Kakashi stood before the Memorial Stone in Konoha. In the past, whenever he stood here, he appeared solitary; now, that loneliness seemed to have deepened. A single glance was enough to see the darkness within his heart, slowly consuming him.
It was for this reason that Shisui and Shinnosuke had both remarked on his unstable mental state, granting him a leave of absence from the Anbu.
Kakashi stood motionless, his eyes fixed on the names carved into the stone. Several new names had been added, ninjas who had sacrificed their lives to protect the village during the Night of the Nine-Tails. Among them was his mentor, the Fourth Hokage, Namikaze Minato.
"Minato-sensei..." Kakashi murmured softly, his eyes clouded with pain.
The Minato Team, once the anchor of all his emotions, had now completely vanished into smoke. Getting lost on the path of life… this was the perfect description of Kakashi's current existence. He didn't even know why he kept coming back to this stone. Perhaps it was because only here did his loneliness feel justified.
In the vastness of Konoha, there seemed to be no place where his existence was truly necessary.
As Kakashi stared blankly at the Memorial Stone, the sound of footsteps approached from behind. Alerted, Kakashi turned his head, his expression shifting to one of surprise.
"You... your name is Kakashi, correct?" a slightly gentle voice asked.
The owner of that voice was none other than Danzo.
As a member of the Anbu, and having participated in that meeting regarding Diarmuid's intelligence, where Danzo had put on a performance that suggested a questionable intellect, Kakashi recognized him instantly.
"It is, Danzo-sama!" Kakashi responded quickly.
His surprise stemmed from Danzo's unusual appearance today. One of his eyes appeared to be blind. Indeed, when Orochimaru had met Danzo recently, Danzo had been fine. Now, one eye was tightly wrapped in bandages, making him look as though he had suffered a severe injury.
In reality, Danzo had recently transplanted a three-tomoe Sharingan. No one knew why he had done it, and no one in Konoha even knew about the surgery; the Root medical ninja who performed the procedure had already been silenced.
"Have you also come to pay respects to Konoha's heroes?" Danzo asked softly.
In this moment, he seemed like nothing more than a kind elder. Kakashi glanced at Danzo's hand and saw a bouquet of flowers. He had truly come to mourn the dead. This shocked Kakashi; he frequented the Memorial Stone more than anyone else in the village, yet he had never seen Danzo here before.
This was the first time he had run into him. However, the flowers in Danzo's hand... they looked familiar. Long ago, Kakashi had noticed that the same type of bouquet frequently appeared at the Memorial Stone. It was the exact kind Danzo was holding.
Could it be that, without anyone knowing, Danzo-sama has been coming here regularly to pay his respects?
Truthfully, this defied Kakashi's expectations. In his mind, Danzo didn't seem like that kind of person. But upon further reflection, he realized he didn't actually know Danzo at all. His only impression of the man was his strange behavior during that high-level meeting. While Kakashi was a Jonin, his status in the village wasn't high enough to be privy to the inner workings of the leadership. Even knowing Danzo existed was considered well-informed for someone of his age.
Processing these thoughts, Kakashi's reaction remained swift. "Yes," he replied.
"Minato was an excellent Hokage and a hero of our village, just like my Sensei," Danzo remarked conversationally. He knelt down and gently placed the bouquet at the base of the Memorial Stone.
"Danzo-sama's Sensei?" Kakashi looked at him with curiosity. He had no idea who Danzo's mentor was. No one had ever told him, and his age and rank hadn't granted him access to such historical details.
"Yes. My Sensei, like yours, sacrificed his life to protect the village," Danzo said. After a brief pause, he added, "And, they were both Hokage."
Kakashi's heart skipped a beat. He stared at Danzo in astonishment. "A Hokage?"
"Yes, it was a very long time ago. Not many people in the village recognize me now. Heh, it is a bit embarrassing to admit, but my Sensei was the Second Hokage, Senju Tobirama," Danzo said with a small smile, his eyes appearing to drift into the past.
Kakashi was genuinely stunned. He had never imagined Danzo was a disciple of the Second Hokage.
Because of his lack of knowledge about Danzo, combined with the fact that their experiences seemed to overlap, and the timing of this encounter during Kakashi's period of extreme emptiness and confusion, Danzo's appearance at the stone and his status as Tobirama's student instantly shifted Kakashi's perception.
"Shifted" might not be the right word; Kakashi didn't know enough to have a firm opinion. "Refreshed" was more accurate.
"Forgive me, Danzo-sama. I was unaware that you were a disciple of the Second Hokage," Kakashi said apologetically.
"It matters not. Very few people know, and given my position and the things I must do, I cannot afford to bask in that glory. I am a man of Konoha who walks in the darkness," Danzo said with a touch of profound sentiment.
"A man who walks in the darkness...?" Kakashi repeated, feeling a strange resonance with those words.
"Yes. While the flames of the fire illuminate the village, the shadows and the Root remain forever buried underground," Danzo said.
In truth, this was a meticulously planned "chance encounter." Danzo's target was Kakashi. Of course, Danzo did frequently come to mourn his mentor, Tobirama, in secret. He was a complex man; while he felt resentment toward Tobirama for choosing Hiruzen as the successor, he had also inherited much of Tobirama's ideology, such as his stance against the Uchiha.
In his heart, his feelings for his mentor were complicated, but ultimately, he held immense respect for him. The bouquets Kakashi had often seen were indeed the result of Danzo's actions over the years.
"You and I in my youth are truly one and the same," Danzo said suddenly, looking at Kakashi.
Kakashi blinked. Danzo-sama, our hair colors aren't even the same, are they?
But before Kakashi could speak, Danzo continued, "Lost, devoid of conviction and purpose... consumed by loneliness and darkness. Is that not so?"
Kakashi was taken aback. Many people had seen that his mental state was fragile, but Danzo's summary was the most accurate he had ever heard.
"Do not be so surprised. It is because I was once exactly like you that I can empathize," Danzo stated.
Kakashi fell silent. Once exactly like me? He suddenly looked up and asked, "And then? What happened?"
"And then..." Danzo murmured. His tone became genuinely reflective as he looked at Tobirama's name on the stone. With a strange glint in his eyes, he whispered, "The darkness sought to consume me, so I consumed the darkness instead."
Kakashi looked on with confusion, not quite understanding the metaphor.
Danzo pulled his gaze away from his mentor's name and looked directly at Kakashi. "Kakashi, would you like to come work for me?"
Kakashi hesitated. "But, I am Minato-sensei's..."
"The Fourth Hokage, who invited you into the Anbu, is no longer here. You no longer have a place to belong, Kakashi," Danzo said softly.
No place to belong...
Yes, that was it. That was why Kakashi felt so lonely. Just as Kakashi's resolve began to waver, Danzo struck again.
"You must have noticed that many things don't add up, haven't you?" Danzo said. Almost as if by design, he didn't look at Kakashi as he spoke, but instead reached out to touch the carved name of Tobirama.
Kakashi was confused. What things? What are you talking about?
"Kushina's labor was a top-secret matter in Konoha. Even I did not know the date. And yet, that individual claiming to be Uchiha Madara knew exactly when it was."
"You are a Jonin who survived the trials of war. Why were you forbidden from assisting Minato on the Night of the Nine-Tails? Was it truly to maintain order in the village? To keep an eye on the Uchiha?"
"Lord Fourth once shook the shinobi world. I imagine no one knows his strength better than you, his disciple. How could such a man die so easily?"
Kakashi's confused gaze turned sharp and heavy. Suspicion began to bloom in his eyes.
The latter two points could be explained away with logic. But regarding Kushina's delivery date, Kakashi had always been troubled. How did the masked man know? As Danzo said, very few people knew the date, even Danzo himself was kept in the dark.
So who leaked it? And for what purpose?
Kakashi immediately ruled out the "correct answer," himself, because in his mind, he had never spoken of it to any "living person." He hadn't thought much of it before, but under Danzo's guidance, his doubts were magnified infinitely.
"Perhaps because I have walked in the darkness for too long, I have a habit of viewing everything from the worst possible perspective," Danzo said with a sigh. He looked at Kakashi and whispered, "I, too, hope this wasn't a scheme he devised just to reclaim the Hokage's throne. But... the future of Konoha truly cannot be entrusted to such a man, can it?"
With that, Danzo said no more. He turned and walked slowly away from the Memorial Stone.
Kakashi watched Danzo's retreating back with a somber expression. Danzo's final sentence hadn't named names, but Kakashi wasn't a fool; he knew exactly who was being implied.
"The Hokage's... throne..."
Kakashi's eyes were filled with vacillation, suspicion, and helplessness. This was something he had never considered before, as he had always believed the relationship between Lord Third and Minato-sensei was excellent.
How could it... how could it be like this?
And yet, Danzo's words had shaken him. The human heart is the one thing that should never be put to the test.
"Minato-sensei... Lord Third..." Kakashi whispered to himself, eventually leaving the Memorial Stone, looking like a man who had lost his soul.