The valley was a graveyard of ambition, its soil soaked with chakra and venom, its air thick with the smoke of green fire and the echo of shattered techniques.
At the core of the Susanoo, Renjiro stood—barely standing, his body trembling, his Mangekyō burning the remaining reserves of his chakra.
Across from him, Orochimaru remained on one knee, his yellow eyes fixed on the boy who had done the impossible. For the first time in decades, the Sannin felt something unfamiliar creeping into his consciousness.
Fear.
But his mind was already racing through contingencies. He had survived worse. He had survived the Third Hokage, had survived his own experiments.
He would survive this.
Renjiro watched him from inside the Susanoo, his eyes burning, his body screaming for rest. He had pushed himself beyond every limit, had burned through chakra reserves that should have lasted days. The Susanoo was still stable, barely, its silver frame holding together through sheer force of will.
But Orochimaru was still alive. Still dangerous. Still planning.
He's beaten, Renjiro thought, but not defeated. Someone like him always has another contingency.
Orochimaru acted.
Before Renjiro could strike, the Sannin coughed blood, laughed weakly, and slammed his hands together.
CRACK.
The last reserves of his chakra ignited.
"White Snake Escape Technique."
Hundreds of tiny white snakes erupted from his body—from his sleeves, his mouth, his skin, his wounds. They burst forth like a fountain of pale light, scattering across the valley in every direction. Each snake was small, insignificant—but each one contained a fragment of Orochimaru himself. Memories. Chakra. Consciousness.
Kill ninety-nine, Orochimaru thought, his consciousness splintering across the swarm. One survives. I survive.
But he did not trust the snakes alone. Even as they scattered, he launched a final assault—curse-marked kunai, paralytic tags, hidden blades that shot toward Renjiro from a dozen angles. The attack was not meant to kill. It was meant to distract. To force Renjiro into an impossible choice: stop the snakes, or defend himself.
Not both.
Orochimaru smiled, even as his body began to dissolve.
There, he thought. An impossible decision.
Renjiro made a different choice.
With a final surge of will, he dismissed the Susanoo entirely. The giant dissolved, its silver fragments scattering, a sliver of its chakra returning to him.
Orochimaru's eyes widened. He had expected pursuit, had expected Renjiro to chase the snakes, to try to stop them one by one. Instead, the boy became calm. Very calm.
I don't need to chase every snake, Renjiro thought, his expression hardening. I only need to find them.
Adamantine Chains.
They emerged directly from his abdomen—hundreds of them, then thousands, filling the valley like roots, like veins, like a divine net descending from the heavens.
They spread across the battlefield, across the trees, across the river that bordered the valley. They reached into the earth, into the air, into the spaces where Orochimaru's fragments had fled.
Purge of the Wicked activated one final time.
Not as destructive. Not as absorption. As tracking. The green flames ignited along the chains, spreading across the valley, touching every surface. Every snake that the flames brushed became marked—a spiritual beacon that the chains could follow, no matter how far they ran, no matter where they hid.
A snake hiding in a tree. The chains caught it.
A snake burrowing underground. The chains caught it.
A snake swimming in the river. The chains caught it.
A snake nearly escaping the valley. The chains caught it.
One by one, the fragments were dragged back, their white forms writhing, their consciousness screaming. The chains gathered them into a bundle—a writhing mass of pale serpents, bound together by silver links and green fire.
The predator was now captured. The specimen had become the collector.
Renjiro stood over the bundle, his body barely standing, his eyes bleeding, his chakra nearly exhausted. But he was still in control.
"I could seal you right now," he said, his voice raw, hoarse. "No experiments. No escape. No second body."
He paused, letting the weight of the words settle.
"You know I can do it."
Orochimaru's consciousness, fractured across the bundle of snakes, stared up at him. The yellow eyes, multiplied a hundredfold, fixed on Renjiro with an expression that was part hatred, part curiosity, part something that might have been admiration.
He can, Orochimaru realised, the truth settling into his fractured consciousness like poison.
"Then why don't you?"
The voice came from the bundle—distorted, fragmented, but unmistakably Orochimaru.
Silence.
Renjiro stood over the bundle, his chains still burning, his eyes still bleeding. The question hung in the air, heavy with implication.
"Because I want something from you."
He crouched down, bringing his face level with the writhing mass of serpents.
"The Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan. Tell me how to achieve it, and you live and walk away with the cells."
The bundle went still. Then, slowly, a laugh emerged—dark, genuine, surprised.
"You would still give me the cells?" Orochimaru's voice carried genuine incredulity. "After all that?"
"Yes. In exchange for the knowledge."
Orochimaru was silent for a long moment. Then, the laughter faded, replaced by something more analytical.
"The Eternal Mangekyō," Orochimaru began, his voice carrying the cadence of a lecturer addressing a promising student. "The evolution that stops deterioration. The fusion of two Mangekyō into one."
He paused, his yellow eyes gleaming.
"The process requires resonance between the eyes. Spiritual compatibility. The donor's chakra imprint must be nearly identical to the recipient's, which is why siblings are the traditional source."
He tilted his head.
"But you have no blood sibling. You told me that yourself."
"I do not." Renjiro's voice was flat. "But I have something else."
"The Hashirama cells," Orochimaru said, his voice almost reverent. "Yes. They could bridge the gap. The First Hokage's tissue adapts, regenerates, and promotes compatibility between incompatible elements. With Hashirama cells as a catalyst, even non-relative Mangekyō could be combined."
He paused, his expression shifting.
"But it would not be easy. The process would require a ritual, a body array, blood activation, a specific hand seal sequence. Simultaneous implantation of both eyes. The pain would be excruciating. The risk of death is significant."
He smiled.
"And the result; the Eternal Mangekyō, would be yours."
Renjiro absorbed the information, his mind cataloguing every detail.
"What if both sets already belong to relatives?"
Orochimaru froze.
The bundle of snakes went still, its yellow eyes widening. The question had caught him off guard—a possibility he had not considered.
How many Uchiha corpses has this boy been collecting? Orochimaru wondered, his internal voice sharp with a new calculation.
"If both sets are related," he said slowly, "then the Hashirama bridge is unnecessary. Your own blood becomes the catalyst. Uzumaki vitality acts as a mediator. Three-way synchronisation—your body, the first donor's imprint, the second donor's imprint."
He explained the ritual details: the body array, the activation sequence, the hand seals that would begin the transformation. The process would be brutal—possible death, genetic rewriting, the agony of having one's very being reshaped.
"But the reward," Orochimaru concluded, "is the Eternal Mangekyō. Unrestricted power without the cost of blindness."
Renjiro listened, memorised, and stored the information.
Then he began to release the chains.
Slowly, methodically, the silver links loosened. The green flames faded. The bundle of snakes began to reform, its fragments merging, its consciousness consolidating into something approaching human form.
One chain remained, wrapped around Orochimaru's neck.
Insurance, Renjiro's expression said.
He reached into his pouch and withdrew a small vial—containing a sample of Hashirama cells. He tossed it toward Orochimaru, who caught it reflexively.
"Here," Renjiro said. "This should be enough to honour the deal."
Orochimaru stared at the vial, his yellow eyes gleaming.
"You are a fascinating creature, Renjiro-kun," he said, his voice carrying the particular warmth of a predator who had been outmatched but not broken.
"I'll be watching your ascension with professional interest."
He began to dissolve, his body fading into the mist.
"I let you go once," Renjiro said, his voice cold. "There won't be a second time."
Orochimaru's smile was the last thing to disappear.
"I would expect nothing less."
The valley finally became quiet.
The green flames flickered and died. The chains dissolved, their silver links fading into chakra mist.
Renjiro stood alone.
His Mangekyō flickered, their six-pointed patterns fading slowly. The blood from his eyes traced crimson rivers down his cheeks, staining his collar, his chest, his hands. His body screamed for rest, for healing, for the simple mercy of unconsciousness.
But he could not rest. Not yet.
He fell to one knee. Then both.
I'll never be that helpless again, he thought, the promise burning in his chest like the green flames that had consumed his enemies. I'll never let anyone take from me again.
He looked up at the sky, at the stars that were beginning to emerge through the smoke, at the vastness of the world that still stretched before him.
The Eternal Mangekyō is within reach. I have the knowledge. I have the eyes. I have the cells.
Now I just need to survive long enough to use them.
=====
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