As for the brutal clash between the Uchiha brothers, Tsunade only spared it a passing glance.
What she truly cared about was Jiraiya.
Annoying as he was, he couldn't just die like that.
Especially not with the leader of the Akatsuki looming in the background—a man capable of wiping out Konoha in a single move.
That was what troubled her most.
According to Kaede Kitahara, that level of power had already crossed into what was called Super Kage Level.
She didn't fully understand what that meant, but using the Akatsuki leader as a reference, the distinction became clear enough.
Kage Level shinobi could threaten a great ninja village, but they couldn't take one on alone.
Super Kage Level shinobi could.
And she was about to become the Fifth Hokage.
Facing an enemy like that… how was she supposed to respond?
"I can't let him die for nothing."
Tsunade quickly made up her mind. If she had the strength, she would have already marched straight into Amegakure to confront the Akatsuki herself.
"Sasuke's grown fast… and Itachi… what a waste," Jiraiya sighed.
He stood firmly on Konoha's side. So even though Itachi had slaughtered his entire clan, Jiraiya didn't feel much hatred toward him.
Everyone had their own perspective.
To Sasuke, Itachi was the worst demon imaginable.
But to Jiraiya, he was still a shinobi who had done right by the village.
Then Jiraiya let out a bitter chuckle.
Itachi had died a tragic death, but Jiraiya himself had died even earlier.
At the hands of Yahiko and the others.
Even now, he couldn't understand why Yahiko's eyes bore the Rinnegan when he clearly remembered those eyes belonging to Nagato.
But now that he knew Amegakure was a den of monsters, there was no way he would recklessly charge in again.
An organization that could produce fighters capable of matching him one after another… he would have to be a fool to walk straight into that.
"Itachi… what a pity. It didn't have to end like this. In this timeline, I'll make sure it doesn't," Namikaze Minato said quietly.
For someone as loyal to Konoha as he was, he couldn't bring himself to hate Itachi.
Watching him finally reach release in the end, Minato couldn't help but feel a sense of heaviness.
The Uchiha Clan had been a problem.
But the greater problem had always been the advisory council—Shimura Danzo and the others who had pushed the clan to the brink.
This time, he would stop it before it reached that point.
So this was what Kaede Kitahara meant by "holding back."
From the outside, it looked like Itachi had fought with everything he had.
But in reality, he was already far from his peak, fighting while gravely ill, his vision nearly gone.
Which meant Sasuke had been battling a half-blind opponent all along—and still managed to push the exchange of weapons to such an intense level.
That alone was impressive.
Much of Itachi's performance had relied on instinct honed through years of combat.
There had been more than one opportunity for him to kill Sasuke, yet he had held back each time.
Sasuke hadn't fully reached Kage Level yet. Whether in terms of chakra reserves or combat experience, he was still lacking.
In fact, he hadn't yet reached the level of presence he later displayed against Shimura Danzo.
But in this battle, he had thought more carefully.
Perhaps because he knew he was the weaker one, he had been more willing to rely on strategy.
From that perspective, calling it "holding back" wasn't entirely wrong.
Hatake Kakashi remained silent, his expression complicated.
From the very first day he met Sasuke, the boy had spoken of nothing but killing that man.
Even during their introductions, Sasuke had declared his goal plainly—to kill him.
And now, he had done it.
He had achieved his revenge.
Yet behind it lay another tragedy.
Kakashi quickly composed himself.
This was the shinobi world.
He had long since grown used to it.
Had he faced any fewer hardships than Sasuke?
No.
You simply learned to live with it.
Within the Akatsuki base, under dim light, Uchiha Itachi fell into silence.
In the end, everything had unfolded as he had planned… and yet, it hadn't.
Sasuke had come to him, just as he intended. The brothers had fought their final, brutal battle.
Sasuke had defeated him at the end of his strength.
Through that battle, Itachi had taught him everything he could, filling the gaps in his experience fighting a Kage Level opponent.
Sasuke had defeated Orochimaru before, but that had been a battle of consciousness—and Orochimaru had been weakened. It couldn't count as true experience.
But this fight… this would teach him something real.
Like what it meant to push yourself to the brink of death and still survive.
And yet, things hadn't gone entirely according to plan.
Sasuke hadn't awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan.
That was a major problem.
Itachi had repeatedly emphasized its importance, deliberately provoking Sasuke, deepening his hatred—all to push him toward killing his closest friend and awakening that power.
As for sacrificing an innocent life… he had never cared.
He had slaughtered his entire clan.
What was one more?
In his mind, making Sasuke stronger was the highest priority.
People didn't die just because they lost a friend.
Without the Mangekyō Sharingan, Sasuke's greatest weakness remained.
Otherwise, Itachi could have transplanted his own eyes into him on the spot.
Fortunately, Sasuke eventually awakened it later, during his fight with Danzo.
After that, he even obtained the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan—and something Itachi himself couldn't fully understand, a strange ripple-patterned eye with tomoe.
It resembled the Rinnegan of the Akatsuki leader, yet it wasn't quite the same.
According to Itachi's plan, Sasuke should have returned to Konoha carrying his head, hailed as a hero.
Instead, Sasuke spent three years under Orochimaru… and later seemed to drift away from Konoha entirely, even harboring thoughts of revenge against it.
What surprised Itachi even more was that, in the end, Sasuke became a savior, returned to Konoha, found someone he loved, and even had a daughter.
How did that make any sense?
The entire process had gone wrong.
And yet, the final outcome was exactly right.
How was he supposed to make sense of that?
Itachi felt a rare sense of frustration.
At this point, there was little he could do.
It seemed that the one who had pulled Sasuke back onto the right path was the Fourth Hokage's son—Uzumaki Naruto.
Perhaps that was fate.
If not for the night of the Nine-Tails' attack, given the close ties between their families, the two of them might have grown up as childhood friends.
They were the same age, would have attended the academy together, possibly even been placed on the same team under a powerful jonin.
In the end, they would have become protectors of Konoha.
Another case where everything along the way had gone wrong…
And yet the result had still been right.
No matter what had happened, they had protected the village.
"Even Amaterasu couldn't kill Uchiha Kenji?"
Itachi frowned slightly.
He had originally assumed that Uchiha Kenji was Uchiha Madara and had been extremely wary of him. According to his plan, he intended to leave a final safeguard within Sasuke.
He didn't want Sasuke to be manipulated after his death.
That was why, at the very end, he had tapped Sasuke's forehead.
Did people really think it was just a sentimental gesture? A callback to their childhood?
Of course not.
Even if others couldn't understand it, he certainly did.
He had sealed a prepared ocular jutsu into Sasuke's eyes.
As for its target…
That wasn't hard to guess.
Most likely, it had been Amaterasu.
Set to activate automatically upon seeing Uchiha Kenji's Sharingan.
Why not set it to trigger upon seeing his face?
Because he had never seen that face.
There was no way to establish that condition.
But judging from what came later—Sasuke joining forces with Uchiha Kenji, working together to hunt down Shimura Danzo—it was clear his contingency had failed.
Sasuke's words had been filled with hatred toward Danzo…
And toward Konoha itself.
Which meant Uchiha Kenji had told him the truth.
The truth Itachi had tried so hard to hide.
It was obvious.
And that was how Sasuke had been influenced.
Even if most of what he said had been true, he must have twisted it just enough to guide Sasuke's thoughts.
A lie made of nine parts truth and one part falsehood was the hardest to see through.
Sasuke had become his tool.
And that was something Itachi could never accept.
Based on his own understanding, he must have sealed Amaterasu into Sasuke's eyes as a safeguard.
But in the end, it hadn't worked.
"Then it must have been his Mangekyō ability," Itachi murmured to himself.
Amaterasu was undeniably powerful—instantaneous, inescapable once locked onto a target.
But it had one fatal flaw.
It didn't kill immediately.