Chương 74: A Difficult Choice.

"Are Kakashi and the jinchuriki acting within parameters?"

"Yes, Hokage-sama… Kakashi teaches the jinchurki the art of torture well while the jinchuriki pays him a lot of attention. It also seems like the jinchuriki doesn't trust Kakashi a lot anymore and always maintains a cold aloof demeanour while facing him."

"Hmm… and how are your relations with the jinchuriki? What is the standing from the last week?"

"It is the same as last week Hokage-sama… the jinchuriki looks at me with guilt and worry. He places the blame of your blessings on me on himself and wishes to right what he thinks is a misfortune."

"Hmmm… good. Get him a little more guilty, enough that if I command your sacrifice he'll transform into the nine tails. Once he loses control to the hatred, he'll become an asset to the village, without the nine tails he's just another boy, a tool aplenty."

"Yes, Hokage-sama… your wish is my command."

"Good. Follow me then…" Danzo said, standing up from his chair before rounding the table and leaving the Hokage office. Haruto followed him with no idea of where they were going, but he quickly guessed the location, 'The training grounds?' They walked together with Haruto trailing slightly behind Danzo, before they quickly entered the training ground seven. In front of Haruto were Kakashi and Naruto, but apart from them was another ROOT shinobi.

Danzo simply stared at the hatred simmering in Naruto's eyes for a second before breaking eye contact and giving the orders.

"Begin the test. Have the prisoner be brought."

"Yes Hokage-sama." The ROOT shinobi bowed politely before looking off into the distance in the tree lining the borders of the training ground and out emerged three more ROOT shinobi carrying a man nailed to a stake. The man was half kneeling with both his hands and legs nailed to the stake quite painfully such that each time the man so much as flinched the nails carved through a bit more of his flesh.

The three ROOT shinobi planted the stake into the training ground and pulled out a bunch of tools from their pouches. They all stood in a line before Naruto, while the other ROOT shinobi that Danzo had ordered stepped forward to explain the scenario.

"In front of you is the man who has been found guilty of planning to overthrow the Hokage-sama's reign, your job is to figure out his co-conspirators. You may use the tools provided, anything else you do is also acceptable, provided it brings out the result that the Hokage-sama is satisfied with." Naruto's pupils trembled. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings. There had been a group planning to overthrow this tyrant?

And he was supposed to sabotage them further by torturing one of them? Weren't they on the same side? Wouldn't torturing them be like using an axe on his own legs? Naruto's lips trembled as his eyes firmed.

'No! I won't do this!' Seemingly understanding his resolve, Danzo gave a simple command.

"Haruto Hayashi, give your life for the future of Konoha!" Naruto's resolve immediately shattered. His hand extended out towards Haruto causing Danzo to lift his hand and sneer.

"Interested now?" Naruto shivered. He couldn't piece back his broken mind together. The world around him spun and his body started to feel colder. His chest started to feel heavy, each breath a labour that none would ever take up. It was as if he were dying. Amidst all that confusion and fear, Kakashi stepped forward. He placed his hand on Naruto's head and ruffled his hair a bit. Naruto looked up at Kakashi, only to see his lone eye crinkling while looking down at him.

"A weak shinobi who gets caught on his mission would only drag us down. The mission is of paramount importance and those who abandon their mission or let it leak are worse than trash." Naruto's hands trembled. A fit of fury arose within him as he heard those words.

"So what should he have done!? Die before he got captured!? How can you be so inhumane to a human life!? I regret taking you as my teacher! I regret everything! I hate you all!!! I hate you all!!!!!" Seeing Naruto throw a tantrum, Danzo spoke again, "Haruto Hayashi, lay your life down for the future of the village." Naruto froze again. His lips quivered as tears welled up in his eyes. He was being asked to measure the value of lives, as a six year old boy.

He didn't know what was worse, that his heart hadn't arrived at an answer, or that his mind refused to give one and wanted to betray the world that had betrayed him first. Piercing through all that pain and suffering, the prisoner suddenly whispered, yet among the deathly silence of the village his whisper was as loud as a ringing gong at a silent temple.

"Kill mee…" The ROOT shinobi standing closest to him snapped at his chin with his elbow and rearranged the man's face once. Yet the man did not shut up, he kept wailing in the same pained, lost, and wrecked tone, "Kill me…" Naruto's eyes snapped right onto the prisoner's eyes and he suddenly realised. He'd seen the same look in all the prisoners brought to him and Kakashi before, the ones who stayed alive long enough that they needed to be killed. The ones who had outlived their purpose.

'He's a corpse…' The man had already betrayed his comrades. His torture session had already ended. The ROOT had just healed him up and brought him out for the test. After all, how could they let a valuable prisoner be experimented upon by a six year old. The man was dying in his shame, reveling in the guilt that came in hoards after realising what he had done. Naruto finally sighed. He slipped from under Kakashi's grasp and walked towards the prisoner.

Grabbing a plain old kunai from a ROOT operative, Naruto stood in front of the meekly dressed prisoner.

"I'm sorry…" Naruto mumbled before stabbing a kunai into the man's back. Tears strolled down Naruto's cheeks as he mumbled another weak sorry before he stabbed a kunai into the man's shoulder, just like Kakashi had taught him. Naruto sobbed uncontrollably as he stabbed the man in the solar plexus and gutted him thoroughly. The man coughed up some blood but smiled kindly as he looked down on Naruto. He leaned in a little closer, straining the nails keeping him fixed, and whispered the names that he had to reveal.

"I'm sorry!" Naruto shouted one final time before beheading the man once he'd revealed all the names of his comrades once again. Danzo still looked down at Naruto with a sneer. His hand had raised at some point in time to stop Haruto from killing himself, but he still kept it in the air, as if ready to give Haruto the command at any point in time.

"So tell me… who are they? Tell me the names of those traitors whose heads need to be hung on the gates of the village tomorrow morning." Naruto looked at Danzo, his eyes earning a furious glint, he gritted his teeth as he stared at Danzo's raised hand. Finally he closed his eyes, took a deep breath in and let it all out before opening his eyes again. There was a certain chill in them that even sent a shiver down Danzo's spine whether he liked it or not.

But Danzo overwrote the fear with his experience and stared at Naruto defiantly. Finally after a tense silence Naruto spoke up.

"Shikaku Nara. Inoichi Yamanaka. Choza Akimichi."