The words the Masked Man had left behind soon spread within a small circle.
The village was merely finding another way to weaken the Uchiha.
Today, submit your records.
Tomorrow, hand over your missions.
The day after, hand over your eyes.
Those three statements drove like nails into the hearts of many young clan members.
Uchiha Gen did not rush to suppress them.
He could not suppress them.
What the Masked Man had said was not fabricated out of thin air.
The Uchiha had indeed been suspected.
The Konoha Military Police Force had indeed been restricted.
Shisui's eyes had indeed nearly been taken from him.
The more real a fear was, the less a simple "Don't overthink it" could resolve it.
He knew the greatest danger with words like these was not that someone spoke them.
It was that everyone thought they made sense, yet could only say so behind closed doors.
So Fugaku convened another open meeting with recorded proceedings within the clan.
This time, the subject was not accountability.
It was the feeling of being weakened.
Many people froze the moment that phrase came up.
Uchiha Jun was the first to stand.
"I do feel like we're being weakened, little by little."
He spoke bluntly.
"The police force has to be reformed, clan meetings have to be filed, Anbu missions have to be recorded, and even Shisui has to put the limits of his genjutsu use in writing. It all sounds reasonable, but in the end, isn't every step restricting the Uchiha?"
His words silenced the meeting hall.
Shisui's gaze dimmed slightly when he heard his own name.
He had asked similar questions himself.
Were the limits on his abilities meant to protect him, or restrict him?
But the difference was that the Uchiha had written those limits