The Hokage's office was unusually quiet that day. Parchments stacked neatly on the desk rustled faintly as Hiruzen Sarutobi set down his brush. The silence, however, was shattered when the door flew open with a thunderous slam.
"Hiruzen! I heard the Nine-Tails has begun training in taijutsu?" Danzo Shimura strode into the room, his face dark, voice edged with impatience.
Hiruzen lifted his gaze from the documents, his calm eyes locking on the intruder. "Not taijutsu training," he corrected with deliberate weight. "He is merely exercising his body."
Danzo scoffed, dismissive. "Call it what you like. Even if the beast seems stable now, that does not mean it will remain so in the future. My proposal is simple: hand him over to the Foundation. I will ensure he is shaped into a proper weapon."
The words had barely left his mouth before Hiruzen's tone turned iron-cold. "Absolutely not." His voice carried the weight of finality.
"And he has a name," the Hokage continued, his eyes sharpening like steel. "Naruto Uzumaki. He is not the Nine-Tails. Watch your words, Danzo."
Danzo did not flinch, his single visible eye burning with fury. "You'll regret this, Hiruzen."
"Remember," Hiruzen said, adjusting the Hokage's ceremonial hat, his presence filling the room like a mountain. "I am the Hokage."
The tension snapped like a bowstring.
"Enough!" Danzo snarled, turning sharply on his heel. The door rattled as he slammed it behind him, the echo of his footsteps receding down the hall. For years, that same phrase I am the Hokage had weighed heavily on him, a constant reminder of the power he could never seize.
Hiruzen remained by his desk for a long moment before rising and walking toward the tall office window. He watched Danzo's shadow retreating, a heaviness settling in his chest. His expression hardened.
He knew the truth.
When the rumors had first spread years ago whispers that Naruto was not a child but the very embodiment of the Nine-Tailed Fox it had blindsided him. Few in the village had the influence to seed such a rumor so quickly and thoroughly. To uncover the culprit had been simple.
It was Danzo.
The realization had filled Hiruzen with a rare and burning anger. He had stripped away portions of Danzo's authority as punishment, though not all. For all his ruthlessness, Danzo was a comrade, a bond stretching back to their youth. Time had dulled Hiruzen's edge, age had eroded his once-unyielding resolve, and so he left the Foundation in Danzo's hands.
Now, however, he could only murmur under his breath. "Do not lose yourself completely, Danzo. If you walk the wrong path, not even I will shield you."
Turning away from the window, his gaze fell on the framed portraits that lined the wall. His eyes lingered on the image of a young man with golden hair, a bright smile frozen in time.
"Minato…" Hiruzen's voice softened, almost paternal. "If only you were still here. I have grown old. But rest assured, your son's safety will never be neglected. I swear it."
The boy's identity was too dangerous, too layered with peril.
Naruto was both the host of the Nine-Tails and the orphaned child of the Fourth Hokage.
When Hiruzen had taken the infant into his arms that night, his first instinct had been to conceal everything. But Danzo, in his hunger, had acted without restraint, spreading the poisonous idea that Naruto was the Nine-Tails incarnate.
It was a calculated move. By stoking the villagers' fear, Danzo sought to pressure the Hokage into surrendering the child to the Foundation. He envisioned Naruto molded into nothing more than a loyal weapon.
But for once, Hiruzen had refused to bend. Against the tide of outrage, he had stood firm, issuing a decree: no one was to harm Naruto. Any violation would be punished with the full weight of the law. That single moment of defiance had caught Danzo off guard. For a fleeting instant, Danzo must have wondered if the resolute, fiery Hiruzen of their youth had returned.
The truth was this: the revelation of Naruto as a Jinchūriki, a human host, was dangerous but survivable. Every great village had its tailed beast containers. To assassinate one was folly at the brink of death, a tailed beast would not idly watch its vessel perish. Its rage would explode outward, leaving devastation in its wake.
It would take a Kage-level shinobi to fell a Jinchūriki, and no village could afford such an exchange. To lose a leader in order to kill a host was far too steep a price.
But the boy's heritage? That was different.
The son of the Yellow Flash.
That truth could never be allowed to surface. Not a single hint.
When Minato Namikaze fell, the Third Great War was fading but not yet concluded. If the enemy nations had discovered the child left behind, assassination attempts would have rained down endlessly.
Minato's name alone carried terror. On the battlefield, he had been a phantom of golden light, earning the moniker "The Yellow Flash." His kill count was beyond reckoning. Shinobi from all four great nations had fallen before him, as had countless mercenaries from smaller villages.
In fact, an unspoken rule had once circulated among enemy forces: if you encountered the Yellow Flash, you had permission to retreat without penalty. That was how deep the fear ran.
Those who had faced him and survived lived with scars deeper than flesh. They turned at shadows, slept fitfully, avoided walking with their backs exposed, fearing at any moment that golden light would flicker and their lives would end in silence.
For every man Minato killed, there were families, clans, entire circles of friends left hungering for vengeance. His reputation was built upon rivers of blood, and his enemies were unnumbered.
So long as Minato lived, none dared challenge him. But with him gone, the boy he left behind was a target. If it were ever revealed that Naruto was Minato's son, the child would be hunted to exhaustion. Assassins from every corner of the shinobi world would descend.
And Hiruzen knew: no guardian, not even himself, could shield Naruto forever. He could not spend his days and nights at the boy's side. Reality forbade it.
That was why the truth had to remain buried.
All he wanted was for Naruto to grow up like any other child. To live, laugh, stumble, and rise again. To simply be safe. That was the only wish left to an aging Hokage.
"Kakashi!" Hiruzen's voice broke the silence, resonating across the office.
At once, the air shimmered. A white-haired shinobi materialized from the shadows, clad in the uniform of the ANBU, his mask concealing all but one eye.
"Hokage-sama," Kakashi said, kneeling on one knee, his tone formal and unwavering.
"From this day forward, you will watch over Naruto," Hiruzen commanded. His voice was low but firm, brooking no argument. After a pause, his eyes narrowed. "And should any operative from the Foundation attempt to interfere with him… do not hesitate. Kill them. Under no circumstances is Naruto to be handed over to Danzo."
At the mention of Naruto, Kakashi's lone eye flickered, a warmth breaking through his otherwise impassive expression.
For him, family was long gone. His father, his teacher, his comrades one by one, all had been taken. The heart that had once brimmed with talent and promise had grown cold, encased in grief.
Only Naruto remained, the last living bond to his late sensei.
Once, Kakashi had pleaded with the Hokage to let him raise the boy, to keep him close. But Hiruzen had refused. Any association with Minato's surviving comrades would risk exposing the truth. To the outside world, Naruto had to remain just another orphan.
And so, Hiruzen had erased every clue, every thread that might betray Naruto's parentage.
Now, at long last, Kakashi was given leave to protect him from the shadows.
"I understand," Kakashi replied. For the first time in years, he accepted a mission not out of duty, but out of his own will.
Hiruzen studied him quietly, a sigh pressing at the edges of his chest. He remembered the boy who had once been Konoha's brightest prodigy, the youngest ever to become a jōnin at twelve. Now that same boy was a man frozen in place, weighed down by ghosts.
Once, he had considered grooming Kakashi as the next Hokage. But in his current state, it was impossible. The burden would crush him.
The Third turned his gaze back to the window. The village beyond lay bathed in sunlight, unaware of the fragile threads holding its future together.
And at the center of it all was one small boy.