Chapter 50: A Legacy Revealed
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[VIP Highlight: Uchiha Fugaku (VIP1) - "Danzo will pay for what he's done"]
Uchiha Fugaku: That old thief Danzo stole my clan's legacy! Our lands, our scrolls, our history—all confiscated while my son lives on subsistence rations! The shame!
Uchiha Mikoto: My poor Sasuke... growing up not just orphaned, but impoverished. Eating ration bars in an empty compound while Danzo funds his dark operations with our family's wealth.
Kushina Uzumaki: Mikoto, dear, try not to despair. Hardship can forge strong character. Naruto grew up the same way, and look how resilient he is!
Uchiha Mikoto: Her spectral form softened. Thank you, Kushina. And here you are comforting me when you've suffered so much yourself...
Kushina Uzumaki: Huh? What do you mean? I'm doing fine!
Uchiha Mikoto: A knowing, sympathetic smile. Oh, sweet sister. We're both married women. I understand the... challenges. With Minato being so... fast... it must be quite demanding for you.
Kushina Uzumaki: Turns a shade of red visible even in the afterlife. MIKOTO!
Minato Namikaze: Ethereal form flickering with embarrassment. I... um... that's not...
Uchiha Shisui (VIP2): Danzo truly is despicable. Steals eyes from his own subordinate, steals wealth from orphans... I wonder what kind of teacher produces such a student.
Tobirama Senju (VIP5): Coldly. Care to elaborate, boy?
Uchiha Kagami (Regular Viewer): Clears throat nervously. Shisui! Danzo and I were both students of the Second Hokage! Mind your words!
Uchiha Shisui: My apologies, Grandfather. I spoke from... fresh bitterness. Forgive me.
Uchiha Kagami: Don't apologize to me! Apologize to Lord Second!
Uchiha Shisui: Forgive my outburst, Lord Second Hokage. It won't happen again.
Tobirama Senju: For Kagami's sake, I'll let it pass. Once.
In the hospital courtyard, the air still smelled of ozone and scorched earth from Naruto's explosive (and damp) landing in the koi pond. Ren faced Kakashi across twenty feet of open ground, the medical bills for two-thirds of Team 7 resting between them like an unspoken accusation.
"So you want me to pay for Sasuke's treatment?" Ren tossed the bill back.
"Both of them," Kakashi corrected, catching it effortlessly. "But I'm open to alternatives. One condition."
Ren's eyes narrowed. "Which is?"
"Fight me. If you win, I cover all medical expenses." Kakashi's visible eye crinkled. "To keep it fair: one shadow clone only, no ninjutsu. Just taijutsu and tactics."
Ren considered. His Vortex-enhanced physique hummed with potential. The combat experience from Minato and Tobirama whispered strategies in his mind. And the live stream audience was already placing bets.
Minato Namikaze: He's testing Ren. Wants to measure his skill firsthand.
Tobirama Senju: Standard assessment protocol for an unknown variable. The boy should refuse—he gains nothing from revealing his capabilities.
Uchiha Madara: Refuse? Nonsense! A warrior meets every challenge! Show this one-eyed fool what power looks like!
"That's what you said." Ren nodded. "Don't regret it."
Kakashi smiled behind his mask. "Courtyard. Now."
They moved—Kakashi with that lazy, efficient grace, Ren with the controlled economy of motion that belied his age. In the open space behind the hospital, afternoon light dappled through cherry trees just beginning to shed their blossoms.
Kakashi formed a single hand seal. Poof. A perfect shadow clone appeared beside him, already in a fighting stance.
No words. Ren moved first.
His hands blurred—not to form seals, but to draw and throw. Six kunai arced through the air, their trajectories wide, seemingly careless. They thudded into the ground around Kakashi's clone in a loose circle, none closer than three feet.
Kakashi didn't move. "Scatter-throwing? You've forgotten basic shurikenjutsu principles. Accuracy suffers with volume."
Hyuga Hizashi: A feint. The boy isn't that sloppy.
Third Raikage: Those placements are intentional. Watch.
Ren didn't respond. Instead, he took a sharp inhale—and exhaled a roaring sphere of flame that filled the space between them.
C-rank: Great Fireball Technique!
Kakashi's clone leaped backward, avoiding the conflagration. But as he landed—
When did he form the seals? I never saw—
The thought barely registered before Ren was there, not where he'd been standing, but behind Kakashi's landing point, a swirling sphere of blue chakra already pressed toward the clone's abdomen.
Minato Namikaze: Rasengan! He's combining them!
Kushina Uzumaki: Our techniques... he's using them together...
Kakashi's reflexes were legendary for a reason. Even surprised, his clone's hand shot out, catching Ren's wrist, elbow applying leverage to throw the boy and his deadly sphere aside.
But Ren vanished.
Not backward. Not aside.
Poof.
He reappeared directly behind the clone, the Rasengan's scream filling the air as it connected squarely with the clone's back.
—BOOM!
The shadow clone disintegrated in a puff of smoke.
In the branches of a nearby cherry tree, the real Kakashi Hatake straightened so abruptly he nearly lost his footing. His book slipped from his fingers, tumbling to the grass below unnoticed.
His single visible eye was wide, the sharingan beneath his forehead protector burning with sudden, fierce activation. He stared at the boy now standing calmly amid the scattered kunai, cherry blossoms drifting down around him like snow.
No hand seals for the teleportation.
No warning.
Just instant, impossible movement.
Kakashi's breath caught. Memories flooded him—a flash of yellow hair, three-pronged kunai, the word "FLEE" carved into his consciousness during the Kyuubi attack. The signature technique of the man who'd been more father than teacher.
"Flying Thunder God," Kakashi whispered, the words tasting of ash and old grief. "But... how?"
The kunai. The poorly thrown, widely scattered kunai he'd dismissed as amateurish. Each one bore a tiny, almost invisible marking. A formula he hadn't seen in twelve years.
Ren met his gaze across the courtyard. "You said no ninjutsu. I used taijutsu and tactics. The Rasengan is technically a shape transformation, not a ninjutsu requiring seals. And the teleportation... well, that's just good positioning."
Kakashi dropped from the tree, landing lightly. He didn't retrieve his book. His entire bearing had changed—the lazy slouch gone, replaced by the coiled readiness of a hunter confronting something that shouldn't exist.
"You have the Fourth Hokage's techniques. The Rasengan. Flying Thunder God. How?"
Tobirama Senju: Sigh. And so the cat leaves the bag. Or in this case, the Yellow Flash's legacy.
Minato Namikaze: Proudly. He's adapted it well! Using the poorly-thrown kunai as anchors! That's creative!
Kushina Uzumaki: You're proud?! He just revealed your signature techniques to your own student! Kakashi's going to have questions!
Uchiha Madara: Questions are meaningless. What matters is that the boy wields power. How he obtained it is irrelevant.
Hashirama Senju: But Madara, the Fourth's techniques are a national treasure! They shouldn't be in the hands of a child without oversight!
Ren considered Kakashi's question. The truth was impossible. Oh, your dead sensei donated them through an afterlife streaming service because I showed him his son eating expired milk.
Instead, he shrugged. "I found scrolls. Studied. Practiced."
"Scrolls." Kakashi's voice was flat with disbelief. "Flying Thunder God was never fully transcribed. The Fourth took most of its nuances to his grave. And the Rasengan..." He stepped closer, his sharingan now openly active, tomoe spinning. "Who are you really, Ren Arakawa?"
The air thickened. In the hospital window above, a pale face peered down—Sasuke, awake now, watching with dark, intense eyes.
Uchiha Fugaku: My son witnesses this. Good. Let him see what true power looks like, not the diminished shadow Danzo left him.
Uchiha Mikoto: But Kakashi looks... angry. Or scared. I can't tell which.
Ren met Kakashi's gaze, the sharingan's hypnotic swirl reflected in his own eyes. "I'm the guy who's going to protect Naruto. And who just won a fight against your clone. Medical bills are your problem now."
He turned to leave, but Kakashi's voice stopped him.
"Wait."
Ren paused.
"The Fourth..." Kakashi's voice softened, the anger bleeding into something more complex. "He would have been fascinated by you. And terrified. These techniques... they're not toys."
"I know." Ren didn't look back. "They're tools. And I have a lot of tools now."
He walked away, leaving Kakashi standing amid the cherry blossoms and scattered kunai, the ghost of his teacher hanging between them like a shared haunting.
In the Pure Land, Minato Namikaze watched his student's stunned expression through the stream.
Minato Namikaze: I'm sorry, Kakashi. I wish I could explain.
Kushina Uzumaki: He looks so lost. Like he's seeing a ghost.
Tobirama Senju: He is, in a way. Your legacy is a ghost he's been carrying for years. Now it walks in another.
Kakashi finally bent to retrieve his fallen book. His fingers traced its cover absently as he stared at the spot where Ren had vanished—not with teleportation this time, just ordinary departure.
"Sensei," he murmured to the empty air. "What game are you playing from beyond the grave?"
Above, Sasuke's face disappeared from the window, curtains falling closed. In the koi pond, Naruto surfaced, sputtering and covered in lily pads, blissfully unaware of the revelation that had just shaken his new sensei to the core.
And somewhere in the shadows between hospital buildings, a figure with bandaged arms watched it all, a single eye narrowed in calculation.
Danzo had seen the Rasengan.
He had seen the teleportation.
And he understood exactly what they meant.
The game, as they say, had just changed entirely.