A Touch and It Shatters

Was everything I had done a deception, all of it meaningless?

A Thorn Spike lashed out like a snake, piercing straight through his arm and plunging deep into the flesh. Blood streamed down his arm. His hand released the knife, and the blade flew into the air, spinning before plunging into the nearby earth with a clang.

Madara's knees went weak, and he dropped to one knee, opening his mouth to vomit a mouthful of blood.

On his face, hideous bloody tears streamed down his cheeks, impossible to tell whether they were blood or tears.

He only felt unbearable pain.

She lied to me!

She lied to me!

They all lied to me!

I don't believe it!

I'm not a child!

How could I be deceived by such a simple lie!

He suddenly bent forward and vomited up great mouthfuls of blood and fragments of his organs. The Thorn Spikes surrounded him, but they did not rush forward impatiently to tear him into pieces. They merely writhed dangerously around him.

Killing intent still lurked everywhere.

One hand covered his mouth as he endured the agony churning through his body. Blood continuously streamed between his fingers.

The scene before his eyes blurred, until a sheet of blood-red seemed to veil the entire world.

It was a view completely different from what the Sharingan revealed. A stifling, deathly crimson, like ink, seeped through and dyed the world.

"What did you do?"

"Who knows?" The lofty Goddess looked down at the man and said with a light laugh, "Aren't you very clever? Why don't you guess? You should know a little trick of this level, shouldn't you?"

His skin began to split. One crack after another burst open strangely across his body, as though cut by a knife. As blood flowed, his skin