The Uchiha Are Already Part of Konoha—Where Else Do They Need to Integrate?

Yan's actions startled everyone.

The elders who had been smiling moments ago could no longer smile.

Only then did they realize that Yan was no obedient little lamb.

He was a hedgehog covered in spines!

If they underestimated him and dared to provoke him, they had to be prepared to be pricked by those spines.

"Yan! What are you trying to do? Are you challenging my authority?"

Uchiha Fugaku rose from his seat and appeared beside the Sixth Elder, helping him dispel the genjutsu. He also activated his three-tomoe Sharingan and confronted Yan.

Judging by his heaving chest, he was truly furious.

With the genjutsu dispelled, the Sixth Elder, drenched in sweat, looked at Yan with a trace of fear in his eyes.

Who knew what he had just gone through?

Faced with Fugaku's questioning, Yan calmly spread his hands.

"As for whether this constitutes a challenge to the clan head's authority, that is for the clan head himself to judge. I did nothing wrong.

"The clan's support and the clansmen's support gave him the status of elder, but that does not mean he can yell at me."

"If you had truly made great contributions to the clan, I would respect you—as a senior, as an elder, as a clan elder.

"Unfortunately, you have not."

As he spoke, Yan revealed a mocking smile. His gaze swept over the Sixth Elder, who had yet to recover, and he said disdainfully:

"All you have ever brought the clan is compromise, retreat, and forcing the clansmen to live with their tails tucked between their legs."

"An old dog like you does not deserve my respect."

Since they had already torn off all pretenses, why bother being polite? Calling him an old dog was already courteous enough. At least he had not cursed too harshly.

Ignoring Fugaku's increasingly grim expression, Yan loudly addressed the other elders:

"Everyone, does it not bother you that someone like this can become a clan elder and stand on equal footing with you?

"Honestly, I find it rather embarrassing."

The elders had still been unsettled by Yan's insubordination, but after hearing that, they exchanged strange looks with the Sixth Elder, who was still shaken, and found themselves somewhat bothered by it.

At the very least, they felt that he was an embarrassment.

You could not even handle a junior, yet you were still an elder? Stop disgracing yourself.

He had actually been controlled by a junior's genjutsu without even the ability to resist.

It was shameful to associate with him.

"Uchiha Yan, do you intend to lead the clan to destruction?"

After a long while, the Sixth Elder finally recovered. At that moment, he wanted nothing more than to dig a hole and hide in it.

In his panic, he hastily pinned this accusation on Yan.

Yan was successfully amused.

"If the Uchiha will be destroyed simply because we refuse to live with our tails tucked between our legs, then the Uchiha would have been destroyed eight hundred times over."

"Cough, cough!"

Yan was not the only one who wanted to laugh. Several elders nearly failed to hold it in as well, especially the First Elder.

The way he looked at Yan was growing increasingly gentle.

He had always believed that Yan was a junior born for the hardliners.

With that personality and that way of doing things, it would be such a waste if he did not join the hardliners.

He had to be won over.

"Enough!"

Seeing that the Sixth Elder still wanted to retaliate and cling to the matter, Fugaku, as clan head, shouted in a low voice:

"This matter ends here. Sixth Elder, I do not wish to see you hurling baseless insults and accusations at the clan's juniors again. Yan, I also do not wish to see such insubordination happen again."

As the clan head, Fugaku was the one caught in the most difficult position, trapped in the middle with no good option on either side.

In the end, he could only punish both sides equally. It looked as though everyone had suffered, but Yan had made out like a bandit.

Such punishment did not hurt him in the slightest.

The Sixth Elder, on the other hand, had even lost the right to openly criticize and insult juniors. How could that not make him miserable?

Normally, when an elder scolded a junior, even if you were unhappy, you could only endure it.

But now, he could not even scold them anymore.

The Sixth Elder's vision went dark, and he nearly fainted on the spot.

However, the doves were weak and unpopular. At a time like this, no one would step forward to speak for him. The fact that no one kicked him while he was down was already out of consideration for old ties.

Returning to his seat, Uchiha Fugaku said with a grim face, "For certain reasons, the clansmen have expressed a great deal of dissatisfaction toward certain people. Yan is right. The Uchiha have their own pride and dignity. We cannot keep wronging ourselves and our clansmen just to cater to someone else."

Things had come to this. Even if Fugaku did not agree with targeting the doves, he could only follow the prevailing tide.

The storm had already been stirred up. As clan head, he could not oppose all the clansmen at this time and turn around to support the doves.

Otherwise, if the hardliners obstructed him in secret, he, as clan head, would face no small amount of trouble.

The best solution now was to sacrifice the doves and stabilize the situation.

"Clan head, everything we have done has been for the clan. The conflict between the village and the clan is growing deeper and deeper. Only by changing our image and earning Lord Hokage's forgiveness can the Uchiha integrate into the village."

The Sixth Elder was frantic.

The doves already had little influence within the clan. If they were cut down in one stroke, there would be no reason for this faction to exist.

He too would be driven out of the clan's center of power.

"Hahahaha..."

Yan could not hold it in.

He had wanted to endure it, but in the end, he had overestimated his own patience.

"Uchiha Yan, what do you mean by that?!"

Like a wounded beast desperate to bite someone, the Sixth Elder roared madly.

His bloodshot eyes were fixed on Yan.

From the look of it, he wanted nothing more than to swallow Yan whole.

If Yan had not been stirring up trouble these past few days, none of this would have happened. And now, the doves were practically finished.

"It means nothing. I just think what you said was very interesting, Elder. No, very ridiculous."

Yan's acting was exaggerated. He let out a few more dry laughs before staring at him expressionlessly. "You almost made me laugh to death."

"Yan, explain your reasoning. Why do you disagree with the Sixth Elder?"

Fugaku truly feared that Yan would hit the Sixth Elder with another genjutsu. The man was already old; after being controlled by genjutsu time and again, another shock might make him drop dead at any moment.

Yan's forcefulness and strength also made Fugaku unable to underestimate him any longer.

He had to treat Yan as someone important.

Shaking his head, Yan looked as though he could not be bothered to answer. However, he still had to give the clan head some face, so he curled his lip and replied without much interest:

"I think the Elder's words and ideas are ridiculous, because the clan is already part of Konoha. Do we still need to integrate? Integrate where?

"Like the Senju clan, dispersing the clan and blending into the civilians—that is what counts as integration?"

"Everyone, open your eyes and take a good look. Among all the clans, large and small, in Konoha, which one has truly integrated into the civilian community?"