The meeting room door was opened.
Akimichi Torifu sighed heavily, exchanged a glance with Uchiha Kagami, and left in silence.
Utatane Koharu and Mitokado Homura walked to Sarutobi Hiruzen's side and stopped.
"Hiruzen, we'll be going now." Mitokado Homura pushed up his glasses, his eyes filled with sincere approval.
"We support you." Utatane Koharu's words were brief, but they carried great weight.
Sarutobi Hiruzen nodded slightly.
"I appreciate your support."
The two said no more and turned to leave.
In the empty meeting room, only Sarutobi Hiruzen and a grim-faced Shimura Danzo remained.
The evening sun slanted in through the window, stretching their shadows long.
"Hiruzen."
Danzo's voice was low, suppressing some emotion.
"Why did you do this?"
"Are you humiliating me?"
Sarutobi Hiruzen turned and looked at him calmly.
"Humiliate you? No, Danzo. I am saving you."
Danzo's brows knitted together.
"Saving me?"
Sarutobi Hiruzen did not answer directly.
He walked to the window, looking at the Hokage Rock behind the village.
"Come with me."
Before his voice had faded, his figure blurred into an afterimage and vanished.
Danzo's pupils contracted, and he followed without hesitation.
Two figures leaped rapidly across Konoha's rooftops, finally landing on the head of the Second Hokage's stone statue.
The wind was strong, blowing their robes.
From here, one could overlook the entire village of Konoha.
Smoke curled from chimneys, pedestrians walked the streets, and children laughed and played. It was a scene of peace and tranquility.
"Danzo, look."
Sarutobi Hiruzen spoke, his voice slightly distorted by the wind.
"This is what Sensei gave his life to protect."
Danzo was silent, his gaze also fixed on the village below.
"I know."
"No, you don't."
Sarutobi Hiruzen cut him off.
"You only see the threats the village faces, but you don't see what the village itself is."
"The village is every single person who lives here. It's the lazy guys from the Nara clan, the big guys from the Akimichi clan, the patrol teams from the Uchiha clan, the owner of the ramen shop, the crying child in the Ninja Academy."
"It's not an abstract concept, Danzo."
Sarutobi Hiruzen turned, looking directly at his former teammate.
"Your Root may have started with good intentions. But it will only create something more terrifying than darkness."
"It's called panic, and distrust."
"A secret, unsupervised organization, secretly monitoring and judging everyone in the village. Today it can eliminate enemies, tomorrow it can eliminate dissenters. The day after, it will create enemies just to maintain its own existence."
Every word from Sarutobi Hiruzen struck Danzo's heart.
Danzo had never considered these things.
He only thought about how to protect Konoha with the most effective and ruthless means, but he forgot that the means themselves could become the root of Konoha's destruction.
Sarutobi Hiruzen's description showed him a path to ruin he had never envisioned.
"A root that is grounded in darkness and never sees the sun will ultimately have only two fates."
"Either it rots from within, or it becomes a venomous vine that turns around and strangles the very tree it was meant to nourish."
Danzo's lips moved, but no sound came out.
He found himself unable to refute.
What Hiruzen said was not impossible.
He looked at Sarutobi Hiruzen before him, the man he had always considered too merciful.
Overnight, it was as if he had become a different person.
His vision was too far-reaching, too deep.
"Power is a tool to protect them, not a toy to satisfy personal ambition."
Sarutobi Hiruzen's voice returned to its calm state.
He patted Danzo's shoulder.
"But I need you."
"I need your ruthlessness and decisiveness, your willingness to dirty your hands for the sake of the village."
Danzo's head snapped up, his eyes filled with astonishment.
"So, the leader of Root is still you."
A glimmer of hope rose in Danzo's heart.
After all this, Hiruzen still had to rely on him in the end.
However, Sarutobi Hiruzen's next sentence plunged him into an icy abyss.
"However, I need someone to assist you."
Sarutobi Hiruzen's expression did not change in the slightest.
"The second-in-command of Root will be Uchiha Kagami."
"What did you say?"
Danzo cried out, his face a mask of disbelief.
"But he's an Uchiha! To let him into Konoha's most core secret organization? Hiruzen, are you insane!"
"Have you forgotten how wary Sensei was of the Uchiha!"
"I haven't forgotten."
Sarutobi Hiruzen's tone was indisputable.
"I am more aware of Sensei's concerns than anyone. But I also trust Sensei's judgment. He trusted Kagami to his dying day."
"Making Kagami the second-in-command is to tell everyone in the village, especially the Uchiha clan, that we trust them."
"This is a sign of trust, and also a shackle. When an Uchiha enters Root, they must follow the Hokage's will as their highest command, not their clan's."
"This is the best opportunity to fully integrate the Uchiha into Konoha, and the only way."
"We can no longer push them to be the village's opposition."
Danzo's mind went blank.
He looked at Sarutobi Hiruzen, feeling a chill rise from the soles of his feet.
Making Uchiha Kagami the second-in-command was equivalent to placing a monitor absolutely loyal to the Hokage right beside him.
And he had framed it under the grand banner of trust.
What a brilliant move, killing two birds with one stone.
"And that's not all."
Sarutobi Hiruzen seemed to have seen through his thoughts.
"The first members of Root will be selected from the most loyal children of the major clans."
"Including people from my Sarutobi clan."
Danzo was completely stunned.
With this, he had no fight left in him.
With all the major clans sending people to join, Root would be transformed from his personal army into an elite force directly under the Hokage, composed of all the major clans.
He, as the leader, would be more like a figurehead, a chief instructor with no real power.
Any small move he tried to make would be exposed to everyone.
An overt scheme.
This was a completely overt scheme.
...
Hokage's Office.
Uchiha Kagami stood before the desk, his expression solemn.
"Lord Third, you sent for me."
Sarutobi Hiruzen put down the document in his hand and looked up at him.
"Kagami, the new department that was established a few days ago is, in general, for handling matters that are beyond the reach of the village's light and Anbu."
"I want you to serve as the deputy director of Root."
Uchiha Kagami's body shuddered violently.
He had thought Hiruzen would place him in an important position because of their teacher's relationship.
But he never imagined it would be this important.
To have an Uchiha take charge of a corner of the village's core power.
This trust was too heavy.
He instantly understood the profound meaning behind this appointment.
This was a signal to the entire Uchiha clan, no, to all of Konoha.
The Third Hokage wanted to resolve the rift between the Uchiha and the village.
A warm current surged through his heart.
He saw it.
He saw the hope of true integration between the village and the clan.
That was what the First Hokage had pursued his entire life, and it was the future he himself had dreamed of.
Uchiha Kagami took a step back, knelt on one knee, placed his right hand over his chest, and bowed his head deeply.
"Thank you for your trust, Lord Third!"
"From this day forward, my life and these eyes will fight only for you, Lord Hokage!"
Sarutobi Hiruzen stepped forward and personally helped him up.
"Kagami, I believe in you."
"I need your strength as well."
Uchiha Kagami's eyes were slightly red as he nodded heavily.
As he was leaving the office, he happened to pass Danzo, who was waiting at the door.
Their eyes met, and the atmosphere grew tense.
In the end, Uchiha Kagami gave a slight nod and left first.
Danzo entered the office and looked at Sarutobi Hiruzen sitting in the main seat, his feelings a complex mess.
He had lost.
All his schemes seemed so laughable in the face of Hiruzen's overt plot.
He had no choice but to accept it.
"Hiruzen, you will regret this."
He still said it in the end.
Sarutobi Hiruzen's gaze lifted from his documents, looking at him calmly.
"Danzo, I am the Hokage."
A single sentence lodged all of Danzo's unspoken words in his throat.
He gave Sarutobi Hiruzen a deep look, then turned and left the office.
He picked up a document and handed it to the Anbu behind him.
"Relay my orders."
"Root's first mission."
The Anbu knelt on one knee and respectfully took the document.
"Thoroughly investigate the list of orphans of fallen shinobi, and verify the distribution of their pensions."
"Anyone who has embezzled, skimmed, or misappropriated funds..."
A cold glint flashed in Sarutobi Hiruzen's eyes.
"Regardless of which clan they belong to, or what their status is."
"All are to be executed without mercy."
"Yes!"
The Anbu's figure vanished.
A few days later.
Within Konoha, several notorious moneylenders, as well as ninja responsible for resource allocation, were found dead in their homes.
Next to their bodies, a tree root symbol was drawn in blood.
At the same time, pensions that had been withheld for years were quietly delivered to the homes of the impoverished orphans.
The entire civilian population of Konoha was in an uproar.
People didn't know what Root was.
But they knew that the newly appointed Third Hokage was using the most thunderous means to seek justice for them, the victims of war.
In an instant, Sarutobi Hiruzen's prestige among the civilians reached its peak.
Inside the Hokage's office.
Utatane Koharu and Mitokado Homura looked at the report in their hands, their faces filled with undisguised admiration.
Late at night.
The light in the office was still on.
Sarutobi Hiruzen leaned back in his chair, rubbing his brow wearily.
Dealing with mountains of paperwork was more tiring than fighting the Gold and Silver Brothers.
His gaze fell on a thick list on the desk.
"Registry of Konoha's War Orphans Throughout the Years."
He flipped through it page by page. Behind every name was a broken family.
Suddenly, his finger stopped.
On one line of the list, a name was written.
"Orochimaru."
Both parents were Konoha jonin who died in a conflict with Iwagakure at the end of the First Great Ninja War.
In Sarutobi Hiruzen's mind, the bloody image from the simulator, of a chest pierced by the Sword of Kusanagi, flashed involuntarily.
And just then, the cold, mechanical voice sounded in his mind.
[Key Destiny-Node Figure Detected: Orochimaru.]
[Consume mental energy to simulate his various possible futures?]