When the cross-check table was laid on the conference table, the full outline of the old-shell system emerged for the first time.
Old wartime identification numbers.
Frozen identity numbers.
Old seals.
Passes belonging to former personnel.
Manual clearance codes.
Taken individually, every one of these things could be explained.
Wartime chaos.
Logistical misuse.
Temporary reassignment.
Delays in access control.
Emergency clearance.
But once they were placed on the same table, those explanations began to contradict one another.
If it was merely wartime chaos, why had they turned up alongside former border informants recently?
If it was merely logistical misuse, why had they come close to files associated with the Core Sealed Archive?
If it was merely a delay in access control, why had revoked passes repeatedly reached the fringes of sensitive document handling?
If it was merely emergency clearance, why were there no review signatures?
Gen looked at the table and understood perfectly.
The old shell wasn't a skin.
It was an entire network of doors.
Root didn't necessarily enter through the same door every time.
It could use wartime numbers to access old files.
It could use frozen identities to move things through transfer channels.
It could use old seals to supplement paperwork.
It could use former personnel's passes to enter the outer areas of the Hokage Building.
None of those doors was very large.
Every one of them could be explained away as an oversight.
But when there were so many doors, they were no longer oversights.
Fugaku submitted the findings from the cross-check table to the Third Hokage.
"The Uchiha request that all old numbers, old seals, frozen identities, and revoked passes involving past Uchiha cases be placed on a list subject to independent witnessing."
Danzo said coldly, "Do the Uchiha intend to place the Hokage Building's