No way, no way-you didn't know?

"It's you!" Naruto stood on legs that were still weak, his blue eyes blazing with anger.

"You've gone too far! Grandpa Third sits at home feeling miserable every day, all because of the malice of you civilians! Your rumors cost him his position as Hokage!"

"Grandpa Third is a great hero who protected Konoha! What gives you the right to slander him?"

Shuofang Si's taunt about "throwing a shuriken from eight hundred li away" had already stirred Kakuzu's killing intent.

But at this revelation, the two masks floating behind him slowly stopped. He had always hated the darkness among a village's ruling elite. Otherwise, he would never have defected from Takigakure all those years ago.

He had paid considerable attention to the recent news that Konoha's Third Hokage had stepped down after scandals in his administration came to light. Aside from making money, it had been the second most interesting thing to him lately.

He had never expected this arrogant young man before him to be the very spark that had ignited that upheaval.

This was juicy gossip he simply couldn't miss.

Kakuzu withdrew his masks, the eerie green light on his face covering flickering faintly. He quietly replenished his chakra and settled in to watch the show.

A cold smile appeared on Shuofang Si's lips. "Looks like the Third has thoroughly brainwashed you. How pathetic, Demon Fox."

Naruto hated that name more than anything. His pupils abruptly contracted, and he bristled like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.

"What did you say? Shut up! I won't let you slander Grandpa Third again!" He raised his fist and charged at Shuofang Si.

But his serious injuries had yet to heal, and his unsteady steps felt as though he were walking on cotton.

Shuofang Si punched him square in the face. Naruto toppled backward and slammed into the ground, seeing stars and unable to get up.

Sure enough, if you wanted people to listen to reason, you needed the strength to make them.

Shuofang Si looked down at Naruto, who was struggling to rise from the ground, his voice so calm it was almost cruel.

"Looks like you haven't realized a thing, our Demon Fox jinchūriki. During the Nine-Tails Rebellion a few years ago, who in the village didn't see that enormous Nine-Tails Demon Fox?"

"Yet despite being a jinchūriki, your identity was apparently left unprotected. People bullied you, calling you Demon Fox at every turn. You couldn't buy anything you wanted, and people threw stones at you every day."

"Those stones battered you until your head was bleeding, but apparently they never knocked any sense into you."

"What... exactly... do you mean?" Naruto struggled to get up, but his arms and legs still refused to obey him after that punch.

"How pathetic. You still don't understand? This is the tragic fate of a jinchūriki. If you wanted to keep the most powerful weapon of war completely under your control, what would be the best way?"

"If a child came home crying after being bullied, believing the whole world was darkness, and a kindly old grandpa was there to smile and pat his head, what would that old grandpa become to the child?"

The revelation struck the watching Konoha ninja like a thunderbolt.

That was right. Everyone knew about the Demon Fox, and everyone knew Naruto had been shunned since childhood as a symbol of ill omen. But they had never really thought about the reasons behind it.

If they were Naruto, living under those circumstances, Grandpa Third would undoubtedly be a ray of light in that dark world. No, he would be the sun.

Naruto froze for a moment before snapping back to his senses, his breathing ragged and his eyes bloodshot. "Impossible! Grandpa Third isn't that kind of person!"

"He brought me food when I couldn't buy anything to eat! He gave me money when I didn't have enough to live on! And he comforted me when I was bullied! Grandpa Third is nothing like you say!"

Shuofang Si suddenly burst into laughter, so wild that he sounded ready to join the Uchiha Four Laughing Masters on the spot.

Even the furious Naruto was stunned by his behavior. "What are you laughing at? Hey!"

"I'm laughing because someone's been playing you like a puppet, you idiot." Shuofang Si stopped laughing, his face full of scorn.

"He was the Hokage, yet he couldn't keep your identity as a jinchūriki secret and let the news that you were the Demon Fox spread all over town? As Hokage, a single word from him would have sent countless ninja to protect you."

"You know better than anyone how you were treated as a child. If he'd given even one order, how could anyone have bullied you to that extent?"

Naruto's eyes widened, his lips trembling. "That's impossible! You're making it up!"

He instantly grew frantic, as though his entire worldview had been shaken.

Shuofang Si ignored him and continued, "And that's not even getting into your pitiful living allowance. Such a pittance. They told you your parents were heroes, but don't tell me you don't know who those heroic parents were? No way, no way-you didn't know?"

"You're the orphaned son of two heroes, but look how short you are. You don't even get enough nutrition, and you can only wait desperately for the Third Hokage to hand you your allowance. Is that right? Does that make any sense, Ka-ka-shi?"

His tone grew increasingly mocking, and by the end, he practically forced each syllable of Kakashi's name out through clenched teeth.

Kakashi immediately broke into a cold sweat. Is that right? How did I get dragged into this?

But the biggest problem was that he couldn't say it made sense without betraying his conscience.

He had known about Naruto's situation back then, but his father had killed himself, Obito and Rin had both died, and even Minato and his wife were gone. He had sealed his heart away completely, sinking into darkness and becoming utterly numb.

He had merely served as a cold mission machine in the Anbu. Only in recent years, after leaving the Anbu and becoming a jonin leading a team, had he gradually begun to recover.

But Naruto's childhood was already over.

Naruto turned to Kakashi, his voice trembling in a way it never had before. "Kakashi-sensei, you know who my parents were? Did you know them?"

Kakashi closed his eyes, his expression conflicted. Minato-sensei and Kushina, his teacher's wife-the couple whose smiling faces he could still vividly recall-appeared in his mind.

What should I do? How should I answer?

But while he wrestled with whether to reveal the truth, Shuofang Si had already made the choice for him.

"Demon Fox brat, hated by the whole village... looks like you really don't know. How pitiful. Your parents were the Fourth Hokage and his wife."

"What?!" Everyone present except Kakashi looked too shocked to speak.

Sakura clutched her head with both hands, unable to believe it. Naruto, that annoying guy, was actually the Fourth Hokage's son? And the way she usually treated him...

Even Neji and Sasuke were too stunned to speak.

The Fourth Hokage was Konoha's hero, the man who had saved the village.

And Naruto-the Naruto who had grown up in a shabby home, with everyone calling him Demon Fox since childhood-was his son?

Kakuzu burst into hoarse laughter, the sound echoing through the night sky beneath the rolling thunderclouds.

"This is the darkness of a village's ruling elite! But what I didn't expect, judging by this brat's age, was that any parents would be stupid enough to turn their child into a jinchūriki before they died. Didn't they know what a jinchūriki would face in the village?"

"Shut up!" Kakashi was furious.