"Oh, that face…"
The tall man closed his eyes and silently stepped back.
While using hand signs to make a simple communication with the equally solemn White Zetsu, he spoke in a somewhat surprised tone.
"I thought that when you chose to put on Kirigakure's forehead protector, you had completely abandoned your clan, village, and everything from your past, Shisui Uchiha."
"Perhaps."
Shisui Uchiha noncommittally placed his hand on the short sword behind his back.
"But compared to fellows like you, it seems I did not abandon that much after all."
"Do not misunderstand. Konoha abandoned us first. They abandoned Lord Danzo's teachings and will. We were unable to tolerate all that, and that is why we became the current Root… We cannot be compared to someone like you, who was clearly still being expected by so many people, yet chose to abandon everything on your own."
As the tall man said this, he placed his hand on White Zetsu's head.
"Trying to run?"
Shisui Uchiha's gaze sharpened. He raised his hand and threw the samurai blade in his hand at high speed toward the other party.
"I have no interest in fighting someone like you, when no one knows whether your defection is truly sincere, in a place this close to the Uchiha clan's residence."
Listening to the sound of the wind, the tall man created a huge rock shield and blocked Shisui Uchiha's thrown weapon.
He calmly left behind a reason that could not be criticized much.
Then he and White Zetsu's clone both used Earth Release to burrow underground, silently disappearing into the dark forest just as they had come.
Only one meaningful sentence remained in the air before fading away.
"For you people of the Uchiha clan, Konoha becoming a little weaker and a little more chaotic should count as something you would be happy to see, right?"
Shisui Uchiha's expression did not waver at all because of the words the other party threw down before fleeing.
After waiting for a moment and confirming that the other party had fully gone far away, he casually tossed the still-frightened Itachi Uchiha onto a nearby tree stump and said coldly,
"Those two fellows have already left. The Uchiha clan shinobi coming to look for you are not far from this area either. Follow the direction you came from, and you will meet them soon."
Hearing Shisui Uchiha mention the direction he had come from, Itachi Uchiha, who had just fallen on his backside, could not help freezing.
He ignored the exhaustion and pain in his body and widened his eyes as he asked,
"You… why would you… No, wait. The traces I saw… were they all deliberately left by you?!"
"Not a bad reaction. Just a little too slow."
Shisui Uchiha turned his face sideways. His blood-red Sharingan carried undisguised disappointment.
"If, at the third trace I left, you had realized that those traces might be traps set by an enemy to lure you deeper, then turned back and reported it to your clansmen, perhaps I would have thought Mr. Fugaku's expectations for you were not without reason."
"But looking at it now, he really did place those expectations on the completely wrong person… As expected, even eyes capable of glimpsing the future cannot accomplish much when they fall into the hands of an ordinary man."
Hearing this, Itachi Uchiha could not help clenching his fists.
He still remembered his father's expression after Shisui Uchiha was captured, as if guilt and regret had been carved deeply between his brows.
He still remembered his father's melancholy and confusion when Konoha rejected the proposal to bring Shisui Uchiha back at any cost.
He remembered even more clearly the almost instant grayness that overtook his father's expression when he heard the news that Shisui Uchiha had defected to Kirigakure.
"Father has always been running around and working hard for your sake. Even after being rejected by Konoha so many times, he was still the person in the clan most determined to bring you back from Kirigakure… Is speaking maliciously about someone who cared about you so much and valued you so much the way you conduct yourself, Shisui Uchiha!?"
"Regret, guilt, care, concern… Can those things reverse time and correct the mistakes that happened back then?"
Shisui Uchiha met Itachi Uchiha's eyes. In his slowly rotating three-tomoe Sharingan, the young boy's immature, irrational face was reflected.
The only thing pure about it was his love for his family.
Shisui shook his head slowly.
"Intentions alone cannot change anything. The power of one person alone cannot achieve those grand and beautiful ideals either… You still have many things to learn, Itachi Uchiha."
"But after learning so much, did you not still choose to betray everything?"
Perhaps because Shisui Uchiha had unexpectedly spoken to him about many relevant and irrelevant topics, Itachi Uchiha's overly tense emotions gradually calmed down.
He looked at Shisui Uchiha, who was so close yet seemed as if he would vanish into the darkness at any moment. He took a deep breath and asked the question that everyone in the Uchiha clan was extremely confused about, yet had never had the chance to ask in person.
"What exactly was it for, Shisui Uchiha? Why would you do something like this… something that made everyone who cared about you, valued you, and waited for you so sad? Could it really be as some people in the clan say? Were your mind and will permanently altered by that Fourth Mizukage's evil genjutsu?"
Hearing Itachi Uchiha's question, which was filled with confusion, doubt, and even a little unrealistic hope, Shisui Uchiha fell silent for a short while.
Then, looking at the torchlight slowly swaying closer several hundred meters away, he spoke in an almost dazed and distant tone, mocking himself as he said,
"Because the days I spent in Kirigakure made me realize one fact."
"What fact?"
Itachi Uchiha subconsciously asked.
"If you want to defeat darkness, you must at least possess a sufficiently deep understanding of its depth and silence."
Shisui Uchiha slowly retreated backward.
The moonlight that originally shone on his face left his body bit by bit.
Unfathomable shadows surged upward like a tide, completely covering his body and face.
Only those eyes remained, still able to reflect the light of the soul even in the darkness.
"Mr. Fugaku expected that one day I would obtain the Mangekyo Sharingan, rely on my own ocular power to defeat Rei Kaguya, and use that glory to push the Uchiha clan to unprecedented heights… But when I watched Kirigakure under Rei Kaguya's rule, I discovered that I knew nothing about him. I could not see through the power he possessed, nor could I understand what kind of world he wanted to turn this world into. Facing an enemy like that, I could find no method to defeat him."
"But I am not Mr. Fugaku's only hope. In the future he saw, there was another pair of Mangekyo Sharingan."
"So I thought… if I could deeply and personally feel darkness, understand darkness, and experience darkness, then even if I become lost within it and stand before the next person who wishes to defeat darkness, perhaps after he steps over my corpse, he will be able to find a method to crack the darkness from the knowledge I have obtained."
Itachi Uchiha listened to Shisui Uchiha's words, which were already close to murmured delirium.
His naturally gentle personality made him forget for a moment that the other party was essentially still a missing-nin.
He subconsciously reached out toward the direction where Shisui Uchiha was disappearing and shouted in a tone helpless from the immense impact,
"W-Wait…"
But Shisui Uchiha's figure had already completely vanished into the darkness.
Only Itachi Uchiha's uncertain attempt to make him stay remained in the air, along with the dense sound of footsteps quickly rushing toward this place, as if they had noticed something.
"Itachi!? Is that Itachi!? Are you here!?"
Hearing Fugaku Uchiha's voice gradually draw closer, carrying anxiety, unease, panic, regret, fear, and many other complicated emotions all fused together, Itachi Uchiha slowly lowered his raised arm and stood there in a daze, lost and empty.
He could not sense any falsehood in Shisui Uchiha's words.
All he could feel from them was a bit of bitterness, a trace of desolation, and a deep loneliness that seemed as if it would brand itself into his eyes and heart.
Shisui Uchiha… have you really resolved yourself to walk alone, without even the slightest regret even if you become lost in the darkness?
…
"Hm. As expected of Itachi Uchiha's senior and guide. After taking the man's own words and slightly polishing them, the effect when using them to fool Itachi Uchiha seems quite good…"
The "Shisui Uchiha" who had escaped into the darkness removed the Transformation Technique on his body while landing steadily on a towering ancient tree.
From a distance, he looked toward the Hokage Rock faintly visible on the cliff wall far away.
"Well then, what will you do next, Obito Uchiha? Shisui's move has been exposed before your eyes, letting you know that I am also paying attention to Konoha's side. But the opportunity to forcibly seize the Nine-Tails while the seal is weak and the Jinchuriki is also unable to resist only exists this once…"
"Will you rationally give up this contest for the Nine-Tails and only try to take away the Kamui Mangekyo in Kakashi Hatake's possession, or… will you continue to attack by force?"
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