The door to the Hokage's office clicked shut behind Uchiha Sasuke, sealing in a silence so profound it felt like a tomb. The early morning sun streaming through the windows now seemed harsh, accusatory, illuminating every line of shame on the faces of those who remained.
Hiruzen Sarutobi did not move from his spot by the window. He watched the small, determined figure cross the training grounds below, a black speck moving relentlessly away from the tower, from him, from the wreckage of everything Hiruzen had tried to steward. The boy's words echoed in the vault of his skull, each one a hammer blow on the rusted iron of his memories.
"He chose the village over his friend. Because that is what a Hokage does."
"What did you do?"
"You chose your sentimental attachment to a monster over your duty."
Sentimental attachment. The phrase was a sick joke. What sentiment was left in the hollowed-out shell of his friendship with Danzo Shimura? He traced the decay back, past the recent horrors, past the Uchiha massacre, past the Nine-Tails attack, back to the very beginning, to the rot at the root.
He saw two boys in academy uniforms, competitive, ambitious. Danzo, always half a step behind, his eyes burning with a need to prove himself. Hiruzen, the prodigy, blessed by the Senju legacy. They became teammates under Tobirama-sensei. Danzo's hesitation at the fateful river, his own leap to be the decoy—that moment had crystallized everything. He, Hiruzen, had been chosen as heir. Danzo had been left in the shadow.
And instead of letting that shadow dissipate, Hiruzen had begged. He could hear his own younger voice, grating in his memory. "Please, Tobirama-sensei, take him as a student too. He's strong. He's dedicated. He just needs guidance." He'd pleaded for Danzo to be included, out of pity, out of guilt, out of a childish desire to keep his friend close. He'd even suggested Danzo over the brilliant, honorable Sakumo Hatake. Tobirama's weary, prophetic reply thundered in the quiet office: "On your head be it, Hiruzen."
On his head. Every death. Every atrocity. The weight was cosmic, crushing.
He had known Danzo was dangerous. He'd known about the early ROOT experiments, the "hard decisions" made in the dark. He'd justified it to himself. The village needs a dark mirror. Needs someone to do what I cannot. He had given Danzo the leash, believing he held the other end. But the leash was an illusion. Danzo had built his own kennel in the darkness and bred monsters there.
The files. Sasuke had spoken of files. Hiruzen, in his willful cowardice, had only read the summaries presented to the Council after Danzo's capture. Clean, sanitized lists: Betrayal of Uzushio. Attrition of Senju. Uchiha Massacre. Human Experimentation: 1,243 subjects. Numbers. Abstract concepts. He had mourned the idea, not the reality.
Now, driven by a masochistic need for the full measure of his failure, he turned from the window. He ignored Koharu's shrill whispers to Tsunade about discipline, ignored Homura's shell-shocked silence.
Hiruzen: "The archives. The sealed Danzo files. I wish to see them. All of them."
Tsunade studied him, her gaze a mix of pity and grim understanding. She gave a short, sharp nod to Shizune, who paled but hurried out.
They were brought in not as scrolls, but on a heavy data-crystal reader, a piece of Kumo technology integrated into Konoha's post-purge systems. Tsunade activated it with a pulse of chakra, and holographic pages, photographs, and medical scans flickered to life in the air above her desk.
Hiruzen stepped forward. He made himself look.
He saw not numbers, but faces. The "Senju attrition" was a gallery of portraits: bright-eyed men and women, some with the distinctive spiky blonde hair, cut down in "training accidents," "missing-nin encounters," or simply vanishing. He saw a young Nawaki, Tsunade's brother, in a candid shot, grinning. A mission report, falsified by ROOT, detailing his "reckless charge" into an enemy ambush. A footnote in Danzo's own cramped handwriting: Senju optimism remains a tactical liability. Removed.
His stomach turned.
Then, the Uzumaki. He saw schematics of the Uzushio defenses, with weak points highlighted in red—Danzo's intelligence sent to Kiri and Iwa. He read intercepted messages detailing the delay of the Konoha relief force. Allow the primary containment to breach. Harvesting teams may move in once the fighting dies down. Harvesting. They were talking about people. About his wife's kin.
And Mito-sama. The great, graceful first Jinchuriki, who had welcomed him as a boy. A toxicology report, long suppressed. Traces of a slow, cumulative poison in her tea service, administered over years, exacerbating her natural decline. A note: The vessel's vitality is unnatural. It delays transfer. Gently accelerate the process.
He had to grip the edge of the desk. Biwako… his dear Biwako, killed in the Nine-Tails attack. An attack Danzo had facilitated. He saw the report: the precise time and location of Kushina's birth, neatly copied and passed to an intermediary. He saw Danzo's private musings: The Yondaime is too idealistic. The Uzumaki-Kyuarma symbiosis is a risk. A crisis will create opportunity for a stronger, more pragmatic leadership. He'd gambled the entire village, murdered Hiruzen's wife, orphaned Naruto, all for a political opportunity.
But the worst, the thing that finally broke through the numb horror and kindled a cold, dying fury in his chest, were the Uchiha files. Not the massacre, but what came before.
Photographs of laboratory tables. Children. Uchiha children, strapped down, their eyes wide with terror, hooked to chakra-draining arrays and intravenous drips of glowing, virulent green liquid—Hashirama cell slurry. The "Project Bloom" results. Close-ups of mouths and nostrils choked with blossoming, bloody flowers. The eyes of a six-month-old infant, filmed as a researcher injected a neuro-toxin to "stimulate ocular distress." The child's silent, confused crying before its tiny body seized and went still. The researcher's log: *Subject 7-A (Male, 6 mo.). No Sharingan manifestation. Termination authorized.*
A week-old infant. Naota.
Hiruzen remembered holding Asuma as a baby. The overwhelming, terrifying love. The promise to protect. Danzo had looked at a child like that and seen only a data point, a failed experiment.
The "Echo Chamber" audio logs played snippets. The desperate, paranoid ravings of a loyal Uchiha chuunin, driven mad by days of hearing fabricated evidence of his family's executions. Danzo's voice, calm on an oversight recording: The hatred is the key. Stoke it. Make them believe there is no hope within the system. The coup must be their idea, their desperate, inevitable lashing out. Only then will the excision be seen as necessary.
He had known. On some level, he had always known Danzo was capable of this. He had just… chosen not to know. He had allowed the darkness to grow, fertilized by his own inaction, until it swallowed the light whole.
And for what? Sasuke's final comparison to Hashirama and Madara was the cruelest cut of all. Hashirama had loved Madara as a brother. Yet, when the dream they built together was threatened by Madara's descent, Hashirama had ended him. He had borne that unimaginable pain to protect the greater whole. That was the weight of the hat.
Hiruzen had borne no such weight. He had shirked it. He had allowed his "friend" to become a tumor, and then offered up the healthy organs of the village to feed it.
He closed his eyes, but the images were burned inside his eyelids. The smiling Senju. The poisoned Uzumaki. The terrified Uchiha children. His Biwako. All on his head. Every single one.
A dry, tearless sob shook his frame. It was the sound of a monument crumbling to dust.
"Leave me," he rasped, not opening his eyes.
He heard movement—the elders, shocked into silence, being ushered out by Shizune. He felt Tsunade's heavy gaze on him for a moment longer before she too left, the door closing with finality.
Alone in the sunlit office, surrounded by the ghostly holograms of his failures, Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Professor, the God of Shinobi, sank to his knees. Not in prayer. In utter, desolate defeat. The village had survived. But the soul of it, the thing he was meant to protect, had been murdered long ago. And he had been the one holding the door shut while the killer worked.
________________________________________
LOCATION: KUMOGAKURE – INDRA'S PERSONAL LAB, SKYHAMMER ORBITAL PLATFORM
The alert was a soft, three-toned chime in the serene silence of the laboratory. Indra, who was calibrating a molecular sequencer for the next batch of Chakra Pathway Stabilizer, paused. A holographic screen blinked into existence before him, projected from his own ocular implant. It was a Thunderhead priority notification, flagged through the Storm Coalition's intelligence-sharing protocol from Konoha.
*Subject: Uchiha Sasuke. Status: Mission concluded. Target: Uchiha Itachi. Outcome: Target deceased (confirmed). Additional: Subject has departed Konoha via official diplomatic pass. Stated destination: Kumogakure. ETA: 48-60 hours. Context: Post-conflict psychological evaluation suggests high probability of seeking (a) closure with kin, (b) consultation on ocular evolution.*
Indra absorbed the information without a change in expression. It was a logical progression. He had anticipated this vector once Sasuke engaged with Itachi. The boy was a puzzle of trauma and potential, and the final confrontation would leave him with a power vacuum and unanswered questions about his heritage. That he would look to the only other successful Uchiha survivor, one who had transcended the clan's traditional curses, was elementary.
He dismissed the alert. Across the lab, Rias was examining a crystalline growth of the new Sonic-Wood hybrid, her head tilted as she listened to its faint, harmonic resonance.
Indra: "Sasuke is coming."
Rias looked up, her green eyes sharpening from scientific curiosity to immediate understanding. "Itachi?"
Indra: "Terminated. Sasuke was victorious. He is en route here. He will seek the Eternal Mangekyō."
Rias placed the crystal sample down carefully. "He won't want to take his brother's eyes. Not after everything."
Indra: "An accurate assessment. He will seek an alternative. My method."
She walked over, leaning against his worktable. "Are you going to give it to him?"
Indra: "The data, yes. The procedure, yes. It is strategically sound. A stabilized, powerful Uchiha ally, indebted to us and free of the traditional degeneration, is a significant asset against Obito and the Akatsuki. It also furthers the paradigm shift away from stolen power."
Rias smiled softly. "It's also the right thing to do. He's family."
Indra acknowledged her point with a slight nod. Sentiment and strategy were not always mutually exclusive.
Rias: "He'll be… adrift. He's defined himself by that hatred for so long. He'll need more than just new eyes. He'll need connections. A place. A reminder that the Uchiha legacy isn't just about loss."
She had a thoughtful look. "You know… Sona has been buried in logistics for Darui for months. She's brilliant, but she's all work. And she's been subtly asking about the 'fierce heart' theory ever since you explained it at the Exams."
Indra's mind instantly pulled up the relevant file. Sona Uzumaki. Age: 19. Daughter of a minor branch Uzumaki who manifested strong water affinities and a preternatural talent for administrative fuinjutsu and large-scale chakra flow management. Appearance: slender, with deep blue hair cut in a precise bob, intelligent eyes behind stylish glasses (chakra-reactive lenses, her own design). Assigned as Special Aide to Darui, essentially running the day-to-day operational backbone of Kumo's military and civil infrastructure. Combat Rating: Low-Jonin to Special-Jonin level, but her true power was systemic control—she could reroute village-wide barrier energy, coordinate sensor nets, and manage resource logistics in her sleep. Quasi-Kage level in terms of indirect impact. Personality: Analytical, quietly dry-witted, intensely private, possessed of a core of steel. She looked, as Rias's mental image supplied, remarkably like a certain heiress from a dimension of devils, albeit with Uzumaki red highlights in her blue hair under certain light.
Indra: "Sona Sitri-Uzumaki is a valuable asset. Pairing her with a volatile, recently traumatized avenger seems an inefficient use of her capabilities."
Rias: "Or it's the perfect project for someone who understands systems to help stabilize a critical variable." She nudged him. "You said it yourself. The theory is about complementary will, not just attraction. Who has a stronger, more disciplined will than Sona? She runs this village from the shadows. And Sasuke… he's all focused intensity. He needs someone who can match that focus, but channel it into building, not just destroying. They're opposites in methodology, but similar in sheer… force of purpose."
Indra considered it. From a purely analytical standpoint, Rias had a point. Sasuke needed recalibration. Exposure to Sona's orderly, systemic world could provide a new framework for his power. And Sona, who dealt in abstractions and large-scale flows, might benefit from direct interaction with a personification of raw, elemental power and legacy. It was an experiment in social integration.
Indra: "I will not orchestrate it. But I will not object to their paths crossing. The Uzumaki residential district is a logical place for him to be introduced to the clan's new reality. She is often there in the evenings."
Rias's smile turned knowing. "That's all I'm suggesting. Just… let the system run its course."
________________________________________
LOCATION: LAND OF LIGHTNING BORDER – FOREST TRAIL
Sasuke moved with the steady, ground-eating pace of a long-distance courier, not the frantic speed of a fugitive. The landscape had shifted from the dense, verdant forests of Fire to the sharper, rockier foothills of Lightning. The air grew cooler, carrying the faint, clean scent of ozone and high altitude.
His mind was a quiet, echoing chamber. The feverish rage was gone. The crushing grief was compartmentalized, locked away with the image of Itachi's final smile. What remained was a vast, purposeful emptiness. He was a vessel being scoured clean, ready to be filled with something new. The words he'd spoken at the memorial stone were his compass now: The Uchiha name will not end in tragedy. It will be remembered for justice.
To do that, he needed power. Sustainable power. Not the borrowed, corrosive strength of the Cursed Seal. Not the fleeting, hate-fueled surge he'd used against Itachi. He needed the stability Indra had achieved. The Eternal Mangekyō.
The thought of asking for help, of being indebted, rankled his pride. But his pride had been built on a foundation of lies. It was time to build something new, on a foundation of truth and pragmatism. Indra had offered knowledge before. Sasuke would now ask for it.
His journey was not just physical. In every village he passed near (he avoided them, sticking to the wilds), he would find a quiet grove or a high overlook at dusk. From his pack, he would take a small, plain wooden plaque he had carved, and a single white flower—a lily of the valley, the first thing he could find that wasn't a battlefield weed. He would place the flower on the ground, hold the plaque, and speak a name to the wind.
"For Aunt Chiyo."
"For Uncle Hayate."
"For Cousin Ren and his fiancée."
"For Naota."
He didn't know if it meant anything. But it was a ritual. An acknowledgment. A promise that they were not just entries in Danzo's ledger. They were being remembered, one by one, by the last son of the main house. It was the only offering he could give.
After two days of relentless travel, he saw it on the horizon: the towering peaks piercing the clouds, and nestled among them, the gleaming, metallic and crystalline structures of a village that looked towards the future, not the past. Kumogakure.
The difference was palpable even from miles away. The roads improved, becoming smooth, fused stone. Chakra-lamps, unlit in the daylight, lined the way. He passed orderly, prosperous-looking farmsteads with fields of glowing, robust chakra-grain. There were no walls of paranoid wood or stone. Instead, a faint, shimmering haze—the outermost layer of the Thunderhead barrier—hung in the air, and high above, specks that were Eagle Clan members circled in lazy, watchful patterns.
He was met at a checkpoint not by a gate, but by a smooth, open archway of dark alloy. Two Kumo shinobi in streamlined, practical armor stood there, their demeanor alert but not hostile. One of them held a small scanner.
Kumo Shinobi: "Identity and purpose, traveler."
Sasuke: "Uchiha Sasuke of Konoha. I am here under diplomatic pass from the Fifth Hokage to confer with Uchiha Indra and the Raikage." He presented the scroll Tsunade had given him.
The shinobi scanned the scroll, then Sasuke himself with the device. It chimed softly. "Biometric and chakra signature match Konoha records. Pass verified. Welcome to Kumogakure, Uchiha-san. An escort will guide you to the administrative sector."
There was no suspicion, no lingering side-eye at his name or his eyes. Just efficiency. It was disorienting.
The "escort" was a silent, floating disk that appeared from a slot in the archway. It hovered at knee height. "Please step on," the shinobi instructed.
Sasuke did. The disk accelerated smoothly, carrying him along a designated aerial pathway into the village itself. He soared past buildings that were a fusion of traditional stonework and impossible, gravity-defying metal and crystal spires. He saw public training grounds full of shinobi and civilians alike practicing taijutsu forms. He saw gardens of singing plants. He saw people who looked like Uzumaki—vibrant red hair everywhere—going about their business with an air of bustling confidence. The village hummed with energy, not the frantic anxiety of a military camp, but the productive vibration of a powerful, secure engine.
The disk deposited him at the entrance to a severe, beautiful building of dark blue stone and silver metal—the Raikage's Tower, though it looked more like a research institute crossed with a command center.
He was expected. Darui himself was in the lobby, leaning against a wall, looking as lazily competent as ever.
Darui: "Uchiha. Got here faster than projected. The boss is in a meeting with the Earth Daimyo's trade reps. Indra's up in his lab. Figured you'd want to see him first." He gestured to a transparent tube. "Transport goes straight to the Skyhammer annex. He's expecting you."
Sasuke just nodded, following Darui into the tube. There was a faint sensation of pressure, and then they were shooting upwards through the core of the mountain at incredible speed. Seconds later, they stepped out into the sterile, breathtaking expanse of Indra's orbital laboratory. The curved viewport showed the blue curve of the planet below and the starry blackness of space above.
Indra was waiting beside a central console, having just finished a communication on a hologram. He turned. He was even more imposing in person than in memory or hologram—taller, denser, with that calm, all-seeing gaze that missed nothing. The faint sigils orbiting in his Rinnegan were hypnotic.
Indra: "Uchiha Sasuke. Your journey was efficient. My condolences on your loss, and congratulations on your victory."
The words were precise, devoid of platitude. They acknowledged both the personal and tactical outcomes.
Sasuke: "It wasn't a victory. It was a conclusion." He dispensed with any preamble. "I need your help. I need the Eternal Mangekyō. I will not take my brother's eyes. I want… the scientific path."
Indra regarded him for a long moment, then gave a small, approving nod. "A rational choice. The data and methodology are available. The procedure is non-trivial, but your cellular vitality is high, and your Mangekyō is newly awakened, not yet deeply degraded. The success probability is 97.3%. Come."
He led Sasuke to a medical bay that looked more like an alchemist's workshop fused with a supercomputer. He began explaining as he prepared arrays of crystals and vials of shimmering fluids.
Indra: "The degeneration is a flawed genetic expression, a cellular apoptosis trigger linked to the intense chakra metabolism of the Mangekyō. The traditional 'Eternal' solution is a crude graft, forcing a foreign, compatible genetic sample to override the flaw. My solution is corrective gene therapy. We sequence your Mangekyō-active DNA, identify the apoptotic markers, and use a tailored retrovirus to rewrite them. The stabilizing medium is a serum synthesized from my own perfected Uchiha-Uzumaki hybrid cells, Hashirama cell derivatives for regenerative potential, and a catalyst of refined natural energy. The Healing Pod provides the controlled environment for cellular reconstruction."
It was a flood of technical information. Sasuke understood perhaps half of it. But the core principle was clear: fixing the problem at the source, not patching it with stolen parts.
Sasuke: "How long?"
Indra: "Sequencing and serum preparation: three days. The procedure itself: 36 hours in stasis. Full chakra integration and ocular stabilization: an additional two weeks of controlled training. You will remain here for the duration."
Sasuke didn't hesitate. "Do it."
________________________________________
The next three days were a strange limbo. While Indra and his automated systems worked, Sasuke was given the freedom of a secure guest level. Rias visited, her presence calming and direct. She didn't offer sympathy; she offered context. She took him, via a spatial fold, to the Uzumaki Residential District.
It was a revelation. It was nothing like the ghost-town of the Uchiha compound. It was vibrant, loud, and full of life. Children with vibrant red hair, and some with raven-black hair and occasional flashes of Sharingan—the "Storm-Born" orphans Indra had resurrected—ran through parks and practiced basic chakra exercises. Adults discussed sealing arrays at café tables or bartered for artisan goods in a bustling market square. The air smelled of good food, ozone from training grounds, and the peculiar, clean scent of advanced chakra-tech.
He felt like an archaeological artifact suddenly placed in a future city. The sheer normalcy of Uzumaki and Uchiha life here was the most shocking thing he had ever witnessed.
It was there, on the third evening, that he met her.
He was observing a class of older children being taught a collaborative barrier technique by a severe-looking woman with blue hair and glasses. She was not just teaching; she was orchestrating. With precise, minimal gestures and clipped commands, she had two dozen children synchronizing their chakra flows into a complex, interlocking dome of energy. Her voice was calm, her explanations crystalline. She fixed errors not with scolding, but with a pointed question that made the child realize their own mistake.
Sona: "Kenta, your output is fluctuating. Is your grounding seal stable, or are you anticipating the rotation phase early? Re-check your anchor."
The boy, chastened, focused, and the fluctuation smoothed out.
After the class dismissed, she noticed Sasuke watching. She walked over, wiping her hands on a cloth. Her eyes, behind her glasses, were a sharp, intelligent blue. She assessed him in a single, sweeping glance that felt less invasive than comprehensively informative.
Sona: "Uchiha Sasuke. I am Sona Uzumaki. Aide to Commander Darui. Indra and Rias mentioned you were acclimating." Her tone was polite, professional, utterly devoid of the awe or pity he was used to. She spoke as if he were a new piece of infrastructure to be logged.
Sasuke: "You teach children barrier techniques?"
Sona: "I teach systems. Barrier networks are simply one expression. The mind that understands how twelve children can power a B-rank barrier can also understand how to route chakra to stabilize a sector of the Thunderhead, or optimize the yield of a chakra-grain silo. Foundation is everything." She tilted her head. "Indra said you seek to rebuild a foundation. A difficult task. It requires a blueprint. Do you have one?"
The question was so blunt it was refreshing. "I have a goal. Justice. A new legacy. The details are… pending."
A faint, almost imperceptible smile touched her lips. "Goals are endpoints. Legacies are results. The blueprint is the process that connects them. If you require a schematic for process, the archives are available. I can provide the access codes." She handed him a small, crystal data-chip. "It contains foundational texts on large-scale chakra system theory and historical case studies of clan socio-political integration. It may provide… useful reference points."
She gave a slight, polite nod and walked away, already speaking into a communication seal on her wrist about a discrepancy in the western sensor grid's power draw.
Sasuke stared at the data-chip. It was the most unromantic, practical interaction he'd ever had. And he couldn't stop thinking about the absolute, unshakeable competence of her. She was a master of systems. He was a weapon seeking a new target. The contrast was fascinating.
________________________________________
The procedure was, as Indra promised, non-trivial but without incident. He spent a day and a half in a waking dream-state within the Healing Pod, feeling his eyes burn with a cold, transformative fire as the genetic serum rewrote his very optic nerves. When he emerged, his vision was… clearer. Sharper. The world had more dimensions. And when he focused, his Mangekyō activated without the familiar, creeping strain at the edges of his consciousness. The pattern was his own—a stylized, six-pointed flower shape with curved blades between the points, deep purple against the red. It felt settled. Permanent. Eternal.
The two weeks of training that followed were grueling. Indra was a merciless, brilliant instructor. He didn't teach Sasuke new jutsu; he taught him efficiency, precision, and synergy.
Indra: "Your Amaterasu is a blunt instrument. You summon black fire anywhere you look. Wasteful. The ignition cost is high. You must learn to control the intensity and duration at the point of creation. A pinpoint, sustained flame to cut through an enemy's guard is more efficient than a conflagration to burn a forest."
He had Sasuke practice lighting a single, persistent black flame on a moving, shielded target the size of a coin, while maintaining all other chakra functions.
Indra: "Your Tsukuyomi is a sledgehammer. You torture with time. Crude. Time is a field, a dimension. Learn to manipulate its texture within the genjutsu. Slow perception for analysis. Accelerate it to induce mental fatigue. Create localized loops to disorient. It is a surgical tool, not a club."
Under Indra's guidance and Rias's occasional insights into sonic-based mental frequencies, Sasuke's ocular prowess refined from brutal power to artful mastery.
And he began to manifest his Susanoo. It rose around him not in a raging burst, but in a controlled, flowing emergence of purple-tinged spectral energy. It took the familiar humanoid warrior form, clad in samurai-like armor, a bow of chakra energy appearing in its hand. It felt like an extension of his own body, stable, powerful, without the desperate, draining feel he'd sensed when Itachi used his.
During breaks, he would often find himself in the administrative halls or the Uzumaki district. He began using the data-chip Sona had given him. He'd cross paths with her. Their conversations were always brief, always about practicalities.
Sasa: (Studying a hologram of the village's water recycling system) "This feedback loop here. It's inefficient. A staggered cycle would prevent the pressure drop during peak draw."
Sona: (Looking over his shoulder, adjusting her glasses) "Correct. That was the Mark I design. The Mark III, which I implemented six months ago, uses the staggered model. The schematic you're viewing is archived for historical study." A pause. "You identified the flaw quickly. Your pattern recognition is above average."
Sasuke: "It's obvious."
Sona: "To you. To most, it is just a pretty light show. You have a mind for systems. You simply have only applied it to combat systems." She would then be called away, leaving him with a new, tangential thought.
He saw her calm a logistical crisis with a few quiet words into her headset. He saw her effortlessly disarm a arrogant visiting merchant from the Land of Tea with pure, cold logic that left the man sputtering. He saw the deep respect—tinged with a hint of fear—that everyone from clerks to jonin had for her.
And he remembered Indra's theory from the Chunin Exams, spoken so long ago. "Uzumaki, Senju, and Uchiha are evolutionarily attracted to partners with strong will and spirit… physical traits being side effects of genetic selection for chakra vitality and resilience."
He'd dismissed it as pseudo-science then. Now, watching Sona Uzumaki dismantle a flawed security rotation schedule with the same ruthless efficiency he'd use to dismantle an opponent's stance, he felt a strange, unfamiliar heat rise to his cheeks. It wasn't about her appearance (though she was striking in her severe way). It was about the sheer, formidable power of her intellect and will. It was a different kind of "fierce heart." One that built and sustained, rather than destroyed.
The thought of his parents, of Fugaku and Mikoto—a union of two powerful Uchiha wills—flashed in his mind. Was this what it looked like? Not just passion, but partnership? A meeting of complementary forces?
He shook the thought away, focusing on his training. But it lingered in the back of his mind, a quiet, persistent new variable.
Towards the end of his second week, Indra took him to a secluded facility on Turtle Island. There, he was finally introduced to Fujian Uchiha and Delia Uzumaki.
Meeting his resurrected uncle was another seismic shock. Fujian looked young, healthy, and carried a quiet, steady strength that reminded Sasuke painfully of his father, but without the stern, burdened weight. Delia was all warm, fierce energy. They greeted him not with overwhelming emotion, but with a solemn, profound understanding.
Fujian: "Sasuke. We have heard much. You have borne an impossible weight with great strength. To see you stand here, free of that hatred… it is more than we dared hope for."
Delia: (Pulling him into a brief, tight hug) "You are family. This is your sanctuary too, whenever you need it."
They spoke of the past, but not with morbid focus. They spoke of the future Fujian was helping to build in Kumo's intelligence corps, of Delia's work with the hospital. They were living. It was the final proof that the cycle could be broken.
Later, alone with Indra on a cliff overlooking the sea, Sasuke asked the question that had been burning in him since he learned of Project Phoenix.
Sasuke: "My parents. Fugaku and Mikoto. How long? When can you…?"
Indra: "The genetic sequencing is complete. The soul-recall parameters from the Pure Lands are more complex for adults with fully formed psyches and a natural death imprint, as opposed to children or those like my father and the Third Raikage who died in intense, focused moments. The vessel synthesis would also require a more robust donor base. Estimated time for viable procedure: eight to twelve months, assuming no major disruptions from the Akatsuki conflict." He looked at Sasuke. "The offer stands. When you are ready, and when the timeline is secure, we will begin."
A year. He had a year to build a world safe enough to bring them back to. It wasn't a hope; it was a mission parameter. "I'll be ready," Sasuke said, his voice granite.
________________________________________
The month drew to a close. Sasuke was a different shinobi. His power was settled, immense, and controlled. His purpose was clear: justice for the past, security for the future. He was preparing to return to Konoha, to take his place as a power within the reformed system, to hunt Obito.
On his final evening, as he walked a secluded mountain path back from a last training session with Indra, the air before him warped.
A spiral of darkness peeled open. From it stepped Obito, wearing his orange mask, his single visible eye narrowed.
Obito: "Uchiha Sasuke. I felt the disturbance. The death of a Mangekyō. Your brother is gone. And you… you are alone. Empty. I know the feeling."
Sasuke stopped, his expression impassive.
Obito: "He offered them to you, didn't he? His eyes. The path to Eternal power. And you, in your sentimentality, refused." His voice dripped with mocking pity. "A foolish choice. Power is the only truth in this hellish world. You must take it, by any means necessary. You should have taken your brother's power! It was your right! Your inheritance!"
Sasuke just looked at him. This ghost, this manipulator, this man who had set his brother on his path and now preached the philosophy of theft and despair. The final piece of the old, rotten world, standing before him.
Slowly, deliberately, Sasuke activated his eyes.
Not the Mangekyō.
His Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan.
The unique, six-pointed flower pattern bloomed in his eyes, a deep, stable purple against the crimson. There was no strain, no flicker. Only absolute, permanent power.
Obito's visible eye widened behind his mask. The mocking certainty shattered into pure, unadulterated shock. "That… that's not… you didn't…!"
Sasuke: His voice was colder than the mountain wind. "Your era of theft is over, Obito. Your philosophy is obsolete. I didn't take my brother's eyes. I fixed my own. I didn't choose the path of despair. I am building a new one."
He took a step forward, his Susanoo beginning to whisper into existence around him in a cascade of purple light, not as a raging demon, but as a summoned sovereign. "You are a relic. A ghost clinging to a broken dream. And I am the one who will finally put you to rest."
Obito stared, utterly disarmed. His entire worldview, his justification, his plan—all of it was predicated on the Uchiha curse, on the inevitable corruption and need for stolen power. Before him stood an Uchiha who had broken the curse through science, through will, who stood in a village that had broken the cycle of clan persecution. Sasuke was the living repudiation of everything Obito believed.
For the first time, genuine fear flickered in Obito's eye. He wasn't facing an angry victim or a potential recruit. He was facing the future. And the future had very cold, very focused, and very powerful eyes.
With a snarl of frustration and confusion, Obito's form dissolved into the Kamui vortex, retreating from the undeniable truth standing before him.
Sasuke let his Susanoo fade. He looked at the spot where Obito had been, then up at the gleaming towers of Kumo, and finally towards the west, towards Konoha.
The path was clear. The tools were forged. The ghosts of the past had been named, and one had been laid to rest. The ghost who remained was next.
He turned and walked back towards the light of the village, his steps sure, his eyes forever clear.
End of Chapter – 96