Masked Man, I see you

The abnormal spatial chakra residue lasted less than a breath.

Flames swept over the street entrance, and with a surge of heat, that tiny swirl vanished as though it had never appeared.

But Uchiha Gen did not look away.

He knew what he had seen was no illusion.

The system would not issue a notification because of flickering light in a fire. Nor could an ordinary Body Flicker Technique leave behind the distortion his Sharingan had caught.

The real danger had never been the fire before him.

It was not even just the Nine-Tails.

Terrifying as the Nine-Tails was, at least everyone could see where it was. But the Masked Man lurking amid the chaos was the mastermind they could least afford to overlook tonight.

"Gen?"

Uchiha Ryo called to him quietly.

Uchiha Gen came back to his senses and immediately lowered his voice. "Don't stare in that direction for too long."

Uchiha Ryo froze.

"Someone's hiding in the shadows."

His fingers instantly tightened around his kunai.

Uchiha Gen shook his head. "Don't attack, and don't pursue him. We can't catch him right now."

He said it calmly.

So calmly that it almost sounded like an admission of his own weakness.

But precisely because he knew how weak he was, he could not drag his squad into certain death.

A thirteen-year-old with a One-Tomoe Sharingan, a few young clansmen, and two Chunin from the Konoha Military Police Force. That was enough for an ordinary fire rescue, but against the Masked Man, they could not even begin to test him.

Uchiha Gen was not trying to win.

He was trying to get more people to see the anomaly.

"Is Inoue Shin still here?"

"He's over at the shelter," Uchiha Makoto replied. "He's injured, but he can still move."

"Bring him here."

Uchiha Makoto paused. "Now?"

"Now."

Uchiha Gen looked toward the end of the street, his voice very quiet. "He's support from the Barrier Team. He knows more about spatial chakra and barrier fluctuations than we do. Having him look at where the residue was will do more good than us saying a hundred words."

Uchiha Makoto understood immediately and ran toward the shelter.

Before long, Inoue Shin arrived, clutching his injured arm, his face pale from blood loss.

"You said there was something abnormal here?"

When he saw the Uchiha standing at the street entrance, his first reaction was still wariness.

Uchiha Gen offered little explanation. He merely pointed toward the broken wall blackened by fire.

"There was a chakra distortion there just now. Like a vortex. It only lasted a moment. You don't have to believe me. Just look at the ash on the ground and the scorch marks on the wall."

Inoue Shin frowned and stepped forward.

He was neither a sensory ninja nor an expert in Space-Time Ninjutsu, but the Barrier Team had trained him in basic trace analysis.

An ordinary ninja moving at high speed would stir up wind. Flames would bend with the airflow, and ash would be swept in the same direction.

But the ash in front of the broken wall was different.

It had not been blown apart. Rather, it looked as though something had drawn it inward toward the center, forming a very faint circle.

Inoue Shin's expression slowly changed.

"Someone used a special ninjutsu here just now?"

"I'm not sure."

Uchiha Gen did not make any absolute claims.

He needed a witness, not to make himself look all-knowing.

"But it matches what Takuya Yamashiro described. A kunai passing through a body, the air distorting, the target changing position in an instant."

Inoue Shin fell silent for a moment, then suddenly turned and called out, "You two, get over here!"

Two Konoha ninja hurried over from the shelter.

"Record this location. South street entrance, beside the broken wall. Suspected anomalous spatial traces. Connected to the testimony of Takuya Yamashiro from Patrol Squad Two."

One of them hesitated. "We're recording this now?"

Inoue Shin gritted his teeth. "If we don't record it now, there'll be nothing but ash by dawn!"

At those words, the way Uchiha Ryo looked at Uchiha Gen changed again.

He finally understood why Gen had not given chase.

Pursuing the enemy might prove their courage, but it would very likely leave nothing behind.

Showing the traces to Konoha ninja and having them record the evidence themselves was how they could make sure it survived until dawn.

Just then, the corner of Uchiha Gen's eye suddenly twitched.

The tomoe in his Sharingan caught an extremely thin glint of cold light.

It did not come from the end of the street.

It came from a half-collapsed window frame on the second floor to his right.

He did not even have time to shout a warning.

His body had already leaned backward.

Whizz!

A jet-black senbon grazed his cheek and buried itself in the wooden post behind him.

A faint sting spread across the side of his face, and blood slid down his jaw.

Uchiha Ryo spun around. "Who's there?"

There was no one behind the window frame.

But the dust there was collapsing inward, as though an invisible hollow had just closed.

Inoue Shin saw it too.

His expression changed completely.

"What was that?"

Uchiha Gen did not answer.

He stared at the window frame, cold sweat already seeping down his back.

If the system had not strengthened his visual prowess, he would never have been able to see that senbon clearly. Even half a beat slower, and it would have struck not his cheek, but his eye.

The Masked Man had not shown himself.

He had not even made a serious attack.

This was only a warning.

The first warning from someone lurking in the shadows to an Uchiha boy who should never have discovered those traces.

"Stay together!"

Uchiha Gen immediately barked in a low voice.

Uchiha Toru and the two adult clansmen closed ranks at once, shielding the civilians and injured ninja in their midst.

"He's trying to throw us into chaos."

Uchiha Gen wiped the blood from his cheek, keeping his voice steady.

"If we fall apart, the witnesses, the records, the traces-all of it will become a confused melee no one can explain."

Inoue Shin clenched his fists and asked quietly, "Do you know who that person is?"

"No."

Uchiha Gen looked at the distorted ash marks remaining on the window frame.

"But I know he doesn't want us to keep investigating."

This time, Inoue Shin no longer looked at him with suspicion.

Because that senbon had been fired right before his eyes.

And right before his eyes, the attacker had vanished from a place where no one should have been.

In the distance, the Nine-Tails roared again.

A dazzling chakra glow rose from the center of the village, as though more powerful ninja were making their way to the battlefield.

Uchiha Gen knew they had little time left.

The Night of the Nine-Tails would soon be over.

Once dawn broke, death, ruins, fear, and anger would all come crashing down together. By then, many people would no longer care about the details. They would only want a target to bear their resentment.

If the Uchiha still left nothing behind, they would be suspected, isolated, and pushed step by step toward destruction, just as in their original fate.

"Keep rescuing people."

Uchiha Gen turned toward the others.

"Record everything: the traces at the south street entrance, Takuya Yamashiro's testimony, and that senbon just now. Every additional person who knows makes it that much harder to cover up what happened tonight."

Uchiha Makoto nodded, gripping the charcoal pencil so tightly his knuckles turned white.

Uchiha Ryo looked at the blood on Gen's face and said quietly, "You almost died just now."

"That's why we have to hurry."

Uchiha Gen raised his head and looked toward the empty window.

He did not shout the Masked Man's name or make any provocative gesture.

But his Sharingan did not look away.

Between the firelight and thick smoke, he seemed to see, across half a street of ruins, a red eye hidden deep within a vortex.

For one brief instant.

That gaze settled on him too.

On the other side of the street, the shadows twisted silently.

The masked man stood beneath a ruined eave and glanced down at the second senbon in his hand, still unfired.

He had only meant to dispose of a witness who had survived by chance.

He had not expected that the real problem would not be that Chunin.

It was an Uchiha boy who should never have been here.

"The Uchiha Clan..."

The voice beneath the mask was so low that the crackling fire almost swallowed it.

"Has one more troublesome member."