Konoha: Superman template, the spoiled brat becomes strong.

Suddenly, nine white flowers bloomed from the ivy at Guiyuan Shrine, and words slowly emerged from the heart of each flower. When the wind blew, the words floated up and formed a line: "The truth is not in human hands, but in people's hearts."

Looking at the words in the air, Bai Ye suddenly remembered what Granny Chiyo often said: "I've lived for seventy years and I only understand one thing—a stone can suppress grass, but it can't suppress grass seeds." At this moment, he finally understood that those erased names and those altered memories were never grass, but seeds buried in the ground.

Meanwhile, in Sunagakure Village, a thousand miles away, Chiyo was sitting in front of a fireplace wiping her puppet, the Salamander.

A flash of red light suddenly streaked past the window, and her cloudy eyes widened abruptly. She slammed her cane heavily on the ground: "Old man, I've been waiting for this day, my knees are practically frozen stiff." She turned to look in the direction of the dungeon where Ebizo was imprisoned, a smile playing on her lips. "Ebizo, Ebizo, starting tomorrow, this dungeon... it'll be repurposed." The musty smell of the Sunagakure dungeon hadn't yet dissipated when Chiyo's cane struck the bluestone slabs heavily.

Two shadow guards were working together to move Ebizo's shackles. The rusty chains dragged across the ground, scraping against the wall with a harsh sound. "Be gentle." She squinted, her cloudy eyes reflecting the undried water stains on the wall—stains left by the teacup that Ebizo had spilled when he was taken away.

Three days ago, she ordered people to wipe the walls seven times with vinegar essence. Even now, you can still smell the sour aftertaste, as if it is vomiting out the filth of the past for this prison cell.

"Wide up the ventilation window on the east side." She tapped the corner of the wall with the tip of her cane. "So that the midday sun can shine in." As the young shadow guard nodded, the kunai at his waist struck the stone wall with a crisp sound.

Chiyo stared at the pale blue veins behind his ear—traces of long-term use of substitute drugs, exactly the same as Ebizo's back then.

“Go and bring Kenichi Saeki’s memorial tablet,” she suddenly said.

Chapter 122 Investigating Will Lead to Misfortune

The shadow guard paused, his Adam's apple bobbing. "That was... erased by the historian..."

“What has been erased should be engraved in the most conspicuous place.” Chiyo took out a handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped the coral carving on the head of her cane—it was something she had won from a nobleman of the Land of Wind when she was young. “Back then, Ebizo used this dungeon as a sieve, and the number of names he sifted out was more than the number of grains of sand.”

Now we need to make these names grow back through the sieve.

When the stone tablet was brought in, its shadow covered half of Chiyo's face.

The dark gray stone still carried the dampness of the quarry. She personally carved the four characters "Saeki Kenichi" with a carving knife, and the blade chipped three times.

The moment the young shadow guard reached out to touch the monument, a strange wind suddenly swept through the dungeon, making his bangs fly wildly.

His pupils suddenly contracted, and his fingertips turned bluish-purple, the same color as Onodera Ren's cuffs. Then his knees buckled and he knelt on the ground, his hands gripping the edge of the monument tightly: "I...I saw the brazier!"

In the winter brazier, the charcoal crackled and popped... He stroked my head and said, "Archer, if Dad's name is forgotten, remember it for me..."

His voice was choked with sobs, and his words trembled at the end: "I am standing up for my father!"

He died of illness in the mine three years ago. The mine owner said that if a body double dies, it won't be recorded... But before he died, he grabbed my hand, his fingernails full of blood, and said, "Don't let your name rot in the ground..."

Chiyo knelt down, her withered hand covering his trembling nape.

She could feel the veins throbbing beneath his skin, like seeds that had been suppressed for too long suddenly breaking through the soil. "From this day forward, you are not substitutes." Her voice was softer than ever before, yet it resonated like a hammer striking bronze. "You are the torchbearers."

A wick can be replaced when it goes out, but lamp oil must be passed down from generation to generation.

The shadow guard raised his head, his tears washing away the dust and leaving two white streaks on his face.

He stared at Chiyo, then suddenly grabbed her wrist: "Then...can I go to Shige?"

I want to see... I want to see if my father's name is really lying in some book...

"No rush." ​​Chiyo patted the back of his hand, and stood up with a posture straighter than when she was young. "Once the sign for the True History Court is hung up, the doors of the History Pavilion will open to you by themselves."

The moonlight from the south gate of the City of Fire is climbing up the stone tablet.

Tanaka Hisashi wrapped his coarse cloth coat tightly around himself, and the white breath he exhaled condensed into small clumps in front of him.

He has been standing in front of the newly erected "automatic name display" monument for three days, but the surface of the monument is still empty, like an unfinished letter.

But he knew that what was coming would come—just like that rainy night three years ago when he found half a torn copy of "Records of Refugees from the Land of Fire" in the back alley of the bookstore. The torn pages were stained with blood, but it read, "Tanaka no Kami, born in the seventh year of the Zhenguan era, an archivist in the History Bureau."

"boom!"

The sound of the stone hitting the base of the monument startled him so much that he staggered.

Three figures wearing straw hats emerged from the alleyway. The one in the middle carried an iron sled, the moonlight illuminating the Leaf Headband on his waist—a design reminiscent of the Anbu. "Old man, if you know what's good for you, tear down the monument." The tip of the sled scraped against the monument, making a hissing sound. "The rules of the History Pavilion are not for a bookstore manager like you to change."

Tanaka Hisashi's fingers clenched the hem of his coat.

Just as he saw the tip of the sledge about to strike the monument, the ground suddenly glowed with a bluish light.

The vines sprouted from the cracks in the bricks, faster than a snake, and wrapped around the ankles of the three people.

The man in the middle screamed and staggered, and the iron sledge fell to the ground with a clang.

Qing Teng didn't use any force; she just gently pulled the three of them to the front of the monument.

"This...this is?" The straw hat on the right slipped off, revealing a face of a man in his thirties. He stared at the monument, his pupils contracting sharply.

Under the moonlight, the three characters "Tanaka Mori" rose from the bottom of the monument, each stroke appearing as if someone were writing them with gold powder.

“My father…” His voice suddenly went hoarse. He staggered and knelt before the monument, his hands stroking the name “Tanaka Mamoru”. “My father said he was a shop assistant in a silk shop… but the monument says he was an archivist at the Imperial Archives… three years ago, my uncle suddenly gave me money to buy property, saying, ‘Don’t investigate the Imperial Archives, you’ll be in trouble if you do…’” He suddenly looked up, tears falling onto the monument. “So I was impersonating my uncle!”

He erased my father's name back then, afraid the truth would be revealed, so he had me take his place...

Tanaka Hisashi squatted down and patted him on the back.

The vine, having loosened its grip on her ankle, was now climbing up the base of the monument, twining around the inscription "Tanaka Mamoru" and blooming a small flower. "Remember," he said softly, "from now on, you won't be living for anyone else's identity, but for these names."

The wind picked up in the Gobi Desert outside Guiyuan Shrine.

White Night wrapped his cloak tighter around himself, and the sand felt like pebbles hitting his face.

He stood in front of a protruding rock and suddenly pressed his hand to his chest—the burning heat of the core of his Wood Release technique had completely subsided at some point.

He drew his dagger, the blade slicing across his palm, and drops of blood fell onto the sand.

The sand grains suddenly moved.

Where the blood droplets fell, the fine sand receded as if blown away by the wind, revealing damp soil.

A green sprout emerged from the soil, its two tender leaves still stained with droplets of blood, gleaming like jade in the moonlight.

Bai Ye stood frozen in place, the dagger clattering into the sand.

He squatted down and gently touched the tender bud with his fingertips—it was alive, carrying the warmth of spring.

In the distance, countless points of blue light rose among the mountains.

He recognized those lights: the glow of the memorial tablets in various places, the glow of erased names, and the light of seeds that had been buried for too long finally breaking through the soil.

He suddenly laughed, the sound carried by the wind and scattered into the night sky of the Gobi Desert.

Deep within the Fire City's basement, Fujiwara Shizuka's fingers were completely transparent.

She watched as the last line of words slowly appeared on the wall—"Bai Ye, you are free"—and a smile crept onto her lips.

The entire wall collapsed under her gaze, and in the dust that rose up, the skeleton of a young man in a white robe was revealed.

The Wood Release seed in his chest was still pulsating faintly, like a star that was about to go out but refused to go out.

The wind lifted the hem of Bai Ye's clothes. He looked at the blue light among the mountains, then looked down at the green buds at his feet.

The sand dunes seeped into the soles of his boots, cool and refreshing, like some kind of anticipation, seeping into his heart through his veins.

He reached out and gently placed his hand on the tender bud. Blood was still seeping from his palm, dripping onto the tips of the leaves and blooming into tiny flowers.

The night wind of the Gobi Desert whips sand across my knuckles, and the white night still bleeds from the palms covering the tender buds.

The emerald-green flower drooped slightly under the weight of the blood droplets, yet stubbornly raised its leaf tips, much like the wild chrysanthemums in the Fire Country Lane that, even when trampled into the mud, still tried to burrow into the sunlight.

His fingertips were about to retract when he suddenly stopped—

A very slight vibration came from the soles of my feet, like pebbles rolling in a stream when the ice first melts in spring, yet more chaotic and warmer than the resonance of Wood Release.

Chapter 123 Film Festival

He frowned, the sand on the soles of his boots slipping away, the pulsation of the earth veins climbing up his arches, colliding with the emptiness at his knees where the Wood Release core had fallen silent.

This isn't chakra resonance; it's more like... a heartbeat.

"The direction of the City of Fire," he murmured, his Adam's apple bobbing.

Suddenly, his mind surged, and the image of the white-robed skeleton beneath the ruins of the Guiyuan Shrine clearly appeared—the Wood Release Seed in his chest was beating at the same frequency, as if it were connected to the same pulse by an invisible thread.

He recalled the words "You are free" that appeared on the wall before Fujiwara Shizuka disappeared, and the empty eyes of the skeleton in the dust raised when the basement collapsed, which seemed to hold unspoken words.

“It’s not resurrection.” He crouched down, pressing his fingertips to the sand, the vibrations of the earth’s veins transmitted through his fingertips. “It’s waiting.”

Wood Release threads seeped from the palm, like silver spider silk seeping into the sand.

Byakuya's closed eyelashes trembled slightly, and chakra flowed upstream along the threads, passing through the tangled rocks beneath the Gobi Desert, crossing the undercurrents of the River of Fire, and finally touching a cold barrier.

That was the Wood Release seal of the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju. The patterns still contained the myriad phenomena of that time, but a very fine gap was left in the center, as if it was deliberately waiting for someone to come.

"The Silent Corridor." He suddenly opened his eyes, his pupils reflecting the moonlit sea of ​​sand. "A door that only those with dual bloodlines can open."

The wind lifted the hem of his cloak, revealing the puppet mechanism box hanging at his waist.

The dual power of the original bloodline and the puppeteer surged within him. He recalled what Granny Chiyo had said three days ago: "Some secrets are only meant for the living to know." His knuckles clenched until they turned white, but he still turned to the north, his boot heels crushing a few grains of sand. "If the door isn't closed, someone has to push it open."

The sandalwood scent of the "Memory Altar" in the wood leaves, mixed with the fishy smell of green vines, wafted into my nostrils.

Onodera Ren's fingertips traced the blood-red vines entwined around the stone pillar. Today's ritual was different from usual—the seventh boy to touch the vines had just placed his hand on them when the vines suddenly contracted as if scalded by fire. Yet, the boy's lips moved uncontrollably, uttering a string of ancient syllables: "Sealing the meridians and locking the soul, using bones as the gate..."

"A remnant of a forbidden incantation!" Her pupils constricted, and her nails dug into her palms.

The unique ink patterns of the dark side of Qingye appeared on her wrist. She quickly formed a hand seal, and blood ink seeped from the tips of the vines, drawing the totem of Qingye's secret command on the ground.

Chakra followed the ink lines into the earth's veins, but just as it was about to reach the source, it was gently bounced away as if it had hit cotton.

"Don't awaken the sleeping roots."

The blood-red characters appeared on the mottled wall, the strokes of which were the slender and delicate style of Fujiwara Shizuka. However, even with all his senses activated, Onodera Ren could not detect even a trace of the remaining consciousness.

She took a half step back, the vines curling up at her feet like a disciplined beast.

“It’s the earth’s veins speaking.” She took out a tinderbox and lit the secret command totem.

As the flame licked the blood-ink, she seemed to see Fujiwara Shizuka's phantom laughing in the smoke, "Some doors are not meant for us to open."

As the night lights of the South Market in the City of Fire went out one by one, Hisashi Tanaka was squatting in front of the newly erected "Mingji" (a memorial stone) monument.

The vines seemed to come alive as they crawled out from under the monument, wrapping around the ankles of three high-ranking Konoha officials—one of them, a middle-aged man with a mustache, suddenly froze, staring at the three characters "Yamashiro Taku" on the monument, his Adam's apple bobbing: "My father... he said he died in battle on the border of the Land of Lightning..."

“He took over the role of the archivist at the History Museum.” Tanaka didn’t look up, his pen scratching as he wrote on the bamboo slips. “The fire three years ago burned down half of the History Museum.”

The man with the mustache suddenly knelt down, his forehead pressed against the stone tablet: "It was my uncle... He forced my father to take the blame, saying 'Only the dead can't speak'..." His sobs, mixed with the soft rustling of vines sprouting, were particularly clear in the empty market.

After the three staggered away, Tanaka Hisashi pulled out half a tattered scroll from his pocket.

The handwriting on the Hidden Scroll of the History of Fire had faded, but the last chapter was still clear: "The First Emperor once swore: If future generations use memory as a blade, then my coffin will open itself." He dug up the soil under the base of the monument, buried the tattered scroll in it, and wiped the dust off the surface of the monument with his fingertips: "What you are waiting for is not a hero, but a creditor."

The moonlight suddenly became clear and bright.

On the surface of the monument, the four large characters "Senju Hashirama" slowly emerge, but are then covered by newly carved names such as "Yamashiro Taku" and "Tanaka Mamoru," like the tide washing over the beach, old marks not yet faded, new imprints already superimposed.

As the messenger crows of Kumogakure flew over the border of the Land of Fire, Hijiri was staring at the urgent secret report on his desk.

The "Mingji" stone tablets of the Land of Lightning are glowing tonight, and border ninjas report that the erased names form a line under the moonlight, pointing directly towards the Land of Fire.

He crushed the secret report, and lightning chakra crackled in his palm.

"Shadow Meeting!" he roared at the guards outside the door. "Notify the Tsuchikage and Kazekage that tomorrow at noon, at the Cloud Village Castle."

Outside the window, the earth's veins in the direction of Guiyuan Shrine were still pulsating gently, as if counting the footsteps of someone.

As the earth's veins trembled through the clouds at Guiyuan Shrine, the bronze doors of Kumogakure Castle were vibrating and humming from the impact of lightning chakra.

Clutching the shattered fragments of the secret report, the lightning patterns on his knuckles crackled with blue flames, making the crack on his forehead appear even more menacing—a mark left three years ago when he clashed swords with the "previous Raikage." Now, he realized that the so-called "previous Raikage" was nothing more than a substitute whose memories had been altered.

"The screening begins." He kicked open the sandalwood door of the council chamber, shaking off the dust that had accumulated on the beams.

The Fourth Tsuchikage, Kurotsuchi, was holding a teacup when the roar scalded his fingertips, causing them to tremble. The Fourth Kazekage, Rasa, had golden sand condensing into sharp spikes on his sleeve, but it slowly dispersed into fine sand when it met Bee's gaze.

The three figures' gazes swept over the three plain-clad figures who had suddenly appeared in the hall—they wore bronze waist badges that read "Ming Reporter," and the youngest girl among them was clutching half a charred bamboo slip, her knuckles white.

"We need to check the historical records of imposters in the Land of Thunder," the girl said first, her voice ringing out like a newly emerged silkworm.

Bi noticed the pale blue vine-like patterns behind her ears, which were exactly the same as the engravings on the "Yamashiro Taku" stone tablet in the southern market of the Land of Fire.

Just as Heitu was about to slam her hand on the table, Bi raised his hand and pressed down on her wrist: "Give me your reasons."

"At three-quarters past midnight last night, twelve memorial monuments on the border of the Land of Lightning simultaneously glowed." The middle-aged man lifted his shirt, revealing a raised blue vine mark on his chest. "The same name appeared on each monument—'Agent of the Raikage, Unzo.'" Rasa's golden sand suddenly surged violently: "Unzo was the captain of the Third Raikage's personal guard. Records show that he died twenty years ago in an attack by Iwagakure—"

Chapter 124 Abolish the Body Double System

“But his double lived until five years ago.” The girl slammed the bamboo slip onto the stone table, dark red blood seeping from the scorch marks. “This was dug out from the cracks in the walls of an old house in the Land of Lightning, recording the flow of the silver-gray liquid when each double awakened.” She traced the dark patterns on the bamboo slip with her fingertips. “All the liquid eventually converged in the Land of Fire… at the Guiyuan Shrine.”

The council chamber fell into a deathly silence.

Bi suddenly laughed, the sound shaking the thunder pattern totem on the roof beams, causing dust to fall: "So you want evidence, I'll give it to you." He drew the thunder blade from his waist, the tip of the blade lifting the "Shadow Substitute Codex" in front of the old-school elders, "From this day forward, Cloud Hidden abolishes the Shadow Substitute system, and all records are made public."