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The shadow fell across the hospital room like a physical weight.
It wasn't about actual mass, but rather an overwhelming sense of presence that made the air itself feel heavier and harder to breathe.
Tenten startled visibly, her body tensing on pure instinct. The apple she'd been holding slipped from her suddenly nerveless fingers and hit the floor with a dull thud that seemed impossibly loud in the quiet room.
She practically jumped to her feet, bowing deeply and respectfully. "Third... Third Hokage!"
Rock Lee also struggled to sit upright in his hospital bed, his expression shifting to one of surprised respect. With all the bandages still wrapped around his torso and limbs, he looked particularly disheveled and vulnerable.
"No, don't move."
An aged yet surprisingly gentle voice filled the space between them.
Hiruzen Sarutobi walked slowly into the ward, removing his distinctive straw hat to reveal a face deeply lined with wrinkles, yet still radiating sharp intelligence and quiet authority.
He didn't look at Rock Lee immediately. Instead, he bent down with surprising grace for someone his age, picked up the fallen apple from the floor, and handed it back to Tenten, who remained frozen in complete shock.
"Don't be nervous, young lady." He smiled warmly at her. "I'm just an old man passing through, here to check on the flowers growing in our village."
Tenten's face flushed bright crimson as she accepted the apple with trembling hands. She opened her mouth several times but couldn't manage to produce any coherent words.
The Hokage himself had come to visit personally? Here? To see Lee?
How was that even possible?
Hiruzen Sarutobi finally turned his attention to Rock Lee, who lay watching from his hospital bed with carefully controlled surprise.
That penetrating gaze was strange and unsettling in a way that was difficult to define.
It didn't feel like he was looking at a mere genin or even at a promising junior shinobi.
It felt more like an experienced master craftsman examining a piece of uncarved jade that possessed an unusually interesting texture and hidden potential.
"Rock Lee," he began slowly, his voice measured and deliberate.
"Yes, Third Hokage!" Rock Lee sat at attention immediately, his voice loud and clear, full of vibrant energy that seemed completely inconsistent with someone who should have been critically injured.
Inner thoughts: 'Here we go. That old fox finally couldn't resist coming to investigate personally. Just as planned.'
Hiruzen Sarutobi nodded once, pulled a chair over from the corner of the room, and sat down with the casual authority of someone settling into his own office rather than a hospital ward.
"I received a report from Anko about you," he said, getting straight to the point without any diplomatic preamble or unnecessary pleasantries.
"About your training methods."
Tenten's heart leaped into her throat with sudden dread.
She realized with crystal clarity that the Third Hokage hadn't been passing by at all. He'd come here specifically because of Lee's completely insane and self-destructive behavior that she'd witnessed!
A perfectly calculated mixture of determination and embarrassment appeared on Rock Lee's face as he responded. "Yes! To become stronger, I must put in a hundred times, a thousand times more effort than anyone else!"
"Is it truly worth it?" Hiruzen Sarutobi's eyes seemed to pierce through flesh and bone straight into the soul beneath. "Using methods that border on deliberate self-destruction to gain such minuscule increments of progress. I understand that during the Chunin Exam preliminaries, nearly every bone in your body was shattered. And now you've sustained similar catastrophic injuries again. What happens next time?"
He paused deliberately, allowing his words to sink in before lowering his voice slightly.
"Aren't you afraid? Afraid that one day you truly won't be able to stand up again, no matter how strong your will?"
The air in the room became deathly silent and oppressively heavy.
Tenten watched Rock Lee with barely concealed anxiety, her palms sweating profusely as she clutched the forgotten apple.
She'd wanted to ask him that exact same question so many times but had never found the courage.
Rock Lee fell silent for several long moments.
He didn't immediately respond with his usual passionate slogans about youth and dedication.
Instead, he lowered his head slowly, staring down at his cast-covered arm. A hint of genuine confusion and pain seemed to flash through his eyes, emotions that looked raw and unfiltered, but in the end they all crystallized into an almost twisted obsession that dominated everything else.
"I'm afraid," he finally spoke, his voice coming out slightly hoarse and strained.
"Of course I'm afraid. I'm terrified that I won't be strong enough when it matters most. Afraid that I can't protect my important companions when they need me. I'm afraid that when real danger arrives, I'll only be able to watch helplessly like a completely useless piece of trash while everyone else suffers."
He suddenly raised his head, his eyes blazing with fierce intensity, and stared directly at the Third Hokage without flinching or looking away.
"Lord Hokage! Do you truly understand what it feels like to have no natural talent whatsoever?"
His voice grew more passionate with each word. "It means that no matter how fast you run, there will always be someone naturally faster. No matter how well you perform, there will always be someone who can easily surpass you without even trying."
"I have no bloodline limit! No brilliant tactical mind! I can't even master the most basic ninjutsu or genjutsu techniques that every other Academy student learns without difficulty!"
"All I have is this body! And the unwavering will that Guy-sensei taught me to cultivate and protect!"
His voice grew increasingly impassioned, his face flushing with genuine-looking excitement, as if he wanted to physically tear out his very soul and lay it bare before the Hokage for inspection.
"Therefore, if this body is my only weapon, then honing it to its absolute ultimate potential is my only path forward! It's the only option I have!"
"Even if it shatters! Even if it's completely destroyed! As long as it can shield my comrades from even a single attack at a crucial moment, buying the village even one precious second of time, then it's worth it! Then everything I've suffered has meaning!"
"If my dedicated efforts, like the burning leaves of Konohagakure itself, can bring even a glimmer of light to protect this village, then I am willing to burn continuously without stopping! I'll keep burning until I'm reduced to nothing but ashes!"
Inner thoughts: 'Perfect! That was a flawless performance! I almost believe my own words now. The Will of Fire speech hits all the right emotional notes. Come on, old man, shouldn't you be giving me full marks for this?'
His words rang out powerfully and resonated throughout the small hospital room.
Tenten's eyes filled with tears that threatened to spill over at any moment. She seemed to see, overlaid on top of the bandaged figure before her, that clumsy boy practicing alone under the moonlight, falling down again and again, only to push himself back up and continue without complaint.
This was him.
This was Rock Lee.
A hopeless, passionate, completely dedicated idiot who would never give up.
Hiruzen Sarutobi listened quietly and attentively to every word. At some point during the speech, he'd produced his pipe again, though he didn't light it. He simply stroked it thoughtfully with weathered fingers.
He studied the seemingly fanatical young man lying before him in that hospital bed, but his own heart and mind remained coldly analytical and clear.
Something was wrong here.
Every single word Lee had spoken conformed perfectly to the doctrines of the Will of Fire. The speech was as flawless as a textbook example, hitting every emotional beat with precision.
But deep within those passionate eyes, hidden beneath all that burning intensity, there was too much calculation. Too much calm detachment.
It was an absolute, controlled calm that even the most convincing display of burning passion couldn't completely conceal.
This boy was like a supremely talented actor giving everything to play a passionate role with complete conviction.
He didn't actually enjoy the effort or even the pain itself.
What he enjoyed was the process of gaining power through controlled self-destruction. He was optimizing his growth through deliberate damage.
He wasn't firewood burning himself up for others' warmth.
He was a blade.
A potentially peerless, lethally sharp blade that deliberately sought out the hardest whetstones available, even if being sharpened meant being broken and reforged repeatedly.
Was this phenomenon a blessing for Konohagakure, or a curse waiting to manifest?
A long, contemplative silence stretched between them.
Finally, Hiruzen Sarutobi stood slowly from his chair.
"I understand," he said simply.
He neither confirmed that he believed the performance nor stated that he saw through it.
He simply reached out and patted Rock Lee gently on the shoulder with one weathered hand.
"Take care of yourself properly. Konohagakure's future needs young shinobi like you."
His hand felt warm against Lee's shoulder, and also very old, carrying the weight of decades of leadership and countless difficult decisions.
But the moment that hand made contact, Rock Lee felt an inexplicable chill creep through him despite the physical warmth.
This old man was definitely not easy to fool or manipulate.
Hiruzen Sarutobi didn't say anything more. He placed his distinctive straw hat back on his head and turned to walk toward the door with measured steps.
Just as he was about to step out of the ward and disappear down the corridor, he suddenly stopped without looking back over his shoulder.
"Oh, one more thing."
"Starting tonight, Training Ground Three will be exclusively open to you during nighttime hours."
"Try not to disturb the other shinobi anymore with your methods."
After delivering that statement, his figure disappeared around the corner at the end of the corridor, leaving only the faint echo of his footsteps behind.
The hospital ward fell into heavy silence.
Tenten released a long breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, her entire body going limp with relief as she collapsed back into her chair. She looked at Rock Lee with an incredibly complicated expression that mixed heartache, genuine admiration, and a hint of something else that might have been awe.
"Lee..."
"Ah, Tenten!" Rock Lee interrupted cheerfully, as if nothing particularly significant had just occurred. His trademark honest smile returned instantly as he scratched the back of his head in an embarrassed gesture.
"The Third Hokage is such a kind and thoughtful person! He came all this way just to check on me personally!"
"But what did he mean at the end? Training Ground Three will be open exclusively for me? That's incredible! It means I can engage in even more intensive and focused training tonight without worrying about disturbing anyone!"
Watching him excitedly begin planning his next session of self-harm masquerading as legitimate training, Tenten opened her mouth to protest or reason with him.
But she found she couldn't produce a single word of objection.
She could only sit there silently, picking up the knife from the table and beginning to peel the apple that had fallen to the floor earlier with trembling hands.
Rock Lee reclined back against his pillows, staring up at the plain white ceiling. From an angle that Tenten couldn't see from where she sat, a slight satisfied smile played across his lips.
Perfect.
His threat assessment had been raised significantly. His activities had been classified as village secrets. And he'd been given exclusive access to an isolated training facility.
These signals, when properly translated, meant exactly what he'd hoped: Your methods are dangerous and concerning, but also potentially very useful to us.
We're allowing you to continue sharpening yourself, but only where we can monitor the process.
This was precisely the outcome he'd been working toward.
His retirement plan's first critical step was now firmly established and secured.