Naruto: I am Uchiha Fugaku

"Given up?"

In a dimly lit cave, Orochimaru sat cross-legged with his eyes closed, meditating.

As a Kage-level shinobi, how could he possibly remain unaware of being tailed? He had detected Uchiha Fugaku and his team shortly after they began tracking him.

The reason he hadn't erased his traces—allowing them to continue following—was to lure them into the Land of Rivers. The Akatsuki's designated meeting place was located there, and he intended to use Fugaku's group to test the organization's capabilities.

However, an unexpected downpour had ruined his plans.

"Clan Head Fugaku, it seems your luck is truly exceptional," Orochimaru murmured, his lips curling into an eerie smirk.

Through his snakes' chakra perception, he had identified Fugaku among the pursuers. Though their previous transaction had been smooth, Orochimaru had no intention of sparing him.

Yet, against all odds, Fugaku's fortune had intervened—a sudden rainstorm had saved his life.

"Very well. I suppose I'll have to personally assess Akatsuki's worth."

Rising to his feet, Orochimaru exited the cave and set off toward the rendezvous point.

Poof!

A puff of white smoke dissipated as the small snake he had summoned to monitor Fugaku's group vanished without a trace.

In the distance, atop a towering tree, Uchiha Fugaku emerged from the trunk as though stepping through air.

After parting ways with Uchiha Tomomi and the others, he had secretly returned using the Floating Jutsu.

"So we were being watched."

His gaze fixed on the spot where the snake had disappeared, Fugaku's suspicions were confirmed.

Having refined the second Yamanaka clan corpse, his sensory abilities had sharpened. Over the past two days, he had sensed a faint, elusive presence—so subtle he had nearly dismissed it as imagination.

Now, witnessing the vanishing snake, he knew it had been real.

Such a small serpent carried minimal chakra, and summoning creatures of this nature excelled at concealing their presence. Even for someone with Fugaku's heightened perception, detecting them had been nearly impossible.

"A snake summon... meaning Orochimaru was the one surveilling us, which means he knew about our pursuit from the start."

Fugaku fell into deep thought.

If Orochimaru had been aware, why hadn't he erased his tracks completely to shake them off? With his Kage-level prowess, cutting off their pursuit would have been effortless.

At the very least, Orochimaru could have ambushed them—yet he had done neither, allowing them to continue trailing him. Fugaku sensed there had to be a deeper motive behind this.

"Never mind. The mission's been aborted. Whatever Orochimaru planned, it's irrelevant now."

Shaking his head, Fugaku turned and sped off to rejoin Tomomi and the others.

The rain had ceased, the dark clouds dispersing as sunlight broke through, warm but not scorching against the skin.

On a vast, flat boulder stood two men cloaked in black robes adorned with crimson clouds.

One of the men had a stubbled face, a burly and weathered middle-aged figure, and was wearing a ring inscribed with the character "Three."

The other man had pale skin, with a vicious scar running from his left eyebrow to the right corner of his mouth, and wore a ring bearing the character "North."

When Uchiha Fugaku realized he was being watched and turned back to regroup with Uchiha Asami and the others, these two men blocked his path.

"Uchiha Fugaku—bounty of thirty million!"

The weathered middle-aged man pulled out a bounty notice, his eyes fixed on Fugaku as he read aloud.

After Uchiha Fugaku and his companions entered the Land of Rivers, they had already been detected by the Akatsuki organization. Moreover, they discovered that Fugaku carried a thirty-million-ryō bounty.

Thirty million was an enormous sum.

Currently, Akatsuki was amassing funds, so upon learning that a high-value target had entered the Land of Rivers, they immediately took notice.

Not long after, they noticed that Fugaku had separated from the other Uchiha clan members.

Akatsuki recognized this as the perfect opportunity to strike and dispatched these two operatives.

"A bounty?"

Fugaku's expression turned odd.

From their attire and the rings on their hands, he could tell they were members of Akatsuki.

However, he had no recollection of these two.

The reason they had intercepted him was clearly because of the bounty on his head.

If not for the bounty notice in their hands, he might have even forgotten he had one.

"Don't blame us—blame the one who issued the bounty!"

The man with the vicious scar spoke coldly, his entire demeanor exuding a chilling aura.

His gaze toward Fugaku was as if he were already looking at a dead man.

To be recognized by Akatsuki and recruited as members, these two were undoubtedly formidable.

Though not quite at Kage-level, they were elite jōnin—and among the strongest of that rank.

Had Fugaku been traveling with his companions, he might have stood a chance of survival. But now? There was no hope.

"Thirty million… isn't that a bit too low for me?"

Fugaku chuckled self-deprecatingly.

As far as he knew, in a few years, the Third Hokage's son, Sarutobi Asuma, would have a bounty of thirty-five million.

And Asuma was merely an elite jōnin.

Meanwhile, he—a Kage-level shinobi who had awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan—was only worth thirty million. It was downright pitiful.

Of course, this was because he had deliberately concealed his true strength.

"It's already quite generous. Your bounty is significantly higher than most elite jōnin."

The weathered middle-aged man tucked away the bounty notice, his eyes locked on Fugaku.

"His allies aren't far. We should act quickly—he might have a way to contact them!"

The scarred man warned.

"Understood."

The middle-aged man nodded.

With a powerful push off the rock beneath him, his body shot forward like a cannonball.

"Earth Release: Rock Fist Technique—!"

Mid-air, his right arm became encased in solid stone, transforming into a massive rocky fist aimed straight at Fugaku.

Naturally unwilling to take the blow head-on, Fugaku leaped back, narrowly avoiding it.

CRACK—

The weathered middle-aged man's fist smashed into the ground, creating spiderweb-like cracks radiating outward from the impact point. The ground beneath Uchiha Fugaku's feet became unstable.

"Ice Release: White Whale—"

Just as Uchiha Fugaku lost his footing, the man with a vicious scar across his face completed his hand seals and unleashed his ninjutsu.

A massive white whale, formed entirely of ice, surged forward with terrifying momentum, crashing toward Uchiha Fugaku.

PS: Read Advance Chapters at https://www.patreon.com/c/Xentronix