Hokage Building, Hokage's Office.
Uchiha Ren and Minato Namikaze entered the office one after the other.
"Minato, how much do you think we can trust this change in Shimura Danzō?"
Ren casually sat down in one of the guest chairs beside the desk and asked with a hint of amusement.
Minato also sat down in his own chair behind the desk and shook his head.
"To be honest, judging solely from what I saw just now, I'd say there's more than a ninety percent chance that his change is genuine."
"But once you add the name 'Shimura Danzō' to the equation, I'd trust it at most thirty percent!"
After a pause, Minato explained helplessly, "They say that changing the mountains and rivers is easier than changing a person's nature. I simply can't believe someone like Shimura Danzō could change his beliefs because of a single jutsu!"
"After all, such a change would amount to completely denying everything he had stood for throughout his entire life!"
Ren nodded.
"I also feel that Danzō's transformation can't be taken at face value."
"Izanami is a jutsu that allows a person to see themselves clearly, find themselves again, and accept who they truly are. It sounds almost fantastical, and in practice, it really is."
"Because I've never personally experienced it, I can't determine exactly what Izanami considers its boundaries."
"But if simply changing your thoughts is enough to escape Izanami's loop, then it wouldn't be particularly difficult to break."
"After all, deceiving yourself isn't something that's impossible."
"Deceiving yourself?" Minato was taken aback. "How would you do that?"
Ren explained, "The most straightforward method would be to seal away or erase part of your own memories. That's a common method used by spies from the various shinobi villages, allowing them to infiltrate other villages more effectively."
"That's why there have been many spies who, before their tampered memories are restored, don't even know that they're spies. They wholeheartedly serve the enemy village."
"Only after those memories are unlocked can they truly return to being themselves."
Minato understood what Ren was getting at and frowned slightly.
This situation was indeed troublesome. It seemed that this could genuinely be one way of circumventing Izanami.
Minato himself knew techniques for sealing memories, and as the leader of Root—the Darkness of the Shinobi World—Danzō naturally knew similar methods.
At this point, Minato's confidence in Danzō's transformation had fallen to less than ten percent.
Ren continued, "Aside from direct methods such as sealing or altering memories, there are also gentler methods, such as self-hypnosis and self-suggestion."
"In short, if Danzō really experienced hundreds of thousands of cycles within Izanami, there's no way he wouldn't have tried methods like these."
"More importantly, did Danzō really not know in the past that what he was doing was wrong?"
"I'm not so sure about that."
"Again, understanding something and changing your actions because of that understanding are two different things. He still had to do what he believed needed to be done."
"The things Danzō did may have been wrong for the village and for other people, but they benefited him personally."
"So perhaps Danzō truly did come to understand himself. But getting him to actually change himself is another matter entirely."
"For some people, defeating their bodies is easy. Breaking their will, however, is far more difficult."
"Danzō spent his entire life being suppressed by Hiruzen Sarutobi. His positions as Root's leader and as a Konoha elder rose and fell several times. How could someone like that easily deny everything he had built his life upon?"
Minato nodded in agreement.
Danzō had, after all, survived decades of blood and fire. Unlike Hiruzen Sarutobi, Homura Mitokado, and Koharu Utatane, he had never truly left the front lines behind.
His willpower was undoubtedly extraordinarily tenacious.
After pondering for a moment, Minato asked, "So you're saying there might be a trap behind the things Danzō asked us to do?"
Ren nodded.
"Even if we're the intermediaries passing messages between them, Danzō and his Root operatives specialize in covert missions. Finding a way to communicate secretly without us noticing wouldn't be difficult for them."
Minato said solemnly, "Then should we reject Danzō's proposal?"
"That's not necessary. Otherwise, there would have been no point in agreeing to it in the first place."
Ren shook his head before continuing.
"On the contrary, I think this might actually be a good opportunity."
"We can turn their scheme against them and lure out all those rats hiding in the shadows, then wipe them out in one stroke."
Minato didn't agree immediately. After thinking it over, he said, "If that's the case, then we'll have to choose the personnel for this operation very carefully."
"As you said, Root specializes in covert missions. They're the hidden blade within the ANBU. Their instincts are extremely sharp."
"We basically can't use any of our people who operate openly."
Ren chuckled.
"That's simple. Let the ANBU handle the mission."
Minato looked surprised.
"You've finished reorganizing the ANBU?"
"Mm."
Ren nodded.
"I was just about to tell you about that."
"After our initial screening, we uncovered thirteen Root operatives who had infiltrated the ANBU. There are also thirty-eight ANBU shinobi who have murky ties with Root."
"On top of that, a full one-third of the ANBU is made up of shinobi from the Sarutobi clan. Among the rest, quite a few are from the Mitokado and Utatane clans."
"If Hiruzen Sarutobi were still Hokage, this ANBU would indeed be the sharpest blade in his hands."
"But for you, it's practically a sieve."
Minato's expression didn't change much.
The ANBU was a special organization directly subordinate to the Hokage. Hiruzen had been Hokage for decades, so it was only natural that he had shaped the ANBU into something like this.
Fortunately, Ren had used Danzō as an excuse to clean up the ANBU ahead of time. Otherwise, this version of the ANBU would have been a tremendous headache for him.
Minato asked again, "Then what's the situation with the ANBU now?"
Ren answered, "Because of the special relationship between the Ino–Shika–Chō clans and the Sarutobi clan, I haven't recruited large numbers of people from those four clans. I only had Chōza select a few trustworthy individuals from among them."
"On top of that, we've transferred personnel from the Uchiha, Hyūga, Aburame, Inuzuka, and Kurama clans, along with elite civilian-born shinobi recruited from outside the clans."
"The ANBU has now been restored to a four-squad structure."
"Four squads? Two hundred people?"
Minato smiled.
"That's a pretty good number. It's already enough to get the ANBU operating normally again."
Ren added, "Including administrative personnel, as well as personnel transferred from specialized departments such as the Interrogation Division and Analysis Team, there are a total of 253 people."
"That's more than enough for this mission."
"And it'll be a good opportunity for them to work together and get accustomed to one another."
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