This—this was the normal reaction.
The kind any adult should have.
Even when Elder Takahiro had floated the idea that Akai was channeling the Kyuubi's chakra, there had been hesitation beneath his certainty. His voice had been loud, yes—but it trembled at the edges. Rational fear. The kind that made sense.
That was how an average adult would respond:
With measured eyes. With cautious warmth, maybe, dismissing it as a child's wild imagination.
Or with concern—but not that rigid, suffocating kind masquerading as discipline. Not the kind obsessed with "the clan's path."
It only confirmed what Akai already knew.
Elder Genzou wasn't rational. He wasn't concerned.
He was emotional. Proud.
He hadn't attacked Akai out of worry.
He looked down on him—as if Akai should be grateful for the attention.
That wasn't discipline.
That was ego.
Akai's eyes lingered too long on Shisui's face, dissecting every flicker of expression. Searching for any hint of discomfort, judgment, or curiosity.
Shisui, sensing the scrutiny, shifted but said nothing.
Thirty minutes passed in silence before a nurse arrived to escort them. Her face was unreadable, her movements quiet and smooth.
Akai arched an eyebrow.
There were no more tests for him. He was certain of it.
They approached the exam room. Just as the nurse reached for the handle—
It creaked open on its own.
A man stood in the doorway.
He was wrapped in white bandages—from his right arm to the crown of his head, even over one eye. His skin was pale and aged, an X-shaped scar stamped onto his chin like a warning sign. Shaggy black hair framed his face, and his frail posture suggested he should be using a cane.
He didn't need one.
He didn't need anything.
He commanded the room.
"Elder Danzō," Shisui greeted, bowing. His voice was flat. Respectful, but cold.
And that was when Akai saw them.
Cursed spirits.
They clung to the man like leeches.
Shadowy, slender forms slid across his arms and shoulders, burrowing into the folds of his bandages. They didn't speak. They didn't move.
They watched.
Akai froze.
He had written this down—days ago.
Ninjas attract more cursed spirits than civilians.
Bloodshed, fear, death—it stains them.
But this... this wasn't residue.
This was deliberate.
And then—something else.
Behind Danzō stood a figure.
Brown hair. Red eyes. A Sharingan—
But wrong. The tomoe were uneven, like someone had painted them in a rush, with a shaking hand and a broken brush.
He wore a flak jacket darker than standard jōnin gear, and a hitai-ate with a leaf symbol that looked blurred, like a memory that refused to stay whole.
No twisted limbs. No monstrous aura.
But nothing about him felt human.
Akai's chest tightened.
This wasn't just strange.
It didn't belong.
The figure raised its head, locking eyes with him.
Then it smiled.
A slow, deliberate smile that peeled back just enough lip to reveal jagged, shark-like back teeth.
"You can see me?" it asked, voice serene—too serene.
Of course Akai could.
The grin. The tone. The phrasing.
This wasn't a dream.
This wasn't a trick.
This was a cursed spirit—
One wearing a human shape.
"Still... I'm surprised. Didn't think you knew how to show respect to your elders."
Then, casually, he reached out and ruffled Akai's hair.
Like he was praising a dog.
"Good boy~"
Akai's spine stiffened.
Every muscle begged to lash out.
To hiss Just shut up and take the damn book.
But he didn't.
He stood there—barely twitching—imaginary veins throbbing at his temples: 💢💢💢
Only once the journal left his hand did he turn back to the cursed spirit.
Its grin had faltered.
Just a touch.
Something like disappointment darkened its eyes.
But Akai stepped forward.
The claws shifted—closer now. Almost brushing his throat.
Each step narrowed the distance.
The air itself grew thin, brittle.
The spirit leaned in, watching him closely—hunting for the one human reaction it craved:
Relief.
One blink. One breath. One twitch.
But none came.
Akai's face remained still. Cold.
And something clicked in the cursed spirit's gaze.
A recalculation.
A new equation.
It made a decision.
Was that just my feeling?
The claws retracted. Slowly. Effortlessly.
They folded back into the fur like knives returning to a sheath.
Then the spirit stepped aside—deliberate, unhurried—clearing the way.
But it didn't vanish.
It didn't stop watching.
It didn't stop waiting.
Still, it searched—for that flicker of relief. That smallest crack in the mask.
It found none.
Akai walked in.
The room was quiet, but not heavy. The kind of quiet that lingered when too many adults were waiting for a child to speak. Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, stood by the far wall with his hands behind his back, that ever-patient smile worn like armor.
Beside him, Elder Takahiro scowled, his arms crossed—aged lines on his bald forehead forming deep trenches. On the examination bed behind them sat Genzou, stripped from the waist up, his right shoulder heavily bandaged where an arm used to be. Cold sweat slicked his brow.
Akai stood before the second bed, directly across from them. He bowed politely, voice neutral.
"Greetings, Lord Hokage. Elders."
"Ah, so you do remember me," Hiruzen said kindly, nodding. "That's good. You've grown sharper since I last saw you."
Akai didn't respond right away. His face was as unreadable as always—blank, calm, almost bored.
But that was far from the truth.
He was focused. Extremely focused.
The cursed spirit stood just a few feet in front of him. Its red, hairy arms hung lazily at its sides, claws tapping together in irregular clink, clink patterns like a beast sharpening its knives through idle play.
The thing's grin stretched too wide, too eager—blackened teeth peeking between the curved lines of ink-painted lips. Its red eyes never blinked.
He's still watching for a reaction.
Akai knew he couldn't afford to give one. Even now, with his Byakugan active—fueled not by chakra, but cursed energy—the faintest flicker of emotion would betray him. That's why his gaze was so still. That's why his body didn't shift. He wasn't staring at Genzou.
He was pretending to.
But the adults misunderstood. They followed his line of sight and landed on the wounded elder.
Takahiro narrowed his eyes at him, suspicious but silent. Hiruzen's lips pressed into a line.
Genzou, on the other hand, visibly twitched. His breathing quickened. He was gritting his teeth now—not out of pain, but from the old echo of fear. Akai's earlier display had left a scar deeper than any severed limb.
Still, none of them saw what Akai saw.
The cursed spirit's claws tapped against each other again.
Clink. Clink.
You're watching for a flinch, Akai thought. You want to see fear. You want confirmation that I can see you. But if I give you that...
The thing tilted its head slowly, expression never changing. It was testing him.
Behind the cursed spirit, Akai could just barely make out the second bed's foot. The spirit's frame blocked most of it, but not enough to conceal how close it stood—directly between him and the others.
It wasn't leaving.
And yet, Akai stood there, calmly. The blank expression he wore wasn't just a mask—it was a scalpel, precise and sharp. One wrong movement, and he'd lose more than just the adults' trust.
He'd lose control.
Hiruzen took a step forward, speaking gently.
"Akai... I understand this might be a difficult situation, but you don't need to be so tense."
Akai blinked slowly.
"I'm not tense, Lord Hokage," he replied. His voice had the perfect balance of childlike formality and emotional detachment. "I was simply observing Elder Genzou's injuries."
Elder genzou shuddered, anger was palpable to his voice.
Hiruzen's gaze didn't waver, but his voice shifted slightly—gentler, as if attempting to guide a thread through a needle without snapping it.
"That's enough," the Third Hokage said.
He wasn't stern.
He wasn't kind.
Just final.
"You've shown what needed to be shown. But now, I want you to calm down, Akai."
The cursed spirit still loomed behind him, that grin stretched unnaturally wide.
Claws clicked together—tink, tink—like ceremonial shears, eager for the snip.
Akai didn't flinch.
His eyes stayed forward, focused, never once straying to the malformed thing standing just within reach.
He felt it.
Its breath. Its weight.
Its hunger to be seen.
But he wouldn't give it that.
Hiruzen stepped closer, hands calmly folded behind his back.
His tone softened—meant to reassure.
To begin with, the Third Hokage had no authority to interfere in clan matters. But the moment Genzou shouted that the boy was using the Nine-Tails' chakra, everything escalated. What should have been internal business turned into a village-wide issue—one that even the council couldn't ignore.
"I've already informed the council. Everyone involved."
A pause.
"There's no evidence linking your abilities to the Nine-Tails. I've made that clear."
Takahiro grunted but said nothing.
Genzou sat stiffly on the edge of the exam bed, his bandaged stump hidden beneath flickering lights.
Sweat gathered on his brow.
The boy who'd mutilated him stood barely a meter away—quiet, unreadable, too still.
That wasn't a child.
And still, Hiruzen pressed on, measured and composed.
"Genzou has paid a price. Don't you think that's enough?"
Silence.
Akai's head tilted just slightly.
Then, after a beat, his lips parted.
"Sure."
One word. Flat.
No texture. No meaning.
Then—
"...But that's not why we're here, is it?"
Snap.
The room changed.
Not visibly, not physically—
But something shifted.
The walls felt closer. The air thicker.
The cursed spirit behind him leaned in, claws paused mid-motion, like an audience member savoring the final act of a performance.
Takahiro's jaw locked.
Genzou's breath hitched, teeth grinding so hard they threatened to splinter.
Even Hiruzen blinked—just once.
Slow. Careful.
Because that voice?
That tone?
It didn't belong to a boy.
It belonged to something far older.
Colder.
Sharper.
Akai's gaze didn't move. Still forward. Still fixed.
"We're not here because of the misunderstanding about the Kyūbi's chakra," he said, each word precise, deliberate.
A beat.
"And not because I took one of his arms, either... are we?"
He said it plainly. No pride. No malice.
Just the truth.
And somehow, that was worse.
The temperature in the room dropped.
Every adult felt it.
A subtle unraveling.
A child speaking like a scalpel carving through ceremony.
Hiruzen's brow lifted—not in challenge, but in quiet confusion.
A fracture in his control.
But Takahiro... he understood.
Of course he did.
It was never about chakra.
Not really.
Not the Nine-Tails. Not cursed energy. Not violence.
The reason they're here...
It was Genzou.
The way he acted—shouting, accusing, clawing for justification—it had nothing to do with protocol.
Nothing to do with truth.
Takahiro knew that from the start. He'd seen through the cracks, read between the lines. Even when Genzou barked about the Kyūbi's chakra, Takahiro had already stopped listening.
He had his own theories.
He just never said them out loud. Not where they'd matter.
Because Genzou wasn't searching for answers.
He was demanding obedience.
Control.
Takahiro turned.
Genzou sat on the edge of the bed, shirtless, stiff, breathing through gritted teeth. The bandaged stump of his arm looked small in the sterile light—almost pitiful.
He looked broken.
But not humbled.
Just seething.
And Takahiro? He looked at him like a man finally recognizing rot in the wood.
A boy treated like a pet. Now punished for biting back.
Genzou met his gaze—and saw it.
That same coldness Akai had thrown at him hours ago.
Now it sat behind Takahiro's eyes, too.
And for the first time, Genzou felt something sharp press at the back of his mind:
Takahiro's going to cut me loose.
And then—
Takahiro moved.
The cursed spirit, lounging near the wall like a cat at a banquet, tilted its head with interest. It didn't stop him. It stepped aside.
Akai caught that.
And his eye twitched.
It moved for him.
Takahiro came to a stop in front of the boy—not like an elder. Not like a scolding parent.
Like a man with a knife in his heart.
"...Do you hate your clan?"
No force.
No tension.
Just words, laid flat.
Akai blinked, stunned. "...What?"
"If you hate that name," Takahiro said, quiet and clear, "then renounce it. I'll release you from your obligations. Your ties. Your surname."
Silence.
And then—
"What the fuck?" Akai snapped.
It wasn't confusion. It wasn't even anger.
It was insult.
It was betrayal wrapped in disbelief.
He stared up at Takahiro like the man had just offered to sell him off.
The cursed spirit took a step back, claws paused mid-tap, eyes watching something deeper than fear.
Akai's voice dropped.
"So that's the solution? Ignore the infection, and just cut off the limb that's screaming the loudest? That's your fix?"
The words were cold. Icy.
He wasn't picking a fight—he was diagnosing a disease.
When the employees of a black company went on strike, the answer was never to confront the boss lounging in comfort while the workers collapsed under the weight of unpaid hours.
No—management just pressured the workers to resign. Not fired. No severance, no vacation payouts. Just quietly discarded, cost-free.
That, to Akai, was the truth buried in his words.
He didn't wait for an answer.
"And now you're saying I can walk free. From the clan. From your name."
A thin smile twisted his lips.
"Like I'm some defective product you're eager to return to the shelf."
Takahiro said nothing.
Then:
"Not all problems," he said, softly, "can be solved by keeping the broken parts."
Akai's head tilted.
"Hearing that from you, Elder... it almost sounds like you believe it."
Takahiro didn't wince. But his shoulders shifted. Just barely.
"I'm giving you a way out," he said. "The cage that you hate so much, If you want it... I'll ask the Uchiha to take you in."
The room stopped.
Even the cursed spirit blinked.
Shisui let out a tiny, wordless laugh—like he'd finally confirmed some rumor he'd always suspected.
Only Genzou and Hiruzen didn't react.
Though Genzou—
He looked like he'd swallowed a kunai.
Akai didn't move.
Didn't breathe.
The words circled him like birds over a corpse.
And then, softly:
"...So I was right," he murmured. "A half-Uchiha."
He didn't say it to anyone. Just to himself. Like connecting a thread on a wall of red string.
No joy. No satisfaction. Just confirmation.
And when he looked back at Takahiro—
There was no triumph.
Just emptiness.
"Don't bother," Akai said.
His voice didn't raise.
It didn't need to.
"I doubt they'd want a defect like yours, either."
The air shifted. Like someone exhaled through stone.
Hiruzen's eyes narrowed.
Shisui flinched.
Genzou snarled beneath his breath.
But Akai stood firm.
He wasn't talking about blood. Or Sharingan. Or chakra.
He was talking about the baggage they'd strapped to his spine.
The scripts they handed him, demanding he play the part.
He was done being their project.
And he wasn't carrying their name to make it easier for them.
But those words weren't true. To them, he was never a defect—he was a monstrous genius. One who despised the word genius, despite embodying it. Takahiro knows that all too well.
BLAM! The door was opened, It was Hiashi Hyūga.
Ha, so he really can't see me, a certain cursed spirit thought with disappointment as it slipped past the door—now creaking open from the other side.
The clan head stepped into the sterile room with an imposing calm, white robes trailing behind him like mist. His expression betrayed no urgency, no confusion—only the quiet resolve of a man who had long made up his mind. The spirit faltered in the doorway, uncertain if this man could perceive it. But Hiashi's eyes—those cold, featureless Byakugan—swept across the room and moved on without pause.
That was enough.
With a final, almost spiteful glance at the boy on the examination table, the cursed spirit turned and phased into the shadows of the corridor.
What a disappointment.
Inside the room, Akai Hyūga remained still, but a flicker of something stirred in his chest—mental satisfaction.
Good. Get lost, he thought privately, Get away from me you Uchiha wannabe.
The faintest upward curl of his lips quickly vanished as Hiashi closed the door behind him.
"There is no need for that," Hiashi said calmly, eyes scanning the others.
Elder Takahiro glanced sideways from his seat beside the examination table. His forehead creased with suspicion.
"What do you mean, Hiashi-sama? No need for what?"
Hiashi didn't immediately answer. Instead, he turned—slowly, with the solemnity of a judge delivering sentence—toward a figure standing near the far wall: Genzou Hyūga, once a towering presence in clan matters, now still and pale as frost.
"From this moment on," Hiashi began, each word falling like a thrown kunai, deliberate and unflinching, "Father—no... Elder Genzou, you are relieved of your duties as the main house's advisor."
Genzou blinked.
The room went still.
"...What did you say?" he asked, voice low, trembling with disbelief. His aged fingers gripped the bandaged stump of his hand, as if trying to steady something far deeper than flesh.
Hiashi didn't repeat himself.
"You—you can't mean that," Genzou stammered, stepping forward. "After decades of service? After everything I've sacrificed—for the Hyūga, for you—!"
"You served with conviction," Hiashi answered, calm as ever. "But conviction twisted by pride becomes tyranny."
"Tyranny?" Genzou hissed, the word bitter on his tongue. Tyranny—the very thing he claimed to oppose.
His mind recoiled, unbidden, to a moment long past. A lesson once offered to Takahiro: "The mark is not a curse, Takahiro. It is a safeguard. So long as those who hold the key to it do not become tyrants, it is not a tool of oppression—it is a means of unity. To ensure the clan remains whole, not divided by ambition or reckless emotions."
Tyranny.
For the first time in years, Genzou felt the foundation of his beliefs begin to crack. Doubt crept in.
Who was it, truly, that had strayed from the path?
The boy... or him?
.
.
.
To be continued.