Konoha Tarnished

July 2nd, 0:08!

In Konoha, the Hokage's office—the guard captain who had awakened from the forbidden ground reported the urgent incident of Madara's remains going missing!

"What did you say?" Naruto's bandaged right hand slammed against the desk, sending the mountain of documents piled on top scattering across the floor!

"Are you sure? The one who broke into the forbidden ground and took Madara's corpse was that Uchiha Chen?"

"Yes, Seventh Hokage. Years ago, when I returned to the village from a mission, I had a brief encounter with Chen! With a face that distinctive, I couldn't mistake it! He took down all my subordinates! I let my guard down too, fell for his Sharingan Genjutsu, and passed out."

Naruto's face tightened. "How many casualties?"

The squad leader said, "Fortunately, no casualties! Everyone was just knocked unconscious! I think that Chen probably didn't want to take things too far."

"I see..." Naruto let out a breath, sank back into his chair, propped his chin on his hands, and pondered his next move.

How did he manage to slip past the Guardian Barrier and the Yamanaka Clan's Sensory Division, coming and going without a trace...

Naruto was puzzled, but faced with the reality, he could only accept it.

At that moment, the Hokage Advisor standing nearby, Shikamaru, suddenly asked, "Uchiha Chen—did he leave any message?"

"Huh?" The squad leader froze. "A message! Right, I think there was one! He told me to pass it to the Seventh Hokage!"

"What message?"

In the instant he fell under the genjutsu, a faint voice had echoed in the squad leader's mind.

"It was something like... 'Tell the Hokage, I've already signaled plenty of times. You've chosen inaction, so I'll have to do things my way.'"

"Huh? Signaled?" Naruto frowned and looked at Shikamaru. "Did Chen ever say... he wanted to take Madara's remains?"

Shikamaru pinched his chin, thought for a moment, then shook his head with certainty. "No. Over the past ten-plus years, he did contact us unilaterally through letters many times, but he never once mentioned any intention to take Madara's remains."

Since it wasn't official correspondence between the Five Great Nations, Chen's private letters wouldn't be directly submitted to the daily administrative documents Naruto had to handle. Instead, Shikamaru, as advisor, would preview them and decide whether to pass them up.

(Disclaimer: Regarding the controversy over Shikamaru's character, I'll reveal in advance that he's under some kind of 'technique'—the work of an unknown party on neither side. I planned to unveil it as the plot progressed, but since there's been some debate, I'll give you this heads-up early.)

But Shikamaru found the content of his letters either unrealistic or alarmist, so he intercepted them all.

It wasn't until three years ago, when Chen first mentioned his identity as a member of the Uchiha Clan in a letter, that Shikamaru informed Naruto.

Naruto thought... A descendant of the Uchiha—though they were a branch guarding the Blood Pool Clan's forbidden ground in the Land of Lightning nearly a century ago, their status long reduced to commoners—could still be considered a distant relative of Sasuke, right?

So he planned to find time to personally meet with Chen... but then, the Feudal Lord of the Land of Fire summoned Naruto for something urgent. Unable to avoid it, Naruto left without even leaving a Shadow Clone.

And so he stood Chen up.

Naruto recalled, "That day, I remember he waited a long time in the reception area, right?"

The squad leader said, "Yes, yes, yes! That was the time I came back to report and saw him in the reception area. He was sitting there, constantly looking down at his watch!"

Naruto said, "After that stand-up, he went completely silent. I never expected that today, he'd pull something so outrageous..."

When that stand-up was mentioned, a flicker of indescribable emotion passed through Shikamaru's eyes.

"Naruto, now that things have come to this, there are some things about Chen I need to tell you..."

Naruto tensed slightly and signaled the squad leader with a glance. The latter immediately understood, left the room, locked the door behind him, and stood guard in the hallway.

Naruto propped his chin on his hands. "Go ahead, Shikamaru."

Shikamaru lit a cigarette.

"I shouldn't have kept this from you, but Chen's statements in his letters were quite suspicious, so I started investigating his background privately a long time ago."

"First, his identity as a descendant of the Uchiha Clan is genuine. Back then, the chaos caused by the Gold and Silver Brothers of Kumogakure also affected the Uchiha clan members guarding the Blood Pool Clan's forbidden ground. Most of them died. The very few survivors didn't return to Konoha; they settled in the Land of Lightning under assumed identities."

"Chen's parents were among those who stayed in the Land of Lightning, but their identities were accidentally exposed, inviting revenge from the surviving members of the Uchiha's old enemy, the 'Blood Pool Clan.' Both of them were killed."

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"Leaving the brothers 'Chen' and 'Jin' to depend on each other."

"That's quite a twisty background. And then?" If it weren't for the Madara incident, Naruto might have sympathized with Chen upon hearing this.

"Later, according to reports, the surviving Blood Pool clan members were gradually eliminated—women and children included. Every last survivor of that clan was completely wiped out. There's no solid intel that the brothers did it for revenge, but I think it's hard to separate them from it."

"Revenge... the same path Sasuke took back then. It's like the Uchiha's fate."

Shikamaru continued, "Chen and Jin aren't affiliated with any ninja village's ranks, nor did they join the Allied Shinobi Forces to participate in the later Fourth Great Ninja War."

"If their status was civilian, avoiding the shinobi world's war is understandable, but after the war, his actions were far too purposeful."

"You know, as the war's most outstanding hero, you have the greatest rallying power in the entire shinobi world—the true leader of the Five Kage. He has ties to Konoha's Uchiha, so trying to latch onto you and find a place to settle down would be one thing, but he had to do it in such a sensational way."

Naruto asked, "What kind of sensational way?"

Shikamaru flicked his ash and said, "This man actually questioned the system of the Hokage's direct governance in his letters! He said that the 'Kage,' as a village's highest combat power, shouldn't waste so much energy on tedious administrative work. Instead, a secretariat-like institution should be established to replace the Kage's functions. The Kage should focus entirely on combat training! Is that any of his business?"

Naruto didn't comment on that.

"Later, I heard his brother died."

Naruto was startled. "How did he die?"

Shikamaru said, "There's no way to trace this matter, but ever since his younger brother died, Dust's actions have deviated from the normal track. The exchange houses and the underground black market auctions—those corners hidden in the shadows of the ninja world that can't see the light—yet traces of his involvement were found there!"

"It's said that in just a few short years, he amassed enough funds to sustain a large ninja village like Konoha for several years. He's a rogue ninja not affiliated with any village—what was he hoarding wealth for? It's hard not to draw parallels to the Akatsuki, which once had wealth accumulation as a phased goal!"

"If it were only to this extent, in my mind, this person would be nothing more than an underground broker running wild after losing his family ties!"

"What truly made me classify him as a 'dangerous element' was that in his letters, he said the clan of Kaguya Ōtsutsuki is still active on this land!"

"What!?" The three characters 'Ōtsutsuki' jolted Naruto upright from his seat.

When he first became Hokage, Sasuke had convened the Five Kage and made a similar conjecture regarding Kaguya cultivating the White Zetsu soldiers—that there were still Ōtsutsuki lying dormant in this ninja world.

And to verify this conjecture, Sasuke had been conducting secret investigations outside all these years!

But what Shikamaru said next was even more startling: "However, even Sasuke hasn't verified that intel, yet that Uchiha Dust directly named that Ōtsutsuki in his letter with absolute certainty!"

"What name!?"

"I remember it was, Ōtsutsuki, Isshiki!"

"Ōtsutsuki, Isshiki?"

Seeing that Naruto seemed to be taking it somewhat seriously, Shikamaru said, "My speculation is this: after that discussion back then, someone among the Five Kage accidentally leaked the news, and Uchiha Dust, upon hearing it, started making a big deal out of it."

"But... what would he gain from doing that?"

"Three years ago, on the day you stood him up, I went to the reception room and personally asked him how he knew about the Ōtsutsuki intel. Guess what that Uchiha Dust said?"

Naruto slowly sat back down in his chair, "What did he say?"

"He actually said he foresaw it in a dream. Hah, that's a skill only the Great Toad Sage of Mount Myōboku possesses—what qualifications does he have? He didn't even bother to draft a lie."

"But I didn't call him out on the spot. Maybe he had some unspeakable difficulty regarding the source of his intel and couldn't say it directly. To be cautious, I decided to test whether he was truly sincere."

"And how did you test him?" Naruto frowned deeply.

Shikamaru said, "I told him straight up: your words and actions are far too suspicious. From the standpoint of the Hokage's advisor in Konoha, I simply cannot believe what you're saying."

"If you want to prove yourself, then cooperate with Konoha's procedures—first seal your chakra, then stay briefly in Konoha's confinement room, and let the Yamanaka clan of Konoha verify whether what you say is true or false!"

Naruto propped his chin on his hand and frowned, "And then? How did Dust react?"

"Click!" Shikamaru's expression darkened as he lit another cigarette.

Amidst the rising smoke, Shikaku crumpled the cigarette filter, "That Uchiha Dust, he actually said..."