He thought of his father, of clan meetings cloaked in secrecy.
Why? Why is this even happening?
He stepped out into the hallway, leaned against a column, and let out a breath that he didn't realize he'd been holding.
His thoughts were in chaos.
Is it my fault? Am I not strong enough? Why are we heading toward a war with our own people? If Konoha falls, it won't be from outside. It will be because we couldn't stop this from within.
He imagined Sasuke walking through a village in flames. No. I won't allow that. Even if I must betray everything I know... my clan, my code, my mission... I will protect the village. That thought, dark and unwavering, etched itself deeper into his soul.
He pulled his hood up. He needed to return to the Hidden Leaf. The Lord Hokage had to know.
Even more than that... He needed to know who among the Uchiha had sent that scroll.
But before that.... who is this boss?
--
Itachi did not leave the merchant office immediately. His instincts warned him that something was amiss... more than what Mugen's words had let on. The red-ring scroll, the sudden surge in weapons trade, the absence of this mysterious "boss," and the volume of goods being moved... it didn't feel like a simple escalation. It felt like a storm was about to break.
Before leaving, he knew he had to uncover the current dealings between the Mugen Merchant Company and the Uchiha clan. More importantly, he had to find out who this elusive "boss" truly was. That knowledge might shift everything.
When Mugen excused himself to begin preparing security logistics for the caravan, Itachi quietly shadowed him from a distance. His Sharingan spun slowly, taking in every flicker of chakra around the compound. Mugen entered the inner archives briefly, then took a sealed pouch and handed it to a courier. As the courier departed, Itachi marked him and placed him under a subtle genjutsu... one that would keep him oblivious while feeding back visual and auditory information.
Then, Itachi returned to the compound under the guise of leaving, but doubled back with stealth. Within Mugen's archives, he cast a high-level genjutsu on the guards and the document keeper... a subtle illusion that bought him time without alerting anyone.
He uncovered transaction logs between the Uchiha and Mugen's company. The earlier requests were small... quantities of weapons, medical herbs, sealing tools, and raw chakra ore. But the logs showed a rapid increase in order size over the past one month. The latest delivery was not only the largest but also bypassed the usual chain of command. It was a direct request signed under the same red-ring insignia, but this time addressed personally to Mugen.
That was a red flag.
To find the origin, Itachi expanded his genjutsu reach. He snuck into the dormitory where the senior staff resided, one by one placing them under a hypnotic trance. From a senior trade officer, he learned of the red-ring scrolls' entry points. They came not directly from the Uchiha compound but through a location masked as a gambling house called The Hidden Flames, deep within Fire Country's trading district.
He made his way there at nightfall.
The Hidden Flames was raucous on the surface... coin games, dice tables, sake flowing. But beneath it, chakra signatures were carefully concealed. Slipping past illusions and noise, Itachi identified a handful of people with faint Uchiha chakra signatures.
In the storage room, he subdued the head clerk and cast a genjutsu that pried open memories. One by one, he saw glimpses:
A masked man, known only as the "boss," receiving scrolls from Uchiha.
The same boss giving orders to trade small shipments... rare metals, tools, and forged IDs.
Money flowing into the gambling den and vanishing through hidden channels.
The Nameless uchiha boss meeting GM directly handing him a scroll and speaking in hushed threats.
This broke the usual chain. Normally, the scrolls passed through to keep uchiha out the mess and Hidden flames gambling house was the face:
Uchiha Clan → Nameless Uchiha Boss → Hidden Flames Gambling House → Mugen Merchant Company
But lately, the Nameless Uchiha Boss had cut the gambling house out, dealing directly with Mugen.
Itachi pieced it together:
An unknown group... outsiders, perhaps mercenaries or rogue intelligence... had discovered the Hidden flames' underground financing. They had seen a large cache of money that was meant to be sent to GM. Alarmed, the nameless Uchiha boss broke the usual secrecy and approached GM directly to accelerate operations before the whole system collapsed. GM, greedy and opportunistic, leapt at the chance.
Together, with GM's deep knowledge of trade routes and the Uchiha's red-ring scroll authority, they began moving vast quantities... bypassing all regulation.
Itachi stood over the subdued Hidden Flames clerk, heart pounding.
Was the Uchiha planning a coup sooner than expected?
Itachi stared at the crumpled red-ring scroll, now retrieved from the gambling house's secret drawer. The boss had written it just before his disappearance:
"Increase delivery. Time is short. They saw the money crates. I will take care of them. I leave the rest to your discretion, GM. Do not fail us."
He clenched the scroll.The shadows of the Uchiha were moving faster than he'd feared.
He didn't have an answer yet. But he had more questions.
Where was the nameless Uchiha boss?
When he asked, the clerk showed panic. "He left... two weeks ago. Said he had to visit someone west of Fire Country. He never came back."
Itachi filed the location.
He calculated a potential perimeter search... 1km, 2km, 5km... but anything beyond that would be lost. Too much time had passed. The man could be dead, captured, or worse... defected, if not he should have returned by now.
Itachi left the city walls under darkness, moving silently through forested paths west of the Fire Country. He began a perimeter search within 1km radius first. No sign. Second perimeter, broader… he found a small blood smear on a tree bark, long dried. Animals had already disturbed the scene. It could have been completely unrelated.
By the 5km mark, he found a broken shard of obsidian common in high-ranking Uchiha weapon seals.
He activated his Sharingan and replayed visual echoes faint chakra residue, fading trails. A skirmish, brief. The Nameless uchiha boss had been attacked. Two attackers, No only one.
Traces of explosion. Very light dried blood on the dirt and trees, which if not seen keenly would have went unnoticed. He found a body thrown out from a tomb with missing eyes. [A/N: Kakuzu has taken the eyes and left the heart as it was not useful.]
What Itachi didn't know, what no one knew, was that this nameless Uchiha boss was silenced by Neji Hyuga, as he was a dangerous catalysts in his plans to stretch his eyes outside konoha.
He compiled a detailed record each intercepted scroll, every suspicious transaction, routes, disguises used, merchant seal signatures, quantities, timings, names of the guards and gambling house agents, chakra signatures, and mentions of the red-ring. He sealed the record in a coded fūinjutsu scroll under his own ANBU name.
This was evidence. If coup was coming, Konoha had to be ready. He left the gambling house in silence. His single crow followed him in the moonlight.
--
The rain slicked tiles of the Uchiha compound gleamed under a silvered moon. Inside the largest meeting hall... a wide tatami-floored chamber with high cedar beams... the Coup Faction gathered. Shadows clung to the corners; only a low brazier's fire cast an orange glow over the council.
At the head sat Setsuna Uchiha, the faction leader. His hair was iron-grey, tied back tightly, his face carved with the lines of a man who had fought too many battles to be patient anymore. His Sharingan glimmered faintly even at rest, like coals that never fully cooled.
The murmurs in the room hushed as Setsuna's palm slammed the table.
"Confirmation just arrived from our contacts in the merchant company," Setsuna began, voice deep and deliberate. "The next shipment of weapons is in motion. It will arrive within the month."
A ripple of nods and quiet satisfaction spread across the seated Uchiha.
But then his tone hardened. "And yet... nothing from him."
They all knew who he meant: the Nameless Uchiha... their best unregistered ninja, the one who had handled every covert transaction with the outside world. The man whose face not even Fugaku Uchiha had seen. His disappearance was a wound in their chain of command.
Setsuna's eyes narrowed. "Ten days. Ten days without contact. Not a word. Not a sign. And because we cannot risk sending a registered ninja, we sit here with our hands tied like fools."
One of the younger lieutenants spoke hesitantly. "We could… assign another unregistered uchiha ninja. There are—"
"No," Setsuna cut in sharply. "The Nameless was our best. A shadow with no record, no ties. Replacing him without cause risks exposing the network we've built for years."
Another voice, more cautious, ventured, "If the shipment is delayed..."
"It won't be," Setsuna growled, though a faint doubt glimmered in his tone. "We wait two more days. If there is still no word, we send one of our own. And not just to recover the next shipment but to take control of the merchant link permanently. It seems G.M is doing is great job for us."
One of the older clan members unrolled a parchment. Inked tallies lined the page.
"This shipment will arm nearly few dozens of out shinobi. But… it is still not enough," the man admitted, glancing at Setsuna.
Setsuna's jaw clenched. "Not enough. Never enough." He rose from his seat and began pacing slowly along the length of the room.
"Do you know what it feels like," he said, his voice a low growl, "to have been the backbone of this village's military… and then to be pushed aside like ornamental guards at the gate? We, the Uchiha, built the safety of the Hidden Leaf with our blood. And how are we repaid? We are boxed into the Police Force like watchdogs, while the Hokage and his lapdogs decide the fate of the village."
He turned sharply, Sharingan flaring, catching the eyes of every person present.
"This coup is not just about reclaiming our pride. It is about taking the seat of power that was always ours by right. And to do that, we will need more than just enough to fight, we will need enough to rule."
Setsuna's voice lowered, almost intimate. "With the right stockpiles, the right timing, we will end this in a single strike. And when we control the weapons… we will control the economy. No trade leaves or enters the Fire Country without passing through Uchiha hands. The Hokage's office will be an old talk. We will be the pillar that holds this nation upright."