The flames were still burning.
Broken beams crackled, the half-collapsed roof teetered overhead, and scorching smoke churned through the night.
Uchiha Shingetsu stood in the middle of the ruins.
Blood still ran from his left shoulder.
The blast from the Explosive Tag had left his chest numb, and every breath felt like a knife scraping his lungs.
Yet his eyes gleamed with a frightening intensity.
His One-Tomoe Sharingan slowly turned.
Deep in his crimson pupils, the Root ninja before him was reflected.
The man wore a grayish-white mask, hiding his expression.
But Shingetsu could feel it.
The Root ninja was furious.
Not because his companion had died.
In a place like Root, there was no such thing as ordinary camaraderie.
He was angry because a nine-year-old Uchiha orphan had dared to resist Root.
Dared to kill one of their own.
More importantly—
This Uchiha brat, who had originally been deemed "of little value for retrieval," had awakened his Sharingan in a life-or-death struggle.
What did that mean?
It meant he was no longer ordinary material.
He was a pair of eyes still growing.
The Root ninja's voice was cold.
"Uchiha Shingetsu."
"Seems the intel was wrong."
"You're not worthless."
Shingetsu bared his teeth. His face was pale, but his smile was icy.
"So what?"
"Are you going to dig out my eyes and offer them to Danzo?"
The Root ninja's pupils contracted slightly.
The mask hid his face, but Shingetsu still caught the subtle shift in his presence.
He'd guessed right.
Danzo had already started collecting Sharingan.
He might even have begun experimenting on people long ago.
The thought only sharpened Shingetsu's killing intent.
He knew that in the original Naruto story, Danzo had a whole row of Sharingan in his arm.
But watching it in an anime and living in this world were two completely different things.
Those eyes hadn't come from nowhere.
Behind every Sharingan was the corpse of an Uchiha.
Perhaps it had been stolen after they fell in battle.
Perhaps Root had secretly assassinated them.
Or perhaps, like Shingetsu tonight, they'd been taken away as "specimens," never to return.
This world was colder than he remembered.
Darker.
The Root ninja slowly drew the short sword from his back.
Its slender blade glinted faintly.
"You know too much."
"So you can't be allowed to live."
Before the last word had even faded—
The Root ninja vanished.
So fast!
Shingetsu's pupils shrank.
His Sharingan tracked the man's movements, but his body couldn't keep up.
That was the difference between them.
He had only just awakened a One-Tomoe Sharingan.
He'd killed the first Root Chunin through a surprise attack, his surroundings, an Explosive Tag, and his opponent's carelessness.
But this man was different.
He knew Shingetsu was dangerous now.
He wouldn't give him the same opportunity again.
In the next instant, a flash of steel was right in front of Shingetsu.
The short sword thrust straight for his throat.
Shingetsu twisted aside almost by instinct.
Shhk!
The blade grazed his neck.
A line of blood sprayed into the air.
So close.
Just a little closer, and his throat would have been cut open.
Shingetsu didn't retreat.
Instead, as he twisted, he kicked a burning chunk of wood on the ground.
Sparks and smoke burst toward the Root ninja's face.
The Root ninja snorted.
"Pathetic little trick."
He swept his left hand out, releasing a burst of chakra that scattered the smoke.
But as it cleared, he saw three Shuriken flying toward him from different angles.
High, middle, low.
They blocked every route forward.
The Root ninja slashed rapidly with his short sword.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
All three Shuriken were knocked away.
But the instant he deflected them, something tightened around his foot.
Wire!
The sparks Shingetsu had kicked up were just a distraction.
His real goal had been to use the Shuriken to pull the wire around the man's ankle.
The Root ninja's gaze turned cold.
"Still using the same trick?"
Chakra surged beneath his foot, snapping the wire instantly.
But in that brief pause, Shingetsu had already lunged at him.
His Kunai stabbed toward the man's heart.
The Root ninja didn't dodge.
He simply raised a hand and seized Shingetsu's wrist with perfect precision.
Crack!
The sound of breaking bone rang out.
Pain shot through Shingetsu's wrist.
His face paled, and the Kunai nearly slipped from his hand.
The Root ninja's voice was icy.
"You've got decent combat instincts."
"Too bad your body's too weak."
"Your Sharingan has only just awakened."
"Fighting back like this is pointless."
He raised a knee and slammed it into Shingetsu's abdomen.
Thud!
Shingetsu was sent flying, crashing into half a broken wall.
Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
His insides felt as if they'd been knocked out of place.
The Root ninja didn't stop.
He walked toward Shingetsu, one step at a time.
His pace was steady.
Unhurried.
Like a hunter closing in on prey already caught in a trap.
Shingetsu struggled to his feet, his vision going dark.
Too strong.
At least for him, the Root ninja was absurdly powerful.
Even if the man was only a Special Jōnin—or even an elite Chunin—Shingetsu's nine-year-old body couldn't stand against him head-on.
Just then, the system prompt sounded in his mind again.
[Special Trait: Causality Perception, activated.]
[Effect: The host can perceive dangerous causal threads for a short time during combat.]
[Warning: The current enemy is about to launch a lethal attack.]
The moment the voice faded—
The world before Shingetsu changed.
The flames, ruins, smoke, and Root ninja—
Everything seemed to slow down.
A faint black line appeared on the Root ninja. It stretched from the man's right hand, the one gripping his sword, straight to Shingetsu's heart.
A dangerous causal thread.
The next strike would pierce his heart!
Shingetsu's heart tightened.
The Root ninja moved in the next instant, just as expected.
He was even faster than before.
The short sword cut through the air.
It thrust straight toward Shingetsu's chest.
Without Causality Perception, Shingetsu would never have dodged it.
But now, he already knew where the attack would land before the man even struck.
Shingetsu threw himself to the left.
The short sword stabbed past him, grazing his clothes.
The Root ninja's movements faltered.
"Were you predicting my move?"
Shingetsu hit the ground and didn't hesitate. He snatched up a handful of ash and flung it straight at the man's mask.
The Root ninja turned his head to avoid it.
But Shingetsu had never meant to hit him.
He only wanted to make him turn his head.
The instant the Root ninja did, the last Kunai slid from Shingetsu's sleeve.
He caught it in reverse grip and thrust upward with all his strength.
His target wasn't the throat.
Nor the heart.
It was the small strip of jaw exposed beneath the mask.
The Root ninja's gaze darkened as he reached out and seized Shingetsu's wrist.
The same spot.
The same hold.
But this time, Shingetsu smiled.
A sudden unease stirred in the Root ninja's heart.
The next moment.
Shin-getsu suddenly let go of the kunai in the hand he had been grabbed by.
The kunai fell.
The Root ninja instinctively looked down.
Wrapped around the kunai's handle was an Explosive Tag that had burned down to its last moment.
Another Explosive Tag!
The Root ninja's pupils contracted.
He finally understood.
This kid had never intended to kill him with the kunai.
Every close-quarters move, every struggle, every seemingly desperate attack had been meant to get the Explosive Tag right in front of him.
Madman!
This Uchiha brat wasn't afraid to die at all!
Before you continue