Shisui Uchiha shook his head, and Itachi Uchiha followed suit.
Uchiha Gen smiled faintly and looked at Itachi. "Why is it impossible?"
Itachi Uchiha's expression froze. He stammered for a long while without being able to give a reason, finally saying, "I... I can't think of a reason. My intuition just tells me something like that couldn't happen."
"What about you, Shisui?"
"Earlier, Gen, you said that Hashirama Senju had led the founding of Konoha, so he must have enjoyed immense popular support."
"If he refused, wouldn't he be letting everyone down?"
Itachi Uchiha's eyes lit up at that. That made sense.
"Shisui, you're absolutely right."
Having received approval, Shisui immediately beamed.
"Hashirama Senju was the only possible choice for First Hokage. Only he could win everyone over; no one else could."
"If Hashirama Senju hadn't existed, Madara Uchiha could still have won people over through force. But with Hashirama Senju around, he couldn't."
"If anyone else took the position, the people simply wouldn't accept it. Discontent would easily lead to instability, instability to internal conflict, and internal conflict could cause Konoha to fall apart."
"That was something Hashirama Senju could not tolerate, so he had no choice but to take the position."
"Although I'm an Uchiha, I acknowledge that Hashirama Senju taking the position was both reasonable and inevitable."
Shisui and Itachi nodded slightly, indicating that they too agreed with Hashirama Senju becoming Hokage.
"After Hashirama Senju took the position, he promised Madara Uchiha the seat of Second Hokage. But by then, Madara Uchiha had already resolved to leave Konoha."
"Why?"
"Because Madara Uchiha no longer trusted Hashirama Senju."
"Why didn't he trust him? Because the promised Hokage position wasn't fulfilled?"
"That was part of the reason."
"After careful analysis, I think Madara's thoughts were probably like this."
"The