When the notice for the special training group arrived in the Clan District, Fugaku did not open it right away.
He simply stared at the Anbu seal on the envelope, remaining silent for a long time.
This time, the notice had a reference number.
It had an authorization trail.
It had confirmation from the Hokage Office.
On the surface, it was cleaner than any of the previous unnumbered missions.
But Uchiha Gen knew that made it even more troublesome.
The enemy had learned to change its skin.
Unnumbered missions were hidden blades.
An official notice like this was a blade in plain sight.
A hidden blade could be countered by exploiting procedural flaws, but an open blade wore the guise of the village nurturing talent.
If the Uchiha handled this poorly, they would instead look unwilling to let Itachi serve Konoha.
No missing reference number.
No clandestine delivery.
No procedural flaw that could be spotted at a glance.
It called isolation nurturing.
It called single-channel contact advanced training.
It called taking Itachi out of the clan's records Konoha's regard for talent.
Itachi stood beside the desk without speaking.
Shisui asked first, "What does the training cover?"
Fugaku opened the notice.
"Deep infiltration, single-channel communication, decision-making in extreme missions, and elimination of special targets."
The last item silenced everyone in the room.
Elimination of special targets.
There was nothing inherently wrong with those words.
The Anbu did need to deal with dangerous targets.
But when applied to Itachi, they were particularly jarring.
Looking at that line, Itachi felt a momentary chill in his heart.
He was not afraid of missions.
What frightened him was that one day, the words "special targets" might be applied to his clansmen.
When that happened, if there were no records, no witnesses, and no one who