Sasuke's POV
Sasuke's breath caught the moment he saw it—
Akira's Mangekyō Sharingan.
For a second, he thought his eyes were fooling him.
No… they weren't.
That pattern—undeniable. Absolute. Impossible.
Akira Uchiha… eleven years old…
and he had awakened the Mangekyō.
Sasuke's mind spun.
He knew Akira had the Three-Tomoe Sharingan. Everyone in the clan whispered about it. But this…
Even Nii-san awakened the Mangekyō around twelve or thirteen…
How… how is Akira already there?
A burning heat exploded inside Sasuke's chest. Not anger. Not jealousy.
Something worse.
A painful, suffocating sense of inferiority.
From the beginning, Sasuke had never been able to defeat Akira.
But he always believed—firmly—that Akira was within reach.
A distant but visible peak.
Something he could climb toward.
But now…
Now Akira was standing far beyond that peak, in a realm Sasuke had barely even dreamed of reaching.
Akira was no longer just a rival.
He had surpassed even the milestone Sasuke had worshipped his whole life—
Itachi.
The auditorium lights dimmed again, Akira left the stage, and silence filled the hall.
Nothing happened for a few minutes.
Sasuke was still staring at the door Akira had exited through when he suddenly saw something—
Gaara had vanished.
Right from his seat.
No chakra pulse.
No sound.
No flicker.
It wasn't a jutsu.
There was only one possibility.
…Genjutsu.
Sasuke clenched his fist, formed the hand seal, and shouted inside his mind:
Illusion—DISPEL!
A loud, cracking noise exploded around him.
Like glass shattering—
like a mirror breaking—
the world split apart and fell away.
And Sasuke opened his eyes in the true auditorium.
He was free.
But there was no triumph.
No satisfaction.
No pride.
He learned he was the third to break out.
First was someone from the Hidden Sand.
Second was someone from the Hidden Cloud.
Sasuke gritted his teeth.
I call the Uchiha the pinnacle of illusions… and yet others broke before me?
I didn't break it through skill—I only escaped because I saw Gaara vanish…
If he hadn't broken free first, I… I wouldn't have either.
The burning inside his chest turned into a wildfire.
He always believed that aside from Akira, he was the top among his peers.
But today proved something horrifying.
He wasn't even close.
His heartbeat pounded so hard he felt his vision blur—
And then—
His eyes shifted.
One Tomoe spun wildly—
twisted—
split—
and formed Two Tomoe Sharingan.
Sasuke exhaled shakily.
Not in joy.
Not in relief.
But in desperation.
Because somewhere in his heart, he now knew
If he didn't evolve…
Akira would leave him behind forever.
---
Gaara's POV
Gaara sat in silence, his expression calm, barely blinking as he listened to Akira Uchiha's speech from the center of the auditorium.
Shukaku's voice suddenly rumbled inside him like a growl in a desert storm.
"Oi, brat… those eyes… those eyes are dangerous."
A pause.
A twitch of irritation.
"Mangekyō Sharingan. That kid has awakened the Mangekyō!"
Gaara did not react. He didn't even shift his gaze.
He ignored the beast.
He simply continued watching Akira speak—steady, still, alert—waiting for the speech to end.
Akira left, the lights returned, the hall went quiet.
And then—
Shukaku's voice hit him again, this time sharper, urgent:
"Wake up, you sand-loving idiot!"
Gaara blinked.
"…It's an illusion."
The moment he heard the word, Gaara moved.
He didn't shout, didn't panic.
He simply gathered his chakra, flooding it through every pathway, every tiny channel in his body—
a sudden sweeping current like a desert wind tearing through dunes—
And the world around him cracked.
Not loudly.
Just a silent, dry fracture—
like old stone splitting in heat.
And the illusion fell apart.
Gaara opened his eyes in the real auditorium.
Everyone around him—hundreds of shinobi from every village—
were still trapped.
Unmoving.
Breathing slowly.
Caught.
Gaara sat alone among them, awake.
He did not smile.
He did not feel pride.
This was not triumph.
This was evaluation.
The illusion caster—
the Uchiha boy even younger than him—
was someone Shukaku feared.
And that meant something.
"Tch… to put more than a thousand humans in a single illusion… even that old man Rasa couldn't do that," Shukaku muttered, uneasy.
Gaara said nothing.
He simply exhaled, a quiet breath, neither relief nor tension—
just acknowledgment.
He folded his hands in his lap and waited, calmly, patiently, for the moment they would allow him to leave this hall.
Because one thing was certain:
This exam was not simple.
And Akira Uchiha…
was a threat unlike anything he had faced before.
---
After Akira left the auditorium, he waited outside for Naruto, Sasuke, and the others.
A few more minutes passed, and finally they appeared.
Naruto looked depressed, his shoulders sagging.
He had broken the illusion after Sasuke.
Sasuke, on the other hand, walked out calmly—
as if he hadn't just been burning with frustration or nearly forcing his Sharingan to evolve.
His face was blank, but Akira could read him clearly.
Akira knew Sasuke's pride better than anyone.
And that was exactly why he had shown his Mangekyō Sharingan during the reveal—
because he knew Sasuke would sense it and react.
As for Shukaku and Matatabi, Akira was sure that with their tailed-beast senses, they probably sensed his Mangekyō as well.
But the others didn't know anything.
Seeing Sasuke's rigid expression, Akira knew he had succeeded.
He stepped forward and said casually:
"Congratulations on awakening your two-tomoe Sharingan, Sasuke."
Naruto, hearing that Sasuke had evolved his Sharingan further, felt both happy and deeply frustrated.
Sasuke hadn't said anything to him, but Akira had sensed it instantly.
Still, everyone congratulated Sasuke.
Sasuke, true to himself, just nodded once, said nothing, and started walking away with Akira.
Just when the two were about to leave, a voice called out:
"Akira! Do you want to visit the flower garden? The new one nearby?"
It was Yamanaka Ino.
Akira glanced at Sasuke, then at Ino, then smiled gently.
"Well… sure, let's go."
Sasuke only nodded once and turned away.
In his mind, he scoffed:
"Go waste time with women if you want. I'll surpass you."
Thinking that, he felt strangely satisfied and motivated.
He headed straight for the Uchiha clan estate, determined to train even harder.
Akira, meanwhile, walked around the village with Ino.
They visited the flower garden, ate snacks from street stalls, and wandered leisurely.
At some point Akira asked:
"Hey, Ino, how much time did it take for you to break the illusion?"
Ino put on a thoughtful expression.
"Hmm… maybe ten minutes?"
Akira raised an eyebrow.
"How did you figure it out?"
Ino smiled proudly.
"Well, I felt a weird tingling sensation right after you left the hall. Then I tried using my Mind Reading Technique on others—but it didn't work. So I knew it had to be an illusion. After that, I just broke out."
Akira smiled at that.
They walked together for a few more hours, talking and laughing, and finally, Akira dropped her at her house.
Only then did he return to his own home.
---