It's better to be a rebel ninja than to be a Hokage

I can't remember how many times I looked up.

In other words, ever since I can remember, I have always looked up to my brother who shares the same blood with me.

Uchiha Itachi.

When at home;

When I was in school;

When doing ninja sparring;

In the eyes of my father and mother...

As an Uchiha, as a younger brother——

——I have always just been chasing Itachi.

Even that night, the night that he would never forget in his life, the night when all the happiness in the past disappeared, he looked up at Itachi as usual.

Now, just like that night.

With only a pair of three-magatama Sharingan, Kirin was unable to kill Itachi even with his most carefully prepared strongest moves.

That third power called Susanoo surpassed the abilities of the left and right eyes of Amaterasu and Tsukuyomi's Mangekyō Sharingan...

That huge orange-red shadow that you have to look up to see the whole picture.

Uchiha Sasuke knew very well that he could not win.

But fate finally chose to pity Sasuke, the weak one... Before Uchiha Itachi took away Sasuke's eyes, Itachi fell to the ground exhausted before Sasuke.

Revenge...successful.

But as an avenger, Sasuke found that he was not as excited as he imagined.

Uchiha Itachi, until the very end of his death, still left doubts in Sasuke's heart.

why?

Itachi, who was extremely vicious and would do anything to pursue power, would finally reveal such a relieved smile - a smile that only a gentle brother in his memory would reveal?

Along with that smiling face, Itachi's dying words, which he didn't hear clearly during the battle, were engraved in his memory in his deep dream, with those words and tone so clear that it was terrifying.

Forgive me, Sasuke... This is the last.

What does "finally" mean?

Sasuke didn't have time to think deeply. Darkness invaded him in an instant, plunging Sasuke into a cold darkness.

Sasuke covered his eyes which were burning with pain.

The uncontrollable pain in his eyes woke Sasuke from his dream.

But when I opened my eyes, the view was still pitch black.

Could it be that I have gone blind?

After all, Sasuke used up all his eye power in the battle with Itachi.

But soon, Sasuke realized that it was not his eyes that were in darkness.

Rather, it was the dimness brought about by the space he was in.

In this dim space, Sasuke heard Naruto's voice:

"You look like you have lost all hope in life. It's so rare to see this kind of emotion in you."

Sasuke looked in the direction of Naruto's voice.

At the other end of the pitch-black space, the faint candlelight that was not enough to illuminate the entire space was all reflected on Naruto.

At this moment, Naruto became the only light in Sasuke's dark vision.

Sasuke did not respond to Naruto. He was a little unresponsive and subconsciously absorbed the only brightness in his lifeless eyes.

Naruto didn't expect any response from Sasuke now that his revenge was successful, as he felt the emptiness in his heart.

"In the past, I practiced meditation in this darkness... to suppress the tailed beast in my body."

Naruto approached Sasuke with a candle in hand, took the initiative to break the silence, and explained: "This is a forbidden area for the Snow Country. You don't have to worry about being discovered when hiding here."

Naruto's explanation made Sasuke understand why he woke up here.

Naruto took him away from the battlefield where he dueled with Itachi and hid him when he was on the verge of death.

"Snow Country?"

Sasuke finally responded to Naruto as he struggled to sit up.

But such a simple action almost exhausted all of Sasuke's current strength, and the soreness of his muscles and the pain in his bones continued to flow into his brain as he stood up.

"It seems that you were hiding in this country during the three years you disappeared."

Sasuke's eyes were on Naruto who was getting closer and closer to him as Naruto placed the candlelight on the bedside table where he rested.

When Naruto pulled up the chair and sat next to Sasuke, Sasuke's eyes showed a rare hint of color.

A color of... surprise and doubt.

The faint candlelight shone on Naruto's calm face. With this expression, he took out a glass test tube bottle full of medicine from his arms and placed it next to the candlelight.

The candlelight clearly illuminated the bright red eyeball floating in the potion in the test tube bottle.

A three-magatama Sharingan.

"This eye shouldn't be worth your surprise."

Naruto noticed Sasuke's gaze, raised his head slightly, and looked into Sasuke's dark eyes.

"Is this Kakashi's eye?"

Sasuke observed the eyeball in the test tube bottle.

As Naruto said, this is actually not something worth being surprised about. Sasuke knew from Naruto from the beginning that Naruto had the Sharingan.

Kakashi's Sharingan had already been obtained by Naruto.

Sasuke just didn't understand why Naruto took out the Sharingan and placed it in front of him.

But when faced with Sasuke's question, which was almost the "only" "correct answer".

Naruto did not answer to confirm it.

He just stared at Sasuke in silence.

This eye contact took a while, and some things that Naruto expected did not happen through this eye contact.

Sasuke's genuine confusion was not a false pretense.

Naruto dropped his eyes.

It seems that he did not attract Itachi's attention too much when he came into contact with Sasuke halfway.

After all, Naruto and Sasuke have really no connection with each other and have not been in contact for a long time.

The process of Naruto and Sasuke contacting each other again after three years was unexpected for Naruto, let alone Itachi.

In Naruto's original plan, his contact with Sasuke was supposed to happen later.

Unexpectedly, after losing the help of Kabuto Yakushi, Orochimaru actually began to use Sasuke vaguely.

Bringing Naruto and Sasuke into contact during the incident concerning the Undead Duo.

In the original work, Orochimaru's contact with the Akatsuki organization has always been through Kabuto Yakushi.

Orochimaru's arrangement for Sasuke changed Naruto's own plans regarding Sasuke from deliberate preparation to unintentional intention.

The lies woven by the latter are always more difficult to detect, as long as the original surprise can be regained.

Naruto's intrusion did not affect Itachi's plan for Sasuke.

Or perhaps, it was because after Naruto came into contact with Sasuke, he accelerated Sasuke's pace of revenge against Itachi, so Itachi did not have time to analyze Naruto's purpose of approaching Sasuke.

Before his death, Itachi did not tell Sasuke the truth about his defection from Konoha through delayed genjutsu or other means.

Itachi still chose to let everything in the past disappear in this ninja world along with his death.

"Do not……"

After confirming that Sasuke was still unaware of everything, Naruto raised his eyes again and denied Sasuke's speculation.

Blurt out the real answer:

"These are Uchiha Shisui's eyes."

Uchiha - Shisui.

When Sasuke heard the long-lost name coming out of Naruto's mouth, he inevitably felt extremely dazed.

Naruto shouldn't know this name.

Naruto just quietly watched Sasuke, whose inner thoughts were impacted by the unexpected name Uchiha Shisui.

After a long time, Sasuke finally came to his senses.

Sasuke rarely doubted Naruto's words: "Naruto, there is no reason for Shisui's eyes to be on you..."

"…If this eye was on Itachi, wouldn't it make more sense to you?"

Sasuke had only half revealed his doubts when Naruto interrupted him with a rhetorical question.

"..."

Sasuke fell silent again, staring at Naruto blankly.

"Itachi, didn't he tell you anything?"

Naruto suddenly raised the tone of his question to Sasuke, and there was a hint of... accusation in his tone.

This sudden accusation was completely incomprehensible to Sasuke.

But facing Naruto's questioning that seemed like an unexpected disaster.

Sasuke did not try to explain in his heart, but instead began to doubt himself.

Itachi's words before his death...

expression……

Through Naruto's questioning now, it was further magnified in Sasuke's heart.

But Sasuke himself couldn't find the answer to the doubts that he couldn't suppress in his heart.

He looked at Naruto, hoping that Naruto, who obviously knew something, could help him at this time.

"Naruto…what do you mean by that?"

But this time, it was Naruto who fell silent.

Feeling silence in a dark environment does not make people feel peaceful.

It will only make those with heavy hearts more anxious.

This anxiety manifested itself in Sasuke's reaction, which turned into actual pain.

The pain came from Sasuke's eyes.

At this moment, Sasuke felt the intense phantom pain as if thousands of needles were piercing his eyes, and his vision became blurred.

Sasuke raised his hands to cover his eyes, hoping to relieve the pain in his eyes in this way.

"There are actually better people to tell you the answer than for me to tell you the answer now."

It was then that Naruto's soft voice broke the silence he himself had contributed to.

A better candidate?

Sasuke endured the pain in his eyes and looked at Naruto.

Under the dim candlelight, there was a third person in this dark space besides Sasuke and Naruto.

The blurry figure appeared in front of Sasuke as Naruto spoke.

Although Sasuke's vision was now difficult to focus on, he still immediately recognized the identity of the figure.

This figure should be dead.

And he was killed by Sasuke himself!

There is usually no possibility of resurrection of the dead.

Only through forbidden techniques...

...The only ninja Sasuke knew of who possessed this forbidden technique was Orochimaru.

Orochimaru, who was one of the three ninjas in the past and a member of Konoha, learned and mastered forbidden ninjutsu from the sealed book guarded by the Hokage.

But soon, Sasuke reacted.

It is also possible that Naruto, who stole the Book of Seals three years ago, could master this forbidden technique.

"Itachi!"

Sasuke gritted his teeth and called out the figure's name. His tone still contained hatred for Itachi, but now this hatred was no longer pure.

There was a hint of complex emotions in Sasuke's words that even Sasuke himself was not aware of.

That’s right, the third person in this dark space before my eyes—

——It was Uchiha Itachi whose soul returned from the Pure Land through the Impure World Reincarnation technique.