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He had been crushed before he could even react, with no power to fight back and no time to prepare himself.
The only time he'd touched Gaara at all was when Gaara attacked.
Sasuke still had ninjutsu he hadn't used. He knew the Great Fireball Jutsu—he'd mastered it back in his first year at the Academy—but he had never bothered to show it off.
Because the standard he measured himself against was Itachi.
"Let's go, Gaara, Naruto."
The man didn't even bother to evaluate him. He simply moved past Sasuke, clearly intending to lead the others away.
Wait.
Sasuke wanted to shout.
I can still fight. I haven't used my full strength yet.
But Rōshi's hand was already on Naruto's shoulder. Gaara moved to his other side. The two of them vanished from the training field together with the Body Flicker Jutsu.
In Sasuke's dark pupils, all that remained were a few drifting grains of sand, falling where Gaara's Sand Flicker had been.
Gaara… aside from that automatic sand defense, he can also use the Body Flicker Jutsu.
The pink-haired girl jogged up to him and crouched down, reaching toward him as if to help, but her hand stalled awkwardly in mid-air. She spoke in a rush: "Sasuke-kun only used Taijutsu. No matter how you look at it, Gaara used Ninjutsu, so..."
Sasuke brushed her hand aside. He didn't need this kind of consolation. Excuses like that burned his pride more sharply than open mockery.
"Sasuke-kun." Sakura tried to get closer, but all she received in return was a cold stare.
Ino hurried over and stepped in front of Sakura, shielding her. "Sasuke-kun, Gaara's situation is special, you know. Lord Roshi said it himself—that was the sand's automatic defense..."
Sasuke didn't want to hear another word. Once he had his balance back, he simply turned away and walked off to the side of the field.
Karin, who had been staring after Rōshi, noticed Sasuke's retreating back and felt anger flare. "You arrogant brat! What do you think other people's concern is for?!"
Sasuke glanced over his shoulder. "You land two sneak attacks and think that gives you the right to lecture me?"
"Karin, forget it!" Ino grabbed Karin's arm in a hurry.
"Karin, calm down!" Putting aside her own hurt, Sakura quickly moved to stand in front of Karin with Ino.
Shion, who had been watching quietly, stepped closer as well and murmured to Karin, "If you start a fight now, you'll only make things difficult for Iruka-sensei."
Iruka watched it all unfold, a dull ache throbbing at his temples. He didn't scold Sasuke. Forcing a smile, he raised his voice. "Alright, that's enough! The combat observation is over! Everyone, gather up—we're moving on to the next part of training!"
Iruka dragged himself through the remainder of the lesson without much spirit, and the students' minds were clearly elsewhere.
By the time class ended, Sasuke was already gone.
He didn't go home. Instead, he headed for the woods near the Naka River—the place where he had often trained with Itachi.
There, Sasuke trained alone. Ninja tools, Taijutsu, Ninjutsu—he cycled through them again and again, replaying his defeat with every movement.
Sasuke pushed himself until his muscles burned and his chakra was nearly drained. At last, he slid down against the trunk of a large tree and sank to the ground.
'…I'm too weak.'
He tipped his head back, staring up at the ink-blue night sky framed by sparse branches and leaves.
Wasting time at the Academy… trapped in those meaningless classes…
By now, Big Brother had already graduated—and even completed S-rank missions.
"Sasuke."
Itachi stepped out from the dark woods, his silhouette taking shape in the starlight.
Sasuke lowered his head slightly, looking at his brother through the dim light.
"Mother's already finished making dinner."
"I'm not hungry," Sasuke muttered.
Itachi walked over and crouched beside him. His eyes swept over Sasuke's dust- and sweat-stained clothes, then the small cuts and bruises scattered across his exposed arms and hands.
Reaching into the tool pouch at his waist, he took out a bamboo water flask and a small box of ointment. He unplugged the flask, poured a little water onto a clean cloth, and carefully wiped the dirt and sweat from Sasuke's arms before gently applying the medicine.
"Brother, I want to become strong."
"…All right."
"…" Sasuke stared at Itachi, who continued treating his wounds with quiet focus. "Brother, you're just humoring me."
"Captain already approved my leave."
Sasuke's hands curled into fists. "What did that man say this time?"
"He mocked me again, didn't he?"
Every time. Every time he embarrassed himself, every time he failed, his brother somehow found out.
"The captain wouldn't do that."
"It's you who doesn't know anything, Brother!" Sasuke's voice cracked, growing louder. "You have no idea what he said to Father!"
That undisguised bitterness, that almost contemptuous tone—Sasuke could still clearly hear the way Rōshi talked about village affairs in front of their father.
Itachi glanced up and smiled at him.
Sasuke felt suffocated. Every time that man came up, his brother was always like this.
"Let's go home and eat. Mother is worried." Itachi turned and lifted Sasuke onto his back.
Sasuke said nothing, silently accepting.
Back home, he braced himself for his father's interrogation or cold criticism. But Fugaku only looked up as Sasuke entered, gave him a single glance, then returned to the scroll in his hands without a word. His mother, Mikoto, didn't ask why he was late either. She hurried over to check the wounds, her eyes full of distress, but she also stayed silent.
That quiet, forbearant attitude made Sasuke feel even more on edge, as if sitting on pins and needles. Dinner passed in heavy, almost stagnant silence, broken only by the soft clink of bowls and chopsticks. The food was tasteless to him. After forcing down a few quick bites, he stood up and tried to escape back to his room.
"Sasuke," Itachi called, his tone calm. "I'm taking you to see the captain."
Sasuke froze mid-step. He turned around sharply, shock and resistance flashing in his eyes—then, beneath the stubborn unwillingness, a faint, unwilling spark of hope.
Sasuke had never been to the Hokage's office before.
It didn't look that different from the teachers' offices at the Academy—just more documents stacked everywhere.
"Captain." Itachi's tone was more respectful than Sasuke had ever heard it; he even gave a slight nod. "I've brought Sasuke."
Then Itachi turned and left the office.
For a while, the only sound in the room was the soft scrape of a pen moving across paper. Sasuke stood rigidly in front of the wide desk, watching the man handle the documents with practiced ease. From time to time, he rose and walked over to the larger desk nearby—obviously the Hokage's—to take or put away scrolls, moving so naturally it was as if that seat were his own.
"If you don't mind, have a seat over there first." The man pointed toward a sofa off to the side.
Sasuke didn't move.
"It seems your gloomy mood still hasn't cleared up," the man remarked.
"Your personality actually isn't very much like an Uchiha."
Sasuke's lashes trembled, but he stayed silent.
"Gaara is the one in Sunagakure's next generation most likely to become Kazekage," Rōshi said.
"When I was talking with Fugaku earlier, you were listening in nearby, weren't you?"
"I do have expectations for you to become Hokage."
The words dropped into Sasuke's heart like a stone into a deep pool, sending turbulent ripples through him.
'So… was that why this afternoon's failure was so disappointing?'
'Was that why Father had been silent and Mother so worried—because he'd let everyone down and failed to live up to this… expectation?'
"My brother… he…"
"Itachi, huh? He's also one of the candidates," Rōshi said. "But it's not set in stone. For Itachi, you might be the better choice."
"A single failure is nothing. On the contrary, it's pointless to dwell on it too much."
"Gaara's training—Naruto will be taking part. That was his own request."
"As for you…"
Sasuke drew in a long, steadying breath, as if trying to force all his frustration and unwillingness out of his chest. He lifted his head, black eyes locking onto Rōshi.
"Please let me participate as well."
"I will use my strength to restore the reputation of the Uchiha clan."
'And I'll reclaim the chances and glory that should have belonged to us.'
It wasn't until he stepped out of the Hokage's office that Sasuke truly processed what he had heard—and what he had said.
'Me… Hokage?'
Plenty of kids at the academy wanted to become Hokage. Sasuke used to want that too. But Itachi was far more exceptional than he was, his father, the clan—everyone said so.
And even if it wasn't his brother, there was still Shisui in the clan.
So even if the thought had crossed his mind, there were still people within his own clan he had to surpass first.
But… this time, it was a high-ranking official of the village saying it to him personally. Someone his brother deeply respected, someone even his father would defer to.
Walking down the corridor, Sasuke spotted Itachi standing silently by a window.
"Brother," Sasuke approached him, "did you... already know about this?"
"About what?"
'Brother doesn't know… But didn't Roshi-san say Brother also had high expectations for him?'
"Tap, tap, tap—"
The crisp sound of heels echoed down the corridor, sharp and unhurried. Only a few people walked that casually inside the Hokage Building. Years of duty here as anbu had trained Itachi's body to react before his mind; his spine straightened, his posture unconsciously becoming more formal.
A blonde woman strode past.
"Hokage-sama," Itachi lowered his head in greeting.
"...Hokage-sama," Sasuke followed his brother's lead a beat later.
"Hm." Tsunade gave them a brief nod in reply and continued on.
Sasuke's gaze lifted to the bold "Gamble" character emblazoned on the back of her haori as she walked away.
He hadn't noticed it before, but after meeting those two people, he couldn't help feeling that the Fifth Hokage, despite her title, didn't seem to have a stronger presence than the person inside that office.
"Let's go back, Sasuke."
"Yes, Brother."
——
Once inside the office, Tsunade kicked off her heels, letting them land haphazardly by the door. Barefoot, she padded over to the large sofa and dropped onto it, sitting cross-legged without the slightest concern for her image.
"That Sasuke kid looked distracted. What did you say to him?"
"I encouraged him to aim for Hokage."
Tsunade sucked in a breath. "Did he take it seriously, or were you saying it seriously?"
"If the Uchiha don't change their habit of solving everything on their own, the villagers won't accept it."
Solving everything themselves usually meant trying to keep all the benefits for themselves. Unless you were someone they acknowledged as an insider or an outsider who simply overpowered them, it was almost impossible to get a share.
"If you promise them something, and they don't get it and problems break out, Kakashi won't be able to clean up the mess."
"I've already discussed it with Fugaku once—on the condition that the branch is handled properly," Roshi replied.
"You can't even manage one police force, and you went and added a branch as a condition?" Tsunade shook her head. "Has the Nine-Tails' chakra been gathered yet?"
"Today's intensity wasn't enough. The Nine-Tails didn't actively strain the seal or leak chakra," Roshi said, frowning slightly as he wondered if it was because he'd been there.
He quickly lost interest in chasing that thought down, tidied up the documents on his desk, and prepared to leave.
"Heading back?"
"I'm going to the Hyuga clan. The Main House is changing successors."
"Changing successors, huh…" Tsunade yawned, clearly not very interested. "The Hyuga haven't done that in decades. Is that youngest daughter, Hanabi, really that strong? Strong enough to make Hiashi decide to switch?"
Roshi had already reached the door and wrapped his hand around the knob. He paused, thinking over her question. After a few seconds, he finally gave an answer that almost made Tsunade choke:
"She's more outgoing than Hinata."
He'd run into the girl once at the branch family compound, and she'd matched his impression perfectly.
——
Neji hadn't understood what the Caged Bird seal truly meant before.
He had long since accepted every role fate had forced on him—to protect his cousin Hinata like an older brother and to guard the Main House as a member of the branch family.
He trained without complaint, pushed himself to improve, and treated it all as his natural duty, carrying a simple yet firm sense of purpose.
Until that day—when his father screamed under the agony of the Caged Bird Seal and his uncle, always stern but never cruel, didn't even flinch as he activated the jutsu.
It should have been just a brief episode.
Yet his uncle killing for the clan, and his father dying in his place, completely shattered Neji's view of the Main House.
He could no longer see Hinata through the eyes of an older brother. Instead, he saw her as a branch family member would: the main house's sheltered young lady.
His uncle had killed her because she was kidnapped. The clan had endured criticism and pressure from the village because of it. His father had paid with his life because of it… So was she really worth all those sacrifices?
Timid. Indecisive. Even her most basic gentle fist was soft and powerless.
Aside from being Hiashi Hyuga's daughter, the Main House's eldest daughter by birth, what other value did she have that justified such a price?
Neji couldn't understand. Each time he was summoned to the Main House to spar with Hinata, that confusion—and the faint anger behind it—only grew. Watching her clumsy movements, sensing her fragile resolve, remembering his father… his rage and killing intent finally burst through the dam of his reason.
And then he experienced, for himself, the pain his father had once endured.
The cursed seal's torment tore straight through his nerves—like countless red-hot needles driving into his brain—ripping away thought and movement in an instant. As his vision collapsed into darkness, the last thing he saw was his uncle's cold, unblinking Byakugan.
After that, Neji was no longer the Main House young lady's regular sparring partner.
He was only formally summoned to the Main House again last year, after he injured three Kumogakure exchange students at the Academy. Clan Head Hiashi barely scolded him; he simply told Neji to be more careful and not bring unnecessary trouble to the clan.
Neji accepted the warning. He had no interest in tormenting the weak.
He only wanted to prove that his late father still had worth—and that this worth did not lie in being sacrificed by the Main House, but in Neji himself, the son who could climb to the very peak of the clan even with the Caged Bird Seal carved into his forehead.
That was the only thing he could do and the sole meaning of his existence.
After finishing his training for the day, Neji calmed his breathing and headed back toward the clan compound.
Just as he was about to turn the corner onto the main road leading to the branch family quarters, his steps suddenly stopped.
Not far ahead, just outside the main gate of the Main House residence, nearly all of the clan's key Main House members stood assembled under the lead of Clan Head Hiashi Hyuga. They wore formal robes bearing the Hyuga crest, their postures stiff with solemn respect—a sight Neji had rarely witnessed—as they inclined their heads in a slight bow, seeing off a guest.
The guest stood with their back to Neji, tall and slender, dressed in a simple dark jonin outfit. Even from behind, with nothing more than that indistinct silhouette, they made every Main House member present—Hiashi included—carry themselves with an almost wary deference.
Neji immediately stepped back, melting into the shadow of the corner wall. He held his breath, pale eyes watching quietly from the darkness.
This was the second time.
The second time he had personally seen these Main House nobles, who stood so far above and controlled the fate of the branch families, display such humility and respect toward someone.
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