A blurry vision, slouched shoulders, perhaps a whole being deprived of energy. To know that he had been lied to, led to and ultimately manipulated into slaughtering his own clan.
That was something Itachi Uchiha knew very well. He knew he had been used; he knew if he hadn't done it, perhaps the end result would have been much different.
But nevertheless, he believed in peace. He believed that the lives of hundreds couldn't be worth more than the lives of thousands, perhaps even millions.
'It was the right choice given the circumstances' He used this same sentence to convince himself for years, to keep standing.
If the Uchiha Clan were allowed to perform their coup, the whole village would have entered a civil war, giving way for the other nations to invade the land of fire in its weakened state. Millions would die. Instead, if the clan perished silently... if he became the criminal who slaughtered them, the village's political stance could be maintained, and although the loss of the Uchiha Clan meant a decrease in the village's power, it was a worthy sacrifice in exchange for peace.
But then, he saw... the truth.
In the memories he got from Azrael, he saw Danzo holding meetings with higher-ups of the village and even nobles from the Land of Fire. Their viciousness... how they implanted this mindset in Danzo, in which he had to be the one to rule. The Uchiha Clan was too strong, and their power to control the Kyubi turned them into a variable.
So long as the Uchiha Clan existed, they wouldn't be able to control the village completely.
As if by a joke of fate, the Kyubi was released by an Uchiha... the perfect narrative for Danzo to turn the Third Hokage and the council against the clan. Isolating them, moving along with his plans... tampering with a young boy's peaceful mind, making him think his clan was 'evil'.
Sacrifice is not something new for a shinobi. To lay down their life for the greater good, for the sake of their village... that's something normal.
But seeing the eyes of his fellow clan, gruesomely attached to Danzo's arm, like slaves.
He realised... this was no sacrifice for the greater good. This was the selfish sacrifice of a man who manipulated the whole world to achieve his objective and get the proud Uchiha Clan, one of the founders of the village, out of the way in order to achieve his twisted objectives. In the future, there wouldn't be peace... in the future, this man would lead the village to war for his twisted vision.
'I leave the rest to you, Itachi. ' He heard his friend's last words one more time, Shisui Uchiha. He thought back then, sacrificing the clan for Konoha's sake meant following in his footsteps. He was wrong.
Itachi Uchiha saw his hands and could see and smell the blood more than ever.
"Mother, father, Shisui... It wasn't... for peace", He mumbled eerily, hands shaking, his vision going more and more blurry by the second. He didn't know what was wrong... what was right.
The only thing he knew was the huge desire that welled up within him like an erupting volcano—the desire to massacre someone.
"In front of the outright invasion sponsored by the fifth hokage herself, Konoha will prevail!" Danzo shouted from on top of his summon. Now that Itachi and Azrael had joined hands, he knew he had to be serious if he wanted him and his root corps to survive.
The best narrative to play was that in which Azrael was an invader brought in by Tsunade Senju. So he went along with that.
Itachi, who had been holding a kunai against his neck, was stabbed in the back by one of the Anbu. He immediately transformed into a crowd of flying and screeching crows. Genjutsu.
*BOOMM!!*
*BOOMM!!*
The anbu started dropping smokes in the forest and got in formation to face both Azrael and Itachi. There was enough smoke to cover the whole region. Azrael frowned, thinking this approach was a bit pathetic considering she could feel so much as the wind disturbance of their movements with her wings. Her eyes settled on Itachi for a moment, concerned about how he was coping with the truth.
She didn't need to.
*WHOOSH!*
Compressed air bullets shot towards them from the smoke. Itachi used his jutsu to create a massive ball of fire that shot towards the incoming bullets. The flames exploded like blazes of inferno in the forest, lighting up everything and scattering a huge part of the smoke. Some more void bullets came from the side, the east region, but Azrael casually created two dark spears and waved them, smashing both bullets without even seeing them.
Ten Anbu shot out of the smoke, lunging at them, but Danzo was nowhere to be seen.
*WHOOSH!*
Azrael's visage turned hideous as her skin melted and revealing way to her skeletal face. Even the hand that was holding the scythe began to peel off rather gruesomely. From those skeletal parts, a white and black flame blazed up.
Now, no longer just an angel, she resembled a genuine Death Star Archon, her true nature beyond the facade of an average Star Angel.
She graved Sheol and swung it once, creating a storm of black flames that engulfed the ten incoming Anbu, slicing all of them in half with that swift motion. Their bodies burned quickly; they didn't even know what was happening. The scythe hadn't touched them, the flames hadn't touched them... and yet they were burning.
"Retreat and re-organise!" They heard one of the Anbus shout from within the forest of the smoke.
Without prior notice, Azrael caught Itachi's coat with her skeletal hands. They started at one another one time, and she saw the literal pain in this man's eyes. His sharingan bled, his whole being dead.
This was a walking corpse, not a man. But she had already seen a lot of them that resembled him. And she knew there was hope for those... the hope of vengeance.
"I don't know what you're thinking, child... I told you not to come, and yet you did. That being the case, bring justice in the name of death! Go, I leave the rest to you, Itachi!"
Azrael launched Itachi towards somewhere in the smoke region. He groaned at the sheer speed he was thrown. Flying several hundred metres per second. In no time, he saw Danzo, trying to run in the middle of the smoke, jumping from tree to tree.
!!!
The man was caught by surprise by Itachi poking out of nowhere from the smoke.
A kick to the ribs did it; it made Danzo spit blood mid-jump, and launched him to the ground like a missile.
*BOOOMMM!!*
Itachi landed close to the crater of destruction that Danzo left upon impact. He checked up his leg, likely fractured due to the immense force behind the strike. No doubt he should be dead after that.
However...
Danzo manifested out of thin air like a ghost, watching him with a hideous and furious frown.
On the other side of the forest, the explosions rang devastatingly, loud enough to reach the village where people were already starting to pile up, even at night. However, there was a mysterious invisible wall that stopped them from going into the forest.
From the ground, it was difficult to discern, but the white and black flames were visible along the eerie darkness of the night.
Azrael remained to fight the Anbu formation quite comfortably. She used her scythe and dark spears while releasing white, blackish fire from her body. Her wings began turning black, and her feathers began falling, transforming her into the archon she is.
The world began to turn dark, and limbo took over the region. Black and white fire blazed everywhere and allowed Azrael to see and tamper with souls.
She removed her dark spear from one of the Anbu's bodies, and it began to scatter like burning ash. Her gaze fixed on a corner far away, and she sighed, rubbed her forehead and walked there.
With one swift move, she threw Sheol towards that location. The scythe span horribly, chasing after a certain spot in the forest where a gasp was heard.
Before striking, though, the scythe stopped mid-air, right before it reached something... or someone.
A boy fell on his butt; he had been concealed within some trenches.
*WHOOSH!*
Azrael disappeared like a haze of darkness and reappeared in front of him. Leaning down with an angry visage. She pressed her forehead agaisnt the boy's forehead, pressing his headband.
"What are you doing here, Naruto?!"
"Hehehe, you got me~".