Drkest
patreon
Burdened Soul: Uchiha SI Ch.76
🕑 Added 2025-07-14 18:36:35 +0000 UTCChapter 76 MIKOTO UCHIHA Mikoto had taken a sigh of relief when the war with Kiri had ended, for with that her family had become whole once
Chapter 76 MIKOTO UCHIHA Mikoto had taken a sigh of relief when the war with Kiri had ended, for with that her family had become whole once
Chapter 76 MIKOTO UCHIHA Mikoto had taken a sigh of relief when the war with Kiri had ended, for with that her family had become whole once
Chapter 76
MIKOTO UCHIHA
Mikoto had taken a sigh of relief when the war with Kiri had ended, for with that her family had become whole once more. She had prayed desperately that it would remain that way, but the fates had different plans.
Madara Uchiha, a name that most people had forgotten about, had come alive once more and had brought with him utter savagery and destruction. She had read stories about the might of Madara, but no story could do justice to what she had witnessed that day.
That might. It was unlike anything she had seen before. And in the face of that power, four heroes of the village had sacrificed their lives so that they could protect the future of this village.
Four heroes, which included two Hokages and her own husband, Fugaku.
And though he had never been a talkative person, his absence had turned her little home silent, as Mikoto tried her best to care for her children as much as she could.
But war had come once more, and she could protect them no more.
Minato had chosen Izuna as his successor, and though many doubted him because of his age, the village rallied behind him as they all looked to their new Kage to protect them against the combined might of Iwa and Kumo.
War clung to her eldest child, and she often cried as she remembered how he had spent nearly all of his life at war, yet had never let it consume him. Izuna had faced more battles than many seasoned shinobi, and yet he was still a boy.
To others, he may be their Hokage, a deadly shinobi, but to her, he would always remain her little child who had spent his entire life on the battlefield.
In these troubling times, everyone had to play their part, including Itachi, who had been deployed as well, emptying the House, and she had just spent an hour putting Sasuke to bed when she walked towards the porch and saw Izuna standing there, leaning, staring at the skies.
The past few days seemed to have aged him by years, and what little joy he had regained in the last few months was now gone again, as duty and burden weighed him down.
“Izuna,” she called out, and he turned to face her. He had not come home since the funeral, spending all his time at the Office given the situation with the war.
“Mother,” he called out softly, not as Izuna Uchiha the Hokage, or Izuna Uchiha, the Seven Headed Demon, but as her son—her young but burdened child.
“Have you eaten anything?” she asked, holding back her tears, for she had to be strong for him; she had to be the shoulder he could lean on as he carried the weight of Minato’s legacy.
“No,” he answered, and she nodded.
“Sit, I will bring food,” and so she warmed up the dinner she had made, and brought it to him as he sat on the porch. In the end, he said little and ate in silence. As he put down the bowl, he whispered.
“I am sorry,” he whispered as her body stilled at those words, as her son continued in a desperate whisper.
“I thought that I could stop the wars, that I could protect the people around me, but I failed,” and she shook her head as she wrapped her arm around him.
“No, my child. It is not your fault,” she assured him, as she cursed this wretched world for putting him through this all.
“Then why does it feel like it?” and she had no answer to that.
“I don’t know. But remember this, that we did not start this war, that you did not start this war, Kumo and Iwa did,” and he sighed.
“What if Minato-san was wrong? What if I am not enough?” he whispered his doubts, and as a Hokage, he could not speak of them to anyone but her.
“You are,” she assured him as she caressed his face and looked him in the eye.
“I am young, and I am not nearly as skille...”
“Look into my eyes,” she cut in, as she pushed chakra into her eyes. The tomoe spun slowly, petals blooming from a deep, rich red to black, delicate yet fierce. The shape of memory, woven in pain and pride
“The Mangekyo....” he gasped, and she nodded.
“Yes, it allows me to show one’s memories...” and as she gently used her ability on him, the world around them shifted, though not by much, for they both stood there, as she showed him a memory from a day not so long ago.
Mikoto sat with Fugaku on that very porch, as her husband sipped his tea.
“Do you think Itachi is ready to become a chunin?” she asked, and Fugaku was quick to nod.
“Yes, if not for his limitations with his katon techniques, he would have been a jounin by now. But if he continues to improve at his current pace, he will be equal to a jounin within a few months,” and Mikoto smiled proudly.
“He hopes to surpass Izuna,” and her eldest, besides her, stiffened as Fugaku in the memory sighed.
“That is easier said than done,” and there was pride in that voice as her husband continued.
“Because that boy has long surpassed me....” and as if he could glance at him, Fugaku gave a slight glance to them as he finished.
“...and is the only one who could one day become as strong as Madara himself.”
0000
IZUNA UCHIHA
In the end, a war was imposed upon them, as Iwa and Kumo marched towards their borders with a substantial force under the command of their Kages. As vulnerable as Konoha may be, the two armies posed little threat to them on their own.
No. The main trouble was the Tsuchikage and the Raikage leading the men, and Izuna knew that the time for peace through mercy and benevolence was gone. Twice now, Konoha had offered Iwa and Kumo mercy, but the two villages refused to learn their lesson, and so as the Godaime Hokage, he would make sure to drive in the lesson the hard way.
He planned to kill their kages, incite absolute chaos within their ranks, and then force the villages to beg for negotiation.
Already, a significant bulk of their forces had departed, and Izuna was about to leave for the border alongside Kusa to face Iwa and its allies.
He could have teleported to the place, but he planned to wipe out any fringe forces that may have infiltrated their lands behind the defensive line along the way.
Tsunade Senju was to take charge of the village while he was gone, and the Senju Princess’s presence had helped inspire confidence in these troubling times, as the villagers all looked towards a hero to lead and protect them in this war.
“What are you doing here?” and he was to leave alone. So, he was pretty surprised when he saw the unlikely face of Konan waiting for him at the gates.
“Did you really think I would let you go into battle all by yourself?” she asked, and he shook his head.
“This is not your war. The people of Ame, especially you, have already paid your due,” and the refugees had been at the forefront of the war against Kiri, and though many had volunteered, it did not feel right to him to plunge them all onto the battlefield like fodder once more.
“This is our village as well, Izuna,” she replied, looking him in the eye, her lips as she continued.
“When we had nowhere to go, Konoha gave us a home. It gave us a life,” she spoke softly as she walked towards him.
“It gave me a new life—a new hope. For a better future, for a peaceful future, and I will fight to defend it,” and she scoffed as she smiled at him, as she formed a bird out of her papers.
“You’re stuck with me, Lord Hokage,” and for the first time in weeks, Izuna smiled as they both walked up the paper bird and took to the skies.
“Rest,” she whispered as Izuna felt the weariness from all the sleepless nights hit him.
“I will wake you up when we are near the battlefield,” he said, and then yawned, leaning on her shoulder and closing his eyes.
“Thank you,” he whispered, and the world vanished within seconds.
“No, thank you....”
.
.
.
It took them a day to reach the border, and the defensive line was already set. Choza Akimichi, the leader of the Iwa front, came to greet them both as Izuna jumped down from the bird.
“Lord Hokage,” the man greeted, and Izuna still seemed unsettled by the title, and all of the shinobi there were eyeing him with hope and reverence as he addressed the Akimichi clan head.
“How much longer till Iwa’s main force arrives?” he asked.
“A day, my lord,” came the answer as Izuna began to rub his chin.
“Well, then let us prepare a surprise for our guests...”
0000
The Third Tsuchikage Ohnoki—the Fencesitter
Ohnoki frowned as the Iwa forces came upon Konoha’s border, or at least what was supposed to be the Konoha border.
“Are you certain?” he questioned the captain, who nodded once more.
“Yes, Ohnoki-sama. There is no trace of Konoha forces up ahead,” and that was troubling. For all their naivety, Konoha had a rather impressive information network, and he had declared his intention to attack Konoha rather openly.
No matter what had transpired within Konoha’s lands that had led to the demise of that wretched Yellow Devil, Ohnoki believed that Konoha should have had enough time to mount a proper defensive line.
Yet the border was empty.
He had searched the area himself from the skies and had found no trace of an army, and now his sensors had failed to locate them as well.
“Should I command the army to move forward then?” questioned the captain, as Ohnoki rubbed his chin, sensing a plot yet finding no hint about its nature at all.
“Has anyone here noticed anything odd beyond the absence of Konoha’s forces?” he addressed his captains, all of whom looked down at the map with curious and nervous gazes.
“Not really, Tsuchikage-sama.” “Everything seems fine.”
“Well, the forest has expanded a bit, but that seems natural,” and in the end, there was nothing to stop him from giving an order to advance.
Yet Ohnoki felt that something was off; his decades of experience were warning him that this was wrong, that they were missing something.
“Wait,” he decided in the end as he addressed the captain.
“I must try something first,” and so he closed his eyes, and molded his chakra as he had done for years now, and rose into the skies to examine the area once more, and all that he saw for miles upon miles were large swathes of forest.
Then he remembered the words of one of his captains.
“Expanded, huh?” he whispered, and by now he had the map of the area memorised, and he saw for himself that the captain was right, that the forest had indeed expanded for around half a mile, which was somewhat strange.
And the idea hit him at once.
“Could it be?” he whispered, as he remembered the cunning of that yellow devil. Both Namikaze and that Uchiha brat were amongst the most cunning shinobi alive, willing to use any and every means at their disposal to win.
“I am going to force you out of your hiding holes,” and with that, he brought together his hands as he began to gather chakra.
“Particle Style...” he whispered as he pulled apart his hands, as the glowing square formed in between them, as he aimed it at the expanded forest.
“..Atomic Dismantling Jutsu!” and the attack rushed towards the forest down below, as Ohnoki tore apart the entire expanded area, and saw it decimated in front of his eyes.
BOOOM! BOOOM! BOOOM! BOOOM!
In the end, he stopped and flew down to see only charred and burnt ground, his attack had destroyed everything and anything in the path, yet despite that, he saw no signs of body or retaliation.
“Ohnoki-sama! Ohnoki-sama!” his captains rushed towards him, believing that he had found an enemy, but he had been wrong.
He touched the bark of a tree and saw that it was wood indeed, that there were no Konoha shinobi hidden inside it at all.
“Have you found the enemy?” they questioned, and he shook his head.
“No,” and the sense of unease still followed him. But he could not simply stand his army here without any hurdle in his sight.
“Tell the men to move forward,” he ordered the captains as he turned to face them.
Whatever ploy Konoha had cooked up, he was here to face it. As a Tsuchikage, he had the power and the ability to destroy any plan hatched up by any of them.
“I will be watching over them from the skies,” and with that, he rose into the air once more and headed forward as his army followed his command.
Ohnoki was not a natural sensor, but he had learned the technique over the years and so he stretched his senses yet found no trace of any Konoha shinobi at all, until they were halfway through the forest when a single chakra signature appeared.
“Halt!” he screamed, but it was too late as the entire forest began to blow up in front of his eyes, swallowing up a major chunk of his forces.
“Earth Style:...” Yet before he had finished molding his chakra, his senses alerted him to an impending danger as he turned up and saw a shinobi standing above him holding what seemed to be lightning in his hands.
“Senpo:...” he heard the whisper as he realised why he had been unable to sense his chakra at all, for this was not ninjutsu. This was senjutsu.
“INDRA’S ARROW!” and then he saw the shinobi move as a massive bolt of lightning rushed towards him, giving him no time to block or evade as Ohnoki gathered his chakra to protect himself from the attack.
“AGHHHH!” The bolt hit him as Ohnoki was thrown onto the ground.
BOOOOM!
Such was the force of the attack that it created a crater in its place, as Ohnoki felt pain rip through him. His body burned, his skin scalded as he pushed himself back up, the dust clearing as he saw his enemy slowly descend from the skies.
It was him—Namikaze’s little pet. The one he had spared just a few days ago, yet this time he appeared different. The Purple markings around his eyes had expanded, and those red eyes of his now had slits in them, like the eyes of a snake, as two horns sprouted from his forehead.
“Konoha must have grown quite desperate,” and now they showed themselves, hundreds upon hundreds of Konoha shinobi sprouted out of the ground, and the trees as the forest around them turned into a battlefield.
“To make you their new Hokage,” and given that it was not Sarutobi or even any of his accursed students, meant that whatever traagedy had struck Konoha had wiped away a significant part of their elites.
“You are a hundred years too young to face me, you child!” and yet he remained unfazed, as he continued to look down at him with those monstrous eyes of his.
“You and Iwagakure have exhausted all the goodwill you had,” he began, his voice cold and serene as he brought together his hands, and a black skeletal figure began to swirl around him.
“Ninpo:...” he heard him whisper as Ohnoki touched the ground, as the earth beneath his feet began to shift and form as he was lifted into the skies, as he used his own creation.
“Doton:...”
“SUSANOO!”
“GIANT EARTH GOLEM!”
0000
.
.
.
“What!” Akimichi Choza gasped as he heard their new Hokage’s plan.
“You plan to move the forest!” and that was as absurd a sentence he had ever heard, for the young Hokage proposed to divide the Earth and move the forest.
“Yes, then Konan will use her technique to build a new forest right here,” he said, pointing towards the Ame kunoichi, who raised no objection.
“But instead of wood, these trees will be made up of paper bombs in the front and those at the back will hide our forces, allowing us to ambush Iwa and its forces right in this very forest,” and Choza had heard about the bold and new ideas of their new Hokage, but this.
This went beyond the norm.
“It is a great plan, but to do all this in one day,” he asked, and even if they were all to work together, such a thing would require multiple days.
“Ohh, you don’t need to do anything,” and with that, he saw him step forward, as he felt their new Hokage’s chakra shift, as the purple markings around his eyes expanded and a pair of horns sprouted from his forehead.
“Is that...” he whispered, for this was his first time witnessing the rumored technique of the legends, a technique which only a handful of shinobi had ever been able to master.
“Sage Mode,” the purple-haired kunoichi answered from the side.
“I will handle it all,” and with that, he saw him close his eyes as their new Hokage began to cycle through a massive chain of handseals, before he reached for the ground.
“Senpo: Grand Mobile Core!” and he watched wide-eyed as the ground split in front of his eyes, and the forest was cut into two as the lands were pushed apart, while all he could do was watch.
And in that moment, Choza realised that Minato was right in putting his trust in Izuna, that all of them had been wrong. Namikaze had not chosen him to be his successor for the potential he had.
No, he had chosen Izuna because he was the strongest shinobi in the village.
And as silence fell over the area, the young Hokage stood up and faced all the gathered forces.
“The Era of Peace is Over!” he declared, as the very wind carried his voice through the forest.
“I will turn this forest into a tomb for Iwa’s ambition!”
00000
Comments
BuzzGrave
Let there be carnage..hahaha
ProfoundMagician
Dude you always have the best cliff hangers man
