Sasuke coldly sized up Sai and Sakura, while they scrutinized the members of Taka Squad beside him.
Were these Sasuke's teammates now?
"Naruto, Sasuke, and Kakashi-sensei."
"I don't think we've ever really sat down together for a meal, have we?"
"This is a first."
Gekkō Raito welcomed everyone like a gracious host.
Although everyone sat around the same round table, each had their own agenda during the meal.
Naruto stared fixedly at Sasuke, afraid he might run off the next second, while occasionally scanning Gekkō Raito out of the corner of his eye.
He wanted to gauge Gekkō Raito's current strength.
What alarmed Naruto, however, was that even though he had mastered the sensory abilities of Sage Mode, he could not see through Gekkō Raito at all.
The chakra in Gekkō Raito's body was like a pool of stagnant water, unfathomably deep and unsettlingly strange.
"None of us are of legal drinking age yet, so we'll have juice instead of alcohol today."
Gekkō Raito raised his glass and said to Naruto, who seemed on the verge of speaking, "However much you have to say, hold it in. Drink this first."
He turned to glance at the expressionless Sasuke.
Kakashi shook his head with a wry smile and raised his glass too.
"The speed at which you've all grown really has far exceeded anything I imagined as your teacher..."
Kakashi had once thought that Gekkō Raito was, at most, a promising candidate to become an elite jōnin.
If he progressed steadily, he might someday qualify to compete for the position of Hokage.
Sasuke and Naruto had held the same potential.
The three of them should have become Konoha's pillars and restored its glory.
Yet reality was like a lousy screenwriter, producing the most melodramatic script imaginable.
Danzo had used Gekkō Raito