Anbu Archive

The ventilation grate was removed without a sound.

Lin Feng hooked the edge with one hand and slid into the bend of the duct like a snake. His Sharingan turned slowly in the darkness, its Two-Tomoe sweeping across the nodes of three low-level sealing techniques ahead. He avoided the first chakra thread, slipped past the second warning rune, and paused for half a second at the edge of the third sensory barrier.

The instant the technique's glow dimmed.

Lin Feng landed.

The second underground level of the Anbu Archive.

The air carried the scent of old paper and sealing ink. Four rows of steel scroll racks stretched into the depths, and chakra-suppressing arrays were carved at the base of every support column. Lin Feng lowered his breathing and swept his gaze toward the third row on the left—the section for Itachi's missions.

Without hesitation.

He flashed to the rack, his fingertips brushing over an iron case labeled "Anbu Recruitment Roster · Direct Hokage Command." A thin steel wire picked open the clasp, and the scroll made the faintest rustle of paper as it unfolded.

Lin Feng's gaze stopped on the third line from the bottom.

"Uchiha Itachi—Date of enlistment: March, Konoha Year 54. Recommender: Uchiha Fugaku. Approver: Third Hokage Hiruzen Sarutobi. Assigned squad: Anbu Sixth Squad · Special Missions."

Lin Feng murmured inwardly.

One year ago... the same time Shisui began suspecting Danzo.

His thumb pressed down on the date.

Itachi, were you ordered to do this, or did you choose it yourself?

The warning from the drainage outlet seemed to echo by his ear—that calm yet bone-chilling sentence.

"Do not interfere in the affairs of the Uchiha Clan."

Lin Feng rolled up the roster and returned it to the iron case, then turned and pulled out a thick scroll beside it marked "Cross-Mission Coordination Records."

He unfolded it.

Dense mission numbers were listed from top to bottom. His finger followed Itachi's codename, "Crow," down the page before stopping at seven entries.

First: Assassination of a rogue ninja at the Land of Wind border—Root stronghold "Sand Hidden Outpost" provided intelligence support.

Second: Escorting a Land of Fire envoy—the route overlapped with a Root supply line for three days.

Third: Infiltrating the Grass Ninja Village—Root peripheral members had cleared the sentry posts in advance.

The fourth, fifth, and sixth—

At the end of the seventh mission record, a faint hidden mark flashed.

Lin Feng's pupils contracted.

Root coordination again... five out of seven missions overlapped with Root routes. This was no coincidence.

He leaned closer to the hidden mark. It resembled a tree with tangled roots, bearing an identification seal unique to Root at its center. He had seen this mark in records from his previous life, but seeing it with his own eyes on Itachi's mission scroll still made his fingers tighten slightly.

The scroll closed.

Lin Feng did not return it immediately. Instead, he headed deeper into the archive. The Anbu S-rank mission section lay beyond the last row of shelves, its entrance sealed by an independent warning barrier. The barrier was not especially powerful—its purpose was not to stop intruders, but to mark anyone who touched it.

Lin Feng bit his thumb and formed hand seals.

A Shadow Clone condensed at his side and charged straight into the barrier. The warning technique flared abruptly, beginning to trace the clone through the smoke of its dispersal. At the same time, Lin Feng's real body slipped through a gap in the sealing technique at the side of the barrier, braced one hand on the ground, and dropped into the S-rank mission section.

The motion of rising took him only 0.3 seconds.

His gaze locked onto several torn pages scattered across the bottom shelf of a steel rack.

Their edges were ragged from being ripped apart, and the ink had faded dark. Lin Feng picked up the top page and turned it over.

The title was right there—

"Uchiha Clan Surveillance Plan—Operational Codename: Crow."

Most of the text below had been torn away, leaving only a few opening lines: "In view of the Uchiha Clan's potential threat to the village's power structure, upon the proposal of Hokage Advisor Shimura Danzo, a long-term surveillance mission has been established, to be jointly carried out by the Anbu Sixth Squad and Root. Surveillance targets include—"

A tear.

Lin Feng pinched the edge of the fragment.

The line naming the key operative was torn out. Who destroyed it? Itachi? Danzo? Or a third party?

The moment his fingers touched the chakra traces on the torn section, the lingering sealing marks along the page's edge suddenly heated up.

Heat.

A stabbing pain.

The Sharingan in Lin Feng's left eye began spinning uncontrollably. Its Two-Tomoe whirled madly, and something deep within his pupil was forcibly dragged out.

Fragments of images flooded into his mind.

A crow swept past a blood-red Sharingan. The next instant, fine cracks split across the center of the black pupil, like the spiderweb fractures in glass before it shattered. Then came intense pain, driving from his eye socket deep into his skull, as though someone had thrust a red-hot iron rod into his left eye.

Lin Feng gritted his teeth and forcibly cut off the resonance.

He took two breaths. His left eye socket felt as if it were about to burst, and his chakra flow instantly dropped by nearly thirty percent.

The archive's sensory technique had been disturbed.

In the distance came the sound of ninja boots stepping across stone slabs.

Lin Feng immediately tucked the fragment into the inner lining of his ninja tool pouch, closed the scroll rack with a backhand motion, and wiped away every trace of contact with his sleeve as his fingertips passed over the steel frame. He lowered his body and silently darted toward the ventilation shaft.

The footsteps drew closer.

There was more than one person.

Lin Feng's peripheral vision halted as it swept over the base of the last archive rack.

In the dim light, a familiar engraving flashed. A tree with tangled roots, an identification seal at its center—the exact same hidden mark from the end of Itachi's cross-mission scroll.

A Root code.

It meant he was not the only one monitoring these archives.

It also meant Danzo's people knew that the Uchiha Clan Surveillance Plan had been torn apart—or perhaps they did not know who had torn it apart either.

The footsteps stopped at the archive entrance.

The door hinge turned.

Lin Feng fastened the ventilation grate shut and slid into the duct. Without looking back, he held his breath and climbed swiftly through the narrow metal passage.

Behind him came the dull sound of the iron door opening all the way.

Then there was silence.

That silence did not feel like they had found nothing.

It felt more like they had found something, but were in no hurry to give chase.

Only at the first bend in the duct did Lin Feng finally draw in a breath. He steadied his breathing, his left hand pressing against the outline of the fragment in his chest while the fingertips of his right hand still retained the searing sensation from touching the lingering seal marks.

Moonlight cut through the vent at the end of the duct, casting a cold white streak across his face.

He had confirmed six things.

First, Itachi's enlistment in the Anbu perfectly matched the time when Shisui began suspecting Danzo.

Second, Itachi's mission records heavily overlapped with Root strongholds. It was not accidental.

Third, the Uchiha Clan Surveillance Plan truly existed, and its operational codename was Crow.

Fourth, the core information on the fragment—the line naming the key operative—had been physically torn away, while a Sharingan sealing technique had locked away the remaining traces.

Fifth, the destroyer possessed a Sharingan.

Sixth, Root was also watching the same batch of archives, but they likewise did not know who had torn the page.

Lin Feng leaned against the icy wall of the duct and closed his eyes, allowing the stabbing pain in his left eye to slowly subside.

The image of Itachi at the drainage outlet surfaced in his mind.

His gentle tone. His cooling gaze. That warning.

"Do not interfere in the affairs of the Uchiha Clan."

Lin Feng opened his eyes.

The tomoe in his Sharingan slowly stopped turning, and deep within his pupils was reflected the faint moonlight at the end of the duct.

He made a decision.

Tonight's discoveries—the original fragment, the Root code, and the lingering marks of the Sharingan sealing technique—would not be told to Shisui for the time being.

It was not distrust.

It was because this matter had already involved a Sharingan sealing technique. Anyone capable of leaving such chakra traces could not hold a low position within the Uchiha Clan. Shisui had an instinctive emotional attachment to his clansmen, and that attachment would prevent him from maintaining the necessary calm in the face of certain evidence.

More importantly.

Lin Feng did not want to explain to Shisui why he had investigated Itachi alone.

He touched the original fragment in his ninja tool pouch.

Taking the fragment instead of copying it carried risks far greater than the benefit. Root could verify every scroll at any time, and once the missing piece was discovered, they would trace the clue all the way back. But he had to obtain a firsthand sample—the image fragments within the lingering sealing marks were something no copy could preserve.

That might be the only key to uncovering Itachi's true stance.

Lin Feng pushed open the grate at the end of the duct and flipped down into the dense forest.

Moonlight spilled over his shoulders. Behind him lay the silent outline of Konoha.

His left eye still hurt.

His chakra flow had dropped by thirty percent, and the residual Root drugs were still clogging his chakra pathways.

But he now possessed irrefutable evidence, an unexploded bomb, and a new conclusion—

Uchiha Itachi's connection to Root ran far deeper than imagined.

And Shisui might not know everything.

Lin Feng took one step toward the Forest of Death.

Then stopped.

He looked back toward the Anbu Archive behind him. Nothing could be seen among the tree shadows.

Yet his Sharingan had caught that Root code carved into the base of the archive rack. Like an eye fixed upon his back, it still lingered at the edge of his vision.

Lin Feng turned forward again.

And vanished into the depths of the night.