Kill Minato Namikaze

"Kill Minato Namikaze."

"Elder, what did you say? I didn't quite catch that."

"I said... you're going to kill Minato Namikaze. Do I need to repeat myself?"

Uchiha Sen lowered his head, his expression unreadable.

But his tightly clenched fists and whitening knuckles betrayed how he truly felt.

Me?

A student who hadn't even graduated from the Ninja Academy.

Go jump around in front of the Yellow Flash, then shout:

"Minato, I'm going to kill you!"

Even if you, Elder Yashiro, were ready to give up on me, there was no need to treat me like a lackey and order me around, was there?

So what if I took a few of your resources?

What if my growth was a little slow?

This made you seem petty. It was hardly very Uchiha of you.

In the old-fashioned courtyard, the branches of several cherry trees swayed gently in the breeze.

Cherry blossoms drifted down.

A few petals were carried along by the breeze, passed through the corridor, and landed on the tatami.

For a moment, the room was silent.

An old man and a youth knelt facing each other.

Uchiha Yashiro looked at the boy before him, his brow furrowed.

"What? You don't want to?"

The boy clenched his fists even tighter.

"I—"

"I'll do it."

"Good. You haven't disgraced our ancestors' name. Don't worry... whether you succeed or not, I'll grant you one request."

The boy said nothing. Silence was an answer, too.

Elder Yashiro had already achieved his aim. The boy's attitude didn't matter.

"All right, you may leave. Once you've decided what you want, tell Taohuo."

Uchiha Sen bowed respectfully.

Then he stood and left the courtyard.

The room fell silent once more.

Uchiha Yashiro picked up the teacup from the low table before him and took a small sip.

"Come out."

A figure stepped out from behind the landscape screen and came before Yashiro, kneeling respectfully.

"Great Elder."

"Taohuo, tell me what you think of the Uchiha Clan's current situation."

The Great Elder performed the tea ceremony with practiced precision, following the traditions passed down through the generations and devoting care to every step.

Uchiha Taohuo gathered his thoughts, a fervent glint in his eyes.

"The Uchiha name is glory itself. It needs no explanation."

The Great Elder nodded in satisfaction. "Taohuo, there aren't many as pure an Uchiha as you left in the clan. They've forgotten the glory of the Uchiha and let falsehoods blind them."

Uchiha Taohuo wholeheartedly agreed, the fervor in his eyes growing stronger.

Yashiro took note of his reaction and nodded to himself.

"What do you think of the arrangement I just made?"

The Great Elder's intention to mentor him was clear. Uchiha Taohuo held back his excitement and replied:

"The Great Elder wants to show the Konoha High Command that our Uchiha blades are still sharp."

"That's part of it, but you're missing something."

"Please enlighten me, Great Elder!" Taohuo bowed deeply.

"Ah!" Uchiha Yashiro completed the final step of the tea ceremony, then turned solemn and spoke in a grave voice.

"In the last war, forty-two of our clan's elite were killed."

"I know."

"No, you don't!"

Yashiro's voice rose sharply, and he could no longer conceal the hatred in his eyes.

"They took me for a fool, and thought the Uchiha Clan were weaklings they could twist and crush as they pleased."

Taohuo's eyes widened. "You're saying they weren't killed in battle?"

"It doesn't matter."

The Great Elder waved a hand.

"Whether they died in battle or... it doesn't matter anymore."

After calming himself, Uchiha Yashiro resumed his usual unruffled composure.

"The situation is already set. There's no point in pursuing it, especially since they covered their tracks so well. The Uchiha Clan is standing on the edge of a cliff now, so..."

The old man paused. Meeting Taohuo's gaze, he spoke each word deliberately:

"So, I intend to warn Hiruzen. Whoever dares to target the Uchiha, I will use the same methods against him and attack the Hokage's faction without reservation."

Uchiha Yashiro's words rang out with force.

Taohuo considered this for a moment. "Great Elder, as far as I know, it should be Danzo..."

He hadn't finished speaking when he suddenly realized the answer. Then he looked at the Great Elder with admiration.

"You've finally understood."

Uchiha Yashiro nodded, pleased. His guidance hadn't been wasted.

"That's right. Balance. Konoha needs balance, and the Hokage needs it even more. It's his way of wielding power, but also his weakness. He won't let anyone destroy the balance of power he's worked so hard to establish. Hmph! That includes Danzo."

So that was it. Taohuo sincerely admired the Great Elder's breadth of vision. Then he thought of the boy who had just left and sighed.

"Uchiha Sen. What a waste."

"He's a failure!"

The Great Elder harbored deep resentment toward Uchiha Sen.

"He opened his eyes at six. I spent a fortune on his training, and how did he repay me? By becoming the shame of the Uchiha! If he's already abandoned the glory of his name, then he can at least be of some use before he's discarded."

At the mention of Uchiha Sen, Taohuo naturally recalled the genius from three years ago, who had opened his eyes at six and astonished the entire clan.

The Great Elder had gone to great lengths to bring him under his wing. Who could have guessed that over the next three years, Sen would fall so far that "ordinary" no longer came close to describing him?

He'd left everyone speechless. Not only had he failed to display the talent he was supposed to have, but people had been wiping the floor with him.

It was one thing for top clans like the Hyuuga to beat him, but even no-name upstarts from minor clans could take a few shots at him.

No wonder the Great Elder was furious. His investment had gone to waste, and Sen had even earned himself the nickname "the shame of the Uchiha." He was practically worse than Obito.

Now everyone knew that the Uchiha Clan had produced two oddballs: Obito and Sen.

How could the Great Elder not be angry?

"What would you have me do, Great Elder?"

At the mention of Uchiha Sen, Yashiro nearly lost his temper again. A ball of resentment lodged in his chest, neither rising nor settling.

After a long pause, he said bitterly:

"If I haven't heard that he tried to assassinate Minato Namikaze in three days, spread the news throughout Konoha, then hand him over to Hiruzen."

"Yes!"

The conversation in the room continued.

Meanwhile.

Sen, who had managed to take the title of "the shame of the Uchiha" from Obito, was walking alone through the clan compound.

He treated the whispers around him and the occasional dirty look as if they were just a breeze passing by.

He was long used to it.

His expression remained unchanged, and every step landed with precise, measured certainty.

A two-story wooden house with a courtyard, standing at the edge of the compound, was his current home.

Though old, the house had everything he needed.

What he liked most was the little courtyard.

It was small, barely over fifty square meters, but large enough for his training.

He opened the door and left his shoes by the entrance.

The house was rather cold and quiet. Only after he stepped inside did it feel a little more lived in.

Sen had long since gotten used to living alone.

After a simple meal, he went to his workshop by himself.

It was a small room set apart for him. Wood carving was the only hobby he'd brought with him from his previous life.

It was almost laughable. Without any explanation, he'd gone to sleep one night and awakened as an infant in this world.

His parents had both died on a mission not long after his birth, but thanks to an adult's way of thinking, he'd still made a name for himself as a genius in the Uchiha Clan.

A genius who had opened his eyes at six.

But after that...

"Ah!" Uchiha Sen sighed as he looked at himself in the mirror.

There was no need to say anything about his looks. The name Uchiha spoke for itself.

In the reflection, the black irises in his eyes had turned blood-red, and a comma-shaped black mark revolved around each pupil.

A One-Tomoe Sharingan!

Too bad it was fake.

All appearance, no substance. His eyes didn't possess even the slightest bit of ocular power.

And as for the Sharingan's abilities, there was no need to mention them.

It wasn't just ocular power. He barely had any Chakra at all, only about a tenth of what others his age had.

After completing his daily mirror-check, Uchiha Sen picked up the unfinished piece on his desk, as he always did, and began carving it with care.

The pieces he'd already finished sat quietly on the shelves.

Aside from the sound of his carving knife scraping over the wood, the room was silent.

An hour later.

The knife made its final cut.

Looking at the piece in his hands, Uchiha Sen smiled, finally relaxed. He carefully placed it on the shelf.

As it turned out, the reason he'd gone from genius to laughingstock was a speck of light in his sea of consciousness.

It had come with him to this world. Three years ago, on the very day he'd awakened his Sharingan, it had suddenly come to life.

No matter the season, nine-tenths of the Chakra he refined went to it, ocular power included.

The situation felt strangely familiar, so Uchiha Sen couldn't help suspecting that some old immortal was hiding inside the speck of light.

After nurturing it for years, he'd formed a kind of connection with it.

Sen had a feeling that the speck of light in his sea of consciousness was nearly complete. Perhaps something would change today.

After carving, his body and mind were at their peak. It was the perfect time to train.

Uchiha Sen sat cross-legged and once again began refining Chakra with practiced ease.

Energy flowed from his 130 trillion cells and mixed with spiritual energy, forming the force known as Chakra.

In Sen's perception, the Chakra he'd just produced was abruptly drawn away by the mysterious speck of light. It absorbed nine-tenths of it.

The speck felt a little closer to completion.

Not enough?

Again!

Three years of pent-up frustration turned to anger. Today, one way or another, he'd find out who was messing with him.

A wisp of Chakra formed, then most of it vanished. The cycle repeated.

Uchiha Sen was like a precision instrument, refining Chakra over and over without tiring.

Until he reached a certain threshold.

As the speck absorbed the last wisp of Chakra, it suddenly began to throb like a heartbeat.

Once, twice...

It seemed to be giving birth to something.

"Thump, thump, thump..."

The sound came from his sea of consciousness. His heart began beating in rhythm, faster and faster.

In the real world, Uchiha Sen sat cross-legged with his eyes closed, his breathing turning ragged as blood rushed through his body.

Just as he felt he couldn't hold on any longer, as if he were about to burst—

The speck of light in his sea of consciousness transformed in the blink of an eye into a cloud of mist.

His thoughts seemed to freeze.

Dazed and numb, he watched like an outsider as the mist slowly dispersed.

When the last wisp had vanished,

an exquisite set of scales stood in its place.

Then, without warning,

a sentence appeared in his mind.

Every gift of fate comes with its price, hidden from view.

—Balance of Fate.