124 The Framing (2)

"Give this to the Third Hokage for me." Standing outside of his house, Shen handed a letter to an Anbu Black Ops member. Taking the letter, they nodded their heads before disappearing into the night. Currently, he was solving and checking off tasks and objectives.

Of course, his main goal was obtaining a pair of Mangekyou Sharingan so he can finally get rid of the blindness issue plaguing him. But to do that, he needed to know exactly who had the Mangekyou Sharingan.

After all, he still needed the Uchiha Clan intact for the future.

'One month should be long enough to clear my initial suspicion and then... ' Meanwhile, on top of the Hokage's Building, Hiruzen was wearing his standard Hokage uniform and was overlooking the Peaceful Leaf Village.

Coming here to think, Hiruzen heard the sound of movement from behind him. "Lord Third, I have come to deliver me a report." Nodding his head, Hiruzen responded.

"So what has he been up to during his time here?" Standing up from his bowing position, the Anbu ninja spoke.

"He had spent most of his time walking around the village, interacting with a few of the villagers and never leaving our sight. However, he did come in contact with the Uchiha Clan leader though due to the restrictions of entering a Clan's residence, we can not say what."

Listening to that, Hiruzen felt as if he could breathe easy. With no initial reason to doubt the decision of allowing Shen to stay here, he felt more comfortable. "Also, Lord Third, he gave me this to deliver to you." Holding up the letter Shen had given to him, Hiriuzen turned around and took the letter from the ninja.

"Thank you. Continue your observations and reports as normal." Bowing slightly, the Anbu ninja disappeared once more, leaving Hiruzen on the roof alone. Looking at the seal of the letter Hiruzen carefully opened it before taking out the paper inside. Reading what was written on it, Hiruzen only took a moment before placing it back inside the letter.

"Despite what he says, I still feel uneasy…"

And like Shen said he would, he remained passive for an entire month. Other than mapping out the Village in his head, he didn't do a single thing to raise suspicion to himself. He even got close to the local villagers in his area. Of course, merely being passive wouldn't have been enough to lower the security around him.

That's where the System came into play. As he promised, he helped the village in all kinds of ways by abusing the Shop. While he kept how he got everything a secret, Hiruzen respected his privacy, and sure enough, over the month, the Anbu Black Ops continued to watch him, but their numbers decreased.

Maybe it was a sense of guilt or a sense of trust, but Hiruzen slowly began lowering the number of Anbu surrounding him at all times. From twenty to fifteen and then from fifteen to ten. The number went down and down until it finally became something Shen could work with. On that final day, Shen walked the same route he walked every day.

The three Anbu Black Ops watching him from three different positions still did their job vigilantly; however, Shen could handle them a lot easier without other ninjas to watch their backs.

All at the same time, clones of Shen appeared behind each one of them. Watching Shen from afar, one of the Anbu Black Ops remained perfectly still before finally noticing a presence behind him.

Slowly moving his hand to the kunai in his pouch, he moved his body all at once as fast as he could. Drawing the kunai, he immediately attacked the person behind him, only to suddenly have both of his arms and legs caught by some strange black substance coming out of the ground. "What is this?"

Struggling to escape, he watched as the person who was behind him bent down.

"What… But how we had you under surveillance the entire time." Looking Shen in the eyes as he spoke, Shen smiled as he said. "Well, it took a little work, but I managed to pull it off." Tightening his grip as the Anbu glared at Shen. "We should have been more careful… But don't think you will get away with this."

For a moment, Shen froze in place as if repeating the word's the Anbu said in his head. "So people do say that. I honestly don't know how to respond." Speaking in a voice full of awe, Shen removed the Anbu's mask off his face before activating his Sharingan.

With a similar scene happening to the remaining three Anbu, Shen walked into his house without a hitch.

Hiruzen was receiving the report on Shen from one of the Anbu he had caught earlier within the Hokage's office. "So there are no changes I need to be aware of?" Stamping a document, Hiruzen had a mountain of paperwork on his desk as he listened. "No, everything is normal."

The reflection of the Sharingan was caught in Anbu's eyes as he spoke to Hiruzen.

Hearing an almost repeating report for nearly thirty days, Hiruzen leaned back in his chair, stopping his work. "It seems our judgment was correct. I'm sure he has noticed by now he's being watched by us. Maybe it's about time we dismissed Anbu, watching him." Looking up at Hiruzen slightly, the Anbu replied.

"I think that would be a great show of trust and would truly make him feel more open to help us." Nodding an agreement, Hiruzen dismissed the Anbu before getting back to his work. On the other hand, Shen was having a field day.

No longer worrying about watchful gazes, he immediately started creating the vessels that would get him exactly what he needed.

'If everything goes according to plan, then my Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan should be ready by tomorrow night.' And so the first step began.

Night had officially dawned over the village, and except for the ninja on patrol and the few villager's awakened, everyone else was asleep, including everyone within the Uchiha residence area.

Blending in with the night, over twenty dark shadows appeared on top of different roofs within the Uchiha Clan. Scanning the area, each figure chose a direction before scattering. Sneaking into each house they chose individually, and they immediately sought out the sleeping Uchiha Clan members.

One of them proceeded to slowly reach their hand out in one such house, moving closer to the Uchiha Clansmen's eyes. Until finally, being only inches away, a hand reached out, grabbing the figure's hand. The Uchiha Clansmen who had been sleeping, turned his head towards the figure revealing their three tomoe Sharingan shining through the darkness.

"Who are you?"

Tightening their grip on the strange person, the Uchiha Clansmen suddenly saw an afterimage of a bright flashing light. Even with their Sharingan activated, the entire room filled up with that bright light before they could react. It was at that time when the night was still young that an explosion went off.

It was violent enough that it immediately alerted every ninja patrolling the area. Following the first explosion, many other instances of chaos began to occur all across the Uchiha Clan residence. Seeing them all go off like a chain reaction, one of the patrolling ninjas quickly began to make his way to Clan Leader's home.

At this point, the constant echoes of fighting and explosions hadn't just alerted the Uchiha Clan and their guard but also the ninja patrolling the Leaf Village as well. On top of the village wall, one such ninja had a pair of binoculars looking at the smoke rising from the Uchiha Clan residence.

Lowering the binoculars, he looked at the two ninjas behind him.

"Alert Lord Third immediately. If this is an initial attack from an enemy nation, it could mean they are already inside the village." Hearing how difficult the situation could be, the two of them looked at one another. "Yes, Sir!" Soon the two of them were gone on their way to the Hokage's building.

Meanwhile, standing outside of the same building Shen went to talk to him a month ago, Fugaku had a look of seriousness on his face. "Do we know exactly who attacked us?" Speaking to the people who were attacked and caught the intruders' glances, they tried to find the words to describe it.

"Well, they all wore masks and cloaks so that we couldn't see them well in the night. However, their bodies did not have any structure. Any time we attacked them, they seemed mostly unaffected, and most importantly, they acted way too fluidly for a normal person."

Hearing the description of the intruder's Fugaku's face turned slightly pale.

Seeing Fugaku go silent, one of the Uchiha Clansmen asked a question. "So what should we do? We can report their identities to the Hokage and have a search team out in-" Before he could finish speaking, Fugaku yelled.

"No! I'll report to the Hokage myself. Since the intruders have already begun to pull back, deal with the injured."

Hearing Fugaku 's strange order, they all hesitated for a moment before nodding and leaving. On the other hand, across the village sleeping, Shen was forcefully woken up by the sound of knocking. 'Well, that was fast. Dreams seem always to end when they get good.'

Waking himself up, Shen made his way to his front door and opened it.

Standing outside of it were two of the three Anbu that was always watching him. "Master Shen, Lord Third has summoned you. Please come with us." Hearing that, Shen's sleepy appearance contrasted with the contemplating look on his face.

"Well then, I just can't refuse now, can I?"

Following the two, Anbu Shen wasn't led to the Hokage's office but instead a meeting room. This was the room used for the elders when discussing the future of the Hidden Leaf.

Already waiting inside were the current elders, including Danzo, who immediately stared at Shen when he entered the room.

After Shen entered, the two Anbu closed the door behind him, guarding the room's entrance against the outside. Surprisingly enough, along with the elders and Hiruzen, Fugaku was also there. "Please, Shen, sit." Gesturing for Shen to sit opposite of Fugaku, Shen proceeded to do so in a lax manner.

"The reason you and all of us are here at such a late time is that there was a recent attack on the Uchiha Clan residence." Everyone looked directly at Shen as Hiruzen spoke. Glancing at everyone else, Shen continued to act clueless and instead raised his brow.

" I said I would help you and your village due to our deal, but I'm not here to fight in your war."

Having enough of Shen's attitude, Danzo spoke in a severe tone. "The attack was by the Kariudo. We have all read the letter you had sent to Hiruzen, so how can you explain this!" Seeing how aggressive Danzo was being, Hiruzen gestured for him to calm himself.

"Please forgive him. We are grateful for the help you have given to this village; however, I do need an explanation." Hearing them, all Shen didn't reply for a moment until he took a deep breath.

"That's impossible. As I stated before, everything in that letter is correct. I went to every archive and database looking through everything. I even took the time to go to each clan and inquire with each Clan Leader directly.

There is nothing in this village that would draw the Kariudo in such numbers in only a single month of arrival with this entire continent at their disposal even with me here, and even then, it would take them months."

"Well, then you must have been wrong. The Kariudo did attack, and because of your incompetent intel, the village was put in danger! I had warned you all that trusting him would be a bad decision."

As Danzo spoke, Fugaku's expression began to change as if he was coming to a realization. Watching Fugaku's face, Shen took Danzo's words while remaining silent.

Seeing Shen taking Danzo's assault and accusations, Hiriuzen finally stepped in. "Danzo, please allow him to speak." Glaring at Hiriuzen, Danzo halted himself.

"I assure you what I said was correct. If the Kariudo had attacked the village itself, then it would be possible that something had attracted their interest; however, they attacked the Uchiha instead."

Raising his head, Shen looked Fugaku directly in the eye. "While the powers of the Sharingan are impressive, it would draw them in like that, meaning the only thing they could have wanted was something even greater." Hearing Shen, everyone's thoughts could only narrow down one thing. "You mean the Mangekyou Sharingan?"

Staring at Shen with a look of concern, Hiriuzen watched as Shen nodded. "Of course, that would be the case normally; however, as I said in the letter, I had checked for things like that. I talked to Fugaku about if there were any Mangekyou users in his clan, and he told me no. Unless…"

Shen's words immediately caused everyone's gazes to turn to Fugaku, who had been remaining silent this entire time.

'You don't want to tell me who has the Mangekyou that's fine with me. I'll pressure you until you crack.'