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After the page of the portrait that had turned the Art Store upside down, and after Kushina's ears had finally settled back to something close to their natural color, the readers turned the page with caution…
and found themselves before a scene no one had expected after all that weight.
A simple scene. Quiet. Warm.
And perhaps — as some would later say — the most important scene in the entire volume.
[— Manga Scene —]
The Academy yard. Clear daylight.
Iruka stood before a row of small Academy students, and beside him stood an old man wearing the Hokage's hat and his official robes.
"You've come at just the right time. Please, come over here?"
"Alright."
The little ones whispered among themselves as they stared at the old man in the hat.
"That's the Third himself… the one whose face is carved on the mountain."
"The Third Hokage!"
"People said he was the strongest of all the Hokage!"
"They call him the Genius Professor!"
Then one of the little ones raised his hand and spoke with the lethal honesty of children:
"Are you really strong?!! You don't look like it!!"
"Hey! Don't talk like that to—"
Iruka tried to intervene.
"Yes, I agree!!"
the Hokage himself answered, laughing — and Iruka's defense collapsed before it could form.
"But receiving the title of Hokage means he's the strongest person in this village!!"
said another child eagerly.
"Alright then!! I'll become the Fifth Hokage!!"
declared a third, thumping his chest.
"Because I'm really strong and really great!!"
"That's not happening at your current grades."
Iruka commented, with the coldness of a teacher who knows his students' report cards.
"Hahahaha!"
The old man laughed from his heart, then looked at the small faces before him.
"It seems I can expect something from you… all of you are young — everyone except me!! One of you may well be the one who receives the title of Hokage someday."
Then the old man's voice softened, becoming closer to the voice of a grandfather speaking to his grandchildren than the voice of a Kage.
"Everyone lives only once. Don't force yourselves down the hard road. Live as you like, and die as you like…"
"But…"
"Never forget to protect the people who are precious to you. The ones you accept, the ones you trust, the ones you love from the depths of your hearts."
"Then no matter what path you choose, it will not matter."
Then the old man smiled beneath his hat.
"Do you have people like that?"
The small answers came flying from every direction.
"Y… yes! My dad and my mom and my brother… even though I hate them a little!"
"And my pet dog Ponta!"
"I'd say my friends!"
"Hehe, me too!"
Then a small girl raised her hand.
"Then, Hokage-sama… do you have someone you treasure?"
"Yes, of course."
"Woooah!! Who are they? Who are they?"
The old man looked toward a small boy at the back of the row, arms crossed, pretending the conversation did not concern him.
"My grandson Konohamaru, over there… and…"
Then the Third Hokage raised his head, smiled a smile that filled his whole weathered face, and said:
"And every single person in this village!!"
[— End Scene —]
…
In Konoha's reading hall, a new kind of silence settled.
Not the silence of shock left behind by the Fourth Hokage's portrait, nor the silence of grief left by Hayate's death, nor the silence of dread left by Gaara beneath the moon.
It was a warm silence.
The kind that settles when people read something they have known in their hearts for a long time… and see it written down for the very first time.
…
At the head of the hall, Hiruzen Sarutobi was reading his future counterpart's words with calm eyes.
'Live as you like, die as you like… but never forget to protect the precious ones.'
'So I'm still saying the same things twenty years from now.'
That did not surprise him. The man in those pages, however he aged, carried the same heart.
What stopped him was something else.
'Only a few pages ago… we saw a blond boy who will carry the hat and die to save the village.'
'And now the pages explain — without meaning to — why he will do it.'
'Not for the title. Not for the picture on the wall.'
The old man looked across the hall toward the quiet corner, where Minato was reading those same pages with his usual calm.
'But because someone, on some distant day, planted in him the very sentence I plant in every generation:'
'Never forget to protect the precious ones… and no matter what path you choose, it will not matter.'
Then Hiruzen reached the final page of the scene.
His counterpart, looking toward the boy with his arms crossed at the back of the row — Konohamaru, the grandson the halls had known since the manga's earliest chapters, the little one who had chased Naruto with a shuriken bigger than himself and declared he would steal the Hokage title from his own grandfather.
And the question hanging in the drawn air:
Do you have someone you treasure?
The present Hiruzen lowered his volume slowly.
And he looked to his right, where his son Hajimi, ten years old, sat sunk in the pages.
The boy who would one day become the father of that little one crossing his arms at the back of the row.
Then he looked to his left, where little Asuma was turning his page with fumbling fingers, the tip of his tongue sticking out from sheer concentration.
Then the old man finally raised his eyes to the crowded hall. To the faces bent over their volumes. To the clans and the orphans and the merchants and the children and the elders.
And at the very moment his drawn counterpart spoke the answer on paper…
the present Hiruzen's lips moved with the very same words, without a sound:
'And every single person in this village.'
Two old men, twenty years apart, asked the very same question…
answered at the very same moment, with the very same answer.
For some things in this world change: hats pass on, faces get carved into mountains, secrets are laid bare on paper.
But the heart of Hiruzen Sarutobi… does not.
…
And at the Hokage's right, Hajimi Sarutobi, ten years old, was rereading a single line for the third time.
My grandson Konohamaru.
'My father's grandson…'
'Which means… my son.'
The boy had known it since the earliest chapters, ever since that little troublemaker had first appeared chasing Naruto. But something about this scene in particular — his aged father pointing at his son and saying: this is one of those I treasure — made the idea real in a way that was deeply unsettling.
'I'm going to have a son… and my father will name him after the entire village…'
'…and he will love him like this.'
Hajimi stole a glance at his father sitting beside him.
'Alright.'
'I'll just make sure he doesn't inherit his uncle's mischief.'
…
As for the Hokage's left, the thoughts there were running in an entirely different direction.
'…'
Little Asuma, six years old, was staring at the page with knotted brows and slightly puffed cheeks.
'He said my grandson Konohamaru.'
'And he said every person in the village.'
'…'
'And he did not say Asuma.'
'I'm his SON! The grandson comes second after the son! Those are the rules of families!'
The child huffed in silence, and turned the page with a motion that was somewhat more violent than necessary.
'Fine. Whatever.'
'When I grow up and become stronger than Hajimi… he'll say my name first.'
And the sulking child never noticed that his father, from over the edge of his volume, was watching the puffed cheeks with the smile of an old man reading his son like an open book.
…
And throughout the hall, the drawn Hokage's question had worked its way into the readers without asking permission.
Do you have people like that?
For between one page and the next, every reader found themselves answering in secret, whether they wished to or not.
Sakumo looked, without meaning to, at the masked child sitting beside him, sunk in the pages with his serious eyes.
'One person is enough for me.'
And Maito Dai looked at his son Guy, who was repeating the Hokage's words to himself out loud to memorize them — and the father's eyes overflowed once again as he wrung his poor handkerchief for the tenth time.
And Tsunade looked at Nawaki sprawled over his volume, and at Dan beside her… then turned her eyes away quickly before anyone could notice.
As for Mikoto, she looked at no one.
She merely reread the sentence — the ones you accept, the ones you trust, the ones you love from the depths of your heart — while her fingers arranged a lock of hair that needed no arranging, and on her face was a calm that was slightly too deliberate.
And beside her, Fugaku was reading that same page with a completely rigid face.
Rather more rigid than necessary.
And from behind his volume, Hogaku noticed the two simultaneous silences, and decided — with the wisdom of fathers — not to comment.
…
But that same question, in another corner of the hall, fell upon entirely different ground.
From Orochimaru's perspective, the Academy pages were an outright waste of ink.
An emotional speech. Children. Pet dogs. Sentences about love and protection he had heard from his teacher's mouth a thousand times in his youth, until he had memorized them the way one memorizes school anthems: without them meaning anything.
'Live as you like, die as you like…'
'I do live as I like, sensei. That part, at least, I have applied to the letter.'
The man turned the page in boredom.
But the question followed him onto the next page, as badly timed questions do.
Do you have someone like that?
'…'
Orochimaru's fingers stopped turning for a fraction of a second.
Only a fraction of a second.
Then they continued.
'A question for children.'
'People wither. People age. People die. Investing in them is a loss decided in advance… but knowledge does not die.'
'That is the answer. It has always been the answer.'
And the man went on reading.
But somewhere, in that distant deep place its owner never visits, something remained disturbed by that fraction of a second…
that small hesitation which had not existed ten years ago.
And from the head of the hall, over the edge of his volume, Hiruzen Sarutobi was watching his student in silence.
He saw the fingers stop.
And he saw them continue.
'A fraction of a second…'
thought the old teacher, returning to his page.
'…is enough for me to work with.'
…
As for Shimura Danzo, he read the question, and answered it in his mind without the slightest hesitation.
'The village.'
An instant answer. Clean. Complete.
Then he went on reading… and two lines later, he returned to the question without knowing why.
For the old man in the pages had given an answer that resembled his own: every single person in this village.
'He says: every person.'
'And I say: the village.'
'The two sentences are one.'
Danzo turned the page.
'…'
'They are not one.'
'He sees faces. Names. A grandson crossing his arms at the back of a row.'
'And I see walls, and borders, and a balance of power.'
'He protects people, and so the village survives.'
'And I protect the village… even if it costs me the people.'
The man stared at the final page — at the old man's smile beneath the hat.
'And that, Hiruzen, is why you sat beneath that hat… and I sat in the shadows.'
'And it is also why…'
Danzo closed his eyes for a single moment.
'…one of us sleeps at night, and the other does not.'
…
And in the quiet corner, Minato finished the pages calmly, then remained staring at the final sentence.
And every single person in this village.
'The Third Hokage treasures the whole village…'
'And the Fourth Hokage died to save all of it…'
'It is the same sentence. A teacher plants it, and a successor harvests it with his life.'
Then the boy felt a gaze on him, and turned.
Kushina was staring at him, her mouth half-open to say something… then she closed it, turned her face away, and pretended to read.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"Kushina."
"I said nothing!"
Then, after a short silence, and without raising her eyes from a page she was not reading:
"…Just the old man's question. About the precious people."
"Ah. And did you find your answer?"
"Maybe."
And before the boy could ask his next question, she added quickly, in a voice slightly louder than necessary:
"Ichiraku Ramen! The most precious thing to me in this village is ramen! Now shut up and let me read!"
"…Alright."
And Minato returned to his volume, that small quiet smile on his lips.
For some answers, like some truths, need pages in order to ripen.
…
And so, after chapters of betrayals and blood and revelations that had turned the Art Store upside down…
these quiet pages granted the readers a breath they had desperately needed.
But no one in the hall was fooled.
For the volume was still in their hands, and its remaining pages still waited beneath their fingers…
And everyone knew that the manga, as it did every time, never granted warmth…
except to make what came after it crueler.
And the readers turned the page.
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Upcoming chapter titles (spoilers):
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Chapter 212: The Hidden Sand Village Appears in the Manga!
Chapter 213: Face to Face with the Kyūbi!
Chapter 214: A Summoning Beyond All Expectations!
Chapter 215: I Was a Monster Since Birth!
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