Surgery

Within the Spacetime Tower's time-stopping domain, Izuna slept through two hundred days and nights in frozen time.

He remembered his first treatment: the pain had nearly made him faint, but the comfort that followed had left him addicted.

He could endure the pain, but what was more frightening was the unimaginable, exquisite pleasure it brought.

The fifteen-minute treatment was so long. The first five minutes were a purification that scorched his soul, and the next five were an itching numbness as his cells reorganized.

The final five minutes, however, transformed into waves of pleasure that made his muscles spasm, as though every mitochondrion were singing.

This body, sunk in darkness, developed a twisted craving for those brief fifteen minutes of treatment.

He could not suppress the urge to touch the goddess above him, to stroke her cascading hair.

To brush her fluttering sleeves, or even lay his head on her soft, warm lap.

The goddess never rejected those transgressive touches. She neither resisted nor refused, simply accepting his unhealthy attachment with compassion.

In the daze where agony and ecstasy intertwined, only by touching her

could Izuna truly feel that he was not yet completely dead.

After treatment, Izuna could barely support himself through simple activities. The time he spent with his brother and Utsusemi was like a painkiller, kindling hope for life and bringing momentary comfort.

But the curse always tore that false peace apart. After a cumulative three hours in the outside world, he would lapse into a near-death state and have to return to the eternal stasis of the Spacetime Tower.

The twisted symbiosis of dependence and torment, pleasure and pain, was like a disease clinging to the bone.

That continued until the day of the clan council trial that changed his fate.

Black Zetsu was escorted to the central judgment platform in specially made Chakra chains. The sins accumulated over a thousand years in the depths of his consciousness emerged in surging illusion projections all around.

The projections flashed with conflicts sparked by his provocations, brothers who had turned on one another because of his manipulation, and families torn apart by his schemes.

The Senju and Uchiha clans stood on opposite sides of the judgment seats. The hereditary enemies who had once been as incompatible as fire and water now stood shoulder to shoulder.

Utsusemi, in Six Paths Mode, sat high in the presiding judge's seat, the power of destruction flowing through her Tenseigan.

With all eyes upon her, she personally read out Black Zetsu's crimes, each charge accompanied by irrefutable visual evidence.

When the gavel fell, Black Zetsu let out one final roar, and his energy was drawn out by a special Sealing Jutsu formula.

The last wisp of dark energy entered the purification device at the core of the Spacetime Tower, and the thousand-year curse gradually dissolved.

Izuna gripped the railing tightly from the viewing area. Though he could not see, he sensed this historic moment.

The first light of the end had finally arrived. The darkness was about to end, and they would finally welcome the true dawn.

Today, the Sharingan transplant surgery he had long awaited had finally arrived.

Utsusemi would perform it herself, with Itama Senju assisting her.

Utsusemi raised the culture container holding the Sharingan and warned him once more:

"One final confirmation before surgery: the transplanted Sharingan must never be injured! Even if the damage is the slightest bit, you must immediately gouge it out and give it to me for repair."

Inside the transparent tempered-glass container, two Sharingan from Madara Uchiha floated in pale green culture fluid.

These two special eyes had been made using Madara Uchiha's blind Mangekyō Sharingan as a base.

Infused with Six Paths Power, cultivated with Yin-Yang Release, and secretly implanted with Wood Release Cells, they had become Izuna's hope of regaining his sight.

Uchiha Izuna smiled calmly. "You've repeated the precautions seventeen times, but as compensation..."

He looked at the emergency device behind Utsusemi. "My brother's Sharingan's ocular power can recover automatically, right?"

"Absolutely." Utsusemi pushed the consent form toward the brothers. The medical liability waiver on the paper was particularly conspicuous.

"Madara needs to sign too. Once you've signed, we'll begin the transplant surgery."

"Got it." The tip of Madara's pen pierced three sheets of paper as he signed. Once Madara and Izuna had signed the preoperative agreement,

Utsusemi carefully put the documents away and nodded to Itama. "Prepare the operating room."

Her Tenseigan glimmered silver-blue behind her sterile mask as the Chakra Scalpel dissected Izuna's ocular nervous system. Every severed optic nerve flickered with red points of light representing pain.

"Ready for the transplant." Utsusemi's voice echoed through the operating room. This was her first time performing an eye transplant on an Uchiha.

Although she had previously completed successful transplants for several blind civilians with Madara's assistance,

faced with her friend's empty eye sockets, Utsusemi took a deep breath without realizing it.

When Itama took the pair of specially made eyes from the pale green culture fluid, Utsusemi calmed down. Here we go.

The instant the first optic nerve touched the severed end, the veins stood out on Izuna's arms beneath the restraints. Blood seeped through his clenched teeth as he stubbornly turned his face toward Utsusemi.

"This hurts... more than cell reorganization..." His gasps carried the taste of blood.

The Chakra Scalpel paused almost imperceptibly. She wiped Izuna's deathly pale, sweat-soaked cheek with gauze. "Anesthetic would interfere with nerve conduction..."

"Bear with it." Her fingertips pressed against Izuna's temple, and medical Chakra slowly seeped into his skin. "Izuna, I know you can make it through this."

The Chakra Scalpel divided into hundreds of millions of nanoscale filaments, weaving a nerve regeneration network at a speed beyond the Sharingan's ability to follow.

As each connection was stitched, a blue Chakra pattern lit up in the eye socket, like sparks of life being kindled one after another.

Outside the observation window, Madara pressed his palm hard against the barrier. He could clearly see Utsusemi's Chakra rapidly draining away.

What she was injecting into Izuna's eyes through Yin-Yang Release was none other than precisely diluted Yang Power.

The final optic nerve was connected, and the operating room's emergency lights suddenly went out. The surgery had succeeded.

"The eye transplant was very successful." Utsusemi removed her mask. The glow of her Tenseigan, which had been operating at full power, gradually faded, and the microscopic view receded from her eyes like an ebbing tide.

Uchiha Izuna's eyelids fluttered, and he slowly opened his eyes.

The first symbolized the reconstruction of his Chakra pathways, the second marked the reawakening of his Dōjutsu memories, and the third hinted at the potential for Mangekyō.

The Sharingan shone with an uncanny luster under the lights, three Tomoe slowly revolving as though alive.

"Finally..." Izuna's voice trembled in a way it had not for a long time. "I can see what you look like again, Utsusemi."

Utsusemi leaned down and cradled his face, gazing at her masterpiece as she gently stroked the magnificent eyes. "We have plenty of time ahead of us. For now, tell me, is your vision clear?"

"Clearer than at any time before." Izuna broke into a radiant smile. "Now I can even see every minute detail of Chakra's pulse."

He nuzzled Utsusemi's palm. "I almost couldn't piece together your outline anymore..."

He could only get by on the images the Sharingan had etched into his memory.

But his cherished memories of Utsusemi were so few. Now that his sight had returned, he would surely commit many, many more memories to heart!

The torment of two hundred days and nights had finally come to an end. Izuna was no longer a cursed Uchiha, but someone reborn with brand-new power.

His Chakra network had been completely rebuilt, and his new eyes granted him a view unlike anything he had known before.

Uchiha Izuna could feel that his connection to this world was closer than ever before.

He was no longer a failure on the verge of death, but a warrior reborn.