The darkness of the side tunnel was a cool, forgiving blanket. Renjiro stood within it, his back pressed against the rough stone. The only sounds were the distant, eternal rumble of the waterfall and the frantic, fading echo of his own thoughts. He was adrift in this pocket of silence, suspended between the war outside and the war within.
Then, a new sound: footsteps.
Not the silent, slithering approach of a snake, but a measured, solid tread that spoke of a heavy frame and a deliberate presence. They were slow, unhurried, coming to a stop just at the edge of the light, not intruding into his self-imposed isolation. Renjiro didn't need to extend his chakra field to know who it was. The rhythm, the weight of the step—it was unmistakably Jiraiya.
Of the two Sannin, it was always Jiraiya who sought him out. Theirs was a relationship forged in the grim, blood-soaked trenches of Anbu service. Jiraiya had been his superior when Renjiro was freshly recruited. The Toad Sage had never treated him as a child or a weapon, but as a brutally efficient, deeply troubled shinobi who needed watching, a perspective Renjiro, in his darkest moments, had to grudgingly appreciate.
For a long moment, Jiraiya simply stood there, a broad silhouette against the light. He didn't speak, didn't offer a pill or a platitude. He just existed in the same space, sharing the silence, staring out into the same oppressive darkness that Renjiro was lost in.
When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter, more thoughtful than its usual boisterous tone.
"Can you see anything?"
The question was so unexpected, so seemingly random, that it jolted Renjiro from his melancholic stupor. His head turned slightly toward the silhouette.
"What?"
"In the distance," Jiraiya clarified, his own gaze fixed on the blackness beyond the cave mouth. "With those eyes of yours. Can you see anything out there? Further than the rest of us?"
'Of course,' Renjiro thought, the initial surprise hardening into weary understanding.
'He's circling back. The eyes. It always comes back to the eyes. My little performance wasn't enough to throw a man like him off the scent.'
He had known it wouldn't be. Lashing out was a child's tactic. Jiraiya was giving him an off-ramp, a way to volunteer a piece of the truth on his own terms. A bone to throw to the chasing hounds so they might ease up, if only for a moment. Renjiro decided to play along. A partial truth was better than a forced confession later.
He let out a slow breath, the sound barely audible over the waterfall. "Barely," he admitted, his voice low. He chose his words carefully, weaving fact with a convenient, painful fiction.
"It's… not clear. It's like looking through a window during a storm. Everything is distorted. And it… hurts. Something feels off whenever I push it, like I'm straining a muscle that wasn't meant to be used." He paused, letting the hesitation feel real.
"It's the same with the… Mangekyo."
Jiraiya was silent, absorbing this. "Is this the first time you've used it? That form?"
"Second," Renjiro said, the lie coming easily, layered with a painful truth. "The first time… was during my confrontation with the Two-Tails Jinchuriki. A couple of years ago."
The mention of that incident hung in the air between them. Jiraiya remembered the reports, the political firestorm. The infamous standoff between a young Konoha Anbu and Kumo's prized Jinchuriki that had sent tensions skyrocketing and was one of the main sparks that finally ignited the tinderbox into the Third Great War.
Jiraiya ran a large hand through his shaggy, white hair, a gesture of pure weariness. He was silent for another long moment, seemingly changing the subject entirely. "Renjiro… did you ever want a younger brother or sister?"
The question was so profoundly random, so disconnected from shinobi affairs and deadly dojutsu, that it completely disarmed him. It was a key turning in a lock he hadn't known existed.
For a moment, he wasn't Renjiro the shinobi, the transmigrant, the weapon. He was Ethan, just a man, struck by a sudden, acute memory of a life so distant it felt like a dream.
His mind, for the first time in years, flew past the boundaries of the Elemental Nations. He saw a different face in the darkness—not a Kage or a Sannin, but the kind, tired eyes of his mother from his previous life. He heard the boisterous laughter of his younger brother, a constant, annoying, and beloved presence in a small, safe apartment in a world without chakra.
A wave of homesickness, so potent and unexpected it was a physical ache, washed over him.
'Ten years,' he realised with a jolt. 'It's been ten years. Are they even still alive? Do they wonder what happened to me? Do they… miss me?' The questions were a fresh kind of pain, one he had successfully buried under years of survival and violence.
His voice, when he finally found it, was softer, more vulnerable than he intended. "I… wondered how it felt, I suppose. But I couldn't. My parents died in the siege of Uzushiogakure before I could even form an opinion of them."
Jiraiya nodded slowly, as if he'd expected that answer. "If you had one… a younger sibling… would you let them become a shinobi?"
Renjiro didn't hesitate. "Yes. It would make them strong. Strong enough to protect themselves. In this world, that's the only guarantee."
"Would you try to influence their assignments? Steer them away from certain missions? Certain teams?"
"Of course I would," Renjiro said, a hint of confusion in his tone. Wasn't it obvious?
"Anyone in my position would."
"Why?"
Renjiro gave him a look that was almost insulting, as if Jiraiya had asked why the sky was blue. "Because I know how violent the shinobi world is. I've seen it. I've lived it. I would know better than some… administrator in a tower who's never seen blood up close."
"Exactly," Jiraiya said, his voice gaining a new gravity. "Because you think you know better. You'd bear the weight of their safety because you love them." He turned fully to face Renjiro, his expression stark in the dim light. "Now, magnify that by hundreds of thousands. Multiply that love, that fear, that responsibility, by every single man, woman, and child in Konoha. That is the Hokage's burden. The position makes everyone in the village his sibling, his child. He is responsible for all of their lives. Every single one."
He let the words sink in, their weight pressing down on the already heavy air. "It's a taxing, horrific, isolating weight. Every decision, even the ones that seem cruel or illogical from the outside, is made with that crushing responsibility in mind. It's a calculus of lives that would break most men. You might not like all the decisions, Renjiro. You might rage against them. But you must learn to trust that the Hokage is making them with the entire village's survival in his heart, not just your own."
Renjiro didn't reply. He looked away, back into the comforting darkness. Jiraiya's words were logical, persuasive, spoken with a sincerity that was hard to deny. But they crashed against the unshakable bedrock of his future knowledge.
'I can respect the office,' he thought, the bitterness a cold stone in his gut.
'I can respect a leader who bears that weight. But not this one. Not Hiruzen Sarutobi. I've seen how he held his promise to a dying Minato. That is not the act of a man who sees all his people as his children.'
The silence stretched between them, thick with unspoken arguments and unbridgeable perspectives.
It was shattered by a voice that slid into the space like a cold blade.
"A touching lesson in statecraft, Jiraiya."
Orochimaru emerged from the main chamber, his form gliding soundlessly into the dim light between them. His golden eyes flickered between them, missing nothing. "Unfortunately, philosophy must wait. The Hokage has requested our presence. Immediately."
Jiraiya straightened up, his mentor persona snapping back into place. "Back to the village?"
Orochimaru's lip curled into a faint, cold smile. "No. There is a battle currently going on. It seems our departure has been… cut short."