The air in the Uchiha compound was always thick with unspoken things—grievance, pride, a simmering tension that had only grown heavier since the Kyuubi's attack two years prior. The Fourth Hokage was a ghost they were collectively blamed for housing, and the village's sidelong glances had hardened into a wall of silent suspicion.
Hana Uchiha, at twenty, was an anomaly in a clan obsessed with lineage and legacy. Unmarried, uninterested in the political machinations of her elders, she often sat alone on the engawa of her small, quiet home, a pot of tea steaming beside her. She was pretty in a way that was often overlooked, her dark eyes holding a depth that most found disquieting, a stillness that was mistaken for meekness. They didn't know it was the calm at the eye of a hurricane.
That afternoon was no different. The sun was warm, dappling through the leaves of a lone persimmon tree in her garden. Two of her clansmen, Yashiro and Tekka, were loitering nearby, ostensibly checking on a water line, but really keeping a casual, clan-mandated watch on the comings and goings in the district. Their presence was a dull buzz Hana had long learned to tune out.
She lifted her cup, the scent of jasmine filling her senses. She closed her eyes. And then, she began to sing.
Her voice was low, not a melody they recognized, but a raw, resonant chant that seemed to vibrate through the very wood of the engawa. It was a sound none of them had ever heard from her—from anyone.
*"The tides of the past
Turned my aching scars to hardened scales
My breath, a coming storm..."*
Yashiro paused, his hand on the water valve, and frowned. He glanced at Tekka, who had straightened up, his expression puzzled. The words were strange, foreign, but the power behind them was unmistakable. It was a song of deep, ancient pain, of transformation.
*"My bloodline, my roots
Buried deep within, beneath my skin
My heart, drawing the thunder's hymns..."*
A few other Uchiha, drawn by the unusual sound, had begun to linger at the edges of the garden. An elderly woman hanging laundry slowed her hands. A young man practicing shurikenjutsu on a nearby post stopped, the kunai frozen in his grip. Hana's voice was weaving a spell, a palpable energy gathering around her. The air grew heavy, charged, like the moment before a lightning strike.
*"Cold steel sharpens, tempers my scorching bones
The storm, a song tearing from out my throat
Legends guide and shape me
Forging me in agony..."*
Her voice rose, no longer just a song but a declaration. It was fury and resilience given sound. It was the voice of every slight the clan had ever endured, every scar earned and hidden, forged into something unbreakable. The Uchiha nearby felt a bizarre and unsettling pull—a primal recognition. It was the Sharingan put to music, all seeing, all feeling agony.
*"Unveil my heart and song
Mighty roars that ring ever long
Cast off the dead and gone
The storms rage on—"*
The final note hung in the air, not fading but seeming to solidify, a shard of pure, resonant power. For a heartbeat, there was perfect, stunned silence.
It was broken by a sudden, frantic rush of footsteps.
A Jonin, his face pale as ash, skidded to a halt at the gate of the compound, his chest heaving. He didn't even address the gathered Uchiha properly, his eyes wide with a terror that transcended clan rivalries.
"Hokage-sama!" he gasped, the title a ragged cry. "The council... something's happened! They're... they're all dead!"
The Uchiha stared, their own concerns about Hana's strange song instantly vaporized.
"What? Who's dead?" Yashiro demanded, stepping forward, his voice sharp.
"Hiruzen-sama! Homura-sama! Koharu-sama! They just... collapsed! In the council chamber!" The Jonin's voice broke. "And... and Lord Danzo. All of them. At once. The medics said... it was as if their hearts just... stopped."
The news hit the group like a physical blow. The Hokage and all his top advisors. The village's entire leadership, gone in an instant. And Danzo, the shadowy figure who whispered poison about the Uchiha into every ear he could find. Dead.
A collective, stunned silence fell over them again. It was impossible. Unthinkable.
And then, as one, their heads turned.
Their eyes, wide with dawning horror and a superstitious fear older than shinobi arts, slid from the panicked messenger to the woman still sitting on the engawa.
Hana Uchiha took a slow, deliberate sip of her tea. The steam curled around her face, which was serene, placid, utterly unchanged. She placed the cup down on the wooden plank with a soft, final *click*.
She did not look at them. She did not smile or frown. She simply gazed out into her garden, at the persimmon tree, as if she had not just sung the world into a new, terrifying shape.
The storms, after all, rage on.