2

1

“Starting today, you three will be working under me as genin. Some of our missions will be tough. So you need to rely on each other, and make it out alive together!” the man in his forties standing before Itachi shouted loudly, forehead protector tied so tightly it looked painful.

Minazuki Yuki. He had been assigned to be the jonin supervisor for Itachi and the two other new graduates of the academy. In contrast with his lyrical name, he had a burnished face, and beneath the forehead protector digging into the short dark hair on his head were eyebrows like old, used brooms. The eyes that sat below the unkempt brows were round like a fish’s, the nostrils were large, and although the man’s lips were quite thick, his mouth was absurdly small.

“Rely on one another. As if,” the genin next to Itachi muttered, too quiet for Yuki to hear.

Izumo Tenma …

He was the leader of the group that had tried to force Itachi to get down on his knees and apologize, back at the academy. While Yuki continued his superficial lecture, Tenma sat holding his knees, and stared at Itachi.

“We got the village albatross hanging around the neck of this team. To hell with teamwork.”

There was one more person, a girl, there that day, sitting on the other side of Tenma. “Look, you, could you just shut yer yap already?” the girl shouted angrily, interrupting Yuki’s lecture. Her name was Inari Shinko; she was the same age as Tenma. “Ever since school, you been yammerin’ about Itachi on and on and on, but you’re genin now, yeah? So just quit with all yer whinging already!”

“Shut up!“ Tenma said. ”You’re just a girl. And you know, this has been bugging me since we were at school—your accent’s so messed up, you stop making sense halfway through a sentence!”

“I only moved house to Konoha three years afore. I kint help it!” Shinko shouted, pursing her lips.

“Would you both stop it, please?” Yuki timidly tried to calm the bickering pair. But they simply glared at each other, and gave no sign of stopping.

“Girls are always nice to good-looking guys, anyway.”

“Wh-why would I be all up in here for Itachi like that? Looky you, the lad’s only seven. I’m thirteen, hear? I def don’t fancy him!”

“Age doesn’t matter when it comes to love, right!”

“Wh-what on earth are you talking—”

“Haah.” The three of them were so pathetic that Itachi couldn’t stop an unconscious sigh from slipping out.

Naturally finding fault with this, Tenma raged, “What’re you all exasperated for?!”

I can’t spend time with these people … Itachi stood up, eyes closed.

“You jerk! You running away?!”

“Itachi, go on and give this arse a piece of it!”

Ignoring both of them, Itachi looked at Yuki. “I was told that today was just a meet-and-greet?”

“R-right.” Yuki was clearly the most concerned about Itachi, the youngest member of his team.

“So then, haven’t we finished what we came here for?”

“I-I suppose we have.”

“Then I’ll take my leave.”

“Oh! We have a formal mission tomorrow, so make sure you’re on time.”

About to walk away, Itachi stopped and looked at Yuki over his shoulder. “I understand.”

“You’re just running away, you jerk!” Tenma shouted, standing up.

“An’ I’m not done with my talking yet!”

Shinko grabbed onto the hem of Tenma’s trousers.

“What are you doing?!”

“Yer such a loudmouth!”

The sound of their bickering in his ears, Itachi didn’t turn around again. He could tell this wouldn’t be easy.

“You on your way home?” Itachi called out to a familiar back.

The face that turned around abruptly grew bright upon seeing him. “Itachi.” It was Uchiha Izumi. “You have a mission today?”

“We were just meeting each other. Missions start tomorrow.”

“Huh.” Izumi was still attending the academy. When he thought about the fact that a mere month earlier, he had also been going to school like this, he was overcome by feelings of nostalgia. Their road home was the same, to the Uchiha compound. They started walking again.

“How’s your team?” Izumi asked.

“That senior’s on it.”

“Huh?”

“The one with the loudest voice that time you took out those three seniors for me.”

A light of understanding flicked on in her eyes. “Took them out, I mean, I didn’t …” She hung her head as if she didn’t know exactly what to say.

As he watched her, laughter abruptly welled up, and exploded out of him.

Izumi stared with wide eyes. “Why are you laughing?”

“It’s just funny.”

“‘Just funny?’ You’re awful.”

“Sorry.”

This time, they both laughed. Even though no one had actually said anything funny, for some reason, the pair laughed together.

“Can you use the sharingan now?” Itachi asked.

“If I could do that, I’d be graduating just like you did.”

Itachi didn’t look at her, as she pursed her lips in vexation. “I haven’t even activated mine yet.”

“But you still graduated. You’re a genin already. So, like, what kind of ninja are you gonna be when you do activate the sharingan?”

“Dunno …”

Before them, the wall sectioning off the Uchiha community came into view. The family crest was drawn on the magnificent tiled gates separating the village from the compound.

“So lately, the grown-ups have been kinda scary, right?” Izumi asked, quietly, as they approached the compound slowly.

“You hear something?”

“Uh-uh.” She shook her head from side to side. “But sometimes, when I’m walking around in the compound, I’ll just get scared all of a sudden.”

Izumi might have been seven years old, but she had activated the sharingan. Even if she hadn’t totally mastered it, she still had plenty of training as a ninja. Plus, the Uchiha clan had sharp intuition to begin with. Izumi’s gut feeling now was no doubt the early blooming of that ability, so he couldn’t necessarily brush it off as fantasy.

“What’s scaring you?” he asked the fearful Izumi gently.

“Like maybe the grown-ups are thinking about bad things or something …”

Bad things …

The childish way that she put it got closer to the truth than any more adult way of speaking.

In the back of his mind, the faces of the three subordinates who came and went from his father’s place floated up. When the fourth Hokage had been decided on, when the issue of moving to the compound after the Nine Tails incident came up, and then the meetings at Nakano Shrine his father went to all the time … He had to assume they all affirmed Izumi’s instincts.

“Izumi,” Itachi said, as they slipped through the compound gates. He didn’t look at her, but instead kept his gaze focused ahead of him. “You probably shouldn’t really talk about this with anyone else.”

“R-right,” Izumi nodded powerlessly. “If you say so, Itachi, then I won’t.”

They were silent then, as they returned to their respective homes.

2

Countless crows assaulted his enemy. The large man cried out, surrounded by a crowd of beaks so dense, there was no opening for him to flee.

Itachi’s enemy had been neatly caught by his Shadow Clone technique.

“Now!” Itachi shouted from the trees above, far from the flock of crows. Looking down, he could see the enemy shrieking, and Tenma on the ground below him, too stunned to even get to his feet. Yuki and Shinko were also there, surrounding them.

“Here we go, Shinko!”

“All right!”

The pair sprang toward the enemy, and the crows flew up into the air and disappeared into the woods.

“Aaaaah!” the man cried out in agony, and collapsed.

Carefully watching over the particulars of the situation, Itachi quietly leapt down from his branch.

“Nice call there, Itachi,” Yuki said, clapping. Tenma stared, annoyed, as he pulled himself up off the ground. Shinko didn’t pay the boys any attention, but instead went to check on the dead enemy.

It had been discovered that one of the vegetable peddlers who came and went from Konohagakure was a spy for Iwagakure. Itachi’s Team Two had been given the order to dispose of him, and so they had left the village to find him. Normally, it was the Anbu’s job to eliminate intelligence agents from enemy nations. But the Anbu were all currently busy with a certain urgent mission; not one member remained in the village.

The attempted kidnapping of Hyuga Hinata …

The head ninja of the village of Kumogakure, who had had an antagonistic relationship with Konohagakure for many years, journeyed to the village to sign a peace treaty. The mood in the village was celebratory, but then Hinata, the daughter of the Hyuga clan chief, was very nearly kidnapped. The kidnapper was killed, and the girl returned home unscathed, but since the kidnapper was actually the head ninja of Kumogakure, the situation developed into a standoff between the villages. Their head ninja murdered, Kumogakure insisted on compensation, in the form of the body of the Hyuga family head. Konoha pretended that the man’s twin brother was the actual family head and placated Kumogakure with that, somehow managing to avert a descent into war.

Given the urgency of the situation, the Anbu were all sent out, and the village’s key ninja were all on standby in case fighting did break out, so they couldn’t make any careless moves. That said, they couldn’t exactly let an Iwa spy slip out from under their noses.

And here, Team Two was selected. In truth, rather than Team Two, it was Itachi who had been chosen. His practical abilities were already on par with the average chunin, even though he was only seven. Thus, he had drawn the attention of the leaders of Konoha.

The job itself had gone smoothly enough. The spy was caught so easily by the trap Itachi set outside the village that it was almost comical; the man made his own position blindingly clear. With Itachi in the lead, Team Two spread out around the man and closed in on him.

But Tenma was in too much of a hurry.

The mission would have been nice and easy if they had simply taken the time to track the man—but, eager for recognition, Tenma had charged out ahead of the others. And just as a cornered mouse will lash out at the cat, the desperate spy launched an attack at Tenma’s throat. Itachi swept in to save him in the nick of time.

The spy’s kunai dug into Itachi. But he had used a substitution technique, transforming into an enormous murder of crows, and then counterattacked. The rest of it went as noted already.

“Not costumin’ himself none,” Shinko muttered, crouching down in front of the spy’s corpse. Having mainly studied healing ninja arts at school, she was assigned to the team for just such times as this. Assessing whether an enemy was in disguise, possessing knowledge about poisons, and treating the injuries of their comrades—a squad needed to have someone versed in the healing arts.

“He isn’t? Well, that’s good,” Yuki remarked calmly.

“You.” Shinko stood up, put both hands on her hips, and looked at Tenma. “Don’t s’pose you got a word or two to say to Itachi?”

“Huh?” Raising a single eyebrow with force, Tenma looked off in a different direction.

“Weren’t for Itachi’s quick thinking, you’d be dead right about now. You can’t at least thank ‘im?”

“I’m telling you, I got no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Seriously, you. What kinda—” Shinko took an angry step toward him.

Itachi stepped in between them. “Enough.” He stretched out his right hand in front of Shinko.

“I-it’s basically cos of you takin’ that attitude that this boy runs off all wild, yeah?” Shinko asked. “You might be a little one, but you’re a right genin too. Got to give him the what-for sometimes.”

“It’s fine, Shinko.” A smile played on Itachi’s face, and she let out a sigh.

“Don’t let ‘im do what all he wants, yeah?” Shinko said, and turned away.

Yuki watched over them nervously.

“Even if you hadn’t helped me out, I wouldn’t’ve got taken down.”

“Uh-huh.”

Bloodlust … Itachi coolly followed it to its source.

Tenma. His fist, coming toward him. With the minimal amount of movement, Itachi grabbed it.

“I really can’t stand that attitude of yours, like you just see through everything and anything,” Tenma muttered, his clenched teeth squeaking.

“Will you get over it if I apologize?”

“I’m telling you, that kind of answer drives me nuts!” Releasing his fist, this time Tenma sent a kick flying.

Itachi avoided this simply by throwing back his upper body.

With the force of his leg cutting vainly through the air, the older boy spun around twice. And then, with his back to Itachi, he dropped down to sit on the ground. “Not like my physical techniques’d reach you or anything,” Tenma muttered, back still turned. “You can do anything. You got no idea how I feel.”

Itachi didn’t know what to say.

“I’m sorry about what happened at school. And that thing before …” Tenma hung his head, motionless. “Thanks.”

Itachi stared silently at the other boy’s rounded back.

“Well, go in.”

At his father’s urging, Itachi placed a hand on the closed sliding doors. On the other side of the spotless paper, the room was silent. And yet the intense aura there, in that room separated from him by a single sliding door, came though with such intensity that it practically prickled his skin.

An aura of unrest … Itachi’s heart sank.

“Itachi,” his father pressed him.

With no other choice, he opened the sliding door. The hall, fifteen or so tatami mats large, was filled to capacity. But because there was no light in the room, the figures were all silhouetted.

“Sorry to make you wait.” Gesturing Itachi into the room, his father crossed the threshold, and then reached back to close the door.

The darkness grew even more concentrated. With no one shadow leading, several of the human forms stood up, and together lit the candles in the four corners of the room. A faint light illuminated the interior.

“Sit down there, and listen.” His father pointed to a seat at the very back of the room, the only open space on the floor jammed with people.

Itachi pushed through them to make his way to the designated position, and sat down quietly. His father watched his son get settled in, before stepping through the assembled group to sit at the front of the room, facing everyone.

“We’ll now begin our regular meeting,” Yashiro announced from beside his father. “Lord Fugaku’s son Itachi will also be attending the meetings from now on.”

“My son is seven,” Fugaku said. “Although he has the genin status required to take part in these meetings, he is still very much a novice. Due to my admittedly selfish desire to have him learn about the clan status from a young age, he has been allowed to take part. I appreciate your understanding.” He bowed his head.

In response, the clan members sitting before him bowed their heads simultaneously.

“Now then, to pick up where we left off last time, I’d like to discuss the issue of the submission of a written opinion to the Hokage, with regard to the segregation of the clan’s compound.” Yashiro had barely finished speaking before the people at the meeting all started talking at once.

Some insisted on a show of force for Konoha, others said they should keep a calm eye on things and proceed amicably, and still others looked at the faces of those around them, unsure which opinion to agree with. Even though their purposes were all different, it seemed that everyone there wanted to actively participate in the conversation.

Abruptly, Itachi felt someone’s eyes on him and immediately turned his own eyes in that direction.

Shisui.

He met Shisui’s eyes. The older boy was silent, and seemed unaccustomed to the boisterous atmosphere of the place. Then, his good friend smiled at him, and Itachi felt an indescribable sadness.

The clan’s evil feelings hung heavy here. Itachi was also not accustomed to it.

I feel the same as you … Itachi put his heart into the smile he flashed back at Shisui.

3

It was coming up on a year since he had graduated from the academy. Itachi turned eight.

His career as a ninja was going smoothly. He hadn’t been sent on any particularly difficult missions. Looking back on his year, the mission first accomplished after becoming a genin, that of taking care of the Iwagakure spy, was maybe the hardest he’d been on.

His relationship with his teammates was the same as always. Tenma still wouldn’t accept him, and Shinko flared up, annoyed with Tenma’s attitude. Yuki watched over them half in a panic. Itachi didn’t do anything special, but simply stood there on his own.

He thought it was a bit of an unnatural, warped team, but even so, do the same thing over and over for a year, and it becomes the norm. Even if they were still unable to really open up with each other, they somehow managed to execute their missions without fuss, and Itachi was satisfied with that. Because he had no intention of hanging around for that long.

He would pile on the achievements, rise up to chunin, then jonin, before becoming the best ninja in the world and eradicating all war. For that reason, Itachi couldn’t stand still. Instead of spending any of his precious time worrying about his teammates or his supervising jonin, he poured his heart into polishing his own skills. So naturally, he had mastered ninjitsu to the extent that missions went almost too smoothly.

If he had one bone to pick, it would be the fact that Yuki hadn’t recommended him for the chunin selection exams that year. Ostensibly, this was because Tenma and Shinko still hadn’t reached the level where they could take the chunin exams. Participation in the chunin exams was based on the three-person cell.

When he learned he wouldn’t be able to take the exams, in a move unusual for him, Itachi pressed Yuki about it.

Normally, whatever was said to him, Yuki didn’t bother to react, but just this once, he pushed back against Itachi forcefully. He insisted that it was simply impossible that year, with a look on his face that said he wasn’t the least bit interested in what Itachi had to say.

Itachi had no choice but to give up.

But even if he wasn’t allowed to take the chunin exams, he could still be promoted directly to chunin if the village administration and the jonin recommended it. And looking at Team Two’s results, it was immediately obvious just how much Itachi contributed to the team. It was a fact that his judgment surpassed that of even his supervising jonin, and he had reached the highest levels in everything from ninja arts to fighting techniques, all of which had allowed him to rescue his team from danger any number of times.

The administration will definitely say something …

This belief firm in his heart, Itachi pushed on with the mission before him each day.

“The lands have all relaxed now that the war is over, so travel between countries is so much safer now. Which is why we can assign this sort of mission to a genin-centered team,” Yuki said, eyes on the document in his hand. Itachi held the same document in his own hand.

Mission to guard the daimyo of the Land of Fire.

The village of Konohagakure was within the territory of the Land of Fire, and the ruler of the Land of Fire was the daimyo. But although the village was located in the Land of Fire, it functioned semi-autonomously, with an independent government structure that had the Hokage at the top. On paper, the daimyo of the Land of Fire was ranked above the Hokage, but currently, the land’s military might rested with the ninja of Konoha, so the relationship between the two was more like an alliance of equals, rather than master and servant.

The Land of Fire’s daimyo visited Konohagakure annually. This regular event was extremely important for both sides, one that had been faithfully held, even during the Great War.

Team Two had been assigned to guard the daimyo on his trip.

“So the four of us are going to guard him?” Tenma asked, looking at the document.

“Officially, yes, it will be us. But behind the scenes, there’ll be a four-person Anbu cell keeping an eye on things from the shadows. And before that even, the daimyo has his own Twelve Guardian Ninja, an independent corps made up of only the most skilled ninja in the land.”

“So we’re like a formality, yeah?”

“Well, basically, yes,” Yuki said, nodding. “The roads are quite safe since the end of the Great War, so the team with the genin who distinguished themselves the most during the year is selected to guard the daimyo. In other words, this assignment is a great honor.”

Tenma and Shinko both turned toward Itachi. Feeling their gazes on him, he kept his eyes on the document and stayed quiet.

“We meet tomorrow morning at four. At the A-un main gates. Don’t be late.”

Tenma and Shinko both assented aloud. Itachi nodded, still silent.

“All right then. Adjourned!” Yuki vanished, almost before he was done speaking.

Only the three genin remained.

Tenma’s eyes were on Itachi. “Guess you’re the village pet.”

“You don’t gotta go wording it like that!” Shinko said.

“Tch!” Tenma spit at the ground. “Yer attitude is just the worst!”

The usual, unchanging day-to-day …

How many years could he stay here like this? A sigh threatened to spill out of him. But, remembering that his teammates were still there with him, he swallowed it before it passed his lips. He stood with the force of the repressed sigh, and turned toward the other two.

“All right, see you tomorrow.” The words had no sooner passed his lips than he had disappeared.

“He always acts like he’s all that.” Tenma’s grumbling reached his ears like an echo.

“I know I say this every year, but Konoha is so faaar,” the old man said, sitting on a stump and staring at the teacup in his hand. A fan-shaped crown sat above his wrinkled face. A regular old man, simply fooling the world by clothing himself in gaudy finery.

The daimyo of the Land of Fire.

Behind the old man, a luxurious palanquin awaited its master’s return. Around him were two of the Twelve Guardian Ninja, and a dozen or so attendants. And Itachi’s Team Two, spread out in a loose circle.

A main road led from the capital of the Land of Fire to Konohagakure. They had already covered half the distance, and the village was just up ahead. Flat in and around the city, the road started to climb into the steepness of a mountain road. The new green of the woods hung over the heads of the party.

“It might be best if we hurry,” Yuki said, ever so timidly. “Otherwise, we won’t reach the village before nightfall.” Tenma and Shinko watched with exasperation at the jonin bowing his head to the point of servility, humble before even the Twelve Guardian Ninja.

“I know …” The daimyo sighed and lifted his bulk up, the enormous fan-shaped crown on his head rocking. The two Twelve Guardian Ninja watching over him each took one of his arms.

“Master Minazuki,” Itachi said, staring at the road ahead, listening to the exchange between the daimyo and his men.

“What?” The instant Yuki let his eyes chase after Itachi’s gaze, his previous looseness vanished, and his face grew grim. At the change in their teammates, Tenma and Shinko stiffened as well.

“The daimyo,” Yuki said to the Twelve Guardian Ninja.

The two Twelve Guardian Ninja grabbed the old man from either side and lifted him into the palanquin. The four members of Team Two stepped out in front of the daimyo’s party and spread out in a diamond formation, with Yuki at the tip.

The four stared at the man before them. He was approaching with a jaunty step, practically bouncing up off the ground. Nothing particularly suspicious about this. So then, why were all four of them uniformly on guard?

The reason was the man’s face, which was hidden behind a bizarre mask. The surface was painted a burnt orange with horizontal black stripes at uneven intervals. A jet-black hollow around the right eye allowed the man to see. On his body, he wore a long black coat with an open collar that reached below the knee, loosely tied with a thick white bandage. His appearance was reminiscent of a clown. He was not a ninja.

But Itachi’s instincts were telling him there was something ominous about this man. His nervous tension was communicated to his three teammates, setting them on edge as well.

“Hey, are we all right?” one of the Twelve Guardian Ninja asked from behind.

“We’re just going to check this out,” Yuki replied. “Please wait there.”

The man moved lazily forward during this exchange, and then threw his right arm up into the air. “Umm, I have a question I’d like to ask, if you don’t mind?” He sounded extremely drowsy.

Yuki unconsciously smiled broadly at the anticlimactic nature of the man’s tone. “This road is closed today. How did you get onto it?”

“Oh, it is, then?” The man spread out both arms in an exaggerated fashion.

All eyes were on him.

The air shook.

Itachi felt a subtle disturbance in his chakra. “Master Minazuki!” he shouted, but he was too late.

Genjutsu.

Itachi immediately dropped down into a defensive posture, while before his eyes, Yuki was frozen in place, standing rigidly straight. Through his skin, Itachi felt the people behind him freezing as well. The daimyo, his close aides, and the two Guardian Ninja had also been caught in the genjutsu.

“Oh ho, that there would be anyone who could dodge my genjutsu, hm?” In a flash, the voice of the buffoon of only moments ago was brimming with intelligence. The hole in the mask seized on Itachi. “And that there would be two …”

Itachi caught his breath at the fact that he was not the only one to avoid being caught up in the genjutsu. And then he felt a chakra and aura racing up on him. Something was squirming beside him.

“What did you do?!” Tenma.

Before he knew it, his teammate was charging the man. As he ran, Tenma glanced at Itachi. “My specialty is genjutsu. You can’t get me with a technique like this!”

“A technique like this. Oh, well said,” the man murmured.

He’s laughing … That’s how it looked to Itachi.

“Guy like this’ll just take a second, if we both go at him.”

“Tenma!” Itachi called out to stop him. “We need to look carefully and calmly at our—”

Tenma thrust a kunai into the throat of the muttering man.

“A ninja who cannot objectively assess a situation …”

“Wh-what’s happening?” Tenma asked, sounding scared. And for good reason.

His arm had been sucked into the man’s throat and shot out the back of his head. At first glance, it looked like his fist had smashed through the man’s head, but the man didn’t look the slightest bit uncomfortable, and not a drop of blood was spilled. Tenma’s arm had passed right through the man’s body.

“… will die.”

“Heenyah!” Tenma uttered a sound so strange, it was hard to believe it came from a human being. His body flew up into the air. The fulcrum was the man’s arm, which pierced Tenma’s body.

This time, it was no illusion. As proof, fresh blood gushed from the boy’s torso, flowing to the ground like a waterfall. Tenma convulsed in tiny seizures, but gradually grew quieter, until he finally stopped moving completely.

“Those who would rush forward, recklessly seeking distinction, die young. That is the reality of the world of the ninja.” The man looked at Tenma’s eyes, focused on an empty spot in the sky now. “But it’s already too late to teach you that, hm?”

The man forcefully shook the arm that penetrated Tenma, and the corpse slid off and hit the ground.

“Of course, you did not fall, hm? And you did not foolishly charge like this child, but attempted instead to coolly assess both your power and mine. Wonderful, Uchiha Itachi.”

“How do you know my name …”

“I expect that I know everything about the Uchihas.” The masked man’s bouncing was replaced by a no-nonsense step as he moved toward Itachi. He walked very much like a ninja now. “My objective is that old man’s life. If you sit and watch quietly, I will spare yours.”

“I’m a ninja of Konoha—” He felt a pressure like he was being choked, but he desperately forced his throat open enough to spit out the words.

Like a frog under the watchful eye of a snake, his body wouldn’t move the way he wanted it to. Perhaps because of the man’s wordless pressure. Perhaps his instincts, sensing the difference between his own abilities and those of the man, refused to let him fight. Or perhaps all the blood in his body had collected in his head, as his brain frantically tried to analyze the inexplicable phenomenon that was the man’s body.

Whatever it was, the fact remained that he could not move.

I can’t come up with a clear solution to a situation I’ve been put in …

This was the first time in his life anything like this had ever happened to him.

The masked man came up beside him. On his approach to the daimyo, it felt like he stopped next to Itachi. “Could you say what you said before one more time?” The man cocked his head to one side.

“I am a ninja of Konoha,” Itachi said, hoarsely.

“Does that indicate the you wish to die?”

Die … he thought vaguely.

“You can become a good ninja. There’s no need for you to rush to your death here. Still, if you say you wish to die, then I won’t try to stop you.”

Move, Itachi ordered his body.

“Ngh!” As the half-groan escaped him, Itachi managed to move just his right arm. He beat at the mask with his right hand, bereft of even a kunai.

Just like Tenma’s hand, his fist slipped through the face, and came flying out the back of the man’s head. He was sure the man was standing there before him, but no sensation of touch was communicated to his brain. The fear that he had already fallen prey to the man’s genjutsu grew in Itachi’s heart.

“I see. So you wish to die.” The man brought his arm toward Itachi, and swung it downward.

The palm stopped inches away from his face. The man looked up toward the sky, blotted out by the thick canopy above. “That chakra,” he murmured. “Hatake Kakashi …”

The man turned his face back down toward Itachi. “A narrow escape for you, Uchiha Itachi.”

The mask’s shaking.

Itachi had no sooner had this thought than something incredible happened.

The man was sucked into the hole in the mask. Before Itachi’s eyes, the black body concentrated on a single point and was swallowed up by empty space, like the water in the bath after the plug is pulled out, until finally, even the hole in the mask disappeared.

As Itachi stood there dumbfounded, four figures dropped down from the sky above. They wore animal masks. Anbu, an elite group under the direct control of the Hokage.

“Are you all right?!” The shortest of the four, a boy with gray hair in a fox mask, shook Itachi by the shoulders. “Hey! What happened?”

The other three Anbu were going around releasing the daimyo and the others from the genjutsu. As he awoke, the daimyo spotted Tenma’s body, and shrieked.

“Everyone but me was suddenly hit with a genjutsu, and it took a while to release them all. Sorry we’re late.”

Itachi stared vacantly at the fox-mask boy. “Hatake Kakashi …”

“How do you know that name?” the boy asked.

Itachi instinctively knew that the boy in front of him was Kakashi.

Even with the warmth of the blanket wrapped around his body, he couldn’t stop shaking. The man’s attack felt like a memory of a distant day, but it had only happened a few hours earlier.

Given the urgent nature of the situation, the daimyo’s visit was postponed, and he returned that day to the Land of Fire. After hearing reports from the Anbu and Yuki, the Hokage and the other village officials decided to have Itachi report in a few days. He was sent home immediately after he returned to the village.

But he didn’t feel like doing anything. He couldn’t muster an interest in even eating supper; he just lay there under his blankets, despite the fact that it was still early evening. Even Sasuke was awake. Itachi wrapped himself alone in his blankets, and endured the incessant shaking.

In his heart was a disappointment with himself.

Tenma died. Right in front of him. He was the only one who could have saved Tenma.

And yet …

He hadn’t been able to do anything.

“Is Itachi all right?” He heard his father’s voice from the other side of the sliding doors as he arrived home.

“He left his dinner. He’s still lying down in his room.” His mother’s voice.

“He’s a ninja now. Teammates sometimes die in front of you.”

“But he’s still only eight. He should really still be playing at the academy with his friends.”

“A testament to his talents. It’s precisely because he attracted the attention of people in the village that he got assigned the mission of guarding the daimyo. And precisely because it was an important mission, it carried an element of danger. Living through the carnage time and time again is how a ninja grows up.”

His father’s words pushed through the warmth of the blankets, and pierced Itachi’s heart.

Still green …

He was lacking. He was lacking, and so his teammate died. His father was saying all this because he was not good enough yet.

He wanted more power. Enough power to defeat that man.

“Can’t you get him into the Military Police, and have him working under you?”

“He won’t be joining the Military Police.” His father’s words dug into his heart. “I’m thinking about his future here. He needs to keep working hard as a genin right now.”

“But he’s just—”

“It’s fine. I’m sure he’ll get over it.”

Itachi clutched the blankets even more tightly, as if he could use them to escape the sound of his father’s voice.

“Nnngh!” Emotions he couldn’t suppress became a groan of anguish, and forced their way out of him. His body shivered and shook.

He wasn’t shaking because he was afraid. Anger at his own useless self rocked his body. A sense of helplessness, defeat, emptiness, disappointment. He shook with these waves of emotion, turned inward to race through his body.

He wanted power. He didn’t have enough power to protect his teammates. Nor enough to put his father’s mind at ease.

More, more …

He would go beyond even that masked man. No, he would have the power to go beyond anyone and everyone in this world. And then, he would grab onto the root of all fighting with his own hands.

He felt something hot beneath his tightly closed eyelids. Not tears. Something hotter than that.

Throb.

He felt a pounding at the nape of his neck, and then something hot like fire shot through his body and concentrated around the pounding, before pouring into his eyes.

Itachi finally realized that the source of this blazing power was chakra.

Those born into the Uchiha clan were cloaked in a chakra with fire attributes. But he had never before in his life experienced this kind of heat from his chakra. Still, he managed to coolly assess what was occurring within his own body.

Eyes still closed, he pushed the blankets off and sat up in his futon, before gradually opening his eyes.

Awakening …

The world was colored red. Everything was different from the scene of only moments ago. On the other side of the sliding doors, three flames of different sizes flickered. The lives of his father, mother, and Sasuke.

He focused his attention on the flames. The sliding door faded and he could clearly see into the neighboring room. Three people lived in this red world. If he squinted and concentrated, he felt like he would even be able to see their hearts beating.

I’m dizzy …

He was wasting chakra. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he slowly lifted his lids again, the world had returned to normal.

“The sharingan …”

He remembered the masked man. Itachi had seen an eye on the other side of that small hole in the bizarre mask and clearly remembered three magatama floating in that red iris.

“You won’t beat me next time,” Itachi murmured, as red colored his eyes once more.

4

The man had been waving his kunai up at the sky for a while, before Itachi finally placed a gentle hand on his back.

“You done yet?”

The man’s shoulders shot up, as though Itachi’s voice had awakened him from a dream, and he whirled around.

“The thing you’ve been trying so desperately to cut in half is my genjutsu.”

“Wh-what …”

“Do you want to have the dream again?” Both of Itachi’s eyes were a deep red.

“Ee! Eee!” The man dropped his kunai and cowered the moment he saw the sharingan. “H-have mercy!” he begged, tears streaming down his face.

Itachi’s eyes turned black again.

“Itachi!” a voice called from behind. Yuki. Two ninja trailed along behind him. The new additions to Team Two.

Tenma’s death forced Shinko to confront the reality of the callous nature of the world of the ninja, breaking her spirit. So she resigned as a ninja, and now worked in a tea shop in the village.

The new ninja had both graduated from the academy that year. They had been ahead of Itachi at school, but as a ninja, Itachi had a year’s seniority on them.

“Did you catch him?”

“Mm.” Itachi turned his gaze back to the man quailing on the ground.

Yuki came over to stand in front of the man, the two new recruits behind him looking relieved. “You can’t sneak into the village and misrepresent your history just because you want to be a ninja, you know. That’s not how people become ninja.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

“By the way, this kid’s only nine. We got kids like this all over the place; that’s the world of the ninja.”

The man opened his eyes wide in surprise.

A resident of the Land of Fire had slipped into the village, with the intention of becoming a ninja. They were to secure the man, and put the fear of the ninja in him. That was their current mission. Of course, it was the lowest mission rank, a D. But it was the right level for the two newcomers, so that was how it had to be. Naturally, however, Itachi couldn’t get completely on board with this.

It had been just over three months since they started doing nothing but D-rank missions, and Itachi felt a growing sense of urgency. Did he really have the time to be doing this sort of thing? He had the absurd thought that he was actually training himself to master the sharingan through these sorts of missions.

“Way to go, Master Itachi! As always!” the new girl called out, cheerfully. Even though she was four years older than he was, she called him “Master.”

Her name was Himuka. She had a face that didn’t make much of an impression.

The other newcomer was a boy. It had been three months since he joined Team Two, but Itachi had never once seen him talk. His name was Yoji, and he was from the Aburame clan, but so far, Itachi hadn’t seen him use insects.

“All right, let’s head back to the village.” Yuki’s bright voice made Itachi’s heart that much heavier.

“Hah!” Expelling a breath full of ambition, Shisui looked at Itachi and smiled. “Yeah, training with you forces me to really put my back into it.”

Itachi looked at his cheerful friend and felt refreshed in both mind and body, as he stood there drenched in sweat.

They had been sparring seriously for three hours or so, as a way for Itachi to vent his anger with his assignments. They had already gone fifteen rounds, with breaks of about three minutes after each one, resulting in six wins for Itachi and nine for Shisui.

The only rule was no sharingan; everything else was fair game. Sharingan was off limits because the visual technique used up a large amount of chakra, and they wanted to spar for as long as possible.

The shuriken they flung at each other clashed in the air, and flew off in some unexpected direction. Neither Itachi nor Shisui watched to see where they went. They were already leaping at each other, and closing the distance between themselves.

“Chi!”

“Hah!”

Their fighting cries blended together.

Their bodies collided in midair, tangled together, and crashed to the ground.

Shisui got to his feet and in position first, and launched a kick at Itachi, who was propped up on one knee. Itachi immediately thrust his right arm out to block it. His field of view shaking with the impact of the kick, he saw his friend quickly weaving signs.

“Fire Style! Great Fireball Technique!” Shisui shouted, and an enormous ball of flames shot out of his mouth.

Itachi stared at the flames streaking toward him, a smile pulling up his lips at the corners.

Just like Shisui …

Itachi was thrilled. He gloated to himself that even among the people of their clan, only his father and Shisui could release a fireball this massive.

Shisui wouldn’t be able to manage a counterattack in time. His defense was slow, too. Direct hit.

“No way!” Shisui cried out at the unexpected result.

The giant ball of flames ripped Itachi into countless pieces, which transformed into a myriad of crows that attacked all at once.

Substitution.

The real Itachi was running around behind Shisui.

Before Shisui could sense his aura and whirl around, the smaller boy had a kunai at his throat.

“So you win, huh,” Shisui said, regretfully.

In the end, they sparred thirty-five times. The result was eleven wins for Itachi, and twenty-four for Shisui.

“You’re beyond genin level already.” Shisui took a swig of water from his canteen. “Your chunin exam being put off again this year?”

“Yeah,” Itachi replied, before tilting his own canteen back to pour cool water into his mouth.

“You said your supervisor jonin was Minazuki Yuki or something, right?”

Itachi nodded silently.

“Is he maybe jealous of you? Maybe he’s not into what a genius you are, so he’s putting off recommending you for the chunin exams?”

“There’s nothing I can do, even if that is what’s going on with him.” There was no point in thinking about Yuki’s thought process in not recommending Itachi. He wouldn’t get to take the chunin exam again this year. That was a fact.

“But I mean, you’re already so—”

“Let’s just forget about it.” If they talked about it anymore, all that would happen would be that his regret would just grow stronger.

“That reminds me, what happened to that girl Uchiha Izumi?” Shisui awkwardly changed the topic, and Itachi turned wide eyes on him. “It’s usually hard to figure out what you’re thinking, but I guess this at least, is pretty easy.”

“What do you mean?”

“Go take a look in a mirror,” Shisui said, a playful smile spreading across his face.

Itachi averted his eyes. “I don’t have an opinion on her either way.”

“And yet, the minute I said the name ‘Izumi,’ you looked like you had a pretty strong opinion.”

Strong opinion …

Did he? There was no doubt that Izumi was one of the few friends he had. But he also felt like that’s all she was. But then, when pressed by Shisui like this, he felt like maybe she was different. Still, that said, whatever his feelings for her were, they didn’t seem romantic.

In short, he didn’t really know either.

“Anyway, how’s your father?”

“Don’t change the subject,” Shisui said with a grin, before his bright expression clouded over the slightest bit. “Same as always.”

His father had lost a leg in the last Great War, and fallen ill because of that injury; he was currently bedridden. Shisui lived alone with his mother and father, and was the family breadwinner.

“He’s gotten a lot weaker lately. He’s even stopped recognizing me.”

“Really …”

“Well, everybody dies someday. I’m ready for it.”

Faced with Shisui’s sad resolve, Itachi didn’t know how to respond.

“I saw the lineup for this year’s chunin exams,” Danzo started abruptly, in front of Hiruzen, seated in the Hokage’s chair. “It seems that Uchiha Itachi is not on the list once more.”

Hiruzen lifted his eyes from the papers on his desk to look at Danzo curiously. “Now that you mention it, you went out of your way to speak to Itachi when he graduated, didn’t you?”

“I felt I should lay eyes on the face of the academy’s top graduate of all time.”

“I had no idea you were so fixated on the members of the Uchiha clan.”

“It is a loss for the village to make someone with such a promising future waste several years.”

Hiruzen frowned. “But he can’t take the exams without the recommendation of his supervising jonin.”

“Itachi’s supervising jonin, Minazuki Yuki, is below average among the jonin.” The corners of Danzo’s mouth abruptly shot up. “He’s likely jealous of Itachi’s abilities.”

“Yuki’s not that sort of—”

“He is that sort of man,” Danzo asserted, as if to beat back Hiruzen’s opinion. “Perhaps you are unaware, but that man has already sent several genin more talented than himself back to the academy. He can’t do that this time, because Itachi so obviously excels. The boy’s name is known throughout the village.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“He normally doesn’t show it, but deep down, Minazuki has a dark nature.”

A member of The Foundation had investigated him. The Foundation, the Anbu training division under Danzo’s direct control, had a vast information network within the village. The thinking, the philosophies of every ninja in the village, what kind of tendencies they had—The Foundation looked into everything very diligently. All for the security of the village.

If the Uchiha clan’s Konoha Military Police Force was a police organization to maintain public order on the village’s surface, then The Foundation was something like a secret police force that maintained public order from underground. Inheriting an undiluted version of Danzo’s ideal of protecting the peace with darkness, The Foundation leaned even more strongly in that direction than the Anbu, which was under the Hokage’s control. In other words, the Military Police Force and The Foundation were two sides of the same coin.

Heaving a great sigh, Hiruzen slowly opened his mouth. “If Yuki won’t recommend him, then we can simply promote Itachi to chunin through an official decision.”

“It’s better for the village to have him take the exams.”

“Hm?” Hiruzen brought his pipe to his lips.

“The chunin exams is a place where the officials from all the countries come together in the same room,” Danzo continued. “Which is to say, it’s an opportunity to display the future fighting potential of each land. If we demonstrate Itachi’s abilities there, it will enhance the threat our village poses to other countries.”

“Itachi is indeed a gifted ninja, but does he really have that kind of ability?” Hiruzen had only seen the surface evaluations of the mission results, which is why he could ask such a question.

“How could he demonstrate his true abilities on missions where he is forced to go along with a supervisor and teammates who are so clearly inferior to him? Keeping Itachi buried out in the fields any further will be a loss to the village, such that we may never recover.”

“I’m surprised you value the Uchiha clan so highly.”

“The boy Itachi has precisely such value.”

Hiruzen had no idea of Danzo’s true intentions. He might have at least been aware that Danzo had ulterior motives, but even the astute Hiruzen would not realize just what those motives might have been.

Uchiha Itachi. Danzo believed the boy was the very person to fulfill his own dearest wish.

Konoha and Uchiha. A trump card, to sever the link that had continued since the establishment of the village.

That was Itachi.

How could he get him under his control?

That was the issue.

“I’m home.”

“Itachiiii! You’re home!” Small hands hugged Itachi’s back as he took his shoes off. “Is your mission today over?”

“Uh huh.” Standing the hallway, he patted his four-year-old brother’s head.

“You tired?” Now able to speak properly, Sasuke seemed overwhelmed by his desire to talk to Itachi. The smaller boy took great, swinging steps and followed him, as he walked down the hallway to the room they shared.

“From the minute you leave the house, Sasuke’s waiting for his big brother to come home, you know,” his mother had told him, and he had been embarrassed but also delighted, and somehow self-conscious.

“I wanna go on missions too!”

“Still too early for you,” Itachi said, laughing as he walked.

The sliding door before him was open. His father’s room.

“You’re home?”

“Yes.”

His father came out with a sour look on his face, and stood in front of Itachi. “Lord Hokage called me in today to talk about you.”

“About me?”

“On the recommendation of village officials, he wants you to take the chunin exams next year. The other examinees will be working in groups. Naturally, this will put you in a difficult situation. But …” His father closed his eyes and lowered his face for a moment, before lifting it again to look straight at Itachi. “I told Lord Hokage that you would take part.”

“Th-thank you …”

For so long now, he had endured a disappointment he couldn’t completely push aside, no matter how he tried to make himself accept the situation. But those days were finally coming to an end. He had wondered how many more years he would have to continue as a genin on that team. He could see the shroud of heavy clouds over his heart clearing away.

“The village officials recommended you directly, instead of your supervising jonin. So make sure you do it right.”

“I will.”

“Hey, Daddy, what’s happening with Ita?” Wanting to be a part of the conversation, Sasuke wedged himself between them, and looked up at their father.

“You hurry, and be a brave ninja like your brother, too,” Fugaku said, reaching down to lift his younger son up into his arms. Sasuke’s smile wavered.

“All right!”

“Good boy.” Sasuke’s innocent grin brought a smile to their father’s face, as well. “Apparently, it was Shimura Danzo who pushed hard for you to take the chunin exams.”

Shimura Danzo … Itachi recalled the shadowed face he had seen on the day of his graduation.

“What do you think of the Anbu?” Itachi asked. In his father’s voice was a darkness, out of place with his sunny grin.

“Boys!” His mother’s voice came from the opposite end of the hall. “It’s almost suppertime!”

“First, the chunin exams. As long as you show off your true abilities, you’ll get through them without any problem. We’ll talk after that.”

Anbu.

Talk after that.

His father, still holding his little brother, disappeared toward the dining room where his mother was waiting, leaving his ominous words hanging in the air.

Itachi saw light and darkness on the path that stretched out into the future. Left alone in the hall, the vividness of both dazzled Itachi, toyed with his heart.