Kakashi was sitting in his room, the doubt in his mind had bee clear. Even though Hokage had said that he would check whether Danzo had something to do with his father's death or not, Kakashi could see guilt in Hiruzen's eyes.

  He was guilty of not keeping his friend in check, and there was no way Hiruzen would not have suspected that something was odd about his father's death, but he turned a blio that.

  Kakashi kept on sitting in the same pose for an unknown amount of time and only came out of this state when someone knocked on his door.

  "Sir, you were called to the Hokage's office," one of the young Anbu ninja said. Since he was quite young and a iill feared and respected every Jonin, uher Anbu ninjas. Kakashi just nodded his head and vanished from his pce. The Anbu ninja was still standing there.

  Kakashi had left his house without even closing his doors, and it was quite practical. Unless your house was guarded using some powerful seal, there was no way you could guaras safety. Even any genin could get ihe house, let alone a in or jonin. For some time, the Anbu ninja was fused about what to do, but then he just closed Kakashi's door from the outside a. 'It was not like he had asked for my help,' he thought.

  Kakashi was standing in front of Hiruzen, his fapletely serious.

  "Your doubts were correct. Danzo was behind your father's death… I am sorry," Hiruzen said. Even though he was already old, this ret event had taken a few more years from his life. Kakashi, who was already sure about this, kept on looking toward Hiruzen for one minute... two minutes... three minutes... five minutes.

  "I want to know the full truth," was the only thing Kakashi said.

  "Okay, when your father came back…" Hiruzen was just about to start what he learned about Sakumo's death when Kakashi interrupted him.

  "Not by mouth. I want to see it," Kakashi said.

  Both of them looked toward each other. This was truly a difficult decision for Hiruzen. From what he had learned about Sakumo's death, he was one hundred pert sure Kakashi would kill Danzo without even thinking. He had already promised Uchiha to give Danzo to them.

  "Okay, but you have to promise that you will not lose trol and kill Danzo after that. Don't worry; he's going to faething worse than that soon. Uchiha has demanded me hand him over after this Root mess is over. He had harmed them the most," Hiruzen said.

  Kakashi just nodded his head. Seeing Kakashi, Hiruzen almost wao not allow Kakashi to know the truth, but the cat was already out of the bag.

  "Follow me," Hiruzen stood up and took Kakashi to the basement. It was guarded by two elite Anbu ninjas; they were personal guards of Hiruzerusted them the most in Anbu.

  When they entered ihe basement, Kakashi was shocked to see the dition of Danzo. He was ed to a metal table and many seals were pced on him to stop him from perf any jutsu at all. Inoichi was sitting near his head, with his hand over Danzo's head.

  "Inoichi, Kakashi wants to see the truth about his father's death. you do it now?" Hiruzen asked. The reason for that was because Inoichi has been stantly w on finding the information about Root or any other pn Danzo had made for such situations.

  In short, Inoichi was already overexerting himself, and i, Danzo's mind was being stantly attacked by Inoichi. If it was any other person, they would have bee brain-dead long ago, but Danzo had exterained his brain in case he was kidnapped and tortured.

  As a future Hokage, he could not have such a weakness. Due to this, Inoichi could easily extraformation from his mind without effectively killing him.

  "Kakashi, I would not reend you to do that. I know you want to know about your father's death, but the truth is really, really ugly.

  Sometimes you should just fet about your past and live on. I knew Sakumo-sama, he would not want you to worry about him a yourself into this. It will do more harm than good," Inoichi Yamanaka said. He said everything Hiruzen could not say because of his guilt of not doing anything even after knowing the truth.

  "I uand your , Inoichi-sama, but till now I grew up thinking my father was weak. He could not handle criticism a me alo a er of my heart, I somehow hated him. I… I don't want to keep on thinking that. I want to, NO, I have to know the truth," Kakashi said, the vi in his voice apparent.

  Sigh

  "Fine, e here," Inoichi said. Kakashi went to him and pced his hand on Inoichi's hand, and the procedure started.

  Danzo got the hat Daimyo was sidering Sakumo Hatake for Hokage's position. Even though he had failed an S-rank mission issioned by Daimyo himself, Sakumo was still a prime didate for the position. This news was very devastating for Danzo. It was ohing if Hiruzen was Hokage;

  Danzo always believed that he would be since Hiruzen was ast his prime. But if someone as young and powerful as Sakumo became Hokage, not only would Danzo lose all ce of being a Hokage, he would even lose the power he had as an elder and Hokage's friend.

  'This 't happen, I have to do something,' was what Danzo was thinking. Then an evil smile came on his face. 'Looks like I have to fan some rumors once again.'

  Danzo ordered his subordio spread rumors about how Sakumo failed an important mission and it made Konoha lose both fad many political as well as financial resources. After a week of this order, the whole of Konoha started talking about how Sakumo was a disgrace as a ninja.

  How could some lives be pared to the whole vilge? Even his teammates who he saved were somehow pced in a subtle genjutsu and were made to believe that Sakumo made a very big mistake. This affected Sakumo quite a bit. He fought the sed Kazekage otlefield and killed both his son and daughter-in-w. He killed hundreds of ninjas for these people and did so many missions for the vilge, and now that he failed a single mission, all of the vilge was against him. Normally, this would have made him sad, but he could have brushed it off.

  So what if everyone was against him? He just had to wirust back. This was the type of person Sakumo was. But Danzo had made arras for that. He had mixed a special kind of poison in Sakumo's water by poisoning all of the water supply of that area.

  The poison was a very subtle one, only targeting the brain of a person, and made them more emotional. This poison started affeg Sakumo's mind day by day, and since he was being ridiculed by the whole vilge, his mental health started taking a hit.

  And when Sakumo was at his lowest, Danzo made his final move. He appeared at the Hatake pound when Sakumo was alone.

  "Danzo-sama, why are you here? You could have called me," Sakumo asked when Danzo came inside.

  "Sakumo, your strength and loyalty to Konoha are unparalleled. However, there is something we must discuss."

  "What is it, Danzo-sama?" Sakumo asked.

  "Your ret mission failure has caused quite a stir. The other s are questioning the iy and strength of the Hatake name."

  "I did what I believed was right. I couldn't abandon my rades." Even if his rade was not grateful for that, if given a ce, he would do the same thing again. Seeing this, Danzo once again thought about whether he should tih his pn or not,