashi-sensei was just a laid-back guy who probably let the eraser prank slide because he genuinely didn't care about us kids—you'd both have gone slack. But if in your minds Kakashi-sensei became a ruthless jōnin dead set on sending us back to the Academy, the pressure would force you to set aside your differences and work together."
That actually made a certain amount of sense.
But something felt off to Naruto—was that really all of it? He'd known Hanabi since they were small. He knew her better than that.
So on instinct, he asked: "Then what was the real reason?"
"Because teasing you was... fun."
"Huh?!" ×3
All three of them fell apart at once.
[Kakashi: reputation damage: confirmed]
[Shrimp and pork, it's the shrimp and pork again, I feel like I literally just said this 2333]
[Hanabi: lol]
[lmao this is just chaos for chaos's sake]
[all that strategic analysis and she was just messing with them the whole time]
[this is literally only works if you don't get killed]
[Hanabi going full gremlin mode]
After the second wave of chaos settled, Kakashi finally went serious again.
"All right." He looked at Naruto. "So—who are you giving the bells to? Only two people can pass."
"I—" Naruto faltered.
He wanted to pass. Desperately.
But Hanabi had done the most heavy lifting. Sasuke had played a crucial role. Naruto himself felt more like he'd shown up to collect the reward than earn it.
He wanted to pass—but did it feel right?
He looked at Hanabi. She just smiled.
He looked at Sasuke. He could see the hunger there—the need to become a real ninja. But Sasuke said nothing. Just watched him.
The choice was his.
"I—"
"Hold on, Naruto. We're a team." Before he could finish, Hanabi cut in.
A team.
Right. A team!
"Don't go sacrificing yourself, idiot." Sasuke had already read what Naruto was about to do.
He'd been about to give himself up so the other two could pass. And he'd been seen right through.
"Ahh—I get it." Naruto's face broke into a grin. He lifted his head and looked at Kakashi. "None of that 'one person, two people' stuff. We go together!"
The three of them stood side by side.
"Is that your decision? If you insist on sticking together, the worst case is all three of you get sent back," Kakashi said, his voice flat.
"We're a team—I'm not leaving anyone behind! I'm not giving up on either of them! We're one team!" Naruto gripped the bells.
"In that case, I have no choice but to declare you all..."
Kakashi exhaled. Then he raised his head, and his eye curved.
"Congratulations. You all—passed."