It started with a whisper that wasn't his.
> "Why are you watching us?"
Sōgen's head jerked sideways. He was alone. Sitting beneath the old wind-bell tree, an iron pendant swinging gently in the warm night air. Crickets chirped. A branch creaked.
But the voice hadn't come through his ears.
It came through the Network.
And it wasn't tagged.
---
The Phantom Pulse
For three days, Sōgen had locked himself away after unlocking his Mangekyō. During that time, he didn't sleep — not really. He walked through dream-memory corridors stitched from grief, recording every change to his chakra flow, ocular responses, and seal harmonics.
He'd expected new abilities.
He hadn't expected...feedback.
The Network—his creation—was beginning to loop.
Pulses came from nodes that should have been dormant. Knowledge bundles he never approved began propagating. Chat messages posted without authors.
> [Unknown]: "Pain shared is truth multiplied." [Unknown]: "You're not the only one watching." [Unknown]: "Do you dream of drowning in minds that aren't your own?"
He stared at the chat console, eyes slowly narrowing. His Mangekyō flared for the fourth time in 48 hours. His pupils split in that impossible way that only ocular dojutsu could manage — his retina glowing with a pinwheel that seemed to rotate even when still.
Something was inside.
---
Reverse-Seal Interrogation
He didn't panic. Sōgen didn't do panic.
Instead, he initiated a reverse-seal trace. He poured chakra into the base seal behind his left ear and constructed a recursive filter to trace any anomaly backward to its source.
The moment the filter activated, he got a scream.
Not auditory. Neural. Dozens of overlapping fragments of thought.
> "I don't want to remember—" "They said we'd forget—" "Who gave us eyes—?" "—shut it down—"
His head split with phantom pressure. Blood leaked from his nostrils. But buried beneath the noise was a pulse signature.
One he didn't recognize.
One not tied to any seal he ever created.
A node he didn't place.
---
The Silent User
Sōgen found the anomaly in the data cluster labeled [Network Root — Sub-branch: DustMouth].
DustMouth had no uploads. No downloads. No known chat activity. But its presence had always been there. The oldest node.
Too old. Preceding his first test subjects.
He tried isolating it.
The system refused.
Then DustMouth spoke:
> "You're building a god with broken bricks."
---
Mangekyō Ability: Thoughtforge
Later that night, in the storm-slick basement of the Uchiha archives, Sōgen activated his new Mangekyō technique for the first time:
Thoughtforge.
With it, he could intercept intent as it formed. The moment someone considered uploading a memory, he could rewrite it, twist it, evolve it — or erase it entirely.
It wasn't just control. It was co-authorship of knowledge.
He tested it on Renji.
Renji sat across the table, talking about the time he learned to light a fire blindfolded.
Sōgen subtly activated the seal. Mangekyō shimmered.
Mid-sentence, Renji paused. Blinked. "Wait... was it with flint? Or chakra friction?"
The memory was shifting. Rebuilding itself from Sōgen's desire, not Renji's experience.
He whispered:
> "I am your ghost author."
Renji didn't hear it.
But his thoughts did.
---
Dream of a Fractured Network
That night, Sōgen dreamed.
He was standing in the middle of the Network—visualized as a cathedral made of glass, wires, and whispers. Memory-data scrolled across the stained-glass windows.
And standing at the altar: DustMouth.
A figure in robes of negative space. No face. No aura. Just... emptiness shaped like a man.
"You seek to birth clarity," the figure said. "But you are building it from confusion."
"I built this world," Sōgen replied. "You are a glitch."
DustMouth chuckled. "Then you should fear what happens when the glitch learns to code."
---
Unsealing the Mind
The next morning, one of the earliest Network users—Yurei, a monk-turned-herbalist—tried to remove the seal.
He had begun to suspect Sōgen's motives. So he sought a forbidden ritual to "return his soul to silence."
Sōgen intercepted the process via Thoughtforge.
But too late.
Yurei's consciousness imploded. Not death. Something worse.
His body lived. Eyes open. Heart beating.
But his mind was now a looped Network node—forever uploading phantom thoughts into a dead inbox.
Sōgen stood over him, silent.
DustMouth sent a final message that day:
> "And thus your library gains its first tomb."