The sky was still black.
His black hair fell messily over his shoulders.
His eyes, closed for hours, opened in silence. No red. No Sharingan. Only the cold clarity of someone who knows where he's going, even if he no longer knows why.
He hadn't truly slept.
For him, sleep had become a luxury without value.
He sat at the edge of the bed.
The wood barely creaked.
He reached out, grabbed his black cloak, and slid it on slowly.
No metal.
No armor.
No weapon.
Just fabric. And certainty.
He stood.
Silent.
His steps made no sound on the wooden planks.
He crossed the room slowly, as if he wanted the world to forget he had ever been there.
He was nothing like a soldier.
Nothing like a noble.
Just the shadow of a man you cannot label, cannot follow, cannot erase.
Downstairs, the inn still slept.
The fire was out.
The innkeeper hadn't opened the shutters.
Only silence reigned.
No trace.
He stepped outside.
The air was crisp, still frozen by the night.
The first gray light barely tinged the rooftops.
He walked.
The capital hadn't fully awakened.
A few distant hoofbeats. A stray dog. A grumbling merchant setting up crates.
The city was calm.
But not empty.
It was waiting.
"The world will speak today.
I want to hear what it has to say."
Madara knew the alleys.
He knew the blind spots, the rough walls, the sturdy gutters.
He climbed.
One rooftop. Then another.
He made no sound.
His steps were precise, deliberate, as natural as if he had lived here all his life.
The royal castle appeared on the horizon.
Far away.
Almost small.
Like a silhouette carved into the gray sky.
Its slender towers looked like fingers stretched toward the void.
Smoke rose gently from the kitchens or the forges.
The flags barely moved, lifted by a timid wind still cold from the night.
Madara walked.
He didn't hurry.
He followed no path.
He moved like breathing—slowly, naturally, without asking why.
The castle grew larger with every step.
No longer a shape. A mass.
Then a boundary.
The cobbles changed underfoot.
The walls grew taller, the gates thicker, the guards more numerous.
But he didn't approach the front entrance.
He traced the perimeter, read the corners, watched the heights.
He crossed a stone bridge.
Cut between two locked stables.
Slipped into a servant's quarter still asleep.
He climbed a forgotten spiral staircase, jumped a wall, slid between two moss-covered stone statues.
Now the castle loomed over him.
He stopped for a moment.
He looked up.
The towers seemed to touch the clouds.
The walls gleamed like polished bones.
The stained glass cast strange colors across the stones.
And yet, something inside his chest tightened.
Not emotion.
But memory.
"It's the same walk as before.
The same as in the forests.
Long. Silent.
Toward the unknown."
He remembered the unmoving trees. The smell of sap.
The rain falling on his cloak.
The loneliness of footsteps with no destination.
"Here too, I am alone.
But the silence is less true."
In front of him, a storage building leaning against the castle kitchens.
A cracked wall, covered in ivy.
An abandoned terrace.
He approached.
Placed his hand on it.
Climbed.
A tile broke beneath his fingers.
But he didn't fall.
He slipped, regained balance.
Kept going.
A guard passed.
Didn't see him.
Madara didn't move.
Then, slowly, he slipped into shadow.
The roof of the castle wasn't guarded.
It was never meant to be taken.
Not from the air. Not from the heights.
"They build to be beautiful.
Not to survive."
Madara followed a beam.
His steps glided between two slates.
He reached the base of a large central dome, massive, sculpted, proud.
Where the ceiling curved toward the sky.
He stopped.
An old, cracked beam ran across the dome.
Unused for years.
No one came here.
No one looked this high.
But it still held.
Wide enough to carry a man.
Madara hoisted himself up.
He crawled slowly, until he lay flat on the creaking wood.
Ahead, a small opening in the dome.
Tiny. A construction flaw, hidden by a fine grate and constant shadow.
Just wide enough for an eye.
"The blind spot of the world."
He settled there.
Crouched, silent, straddling the beam.
A forgotten god, crouched beneath the stones.
Below...
The grand hall unfolded.
Vast. Circular.
Golden banners. Stained glass high above. Rows of seats arranged in a crescent.
And in the center… the empty throne.
Madara saw everything.
Below… the hall began to stir.
Preparations moved swiftly.
Carpets rolled out.
Gilded chairs aligned in an arc.
Banners hung from the ceiling.
Servants hurried, sweating, harassed by officers in gold and white wool.
Nobles entered. Some already seated. Others fidgeted, searching for their places.
Madara watched.
"They're going to reveal themselves.
But not as they are.
As they want to be seen."
He didn't move.
His breath was barely perceptible.
But his eyes saw everything.
There was disorder.
Disorder disguised as tradition.
The candidates had not yet arrived.
But already, eyes clung to the empty seats.
Madara remained motionless.
He was not there to intervene.
Not to judge.
To understand.
"They still believe in something."
"They believe that choosing a king will change who they are."
He knew this theater.
He had been the actor once.
And the executioner.
And the dreamer.
Today, he was none of that.
Just a gaze, frozen, suspended above the world.
"I want to see… how long their masks will hold."