The Yellow Springs Space seemed like an endless abyss. The sky was bloodred, as if it were about to drip down, crushing the air from his lungs.
"So this so-called Tsukuyomi Space is actually a reflection of your heart." A cold voice sounded beside Itachi's ear, seeming to come not from the world of the living, but from the far side of death.
"You yearn for death, and even prepared a ritual for it long ago. But... you can't bear to let go of your little brother, Uchiha Sasuke."
"You've clung to life for his sake alone." Uchiha Rei's gaze was as cold as the Shinigami's. "You betrayed your clan, yet Sasuke is part of it too. You severed your family ties, then would take away his most precious thing in the name of 'protecting' him... Your love is so twisted it's laughable."
Uchiha Itachi's eye twitched. Rei's words struck straight to the heart.
"Your love is grotesque."
Itachi opened his mouth as if to say something, then silently lowered his head. In his eyes appeared the small figure of Sasuke, standing behind him and staring at him in a daze.
"I was going to kill you." Uchiha Rei slowly raised his hand. Chakra gathered in his palm, forming a Dark Red Ninja Sword. "But now, I don't want to. Maybe killing you would be a release."
"Too bad you made the first move a few days ago." His voice turned colder. "Since you chose to make an enemy of me, you should have been prepared for me to kill you."
"Don't worry." Uchiha Rei turned halfway and glanced into the distance. "Your brother has nothing to do with me. I won't kill him."
In this Yomi Illusion Realm, the words "I won't kill him" sounded like a kind of release, yet also like a sentence.
Uchiha Itachi slowly closed his eyes. The pain, guilt, and inner turmoil that had weighed on his chest for years had finally found an outlet.
Yes... he murmured inwardly. Maybe it's time to let go.
"The Uchiha's fate really is like the Caged Bird Seal..." He slowly lifted his head. Rei's figure was reflected in his blood-red Sharingan. "And I'm the bird that never stops struggling."
Just as he completely gave up resisting, a flash of light suddenly tore through the darkness in his Mental World.
"What is this...?"
He saw the mirror, an ancient artifact he had chanced upon in the clan's underground chamber a few days earlier. He hadn't paid it any mind then, but now it appeared on its own, just as his mind neared collapse.
The mirror's surface glowed, as if actively dispelling the other's Genjutsu. Uchiha Itachi's eyes flew open. "It's the Eight Shaku Mirror!"
As the light spread, subtle ripples stirred through the illusion space.
"And..." He reached out and clenched his hand. A familiar power stirred within his Mental World.
"The Totsuka Blade." He murmured under his breath. "I still have this sword!"
Uchiha Itachi's Mangekyō Sharingan spun furiously, and a phantom sword, blazing with golden light, appeared in his hand. It was a divine sword with the power to seal—one of the legendary Three Sacred Treasures.
Hope rekindled in his eyes. He swung the sword, slashing at the blood-red space!
"Hmph..." Uchiha Rei frowned at the sudden turn of events. "You can still fight back? And those are the Three Sacred Treasures..."
But the illusion space remained unmoved, as if it had swallowed everything.
"Was it too weak... or..." Uchiha Itachi gritted his teeth and swung again and again.
Then, at last, an exceedingly fine crack appeared in the blood-red sky.
"My chance!" A glint flashed in his eyes.
The crack seemed to open a valve. He could feel chakra flowing through his body again. The restraints on him vanished, and a rush of freedom coursed through his limbs!
Without a moment's hesitation, Uchiha Itachi used Ninjutsu. His body instantly turned into a flock of crows, which darted toward the crack!
"Don't think you can escape!" Uchiha Rei roared. He formed Hand Seals, and the illusion space began rapidly repairing itself.
But in the final instant before the crack closed, the last feather slipped through.
Uchiha Itachi had escaped!
The crack was rapidly sealing, but at the last moment, a crow burst through, and Uchiha Itachi returned to reality.
"Ha... ha..." His breathing was ragged, cold sweat streaming down his forehead as blood tears ran from his eyes. "...That was close."
"From this day on, I'm a bird that's broken free of its cage!"
Without hesitation, he turned and raced toward Konoha. His chakra was nearly depleted, and his mind was at its limit. If he fought again, he had no chance of winning.
"He... is even more dangerous than Danzo." Uchiha Itachi calmly assessed the situation. "If I hadn't found those two artifacts in the underground chamber beforehand, today... I'd have died for sure."
"Rei wasn't lying... He really can kill me."
"But I can't die yet." His eyes reddened as Sasuke's face came to mind. "I have to be the one to decide the Uchiha's fate."
The wind rushed behind him.
Uchiha Rei had caught up.
"He's like a cockroach—hard to kill." Uchiha Rei smiled. "You never know when Itachi will pull something out of his pocket."
Perhaps because he had just escaped the brink of death, Uchiha Itachi was a little faster than before.
He swept through the night like a shadow and soon reached the outskirts of Konoha. He leaped onto a telephone pole, then raced along the wires on the momentum of his jump. His afterimage flowed away, vanishing into the maze of intersecting streets.
Uchiha Rei followed close behind, but for a moment, he couldn't catch up.
Just then, a rush of footsteps and shouts came from ahead.
"It's Uchiha Itachi! Get him!"
"Don't let him escape!"
"Uchiha Itachi, don't resist!"
A squad of Anbu Ninjas surged around Uchiha Itachi, surrounding him on all sides.
Uchiha Rei stood high in a tree, making no move to intervene. He watched the chaos, seemingly waiting for something.
Sure enough, a moment later, the surrounded Uchiha Itachi suddenly turned into a flock of crows and scattered.
It was only a Shadow Clone.
"...Quite a clever escape." Uchiha Rei narrowed his eyes.
Using the Anbu's encirclement as cover, Uchiha Itachi had slipped away unnoticed.
But Uchiha Rei showed no sign of anxiety. On the contrary, his expression was cold and assured as he murmured:
"You can run, but you can't hide. You won't escape Konoha... I'll go to your house and wait for you."
Before he finished speaking, he blurred into motion and raced toward the Uchiha Clan Compound.
In the night, Konoha's streets lay silent. The district where the Uchiha Clan lived was especially deserted, almost completely abandoned.
Even ordinary residents of Konoha understood that relations between Konoha and the Uchiha were on the brink of disaster, beyond reconciliation.
The Uchiha had already recalled many Jonin and Chunin, setting up layers of defenses around their territory.
But to Uchiha Rei, those defenses were useless. He slipped through the lines without a single Uchiha guard noticing him.
Before long, he was lying in wait outside Uchiha Sasuke's home.
Yet several hours passed, and there was still no movement inside. Uchiha Itachi hadn't come home.
My time is more valuable than Itachi's. I can't keep waiting.
Uchiha Rei stared at Sasuke's room, a glint flashing in his eyes.
Just now, by invading Uchiha Itachi's Mental World, he had obtained a wealth of important information. Two things stood out above all:
First, the two artifacts Uchiha Itachi had—the "Yata Mirror" and the "Totsuka Blade"—had both come from the clan's underground chamber.
Second, deep in Itachi's subconscious was a golden mark, radiating an unusual chakra signature.
"Since you're not coming back, I'll go to the chamber myself." Uchiha Rei murmured, then turned toward the outskirts of the village.
There, on a mountain upstream from the Naka River in southern Konoha, stood Naka Shrine. It was the Uchiha Clan's ancestral shrine, where generations of clan members had secretly gathered.
The shrine looked unremarkable. According to Itachi's information, a secret entrance lay inside the main hall, beneath the seventh tatami mat from the innermost corner on the right. It connected to the Uchiha Clan's most secret underground chamber. Deep inside was the stone tablet carved by the Sage of Six Paths, whose secrets could only be read in stages by those with the Sharingan, Mangekyō Sharingan, or even the Rinnegan.
Black Zetsu had long since altered the tablet's contents in secret, turning it into a shackle that twisted fate. Now, this ancient place had once again received an intruder.
Uchiha Rei slipped silently into the shrine and quickly surveyed the main hall. Everything looked old and ordinary, but he knew that true secrets never lay on the surface.
"The entrance... is somewhere in here." He closed his left eye. When he opened it again, his Mangekyō Sharingan was already turning.
His vision changed in an instant. The space inside the shrine warped into chakra patterns before his eyes. Beneath one of the tatami mats at the far end, he saw a distinct point where the energy converged. The Uchiha Clan Crest was carved there.
Uchiha Rei crouched and lifted the tatami mat. Beneath it was a slab of hard stone. He tried to push it, but it wouldn't budge.
"As expected... It's no ordinary mechanism." He smiled faintly, his gaze intent.
As chakra from his Mangekyō Sharingan flowed into the stone, the slab began to slowly turn translucent, rippling like water.
"Only those who awaken the Mangekyō can enter... No wonder I couldn't find it, even after all these years." He spoke in a low voice.
A staircase leading into darkness slowly appeared. It was the path to the Uchiha's true secrets.
Uchiha Rei slowly stepped inside, as if walking, one step at a time, into the abyss of fate.
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