We're Different. | The Other Uchiha ✓ (Boruto)

Between the Lines

She felt it. 

The pressure in her lungs changed.

The silence of the trees grew too still. Her heartbeat skipped, not in fear, not yet, but in recognition. 

It was the feeling you got when a predator stepped into the clearing and didn't make a sound.

Y/n didn't turn around.

Instead, she adjusted her gait, the weight of her body shifting ever so slightly. 

Just enough to disturb the illusion she'd placed over the ground behind her, an illusion so subtle it wouldn't be noticeable to the untrained eye. But this person wasn't untrained.

Her step didn't align with the terrain.

And the moment she felt it, the faintest flicker of chakra pulsing like a ripple behind her, a moment too slow to match the forest's rhythm, she knew.

He was there.

"Your genjutsu is impressive."

The voice was smooth, even, unmistakably calm.

Y/n froze.

The kind of calm that came from someone who never needed to raise their voice to be dangerous. 

She didn't turn immediately, she let silence stretch, let her breath slow until her ribs no longer trembled. 

When she did turn, her face was neutral. Guarded.

His eyes met hers.

Black hair, the Sharingan activated, but still gentle in its rotation. 

The faint lines under his eyes. The Uchiha crest on his back.

Uchiha Itachi.

Her uncle.

Her mind reeled with memories that weren't hers to acknowledge. 

She knew this man as a legend, a ghost, a tale told in different voices depending on who was doing the remembering. 

But she knew more than the average shinobi, she knew truths she had no right to know.

And she knew he would sense that.

"You noticed the steps," she said softly, voice low.

Itachi tilted his head slightly. "I've seen many genjutsu. Yours is more... refined than most."

He took a slow step forward. Not threatening. Not hurried. But deliberate.

Y/n didn't move.

The air between them shifted. She kept her eyes on his, resisting the instinct to look away. Every Uchiha knew better than to fall into that trap.

"You're wearing chakra you weren't born with," Itachi said. "You're too skilled to be just a traveler. And your reaction time... It reminds me of someone."

His Sharingan spun once more, almost idly.

"Whose genjutsu am I in?" she asked.

For a beat, nothing happened.

And then the world shifted.

The ground beneath her feet evaporated into mist, and suddenly she was standing in a red-tinted version of the clearing, her body frozen mid-movement. 

Crows flapped overhead, and the air turned metallic, heavy with blood and memory.

Itachi's illusion.

"You activated it when I looked at your shoulder," she muttered.