Konoha was deep in the dead of night.
The remaining faint moonlight was blocked by clouds. Almost all the lights were extinguished, save for a single bright window.
Tree rustled in the night breeze. The Root ninja codenamed "Owl," concealed within a tree, watched the lit window in the distance.
Through the gaps in the study's blinds, he could see the boy named Hyūga Kumokawa hunched over a desk, writing. The diary's surface reflected the warm glow of the desk lamp.
According to the intelligence, the boy had maintained this diary-writing habit for many years.
"Meow."
A faint cat's meow, mixed with the insect chorus, reached him. "Owl" frowned warily, following the sound, only to see two dark figures rhythmically moving one atop the other. Two cats, meowing energetically.
"..."
Owl silently averted his gaze, inwardly grumbling that he must be going mad. The target was just a child.
Though he thought this, his mind involuntarily recalled "Kamaitachi," the man's miserable state after losing his arm. A chill ran through him.
'Never underestimate anyone. I don't want to end up like that.'
At that moment, he saw Hyūga Kumokawa suddenly stop writing. The boy glanced at the clock, rubbed his reddened eyes, clipped his pen into the diary's leather clasp, stood up, and walked out of the study.
Click.
With the soft sound of a bedroom door closing, the light went out. The entire residence plunged into darkness.
Owl didn't move, remaining silently hidden in the foliage.
Only when he heard the distinct sound of snoring from the distance did he finally lower his hand, releasing the sensory jutsu seal. He moved as silently as a leaf falling in the wind, appearing at the window.
The unlocked window made a faint sound. Owl soundlessly infiltrated the study. He first placed the diary into a storage scroll, then conducted a silent search of the room.
Unlike Kamaitachi, he hadn't come to assassinate Hyūga Kumokawa. Finding nothing out of the ordinary in the study, he intended only to take the diary.
After restoring everything to its original state, just as he was about to slip out the window…
"Who's there?!"
A sudden roar assaulted his ears. Owl's pupils constricted violently.
The next instant, before he could react, a sharp whistling sound came from behind, like a shrieking demon on the wind.
"Wind Release: Wind Cutter Jutsu."
Fssst!
Owl could only dodge with all his might. A crescent-moon-shaped wind blade swept past his side. Blood droplets splattered against the wall, forming an irregular half-circle. A red line slowly extended along his arm.
Schlick!
Blood surged as if breaching a dam. His arm slid cleanly from his shoulder, hitting the floor with a thud.
Owl let out a muffled groan, his body trembling slightly. He didn't bother retrieving the severed limb, leaping out the window without hesitation.
But he didn't see what happened after he left.
In the distance, the black cat, who had been atop a calico cat, suddenly stopped its movements. Its white eye turned towards the direction Owl had fled. It extended a paw and slapped away the foolish creature beneath it.
'If you want to take something, you have to leave something behind,' the thought seemed to echo.
Inside the bedroom, Hyūga Kumokawa lowered his hands, the hand seals dismissed. A faint, elusive smile played on his lips as he waited for the system's notification.
Meanwhile, clutching his arm, Owl quickly arrived at a cliff face. He activated a hidden mechanism and entered a dense, heavy patch of shadow.
As he descended deeper underground, water stains and moss gradually covered the dark corners, enveloping him in a damp, humid atmosphere. Yet, he didn't feel suffocated. Instead, he felt a sense of security, as if returning home.
'That guy's strength is indeed not simple. No wonder Kamaitachi fell to him,' he thought, gritting his teeth, a mix of fear and apprehension churning within him as he looked at his bleeding stump.
Inside the vast, enclosed underground space, the lighting was as bright as daylight.
There was even a laboratory with a large observation window, where figures in white coats and masks bustled about.
Rows of glass refrigeration units displayed various specimens. Unidentifiable reagents and petri dishes containing cell cultures were everywhere.
Nearby, other glass containers held transparent green solutions, preserving bizarre plant specimens and parts of animal bodies—bloody organs like eyeballs and kidneys.
On the other side of the observation window, Shimura Danzō stood expressionlessly. His narrow left eye held a profound darkness as he stared intently at the busy figures before him.
No, more precisely, he was staring at something on an operating table.
A piece of white flesh the size of a thumb—cell tissue from the "First Hokage."
But soon, a researcher turned around, shaking his head slightly at the man.
Seeing this, Shimura Danzō's expression turned grim. He raised a hand, touching his bound arm.
"A bunch of incompetents. Without Orochimaru, you can't accomplish anything?" he growled, feeling the increasingly aggressive erosion of the Hashirama cells.
Danzō's arm had been severely injured in a past battle. So, to others, including Hiruzen, his perpetually slung arm appeared to be an old injury from that fight. They didn't know that arm was no longer his own.
Even Danzō didn't know the origin of this arm. That bastard Orochimaru had been tight-lipped, only saying it was a byproduct of his Wood Release cultivation experiments.
Craving power, Danzō had naturally chosen to transplant it, using his entire stock of Sharingan. But he never anticipated the erosive nature of Hashirama's cells would far exceed his expectations.
In just a few years, the cells had gradually consumed the arm. And to this day, they still couldn't figure out how Orochimaru had made the arm capable of bearing them.
No one could replicate it. They only discovered the Sharingan could suppress the erosion.
But if things continued this way, the Sharingan he currently possessed wouldn't be enough to hold back the cells.
'Damn it!' Shimura Danzō cursed inwardly. 'If 'Tenzo' hadn't been snatched by Hiruzen, perhaps I could have had him take Kakashi Hatake's Sharingan.'
As he pondered where to acquire more Sharingan…
The masked Owl appeared beside him, holding the scroll in his hand. He knelt beside Danzō, his voice trembling. "Lord Danzō."
Catching the strong scent of blood, Shimura Danzō's expression hardened. He frowned, looking at Owl's arm.
"Why is it another arm injury?"
Shimura Danzō, with his own injured arm, felt a twitch in his cheek, as if being mocked. But he quickly dismissed the absurd thought, taking the scroll with a wave of his hand.
Owl hurriedly retreated to treat his wound. Danzō unrolled the scroll and glanced down.
He had ordered the diary retrieved to gain a detailed understanding of this Hyūga "failure" and to determine if the boy held any value worth recruiting.
The diary entries were mostly mundane daily affairs. Shimura Danzō read quickly, constructing a mental profile.
A child once timid and weak, who, after his father's death at the hands of his own clan, began to crave power.
'Craving power is good.'
He feared those who desired nothing.
Danzō soon came across the "reflection" Hyūga Kumokawa had written for Hiruzen. His reaction was one of scorn, tinged with bitterness and jealousy.
'That hypocrite Hiruzen doesn't deserve such praise.'
Only the part about the "tree roots" in the reflection made Danzō pause briefly.
But when he turned the page, his hand suddenly froze. He stared intently at a single sentence in the diary, his expression subtly shifting.
[Perhaps my heart is like a tree. The more it yearns for the light above, the deeper its roots must plunge—into the earth, into the depths of darkness.]
Meanwhile, in Hyūga Kumokawa's bedroom.
The system's prompt sounded in Hyūga Kumokawa's mind, just as he had hoped.
[Ding! Your lie has been judged as [Honeyed Words]. Shimura Danzō experiences emotional fluctuation, reaching the state of [Kindred Spirit]. 400 Fulfillment Points acquired.]
"Who writes a diary if they're a decent person?" Hyūga Kumokawa chuckled inwardly. He then mentally commanded: "Manifest Jutsu - Lightning Release Chakra Mode."
[Cost: 1000 Fulfillment Points. Manifest?]
"Yes."
[1000 Fulfillment Points deducted. Remaining Points: 10,593]
'Excellent. Still a comfortable distance from 10,000. Thank you for the points, Lord Danzō.'
Hyūga Kumokawa lay back on the bed, slowly closing his eyes. The knowledge of "Lightning Release Chakra Mode" began flooding into his mind.
However, as his eyes closed, a question he had been pondering for a while surfaced again.
"If I can manifest ninjutsu…"
"Can I… manifest abilities from other worlds?"
He had already tried directly manifesting abilities from worlds distinct from the shinobi world. It didn't work.
The system's manifestation seemed to be based on the rules and logic of the current world. It couldn't create entirely new power systems from nothing beyond chakra.
But Hyūga Kumokawa had a persistent hypothesis.
"What if… I imitated and created abilities from other worlds, using the existing foundations of the shinobi world—souls, bodies, natural energy, and chakra?"
Undoubtedly, if he could truly create something from nothing, if he could shatter everyone's worldview and make them believe in the existence of such a foreign power…
The Fulfillment Points he could harvest would be astronomical.
In fact, his design for Orochimaru was precisely to test this hypothesis.
Pure lies were unconvincing.
A mix of three parts falsehood, seven parts truth… that's how you fool people.
So, to perfect this idea, he still needed the help of his esteemed Lord Orochimaru.
Guided by that scroll, Orochimaru—already deeply versed in the realm of souls—would undoubtedly be able to construct a self-consistent theory and logic.
Then, Hyūga Kumokawa could transform that theory and logic into a "rule" that truly existed in reality.
He would become like the Sage of Six Paths, possessing an independent small world and commanding numerous powerful souls.