Danzo Takes the Blame

The air in the Hokage's office had frozen solid. After Hiruzen Sarutobi's question fell, Danzo's one uninjured eye flickered in the shadows, while his cane gave a faint creak.

An explanation? he sneered inwardly. If not for your tacit approval and indulgence, Hiruzen Sarutobi, would Root have acted so decisively? Now that something "unexpected" happened, you want me to shoulder it all alone?

Danzo simply tightened his lips and said nothing, meeting the Third's gaze with his single eye. Silence itself was a form of confrontation.

Seeing his reaction, Hiruzen Sarutobi took a deep drag from his pipe. The smoke blurred the turmoil in his eyes. Then he abruptly changed the subject, his voice low. "Those Wood Release human experiments you conducted in secret back then... was Yamato truly the only survivor?"

Danzo's heart stirred, but his expression remained unchanged. The informants he had planted around Hiruzen had just been detained by the ANBU, so he still did not know the specifics of Qianyu's Wood Release. He assumed the focus of this confrontation was merely that he had tried to eliminate a suspicious Uchiha remnant and been caught in the act.

"Yamato was naturally the only survivor." Danzo's voice was flat and emotionless. "You personally examined the data and corpses of those test subjects back then. I had neither reason nor means to deceive you about something like this. Isn't Konoha's sole inheritor of Wood Release currently serving under your command?"

His words carried a faint, barely perceptible sneer. Hiruzen had placed Yamato directly under ANBU command, yet had never allowed him to put his abilities to use.

Hiruzen Sarutobi ignored the jab. He set down his pipe and took an object wrapped in sealing cloth from beneath his desk. Once unwrapped, it revealed a piece of wood about a foot long, its grain distinctly visible. One end still bore a fresh break, and the fractured surface faintly emanated an extremely subtle yet incomparably pure vitality.

"Then take a look at this." With a flick of Hiruzen Sarutobi's wrist, the piece of wood, wrapped in chakra, flew steadily toward Danzo.

Homura Mitokado and Koharu Utatane had already been unsettled by the string of upheavals that night. Their eyes now focused on the piece of wood, first in confusion, then with sudden realization as their expressions changed drastically.

Danzo frowned and reached out to catch it. The instant his fingertips touched the wood, his entire body stiffened as though struck by lightning!

This feeling... the almost primordial, surging life force flowing through this wood... was utterly different from those inferior Wood Release products in his laboratory, barely forced into existence with Hashirama's cells and possessing only the outward form!

Yet it was exactly the same as the aura he had felt only a few times at close range—when the First Hokage, Lord Hashirama Senju, casually created things with his own hands!

"This... this is..." For the first time, Danzo's voice wavered noticeably. His single eye stared fixedly at the wood in his hand, as if he wished to see through it. "True Wood Release! Wood Release containing such pure life force! Hiruzen, where did you get this?!"

His breathing involuntarily quickened, and the fingers clutching the wood turned faintly white from the force. To him, this piece of wood was no different from a dog in heat catching sight of a female.

Hiruzen Sarutobi picked up his pipe again and took a deep drag. His gaze behind the smoke was sharp as a blade as he slowly spoke the name. "That child. Cangshu Qianyu. This is a remnant left behind by the power his body instinctively unleashed when he was on the verge of death tonight."

"Impossible!" Danzo practically growled, nearly crushing the wood in his hand. "He is Madara Uchiha's descendant! That face is proof enough! How could he possibly possess Lord Hashirama's Wood Release?!"

"Proof?" Hiruzen Sarutobi's voice abruptly rose, carrying suppressed fury. "Your so-called proof is a vaguely similar face? Fugaku Uchiha's abnormal reaction? Or that suspicion of yours—'those not of our kind must harbor different hearts'? Danzo, look at what you are holding! That is the irrefutable evidence!"

He stepped forward, his Hokage robes stirring without wind as the Hokage's authority pressed down like a mountain. "The evidence now suggests that he is more likely a descendant of the Senju Clan who was separated from his family! Perhaps even... a direct descendant of Lord Hashirama! Are you going to tell me that Madara Uchiha and Hashirama Senju could have left behind a child together? Absurd!"

"Senju..." Koharu Utatane murmured. A flash of realization and complicated emotion passed through her eyes. Homura Mitokado, meanwhile, furrowed his brows, rapidly considering the old matters and political balance that might be implicated.

Hiruzen Sarutobi's words left Danzo speechless, while the light in his single eye flickered wildly. Shock, ecstasy, greed, doubt, resentment... all manner of emotions collided violently within him.

Madara Uchiha's face, Hashirama Senju's Wood Release... such an absolute contradiction had somehow been unified in a seven-year-old child. It overturned everything he knew! But the wood in his hand could not lie, and that surging life force could not be faked!

After a brief, deathly silence, Danzo suddenly raised his head. A terrifying gleam burst from his eye—the obsession of someone who had discovered an unparalleled treasure and would stop at nothing to grasp it.

"Such Wood Release... such talent!" His voice was somewhat hoarse with excitement. "Hiruzen! Hand him over to Root! Only Root's training methods can fully awaken his potential and bring this power under control! I guarantee you, Konoha will gain another pillar like the First Hokage! I will lead Konoha to unprecedented glory!"

"Enough!"

Hiruzen Sarutobi's furious shout exploded through the office like thunder. He slammed his pipe heavily against the desk, sending sparks scattering.

"Danzo! Do you still not understand?!" The Third Hokage's beard and hair bristled as the rage he had suppressed for so long, along with his pain at seeing his old friend stray down the wrong path, erupted all at once. "Look at what your so-called training and control have brought about! Yamato's Wood Release, which he cannot fully control and whose potential is limited? The miserable deaths of countless test subjects? Or tonight's cold-blooded assassination attempt against a seven-year-old child who may carry the First Hokage's bloodline?!"

He pointed at Danzo, his finger trembling faintly with anger. "From this moment onward, your Root is forbidden from taking any action against Cangshu Qianyu—or any innocent person in the village—without my explicit orders! The ANBU will take full control of every investigation concerning this matter! If what happened tonight occurs again, Danzo, I swear in the name of the Hokage that you will be stripped of all duties and thrown into the Inspectorate's prison!"

"Hiruzen! You are strangling Konoha's future!" Danzo refused to yield, striking his cane against the floor. "Misguided compassion! Your so-called protection and guidance will only waste this power for nothing. It may even nurture another calamity like Madara Uchiha!"

"Whether it is protection or strangulation, guidance or breeding disaster, I will make that judgment myself." Hiruzen Sarutobi's voice turned icy, restoring the Hokage's absolute authority. "I am the Hokage, Danzo. This matter ends here."

Seeing the two men at each other's throats and the atmosphere stretched to its limit, Koharu Utatane hurriedly stepped forward to mediate. "Hiruzen, Danzo, both of you, calm down. The most urgent matter is to determine where this child's Wood Release came from, and what it signifies."

Homura Mitokado also said gravely, "That's right. The Senju Clan has long since integrated into the village, its bloodline diluted and scattered. For a child with such pure Wood Release to suddenly appear is indeed suspicious. His records..."