"The reason I recognized you as the Fourth Kazekage from the very beginning was because I admired your character. You are calm, ruthless, and decisive. Pakura is indeed strong, but if she were to live, the internal division within Suna would be inevitable. For such an unstable element, the stronger they are, the less they can be allowed to remain. As my most outstanding disciple, I don't want to hear such spineless talk from you ever again."
"Yes. I will remember your words."
"Alright. This time, you've once again bested Pakura. Your succession as Kazekage is only natural. Even if she narrowly escapes death this time, there will be a next time. If not next time, then the time after that. I will remove this obstacle for you. After all, the reason she existed from the start was to be your whetstone. Now that the blade is sharpened, the whetstone no longer needs to exist."
"Ah!" Pakura let out a long, agonized howl toward the sky, a cry of utter despair. Her heart filled with boundless sorrow.
Why? Why do this to me? Why won't you let me go, even after I'm dead? How can you say something like that?
I hate you!
In the next moment, the scene shifted again. She appeared on a battlefield somewhere. Her squad was currently being surrounded and attacked by a group of ninjas in black robes.
Their origin was unclear, but their attacks were merciless, every move aimed to kill.
"Hold on! Reinforcements are almost here!" she shouted, fending off flying kunai with her Scorch Release as she tried to encourage her comrades.
"There won't be any reinforcements." A nearby ninja said in despair, "The Third Kazekage sent us here to die!"
"No... That can't be!" Pakura denied it instinctively, though something inside her already believed it.
"Stop fooling yourself. Have you forgotten?" the same ninja continued. "Even the Third Kazekage himself said this mission had no return, not even for him. If he gave this kind of mission to you, then wasn't it just to send you to your death?"
"Ah!" Pakura clutched her ears with both hands, not wanting to hear any more. But the ninja's words pierced straight through her, stabbing into the depths of her soul.
The scene shifted again.
Over the next stretch of time, she experienced dozens of different scenarios. Each time she left one scene, she would forget everything that had happened, but the emotions they provoked kept building up inside her.
In the final scene, all the emotions she had suppressed for years exploded at once.
On the streets of Suna, she pointed at the chatting and laughing Third Kazekage and Rasa, unleashing a torrent of curses, saying every foul and hateful thing she could think of.
The two couldn't hear her. But however long they talked, she cursed them just as long. And still, she wasn't satisfied—she just wanted to tear them both limb from limb.
After a while, the sky around her began to darken, and her vision went black. When she opened her eyes again, she found herself sitting in a forest. Kaede, who had been following her, was now staring at her with deep concern.
"Are you alright?" Kaede's face lit up with joy as soon as he saw her awaken.
Pakura's head throbbed painfully, but she couldn't remember anything, so she asked, "What happened to me?"
"Right after that guy left, you passed out. We couldn't wake you no matter what we tried."
"That guy from the Uchiha clan?" Pakura finally recalled what happened before she lost consciousness. "Shin!"
But she still felt like something had been taken from her mind, something important. No matter how hard she tried, she just couldn't remember what it was.
What's wrong with me? Could it be that bastard used some trick on me again? She suddenly thought of a possibility.
But the moment the thought surfaced, even she was startled by it. She quickly shook her head and told herself deep down, No, he's my teacher. How could I think that way about him? Does he even deserve that title? But even though both Rasa and I were his students, he always treated us completely differently. He never intended to cultivate me into someone capable. My existence was merely to serve as a whetstone for Rasa.
She didn't know why such thoughts suddenly emerged, but once they did, not only did she not feel there was anything wrong with them, on the contrary, the more she thought about it, the more it all made sense. Eventually, these thoughts grew into a firm belief, something she accepted with absolute conviction.
I want you dead!
The more she thought about it, the angrier she became. Scene after scene from the past resurfaced in her mind, each one making her clench her teeth in fury.
From thirty meters away, Shin observed all of this with great satisfaction. Everything Pakura had just experienced had been part of a genjutsu he used. But when the illusion ended, he erased all of her memories of what had happened within it, leaving behind only the emotions she had accumulated and the beliefs that had grown during the experience.
The human mind was strange: once you firmly believed in something, you began to see only the information that supported that belief, reinforcing it again and again. Conflicting information, even when it appeared right before your eyes, got selectively ignored.
If you believed someone was bad, your mind would automatically find proof of their badness. Everything they did would appear to confirm that belief. Even if they did something good right in front of you, you would think they had an ulterior motive.
In fact, the more good they did, the more likely you were to see them as hypocritical and dangerous. At this point, it no longer mattered whether the Third Kazekage truly used Pakura as Rasa's whetstone or actually favored Rasa over her.
What mattered was that, under the influence of her newly solidified belief and intense emotions, she had begun to subconsciously ignore all the good things the Third Kazekage had done for her. She only remembered the times he treated her poorly. Likewise, she completely overlooked the times he was harsh and critical toward Rasa. All she could recall was his warmth and approval toward him.
From now on, even if the Third Kazekage were to berate her to his face in the harshest possible terms, she would only interpret it as him having high expectations for Rasa, or merely putting on a show for others. On the other hand, even if he treated her with kindness and warmth, she would see it as an attempt to pacify her, just a tactic to keep her as a loyal and obedient dog.
This wasn't direct mind control. It was guided brainwashing. And the victim wouldn't even know they'd been manipulated. Pakura would not be under Shin's control, but in many cases, the outcome would be even more effective. Achieving this level of subtle influence without leaving behind any trace of manipulation was incredibly difficult. Even for someone as advanced in genjutsu as him, it wasn't guaranteed to succeed every time.
Originally, he had only planned to try it and see what happened. If it worked, great, he'd have planted a time bomb inside Suna ahead of schedule. If it failed, that was fine too, he could just resort to direct mind control. But direct control could be discovered and broken.
This guided kind of brainwashing, however, could neither be detected nor undone. Because ultimately, it was a belief born from Pakura's own thoughts.
He had merely accelerated and nurtured that belief's development.
The reason it worked so smoothly on Pakura was because, deep down, she had long harbored resentment over the Third Kazekage's blatant favoritism toward Rasa.