"Look at those stars."
"Those stars, one after another, are actually the same as the sun we see in the daytime."
As he judged the moment ripe, Sarutobi Hiruzen raised a hand and pointed toward the night sky above them.
Naruto tipped his head back and stared upward. "The sun?" he asked. "You mean that huge, blinding thing that comes out during the day?"
"That's right. This world is vast—so vast it seems endless."
"Wow!" Naruto's eyes lit up at once. "Grandpa, you know so much!"
At those words, Hiruzen could not help showing a faintly smug smile.
Ōnoki let out a dry chuckle. "Heh. As expected of you, Third Hokage."
Mei Terumi narrowed her eyes. "Naruto Uzumaki really is different from ordinary children."
Hashirama burst into laughter in the chat. "Hahaha~"
"Brother, don't speak carelessly yet," Tobirama snapped at once.
"Compared to this enormous world, human beings are actually very small."
"And because of that, the worries we carry are small as well."
Hiruzen shook his head as he spoke. Naruto did not truly understand a single word. No one had ever explained such things to him before, so all he could do was listen with round, unguarded eyes.
"Grandpa… are people really that insignificant?"
Still staring at the night sky, Naruto's big blue eyes slowly filled with tears. If everyone was equally small beneath the heavens, then why had he been treated differently from everyone else?
Hiruzen took out his pipe and drew on it.
"Grandpa, you look kind of familiar," Naruto suddenly said.
"Oh?" Hiruzen's eyes brightened at once. "Why do you say that?"
"Hmm…" Naruto squinted, thinking hard. "You look a lot like the stone faces in the village."
Hiruzen's smile widened instantly. "Heh, you noticed that?"
"Then do you know what kind of people get their faces carved onto the Hokage Rock?"
Naruto, of course, had no idea. He simply shook his head blankly.
"The people carved there are all great heroes—people who protected the village."
"Where the leaves dance, the fire burns eternal..."
And just like that, Hiruzen began sowing the Will of Fire into the heart of a child far too young to understand it.
Naruto did not understand, but it sounded powerful. Looking at the yearning that rose unhidden onto the boy's small face, Hiruzen knew his purpose tonight had already been achieved.
"I get it now, Grandpa. You're amazing!"
Seeing the bright, worshipful gleam in Naruto's eyes, Hiruzen coughed twice, then slowly rose to his feet.
With both hands clasped behind his back, he turned away from the campfire and started to leave.
"It's late. I should be going back."
Disappointment flashed across Naruto's face at once. But the next moment, the boy hurriedly called out, hope burning in his voice.
"Grandpa, can I become Hokage too?"
Hiruzen stopped, turned around, and gave him a gentle, reassuring smile.
"Of course. But you cannot become Hokage first and then gain everyone's acknowledgment."
"Only after you gain everyone's acknowledgment can you become the great hero who protects the village—the Hokage."
"I believe that one day, Naruto, you will absolutely earn everyone's approval."
"Wow!" Naruto exclaimed, all gloom forgotten in an instant. Then he asked eagerly, "Grandpa, are you the strongest person in the village?"
Hiruzen chuckled. "Hehe. Of course. I'm the strongest of the four."
…
The scene cut off without warning.
Silence fell over the entire arena.
Countless strange gazes turned in unison toward Hiruzen Sarutobi in the stands. His old face reddened with embarrassment almost at once, while beside him Orochimaru laughed even more openly than before, without the slightest attempt to hide his delight.
Sakura Haruno blinked in realization. "So that's why Naruto's childhood dream was always to become Hokage."
Ino Yamanaka folded her arms. "Yeah. I always thought it was weird how Naruto kept shouting that he wanted to be Hokage. So he was guided into that idea when he was still that young."
"Ahem, Ino," Shikamaru warned under his breath.
Ino rolled her eyes at him, but in the end she did not say anything else.
Sasuke clicked his tongue. "That idiot."
"Sass! You're the idiot!" Naruto immediately shot back.
For a moment, Sasuke did not know what to say.
But then, as the words on the screen replayed themselves in his mind, he finally understood. No wonder that fool kept blurting out his dream of becoming Hokage even while sitting dead last in the Academy. Someone had planted the seed in him long ago.
Then the old veteran, Ōnoki, chose his moment and spoke again.
Hiruzen's eyelids twitched.
"Yo~ the Will of Fire~" Ōnoki drawled lazily.
"Third Hokage, what impressive skills you have."
The Fourth Raikage immediately joined in with a booming laugh. "Amazing. Truly amazing, Third Hokage!"
"The strongest of the four… if I remember right, didn't the Third Hokage also call himself the God of Shinobi?"
Hashirama sounded sincerely surprised. "Huh? God of Shinobi?"
"Impressive, Monkey! I never thought you'd actually surpass me!"
"Big brother, shut up!" Tobirama snapped again.
If those words had come from someone else, maybe they would have carried some hidden mockery. But when Hashirama said them, he meant them exactly as spoken.
Tobirama, however, understood very quickly where that title had come from.
After Konoha lost both its First and Second Hokage, its foundation had weakened. In order to keep the other villages from seeing that weakness too clearly, Hiruzen had stepped into the empty space and wrapped himself in the reputation of the older generation. Even a self-bestowed title could still serve as a deterrent.
But… in the scene just now, when Hiruzen had said he was the strongest, he had looked painfully sincere.
Tobirama suddenly felt a headache coming on.
It was one thing to deceive outsiders. It was another thing entirely to deceive yourself.
In the end, for Konoha's sake, Tobirama forced himself to speak against his own conscience.
"I can understand the monkey's methods," he said stiffly. "In the end, it was all for Konoha. It was to make the Jinchūriki feel that he belonged to the village..."
But halfway through, even Tobirama felt his face burning. He could not keep going.
From the standpoint of a politician, Hiruzen was indeed a qualified politician. That much Tobirama understood. Yet using such methods on the son of a hero was still despicable to the extreme.
Hiruzen seized the opening at once.
"Yes," he said quickly. "I acted according to my teacher's will. Everything I have done was for Konoha."
Tobirama Senju: ???
You shameless bastard!
The Fourth Raikage burst out laughing. "Hahaha! I see now—so it was all the Second Hokage's idea! No wonder!"
This time, Ōnoki did not add anything further.
After all, this matter now involved Konoha's Second Hokage directly. He was someone from that same era, and he knew very well what the First and Second Hokage of Konoha had really been like.
But the Fourth Raikage clearly had no such reservations. Judging from the way Kumogakure had acted in recent years, he was no longer afraid of Konoha's hollow reputation in the slightest.
Even during Kumogakure's hardest years, they had still dared to reach into Konoha and try to steal people. They had expected to pay a terrible price once they were caught red-handed. Yet in the end, Konoha had turned around and ceded benefits instead.
To the Raikage, that was all the proof he needed that Konoha had long since become a paper tiger—one that excelled most at cutting itself.
Then Madara Uchiha finally spoke, and the atmosphere shifted all over again.
"As expected of master and disciple," he said coldly. "Disgusting, both of them."
Hashirama immediately protested, "Madara, you can't say that."
"Can't say it?" Madara sneered. "Why not?"
"He is nothing more than a Jinchūriki, yet you're so wary of him that you calculate every last scrap of his life, to the point that the boy can't even afford a bowl of ramen. Is this the Konoha you once dreamed of?"
Hashirama fell silent.
Tobirama was furious, but only moments earlier he had already defended Hiruzen for the sake of Konoha's stability. Now that Madara had turned his blade on him as well, what was he supposed to do? Retract his own words on the spot?
Madara, naturally, had no intention of letting go of such a perfect chance.
He continued criticizing Konoha without pause.
He had seen through this village a long time ago. He had also seen through the Uchiha clan itself.
"So far, I haven't seen a single Uchiha speak up," Madara said. "Heh. Have they all been wiped out? Fools."
Then, at last, another voice appeared in the chat room.
"Onii-chan, I'm here," Uchiha Izuna said.