(T/N: Sorry for the delay, I was a little held up.)
Uchiha District. Near the Naka River.
Seeing that Shisui had no intention of continuing the fight, Kaze simply let it go.
Instead, he turned his attention to cheering up little Sasuke.
Once he found out that Sasuke had come here to practice the Great Fireball Technique, Kaze offered a few casual words of encouragement.
To Kaze, it was nothing much—just a few light words.
But to Sasuke, it hit like a critical strike.
Flushing red with excitement, Sasuke was eager to show Kaze how much he'd improved.
"Alright, let's see it," Kaze said cheerfully.
To avoid setting the grass and trees on fire, Sasuke made a point to dash over to the riverbank on his short little legs.
He faced the water and began forming hand seals with serious concentration.
Watching Sasuke so focused, Kaze couldn't help but feel a bit sentimental.
As a transmigrator, he knew all too well—Sasuke was working so hard on the Great Fireball Technique purely to earn his father Fugaku's approval.
But after months of effort, all he'd get in return was rejection.Fugaku would tell him to give up on the childish idea of catching up to Itachi.
Itachi, now in the ANBU, kept his distance from Sasuke more and more.
"…Why does it suddenly feel like Fugaku's brain is fried?"
The more Kaze thought about it, the more convinced he became: Fugaku was neither a good father nor a competent clan leader.
And smart? Please.
When it came to real decisions, he had no spine, no vision.
Let's not even mention the Uchiha Massacre.
Just getting pushed out to the edge of the village—that alone was a colossal leadership failure.
"During the Nine-Tails incident, he actually obeyed the Konoha higher-ups and stayed put."
"But the Hokage back then wasn't even Hiruzen—it was Namikaze Minato."
"And Minato's entire political philosophy was a world apart from the Third's."
"He not only took Obito as his disciple, but he even considered making him the next Hokage."
"Plus, Kushina and Mikoto were practically best friends."
"So close that even something as big as childbirth was openly shared…"
Kaze mused silently.
All the little signs pointed to one truth—Namikaze Minato respected the Uchiha clan.
And yet, Fugaku… actually chose to stand by and do nothing.
"If I'd had the strength back then, I would've been the first to charge out."
Even just thinking about that night made Kaze restless with frustration.
If only Fugaku had the guts back then.
If he had defied the village's command, led the Uchiha to fight the Nine-Tails alongside Minato, putting everything on the line—
That would've been real loyalty. That would've been protection worthy of a Hokage.
As long as Minato survived, Fugaku would've gone down as the second greatest contributor to repelling the Nine-Tails.
Not only would the clan's innocence be cleared,he could've stood proudly behind Minato and pushed back against Hiruzen's faction.
That would've been the smart play.
And if he'd gone even further—taken advantage of the chaos to launch a coup…
Well, who knows? Maybe the tide would've turned in the Uchiha's favor.
But instead…
Fugaku chose the worst option possible.
"…At the end of the day, it always comes down to power."
Kaze let out a quiet sigh and shook his head.
He had only been ten years old at the time.
Even though he had proposed an alternative strategy to the clan, Fugaku had crushed it without a second thought.
And that might've been tolerable—if it had ended there.
But when the entire clan was later relocated, Fugaku, as their leader, didn't even protest the baseless accusations from the village elders.
Worse—he backed the decision wholeheartedly.
"It's for the good of the village," he said.
"The Hokage will investigate and clear our name."
And then he turned around and helped silence the outrage within the clan.
The growing rift between the Uchiha and the Konoha leadership?Yeah, Fugaku absolutely deserves part of the blame.
"What are you thinking about?"
Shisui's voice snapped Kaze out of his thoughts.
Meanwhile…
By the Naka River, Sasuke had completed his hand seals with practiced precision, focusing his chakra into his throat.
"Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique!"
With a youthful but determined shout, a huge fireball burst from Sasuke's mouth, roaring across the river's surface.
The ball of fire blazed with impressive intensity—nearly a full meter in radius—its glow illuminating Sasuke's small frame in the twilight.
Shisui's gaze was drawn to the display, and with a small smile, he sat down beside Kaze.
A soft breeze rustled through the trees. For once, Shisui felt at ease.
"Impressive," he said.
"To perform a Great Fireball of that size at such a young age…"
Kaze nodded slightly, for once in agreement with Shisui."Sasuke's got both talent and the drive to back it up. Given time, his future might not be any worse than Itachi's."
"But in Fugaku's eyes," Kaze added with a touch of bitterness, "a kid like Sasuke is just a disappointment."
He couldn't help but vent his frustrations to Shisui.
The fireball Sasuke had created finally began to shrink and fade.
But instead of turning around to bask in praise, Sasuke started forming hand seals again.
He clearly wasn't satisfied with the last attempt.
That unwavering focus and persistence made his small figure seem ten times larger in that moment.
"A disappointment, huh…" Shisui chuckled softly.
"Sure, he might not be on par with his brother Itachi right now, but calling him mediocre is a stretch."
"Maybe the pressure of being clan leader is getting to Fugaku. That might explain his harshness toward Sasuke."
"But still…"
Shisui suddenly shifted the topic.He clearly didn't want to keep arguing about Sasuke's upbringing.
"The Konoha Military Police Force has always had a bad reputation in the village," he said."Even kids sometimes imitate the adults—spitting at Police Force members behind their backs."
Since he couldn't get Kaze to accept the Will of Fire…
He figured he might as well attack from another angle.
Let Kaze see that the very organization he put his faith in—was already rotten in the eyes of the public.
That it wasn't a place where someone like him should be wasting his talent.
"I know," Kaze nodded, unsurprised.
There were still a few hours before the clan assembly started.
He didn't have anything urgent to do in the meantime.
If Shisui wanted to talk, then fine—they'd talk.
"So what do you think?" Kaze asked, glancing over at Shisui from where he sat in the grass."Have the people in the Police Force really done anything unforgivable?"
After all, Kaze was a member of the Police Force now.
And Shisui… was from the ANBU.
His view of the Police Force was likely based more on rumors than reality.
Kaze had been paying close attention, and from what he'd seen—
Even the more radical Uchiha members weren't outright villains. Arrogant, yes. Full of themselves, definitely. But nothing criminal.
And not everyone in the Force was a hawk.There were doves too—clan members who genuinely wanted to maintain peace with Konoha.
Many of them also worked in the Police Force.
If someone claimed the Uchiha were using their law enforcement role to break the law and abuse civilians—
That was pure nonsense.
The Uchiha clan's pride would never allow them to stoop so low.
If anything…
The Police Force was like the chengguan from the world Kaze came from—urban officers with a bad public image.
People loved to stereotype them.
Even one mistake during an enforcement action could ruin the reputation of the entire department.
Most people didn't care about the facts—they just clung to their assumptions and painted all enforcers with the same brush.
And once someone started making a big deal out of it…
The label of "violent law enforcers" was almost impossible to shake.
"…Maybe you've got a point," Shisui admitted after a pause.
He hadn't expected Kaze to take such an unorthodox perspective—and use it to defend the Police Force.
"But the issue of excessive force—"
"Is easy to fix," Kaze cut in before Shisui could finish.
"Oh?" Shisui blinked, clearly intrigued."How would you fix it?"
If rough enforcement could truly be resolved, then maybe—just maybe—the Police Force's reputation could be salvaged.
And that would be no small feat.
It might even become the key to easing the tension between the Uchiha and Konoha.
Even the Third Hokage had struggled to find a solution to this problem.
But Kaze? He said it without hesitation.
"Record the enforcement process with a camera," he said flatly."Whether it's Police Force officers using excessive force, or just criminals being unreasonable, the truth would be clear at a glance."
"And if we do find any scum in our ranks who abuse their authority to bully civilians?"
"Fire them. Investigate them."
Kaze's voice rang with conviction, each word firm and decisive. His eyes held a rare determination.
Shisui stared at him, momentarily stunned.
In that moment, his mind echoed with Kaze's ninja way—the words he'd once heard him say.
"My heart and actions are as clear as a mirror. All I do is in the name of justice."
(T/N: And thus Kaze introduced body-cam into the Konoha Police Force. Anyway hope you all enjoyed this chapter.)