“Thank you for the meal.”

Kurenai’s voice tried to cut through the silence that had settled over the table, but it wasn’t enough. The only replies were the sound of chopsticks against bowls and the rain that had begun to gently patter on the roof.

Tsunami, Tazuna’s daughter, forced a smile. “It’s not much, but it’s what we have.”

“It’s good,” Kiba said, chewing a piece of dried fish more loudly than necessary. Akamaru, peeking out from his jacket, gave a small bark of agreement. “Right, Akamaru? Though a little meat wouldn’t hurt.”

“Kiba,” Kurenai warned in a low voice.

“What? I’m just telling the truth,” he defended himself, though he lowered his voice.

Tsunami shook her head, her smile a bit more genuine now, though tinged with sadness. “With Gatō controlling the port, getting anything we don’t pull from the sea is nearly impossible. I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Hinata intervened, her voice soft, barely a whisper. “It’s delicious, Tsunami-san.”

Meanwhile, Naruto wasn’t eating. He pushed a piece of fish around in his rice porridge, his gaze fixed on Inari. The boy hadn’t even touched his breakfast. His face was blank, his eyes fixed on the wood of the table, vacant. That look reminded him too much of the nights in his apartment when silence was his only companion. It was a loneliness he recognized, and it tied his stomach in a knot.

Kakashi, who hadn’t said a word either, placed his chopsticks on his empty bowl with a soft but definitive click that drew everyone’s attention. His single visible eye settled on the bridge builder.

“Tazuna-san, after breakfast, I need a complete blueprint of the bridge. I also need a detailed report on Gatō’s men. Patrol routes, number of effectives, if they have any ninja among them, and if so, what you know of their abilities.”

Tazuna nodded, exhaustion etched onto his face. “I have the blueprints in my workshop. As for Gatō’s men… I don’t know much. They move in groups, intimidate people. They’re thugs, but some of them… they move differently. They’re not from around here.”

“Rogue ninja,” Kurenai murmured, more to herself than to the others.

“Exactly,” Kakashi confirmed. “Therefore, we’ve decided to split the squad. Kurenai and I believe it’s the best way to proceed.”

Naruto looked up, interested for the first time.

Kakashi continued, his tone practical and direct. “I will lead the main escort team. Sasuke and Sakura will come with me. Our priority will be to protect Tazuna at the construction site. He is the primary target, and it’s where we expect the most direct attack.”

Sasuke made a faint sound of approval, his dark eyes glinting with anticipation. Sakura, sitting beside him, nodded with determination.

“And what about us?” Naruto blurted out, pointing to himself and the others. “Are we staying here to knit?”

“You, Hinata, Kiba, and Shino will form the support and home protection team, under Kurenai’s command,” Kakashi explained, unfazed by the interruption. “Your mission is twofold and no less important.”

“‘Home protection’?” Kiba repeated with a smirk. “Sounds like we’re going to be babysitters.”

“Your first task is to secure this house,” Kurenai interjected, her firm voice making it clear there was no room for argument. “Tsunami and Inari are the leverage Gatō could use against Tazuna. They are as important as the bridge itself. We can’t let anything happen to them. Understood?”

Kiba grumbled but nodded.

“Your second task,” Kakashi continued, looking directly at Naruto, “is reconnaissance and intelligence. The village is terrified. We need to know why. We need to understand Gatō’s control from the inside. Talk to people, observe the patrols, look for anything out of the ordinary. You are our eyes and ears in the town. The information you gather could be the key to winning this without anyone else getting hurt.”

The explanation seemed to placate Naruto, though his frown didn’t completely disappear. The idea of being “eyes and ears” sounded more important than being “babysitters.”

“Do not underestimate your role,” Kakashi concluded, his gaze sweeping over each member of Kurenai’s team. “A surprise attack on the rear guard can destroy an entire operation. Your job is to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Breakfast ended on that solemn note. As Kakashi’s team prepared to leave with Tazuna, Naruto glanced at Inari again. The boy was still in the same position, withdrawn, drowned in a silence that Naruto was beginning to hate more than any enemy he had ever faced.

The village greeted them with an oppressive stillness. The fog enveloped everything, muffling sounds and desaturating colors. It wasn’t a stealth mission, but the silence of the villagers made it one. The streets, flanked by wooden houses weathered by salt, were nearly empty.

“This is depressing,” Kiba muttered, adjusting his hood. Akamaru let out a low whine from inside his jacket.

“No,” Shino corrected in his monotonous voice. “It’s fear.”

Naruto clenched his fists. “Stop talking like this is a nature documentary! They’re people! Look at them!”

He pointed to an old fisherman mending a net with clumsy, trembling hands. His fingers were covered in scars and the thread he used was frayed. When he saw the ninja approaching, his face contorted into a mask of panic. He hastily gathered his net and practically ran to his house, slamming the door shut.

Kurenai sighed, a cloud of vapor escaping her lips. “I’ll try.”

She approached a woman sweeping her porch with slow, resigned movements. Her back was hunched, not just from age, but from an invisible weight that was crushing her.

“Good morning,” Kurenai said with her kindest smile. “We’re just passing through. We were wondering if you could tell us where to find the market.”

The woman looked up. Her eyes, sunken and lifeless, widened when she saw the Konoha protector on Kurenai’s forehead. Panic paralyzed her for a second. She dropped the broom, which clattered in the street’s silence, and scrambled into her house, slamming the door even harder than the fisherman had.

“Wow, you’re really popular, Kurenai-sensei,” Kiba joked, though there was no humor in his voice.

“It’s not us they fear,” Hinata said quietly, activating her Byakugan for a moment, her pearl-like eyes scanning the surroundings. Her shoulders slumped slightly. “They’re watching. From the windows. Behind the curtains. They see us… and then they hide.”

“They fear the consequences of being seen talking with us,” Shino analyzed. “Gatō has established a system of control based on punishment by association. It is a classic and effective tactic of psychological oppression.”

“I don’t care if it’s effective!” Naruto exploded, unable to hold back any longer. He stepped ahead of the group and stood in the middle of the empty street. “Hey, everyone!” he shouted, his voice echoing in the fog. “We’re from Konoha! We’re here to help! You don’t have to be afraid!”

His only answer was the sound of several windows shutting in unison. A gust of wind rolled a dry leaf down the street. The silence that followed was more resounding than any scream.

Naruto stood there, fists clenched and shoulders slumped. Frustration burned inside him. He had imagined spectacular fights, powerful enemies, a chance to prove his worth. He never thought his first great challenge would be a wall of silence, an entire village that had already given up.

“Naruto, let’s go,” Kurenai said, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Shouting isn’t going to solve anything.”

“Then what will?” he retorted, turning to face her. “How are we supposed to help people who don’t want to be helped?”

Kurenai had no answer. She just squeezed his shoulder tighter and led her team back to Tazuna’s house as the fog swallowed the sound of their footsteps.

That night, the storm that had been brewing at sea finally broke. The wind howled and the rain beat against the roof of the house. Inside, the atmosphere was no less stormy. Kakashi’s team had returned, soaked and covered in mud. Their day had been tense, filled with hostile glares from the other workers and the constant feeling of being watched.

Now, everyone was gathered in the main room, sitting around a crackling fire that cast dancing shadows on their faces. The only sound, apart from the storm and the fire, was the occasional gurgle from Tazuna’s sake bottle.

Naruto couldn’t sit still. He stood up and began to pace, his pent-up energy about to burst. Every glance at Tazuna’s defeated face, every glimpse of the dark corner where Inari had curled up, fueled his anger.

“I don’t get it,” he snapped suddenly, stopping his pacing. “Why doesn’t anyone do anything? Why do they just sit around waiting for Gatō to crush them?”

“It’s not that simple, kid,” Tazuna answered in a hoarse voice, not looking up from his bottle.

“Yes, it is!” Naruto shot back. “You fight! You resist! You don’t give up and let yourself be trampled! That’s what ninja do! That’s what men do!”

Inari, from his corner, let out a snort of contempt, a small but venom-laced sound.

It was the last straw.

Naruto stood before Tazuna, his blue eyes burning in the firelight. The movement was so abrupt it made Sakura jump and Hinata hold her breath.

“That’s enough, old man!” he yelled, his voice competing with the roar of the wind. “You lied to get us here! We were almost killed when we arrived! We’ve risked our lives! And in return, your grandson tells us we’re already dead and your village treats us like we have the plague! We need to know why! Why has everyone given up? What the hell did Gatō do to you to leave you all so… broken?”

The silence that followed was heavy. Kakashi watched the scene over the top of his book. Kurenai looked like she was about to intervene, but something in Tazuna’s gaze stopped her.

The old builder looked up. His eyes were red, not just from the alcohol, but from a pain so deep it had eaten him away from the inside. He looked at Naruto, a boy full of fire and rage, and then his gaze shifted to his grandson, a small, trembling figure in the darkness.

“Sit down, kid,” Tazuna said, his voice now a ragged, broken whisper. “And I’ll tell you a story. Not about ninja or great battles. The story of a hero… and how they drowned him.”

Naruto hesitated, the fury still boiling inside him. But a serious, expectant look from Kurenai told him to obey. He sat down reluctantly, crossing his legs on the tatami. An expectant silence fell over the room, broken only by the crackling fire and the roar of the storm.

“A few years ago,” Tazuna began, his gaze lost in the flames, “this town wasn’t an empty shell. We were poor, we’ve always been poor. But we weren’t broken. There was laughter in the streets. The fishermen would sing on their way home. We helped each other. If a family’s roof broke, we all helped fix it. If someone got sick, we shared our food. We were a community.”

He took a long swig of sake, the liquid seeming to give him the courage to continue.

“And we had someone who reminded us every day why it was worth fighting. His name was Kaiza.”

At the name, Inari shrank even further, trying to disappear into the shadows. Tsunami, sitting beside him, placed a hand on his back, a futile gesture of comfort against such immense pain.

“He wasn’t from here,” Tazuna continued. “He washed up on our shore, a castaway. We could have ignored him, but we didn’t. We took him in. And he… he paid us back tenfold. He was just a fisherman, he didn’t know any jutsu or wield a katana. But he had an indomitable spirit, one that wouldn’t bend to anything.”

A small, sad smile touched his lips. “He stayed. Became one of us. He fell in love with Tsunami… and he became the father Inari never had. The boy’s real father…”

He sighed, the sound heavy with regret. “Inari idolized him. Followed him everywhere, never leaving his side. And Kaiza… Kaiza taught him how to be brave. I remember once, some older kids took Inari’s toy. Inari came back crying, and Kaiza knelt in front of him and said, ‘It’s okay to cry, Inari. It shows you care. But a real man isn’t one who doesn’t cry. He’s the one who dries his tears and keeps fighting to protect what he loves.'”

Naruto glanced at Inari. He saw the almost imperceptible tremor in the boy’s small shoulders.

“When Gatō first arrived,” Tazuna’s voice darkened, losing any trace of warmth, “he didn’t come with an army. He came with bags of money and a fake smile. He started buying up businesses, taking control of the shipping lanes. He offered ridiculous prices. Those who refused to sell suddenly had ‘accidents.’ Their boats would turn up with holes in them. Their nets, slashed. People started to whisper. Fear began to spread through the streets.”

“It was Kaiza who stood up. The first one. The only one, at first. When Gatō’s thugs came to threaten a family into giving up their shop, he stood in their way. He didn’t use ninjutsu. He used his fists and a will of iron. There were three of them, and one of him. But he threw them out of town. That day, he reminded us what it meant to have courage. He became our hero. People started to follow him. We started to resist. We started to dream again. The idea to build the bridge was his. ‘It will be our path to the future,’ he’d say. ‘A way to connect with the world and free ourselves from Gatō.’ He was our symbol of hope.”

The story stopped abruptly. Tazuna drained the sake bottle in one go. The only sound was the incessant drumming of the rain.

“What happened?” Sakura asked in a low voice, almost afraid of the answer.

Tazuna closed his eyes. The pain on his face was so raw it was hard to look at. “Gatō realized that fear wasn’t enough to break us as long as we had Kaiza. So he decided to make an example of him. An example no one would ever forget. He brought more men. This time, he brought ninja.”

His voice cracked, and he had to stop to take a breath. “They captured him. They didn’t hide. They did it in broad daylight.”

“They took him to the town square,” he continued, his voice now a rough, broken whisper. “And they forced all of us out of our houses to watch. The men, the women, the children…” His gaze locked onto the corner where Inari sat. “They tied him to a post and they… they executed him. Publicly.”

Sakura brought a hand to her mouth, a choked gasp caught in her throat. Hinata no longer tried to hide her tears; they ran freely down her cheeks, glistening in the firelight. Sasuke, who had been staring into the flames with apparent indifference, looked up. His expression had transformed into a mask of terrible, icy intensity. The story of a father figure, a protector, publicly executed for defending his people… it wasn’t a story. It was a brutal reminder of the night that had destroyed everything for him. His fist, hidden beneath the table, clenched so tightly his knuckles turned white.

“They killed him in the cruelest way possible,” Tazuna went on, every word a torment. “They wanted the message to be clear: ‘This is what happens to heroes.’ And it worked. That day, Gatō didn’t just kill a man. He killed the hope of an entire village. Kaiza’s spirit died with him in that square. And the Inari we knew… the brave, cheerful boy who followed his father everywhere… he died that day, too.”

Now they all understood. The silence. The fear. The empty eyes. The soul of an entire town, murdered in cold blood.

Inari, who had listened to the whole story trembling in silence, couldn’t take it anymore. He shot to his feet, his small fists clenched, his face soaked with tears of a rage and pain too great for a child.

“SHUT UP!” he screamed, his voice broken by sobs. “STOP TALKING ABOUT HIM! You talk like he was brave! But he was just a fool! Heroes don’t exist! There are only fools who think they’re heroes and die for nothing!” His accusing gaze swept over the Konoha ninja. “And you’re all the same! You talk about helping and fighting! You don’t know anything! You’re going to die! Gatō will kill all of you! YOU’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!”

With that last, gut-wrenching scream, he ran from the room, the sound of his feet pounding up the stairs lost in the roar of the storm. Tsunami, her own face streaked with tears, stood up and went after him without a word.

The room was plunged into a heavy, painful, tragedy-laden silence. Kurenai and Kakashi stared into the fire, their faces grim. This mission had just escalated from a simple escort to something infinitely darker and more complicated.

Hinata continued to cry silently, her heart broken by the story and the pain of a boy who had watched all his hope be taken from him.

Naruto had remained motionless throughout the entire tale. His face was a grim mask, his blue eyes fixed on the dancing flames. The story of Kaiza, a normal man who became a hero through his will to protect others, had hit him with the force of a punch. It was a reflection of everything he aspired to be, stripped of all fantasy.

Slowly, without taking his eyes off the fire, he moved. He shifted closer to Hinata. He said nothing. He offered no empty words of comfort that would sound false in this room full of pain. He simply sat beside her and, with a gentleness no one would associate with his usual loud energy, he wrapped an arm around her, drawing her into a silent and awkward, but firm, embrace.

She startled for a second, then leaned into him, her sobs now muffled against the orange fabric of his jacket.