"Do the people who die become heroes?"
One day, Byakuya asked a question like that.
Even Inoichi, who usually jumped in first whenever anyone spoke, could not find the words this time.
"In the end, nobody remembers them anyway."
"That's not the point," Shikaku said, running a hand across the countless names carved into the memorial stone.
Living.
Dying.
Neither of those things was really the important part.
"Even if everyone else forgets, someone will still remember. We will, for one."
Even after Shikaku said that, Byakuya still wore a look that said he could not quite understand it, but he did not say anything more.
Shikaku found himself thinking that Byakuya was simply too softhearted.
And that was exactly why he had the uneasy feeling that something must have happened, something serious enough to push softhearted Byakuya into doing what he had done.
---
"What exactly did you do...?"
It had happened not long before.
The moment Shikaku saw Byakuya standing in front of a pile of corpses, his face utterly unchanged as he looked back at him, his whole body went rigid. He could not react at all.
"Did I get it wrong...?"
Byakuya murmured to himself, lowering his head to look at the body of a child lying at his feet.
In the end, he had done what Danzō told him to do.
Just as expected, after marking a cursed seal onto his tongue, Danzō had not even waited a full week before sending Shikaku's squad north with Byakuya under the excuse of a new mission.
The southernmost edge of the Land of Fire was damp even in the air.
Just as Danzō had said, something strange really was happening in the area, so the squad split up to investigate.
Byakuya headed to the place Danzō had pointed out, where the refugees had gathered.
There were not even that many people there.
Hardly any living ones, really.
But there were old people.
And there were children.
And because of that, Byakuya hesitated.
"I thought I could do it..."
In the end, the only thing he managed was driving his blade into the old man who spotted him and lunged his way.
The attack had been clumsy and untrained. Byakuya easily could have dodged it.
But he stabbed him anyway.
After that, all that was left was screaming and chaos.
Some threw sacks of poison. Some fought back in whatever desperate ways they could. Just as Danzō had claimed, these people really did possess weapons and poison. There were crates full of the stuff stacked there.
"Who gave you the order?"
Shikaku was not stupid.
The poison and weapons scattered all over the ground were clearly not things Byakuya had brought with him.
The refugees had attacked with weapons and poison.
But even so, Byakuya could have backed off, observed the situation, and responded afterward.
There had been time.
Instead, he had killed everyone there.
The conclusion could not have been simpler.
"Who was it? Who gave you the order... Who was it, Byakuya!?"
Shikaku's furious shout never really reached him.
Am I doing this because somewhere in my head I still think this world isn't real?
Byakuya asked himself that over and over, even while his eyes stayed fixed on the bodies at his feet.
To save your sister, how many people were you prepared to kill?
Did the feeling of the blade sinking in still not seem real to you?
Your hands were already stained with blood that would never wash off.
"...I did it. I did it myself. They attacked me, and I struck back."
The words came out of Byakuya slowly, like he was forcing them through clenched teeth. Then he let the bloodstained sword fall from his hand.
It dropped heavily into the blood that had already started to congeal.
---
I never thought I'd end up like this.
Danzō, you bastard.
"Hah..."
Bound to a chair in the interrogation room, cursing Danzō did not change anything.
It had already happened.
The mistake had already been made.
So what was he supposed to do now?
He had made up his mind long ago to become wicked, to wrap himself in infamy, to walk straight toward dying at Naruto's hands.
But somewhere along the line, the road had twisted into something else entirely.
Click!
"Kuroshiro Byakuya. Hokage-sama has arrived."
The interrogation had not even started yet, but Byakuya already felt exhausted to the bone.
Shikaku must be disappointed in me...
On the way back to the village, Inoichi and Chōza had not said a single word either.
He had spent so long trying to brainwash himself into getting used to this feeling, getting pushed away, getting treated like he did not belong, but this time it was not working at all.
While Byakuya sat there lost in his thoughts, the Hokage walked toward him with measured steps, then gave a cold order to the ninja beside him.
"Make him show his tongue."
"...!"
No wonder he was the Hokage.
Byakuya's eyes widened in shock. He clamped his mouth shut, but someone still grabbed his face roughly, forced his tongue out with a tool, and exposed the cursed seal Danzō had carved into it.
"I see."
"...I did it myself," Byakuya blurted out, watching the ninja step back after putting away the instrument.
He had done this because he had been ready to tear open every wound inside himself if that was what it took to play the villain.
If this all turned into Oh, Danzō forced him. Byakuya wasn't at fault after all, then everything would have been pointless.
So he forced himself to say it again.
"I did it myself, Hokage-sama."
Even shouting into empty space would probably have carried farther than that sentence did.
The Third Hokage did not believe him at all. He only looked at Byakuya with quiet regret in his eyes and ordered the ninja nearby to untie him.
"I..."
"It was Danzō, wasn't it? Whatever he used to force you, I understand, Byakuya."
"...I..."
Force him?
Byakuya stared at the Hokage in confusion.
No one had forced him.
And yet the Hokage kept speaking as though coercion explained everything, leaving him momentarily speechless.
Ah, wait. Does he mean Danzō threatening the Academy kids? But that didn't even affect me...
Byakuya tried to explain, but the Hokage had clearly already made up his mind.
"For the time being, you will serve as one of the Hokage's direct ANBU."
"..."
"The rumors outside will be difficult to suppress. I will announce that you were carrying out a special mission. The related report will be sealed as an SSS-class classified file. As for Danzō, let this matter end here. Forget it."
"I..."
This is not the outcome I wanted at all.
Byakuya completely lost his words.
He could not untangle anything that was happening. How had things ended up like this?
He...
He had just become one of the Hokage's direct ANBU?
Just like that?
So suddenly?
All that remained in Byakuya's heart was an endless, drifting confusion.
---
"Did you hear?"
Rumors spread faster than the wind.
The rumors about the massacre of civilians.
Even though the ninja sent afterward had been silenced and forbidden from mentioning the truth, that the refugees had weapons and poison, everything else still spread through Konoha as if the story had grown legs of its own.
"It has to be a rumor."
The first one to push back was Kurenai Yūhi.
She gave a sharp, humorless laugh as she said it to Asuma, who had come to her father's hospital room with the latest talk from outside.
"Yeah, but the whole village is talking about it now. And with the reputation Byakuya already had back at the Academy..."
They were calling him a shinobi who murdered civilians.
A disgrace to the profession.
Asuma spoke with a troubled expression, clearly thinking the rumors were not going to die down any time soon.
"It might have been an order he had to obey."
"Ah, sir, hello!"
When Asuma spotted Kurenai's father, Yūhi Shinku, walking over with the support of a cane, he quickly bowed his head in greeting.
Shinku answered with a smile, but the look on his face soon turned serious.
"I'm worried about that boy. He's still too young. Even if it was done under orders, the guilt of killing civilians is something he'll carry for the rest of his life."
"..."
"I don't know what sort of reputation he had at the Academy, but the Byakuya I met was a softhearted child. If either of you sees him again, I hope you'll be kind to him."
"Don't worry, Dad. I still owe Byakuya an apology... When I see him again, I'll treat him properly."
"Yeah, same here. Byakuya and I are friends."
Kurenai and Asuma's answers were completely different from anything Byakuya would ever have expected.
The two of them shared a smile.
And Shinku, seeing that, gave a quiet, satisfied nod.