"Haha…" Uchiha Yasuo laughed heartily, tauntingly sneered, "Hey, you don't really think I became a jōnin purely because I'm an Uchiha, do you?"
"Whether taijutsu, or genjutsu, or ninjutsu, the Uchiha jōnin are that small handful of people standing at the pinnacle of the ninja world!"
"It's just a pity…"
The image of corpses strewn across the clan territory that night surfaced again in Uchiha Yasuo's mind, making his blood boil; the anger and hatred in his heart became even harder to restrain, and his chakra gradually began to run wild.
His voice carried a hatred engraved in his bones as he roared loudly.
"Hypocritical Sarutobi Hiruzen, black-hearted Danzō, the envious great clans, ignorant ordinary shinobi, and the numb Konoha villagers…"
"You together joined hands and led to the annihilation of the Uchiha clan!"
"You… all deserve to die!"
Uchiha Yasuo's Sharingan spun wildly, and the cold, dark aura on his body grew much heavier.
The Sharingan is also a bug in the bloodline limit; the amount of Yin-nature chakra is completely influenced by the mental state — the more extreme the emotion, the stronger the chakra often becomes.
In his rage, Uchiha Yasuo's original intent to toy with Aburame Torune vanished.
Killing intent, like a breached dam, could no longer be restrained.
He quickly formed hand seals with both hands; opening his mouth, a fire dragon surged forth, letting out a deafening roar as it rushed wildly toward Aburame Torune.
And earlier, during the shuriken throws, he had attached a specially made transparent steel wire to the back of one of the shuriken.
Using this steel wire as a conductor, this time the ninjutsu attack was something Aburame Torune simply could not evade.
But Aburame Torune never intended to dodge; taking advantage of the brief pause when Uchiha Yasuo opened his mouth to unleash the technique, he completely abandoned defense, channeling all his chakra into the Rinkaichū, and charged forward head-on.
"Hu!"
The instant the flames struck him, Aburame Torune was immediately ignited, burning fiercely like a human candle. Purple poisonous mist churned within the fire, releasing a pungent stench of scorched flesh.
Yet wreathed in flames, he burst out from the sea of fire, closing in on Uchiha Yasuo as he wished, and pressed his hand onto Uchiha Yasuo's arm.
"Got you!"
Aburame Torune's voice was already hoarse beyond recognition, but within it was a manic joy of victory.
He gripped Uchiha Yasuo tightly, chakra surging wildly, driving the Rinkaichū on his skin to proliferate rapidly and crawl toward Uchiha Yasuo.
It was visible to the naked eye that Uchiha Yasuo's arm was gradually turning purple.
At the same time, two Root shinobi suddenly emerged from behind Aburame Torune, rushing forward without regard for their lives—one with the glow of burning explosion tags under his body, the other rapidly forming hand seals.
"Earth Release: Earth Prison Hall!"
The ground trembled violently; the familiar stone prison walls once again rose from all sides, enclosing the three of them inside.
Uchiha Yasuo gave a cold snort, the Mangekyō Sharingan in his eyes spinning madly. A half-bodied Susanoo appeared once more, breaking through the cramped stone prison while shielding both himself and Aburame Torune within its torso.
At the same time, the blade in his hand flashed as he slashed toward Aburame Torune.
But Aburame Torune only focused on forcing the Rinkaichū to reproduce; facing the attack, he did not even attempt to dodge, merely shifting his body slightly.
With a puff, where the blade fell, blood sprayed in all directions—Aburame Torune was cleaved diagonally in two from shoulder to back. Yet even as he fell, his eyes remained fixed on Uchiha Yasuo, intent on witnessing his death.
With a loud boom, the self-detonating shinobi successfully rushed up to Susanoo, embraced it, and exploded.
But this time, the stone prison was maintained by a single shinobi alone—its scale was too small and had already been burst apart by Susanoo.
Without the confinement of the stone prison, the explosive force was greatly reduced.
However, there were far more explosion tags in this blast than before, still shaking Susanoo violently, its armor covered with cracks.
Uchiha Yasuo's left eye streamed with blood tears, his entire body panting heavily.
Most importantly, due to the explosion, Uchiha Yasuo had to focus all his strength on maintaining Susanoo's defense, leaving him unable to resist the corrosion of the Rinkaichū—half his body had already turned purple.
You could see the Rinkaichū about to burrow into his brain, yet Uchiha Yasuo showed no hint of anxiety.
He wore an unusually eerie smile as he looked at the Aburame Torune lying on the ground; facing Aburame Torune's eyes full of hatred and expectation, Uchiha Yasuo suddenly burst into loud laughter.
"Haha..."
"I've been keeping things hidden away; I've been waiting for precisely this wonderful moment!"
"As Danzo's right-hand man, of course I planned carefully how to get rid of you."
"Come on, take a look at the gift I prepared for you!"
While laughing wildly, Uchiha Yasuo manipulated Susanoo to remove the herbal gourd that had been carried on the energy giant's back behind him, aimed it at himself, activated chakra, and inhaled deeply.
Then Aburame Torune watched in despair as a purple mist drifted off Uchiha Yasuo and toward the herbal gourd.
The mist flow composed of nano poisonous insects writhed and struggled like living things, but under the pull of the sealing power it offered no resistance and was sucked into that herbal gourd.
At the same time, Uchiha Yasuo's body rapidly returned from purple back to its normal skin color.
That herbal gourd had been on the energy giant's back since Uchiha Yasuo opened Susanoo's second form. Aburame Torune had seen it before, but Uchiha Yasuo had never taken it off to use it. So Aburame Torune did not know what that gourd was for.
He had never imagined that this herbal gourd would actually be a sealing technique!
The deathblow he had pinned his hopes on was so easily undone by the enemy, and the revelation filled Aburame Torune with grief and fury; he vomited several mouthfuls of blood and could no longer hold on.
Although the Rinkaichū's in-and-out still inflicted tremendous damage on Uchiha Yasuo, under the effect of the dōjutsu the tissues corroded by the toxin recovered visibly before the naked eye.
Uchiha Yasuo dismissed Susanoo, looked at the barely breathing Aburame Torune at his feet, and once again laughed triumphantly.
"Haha…"
"This is the feeling!"
"First give you hope, then make you despair!"
"This feeling is simply so satisfying!"
"This is the feeling of revenge!"
"Haha..."
A flash of hatred crossed Uchiha Yasuo's eyes. He lifted his foot high and then stamped down heavily on Aburame Torune's head.
With a "Puff," Aburame Torune's head was crushed like a rotten watermelon under his stomp; brain matter and bone fragments splattered, spraying everywhere.
Looking at the Aburame Torune whose "liver and brain were smeared on the ground," Uchiha Yasuo's hatred had not yet subsided. He lifted his head and fixed his gaze on the remaining Konohagakure shinobi.
But before he could make a move, a wind-tearing sound suddenly rushed past his ear, and a kunai flew before his eyes.
Then, with a flash of yellow light, a golden-red figure suddenly appeared, one hand raised high. A Rasengan the size of a human head spun violently, letting out a shrill screech that tore the air, and smashed down at him head-on.
...
A moment earlier...
Namikaze Minato flickered to Akimichi Chōza's side, quickly took out medicine from on him, simply bandaged him, patted his shoulder, and said in a low voice, "Hold on a little longer."
Then he bent to pick up a bag of kunai from the ground, tied it at his waist, took up a short blade, and swept his gaze over the faces of the group from Akatsuki watching the battle in the distance.
He paused for a moment on Orochimaru and on the obvious Sharingan of Uchiha Itachi, then withdrew his gaze, turned his head to glance at Uchiha Yasuo over there fighting Aburame Torune without paying it any attention, and merely raised his head to look at Pain in midair.
"I am Namikaze Minato. Enough people have died today. Can this battle end here?"
Although Pain felt it very strange that a dead man like Minato had suddenly "revived" and appeared, moreover inhabiting a child's body, ninjutsu in the shinobi world is bizarre in every way; the Rinnegan can even bring people back to life, so this kind of "pseudo-resurrection" of Minato was nothing all that significant.
He lowered his gaze and asked coldly: "Have you felt pain?"
"Do you understand the value of peace?"
Minato frowned; he also found this kind of god-muttering speech very troublesome, but he still nodded and answered: "I have always known the value of peace, and I do not wish for war to break out anywhere."
"Konohagakure has never taken the initiative to launch aggression against any country and has always been devoted to maintaining peace in the shinobi world."
"Lies!" Pain shouted, cutting him off, and asked coldly: "You say you have felt pain and understood the value of peace. Then I ask you: regarding today's events, will Konohagakure not launch retaliatory actions against Amegakure?"
"This…" Minato was momentarily at a loss for words.
In his heart, he certainly understood that although Konohagakure had always pursued a policy of peace, in practice, those with whom they could truly speak of peace and conduct negotiations had always been only the Five Great Nations.
Now that so many of Konohagakure's people had died—and their enemy was not one of the Five Great Nations but merely a small village like Amegakure—neither the higher-ups of Konohagakure nor its ordinary shinobi and citizens could accept such a result.
Even if only to serve as a deterrent to the other four major nations and prevent them from thinking that Konohagakure had grown weak and might be invaded, the village would inevitably have to carry out retaliation.
Yet, if the ones who had killed these people were not Amegakure but any one of the other Five Great Nations, then, judging by Konohagakure's usual appeasing style, most likely they would just issue condemnation and let the matter drop—and the people would not find it unacceptable.
But Amegakure could not!
To put it bluntly, a small country like Amegakure was unworthy!
Back in those days, Amegakure had once stood on equal footing with the Five Great Nations for a time, but that was because of Hanzō of the Salamander, who had forced that reputation into existence through sheer might.
Only then had the various nations reluctantly acknowledged the status of the Land of Rain. Yet after Hanzō of the Salamander grew old, the Land of Rain returned once more to the place it was always meant to occupy, oppressed in every way by the shinobi of the Five Great Nations.
He had once served as Hokage himself and was very aware of the conflicts within the village. Thus he understood clearly that even though the enemy before him might be stronger than Hanzō of the Salamander had ever been, Konohagakure could never accept negotiating without first fighting.
Not to mention that he was already dead—even if he were still alive, facing such a situation, there would still be only one choice.
That was to win first, and then negotiate.
His personality had always been straightforward; he did not wish to deceive the other side with words, even if that person was an enemy.
Facing Minato's silence, Pain naturally understood what the outcome would be.
"So," he said, "don't speak of how you people of Konohagakure love peace and hate war!"
"You merely take it for granted that the pain and death brought by war will never fall upon your own side!"
"As for where that pain and death fall, you truly do not care!"
"Those who have never felt pain can never understand the value of peace!"
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