The Shadow in the House at Midnight, the Old Man's Will of Fire

Naruto watched Kakashi and the others carry Uzuki Yugao away, and his hands itched.

He had not even gotten the chance to examine her injuries.

The unconscious Root members were carried to the hospital by Kakashi's people as well.

Though Root and ANBU were not on the same chain of command, in Hiruzen Sarutobi's eyes, they were still Konoha's fighting manpower.

After all, Danzo was the most useful scapegoat in his hands.

Yamato approached the three of them with a smile plastered on his face, and he did not skimp on the praise.

"You three have quite the skills. No wonder you're among the standout talents at the Ninja Academy. I'll pick out some suitable jobs for you to handle together later. That's enough for today."

Izumi Uchiha and Hana Inuzuka flushed bright red at the praise, but they did not feel happy at all.

They both knew perfectly well that Naruto had been guiding them the entire time, like a little teacher.

Naruto pulled a long face and refused.

"What do you mean, that's enough? The second-stage camp is not even over yet. Since we came all this way, we should at least stay the night before leaving, right?"

As he spoke, he glanced at his cramped little tent.

Yamato's temple twitched. He formed hand seals without hesitation and slapped the ground.

"Wood Release: Four-Pillar House Jutsu!"

A grand mansion rose from the earth, leaving Izumi Uchiha and Hana Inuzuka staring wide-eyed.

Yamato's smile was utterly fake.

"In that case, you can rest here tonight. Consider it compensation for what happened earlier."

Naruto looked at the mansion with naked disdain written all over his face.

It was as if the words "You're getting in my way" were stamped on his forehead.

"What a drag. Come on, let's go. I'm treating you two to barbecue."

He grabbed one girl's arm in each hand and dragged them toward the edge of the forest.

Kakashi stood nearby, watching Naruto's retreating figure with the corner of his mouth twitching.

The more he looked at it, the less Naruto resembled his devoted teacher. Instead, he seemed a little like that lecherous grandmaster.

Naruto spent some more time strengthening his bond with his two teammates before swaggering back to the little house he had rented.

The instant he pushed open the door, his pupils shrank.

But he quickly forced a smile onto his face.

"Well, old man, what brought you all the way to my place?"

The person standing inside was none other than the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi.

"Naruto, I heard about this exercise. You did well. You revealed your abilities while also protecting your teammates thoroughly."

"What makes me happiest is that you truly understood the Will of Fire. You knew what choice to make when it mattered. Let me thank you on behalf of that ANBU."

After saying that, Hiruzen Sarutobi took a scroll from his robes and handed it over.

He clapped his hands, and a black shadow flashed out from behind him, carrying an even larger summoning scroll in its arms.

Naruto knew exactly what this was. The three ninjutsu he had been promised were being delivered.

Looking at the Third's face, wrinkled into a smile like an old chrysanthemum, Naruto could not stop the corner of his mouth from twitching.

If he had taken Root's side back then, he probably would not even have been allowed to touch these three techniques.

He reeled in his thoughts and forced an expression of delight onto his face.

"These are the three forbidden techniques? Hurry up and let me see them!"

He shouted like an ordinary seven-year-old who had just spotted candy.

Following the instructions on the scroll, Naruto wrote his name on the summoning contract and established a connection with Sage Katsuyu of Shikkotsu Forest.

He smiled as he escorted Hiruzen Sarutobi out the door.

The moment the door closed, Naruto's face darkened.

He had considered before that maybe the Naruto World really was like the manga depicted it: the Third was merely an incompetent fool incapable of controlling his subordinates.

But after these past few years, he had come to understand.

Among all the Hokage, no one could match Hiruzen Sarutobi when it came to political maneuvering.

Whether he had made Konoha stronger was beside the point, but when it came to power, no one held a tighter grip than he did.

Naruto remembered Kishimoto saying in his previous life that the manga, which had originally been intended to end much earlier, had the Third and Danzo-led Konoha higher-ups as its final bosses.

Later, because the story was extended, the two of them were forcibly rehabilitated.

When Orochimaru said, "Konoha's windmill has stopped turning," the meaning behind his words could not have been clearer.

The earlier part of Naruto's story was practically built on the bones of the movie The Storm Riders from his previous life.

Two young boys mistook thieves for fathers, then joined hands to overturn the villains' world.

Naruto clenched the Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu in his hand, along with the Adamantine Sealing Chains that had originally belonged to the Uzumaki Clan, and let out a cold laugh.

"Want to end things like some kind of hero? What a joke. Wouldn't all the suffering I endured these years have been for nothing?"

This was the key to stabbing someone in the heart.

If he had reincarnated as some other commoner, whatever the Third did would have had nothing to do with him.

But he had become Naruto Uzumaki, the one Hiruzen had screwed over so thoroughly. Why should he not take revenge?

When Sasuke used Impure World Reincarnation to summon the four Hokage and demanded to know why Hiruzen had erased the Uchiha, the Third only skirted around the issue and said there had been no choice, that it had been for the village.

He did not dare claim it had all been Danzo's doing.

That confirmed it: the one who gave the order to wipe out the entire Uchiha Clan was Hiruzen Sarutobi himself.

After all, Itachi Uchiha belonged to ANBU, not Root.

His evasive explanation made the other three Hokage and Sasuke overlook one thing.

The coup had only been the idea of one faction within the Uchiha.

Back then, for the sake of peace, they had even forced out their clan head, Madara Uchiha.

After the Battle of the Valley of the End, Hashirama Senju and Tobirama Senju had not suggested wiping out the entire Uchiha Clan either.

He who controls The Storm Riders can rule the world.

Naruto, who carried the Nine-Tails as its Jinchuriki, and Sasuke, who possessed the Sharingan capable of controlling the Nine-Tails—were they not the Nie Feng and Bu Jingyun of the Naruto World?

Unfortunately, Hiruzen Sarutobi's grand game had not been finished before his own student disrupted it.

If the Konoha Crush Plan had not succeeded, the Third would have kept Naruto and Sasuke firmly in the palm of his hand.

Then no one would have said that Hiruzen Sarutobi had drained Konoha dry.

Perhaps he really could have used those two to intimidate the four nations and secure his position as leader of the Ninja World.

The more Naruto thought about it, the more convinced he became that this had been the plan. At last, he clicked his tongue.

Regardless of whether Hiruzen was good or evil, even if Naruto had become the Third himself, he might not have played the game any better.

In the Naruto World, everything depended on bloodlines. For someone from a minor clan with no backing to climb to that position, Hiruzen's abilities were already impressive.

If there was one place he had gone wrong, it was probably that his son, Shinnosuke Sarutobi, could lose his life even while escorting supplies.

Naruto shook his head and suppressed those thoughts.

It was still too early to think about such things. His highest priority was building strength.

The thicker his foundation before the battle with the Six Paths, the better.

He opened the scrolls for the Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu and Adamantine Sealing Chains, then began studying what was written inside.