Kakashi was sitting in his room, the doubt in his mind had become clear. Even though Hokage had said that he would check whether Danzo had something to do with his father's death or not, Kakashi could see guilt in Hiruzen's eyes.
He was guilty of not keeping his friend in check, and there was no way Hiruzen would not have suspected that something was odd about his father's death, but he turned a blind eye to that.
Kakashi kept on sitting in the same pose for an unknown amount of time and only came out of this state when someone knocked on his door.
"Sir, you were called to the Hokage's office," one of the young Anbu ninja said. Since he was quite young and a chunin, he still feared and respected every Jonin, unlike other Anbu ninjas. Kakashi just nodded his head and vanished from his place. The Anbu ninja was still standing there.
Kakashi had left his house without even closing his doors, and it was quite practical. Unless your house was guarded using some powerful seal, there was no way you could guarantee its safety. Even any genin could get inside the house, let alone a chunin or jonin. For some time, the Anbu ninja was confused about what to do, but then he just closed Kakashi's door from the outside and left. 'It was not like he had asked for my help,' he thought.
Kakashi was standing in front of Hiruzen, his face completely serious.
"Your doubts were correct. Danzo was behind your father's death… I am sorry," Hiruzen said. Even though he was already old, this recent event had taken a few more years from his life. Kakashi, who was already sure about this, kept on looking toward Hiruzen for one minute... two minutes... three minutes... five minutes.
"I want to know the full truth," was the only thing Kakashi said.
"Okay, when your father came back…" Hiruzen was just about to start what he learned about Sakumo's death when Kakashi interrupted him.
"Not by mouth. I want to see it," Kakashi said.
Both of them looked toward each other. This was truly a difficult decision for Hiruzen. From what he had learned about Sakumo's death, he was one hundred percent sure Kakashi would kill Danzo without even thinking. He had already promised Uchiha to give Danzo to them.
"Okay, but you have to promise that you will not lose control and kill Danzo after that. Don't worry; he's going to face something worse than that soon. Uchiha has demanded me hand him over after this Root mess is over. He had harmed them the most," Hiruzen said.
Kakashi just nodded his head. Seeing Kakashi, Hiruzen almost wanted to not allow Kakashi to know the truth, but the cat was already out of the bag.
"Follow me," Hiruzen stood up and took Kakashi to the basement. It was guarded by two elite Anbu ninjas; they were personal guards of Hiruzen. He trusted them the most in Anbu.
When they entered inside the basement, Kakashi was shocked to see the condition of Danzo. He was chained to a metal table and many seals were placed on him to stop him from performing any jutsu at all. Inoichi was sitting near his head, with his hand over Danzo's head.
"Inoichi, Kakashi wants to see the truth about his father's death. Can you do it now?" Hiruzen asked. The reason for that was because Inoichi has been constantly working on finding the information about Root or any other plan Danzo had made for such situations.
In short, Inoichi was already overexerting himself, and in result, Danzo's mind was being constantly attacked by Inoichi. If it was any other person, they would have become brain-dead long ago, but Danzo had extensively trained his brain in case he was kidnapped and tortured.
As a future Hokage, he could not have such a weakness. Due to this, Inoichi could easily extract information from his mind without effectively killing him.
"Kakashi, I would not recommend you to do that. I know you want to know about your father's death, but the truth is really, really ugly.
Sometimes you should just forget about your past and live on. I knew Sakumo-sama, he would not want you to worry about him and get yourself into this. It will do more harm than good," Inoichi Yamanaka said. He said everything Hiruzen could not say because of his guilt of not doing anything even after knowing the truth.
"I understand your concern, Inoichi-sama, but till now I grew up thinking my father was weak. He could not handle criticism and left me alone. At a corner of my heart, I somehow hated him. I… I don't want to keep on thinking that. I want to, NO, I have to know the truth," Kakashi said, the conviction in his voice apparent.
Sigh
"Fine, come here," Inoichi said. Kakashi went to him and placed his hand on Inoichi's hand, and the procedure started.
Danzo got the news that Daimyo was considering Sakumo Hatake for Hokage's position. Even though he had failed an S-rank mission commissioned by Daimyo himself, Sakumo was still a prime candidate for the position. This news was very devastating for Danzo. It was one thing if Hiruzen was Hokage;
Danzo always believed that he would be next since Hiruzen was way past his prime. But if someone as young and powerful as Sakumo became Hokage, not only would Danzo lose all chance of becoming a Hokage, he would even lose the power he had as an elder and Hokage's friend.
'This can't happen, I have to do something,' was what Danzo was thinking. Then an evil smile came on his face. 'Looks like I have to fan some rumors once again.'
Danzo ordered his subordinate to spread rumors about how Sakumo failed an important mission and it made Konoha lose both face and many political as well as financial resources. After a week of this order, the whole of Konoha started talking about how Sakumo was a disgrace as a ninja.
How could some lives be compared to the whole village? Even his teammates who he saved were somehow placed in a subtle genjutsu and were made to believe that Sakumo made a very big mistake. This affected Sakumo quite a bit. He fought the second Kazekage on the battlefield and killed both his son and daughter-in-law. He killed hundreds of ninjas for these people and did so many missions for the village, and now that he failed a single mission, all of the village was against him. Normally, this would have made him sad, but he could have brushed it off.
So what if everyone was against him? He just had to win their trust back. This was the type of person Sakumo was. But Danzo had made arrangements for that. He had mixed a special kind of poison in Sakumo's water by poisoning all of the water supply of that area.
The poison was a very subtle one, only targeting the brain of a person, and made them more emotional. This poison started affecting Sakumo's mind day by day, and since he was being ridiculed by the whole village, his mental health started taking a hit.
And when Sakumo was at his lowest, Danzo made his final move. He appeared at the Hatake compound when Sakumo was alone.
"Danzo-sama, why are you here? You could have called me," Sakumo asked when Danzo came inside.
"Sakumo, your strength and loyalty to Konoha are unparalleled. However, there is something we must discuss."
"What is it, Danzo-sama?" Sakumo asked.
"Your recent mission failure has caused quite a stir. The other clans are questioning the integrity and strength of the Hatake name."
"I did what I believed was right. I couldn't abandon my comrades." Even if his comrade was not grateful for that, if given a chance, he would do the same thing again. Seeing this, Danzo once again thought about whether he should continue with his plan or not,