The next moment, Uchiha Ruri had already appeared in a distant forest with Itachi Uchiha.
The forest was dense and deep. The trees' branches and leaves blocked most of the sunlight, making the interior somewhat dim. Itachi looked around in surprise.
Itachi Uchiha, despite harboring doubts about the other surviving members of the "Uchiha Clan" before him, still chose to trust them.
He knew that, true or not, the stranger before him—Sasuke of the Six Paths—was incredibly powerful. Even Pain had been defeated by him.
Itachi decisively took several steps back from Ruri. His hands began forming Hand Seals; this was his battle stance.
His seals were quick and precise, every subtle movement imbued with tremendous power.
Chakra surged wildly inside Itachi Uchiha, like an immense torrent that could not be held back.
He spread his hands slightly, and the tremendous power seemed to find an outlet, rushing from his fingertips and instantly filling the surrounding air.
Then he gave a sharp shout: "Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique!" As his voice fell, he brought his hands together violently. The surging chakra instantly gathered into a massive fireball, carrying scorching heat and an aura of destruction as it roared toward Ruri.
"So we can't avoid fighting after all! Big brother! Let me show you the ocular power of the Six Paths Rinnegan!" Ruri's voice echoed through the air, carrying a note of delight.
Ruri's figure streaked through the air like a ghost, tracing a path so faint it was almost impossible to see before vanishing from where she stood.
She dodged Itachi's aggressively incoming Great Fireball with extraordinary speed. The ninjutsu blazed with fierce flames, as if it would devour everything in its path.
Yet to Ruri, it was nothing more than child's play.
Just as the Great Fireball was about to hit her, Ruri's figure suddenly blurred, as though she had merged with the air, beyond anyone's reach.
Itachi's pupils contracted sharply. A powerful sense of unease washed over him.
When Ruri appeared again, she was already standing before Itachi. At that moment, time itself seemed to freeze.
Itachi had only enough time to notice the strange light glimmering in Ruri's eyes. It was a color so deep it could leave one entranced, as though it contained the endless mysteries of the universe.
"Six Paths Illusion!" Ruri cried softly, and a powerful, mysterious force surged out of her Rinnegan.
This was the power of the Rinnegan, a mysterious force originating from the Sage of Six Paths and renowned as one of the most powerful ocular jutsu in the Ninja World.
The Six-Tomoe Rinnegan had controlled the Nine Tailed Beasts from the original story in an instant. It was only natural that Itachi would be controlled just as quickly.
The power of the Rinnegan was unleashed to its fullest in Ruri's hands.
Itachi's body began trembling against his will. He felt his consciousness being peeled away bit by bit.
It was a sensation unlike anything he had ever experienced, as if his soul were torn into countless pieces, then reassembled into an entirely new existence. He wanted to cry out, but his throat felt blocked by something, and he couldn't make a sound.
In Ruri's Rinnegan, the light of the linked tomoe grew ever more brilliant.
Under Ruri's control, the power of the "Six Paths Illusion" became an invisible blade, slicing through Itachi's consciousness.
She didn't attack Itachi's body directly; that would have been too easy for her.
What she wanted was to utterly destroy Itachi's inner world, and make him question whether what he had done after the Night of the Uchiha Massacre had really been right.
Itachi felt waves of tremendous power flow into his body, only to vanish in an instant.
He tried desperately to grasp those forces, but found himself utterly powerless.
It was a despair unlike anything he had ever felt, as if the entire world had abandoned him in that moment.
Before long, Itachi's consciousness was completely controlled by Ruri's "Six Paths Illusion."
Under the overwhelming power, his resistance seemed utterly futile, like a tiny ant trying to move a mountain.
His eyes—the Sharingan that had once been filled with resolve and determination—had now become unfathomably deep Six-Tomoe Rinnegan.
Beneath the blazing sun high overhead, Itachi stood motionless before Ruri.
Sunlight fell across him, turning his once-black clothes golden.
His expression was still frozen in shock from the moment Ruri had taken control of him. He stood there dumbfounded, just like the people controlled by the God Tree in the original Naruto story.
Within Itachi's mind, he felt as though he had merged with a strange, unfamiliar world.
The power felt both foreign and familiar to him, like a long-lost sense of belonging.
However, that sense of belonging did not last long. As Ruri's control sank deeper, Itachi gradually began to lose consciousness.
He seemed to become a soulless shell, with only the power of the Rinnegan left to control him.
Controlling Itachi, Ruri fixed her gaze on his left kidney.
Something she longed to obtain seemed to be hidden there. She then looked down at her own body, as though weighing a difficult decision.
She slowly raised her hand, gripping a sharp Kunai. To stab or not to stab? The question echoed through her mind again and again.
She knew that if she brought the blade down, Itachi would be gravely injured; it might even cost him his life.
"My grudge over the kidney, Big Brother Itachi. Why do you always have to stab people in the kidney when you kill them? That's just outrageous."
A trace of hesitation and inner conflict flickered in Ruri's eyes. She took a deep breath, trying to calm the turmoil within her.
In the end, she made up her mind and slowly aimed the Kunai at Itachi's kidney.
However, just as she was about to stab him, an inexplicable feeling suddenly welled up inside her, stopping her hand despite herself.
"Tch. Sasuke's memories and body won't let me do it, so I'll play around in your mental world instead."
Ruri murmured softly, a strange light glimmering in her eyes. She knew that for Itachi, who possessed the Sharingan and Rinnegan, the mental world was one of his weaknesses.
As Ruri's words fell, a powerful surge of chakra burst from her body. The chakra leaped and burned through the air like purple flames, eventually gathering into a gigantic barrier. It was deep purple, as though it contained an endless, mysterious power.
"Susanoo!" Ruri shouted.
The barrier rapidly expanded, completely enclosing both her and Itachi.
Inside the barrier was a space separate from the real world, as if it existed in another dimension.
Here, Ruri was the master. She could manipulate anything in this space as she pleased.
Itachi felt a powerful force pull him into an unknown world.
He looked around and found himself surrounded by purple light, as if he were standing in a purple ocean.
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