"Impossible! Absolutely impossible! The village would never kill Sasuke!"
Blood streamed from both of Uchiha Itachi's eyes as he stared fixedly at Uchiha Yasuo's face, which was exactly the same as his own, and he ground out through clenched teeth:
"You killed him!"
"Didn't you?"
"Ah, right, right, right!" Uchiha Yasuo split his mouth in a grim, twisted smile. "That's right, I killed Sasuke!"
"Not only did I kill him—before I killed him, I crushed all four of his limbs to powder, then used the Mangekyō Sharingan's dōjutsu to heal him, and then crushed them again!"
"Over and over, I did it again and again, until at the end, when he cried and begged me to kill him, I finally granted his wish!"
"Do you know what he cried?"
"Watch—let me imitate it for you to hear!"
"Cough, cough…" Uchiha Yasuo coughed twice, cleared his throat, then sharpened his voice, pretending to sound like a child.
"Nii-san, why aren't you coming to save me?"
"Nii-san, it hurts so much!"
"Nii-san…"
"Shut up!" Uchiha Itachi roared like a madman. "Sasuke was only a child—how could you…!"
"A child? You even have the face to say 'child'?" Uchiha Yasuo shouted back even more furiously. "You said it was for peace—then why did you only kill adults? Why did you slaughter even the elderly, women, and infants?"
"You say Sasuke was innocent—were those babies not innocent too?"
"Did Konohagakure ever care about those innocent Uchiha children?"
"No, it didn't!"
"They were afraid!"
"They were afraid that the descendants of the Uchiha would grow up and take revenge on them!"
"They wanted to eradicate the roots completely!"
"Since they wanted to root out every trace, how could that surviving brat Sasuke be left alive?"
"You couldn't bring yourself to do it—that's fine. I'm considerate enough to help you finish your mission for you!"
"No need to thank me!"
"Ah… who are you? Who the hell are you?"
Agitated by Uchiha Yasuo's words, Uchiha Itachi was speechless, only able to let out a powerless roar of rage.
"Who am I? Haha…" Uchiha Yasuo burst into loud laughter. "Look at this face—don't you recognize it?"
"I'm that dog of the politicians of Konohagakure, the beast who personally slaughtered every man, woman, and child of his own clan—Uchiha Itachi!"
"Oh right, I forgot to tell you. Not only did I exterminate the entire Uchiha clan, I also killed the Third Hokage's grandson, snatched the Nine-Tails' Jinchūriki, and killed dozens of shinobi from Konohagakure."
"Although the Nine-Tails' Jinchūriki was taken away by Namikaze Minato, just now even the Ino–Shika–Chō trio died here."
"Guess what—do you think Konohagakure will still trust you now?"
"Huh?"
"Haha…"
"Aren't you the one who loves peace so much?"
"Aren't you the one who's afraid of people in the village getting hurt?"
"Then let me tell you this—not only did I kill Uchiha Sasuke, I'll also ignite a Great Ninja War and make even more people of Konohagakure die!"
"The Uchiha are one of the founding clans of Konohagakure. A Konohagakure without the Uchiha has no reason to exist!"
"I'll utterly destroy Konohagakure!"
"I'll make Konohagakure vanish from the ninja world forever!"
Driven beyond endurance by Uchiha Yasuo's relentless provocation, Uchiha Itachi could no longer hold back. His Mangekyō Sharingan flared, and black flames ignited upon Uchiha Yasuo's body.
"Die!"
"Amaterasu!"
"Haha…"
Without hesitation, Uchiha Yasuo raised his hand and slashed down, cutting away the flesh where the black flames were burning, tossing it aside to let the chunk of meat burn to ashes, laughing wildly without restraint.
"Hey, Uchiha Itachi, so your capacity amounts to only this much!"
"If you can't handle this, how will you ever become Hokage?"
"You have to think about problems like a Hokage!"
"What brother or not—if he must be killed, then he must be killed!"
"How can you be so petty?"
"You need to have broader vision!"
"Stop fussing over such trivial, insignificant matters!"
"All for the sake of the village!"
"All for the sake of peace!"
"I'll kill you!" Hearing Uchiha Yasuo gloating there, the fury in Uchiha Itachi's heart was like a flame doused with another bucket of oil, burning even more fiercely.
The mask of calm he had always worn finally shattered completely, and the Mangekyō Sharingan in his eyes quivered violently from rage.
His gaze swept across Uchiha Yasuo, and when he saw that the latter's wound was visibly regenerating and healing at a speed discernible to the naked eye, he frowned in secret.
He too possessed the Mangekyō Sharingan, and could tell at a glance that the enemy's Mangekyō ability was related to regeneration—so an ability like Amaterasu, one that burned continuously but had weak lethality, was of little use against such an opponent.
Thus, his pair of Mangekyō Sharingan spun rapidly, unleashing another ocular technique.
"Tsukuyomi!"
Uchiha Yasuo suddenly felt the environment around him twist, the world he was in shifting instantly—its colors vanishing without a trace, leaving only black and white all around.
His body was suspended in midair, bound to a cross, while Uchiha Itachi stood before him with a sullen expression, a long blade in his hand.
"This is my Mangekyō genjutsu space. Here, time, space, and even matter are all under my control…"
Before he could finish speaking, the Mangekyō Sharingan in Uchiha Yasuo's eyes also began spinning wildly as he burst out laughing loudly:
"Haha…"
"It's just Tsukuyomi. I know this ability even better than you do!"
"This thing works fine for bullying the weak—but when facing another Mangekyō Sharingan, it's just trash!"
As the final word fell, the chains let out a groan under unbearable strain, and fine cracks appeared on the cross.
In an instant, the restraints on Uchiha Yasuo's body completely collapsed, and he dropped back to the ground.
Uchiha Yasuo widened his eyes, and a surge of violent Yin Release chakra rushed out, colliding head-on with Uchiha Itachi's chakra.
Their bodies shuddered violently at the same time, and blood tears simultaneously flowed from their eyes.
The spatial structure that had been stable began to tremble violently as well. The colors that had vanished reappeared first on Uchiha Yasuo, then spread out through the entire space, and wherever they passed, the genjutsu rules collapsed one after another.
Uchiha Itachi could no longer spare any nonsense; wearing a sullen face, he stood there, focusing on maintaining the existence of the genjutsu space.
The two's mental energies clashed fiercely in midair like a tug-of-war—when you advanced, I retreated—tightly entangled together.
The genjutsu space switched back and forth between color and black-and-white, while its shape kept recombining like a shattered mirror: now square, now round, now bizarre and grotesque, dizzying to behold.
Uchiha Yasuo pushed his Mangekyō Sharingan ocular technique to the limit while pressing Uchiha Itachi on the mental front.
"Itachi, you should know this too: the longer and the more the Sharingan is used, the easier it is to go blind!"
"However, I'll tell you some good news. The ocular technique of my Mangekyō Sharingan is called 'Inaba no Hakuto'; it's a healing-type ocular technique that can convert Yin Release chakra into Yang Release chakra, producing the effect of medical ninjutsu!"
"This ocular technique is very powerful—even if the eyes go blind, it can heal them!"
"Haha…"
"Now you understand, right? Although I don't have another pair of Mangekyō Sharingan from a blood relative, I have in effect obtained results equivalent to an Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan!"
"How can you possibly compete with me!"
But Uchiha Itachi was unmoved, only saying coldly: "Whether ninjutsu, secret arts, or kekkei genkai—at the core of everything for a ninja is chakra."
"The Mangekyō Sharingan is no exception!"
"Even if your ocular technique can convert between Yin Release and Yang Release, so what?"
"Your total amount of chakra is still fixed!"
"The more Yin Release chakra you convert into Yang Release chakra, the more your Yin Release chakra for resistance will decrease accordingly."
"I awakened earlier than you; my total Yin Release chakra exceeds yours."
"I'll see what you can do after your chakra is exhausted."
"Your chakra amount? Hehe…" Uchiha Yasuo cackled. "The Mangekyō Sharingan is not such an inconvenient thing!"
"As long as there is hatred in the heart, chakra will naturally be inexhaustible!"
"If chakra isn't enough, then demand it from the body—squeeze out life force!"
"Such a simple matter—do I still need to teach you?"
"Come, come—today let's fight to our heart's content and see whether you go blind first or I do!"
Uchiha Itachi stopped speaking and single-mindedly squeezed out the chakra within his body, vowing to fight Uchiha Yasuo to the end.
Outsiders could not see this perilous contest of Yin Release chakra; they could only see the two standing face to face as blood tears streamed down from both pairs of eyes.
Beneath the motionless scene was a struggle of souls far more dangerous than physical attacks.
The two, upon meeting, immediately began strangling each other to the death, treating the Akatsuki members around them as if they were nothing.
Yet from the dialogue between the two, everyone also understood that the reason Uchiha Itachi had killed his entire clan was not to measure his own capacity, but because he was acting under orders from the high-ups in Konohagakure.
And the so-called "rogue ninja" was likely not a true betrayal, but a role used specifically to take the blame.
"Konohagakure has, in the end, decayed to this degree!" Orochimaru could not help sighing. "Fortunately, I left long ago."
"I just didn't expect that the Fourth still exists—that he hasn't died completely. How wonderful…"
His long, serpent-like tongue licked once around his lips, and greed filled his vertical pupils.
Beside him, Biwa Jūzō wore a sullen face, clearly thinking of those kekkei genkai clans in his own Kirigakure that had likewise been wiped out.
"Tch, truly disgusting politics!"
"Hey, Leader, are you really going to watch the two of them perish together like this?"
"The organization is precisely short on people right now."
"I see both of them as very powerful. How about taking them both in as companions?"
Pain hovered high in midair, his face as calm as still water, yet he felt somewhat hesitant.
Originally he had misgivings about adding another Uchiha, worrying it would increase the power on the 'Uchiha Madara' side. But now, seeing the two at daggers drawn as mortal enemies, he was instantly a bit tempted.
"Hey, you say that so lightly. Didn't you see those two looking like mortal foes? How could they possibly stop fighting and willingly become companions?" White Zetsu twisted about, retorting like someone with hyperactivity.
Biwa Jūzō only shrugged indifferently.
"Speaking of which, which of the people in our organization came here willingly?"
"Unwilling?"
"Just have the Leader beat them up, won't that do?"
Zetsu was still planning to keep quibbling, but Pain had already made up his mind.
"All right—what Biwa Jūzō said makes a lot of sense."
"God can encompass everything!"
"Before the might of God, anyone can only bow their head and submit!"
With that, he raised his hand and slapped toward the space between Uchiha Yasuo and Uchiha Itachi. A repulsive force arose out of thin air, and the two who were facing off were each flung away.
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