Orochimaru’s Magic Lamp

"In the world of ninja, those who break the rules are called trash… but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash."

That sentence, spoken by Obito, had echoed endlessly in Kakashi's mind over the years. It had forced him to reflect, to question everything:

Should a ninja be swayed by emotion? How should we weigh the lives of our comrades against the success of a mission?

But now, after hearing Orochimaru's explanation, he realized he'd been asking the wrong question all along. He had never once stopped to consider: who counts as a comrade?

During the Battle of Kannabi Bridge, Rin had been captured. Obito had rushed to save her—because she was his teammate, his friend, his comrade. But what about the other Konoha shinobi who had died across other missions when objectives were abandoned or failed?

Were they not comrades, too?

The dilemma Kakashi had been wrestling with wasn't a choice between duty and friendship. It was a choice between visible comrades and invisible ones.

"Uchiha Obito… maybe he wasn't as naive as I thought," Orochimaru said, smiling faintly. "He was decisive. He didn't hesitate to go save Rin, even if it meant turning against you."

"But maybe," he continued, "Obito was simply too foolish to see the other comrades—the ones behind the mission."

Orochimaru tilted his head slightly. "So imagine: if you had said to him what I'm saying to you now, what would he have done? Would he stop and think? Or would he say, 'No comrade gets left behind,' save Rin anyway, and return to complete the mission afterward?"

Kakashi didn't answer. He didn't need to. He already knew.

Obito would have chosen the latter.

"Never abandon your comrades. Save everyone. Don't give up on anyone." Those ideals sounded beautiful. And they were fine—so long as you understood that they weren't reality.

Reality was this: if Minato hadn't arrived in time during that mission, if he hadn't turned the tide, then Konoha would have paid a terrible price for their failure.

"Don't listen to what people say," Orochimaru said calmly. "Watch what they do."

"On the battlefield, there's no time to hesitate. If you're lucky, things might work out. You might save your friends and complete the mission. But when a choice must be made between one or the other—every village teaches the same thing: complete the mission."

"Because you can't know the cost of failure. You can't see what it might destroy."

Kakashi said nothing. Orochimaru's logic was airtight, his perspective rooted in harsh reality.

And yet… the clarity didn't bring relief. It made the weight in Kakashi's chest grow heavier. The answers he'd been seeking for years were finally in front of him—but they didn't bring peace.

The sky had started to lighten. Dew clung to the leaves. The air had turned cold. But the forest was still cloaked in darkness. Kakashi looked at Orochimaru, whose face was hidden in the shadows, and drew in a deep, sharp breath.

The chill pierced his lungs, briefly scattering the numbness he'd carried for so long.

"You're right," Kakashi said hoarsely. "Ordinary shinobi can only do so much. But my father… he must have known that. So why did he make the choice he did?"

"To abandon the mission. To save his comrades. To end his own life afterward… It doesn't fit the image I had of him."

"He was too weak."

"As a ninja, he couldn't bear the weight of his choices… and chose the most cowardly way out."

"That's not the father I remember."

"Sakumo's decision was far more complicated than that," Orochimaru said softly, as if speaking to the past. His eyes glimmered with something like regret. "Far more complicated than Obito's idealistic outburst."

Then his gaze sharpened again.

"You're not a fool, Kakashi. You're not a child lost in ideals. You know the truth: the village can't save everyone."

Kakashi nodded slowly. Obito's face flickered in his mind.

"You're not the only one who knows this," Orochimaru continued. "Danzo. Homura. Koharu. All of them understand that reality."

"But the question is this—if they all understood, what did the Hokage choose to do?"

A line came to Kakashi's mind.

Where the leaves dance, the fire burns bright.

It was inscribed in the ninja academy, on the Memorial Stone. But only now did he begin to understand what it meant.

"Sacrifice to protect," Orochimaru said, repeating it heavily. His expression was grave.

"The First Hokage built the village. The Second created the rules. But it was the Third who carried Konoha into the present day."

"And he did so through sacrifice."

"There's nothing inherently wrong with that," Orochimaru continued. "If you can't save everyone, you choose who to protect. That's the duty of leadership."

Kakashi found himself agreeing. The older he grew, the more he understood the burden the village leaders carried. If he were in their place, would he have done any better?

But Orochimaru shook his head.

"There's a flaw in that thinking," he said. "It's been too long. For decades now, Konoha's leadership—starting with the Third—has grown too comfortable with this so-called 'justice of sacrifice.'"

"They forgot what sacrifice was meant to be: a last resort, not a strategy."

"They stopped weighing it. They started using it."

Kakashi's breath caught.

"That's why you've been feeling this way," Orochimaru said quietly. "That deep unease—it's because you've seen it, too."

He paused, then continued:

"There was a time when the village used ninja like disposable tools, sending them to die in pursuit of 'greater good.' Sakumo's mission happened during that time."

"He saw the corruption behind the orders. So he refused. He rejected it."

Kakashi's fists clenched.

"This wasn't like Obito—he didn't save his comrade because he loved them. Sakumo gave up the mission as an act of resistance. He saw the truth of the village's choices… and he couldn't stomach them."

Orochimaru's voice lowered, almost bitterly.

"But he failed."

"The village turned on him. Even the one he saved resented him. Because the entire system had convinced itself that sacrifice was noble—no matter the cost."

"They all believed: if sacrificing one person could bring benefit, then it was the right thing to do."

"They forgot that if the leadership weren't so greedy for gain, no one would have to be sacrificed in the first place."

"And in the face of that twisted logic—faced with an entire village that couldn't see what he saw—Sakumo chose to die."

"Not from shame. Not from weakness. But as his final act of protest."

Kakashi stood frozen. His chest ached, and something stung at the back of his throat. He didn't know what to say.

Orochimaru looked away for a moment. "The higher-ups were shaken by it. They didn't speak of it aloud, but they reflected."

"After Sakumo's death, they were more careful. The attitude didn't change—'sacrifice to protect' still guided their choices—but they stopped being as reckless."

He placed a hand gently on Kakashi's shoulder.

"That's why, later, you could hear Uchiha Obito speak those idealistic words."

"In an earlier time… no one would've had the chance to say them."

He smiled faintly.

"The truth is, your father—Sakumo Hatake—was a great shinobi."

"He died not because he failed. He died so that others could understand what sacrifice truly means."

"He chose to die… to protect the village from itself."

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