Shin

Shin had grey hair and pale eyes, the latter drawn as black in the anime. As a child, shown on the front of Sai's picture book, he dressed in a pale yellow shirt over dark brown trousers. Once grown he took on the official Anbu uniform, carrying a large shuriken and a tanto across his back. After Kabuto reincarnated him, he was shown wearing an outfit identical to his brother's, complete with the customary Root jacket, and in the manga a Konoha forehead protector as well.

By Sai's account, Shin and Naruto share a great deal: both are loud, impatient, and rough around the edges. For all that, Shin was a warm and pleasant soul who actively encouraged Sai to keep drawing. He was also described as stubbornly tenacious and prone to absent-mindedness.

Despite Root's conditioning to strip away emotion, Shin grew close to the younger Sai, spotting his gift for art and pressing him to pursue it. Sai came to regard him as an older brother and started casting off Root's teachings, until Shin succumbed to an unknown illness, after which Sai's training buried most of his memories of him. In the anime, Danzo forced the two to fight to the death to kill off their feelings; knowing he was already dying, Shin told Sai to report that he had been slain in battle, urging him to suppress his emotions before passing away. Shin was a capable enough shinobi to be raised from the dead for the coming war, skilled with the Root tanto for swift killing strokes and able to overwhelm multiple Anbu shadow clones with taijutsu alone.

Brought back by Kabuto Yakushi, Shin was assigned to support the Surprise Attack and Diversion Platoon and clashed with the Konoha forces. He was ambushed and driven into the ground by Sai, and even as his broken neck knit back together he begged his brother to flee. When his stomach was found to be packed with explosive clay, Kankuro's Sanshouo puppet captured him and smothered the blast. Reforming, Shin told Sai he had no wish to hurt him, since death had finally freed him from Root. On seeing the drawing Sai had made of the two of them together, Shin declared his soul at last set free, then crumbled into a heap of earth and ash, leaving behind the corpse that had served as his sacrifice.