The Four-eyed Journal

Okay, this is a backlog, Chapter 402 has already been released so I have a lot of catching up to do.

On with this chapter which is a great one as we finally get to know the details of how Konoha started, or at least from the viewpoint of Uchiha Madara. One of the lessons I learned from history class is that “history is always biased in favor of the one who tells it.”

Anyways, in Chapter 398 we get a glimpse of how the ninja world was 14 or 15 years ago. Back when Konoha was still yet to be founded and the characters we so love and know of today were born.

In this chapter, we finally learned about the real persons behind the title of First Hokage. The legendary ninja known to be the greatest one during that time, the only one who could use the Wood Element (Mokouton) technique, one of the founders of Konoha, someone who could control the tailed-beasts and the most awesome of all, the one man who defeated Uchiha Madara: Senju Hashirama.

We also finally learned how the five Hidden Villages were formed, the “one hidden village per country” system again invented by Hashirama. What can we say, the man is indeed one great shinobi.

On the other hand, we saw the history of the Uchiha clan, the mighty and powerful clan that really steals the spotlight from any other clan in the Naruto world. They’re not that really bad, making peace with the Senju clan and then joining together to form the Hidden Leaf Village was a good move, however I’m not so sure if the Senju really thought ill of the Uchiha and perhaps it was all Uchiha Madara’s fault that they were put in such a situation of hatred and discrimination.

Oh well, it seems that we will never know the full story since no one else from that era is still alive to tell the tale. Still, it makes one hell of a history.

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Mind-boggling! This is what I would describe Chapter 397: The Man Who Knows the Truth of the Naruto manga series.

Tobi who is also no other than the third Sharingan user, Uchiha Madara has started to reveal to Sasuke the whole truth about his older brother, the legendary Uchiha Itachi. According to Madara, Itachi’s goals were never really to gain power for his own selfish ends, but for a nobler and higher cause: “the protection of the shinobi world, Leaf village and most of all, his little brother Sasuke.”

Unfortunately, the path towards such goals was the tragic demise of the entire Uchiha clan and much of Sasuke’s suffering and pain. Is this the price for the protection of all things dear to Itachi as Madara claims?

But protection from what or whom? From Uchiha Madara of course. My guess is that Itachi knew of Madara’s plans to come back and conquer the shinobi world using the demon spirits and that he would use his own Uchiha clan, the Sharingan in particular, to do this. Itachi would not allow it, so he set out on his own path to gain more power so that in the end, he would be able to stop Madara from fulfilling his evil plans.

Itachi, however, failed but has prepared for this: keeping Sasuke alive and making sure he becomes stronger and more powerful. He even went as far as transferring all of his eye techniques to Sasuke just to give him more powers. That’s the reason Itachi didn’t kill Sasuke even though he could very well do it.

This stunning twist in the Naruto story is surely one for the record books. I haven’t heard of any other character who has risked so much, done something so sick and twisted just to protect the things and persons he valued so much. Uchiha Itachi is just one bad-ass ninja, and a genius similar to the likes of Darth Sidious from the Star Wars universe.

But what is the real truth about Itachi? Why did he had to go through so much just to fulfill his goal of protecting Sasuke? We’ll have to wait for some time because unfortunately, there would be no chapter release next week. But until then, we are left in awe of Itachi’s character.

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Another chapter of the hugely popular Naruto series has been released, Chapter 396: Introductions. In this chapter, Tobi/Uchiha Madara takes center stage as he proceeds to carry out his master plan in which it seems that Uchiha Itachi and Uchiha Sasuke plays very important roles.

After Madara receives word that the battle is over and that Itachi has been defeated by Sasuke, he speeds off to the scene of the battle and see for himself the outcome of bloody and monumental encounter between brothers.

At the end of the chapter, Madara really catches the world’s attention by doing two things:

1. Talking about revealing the “truth” about Uchiha Itachi
2. Taking his mask off

Which brings us to some of the most asked questions about the Naruto world right now:

• What is the “truth” about Uchiha Itachi that Madara is talking about?
• How does Uchiha Madara look like now?
• What is the real plan of Uchiha Madara? Does it involve Sasuke or just his eye?

Now the stage has been set for the next chapter in which these questions will be answered.

You could download this chapter here.

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With Chapter 394 of the Naruto Manga series confirms the end of one of the story’s most phenomenal character, Uchiha Itachi. Love him or hate him, you cannot help but have a feeling that series has really moved into its closing stages now that the ‘Destroyer of the Uchiha Clan’ is dead.

At the end of their violent, bloody and epic battle, Itachi collapses inches away from obtaining Sasuke’s eyes. The most priced objects in the Naruto world next to the powers of the Kyuubi itself. Orochimaru, Uchiha Itachi and even Uchiha Madara all hungered and lusted for a new set of the dreaded Uchiha eyes which hold the sinister Sharingan and all of its unworldly powers.

What’s next for Sasuke?

It seems luck or fate is on the side of Sasuke as he will now walk away from this chapter of his life alive, intact and with both of his eyes. What will he do next? Now that he has succeeded in avenging his clan, what will be his next goal?

Will he fulfill his second one? Which is to revive his infamous Uchiha clan? Girls both from the Naruto and the real world would be delighted by this news. It would very interesting to see the other side of Uchiha Sasuke.

Or, would he pick up the trail he discovered from the tale Itachi told him. That aside from the two of them, there is still one remaining Uchiha, Uchiha Madara. We are now convinced that the eccentric Akatsuki member Tobi and the legendary Uchiha Madara are one and the same and on the other half of Chapter 394, the expanded Team Kakashi is currently battling the strange and mysterious character.

Once more, another link or “bond” exists between Sasuke and Naruto. How will this “bond” determine the outcome of the series, will soon find out.

You could download the manga chapter here

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Hello everybody out there! It is very nice to meet you all! As the title says this is my debut post here, so I would like to start off with a little bit about myself. First of all, my name is Bryan, although I hate that name, and prefer to be called Shika (Not because of Shikamaru, but because of my screen name almost everywhere being Shikahake7) and absolutely love Anime, Naruto in specific. There isn’t really much more to tell, or much more to know, so I’ll get right to the part that I’m sure everybody reading this actually cares about, the latest chapter of the Naruto manga!

So I’m sure everybody who read chapter 365 remembers that Itachi came out from behind a tree to confront Naruto, well in this chapter we get to see the two of them face off, although Naruto consequently gets beat easily, and very fast. He uses a variation on the crow genjutsu (Utaka, or Emphereal I believe the name was) he used on Naruto when using Pein’s (The old Akatsuki Leader whom was revealed to be just in the position of leader, but not the actual one giving the orders) perfect clone technique. Itachi claimed to only be there to speak with Naruto, though Naruto would not allow him to, and Itachi left to confront Sasuke, saying that he “I have an important matter to deal with.” A big let down… I was hoping for something more than a couple panels of useless fighting, but I don’t write it, I only read it…

During this Jiraiya and Tsunade were having their own chat, although with more talking than fighting. Jiraiya has found out that Pein is in Amegakure (Hidden Rain), and that Amegakure has been in a terrible civil war for some time, Pein leading one of the two sides (My guess is Pein is part of the “Republic” side rather than the “Empire” side). This is all he found out though, and he said that he will be scouting around Amegakure for more information before Konoha should do anything big.

The chapter ends with Itachi finally confronting Sasuke.

So that was all the information I found important, time for the breakdown.

What it means for the story: Well, there isn’t much we can pick out of this, mostly just that Itachi is about to fight Sasuke, and Amegakure will finally get some part in the storyline other than getting the crap kicked out of them. What I believe we can assume, though, is that Itachi has some qualms about what he did so long ago, that he is regretting his life style decisions. We can also assume that the end is near, as the Sasuke VS Itachi thing has always been a major driving force for the storyline.

Theory time: As many of you know, there are many theories for what will happen in Naruto out there, some involving Tobi, some involving Pein, and some involving Uchiha Madara. Well there are very few of these that are holding up to Kishimoto’s constant barage of plot twists. One of the few that has is the “The Dark History of Uchiha: The Bloodline of Tengu” theory. Basically it says that the original Uchiha, Uchiha Madara, was the son of a Hyuuga woman and a demon in the shape of a human, a demon called a Tengu, half man half crow. This is backed up by many points, the first and foremost that the Uchiha clan was created from the Hyuuga clan (Kakashi said that himself during the chuunin exams arc, or at least that it was believed to be that way), but I won’t get into that here, that would take a couple pages of posts ^^;;. Anyway, the point is that this chapter only proved a little bit more of the Tengu theory (Please keep in mind that the Tengu theory hasn’t been changed, at least to my knowledge, since it was first made a while ago) because Itachi used the crows in a genjutsu once more, but once again, I don’t wish to get into it here, that would take a long time.

Well that is it for this week, once again, glad to be here, hope to post with every chapter, every week.

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Finally breaking the unexpected blog hiatus on The Four-eyed Journal, I’m back with more commentary on the Naruto Manga series. This time around, it’s all about the latest Chapter, Chapter 352: The Purpose. (This post’s title is for this post and a reflection of what I think of the chapter, the chapter’s original title is different and would be mentioned here instead.)

Picking up from where Chapter 351 left off, Sasuke has finally managed to complete his platoon with the much dreaded Juugo as the last piece. He did so after showing “who’s the real boss” now that Orochimaru is gone. Using his newly acquired skills and techniques from Orochimaru’s training, he exerts his dominance and control over his volatile team through a suave combination of diplomacy backed up by his raw powers, especially the Sharingan.

In the latest Chapter, Chapter 352 Sasuke convinces Juugo to join his team by referencing himself to Kimimaro and his words during his last stay with Juugo.

Juugo and Kimimaro goes way back, the two of them having some amazing yet horrifying powers and abilities found themselves a company and friend in each other. A bond has been forged between them. Something that is not taken lightly in the world of Naruto.

Of course friendship and bonds take on a new meaning or looked up from a different angle when a shinobi puts down his ‘professional’ foot. In chapter 352, Juugo only decides to join Sasuke because Kimimaro sacrificed a lot, even his life for him and that he is curious as to what Sasuke can really do.

Once everything has been settled, Sasuke proceeds immediately to brief his newly formed team of his intentions and plans.

This chapter contains lots of revelations; like why Kimimaro was willing to lay down his life just to bring Sasuke to Orochimaru, why Sasuke is not coming back to Konoha and instead formed a team of shinobi to aid in his goal; to kill his older brother Uchiha Itachi.

Even Naruto, Sakura and the rest of the Konoha shinobi has decided to join in the fray. They are now more focused on Akatsuki and in particular, removing another threat specific to Konoha; Uchiha Itachi. Of course, you can download the chapter here.

If this segment of the manga series has been exciting, the next chapters would be even more. Who will kill Itachi? Sasuke or Naruto?

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