Hiruzen Sarutobi drew on his pipe.
It was a habit more than a need. The smoke didn't do much to his body anymore. What it gave him was something else.
A sense of ritual. A rhythm.
Authority, he thought, letting the word settle in his mind. You can sum it up in one crude measure. How completely I can control every faction and every institution in this village.
The Hyuga. The Uchiha.
Two nails that had to be pulled.
He shook his head, then glanced again at the report Sakumo Hatake had submitted, the one detailing Hizashi Hyuga's behavior at the Hyuga compound yesterday.
"That kid has teeth," Hiruzen murmured. "He can be used."
When you combined intelligence reports with Hizashi's words, it was almost laughable.
The Hyuga Branch House was practically a natural base of support for him as Hokage.
It was hard to find a group more suited to be brought under his banner.
Even civilian shinobi in Konoha, in peacetime, had an absurd amount of freedom. They could take missions whenever they wanted. If they didn't feel like it, they could stay home and sleep all day, and nobody would drag them out by the collar.
And yet in a clan that looked wealthy and powerful from the outside, most of the Hyuga didn't have that freedom at all.
A feudal military machine on the surface, and hidden inside it, a slave society.
I need to raise Hizashi carefully, Hiruzen thought, a thin gleam flashing in his eyes. Let him stir the Hyuga up from the inside.
Not as an ordinary Anbu operative.
He wanted Hizashi to show he had the makings of a squad leader.
If Hizashi rose that far, he'd have the capital to slowly build influence inside the Hyuga Clan, to draw in more Branch House members who wanted what he had, who started yearning for the Hokage's protection.
As for the Hyuga Main House…
No need to touch them yet.
They'd held their heads high for years. Let Hizashi's fire lick at their heels first. Let them burn a little. When they finally panicked enough, then Hiruzen could smile and sit down to talk.
First you press them down, then you offer a hand.
That method never stopped working.
A gift given in someone's winter always outweighed flowers in their spring.
And as for where that "winter" came from…
Well. Nobody needed to ask.
Hiruzen exhaled, eyes narrowing.
"But where do I cut into the Uchiha?"
"It's hard…"
In Hiruzen's eyes, the Uchiha Clan and the Hokage's tower had a gap between them that wasn't just political.
It was trust, rotten at the foundation.
And there were too many reasons for it.
History alone was heavy enough to break backs.
If he traded places, if he woke up tomorrow as an Uchiha, he'd keep the Hokage's line at arm's length too.
How could he not?
The mess between Tobirama Senju and the Uchiha wasn't some buried secret. From the Warring States to now, it had become a famous joke in the shinobi world.
People even wrote stories about it.
He'd heard some sheltered nobles liked to obsess over those tales, like they were gossip about lovers instead of blood enemies.
The truth was, even the founding of Konoha had been strange.
It had been forced into existence by two men, Hashirama Senju and Madara Uchiha, pushing it through with sheer will.
The rest of the middle and upper ranks had never truly reconciled. The hatred was real. It had never gone away.
If you looked at the start of it, though, it was almost… beautiful, in a twisted way.
Madara demanded Hashirama kill himself, and only then did they reconcile.
It sounded cruel. Ridiculous, even.
But Hashirama agreeing had given the defeated Uchiha something to stand on emotionally. It handed Madara his dignity back.
It took two clans that should've ripped each other apart for Izuna Uchiha, for their dead, for every wound carved into their bodies, and made them shake hands instead.
A retreat that was actually an advance, full of grace, the kind that could make even an enemy swallow their pride.
And then the follow-up never happened.
There was no system built to hold it.
Everything rested on Hashirama alone.
So when Tobirama took power, the Uchiha's hope for the title of Hokage collapsed, and then Kagami Uchiha died, and then a dozen smaller things stacked on top of each other until the whole problem became a stone in the village's throat.
The Uchiha were a nightmare to solve.
Take the Konoha Military Police Force.
Anyone with eyes could tell what it was.
A policy the Second Hokage built to limit the Uchiha.
First, it kept them inside the village. Less time on missions. Less time sharpening themselves in real combat. Instead, they did internal security work, the kind that rarely involved true battle. It was like pulling a lion's fangs one by one.
Second, it made a single clan the face of law enforcement. Combine that with the Uchiha temperament, and their reputation in the village was guaranteed to sour year by year.
And now?
Even if Hiruzen wanted to pull the Uchiha out of the police force, it would be painfully difficult.
Because to the Uchiha, it was the last piece of stale bread in their hands.
The fear of losing what little they still held had already grown larger than the desire to gain anything new.
And Hiruzen's own identity didn't help.
He was Tobirama's student.
To the older generation of Uchiha, that alone made him hard to trust.
In that kind of situation, even the bluntest method, taking their interests away, wouldn't achieve much.
Between the Hokage and the Uchiha, there was a chain of suspicion that couldn't be cut clean.
"To deal with the Uchiha," Hiruzen muttered, rubbing at his brow, "I need a bridge strong enough to hold real weight."
"The older generation won't work. It has to be someone young, talented, loyal to the village, someone who can match my thinking and still carry influence inside the clan."
He let out a quiet breath that was almost a complaint.
"Sensei, you really did leave me a mess."
People said the one who tied the knot should be the one to untie it, but even if Tobirama walked back through the door today, Hiruzen doubted he'd handle it any better.
There was one name that floated up in his mind.
A boy called Shisui.
Potential, yes.
But potential was only potential.
In Hiruzen's memories, Tobirama always spoke to Kagami with that calm voice, always insisting he didn't discriminate against the Uchiha, claiming the Uchiha were the ones who truly carried love in their hearts, they just used it wrong.
Hiruzen scoffed inside.
Maybe that line worked on someone as simple-hearted as Kagami Uchiha.
If Hiruzen was an Uchiha, unless he could lock Tobirama inside his own body and talk to him there, he wouldn't waste a single extra word.
Not when you could get Flying Raijin Slice'd for breathing wrong.
Hiruzen's eyes drifted to the Hokage portraits on the office wall.
They stopped on Tobirama Senju.
That stern face. Those red eyes that looked almost like an Uchiha's.
And a thought cut across his mind so suddenly he went still.
This was the shinobi world.
There were jutsu for everything.
Was it possible to bring Tobirama back?
But not as Tobirama Senju.
As an Uchiha.
Hiruzen's hand tightened into a fist.
The truth was, he'd already thought about it before.
About using Summoning Jutsu: Reanimation.
That technique couldn't perfectly reproduce someone's strength in life, but Tobirama wasn't valuable because of raw power.
He was valuable because of his brain.
For Hiruzen, who wanted Konoha to build an overwhelming advantage, to grow stronger through innovation and make that advantage permanent, he craved Tobirama's help almost desperately.
It sounded backward, almost absurd.
But it was real.
There were two problems.
First, the Reanimation body didn't have living flesh to sustain the soul. A few days might be fine, but leave it too long and it was like drying something out, little by little.
And that was still the Second Hokage of Konoha.
More than that, Tobirama in that state wouldn't be able to do meaningful work.
Second was the issue Hiruzen couldn't ignore, no matter how carefully he wrapped it.
He was building Konoha. He wanted it broader, faster, stronger, better.
But there was a prerequisite.
Konoha had to remain under his control.
If Tobirama himself returned, even if you ignored how hard it would be to revive him, Hiruzen knew his teacher well enough to picture what would happen.
Tobirama would try to become the one above the Hokage.
Not because he was greedy for power.
Because men like that carried an unshakable sense of self. They didn't bend easily. They didn't accept being "guided."
And if Tobirama came back as Tobirama, Hiruzen's authority would inevitably bleed away.
That was unacceptable.
But if Tobirama came back as an Uchiha…
Everything changed.
All he needed was a believable identity. An orphan. A survivor.
Or he could be bolder.
He could claim he was Izuna Uchiha's descendant.
Tobirama knew Izuna. Intimately. He'd understand how to play that role.
And if Tobirama wore an Uchiha name, then the bridge Hiruzen needed, the bridge between the Hokage and the Uchiha Clan, would exist.
And an Uchiha Tobirama couldn't interfere with the Hokage's authority the same way.
Because no matter what, Konoha's shared belief was the Will of Fire.
With Tobirama's history against the Uchiha, if he returned in an Uchiha body, it would spark the ugliest thoughts in every corner of the village.
Killing wasn't enough, now you're stealing bodies too?
So if Tobirama returned as "Uchiha Tobirama," he would be forced to live as an Uchiha in Konoha.
He could never be the Second Hokage again.
That secret would have to be buried forever.
Sensei, Hiruzen thought, eyes flat, I'm the Hokage. You're just an Uchiha.
Even if Tobirama offered advice, it would only ever be advice.
Nothing more.
At first, it had been a stray thought, sparked by those red eyes in the portrait.
But once the idea existed, it ran wild, racing through Hiruzen's mind like something that had been waiting to be unleashed.
He was already thinking about methods.
About the steps.
About how to revive Tobirama Senju…
No.
How to revive Uchiha Tobirama.
Forbidden techniques flooded his thoughts. Soul techniques. Chakra techniques. Things with names that should never be spoken in daylight.
Hiruzen stared at the portrait, unblinking.
Then, slowly, he rose from his seat.
One step.
Then another.
He walked toward Tobirama's image like he was being pulled.
At that moment, a knock sounded at the Hokage office door.
Danzo Shimura's voice followed, and behind him came the softer presence of Koharu Utatane and Homura Mitokado.
"Enter," Hiruzen said, his eyes still locked on Tobirama's face.
They stepped inside.
And all three of them froze when they saw him standing there, so close to the Second Hokage's portrait, staring like he was trying to burn the image into his soul.
For a beat, the room held its breath.
Hiruzen… were you really that nostalgic for your teacher?
The silence stretched long enough to turn strange.
"...Hiruzen," Danzo finally said, breaking it. "You…"
Hiruzen turned his head.
His eyes met Danzo's.
There was a chill in them, something carved out by extreme reason, calm to the point of indifference.
"Mm," Hiruzen said. "Sorry to keep you waiting."
"I was thinking."
He gestured lightly. "Sit."
Danzo, Koharu, and Homura didn't move right away.
Because Hiruzen's posture, his tone, and more than anything, that look in his eyes…
It was too familiar.
It looked like Tobirama.