"How did you sway this pack of young wolves? I know the Uchiha well. Strength alone couldn't be what made them submit to you." Uchiha Setsuna, the only elder left standing, was a little bewildered.
Uchiha Madara had possessed overwhelming strength, yet even so, the Uchiha Clan hadn't followed him. That alone was proof—strength wasn't everything.
As an old man who'd lived from the Warring States era into the age of the Third, what hadn't I seen? Scratch that. I'd never seen anything like this!
" Sway them?"
Uchiha Yuji shook his head slightly. "I'm not a man of many words."
"I only told them the truth about the world they live in. They can't change this reality of despair themselves, so naturally they'll place their hopes in someone who can."
Uchiha Setsuna glanced at the clansmen in the room. Most were still young, but there were also a number of seasoned middle-aged shinobi. They were all the Uchiha Clan's backbone.
The former doves, hawks, and moderates were all present.
"What's your first move?"
"The Uchiha have always been wolves, never watchdogs guarding someone's home," Uchiha Yuji said, seemingly offhandedly. "A bone with no meat left on it should have been discarded long ago. I won't let it continue to exist."
Uchiha Yuji hadn't said what the bone was, but Uchiha Setsuna understood at once.
The Police Force!
Or, more accurately, the Uchiha Police Force.
Uchiha Setsuna narrowed his eyes and carefully studied the young man before him through the slits.
"For many people, it's the Uchiha's pride."
"I don't think it's anything to be proud of. It's just a leash tying the Uchiha down." Uchiha Yuji met Uchiha Setsuna's gaze.
"Konoha Hospital and the Anbu are the real centers of power. The Ninja Academy holds power indirectly. And, Elder Setsuna, don't you think our Police Force's authority overlaps a great deal with the Anbu's?"
"We hand over people involved in major intelligence matters to the Anbu. What's left to trouble us is a bunch of trivial matters. Can our Uchiha really handle them properly, given our temperament?"
This worthless Police Force had been reduced to little more than municipal busywork. Whoever wanted it could have it.
Get someone else to share the burden?
Who could the Uchiha get along with?
Everyone had at least some self-awareness.
Uchiha Setsuna slowly shook his head too.
"Or have you gotten senile, Elder Setsuna? Do you really think those medals they hand out are an honor?"
Assigning the battle-hardened Uchiha, all of them either haughty or excessively proud, to handle civil disputes was simply a calculated scheme to keep dragging their reputation down.
It was a hidden blade.
Uchiha Setsuna laughed, a hearty laugh.
"The Uchiha's pride?"
"Don't make me laugh. Since when has handling petty matters like catching thieves been the Uchiha's pride?"
"The battlefield! Only victory on the battlefield is a true source of pride for the Uchiha!"
"A bone with a few scraps of meat on it, and those fools lower themselves to lick it clean. They've disgraced the Uchiha!"
"And if we suddenly walked off the job during wartime, Sarutobi would have no choice but to placate us!"
The old man's voice grew louder and louder, his face flushed an unnatural red in the firelight.
The Police Force received only a pittance in funding each year, and its members were constantly being ordered around. How could anyone call that the Uchiha's pride?
After Uchiha Madara left, Uchiha Setsuna hadn't held much sway within the clan. The increasingly powerful doves wouldn't have accepted his suggestions, and even the moderates wouldn't have supported abandoning the Police Force. Naturally, he hadn't wanted to humiliate himself by proposing such an unreliable idea.
He'd had neither the power, resolve, nor hope to change things.
But today was different. The old man had finally spoken his true thoughts.
"Exactly. That's why I stepped forward."
Uchiha Yuji took a small sip of tea. He gazed at the bright moon emerging from the clouds and watched its silver light spread across the Uchiha Clan Compound.
"Dawn's almost here."
The night was still deep, but Uchiha Setsuna smiled. "That's right. Dawn is almost here."
The night passed in the blink of an eye as they waited for it to end. Autumn morning mist blanketed Konoha, and the massive Kage Rock was shrouded in hazy white fog. The clamor gradually rose through the thin mist.
The bustle replaced the quiet. People felt differently from one another; they couldn't truly understand each other, and arguments inevitably followed.
Those arguments only made the bustling streets more lively.
But as the quarrels went on, someone noticed that something was wrong.
"Why hasn't the Police Force shown up, even though we've been arguing for so long?"
"Come to think of it, I haven't seen a single Uchiha patrolling today. Did something happen?"
Although Konoha was peaceful, fierce fighting had broken out along the borders. The war had been going on for a long time, and even now it hadn't stopped.
It was a little shameful to admit.
In peacetime, the Uchiha, with their deadpan faces and crazy behavior, only irritated everyone. But when the outside world was engulfed in war, a squad of Uchiha shinobi was enough to make people feel safe.
That was the strength the Uchiha Clan had built up from the Warring States era to the present.
If even the Uchiha patrols had suddenly been called away, that meant Konoha was losing the war!
Once that possibility occurred to them, the arguments stopped. The passersby swiftly shifted from watching for entertainment to fleeing in panic. Chaos took the place of prosperity and rapidly spread across all of Konoha.
"Where are those Uchiha?" Sarutobi Hiruzen rubbed his temples in frustration. "There's already more than enough to deal with. I don't need them causing me more trouble."
Even Danzo's stern expression couldn't hide a trace of delight. "I told you long ago that the Uchiha Clan can't be trusted. The fighting at the border is still ongoing, and we still have the advantage."
"Now they're disregarding the bigger picture. Who knows what they'll do if Konoha falls behind! Hiruzen! We absolutely cannot let the Uchiha Clan off lightly!"
Sarutobi Hiruzen looked at Danzo as if he were an idiot and simply shook his head.
He'd already assigned many of the Uchiha Clan's best shinobi to the toughest battlefields. If word of the situation in the village reached them, no one could say what those lunatics might do.
If the defenses were breached, who knew how many lives they'd have to sacrifice.
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