Ryosuke studied the brilliant smile on Uchiha Itachi's face.
Though Itachi smiled, Ryosuke knew better—this was the boy who had learned since childhood to wear masks, never truly showing his heart.
If Ryosuke didn't already know that Itachi would one day personally annihilate the Uchiha clan, perhaps even he would have been fooled.
Itachi wasn't going to change his beliefs just because of a single question. Whether or not he had been fully brainwashed by the so-called Will of Fire, Ryosuke couldn't be sure. But he knew this much: no sane clansman would ever abandon kinship, love, and bonds in order to protect the village.
Yet Itachi had done just that.
Ryosuke scoffed inwardly. What business of his is Konoha without family, without love?
Dragged to the battlefield by his father at the age of three, Itachi had seen bloodshed too early. He'd begun pondering the meaning of life while other children were still learning to walk. That premature maturity let him imagine he could stand at the Hokage's height, weighing clan against village in the name of "peace."
In truth, he was nothing more than a self-styled saint, a butcher who slaughtered his own clan.
And for what? Power struggles.
The Uchiha weren't destroyed because they were evil—they were destroyed because the village elders feared them. Because they feared that once the Senju declined, the Uchiha would claim their rightful place as the strongest clan in the world.
They feared Itachi. They feared Shisui. They feared the clan's genius.
Meanwhile, the Hokage faction crumbled. Tsunade abandoned by grief, lost in gambling and alcohol. Orochimaru exposed for his twisted experiments, defecting from the village. Jiraiya wandering the world writing Icha Icha while chasing his "Child of Prophecy."
Sarutobi Hiruzen, the so-called Professor, saw the Uchiha rising and panicked. Was he truly afraid that the Uchiha couldn't defend the village if they took the reins? With Shisui and Itachi leading, the Uchiha could have crushed other villages with ease.
Instead, he and Danzō branded them "a danger." They whispered that the Uchiha were a "cursed clan." But Ryosuke knew the truth—it wasn't danger they saw, it was rivals.
Hiruzen was old and toothless, hiding in the rear lines of the Third Great Ninja War, signing unequal treaties after victories. He hadn't lifted a finger during the Nine-Tails' attack. Such a man should have stepped down in shame long ago.
And Danzō? He was worse—the "Dark Hokage," the village's shadow. Every tragedy could be traced back to him.
In Ryosuke's heart, there was no reason for Itachi to ever sell his soul for such men.
So he pressed again, voice firm and deliberate:
"Truthfully, wouldn't Konoha be safer, more prosperous, if our Uchiha clan sat at the top of its leadership instead of an aging Third Hokage?"
Itachi's pupils contracted. Inside, his heart shook.
This man—this cousin—was a radical. A would-be usurper. To him, that was detestable.
The Uchiha, he believed, were too selfish. If they gained power, Konoha would suffer.
He remembered when he first awakened his Sharingan, mourning the death of his comrade Tenma. He had gone to his father expecting comfort—only to be congratulated for awakening the clan's eyes. It was then his disappointment in the clan had taken root.
And so he answered smoothly, yet with steel beneath his tone:
"You mustn't say such things. The Third Hokage has brought peace and prosperity to the village. He is not senile—he remains one of Konoha's strongest."
Ryosuke almost laughed aloud. Yes, perhaps Hiruzen was still strong—but what good was strength that hid behind walls while others bled?
The victories of the Third Great Ninja War had come not from Hiruzen but from Uchiha warriors who held the Mist at bay, and from Minato Namikaze, who carved through the Stone and the Cloud's A–B duo.
That was the peace Konoha lived under now—not Sarutobi's peace, but Uchiha and Namikaze blood.
'He must have been poisoned in the academy,' Ryosuke thought darkly. 'Fed nothing but the lies of textbooks and the propaganda of the Will of Fire.'
Ryosuke could only sigh in his heart.
So that's how it is… even now, Itachi still clings to his illusion of a "benevolent" Third Hokage and a "necessary" Danzō.
The man who had spent his entire life scheming against the Uchiha, who branded them evil while secretly coveting their eyes, who orchestrated the Nine-Tails' blame and forced the clan from the village's center… in Itachi's heart, that man was still "respectable."
No wonder the boy would one day wield his blade against his own kin.
For all his brilliance, Itachi's mind had been shackled since childhood—war trauma, indoctrination, the poison of the Will of Fire. So much genius, yet thinking had been "trained onto the body of a dog," loyal and blind.
And when Ryosuke finally threw out his bombshell—what if the elders ordered you to annihilate the clan, including Izumi—he saw Itachi's pupils constrict, his body stiffen.
Shock. Anger. Denial.
"This is absurd," Itachi snapped, voice cutting cold. "I became the Hokage's eyes within the clan to prevent such conflict—to protect Konoha and ease tensions. The Hokage would never command such madness. And I… I could never raise a blade against my family, let alone Izumi."
His tone wavered just slightly at her name, but his face soon smoothed into calm steel.
Ryosuke didn't relent. He leaned in, voice low and edged with gravity.
"Don't be so certain. The so-called benevolent elders you worship are the same ones who stood idle during the Nine-Tails' rampage, the same ones who fear our clan's power more than they love the village. You think they wouldn't use you—your genius, your loyalty—as their weapon?"
Itachi's expression hardened further, his silence louder than denial.
Inwardly, Ryosuke's chest tightened. He really doesn't see it. He truly believes the elders' peace is worth more than his clan's life. If this continues… when the night comes, even Izumi will not escape his blade.
Ryosuke looked at Itachi one last time, then shook his head.
"You refuse to answer because deep down, you fear the answer. Remember this, Itachi: if that day ever comes, the ones worth protecting will not be the decrepit cowards in the Hokage's tower… but the ones standing here, beside you, bearing the same eyes."
Itachi turned away, his silence final. For now.