Two months had passed since Renji's miraculous revival in the mortuary, yet his condition remained unstable. His body lived, but his spirit wandered in and out of reach. Sometimes he stirred faintly, a flicker of breath, a twitch of fingers, before slipping back into a deep, unnatural coma. To the medical-nin watching over him, it was as though the boy teetered between two worlds, caught in a limbo that refused to let him go. Word spread through the village about an Uchiha who had survived the massacre, and whispers grew louder with each passing day.
At the Hokage Tower, Danzo entered Hiruzen's office in a storm, his steps sharp against the wooden floor. Homura Mitokado and Koharu Utatane, the two elders, were already present, their faces tight with unease.
"The boy should not be alive," Danzo snapped, his single visible eye burning with accusation. "This is a mistake. Keeping him alive is a risk."
Hiruzen exhaled smoke from his pipe, his calm expression unshaken. "Renji is the child we all saved that night. His condition is precarious, yes, but his existence is not a crime."
Danzo's voice dropped, sharp and venomous. "It should have ended years ago. At birth."
The silence in the room thickened. Homura and Koharu exchanged tense glances, the weight of a buried secret pressing down. It was they, alongside Hiruzen, who had intervened during Renji's birth—who had stopped the clan from erasing the child in secret.
Hiruzen's eyes hardened, his voice cutting through the smoke-filled chamber. "That choice was made, Danzo. By me. By us. And we will honor it still."
Danzo's jaw tightened, fury flashing across his face. "Your compassion blinds you, Hiruzen. That boy could become something you cannot control." Danzo seethed, but Hiruzen's quiet authority pressed down like stone. The decision was final. The boy would live.
That night, Renji's body lay motionless in the hospital. His breath was steady, but his mind slipped deeper, past the edge of dream and into a place that did not belong to the living.
He fell into the Uchiha mind's eye—yet it was not the crimson void whispered about in the clan. His world was emerald green, a vast, endless expanse that shimmered with an unnatural glow. The ground beneath him was glassy and reflective, pulsing faintly with his heartbeat.
And then they appeared.
Four shadowy figures emerged from the shifting green horizon, their Mangekyō eyes burning the same emerald hue. Each carried a weapon—a massive hammer, dual short swords, a longbow, and a polearm. They stood silently, their presence heavy, their forms half-shadow, half-flesh.
Though they did not speak, Renji felt the weight of their gaze settle on him. It was not hostility, nor warmth—only a quiet, suffocating expectation. They loomed like guardians, or perhaps executioners, watching every breath he took.
The silence pressed in, and yet from it, fragments of knowledge seeped into Renji's mind. Fire twisting into illusion. Shadows rising like soldiers. And above all, the shape of a towering Susanoo, emerald eyes gleaming, wielding both spear and shield.
Another name carved itself into his thoughts, heavy as stone. Tsukuyomi. Renji staggered, clutching his head as realization crashed over him. These powers were not dreams. They were real. They belonged to him.
The four shadows did not move closer, but their outlines shimmered faintly, as though acknowledging his awareness. They remained fixed, patient, waiting.
In the hospital room, his fingers twitched once more. The medical-nin whispered in alarm, yet still, they could not know. Unaware that the boy's true exploration was being waged in a world none of them could see—an emerald world of silence, power, and shadows.