Naruto Uzumaki's Identity Revealed

[On the screen, Minato Namikaze used the Summoning Technique, handed something to Gamatatsu, and gave him a few instructions.]

[The Canopy Screen muted this part.]

Everyone across the Shinobi World began to wonder what Minato Namikaze had said in his final moments that even the Canopy Screen had concealed.

[Then, with the last of his strength, he gently drew Kushina into his arms.]

["Come on, Kushina..." His voice had grown faint as his life and soul rapidly slipped away. "One last time... let's leave Naruto... something together..."]

[Kushina's tears poured down. She knew there was no changing what had happened.]

[She watched her husband's soul turn transparent, then looked at the son sleeping soundly in her arms. Overwhelming grief and a mother's love finally swept aside everything else.]

[She nodded firmly and poured all her remaining Chakra, along with Minato's half of the Nine-Tails, into Naruto's tiny body.]

[An intricate seal appeared around Naruto's navel, spun, and finally settled into place.]

["Naruto..." Kushina could barely speak through her sobs. She gazed at her son's face, unable to look away, and stroked his soft cheek again and again.]

["Don't be a picky eater... eat plenty every day... and grow up strong..."]

["Take hot baths every day... don't stay up late... and get enough sleep..."]

["And make friends..." Kushina's vision grew increasingly blurry. "You don't need many... just a few who truly care about you... that's enough..."]

["And about the three prohibitions for shinobi..."]

[After saying all this, Kushina turned tearfully to Minato Namikaze. "I'm sorry, Minato. I got carried away talking..."]

["No, it's all right..." Minato Namikaze shook his head, then looked at Naruto and said slowly, word by word, "Naruto, what Dad wants to say... is the same as your talkative mom..."]

["Eight Trigrams Sealing Style!"]

A flash of white filled the Canopy Screen. Then it went black.

That marked the end of today's broadcast.

Dead silence.

For more than ten seconds, not a sound came from anywhere in Konoha.

Everyone remained frozen with their heads tilted back, as though encased in ice.

The Canopy Screen had revealed too much at once. The shock was so immense that their minds briefly stopped working.

Then the volcano erupted.

"Aaaaaaah!"

A scream of anguish and fury shattered the silence.

It was Naruto Uzumaki.

At the Ninja Academy, he knelt on the ground, his hands digging into the floor until his nails split and bled. Tears streamed down his face, mixing with the dust before falling hot onto the ground.

His blond hair could not hide the frightening red light blazing in his eyes. The Nine-Tails' Chakra was boiling out of control.

His whole body shook violently, not with fear, but with unbearable rage and grief.

"Danzo! Nine Nether! Naraka! Akatsuki Organization! It was you! You killed my mom and dad!" His cry sounded like that of a wounded cub, full of despair.

All this time, he had believed his parents had died in a disaster.

But now the Canopy Screen had shown him a deeper conspiracy. The loneliness and hatred he had endured had been deliberately engineered. His fury threatened to consume him.

"Naruto!" Haruno Sakura went pale and tried to approach, but the uncontrolled crimson Chakra spilling from him forced her back. All she could do was call out anxiously.

Yet his parents' faces in their final moments rose in his mind, followed by Iruka, Sasuke, Sakura, Hinata, Teuchi... everyone who had given him warmth and a bond to hold on to.

Overwhelming hatred and the love his parents had left him battled inside him, nearly tearing him apart.

At last, he jerked his head up. Tears still flowed, but beyond the pain and anger in his eyes burned a determination fiercer than ever before.

He knew the truth now. A deeper darkness rested on his shoulders.

But he had to keep walking this path, not only for his dream of becoming Hokage, and not only to protect his friends and the village.

He now bore another responsibility: to end this chain of hatred once and for all, and to seek justice for his parents.

To do that, he needed more strength. Only then could he defeat the powerful enemies he had seen on the Canopy Screen.

Just then, Konoha's public-address system crackled to life.

The voice of the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, carried through loudspeakers across the village.

"Today, there is something I must tell you all."

"On the night of the Nine-Tails' attack, Minato and Kushina entrusted their newborn son, the new Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, to the village in their final moments."

"They believed that child was not the incarnation of a Demon Fox who had brought disaster upon us, but a hero who had protected Konoha. They hoped the village would see him that way too."

Hiruzen Sarutobi paused. Every word that followed carried immense weight.

"The orphaned son of the Fourth Hokage, Minato Namikaze, and Kushina Uzumaki is Naruto Uzumaki."

The news exploded in everyone's mind like a thunderclap.

Shame and guilt surged through them all.

The child they had despised, shunned, and called a "Demon Fox" was the son of the Fourth Hokage they revered and had mourned so bitterly?

The hero whose smile had been as warm as the sun, who had given his life to protect the village—his child had borne all their cold stares, isolation, and hatred?

A shopkeeper who had once hurled insults at Naruto dropped the tool in his hand. A mother who had forbidden her child from going near him covered her mouth, her eyes filling with tears. Children who had thrown stones at him stood rooted to the spot, not knowing what to do.

A suffocating silence hung in the air.

Iruka stood among the crowd, tears already streaming down his face. At last he fully understood why the Third Hokage had been so protective of Naruto, and why Naruto had always longed so desperately for acceptance.

His heart ached for every injustice Naruto had suffered, and for the sacrifice of the Fourth Hokage, Minato Namikaze.

Deep inside Root's base, Shimura Danzō heard the announcement from above as well.

"Hmph!" Shimura Danzō snorted in contempt.

Hiruzen Sarutobi was as shameless as ever. Until the Canopy Screen revealed the truth, he had acted as though he knew nothing.

Now that it had exposed Naruto Uzumaki's parentage, he was the first to step forward and play the good man, as if he had only just found out.