By this time, Konoha was deep in the night.
The last traces of dim moonlight were swallowed by clouds. Most lamps had already gone out, leaving only a single light shining brightly in the darkness.
Paulownia leaves rustled softly in the night breeze. A Root shinobi, code-named "Owl," concealed his presence within the trees, watching the illuminated window in the distance.
Through the slats of the study's blinds, he could see the child named Hyūga Y Gin bent over his desk, writing. The surface of the diary reflected the warm glow of the desk lamp.
According to intelligence reports, this habit of keeping a diary had continued for many years.
"Meow."
A faint cat's cry blended into the chorus of insects. Owl frowned alertly and followed the sound with his eyes—only to see two dark shapes bobbing up and down, two cats calling out enthusiastically at one another.
"..."
Owl silently looked away, inwardly cursing himself for being paranoid.
The target was just a child.
Yet despite that thought, his mind involuntarily drifted to "Kama-itachi(Wind Cutter)", recalling the miserable sight of that man missing an arm. A chill crept up his spine.
Never underestimate anyone.
He had no desire to end up like that.
Just then, Y Gin set down his pen, glanced at the clock, rubbed his reddened eyes, slipped the fountain pen into the leather loop of the diary, and stood up, leaving the study.
Click.
With the soft sound of the bedroom door closing, the light went out, plunging the entire compound into darkness.
Owl did not move, remaining hidden among the foliage.
Only after clearly hearing snores drifting from inside did he finally release the hand seal for his sensory technique and flash toward the window like a falling leaf.
The opened window made a faint sound. Owl slipped silently into the study, first sealing the diary into a scroll, then conducting a quiet search of the room.
Unlike Kama-itachi(Wind Cutter), he did not attempt to assassinate Hyūga Y Gin. Finding nothing suspicious in the study, he planned to leave with only the diary.
Everything was restored to its original state.
Just as he was about to climb back out the window—
"WHO'S THERE?!"
A sudden shout rang out.
Owl's pupils shrank instantly.
Before he could react, a piercing wind howled behind him, shrieking like a malicious specter.
"Wind Release: Wind Severing Technique!"
Slash!
Owl barely managed to dodge to the side as a crescent-shaped blade of wind swept past him. Blood splattered across the wall in an uneven arc as a thin red line rapidly spread along his arm.
Splurt!
Blood burst forth as though a threshold had been crossed. His arm slid off cleanly at the shoulder and hit the floor with a heavy thud.
Owl let out a muffled groan, his body trembling violently. Without sparing a glance for the severed arm, he leapt straight out the window.
What he didn't see—
Was that after he left, far away, the black cat perched atop a calico froze mid-motion. Its pale eye turned toward the direction Owl fled. With a swipe of its paw, it smacked away the foolish companion that tried to crowd closer.
"Take something…
and you'll have to leave something behind."
Inside the bedroom, Hyūga Y Gin lowered his hands from their seals, a faint smile playing at his lips as he quietly waited for the system's notification.
Meanwhile, Owl—clutching his bleeding shoulder—soon arrived at a rocky cliff face. After triggering a mechanism, he slipped into layers of deep, dense shadow.
As he descended further underground, moisture and moss coated the dark corners. Warm humidity enveloped him, yet instead of suffocating, he felt an eerie sense of safety—
Like returning home.
"That kid really isn't simple," Owl muttered through clenched teeth, glancing at his endlessly bleeding wound.
"No wonder Kama-itachi(Wind Cutter) fell to him."
Deep underground lay a vast, enclosed space, brightly lit like daylight.
Beyond a massive observation window was a laboratory, where figures in white coats and masks moved busily about.
Rows of glass refrigeration units held countless materials—unnamed reagents, petri dishes containing cultured tissues.
Nearby were transparent containers filled with pale green solution, soaking bizarre plant specimens and portions of animal remains—eyeballs, kidneys, and other grotesque organs.
On the opposite side of the observation window stood Shimura Danzō, expressionless.
Darkness filled his narrow left eye as he stared intently—not at the researchers, but at the item on the experiment table.
A thumb-sized piece of white flesh.
Cells belonging to the First Hokage, Senju Hashirama.
Soon, however, a researcher turned and gently shook his head.
Danzō's expression darkened. He raised a hand to grasp his bound arm.
"Useless trash," he growled.
"Without Orochimaru, you can't accomplish anything."
He could feel the Hashirama cells eroding his body more aggressively by the day.
In the eyes of others—including Hiruzen Sarutobi—his arm was merely an old battlefield injury.
But they didn't know that this arm was no longer truly his.
Even Danzō himself didn't know its true origin. Orochimaru had remained maddeningly tight-lipped, saying only that it was a byproduct of his Wood Release experiments.
Hungry for power, Danzō had accepted the transplant, embedding all of his stored Sharingan into it.
What he hadn't anticipated was how violently invasive Hashirama's cells were.
After only a few years, the erosion had already become severe—and to this day, no one understood how Orochimaru had stabilized the arm in the first place.
The only discovery so far was that Sharingan could suppress the cells.
But at this rate, the Sharingan he possessed were no longer enough.
"Damn it…"
"If 'Kinoe' hadn't been taken by Hiruzen, I might've been able to send him after Hatake Kakashi's Sharingan."
As he pondered where to acquire more eyes—
"Owl," masked, appeared beside him, half-kneeling and presenting the scroll with a trembling voice.
"Lord Danzō."
The thick stench of blood made Danzō's expression stiffen. He frowned at Owl's missing arm.
"…Why is it always arms?"
His own injured arm twitched slightly, as if personally offended. He waved the thought away, took the scroll, and dismissed Owl.
Danzō opened it and began to read.
He had ordered Hyūga Y Gin's diary brought back to better understand this so-called "Hyūga failure"—and determine whether the boy was worth recruiting.
The contents were mostly mundane daily entries. Danzō skimmed quickly, forming an image in his mind.
A once-cowardly child who, after his father was driven to death by the clan, began to crave power.
Craving power is good.
He feared only those with no desires at all.
When Danzō reached Y Gin's "message" to Hiruzen Sarutobi, his reaction was one of scorn—and a sour tinge of jealousy.
That hypocrite didn't deserve such praise.
Only the passage concerning "roots" made Danzō pause.
Then, as he turned the page, his hand froze.
His eyes locked onto a single line.
"…Perhaps my heart is like a tree—
the more it longs for the light above,
the deeper its roots must burrow downward,
into the soil… into the darkness."
At the same time, inside Hyūga Y Gin's bedroom—
The system notification finally sounded.
[Ding! Your lie has been judged as Flowery Words.
Shimura Danzō has experienced emotional fluctuation, reaching the state of "Kindred Spirit."
You have gained 400 Reality Points.]
"Who even keeps a diary seriously?"
Y Gin chuckled, then silently commanded,
"Manifest Ninjutsu — Lightning Release Chakra Mode."
[Cost: 1000 Reality Points. Confirm?]
"Yes."
[1000 Reality Points deducted. Remaining: 10593]
Excellent. Still safely above ten thousand.
Many thanks to Lord Danzō for the generous donation.
Y Gin lay back down and slowly closed his eyes as memories of Lightning Release Chakra Mode poured into his mind.
Yet as his consciousness drifted, a question resurfaced—one he had been pondering for some time.
"If ninjutsu can be manifested…"
"Then can abilities from other worlds be manifested as well?"
Direct manifestation of non–shinobi-world powers had already been tested.
It didn't work.
The system operated strictly within the rules and logic of this world—aside from chakra, it could not create entirely foreign power systems.
But Y Gin had a theory.
"What if… using existing foundations—
the soul, the body, natural energy, chakra—
I imitate and recreate abilities from other worlds?"
If he could truly create something from nothing—
shatter everyone's understanding of the world and make them believe in an entirely new form of power—
The Reality Points gained would be astronomical.
His design involving Orochimaru was meant to test exactly this.
Pure lies never convince anyone.
Three parts false, seven parts true—
that's how deception works.
To perfect this idea, he would need the help of dear Lord Orochimaru.
With the guidance hidden in that scroll, Orochimaru—already deeply versed in the soul—would surely fabricate a self-consistent theory and framework.
At that point, Y Gin could transform theory and logic into actual rules of reality.
He would become an existence like the Sage of Six Paths himself—
Presiding over a small, independent world.
Commanding countless powerful souls.
Author's Note :
Boruto is honestly ridiculous. That whole Uchiha Shin setup—claiming his body doesn't reject transplanted organs, that Orochimaru implanted him with Sharingan collected by Danzō during the Uchiha massacre, then later gave Shin's arm to Danzō—just doesn't add up.
Itachi became an ANBU captain at thirteen and only then massacred the clan. Orochimaru had already defected years earlier, yet Danzō was already walking around with that Sharingan arm before Orochimaru left.
I'm borrowing the concept slightly and trying to rationalize it. Between the manga, anime, databooks, and now Boruto, the contradictions are enough to give anyone a headache.