Protecting the Uchiha Clan: Root

Unlike Shiba Inu Shiba, who was always punctual, Uchiha Obito had never been good at keeping time.

As a child, he was always late. When he grew up, he even started deliberately showing up a few minutes late just to see others anxiously waiting for him.

Tonight, though, he wasn't late. Instead, he was unusually early.

Obito slipped into the darkness like a shadow, then silently infiltrated the Uchiha Clan's territory ahead of time.

"Tsk..." Obito clicked his tongue, standing behind a towering locust tree as he coldly surveyed the street ahead. "The Uchiha... still have a few tough ones."

A few elite-level ninjas still remained at the Uchiha Clan's compound. They might not have known that their clan was on the brink of destruction.

Even on the eve of its imminent destruction, the Uchiha Clan's compound still concealed many seasoned, capable ninjas with real combat experience. Unlike ordinary clan members, who relied solely on their bloodline and the natural talent of the Sharingan, they were elites hardened by years of warfare in the Ninja World.

Uchiha Obito knew this well. He wasn't blindly confident. Although he had already arranged for members of the Akatsuki Organization to attack the Clan Compound, deep down, he still felt a trace of unease.

He knew that even an Akatsuki squad might have trouble quickly suppressing these Three-Tomoe users.

"A leader," he said, surveying the pitch-dark streets from atop a tree, his eyes cold beneath his mask, "should take care of the toughest enemies himself."

Obito had never trusted anyone. He didn't trust the Akatsuki, Madara, or even the dream he had once cherished. He believed only in strength, only in the path he cleared with his own hands. He decided to act early and sweep the area in advance. Root was keeping the outside world in the dark, after all.

Obito slipped into the Uchiha compound without a sound, his objective clear. First, he would eliminate the elite ninjas who posed a real threat, clearing the way for the coming massacre.

This wasn't his first time striking against the Uchiha. Several days earlier, he and Uchiha Itachi had secretly dealt with the clan members who had tried to leave their family.

Tonight, though, was another harvest—one aimed at the core fighters who had remained at the Clan Compound, the ones with genuine combat strength.

Obito took a step forward, ghostlike.

His blade cut through the night, piercing the throat of a patrolling ninja in an instant. The man didn't even have time to react. The last thing reflected in his pupils was a flash of red.

But as Obito continued forward, his brow suddenly furrowed.

"These people..." He crouched and examined the face of one corpse. After a moment of silence, he said, "They don't have Sharingan."

They weren't Uchiha?

He frowned and looked around. In the next instant, several shadows burst out of the darkness and hurled themselves at him, heedless of their own lives.

"Enemy attack!" one of them rasped. "Target confirmed: the masked man. Surround and kill him immediately!"

"Who are you..." Obito swept his blade around, his Katana flashing as he struck. Two attackers fell, their blood splattering the night.

But more emerged from the shadows, moving in formation, their expressions hard, their steps soundless.

"...Root?" The wariness in Obito's eyes swiftly turned to coldness.

These men weren't members of the Uchiha Clan or the Akatsuki Organization. They were Danzo's subordinates, a secret unit belonging to Konoha's Root.

"How interesting..." Obito chuckled, his voice tinged with mockery. "The enemy of my enemy should be my friend. Yet here you are, attacking me at a time like this."

Deep in his eyes, the Mangekyō Sharingan quietly bloomed. Space twisted around him, swallowing him like a vortex. He vanished in an instant, then reappeared elsewhere.

But he soon noticed something was wrong.

No matter how Obito used Kamui to teleport, Root's men seemed able to pinpoint where he would appear. It was as if someone had anticipated his every move.

"I've been marked." Obito began to think.

"Have they been watching me since I entered Konoha?" he wondered. "Or... did someone place a tracking seal on me?"

While parrying his enemies, he shifted sideways, his body a blur in the darkness. He knew he couldn't let himself get dragged into a war of attrition. Even a monster like the Third Raikage would eventually run out of stamina and fall under a coordinated assault.

Obito could leave at any time, but he didn't want to.

The true terror of Uchiha Obito lay in the spatial power granted by his Mangekyō: Kamui.

It was a Dojutsu capable of overturning the rules of the battlefield. In the face of Kamui, the boundary between attack and defense nearly ceased to matter. He could make his body intangible in an instant, causing every physical attack to miss;

He could also suck an enemy into another dimension without the slightest warning.

For him, the choice between fighting and fleeing came down to a single thought.

Worse, that wasn't all.

Under Uchiha Madara's arrangements, he had been implanted with Senju Cells. His body's defenses and healing abilities were close to those of an immortal.

Even when injured, he could heal rapidly, and the power of the Senju Cells could even suppress the side effects of his ocular powers.

"Once someone like him loses control, even I would find him troublesome." That was Uchiha Madara's assessment of Obito in his later years.

For that very reason, Uchiha Madara hadn't completely let down his guard when he entrusted Obito with the plan and his power. He knew Obito's Mangekyō ability was far too unique. If Obito ever lost control, almost no one could effectively restrain him. So, to guard against the possibility that Obito might turn against him, Uchiha Madara had implanted a special control mechanism in his heart.

"I have to shake them off and find a way through." Obito calmly considered his next move, his eyes cold behind the mask. "Who started this chaos in the first place?"

Was Root targeting him? Weren't they his "teammates"?

Root had always believed the Akatsuki Organization had ordered Uchiha Itachi to attack them, killing four Root elites and even beating Danzo. As the embodiment of Root, Danzo's reputation was Root's reputation, and the humiliation had driven him to launch a retaliatory campaign against the Akatsuki Organization. According to Uchiha Rekka's intelligence, the masked man was part of the Akatsuki.

Root had originally planned to attack the Uchiha Clan, while Uchiha Obito had likewise planned to wipe them out. By rights, the enemy of an enemy should have been a friend. Yet, in a cruel twist, these enemies of the same enemy were now fighting each other. To some extent, Root's forces had become reinforcements for the Uchiha Clan, helping them repel Obito's attack; Obito, in turn, had become a blade against Root's invasion.

"Every time I show up, they track me. It has to be a Sensory Ninja."

Konoha had many Sensory Ninjas, and every Hokage had understood their importance. Uchiha Obito knew that too, so he had made a point of targeting them this time.

The Hyuga Clan. The Aburame Clan. Every strike was clean, precise, and swift. On the battlefield, Root's Sensory Ninjas were dwindling.

Yet his position continued to be pinpointed, again and again.

"Not a Sensory Ninja... something else."

He pondered the matter as he entered Kamui Space, withdrawing from the battlefield.

In Kamui Space, Obito stood on a platform surrounded by nothingness. He reached up and pulled open his shirt, noticing a faint irregularity. There was a subtle scent on his body, almost imperceptible, like... some kind of marker. It had been there ever since his last visit to Root Base. He had thought it was just the stench of Root.

"So that was when... Danzo started watching me."

Obito's face darkened. Without making a sound, he changed into a spare set of clothes, and the smell on him faded noticeably.

.

If the scent was the key to the marker, then someone—or some kind of Ninja Beast—had to be relying on it to track his movements.

"Ninja Hounds."

"Then I'll cut the source off."

When he returned to the battlefield, the wind had changed.

He became a shadow and plunged into the night. His Katana flashed like a streak of light, cutting through not only the air, but also Root's last Scout Dogs. The Ninja Hounds didn't even have time to growl before they were sliced in half, blood spraying across the ground.

Root's Sensory Chain snapped. Obito's figure became an illusion once more, appearing and disappearing without a trace. His enemies' reactions abruptly slowed, and the tide of battle turned.

"Retreat!" the Root Battlefield Commander ordered, but it was already too late.

Uchiha Obito moved among them like the Shinigami, cutting them down one by one without mercy. He looked less like a man than a beast. Before long, more than half the Root squad was dead or wounded, and the survivors fled the battlefield.

Root, the chain that should have been secretly keeping the Uchiha in check, was the first to be eliminated that night.

Unless Danzo was willing to personally enter the fray, Root had already lost its say in this Shadow War.

"Now, only the Uchiha remain." Obito's eyes twisted with malice.

Uchiha Obito had gone completely berserk. He had originally been the hand lurking behind the scenes, but now he had become a bloodthirsty blade himself.

The Uchiha Clan had always been fanatical: each member more stubborn and powerful than the last—and their strength often stemmed from that almost pathological obsession. The more fanatical they were, the stronger they became; the stronger they became, the more fanatical they grew.

Obito's thinking was sliding toward extremes, too. Even without Uchiha Itachi, he could still personally wipe out the entire Uchiha Clan. He no longer needed anyone's help, and he had left himself no way back. The guards at the Clan Compound's perimeter couldn't stop him.

So he slaughtered his way into the Uchiha Clan Compound's Core Area, mercilessly wiping out the Hawk Faction strongmen along the way.

But just as he was about to enter the Core Courtyard, a slender figure blocked his path.

It was a girl, no older than fourteen or fifteen, about the same age as Uchiha Itachi. Her expression was cool, her gaze resolute. Her Three-Tomoe Sharingan was active, but she showed no sign of backing down.