“You—!”
Hiruzen Sarutobi nearly choked on his next breath.
The finger he pointed at Shinya was actually trembling.
“Who gave you Uchiha the authority to arrest people openly in the streets, then execute them without even holding a trial?!”
As expected of an old political fox, Hiruzen immediately changed tactics once he realized the woman could no longer be rescued.
If he couldn’t save her, then he would find a way to smear the Uchiha instead.
At least one of his objectives had to succeed.
Shinya’s tone turned slightly colder.
“Lord Third, please choose your words carefully.”
“Not the Uchiha.”
“The Military Police.”
“As for who granted the Military Police its authority, that would naturally be Lord Second, Tobirama Senju.”
“Back when Lord Second was still alive, he personally encouraged members of the Military Police, saying, ‘The peace and order of Konoha will depend on all of you.'”
Shinya’s expression became almost nostalgic.
“That era of boundless vitality, when everything seemed to flourish at once, remains vivid in my mind.”
“As an inheritor of the Will of Fire, naturally I must faithfully carry out the policies and principles he left behind.”
Hiruzen was so angry that he almost laughed.
“My teacher never said anything like that!
On the contrary—”
His voice suddenly stopped.
Shinya felt a trace of disappointment.
As expected of an old fox.
Some things could be done but never spoken aloud.
And some things could be said but absolutely never admitted to doing.
Konoha’s leadership being suspicious and hostile toward the Uchiha was practically an open secret.
But that didn’t mean Hiruzen himself could casually acknowledge it.
The moment those words left his mouth, the entire Uchiha clan would understand exactly how Konoha’s leadership viewed them.
When that happened, even an outstanding Uchiha like Shisui might no longer remain on Hiruzen’s side.
After all, Shisui’s ultimate objective wasn’t actually to protect Konoha at the expense of everything else.
It was to protect the Uchiha.
Unlike Itachi, Shisui fundamentally still stood with his clan.
The realization sent cold sweat down Hiruzen’s back.
When he looked at Shinya again, the dismissiveness he had previously shown toward a younger shinobi had disappeared completely.
Dangerous.
He had almost fallen into the trap of trying to prove his own innocence.
And now that Hiruzen thought about it, Shinya had never once fallen into his linguistic trap either.
From the very beginning, Shinya had carefully separated the Uchiha clan from the Konoha Military Police Force.
Those were two completely different concepts.
If the Uchiha clan simply grabbed people off the streets whenever they wished, then they were an arrogant, tyrannical, inherently dangerous clan.
But if the Military Police arrested someone?
At worst, one could accuse them of excessive force.
And even that accusation might not necessarily stick.
The Military Police was an enforcement organization by design.
Even ANBU only had the authority to investigate and summon members of the Military Police when necessary.
It did not possess ordinary policing authority over them.
“This old man has no interest in arguing with a junior like you.”
“Call Fugaku Uchiha out here!”
Realizing that he might actually lose a verbal confrontation with Shinya, Hiruzen decisively requested a change of opponent.
Shinya might be young, but his methods were disturbingly seasoned.
Worse, he was exceptionally skilled at twisting accusations back onto others.
He was far more difficult to deal with than Fugaku, who usually knew only how to compromise.
At that moment, Fugaku finally walked over.
Having witnessed the entire exchange, he stopped directly behind Shinya.
His hands rested behind his back.
He said nothing.
Seeing Fugaku’s attitude, Hiruzen immediately understood.
He was backing Shinya.
Hiruzen took a deep breath.
Then he slowly asked,
“What exactly are you Uchiha planning?”
He still didn’t directly say the word rebellion.
But Fugaku understood perfectly well what he meant.
Normally, whenever conversations reached this point, Fugaku would immediately try to smooth things over and make some sort of concession.
But this time—
he showed a rare streak of toughness.
Now that he understood Konoha was also afraid of an Uchiha rebellion, Fugaku suddenly found it much easier to speak confidently in front of Hiruzen.
He remembered something Shinya had once told him.
At moments like this, simply stare at your opponent and say nothing.
Let them imagine the rest themselves.
Fugaku had once been known as Fugaku of the Wicked Eye.
The title may have been somewhat exaggerated, but the killing intent he had forged on the battlefield was very real.
Under the gaze of Fugaku’s three-tomoe Sharingan, Hiruzen’s throat moved slightly.
Unlike Hiruzen, whose body had already begun declining with age, Fugaku was currently in the prime fighting years of a shinobi.
And unlike some hollow reputation, Fugaku’s name had genuinely been carved out through battle.
Hiruzen suddenly regretted coming into the Uchiha district alone without bringing ANBU protection.
If Fugaku suddenly lost his mind…
Wouldn’t Hiruzen’s old bones end up staying here permanently?
“…Fugaku.”
“You should calm down first.”
“If there’s something to discuss, we can sit down and talk about it properly.”
In the end, Hiruzen was actually the first one unable to withstand the pressure.
He compromised.
Fugaku glanced from the corner of his eye at Shinya.
Shinya’s expression had never changed from beginning to end.
It was as though he had known all along that Hiruzen would eventually give ground.
At this moment, Fugaku had no choice but to admit it.
Shinya had been completely right.
Showing your fangs at the proper moment really could teach certain potential enemies how to speak politely all on their own.
Forget everything else for now.
Just seeing Hiruzen standing there as though facing a deadly enemy, then choosing to compromise first, gave Fugaku an unexpected sense of satisfaction.
The instant Shinya saw Hiruzen retreat a step, he naturally refused to let the opportunity go.
“The Second Hokage entrusted such an important institution as the Konoha Military Police Force to the Uchiha clan!”
“That was proof of his trust in us!”
“And now, not even twenty years later, someone actually dares openly question the fairness of the Military Police?”
“This isn’t merely an attack on the Military Police.”
“This is practically slapping Lord Second directly across the face!”
Every other sentence out of Shinya’s mouth was either Military Police or Second Hokage.
Hiruzen couldn’t even properly refute him.
The shinobi world placed tremendous importance on master-disciple lineage.
If Hiruzen said a single poorly worded sentence and Shinya twisted it into evidence that Hiruzen resented his own teacher…
What would happen to the reputation Hiruzen had spent decades cultivating?
Shinya’s offensive wasn’t finished.
He looked meaningfully at Hiruzen, a faint smile hanging on his lips.
“Lord Third…”
“Everything the Military Police does is for the sake of the village.”
The instant those words came out—
even Fugaku couldn’t stop himself from turning to stare at Shinya.
Why does everything this brat says suddenly sound so much like Danzō?
Hiruzen’s eyelid twitched violently.
At that moment, he wanted nothing more than to go back and beat Danzō senseless.
Why did you have to repeat that line every time you did something shady?!
Now even these damned Uchiha have learned it!
And if the Uchiha clan—with its overwhelming military power—started behaving with the same complete lack of restraint as Danzō…
Hiruzen realized that cold sweat had once again broken out across his body.
Seeing that he had genuinely startled the old man, the corners of Shinya’s mouth rose slightly.
He continued,
“In any case, that spy already confessed.”
“The procedures have all been completed.”
“So I wonder…”
“Does Lord Third have any further instructions for us?”
Hiruzen felt incredibly stifled.
He had actually been lectured into silence by someone young enough to be his junior.
But Shinya was right about one thing.
The woman was already dead.
No matter how much Hiruzen argued now, there was very little he could actually accomplish.
Still…
He would remember today’s humiliation.
One day, he would make the Uchiha repay it several times over.