Toph felt the shift long before Kakashi reached the cemetery.
The earth had been restless all morning—too many hurried steps, too much unresolved noise. Now, suddenly, it settled. A subtle calming, like a long-held breath finally released.
Three sets of young footsteps, miles away in Training Ground Seven, had found a rhythm together.
He smirked.
So the genius finally let them pass.
He was already there, sitting cross-legged on the bare patch in front of his parents' graves. Barefoot, as always. The soil was cool and damp from last night's mist, clinging slightly to his skin. It knew him. It always told him when someone approached.
Kakashi's steps were the same as ever: deliberate, slightly uneven on the left. Carrying less weight than usual today.
Toph didn't move when Kakashi stopped a few meters away.
"You're early," he said, voice dry.
Kakashi exhaled softly and sat against the nearby stone—the one he always chose.
"Traffic was light."
"Liar."
A quiet settled between them. Not empty. Familiar.
Toph kept one hand flat on the ground, feeling the faint after-echoes of the training field: a lunge, a shout, two bells that never quite rang in unison. Then the shared meal. The decision.
"They fed each other," Kakashi said after a while.
"I felt it."
"The loud one started it."
"Figures."
Kakashi shifted slightly.
"You were listening the whole time."
"Not listening," Toph corrected. "Feeling. There's a difference."
He tilted his head, as if catching a distant vibration.
"The Uchiha's steps are still too careful. Like he's afraid of leaving prints. The girl's are getting surer. And the jinchūriki… he stomps like he's trying to wake the whole village."
Kakashi's voice was quieter. "They're not us."
"No," Toph agreed. "But they could be."
The wind moved through the trees. Leaves rustled. The earth beneath them stayed calm.
Toph's fingers pressed a little deeper into the soil.
"You told them the rule."
"I did."
"Good. Someone has to."
A longer silence.
Kakashi spoke again, almost to himself. "I thought the ground would stay restless."
"It will," Toph said. "Just not today."
He turned his head precisely toward Kakashi.
"You're not asking the real question."
Kakashi was quiet for a beat.
"Will they break?"
Toph considered it.
"Everyone does. The trick is whether they let it bury them… or use it to stand firmer."
He felt Kakashi's gaze—even if he couldn't see it.
"You still think you can keep them from cracking."
"I'll try."
Toph's mouth curved into a faint, crooked smile.
"That's what you said last time."
The earth didn't contradict him.
Kakashi didn't respond immediately.
The silence stretched, heavy with things neither of them ever said aloud.
Finally, the soft sound of him standing. Steps retreating—slower than when he arrived.
Toph didn't move.
He waited until Kakashi's footsteps faded completely, swallowed by the village noise beyond the cemetery gates.
Only then did he speak, voice low, directed at the ground beneath him.
"They're not the only ones leaving new prints today."
The earth shifted faintly under his palm—not a tremor, just a ripple. Subtle. Persistent.
Something changing, far off. A weight shifting in the village's rhythm.
Not danger. Not yet.
Just the beginning of something heavier.
Toph's smirk faded.
He pressed both hands into the soil, fingers spreading.
The calm wouldn't last.
It never did.
He stayed there long after the sun began to set, listening to the slow, inevitable turning of the ground beneath the village.