In an instant, a rain of glances, doubtful, disdainful, cold, shot like silent arrows and fixed on Uchiha Shana.
The air seemed to fall below freezing.
The seeds of suspicion had been planted with precision.
No evidence was needed, only a vague direction, a few words like "chaos," "Yin Release," and "overwhelming," plus the Sharingan's unsettling reputation, to carve a clean crack through Konoha's upper ranks and the clan circle alike: Uchiha.
Uchiha, again.
Were they scheming amid the chaos?
Had they been used by the enemy?
Or… something even worse?
Uchiha Shana's withered face went iron-hard, jaw clenched.
He could feel those barbed stares prickling his back, wordless, cold exclusion and wariness.
He didn't refute it at once. His Sharingan, darker and colder than ever, locked back onto Hiruzen.
Old fox. Vicious play. He was using the other clans' doubts to choke off any Uchiha protests before they could start.
Damn it, are the Uchiha born to carry the blame?
But Hiruzen's next words fell with surgical accuracy on his heart.
"Of course," Hiruzen's tone softened, and his eyes returned to Shana with an expression that could almost be called trust, or expectation. "Elder Shana's granddaughter, Uchiha Mikoto… happened to be at the scene last night. She and Uzumaki Kushina are as close as sisters, and she protected her companion with courage and composure."
His voice rose, the Hokage's commendation brooking no dispute. "After discussion with Mito-sama, Uchiha Mikoto is hereby approved to join Tsunade-hime's squad. Alongside Uzumaki Kushina and Kamiyama Ryo, she will be trained as one of Konoha's future pillars. This affirms the Uchiha clan's loyalty, and repays Elder Shana's excellent guidance."
A slap, then a honeyed date, wrapped in the gilded banner of the "Hokage line" and "Konoha's future pillars."
The looks that moments ago had brimmed with suspicion and hostility shifted at once.
"The Uchiha have entered the Hokage's inner circle?"
For other clans, that alone was a clear signal, the Uchiha were being courted and contained by the top.
The Hokage needed the Sharingan's power.
Doubts remained, but the pressure on the surface bled away by half.
Hiruzen had successfully dragged attention from the incident itself into a subtler political question.
Uchiha Shana's Adam's apple moved with difficulty.
Refuse?
And give up the enormous lure of "the Hokage line" and "Tsunade's disciple"?
It was a chance the Uchiha had dreamed of, to step into the core circle.
Even knowing Hiruzen was sealing their mouths with sugar-coated poison, he had to pinch his nose and swallow.
The price: endure the rumors.
So be it. The Uchiha have never feared slander.
He closed his eyes, the corner of his mouth twitching once, an acceptance of the favor laced with venom.
The flicker of sardonic satisfaction at Hiruzen's eye corner did not escape Uzumaki Mito's gaze.
She sighed inwardly, almost imperceptibly.
To still the internal storm, Hiruzen was using the Uchiha's awkward position once more… so be it.
Her gaze returned to its calm, ancient stillness.
Clack! Hiruzen slammed the table again, snapping all attention back and ending the little bout of political grappling. "Konoha's priority is unity! We throw everything westward! Sunagakure will pay tenfold, a hundredfold! The front needs more support, more shinobi! Avenge those who suffered last night! Guard our home! Uphold the Will of Fire!"
"Yes, Hokage-sama!" the clan representatives, everyone but Uchiha Shana, answered in unison, anger surging.
Internal strife was suppressed, for now. All blades turned outward.
The high council adjourned with a strange "consensus," thick with gunpowder and restrained calculation.
The aftershocks of that meeting were far more violent than last night's silent, kingly shockwave, exactly as Hiruzen had planned.
The smoke in the Hokage's office hadn't even cleared, yet he felt lighter than he had in days. He stood before the huge window, watching a village rousing from stupor.
The streets were no longer littered with fainted bodies. In their place, a molten heat, stoked and guided, was about to erupt.
The ANBU worked fast.
Notices prepared the previous night spread like snow, bulletin boards, key intersections, even bathhouse doors.
Scarlet headlines slashed like marks of vengeance:
"Sunagakure's Secret Arts Raid Konoha! Scorpion Claws at Our Door! Frontline in Peril! Blood Debts Paid in Blood!"
What Hiruzen had thundered in council turned to even more incendiary text, every word bleeding, every line in tears.
The point couldn't be clearer: while Konoha's warriors bled in Rain, Suna sent a vile Spiritual Secret Arts squad to paralyze the rear and sever the front's lifeline. Those mangled Kumo spies? Just Suna's throwaways, framed blame, diverted hatred!
Panic, aftershock, concern for one's own safety, distilled and ignited into a tidal rage, all aimed at the Land of Wind.
"Damn those Suna bastards!" A man just dragged from the public hot springs, reeking suspiciously and sporting a lump on his head, howled at the poster. "I fell in the cesspit, so it was those sand freaks! I'll fight them myself!"
"I knew it felt wrong, chill to the soul!" a woman rubbing her bruised skull snarled. "Suna's vile secret arts!"
At the bathhouse doors, the crowd boiled hotter still.
"Hell with them!" a gray-faced, robe-clad middle-aged man cursed at the signboard, despair dripping from his voice. "Last night I almost 'died young', traumatized! My happiness for the next half of my life, ruined by those Suna bastards! Where's the front? I'll cut them down for a sacrifice!"
"Me too!" another despondent patron nodded fiercely, hatred flooding his eyes. "I'll donate! Three years' wages! Buy the front the sharpest kunai, feed them well, slaughter those desert rats!"
Konoha Hospital's temporary wards bulged with patients.
Those who fell and broke bones, those who overdrew chakra, became the loudest voices.
"Suna scum! No guts to face us head-on, so they crawl in the gutters!" boomed Akimichi Chōjiro, arm in a sling, voice shaking the ward. "I was on tree patrol, who did I offend? Arm snapped! Once I'm healed, I'm going to Rain! Even if this arm's useless, I'll bite a few Suna-nin to death with my teeth!"
Beside him, another badly injured but riled-up shinobi shouted hoarsely, eyes red. "Blood for blood! For my cousin, he died two days ago in the Valley of Wind!"
The Chūnin Exam training field was converted into a frontline enlistment point.
Lines stretched out the gate, genin, young chūnin, even hot-blooded civilians, eyes blazing, itching to charge into the Wind Country.
"Sign me up! My whole family's Konoha! We won't be bullied!"
"My old man died at Suna's hands! I'll take that debt back myself!"
"Count me in! Kill one, break even, kill two, profit one! Slaughter those Suna dogs!"
Clerks shouted themselves hoarse; stacks of enrollment forms climbed into little mountains.
The air stank of fervor and iron, the scent of hatred catching flame.
Fear had been swept away by a flood of rage, leaving only one thought, vengeance. Against Sunagakure. With Suna blood to wash last night's humiliation.
Hiruzen watched it all, the corner of his mouth curling in a thin, satisfied line.
Perfect heat.
The black, heavy pot on Suna's head sat snug and unmoving.
The civilians' fury became fuel to accelerate the war machine.
But that was only the lowest rung.
In the clan districts, the mood was subtler.
In the Aburame compound's humming insect gardens, newly minted jōnin Aburame Shui walked with measured steps.
He tilted his head, speaking quietly to a cloaked clansman. "The residual chill in that shockwave… its overlap with Suna's signature is indeed low. But if Hokage-sama says it is, then it is."
His tone held no ripple, just a stated fact. "Our concern is the order: send more kikaichū west. Rain Country will be their new hunting ground."
In another great compound, on Hyūga training grounds,
Hyūga Tennin stood with a face like still water, Byakugan open to the void, reliving the night.
At length, he closed his sight and said to the youth standing behind him, Hyūga Hiashi, calmly, "The stray waves of Yin Release in the chaos did point toward the edge of the Uchiha compound, but the intensity… far from enough to explain last night's scale. Still, it's good that Elder Shana's granddaughter joins the Hokage's inner squad."
He paused, a blade-glint flashing in his eyes. "Tell our people at the front to keep close watch on the Uchiha. The Sharingan's power can be used, but must never leave our sight." His voice was soft, but brooked no dissent.
Within the Uchiha compound, walled off by high stone, pressure built.
The secret chamber beneath Naka Shrine was dim.
Uchiha Shana sat at the head, the cold fire in his aged Sharingan burning like a provoked wolf.
A few elders with equally grim faces whispered.
"The upper ranks… tch! A neat 'divert the flood east', leave the pot on us."
"Mikoto entering the Hokage line… bait. Poisoned with barbs."
"So for the sake of Elder Shana's granddaughter entering the core circle, we swallow this filth? Those spiteful rumors last night, clearly from them!"
"Enough!" Shana slammed the table, voice hoarse but sharp with killing intent.
"Mikoto must go. This is our chance to wedge into the core. As for the rumors,"
A razor-cold curve tugged his lips. "Some of our brats need tempering anyway. Pass the word, initiate the clan's extreme training. Let them turn that humiliation into killing intent on the battlefield. Uchiha honor will be rebuilt on the enemy's corpses."
His murky eyes lifted toward the Hokage Building, the chill deepening.
"Sarutobi Hiruzen… this debt is noted."
Hiruzen knew all this full well.
The clans' old foxes were not so easily fooled, but he didn't care.
All he needed was to divert attention and forge a common enemy, for now.
As long as every spear pointed outward, internal hazards could be shelved, even turned into the drive that scatters the wolves.
(To be continued.)
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◇ One bonus chapter will be released for every 100 Power Stones.
◇ You can read the ahead chapter on Pat if you're interested: p-atreon.c-om/Blownleaves (Just remove the hyphen to access normally.)