A hundred-year-old Hokage?
Even assuming a ninja could live that long, would they still be lucid? How would someone like that run the village?
Would Konoha really be in such dire straits that they couldn't find a single replacement? Had the rest of them all died in some catastrophe?
Kakashi thought it through carefully. It finally clicked what "5.5th Hokage" meant. It had to be a transitional Hokage. A temporary stand-in before the next one was chosen.
Looked at that way, it really did match what Kaede Kitahara wrote.
But what kind of emergency would force Konoha to skip choosing the Sixth Hokage and shove Danzo into the seat as a stopgap?
Not impossible. But if it happened, it meant the village faced something so massive it couldn't even hold a normal Hokage election.
Thinking about the Hokage line from the beginning, the position honestly did feel cursed. Starting from the First Hokage, Senju Hashirama, none of the successions had gone smoothly.
The First died not long after his final battle with Uchiha Madara. The Second Hokage, Senju Tobirama, took over and was killed shortly after by the Gold and Silver Brothers from the Hidden Cloud. The Third Hokage was appointed on the battlefield.
The Fourth Hokage was the only one chosen through a normal process, but he died not long after. Then the Third unexpectedly returned to power.
What about the future Fifth Hokage? Would it be a normal selection or another emergency appointment?
And who in Konoha right now could even shoulder the role of the Fifth?
Not to mention something clearly happened to the Fifth for a "5.5th" to exist. So what about the Sixth? Would that one at least take office normally?
Information rushed through Kakashi's mind all at once. His mood darkened.
He could suddenly understand why Kaede held such a grudge against Shimura Danzo. The man truly wasn't a good person.
"That dead-last… is he really that important?"
Inside the Uchiha Clan's abandoned estate, Uchiha Sasuke muttered the words under his breath.
After Kaede's constant warnings, he finally realized Naruto might be far more important than he'd ever imagined.
Village elders watched him. His brother, a murderer he hated to the bone, had returned just to deal with the Fourth Hokage's legacy. And now, Kaede had been targeted for execution simply for interacting with Naruto.
Sasuke suddenly understood Naruto might be even more special than the last surviving heir of the Uchiha Clan.
He didn't know what a Root squad was, nor who Shimura Danzo really was, but even he could read between the lines.
No wonder everyone wants to kill Danzo. Even if you don't plan to kill him, he'll come after you first. He's Konoha's biggest tumor. Child trafficking, human experimentation, breaking people's minds… what hasn't he done?
The funniest part is how he thinks he's doing it all "for Konoha," claims he inherited the Will of Fire, and even wants to be Hokage.
What a joke.
Sure, the Third Hokage has his darker side too, but he's nothing like this lunatic. Will of Fire? I'd love to see if the First and Second Hokage would recognize your Will of Fire. If those two crawled out of their graves, the first thing they'd do is beat you to death.
Kaede's diary radiated pure hatred. If he could, he'd kill Danzo with his own hands.
He wasn't some unshakable saint. His self-control was logical, not emotional. His reason told him not to provoke Danzo, but his heart was burning with rage.
He simply lacked the power to do anything about it.
Compared to Kakashi, Sasuke knew almost nothing about Danzo. So when he read phrases like "Konoha's biggest tumor," "child trafficking," "human experimentation," and "breaking people's minds," even one of those was enough to show Danzo was unspeakably evil.
And that kind of man wanted to be Hokage?
Claimed to have the Will of Fire?
It didn't match anything Sasuke had ever learned. Your Will of Fire and my Will of Fire clearly weren't the same.
Despite calling himself a cold, emotionless avenger, Sasuke still respected the Will of Fire. Naturally, he hated people like Danzo.
The philosophy itself wasn't wrong. Who wouldn't want a Will of Fire like the one they read in the textbooks?
But scriptures twisted by the wrong hands weren't rare.
What part of your so-called Will of Fire made you cover your arm with Sharingan? What part made you implant Hashirama Cells into your body? What part justified all the crimes you committed?
Did the Second Hokage teach you any of that?
No wonder you died horribly in the end. Getting stabbed by Susanoo was exactly what you deserved.
Both Kakashi and Sasuke had expected Kaede to keep ranting. Instead, the diary dropped a bombshell.
Kakashi's entire expression sharpened. If this was real, things just became gravely serious.
An arm full of Sharingan?
What did that even mean?
Had Danzo transplanted Sharingan into his arm? And not just one… a whole arm?
Kakashi immediately thought of the bandaged limb Danzo always kept wrapped. He'd noticed it before but never cared. Now, with this new information…
Was that arm really filled with Sharingan?
If that was true, the implications were terrifying.
Never mind why Sharingan—clearly an eye—would be stuck onto an arm. The real question was: where did he get so many Sharingan?
The answer was obvious.
They must have been taken on the night the Uchiha Clan was massacred.
Everyone always said Uchiha Itachi killed his entire clan alone to "measure his capacity." But now it seemed Root might've been involved behind the scenes.
Which begged another question. Were the village elders part of it? Did the Third Hokage know?
There was one other possible scenario. Maybe Root harvested the Sharingan after the massacre.
But no matter which version was true, Shimura Danzo had already crossed every boundary the clans of Konoha agreed upon.
The major clans were old, with long histories. Even those without kekkei genkai guarded their secret techniques fiercely. If Sharingan could be stolen in bulk, what about their own secrets?
To every clan in the village, their kekkei genkai and unique jutsu were the core of their identity. Anyone who tried to take them was crossing a line they could never allow.
If word of this spread, the entire village would erupt.
Not a single clan would stand for it.