"Brat! Where's the enemy?!"
The sudden voice drew the attention of the two and the cat.
The first to arrive was Tsunade.
She leapt from not far away and landed heavily on the ground, the concrete beneath her feet cracking under the force.
"Tsunade-sama, the enemy is already dead," Tachibana Jirō answered her in place of Uchiha Keizumi.
"Dead?"
Tsunade smoothly withdrew the battle stance she had just taken. Without the slightest hint of embarrassment, she cleared her throat and then addressed Uchiha Keizumi. "So, who was the villain you ran into in Konoha this time? Did you really need to cause such an uproar? When I saw you summon that massive creature, I thought you were about to destroy the village."
"Uchiha Itachi," Keizumi stated the name.
"Hm?" Tsunade blinked, then immediately realized. "Don't tell me—it was Uchiha Fugaku's eldest son, that ungrateful brat who wanted to wipe out the entire Uchiha clan?"
"Yes."
Tsunade froze for half a second.
She stepped forward and patted Keizumi on the shoulder. "With you in the Uchiha clan, I don't know whether that's its blessing or its misfortune."
Uchiha Keizumi replied, "A blessing for the righteous, a misfortune for the wicked."
"You little brat, so full of yourself."
Tsunade clicked her tongue. "But strictly speaking, it's the truth. Hardly counts as bragging."
"Anyway—"
Her gaze shifted curiously to the crow perched on the scroll in Keizumi's hand.
"What's this?"
"The Sealed Fire Formula Scroll." Uchiha Keizumi tossed the scroll casually toward Izumi, startling her into scrambling to catch it. "Inside is a black flame, one of Uchiha Itachi's Mangekyō techniques—'Amaterasu.' It's a fire that won't extinguish until it's reduced its target to ash. Keep it as a trump card."
Izumi was stunned. She quickly said, "Thank you, senpai!"
"Keizumi-sama, this crow…" Tachibana Jirō suddenly exclaimed. "One of its eyes—!"
Tsunade and Izumi both turned to look at the crow's eye.
"This looks like…" Izumi's eyes widened. "A Sharingan? But how could a Sharingan have that kind of pattern? Unless—it's a Mangekyō Sharingan!!!"
Tsunade raised a brow. "Mangekyō?"
"Senpai, is this Uchiha Itachi's eye?" Izumi asked cautiously.
Uchiha Keizumi said, "No."
"It's Shisui's Kotoamatsukami. This is Absolute Justice's 'gift.'"
In plain words: it "burst out" as a result of carrying out Absolute Justice.
Otherwise, even a crow made of steel couldn't have survived under the stroke of Keizumi's Susanoo.
The moment his words fell, the sound of footsteps reached them. Hiruzen finally arrived with a large force of Anbu at his back.
And he had heard the last words from Uchiha Keizumi's mouth.
—Shisui's Kotoamatsukami!
"Old man?" Tsunade glanced at the belated Hiruzen, then at the crowd of Anbu surrounding him, and asked bluntly: "That formation of yours… did you come here to support Keizumi, or to keep him in check?"
Hiruzen: "…"
...
"There were two of Konoha's Sannin present, and one of them chose to side with Uchiha Keizumi."
At the same time, within the Hyūga clan compound, Hyūga Hiashi slowly let out a breath.
The veins bulging around his eyes gradually receded as he muttered under his breath: "Looks like tonight, there won't be any armed conflict between the Hokage and Uchiha Keizumi."
Feeling the lingering heat waves in the air, breathing in the faint scent of sulfur still hanging around, Hiashi felt a chill in his heart.
He was rather relieved that the Susanoo summoned by Uchiha Keizumi had been facing away from the Hyūga compound.
Had it been turned toward them, and had that blade come crashing down… the Hyūga compound might have been split clean in two!
After all, the battlefield between Uchiha Keizumi and Uchiha Itachi was less than a kilometer away.
That was why Hiashi could clearly observe the situation over there with his Byakugan.
He even knew who Keizumi was fighting.
Just then, Hiashi faintly sensed something and suddenly turned his head in a certain direction. He saw an anxious figure flash past. That figure seemed to sense something too, and quickly turned back, casting a hurried glance in Hiashi's direction.
"Uchiha Fugaku…"
Hiashi immediately recognized that face, his eyes growing complicated.
"When he learns who it was that Uchiha Keizumi killed, I wonder what he'll think."
"Hm?"
Suddenly, Hiashi also felt a wave of malice directed his way.
When he shifted his gaze, he saw Hyūga Neji not far away. The boy had already turned his back, his cold little face stiff as he walked toward one of the houses.
"Ah, this child… still can't let go, can he?"
Hiashi sighed softly, guilt stirring in his heart. Yet he did not know how to speak to Neji.
…
"Keizumi, why do you possess Shisui's Kotoamatsukami? And just now—who were you fighting? Was that person also using Susanoo? Was that person also an Uchiha?"
Hiruzen did not dare draw too close to Uchiha Keizumi. It was an instinctive caution.
That was also why he had been unable to refute Tsunade's pointed question earlier.
Faced with the questions spilling from Hiruzen's mouth, Keizumi only glanced at Izumi and said, "She'll answer you."
Hiruzen: "…"
Was he really so disdainful that he couldn't even bother speaking a few more words to the old man?
"Eh?"
Izumi froze. She glanced left and right, swallowed hard, and quickly tucked away the scroll that sealed Amaterasu.
Then she straightened herself and spoke with resolve: "Uchiha Itachi has already fallen into the pathological extremism that Keizumi-senpai once foresaw. He plans to conspire with Uchiha Obito, intending within the next two months to unleash a Night of Massacre upon the Uchiha clan."
"He even plotted to strike down the Konoha shinobi who believe in Absolute Justice. He tried to kill me! At that critical moment, Keizumi-senpai appeared and saved me. In the name of [Absolute Justice], he judged Uchiha Itachi—and executed him!"
"The sins of Uchiha Itachi's future had already taken form. Since that was the case, he had to accept the cost of giving himself to sin. By killing him, Keizumi-senpai has saved the entire Uchiha!"
"More than that—it was salvation for the entire shinobi world! For with such twisted, extreme thoughts in his heart, Uchiha Itachi would one day have created an even greater atrocity across the world."
Just as the girl spoke with such shocking words, she suddenly noticed someone else had arrived. In truth, the man had been there for over ten seconds already.
He had certainly heard everything she just said.
"Clan Head Fugaku…"
It was none other than Fugaku, who had rushed here in burning haste.
At this moment, Fugaku stood frozen, utterly dazed.
The girl's words echoed relentlessly in his mind.
"Fugaku…"
Hiruzen also saw him. Subtly, he perceived that Fugaku's emotions were not ordinary. Linking it with what the girl had just revealed, Hiruzen drew a long, heavy breath.
"My condolences."
In the end, those were the only words Hiruzen could manage.
And his voice dragged Fugaku back from his haze.
With stiff movements, Uchiha Fugaku turned toward Uchiha Keizumi. His fists, clenched tight without his realizing it, trembled. The man who had always prided himself on being calm and restrained now found waves of turmoil crashing through him.
Anger.
Grief.
Unwillingness.
Confusion.
Hatred.
All kinds of emotions exploded in his chest like bombs. His eyes reddened until even the whites were tinted, and the muscles on his usually expressionless face twitched uncontrollably.
That had been his eldest son—the one he was most proud of, the one he saw as the future of the Uchiha clan, his very own flesh and blood.
Now, that son had become a soul claimed under the blade of Absolute Justice.
As a father, he hadn't even made it in time to save him, hadn't even managed to see him one last time.
Fugaku had thought himself hard-hearted enough.
But the bitter sorrow of a white-haired parent burying a black-haired child was something no resolve could erase. Now, he felt with painful clarity the very anguish Hiruzen had endured twice before!
"Keizumi…"
"…Why?"
Fugaku's voice was hoarse. He struggled desperately to keep his emotions in check as he demanded of Uchiha Keizumi: "Itachi was still just a child, his views not yet fully formed. Even if he had started to harbor some misguided thoughts, that shouldn't… it shouldn't…"
But here his words failed him.
Shouldn't what? Shouldn't he have been killed?
From the standpoint of Absolute Justice, from the standpoint of the Uchiha clan—was it truly something that shouldn't have been done?
"You should have known this day would come." Uchiha Keizumi's cold eyes swept over him as he spoke. "If you hadn't dismissed my words in the past, if you had kept strict watch over the beast you fathered, or forced his twisted thoughts back into line… tonight's events would never have happened."
"Uchiha Fugaku. Compromise—that is your truest human trait. Faced with the village's relentless pressure, you chose to compromise. Faced with the extreme ideology of the beast you sired, you compromised again."
"The root of all this… can even be traced back to you."
Step by step, he walked up to Uchiha Fugaku, his eyes locking with the other man's.
"Who was it that sent Uchiha Itachi onto the battlefield at the age of four? Who, when his comrade was killed and he awakened the Sharingan, chose not to console him but to praise him for opening his eyes at only eight years old?"
"Who, upon learning that his eldest son would one day fall into the abyss of sin, did nothing to stop it—instead collapsing into apathy, even indulging him?"
"Uchiha Fugaku—it was your conduct that bred this evil. Yet you, weak and indecisive, will never admit that it was your fault."
"Don't foul my ears with your nauseating excuses."
Uchiha Keizumi left not a shred of dignity for Uchiha Fugaku.
He laid bare all of Fugaku's flaws and failings.
And Keizumi did not embellish.
Because these were all things Fugaku had truly done.
In that family, aside from Uchiha Mikoto and Uchiha Sasuke, the other two were warped by nature.
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