Danzo's single word "Good" was like a stone thrown into stagnant water; it caused no ripples, yet it made the surrounding air grow heavier.
The greed and calculation in his single eye had not faded, but rather gained a layer of scrutiny.
"Trust without proof is the cheapest thing," Danzo said, tapping his staff lightly on the ground. "I have given you special privileges. Now, you need to show me value commensurate with those privileges."
He turned his head and ordered the Root Ninja who had been standing stiffly beside him.
"Take him to the 'Zeroing Chamber.'"
"Let 'Zero' test him."
…The so-called "Zeroing Chamber" was a massive cavern even deeper underground than the stone chamber.
There were no walls here, only an endless darkness. Underfoot was a cold, hard rock floor, covered with complex patterns of unknown purpose. The air was filled with a peculiar scent, a mixture of disinfectant and dried blood.
This was Root's screening ground, and also the graveyard for new members. Only those who could walk out of here were deemed worthy of being used as "tools."
Naruto stood in the center of the cavern. The Ninja who had led him there had already retreated into the darkness.
It was so quiet that he could hear the sound of his own blood flowing.
A figure slowly emerged from the darkness opposite him.
He wore the same uniform as the previous Ninja and a plain white mask without any patterns, code-named "Zero."
He was one of the sharpest blades in Danzo's hand, and also Root's instructor, responsible for completely "zeroing out" new recruits who still harbored residual emotions.
"In Root, there are only two rules," Zero's voice, filtered through the mask, became flat and devoid of emotion, like a machine's synthesis. "First, Lord Danzo's orders are absolute. Second, forget yourself."
As he spoke, he slowly walked towards Naruto, an invisible pressure accompanying his steps, attempting to mentally crush his target.
"You are special, allowed not to receive the Cursed Seal. But this does not mean you can rise above the rules."
"Now, let me see where that arrogant confidence of yours truly comes from."
The moment his words fell, Zero's Chakra silently surged.
The surrounding scene showed no change, but Naruto could feel a cold, strongly suggestive mental power quietly enveloping him.
Genjutsu.
It wasn't a low-level Genjutsu that altered the environment, but one that directly invaded the mind, stirring up the deepest traumas within.
Before Naruto's eyes, the dark Zeroing Chamber vanished.
In its place were the familiar streets of Konoha Village.
The sun was bright, but he felt no warmth.
"Get lost, you monster!"
"Stay away from my child, Nine-Tails!"
Eyes filled with hatred, scornful curses, came from all directions. His younger self sat alone on a swing, watching other children, led by their parents, buy the last skewer of three-colored dango.
This was his most familiar childhood.
Zero's voice, like a ghost, echoed in the illusion, laced with mockery.
"See, this is the Village you want to protect. They spit on you, fear you, and see you as a calamity. Your loyalty, your protection, is nothing but a joke to them."
The illusion shifted.
On the street, the figures of a man and a woman were blurry, smiling gently. They had no distinct facial features, but from young Naruto's hopeful gaze, one knew who they were.
"Dad… Mom…"
Naruto in the illusion uncontrollably reached out, tears blurring his eyes.
"Can you pick me up from school? I'm hungry, I don't want instant noodles anymore, and I don't want to swing alone anymore…"
Zero sneered inwardly. He felt his psychological offensive was like a precise scalpel, peeling back the target's most fragile defenses layer by layer.
This was his tried-and-true method. Any Ninja, no matter how strong, always had a soft spot deep inside. As long as he could pry open a tiny crack, he could completely destroy them.
However, the breakdown, roars, and mental collapse he anticipated did not occur.
Naruto, standing in the center of the illusion, merely gazed quietly at the gentle phantom couple, his face devoid of any expression.
"Is this your method of attack?" Naruto spoke, his voice eerily calm, instantly tearing apart the atmosphere of the entire illusion. "Using the target's emotional trauma for inefficient mental pollution. The method is crude, the logic confused, and the conclusions are full of errors."
Zero's heart tightened.
Something was wrong.
He felt his Genjutsu had crashed against an unmovable wall of steel.
"Flaw one," Naruto turned his head, looking at the hateful phantom villagers. "Blaming the protected for the ignorance of the populace is a classic case of responsibility shifting. They are not abusers; they are merely resources that need to be guided and managed. Your cognitive level is still stuck in the black-and-white stage of childhood."
"Flaw two, and the most fatal flaw."
Naruto's figure suddenly became incredibly tall in Zero's perception.
"You are trying to attack an entity that has long since abandoned emotion with 'emotion.' You are insulting me."
Boom!
The entire illusory world trembled violently.
The sunlight, the street, the villagers, the phantom parents, all cracked like a shattered mirror.
In its place was an endless, cold starry sky composed of steel and runes.
Zero was horrified to discover that, at some unknown point, he had transformed from the attacker into the trapped.
He had been dragged into the other party's mental world.
"How… is this possible…"
He saw Naruto standing calmly before him, but in those blue pupils, what was reflected was no longer human emotion, but an absolute rationality and majesty, looking down upon all living beings.
"Now, it's my turn to evaluate you," Naruto's voice echoed like an oracle in this mental space.
"You possess Jonin-level strength, and your Genjutsu mastery is particularly outstanding, yet Danzo only allows you to test new recruits, treating you as a doorkeeper."
Naruto took a step forward, and the invisible pressure made Zero's breathing difficult.
"This does not conform to the principle of resource optimization. There is only one explanation: he does not completely trust you. A tool that cannot be fully controlled, no matter how sharp, can only be placed at the bottom of the toolbox."
Cold sweat seeped from under Zero's mask.
These words, like a scalpel, precisely cut open the deepest wound he had disguised with "loyalty."
"Why doesn't he trust you? Let me guess," Naruto's voice carried no sympathy, only cold analysis. "Most likely, it's because of your background. You didn't join Root voluntarily, but were 'coerced' by him through some means. Family? A lover? Or some weakness you can't let go of?"
He used his psychic perception to sense the most subtle psychological fluctuations at the deepest level of Zero's mind, using his words as a variable to test the accuracy of his guess.
"He stripped you of your emotions, yet he uses your emotions to control you. He made you yearn for order, yet he makes you serve a source of chaos."
"You are deeply entangled, powerless to break free. So you project this pain onto every new recruit you test, trying to see the same despair in them as you do."
Naruto stopped in front of Zero, and at the same time, his Backlash Illusion (backlash Genjutsu) was also cast upon Zero. Countless images that could most intensely stir the fragile nerves of the inner self instantly flooded Zero's mind.
He was crudely iterating through possibilities.
The one that caused the strongest reaction would be the answer.
"So it's family? A young master of a fallen clan, driven to extinction, forced to humble himself under the leash of his enemy merely to secure a chance for his family to survive, what a clichéd story."
"Your loyalty is crumbling. Your will is already riddled with holes."
"Shut up!"
Zero finally lost control. He roared, gathering all his Chakra, attempting to break free from this mental shackle.
Test result: consistent with the guess.
But in this space of will belonging to the "Emperor," any resistance was futile.
Naruto slowly raised his hand, and a kunai appeared out of thin air in his grasp.
He ignored Zero's futile struggles, merely placing the cold blade gently against Zero's neck.
The illusion shattered instantly.
The training ground was still the training ground.
Zero knelt on one knee, gasping for breath, soaked in cold sweat.
On his neck, a shallow red mark was clearly visible. It wasn't bleeding, yet it filled him with more terror than any fatal wound.
Naruto looked down at him, retrieving the kunai.
"The test is over."
Zero's body was rigid. He could feel that, in that instant, if the other party had wished it, his head would have already been severed.
This wasn't a test for Naruto; it was his test.
It was a pure, crushing defeat on the level of will, surpassing speed and strength.
Naruto leaned down, speaking into his ear in a voice only the two of them could hear.
"What Danzo gave you are shackles. He feeds his power with your pain; he calls it 'order.'"
"But I can give you a true choice."
"A true order, one that no longer needs to be bound by emotion, and no longer needs to pledge allegiance to an individual."
"Relying on him, you will always be a suspected tool. Relying on me, you can become a cornerstone of a new order, and personally remove the seals on yourself."
With that, Naruto straightened up, no longer looking at him, and turned to walk towards the exit.
Zero remained kneeling, his body trembling violently.
Loyalty? Betrayal?
No, this was not betrayal.
This was… survival.
He looked up at the orange-backed figure, and for the first time, a flame called "hope" ignited in his eyes.
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