Ripples in the Dark

Safe House Number Two was located deep in the mountains at the border between the Land of Rivers and the Land of Grass, a naturally formed cave system. Stalactites hung from the ceiling, while an underground river flowed through the depths, producing hollow echoes. Neji placed the unconscious Hinata and Hanabi on a dry stone platform, added another binding formula to Hiashi, then turned to leave.

Everything had gone far too smoothly.

The thought was like a fine thorn lodged deep in Neji's mind. Hiashi was no ordinary shinobi. He was the head of the Hyuga Clan, an Elite Jonin who had lived through the Third Shinobi World War. Even in his sleep, the Byakugan's sensory abilities would instinctively remain alert. And with Konoha at its highest state of readiness, how could Hiashi, as clan head, possibly sleep so deeply?

Neji stopped. His pale eyes swept across the darkness. The barrier had already been laid in three layers, cutting off all chakra fluctuations and sounds inside and out. The only sounds in the cavern were dripping water and his own breathing.

Could it be...

"Neji, you've grown up..."

The voice came from behind him—calm, aged, and carrying an indescribable weariness.

Neji's body stiffened. He did not turn around, but his hand had already moved to the ninja tool pouch at his waist. There was no expression beneath his mask, yet his heart skipped a beat.

Hiashi was awake. And he had been awake for a long time.

"Clan head, if you knew it was me, why didn't you activate the Caged Bird Seal?" Neji asked. His voice had been deliberately lowered and altered, icy and devoid of emotion. But he knew it was useless now. Hiashi had recognized him—not by appearance, not by voice, but through something deeper: the Caged Bird Seal, or perhaps the Main House's nearly instinctive sense of control over the Branch House.

The rustle of fabric came from behind him as Hiashi sat up. The binding formula was still working, preventing him from making large movements, but he could speak without issue.

"Earlier today," Hiashi said slowly, as if recounting something from the distant past, "Lady Hokage summoned the major clans for a meeting. She said Konoha had reached a moment of life and death."

Neji listened silently, his fingers tightening slightly around his tool pouch.

"She said the village would prioritize evacuating civilians, while the shinobi of each major clan could decide for themselves whether to leave or stay." There was a trace of mockery in Hiashi's voice, but more than that, there was heaviness. "'Decide for themselves'... Hmph. Easy for her to say. The Hyuga Clan is one of Konoha's great clans, an old clan that followed the Senju Clan in founding the village during the First Hokage's era. If we leave, what will the other clans think? How badly will Konoha's morale collapse?"

Neji did not respond. He knew Hiashi did not need one.

"After the meeting, Lady Tsunade kept me behind," Hiashi continued. "She gave me two specially made kunai and asked me to pass them on to Hinata and Hanabi, repeatedly stressing that they were to carry them close to their bodies."

The cave fell silent for a moment. The flowing sound of the underground river became especially clear.

"I had never seen kunai made for such a technique," Hiashi said quietly, "but when I received them, I could sense faint spatial chakra. That feeling... was unusual. It was like chakra had been folded, compressed, and stored away, waiting to be released at a certain moment."

He paused.

"I guessed they were specially made kunai for the Flying Thunder God Technique. In Konoha, only the Second Hokage, Tobirama Senju, and the Fourth Hokage, Minato, had used that ninjutsu. When Orochimaru defected, he took a great number of the village's forbidden techniques with him..."

Hiashi did not continue, but the implication was obvious.

Neji still stood with his back to him. His black robe nearly merged with the darkness in the cave's faint light. He remembered the night three years ago when he had decided to seek refuge with Orochimaru. He remembered the burning agony of the Caged Bird Seal on his forehead, Hiashi's eternally expressionless face, and those words: "These are the rules of the Hyuga Clan. They cannot be broken."

"Though I don't know why you chose to join Orochimaru back then," Hiashi's voice interrupted Neji's memories, "if you gave those kunai to Hinata and Hanabi, then you intended to protect them."

Protect.

Hearing that word come from Hiashi's mouth filled Neji with absurd irony. Protect Hinata and Hanabi? Why should he protect members of the Main House? Protect those who had been born above everyone else, holding the lives and deaths of the Branch House in their hands?

Neji laughed. It was a quiet laugh, but it sounded especially piercing in the silent cavern.

"Don't flatter yourself." He turned, his eyes behind the mask's special lenses fixed on Hiashi. "I just didn't want your deaths to affect my plans."

Hiashi raised his head. Even in the dim light, those pale eyes remained clear. He looked at Neji with a complicated expression—scrutiny, curiosity, and something Neji could not understand.

"Plans?" Hiashi repeated. "What plan requires the Hyuga Main House to remain alive?"

"That has nothing to do with you," Neji said coldly. "Since you're awake, I can't be bothered making another trip back. This barrier will release itself in three days. In three days, you and your two precious daughters can do whatever you want."

He turned and headed toward the cave entrance, his steps steady and without hesitation.

"One more reminder." Before stepping into the shadows, Neji stopped and glanced sideways. "Don't try to break this barrier. With your strength, you can't."

With that, his body began to blur, as though melting into the darkness. The Flying Thunder God Technique activated with almost no warning, only a slight distortion of space, like ripples spreading across water after a stone struck its surface.

Hiashi remained where he was, watching the direction in which Neji had vanished. The binding formula still held him in place. He could not move, but he could see and hear. The cave fell quiet again, filled only by Hinata and Hanabi's steady breathing and the distant rush of the underground river.

He remembered many years ago, when his younger brother Hizashi had still been alive.

Hizashi had always smiled, even with the same Caged Bird Seal on his forehead that his son bore. He had said, "Brother, it's for the Hyuga Clan's legacy. I understand." But Hiashi knew something in his younger brother's eyes had died. That light, that hope for freedom and the future, had gone out the moment the seal was branded upon him.

Then Hizashi died, to protect him, to protect the head of the Hyuga Main House, dying in his place.

Before he died, Hizashi had said, "Brother, please take care of Neji."

Hiashi had promised, but he had failed. He had brought Neji into the Main House, given him the finest training and Jonin guidance, but he had never removed that seal. Because rules were rules, and systems were systems. The Hyuga Clan's traditions, passed down for thousands of years, could not be broken in his hands.

Otherwise, he would have no face to meet the ancestors of the Hyuga Main House.

But now... Hiashi closed his eyes. Neji had grown up. He had become powerful, and had even learned a forbidden technique like the Flying Thunder God. He hid in the darkness and did dangerous things, yet at a crucial moment, he had still returned and brought the Main House to safety.

What was this? Revenge? Mockery? Or...

Hiashi did not know. He only knew that something enormous was about to happen to Konoha. Something so grave that even Tsunade had begun preparing for the worst, something so grave that Neji had risked exposing himself to come back and "evacuate" them.

"What exactly is this crisis..." he murmured. His voice echoed through the cave, unanswered.

At the same time, in another secret Akatsuki base.

Sasuke leaned against a stone wall with his eyes closed, but he was not asleep. The Mangekyō Sharingan spun in his mind, its new power flowing through his veins like poison. Powerful, profound, as though it could see through all illusion and burn away every obstacle.

But he did not lose himself in it. Because every time he used that power, he thought of Itachi.

He remembered Itachi's fingers gently tapping his forehead, Itachi's final smile, and everything Itachi had done—everything Sasuke had once hated, but now had no choice but to understand.

Heavy footsteps approached, accompanied by the sound of water. Sasuke opened his eyes, three tomoe slowly rotating within them. He had not yet grown accustomed to keeping the Mangekyō Sharingan activated at all times. The newcomer was Kisame, carrying the massive Samehada over his shoulder and grinning, exposing his sharp teeth.

"I brought them," Kisame said, stepping aside to reveal the three people behind him.

Jugo, Suigetsu, and Karin.

Jugo kept his head lowered. A faint killing intent stirred around him, though he was trying hard to suppress it. Suigetsu, on the other hand, looked excited, glancing around as if he had come sightseeing. Karin pushed up her glasses, her gaze lingering on Sasuke's face for a long while before she looked away, her cheeks faintly red.

"Are we really joining the Akatsuki?" Suigetsu asked impatiently, his voice echoing through the empty cavern.

Sasuke rose to his feet. His movements were slow, but every step carried an unquestionable presence. Although the Mangekyō Sharingan was closed, the pressure belonging to the strong had already taken shape around him.

"Not joining," he said, his voice calm but clear. "Cooperating."

Suigetsu blinked. "Cooperating?"

"We help the Akatsuki capture the Eight-Tails Jinchuriki, and the Akatsuki provides us with the tailed beasts to destroy Konoha." Sasuke's gaze swept across the three of them before settling on Kisame. "Those are the terms."

Kisame chuckled twice. He neither objected nor agreed. He merely stood there like a statue, but a sharp glint flickered in his small eyes—he was observing, evaluating, and reporting to "Madara Uchiha."

Sasuke knew. But he did not care. He needed the Akatsuki's power now. He needed the tailed beasts' power. He needed to destroy Konoha and avenge Itachi, the Uchiha Clan, and everyone sacrificed by those hypocritical higher-ups.

As for what came afterward... he would deal with that afterward.

"Snake Squad is officially changing its name," Sasuke announced, his voice echoing between the stone walls. "From today onward, we are Taka."

A hawk. Sharp eyes, lethal talons, diving down from the sky for a killing blow. It suited them. It suited who he was now.

Suigetsu whistled. "Cool!"

Jugo nodded without speaking.

Karin pushed up her glasses and said softly, "As long as it's Sasuke's decision, I support it."

Sasuke did not look at her. His gaze turned toward the cave entrance, where light seeped in. It was faint, but it was there. Just like the road he was about to walk—dark and dangerous, yet with a goal ahead: destroy Konoha, and then...

Then he had not yet decided.

"Once we have news of the Eight-Tails Jinchuriki, we move out," Sasuke said at last, turning toward the depths of the cave. His black robe flared behind him like a crow's wings.

Kisame watched his back, grinned, and followed with Samehada over his shoulder. Suigetsu, Jugo, and Karin exchanged glances before quickly following after him.

Their footsteps gradually faded through the cave before disappearing into the darkness.

Meanwhile, in Konoha, Tsunade stood before the window of the Hokage Office, watching the sky slowly brighten outside. A new day was about to begin, yet her heart felt as heavy as lead.

Jiraiya had already returned, bringing news that the negotiations had failed.

She had delivered the three kunai Neji had sent according to his instructions. Though she did not know what exactly that child intended to do, at the very least, he was protecting certain people in his own way.

As for everyone else... Tsunade closed her eyes. She had done everything she could. The evacuation plan had begun, the defensive arrangements were complete, and every combat force that could be mobilized was already in position.

All that remained was to wait.

To wait for Pain's arrival, to wait for the war to begin, to wait for the child of prophecy—Uzumaki Naruto—to return from Mount Myoboku.

The sky outside grew brighter and brighter as morning light pierced the clouds and fell upon Konoha's Hokage Rock. This might have been Konoha's last peaceful morning.

Tsunade clenched her fist, her nails digging deeply into her palm.

No matter what, she was the Hokage. No matter how powerful the enemy was, no matter how terrible the sacrifices, she had to stand here, at the very front of Konoha.

This was her responsibility, and her resolve.

In the morning light, her figure stood straight as a blade.