Once upon a time?

In Sunagakure's Darkness of Dawn, Granny Chiyo watched the faint light flickering amid the sand that filled the sky.

Back then, she could have stopped it, yet she had watched a young man who aspired to become Kazekage being led toward the Demon Cave of death.

She did not believe she had done anything wrong, yet for some reason, these past few days, she had been tormented by questions from deep within her heart.

Questions from her Ninja Soul, which had not decayed along with her body!

A figure approached through the swirling sand. "You must be Granny Chiyo of Sunagakure."

Chiyo turned her lifeless gaze toward him. "Who are you?"

The newcomer said, "My name is Kabuto Yakushi. You could call me an old acquaintance of Red Sand Scorpion."

Chiyo said coldly, "An old acquaintance? My reclusive grandson hardly seemed the type to make friends. You're an enemy of his, here specifically to take revenge on this old woman, aren't you?"

Click! Beneath her sleeve, the mechanism in her puppet arm had silently opened, ready to fire poisoned needles at any moment!

The man's features gradually emerged through the sand. He was a young man with short, silver-gray hair, and the glasses perched on his nose suited his scholarly appearance.

"You misunderstand. I was once Sasori's subordinate, though, of course, he controlled me with a technique. That technique was dispelled years ago. I came today to convey Red Sand Scorpion's last words to you."

Sasori's... last words?

Granny Chiyo's lifeless eyes contracted sharply, then dimmed.

All these years, she had believed she had seen through the ways of the world and quietly waited for death while fishing. Her only wish had been to see her grandson one more time.

She had never expected that what she received instead... would be news that he would never return.

"Sasori... is dead? Who killed him?"

"I can tell you everything about Sasori in detail. Could you put away your puppet arm first?"

A sharp glint flashed through Granny Chiyo's eyes. The fact that she had converted that arm into a puppet was a secret unknown to outsiders!

It seems... he really came prepared.

"Very well."

She openly revealed her arm, then closed its mechanism.

"Speak."

Kabuto Yakushi adjusted his glasses. "It's a long story. Allow me to tell it from the beginning."

"The Akatsuki? Wasn't that the organization that originated in Amegakure during the Second Shinobi World War and was completely wiped out by Hanzo of the Salamander?"

As a longtime enemy of Hanzo of the Salamander, the man once known as the demigod of shinobi, Granny Chiyo could not help interrupting Kabuto's account with a pointed question upon hearing that Sasori had joined the Akatsuki.

Kabuto Yakushi said, "Yes... but today's Akatsuki no longer shares its original purpose. They are a terror operating in the shadows of the shinobi world, and their ultimate objective is to hunt tailed beasts!"

Granny Chiyo was shocked. "Hunt... Tailed beasts! Don't tell me!"

Kabuto Yakushi adjusted his glasses and said gravely, "That's right. The Akatsuki is the organization that abducted Gaara three days ago and tried to claim Shukaku, the One-Tail, for themselves!"

These successive blows shattered Granny Chiyo's composure. "You're saying the organization that abducted that child is the one Sasori served?!"

Kabuto Yakushi said, "Yes. Sasori didn't merely join the Akatsuki. He even assassinated the former Third Kazekage and turned him, along with many other shinobi who died at his hands, into human puppets... he even converted himself into a human puppet!"

"He..."

Granny Chiyo staggered backward several steps and leaned against the wall, looking as though she had aged ten years in an instant.

The grandson she had waited decades for had committed unspeakable atrocities behind her back!

She sank into bitter blame, both for herself and for him. "It was me... I failed to give Sasori a whole childhood! If only I had stopped his parents from going to war back then! That damned White Fang of Konoha destroyed Sasori's childhood and his future!"

Kabuto Yakushi said with mixed feelings, "The past is set in stone, but the future can still be changed."

Chiyo fixed her gaze on the man before her. "What are you trying to say, young man?"

Kabuto Yakushi said, "Even though Sasori took the wrong path, deep down, he never forgot his true feelings. Before he died, he found the true eternity within his heart. Sasori's final words entrusted us with a request: to make sure the puppets Father and Mother were passed on..."

Granny Chiyo's eyes widened. "He... still remembered those first creations?!"

Kabuto Yakushi said solemnly, "He never forgot. Until the very end, Sasori remained a child yearning for his parents' love. He even went so far as to ask the person who killed him to convey his feelings to you, the one person he had wronged!"

Granny Chiyo clenched her hands, a fierce glint flashing in her aged eyes through the grief she tried to conceal.

"You certainly have some nerve. You're the one who killed Sasori, aren't you?"

Kabuto Yakushi said calmly, "I am not capable of such a feat. All I can tell you is that the person who killed Sasori is going to bring back your future Kazekage in this coldhearted village's place!"

Granny Chiyo froze for a moment, then chuckled softly. "Heh... then what are you after, coming all this way to tell this old woman everything? Surely you're not asking me to go along?"

Kabuto Yakushi knew the time had come.

"I know the stories about you. You even developed a Forbidden Technique capable of bringing the dead back to life, the technique called Life Reincarnation. I beg you... to teach it to me!"

As his words fell, Kabuto Yakushi actually knelt.

This utterly surprised Chiyo! Not because the man before her knew the technique existed, but because... he actually wanted it! A technique... that cost the user their own life!

Granny Chiyo said, "Young man... do you know what you're saying? It's true that I created that Forbidden Technique, but using it will cost you your life!"

Kabuto Yakushi said resolutely, "Of course I know. I have already prepared myself for that!"

Kabuto Yakushi knew full well that he had a purpose to fulfill, that Orochimaru and Sasuke needed him!

Until their grand undertaking was complete, he had to stay alive... he had sworn to become the pillar supporting the two bridges that were Sasuke and Orochimaru, so he had to live, no matter what!

Thus, the resolve he had prepared was to continue serving the two men he admired in an Impure World Reincarnation body, deprived of the sensations of the living!

That was why he had come... willing to kneel and plead, sacrificing himself for Gaara's sake, and even more for Sasuke-kun's!

Granny Chiyo stared at the man before her in shock, not because of the Sharingan in his right eye, but because of the look in his eyes.

It was the look of someone willing to give everything, a look she herself had once possessed, only for the years to wear it away completely.

For the people who mattered to him, for his convictions and his Ninja Way, he would kneel and even offer up his life!

Chiyo searched her heart. When did I abandon my own Ninja Way? Was it truly when White Fang killed my children? No, how many children died because of me? The one who killed my heart was not anyone else, nor was it this shinobi world. It was... me.

It seems I can no longer simply wait quietly for death.

Chiyo did not ask whom Kabuto Yakushi wanted to save. Perhaps she already knew the answer. She asked gravely, "Kabuto Yakushi... I've heard your name. You're the Double Agent from Konoha who moved between the various nations, aren't you?"

Kabuto Yakushi said, "Having my name remembered by an elder of the shinobi world such as yourself is the greatest honor!"

Granny Chiyo said, "Then this old woman cannot fully believe what you say, much less teach you the forbidden technique... first, I must see for myself whether your companion truly went to rescue that child!"

Kabuto Yakushi raised his head. "Then... you mean?"

Swish! Granny Chiyo removed her pale-purple headscarf, shaking loose the hair at her temples. For the first time in ages, a bright, hearty smile spread across her deeply wrinkled face.

"Take me there. If your words prove true, I'll consider granting your request!"