The air in the Root headquarters was dead. It had no temperature, no scent, no life. It was simply a void, pressed between walls of cold, weeping stone. In the center of a barren room, a single lantern cast a sickly yellow light on a stone desk, leaving the corners of the chamber to drown in absolute darkness.
A figure knelt in that darkness, their featureless white mask a stark skull in the gloom. They spoke, their voice a dry, toneless whisper, devoid of all human inflection.
"Lord Danzo. The target, Ryu Haruno, has been under constant surveillance for one week. The observations are… inconclusive."
Danzo Shimura did not look up from the documents he was reviewing. The operative's slight hesitation was more telling than any report. "Explain."
"His behavior is unremarkable," the whisper continued. "He attends the Academy daily. His performance in class is average. His taijutsu during spars is proficient but displays none of the overwhelming speed or nature transformation from the entrance exam. He socializes with the Uchiha heir and the Inuzuka heiress. Outside of the Academy, his activities are confined to his home. There is no clandestine training. There is nothing."
A heavy silence fell over the room. The report was a direct contradiction to the boy who had fought Itachi Uchiha to a standstill. It made no sense.
Danzo finally set his papers down. He stared into the darkness where the operative knelt, his one visible eye narrowed into a slit. Unremarkable. Average. The words were an insult to his intelligence. This wasn't the behavior of a prodigy. It was the behavior of a ghost, a perfect, boring performance designed to deflect attention.
He knows, Danzo thought, a flicker of something akin to respect stirring within him. He knows he is being watched.
The boy wasn't just hiding his power; he was presenting a false, mundane self to the world. It was a level of deception that was breathtaking in its audacity. To have the discipline to suppress his own abilities so completely, day after day, was a sign of a will forged from iron.
"Your observations are incomplete," Danzo said, his voice a low, cold rasp. "You are seeing the mask, not the man. You are watching a performance. Do not break contact for a single second. I want to know when he eats, when he sleeps, when he breathes. Watch for the cracks. Find the truth behind the act."
"As you wish, Lord Danzo," the operative whispered, and then, as silently as he had appeared, he was gone.
Danzo stared at the empty space, a slow, predatory satisfaction stirring within him. This was better than he could have imagined. The boy wasn't just a weapon to be forged. He was a puzzle to be solved. A ghost to be unmasked.
Miles above that cold, dark place, the sun was warm and golden. In the quiet, sun-drenched garden of the Sarutobi estate, Hiruzen snipped a tiny, errant leaf from a bonsai maple with a pair of silver shears. The only sounds were the gentle rustle of leaves in the breeze, the distant, happy hum of the village, and the soft clink of a ceramic cup being placed on the stone table beside him.
"You'll wear a hole in that poor tree if you keep fussing with it," a voice said, a familiar blend of gentle teasing and sharp observation.
Hiruzen turned, a soft smile creasing the lines around his eyes. His wife, Biwako, stood there, a tray with a steaming teapot and two cups in her hands. She poured the fragrant green tea, her movements practiced and graceful. Retirement, Hiruzen had found, was a series of these small, perfect moments, strung together like pearls.
"It requires patience, my dear," he chuckled, setting the shears down. "Something the Hokage's office rarely allows for."
Biwako sat opposite him, her gaze knowing. "Speaking of which, how is our young Hokage holding up? Honestly, Hiruzen, I don't know how you did it for so long. The paperwork alone is a force of nature."
Hiruzen took a slow sip of his tea, the warmth spreading through him. "Minato is doing wonderfully," he said, his voice filled with a genuine, paternal pride. "He has a clarity that I often lacked. He sees the best in people, and it inspires them to live up to his expectations. He leads with the sun, not the shadow."
"He is a kind boy," Biwako agreed. "But kindness can be a heavy burden for a leader."
"It is," Hiruzen nodded. "But it is also the very heart of the Will of Fire." He leaned forward, his old eyes twinkling with a shared secret. "And it seems his heart is about to get much fuller. He came to see me yesterday."
Biwako's eyebrows raised in curiosity.
"Kushina is pregnant."
The words were simple, but they landed in the quiet garden with a profound and happy weight. A slow, beautiful smile bloomed on Biwako's face.
"Oh, Hiruzen," she breathed, her hand coming to rest on his. "That's… that's wonderful news." As a medic who had long been Kushina's personal attendant, she knew better than anyone the significance of it. "A Jinchuriki pregnancy will require special precautions, of course, but… a child. For those two."
Hiruzen nodded, his own smile wide and full of warmth. He looked past his tranquil garden, out at the sprawling, sun-drenched village below, at the great stone faces of the Hokage monument watching over it all. A new life was coming. A new leaf, a new spark to add to the great fire of Konoha. It was the promise of a future, the very reason he had fought and bled for so many years. In that moment, the world felt perfectly, wonderfully right.
The sun hadn't even thought about waking up yet, but Ryu was already hard at work in his secret clearing. The grass was still wet with dew, and the air was cool and quiet.
His old plan, trying to squish a ball of lightning into a tiny point, was a total failure. It was like trying to stuff an angry cat into a very small sock. All he got for his trouble were a lot of painful zaps and frizzy hair.
So, he had a new, much better idea.
He held out his hand and formed the familiar, crackling ball of blue lightning. But this time, instead of squishing, he started to spin it. He imagined it was like a tiny, electric hurricane in his palm. The buzzing sound of the lightning grew into a high-pitched whine as it picked up speed.
"Okay, Part One is a go," he muttered to himself. "Now for the fun part."
He focused, feeding a stream of his green-colored wind chakra into the spinning vortex of lightning. The moment the two energies met, things got wild. The blue lightning and green wind swirled together, creating a beautiful, chaotic ball of teal-colored energy that hummed with a dangerous power. The spinning got faster and faster, pulling in leaves and twigs from the ground, until the pressure in his hand felt like it was about to explode.
"Now or never!" he grunted, thrusting his hand forward.
A thick, brilliant teal beam of energy shot out of his palm. It wasn't a zap or a spark; it was a solid laser of pure power. The beam hit a huge boulder that Ryu used for target practice, and the boulder didn't just crack or break. It vanished. One second it was there, a big, boring rock, and the next it was just a cloud of dust.
But the beam didn't stop. It kept going, punching a perfectly round, cartoon-style hole straight through the middle of three large trees before finally fizzling out in the distance.
Ryu stared, his mouth hanging open. The clearing was silent except for the gentle sound of dust settling.
"It worked," he whispered. Then a huge, giddy grin spread across his face. "IT WORKED! I AM A GENIUS!"
He leaped into the air, punching his fist towards the sky in victory. It was the best, most awesome, most ridiculously overpowered jutsu ever! He was going to call it the... the... "Teal Tornado Beam of Doom!" Or maybe something cooler. He'd work on the name later.
He landed back on the ground, still grinning from ear to ear, and then his legs promptly turned to jelly.
Whoa, he thought, as the world started to spin.
He crumpled to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, completely and utterly drained. Every muscle ached, and his head felt fuzzy. He lay on his back, staring up at the slowly lightening sky, panting like he'd just run a race around the entire village.
"Okay," he said to a passing squirrel. "Note to self: the Teal Tornado Beam of Doom is a one-shot-wonder." He closed his eyes. "And it needs a much better name."