Compared to the shock felt by the other three, Tobirama Senju felt that something was deeply amiss.
Kagami Uchiha had never been a comrade Danzo Shimura truly trusted—at most, they shared the camaraderie of fellow disciples.
It was nowhere near enough for Danzo to trust Kagami to the point of sneaking off together to look at the stone tablet, let alone playing around in illusions.
Tobirama looked at the student before him, taking in his aged, weary features.
In the single remaining dark eye, he could hardly find a trace of the sensitive, paranoid Danzo Shimura he had once known.
“Danzo…
I doubt it was simply because it was Kagami, was it?” Osamu knew Tobirama Senju was one of the people who knew Danzo best.
The excuse “because it was Kagami” was far too flimsy to convince him.
Yet he could think of no other explanation.
He merely turned his head away in discomfort, avoiding Tobirama’s probing gaze.
“That isn’t the point, Sensei,” his voice sounded somewhat stiff.
“I just…
please, don’t dwell on it.” Tobirama Senju did not press further.
Danzo was extremely frail right now, and he had no wish to agitate his student.
Sensing Tobirama’s consideration, Osamu breathed a quiet sigh of relief and continued.
“Not long after, Kagami died in battle.” The expressions of the others instantly turned subtle.
“I…
I took his right eye without permission.” As Osamu spoke, his countenance turned gloomy.
Back then, Danzo should have given the fallen Kagami a proper burial.
Instead, he concealed the truth, writing “missing in action” in the official reports, before bringing Kagami’s body back to Root and transplanting his right eye.
That body was still inside a nourishment pod at Root.
In a sense, Danzo had treated it like a trophy, taking great pains to preserve it.
Avoiding Tobirama’s eyes, which had instantly filled with pained sorrow, Osamu raised a hand to cover his bandage-wrapped right eye.
“Please…
please do not blame me for this.” Seeing Osamu becoming emotionally unstable, Tobirama suppressed the grief in his heart and composed his tone.
“And what happened after that?” “Afterward…
I snuck into the shrine and used Kagami’s eye to read the stone tablet.” Osamu did not relax; if anything, he grew even more tense.
“The writing on the tablet had changed.” “Not because increased visual power allowed me to see more.” “The content of the tablet had been tampered with.” Madara Uchiha abruptly stood up, his crimson Sharingan fixed on Danzo Shimura before him.
His lips parted as if he wanted to speak, but Izuna, standing beside him, pulled him back.
“Brother Madara,” Izuna Uchiha didn’t think Danzo had any reason to lie.
The man had exhausted nearly all his life force to resurrect the four of them and likely didn’t have much time left to live.
“Let him finish first.” “At the time, I thought the tablet had some hidden mechanism that showed different content to different people.
But no matter how I analyzed it, that made no sense.
So I left this behind…
to monitor the tablet’s condition.” Looking at the micro-camera Danzo pulled out, Tobirama finally recognized a trace of the paranoid Danzo he once knew.
“You can channel Chakra into it.
It contains footage of the anomaly.” Madara Uchiha was the first to take the micro-camera.
Once he injected Chakra into it, a beam of light projected from the side of the device onto the wall.
The stone tablet of Naka Shrine stood quietly inside the secret chamber.
A few seconds later, a pitch-black shadow crawled out from a corner, coalescing into a humanoid shape.
The “person” leaned close to the tablet and did something.
But when its body moved away, the original six lines of script on the stone tablet had become seven.
The other three maintained grim expressions, but Madara Uchiha’s posture relaxed.
Black Zetsu.
This was likely part of the preparations needed to manipulate the Uchiha Clan during the Eye of the Moon Plan.
Just as Madara was contemplating how to attribute this to another faction, a white humanoid figure appeared in the video, walking over to Black Zetsu.
“Hurry up, that kid is looking for you!” “That kid”…
referring to Obito Uchiha, no doubt.
Black Zetsu cackled raspily.
“What a pain.
Obito Uchiha is even harder to fool than Madara Uchiha!” White Zetsu chuckled mischievously.
“Well, Madara Uchiha actually believed you were the manifestation of his dark side!” As the two humanoid figures left the secret chamber, the group watching the monitor wore subtle, awkward expressions.
Everyone turned in unison to stare at Madara Uchiha.
And Madara Uchiha’s expression had turned terrifying.
The video produced by the System was guaranteed to be top quality.
Even if one analyzed it with the Sharingan, the only possible conclusion was that it was the absolute truth.
Osamu coughed softly, drawing everyone’s attention back.
“That is why I decided to resurrect Lord Madara as well…
Back then, Lord Madara abruptly left Konoha and then suddenly returned with the Nine-Tails to launch an attack.
No matter how I investigated, I could never find the cause.” “I was already suspicious…
Though in my view, both Lord Hashirama and Lord Madara are troublesome figures who refuse to communicate candidly, resort to force at the drop of a hat, and never consider cleaning up their mess afterward, causing endless headaches for Sensei.
I heard that back when Lord Izuna was still alive, he was also constantly busy managing clan affairs on Lord Madara’s behalf.” Hashirama Senju: …
Madara Uchiha: …
The two troublemakers tried to object, but under the glares of their respective younger brothers, they silently endured Danzo’s sharp tongue.
“Still, neither of you could ever be called bloodthirsty,” Osamu added in concession.
“So I wondered if Lord Madara’s attempt to destroy Konoha with the Nine-Tails back then was intentionally orchestrated by that black creature.” “It was precisely because of Lord Madara’s actions back then that the Uchiha Clan was tacitly excluded from Konoha’s core of power.
During the Nine-Tails incident where the Fourth Hokage perished, the Uchiha Clan was the prime suspect, which was the main reason they were relocated to the outskirts of the village.” “Even now…
the fact that the Uchiha Clan has been driven to plan a collective rebellion stems partly from this.” Madara Uchiha looked at the old man before him and slowly bowed his head.
Then, he began to recount all his past experiences, thoughts, and feelings to everyone present.