They Say I'm a Sample

BOOM!

Another explosion rang out.

This one was even closer than the last.

The flames swallowed both of their figures whole.

The shockwave shattered the crumbling walls.

Uchiha Shingetsu was sent flying like a ragdoll, crashing heavily into the courtyard.

His ears were ringing, and his vision was stained a bloody red.

His body ached to the point of near-numbness.

But he didn't black out.

Because he knew.

His opponent wasn't dead yet.

Ninjas didn't die that easily.

Especially not a Root ninja who had already been on guard.

Sure enough.

A figure stumbled out from within the smoke and dust.

The Root ninja's mask was shattered in half.

It revealed half a face mangled into a bloody mess.

His right arm hung limp at his side, clearly broken.

But his left hand still gripped a short blade.

He was still alive.

And he was still capable of killing.

The Root ninja stared daggers at Shingetsu, his voice finally betraying emotion.

It was anger.

And it was fear.

"Uchiha Shingetsu..."

"A monster like you must not be allowed to live."

Shingetsu lay on the ground, gasping for air.

His body was nearing its limit.

His chakra was completely exhausted.

His explosive tags were spent.

He had only one kunai left, and it had fallen several meters away.

Even though his opponent was severely wounded, as long as he could still move, he could kill him.

What now?

What now?

Shingetsu's mind raced.

Causal Perception activated once more.

This time, he didn't see just one black line.

He saw three.

The first connected to the center of his brow.

The second connected to his throat.

The third connected to his heart.

They were all lethal strikes.

The opponent wouldn't test him again.

The next move would be the killing blow.

The Root ninja slowly raised his short blade.

Just as he prepared to charge.

A commotion suddenly erupted in the distance.

"Fire!"

"Something happened at the edge of the clan grounds!"

"Hurry!"

The Uchiha clansmen had arrived.

The explosions and flashes of fire had finally alerted the patrol.

The Root ninja paused in his movements.

He could not afford to be exposed.

Root was secretly abducting people within the Uchiha compound; if discovered, it would trigger a massive disaster.

Especially now, when the Uchiha were already deeply dissatisfied with Konoha's upper echelons.

If they were caught with concrete evidence, the situation would spiral completely out of control.

He cast a glance at Shin-getsu, his eyes filled with intense killing intent.

"You're lucky to be alive tonight."

"But you won't escape."

"Root will remember you."

With that, he turned to retreat.

Lying on the ground, Shin-getsu suddenly laughed.

The laughter was low.

Yet, it made the Root ninja stop in his tracks.

"Who said..."

"You could leave?"

The Root ninja whipped his head around.

He saw Shin-getsu struggling to lift his head, a scarlet, single-tomoe Sharingan locked firmly onto him.

At that moment, the Root ninja's heart skipped a beat.

Genjutsu?

No, that wasn't it.

How could a single-tomoe Sharingan cast an effective genjutsu on him?

But the next instant, he felt his ankle tighten.

He looked down.

A thin steel wire was wrapped around his leg, though he had no idea when it had been placed there.

The other end of the wire was connected to the main support beam in the ruins, which had been burned until it was teetering on the brink of collapse.

The explosion earlier hadn't been intended solely to wound him.

When Shin-getsu was sent flying by the shockwave, he had flung out that final steel wire.

His goal wasn't to kill him.

It was to trap him.

Exerting his last ounce of strength, Shin-getsu yanked the wire hard.

Snap!

The burning main beam gave way completely.

The half-collapsed roof came crashing down with a roar.

The Root ninja's expression changed drastically, and he tried to use Body Flicker to escape.

But with his right arm crippled and his ankle bound, he was a beat too slow.

Boom!

The massive wooden beam slammed heavily into him.

The Root ninja let out a muffled groan as he was pinned to the ground.

He wasn't dead yet.

His chakra erupted, and he actually managed to hold up the beam pressing down on him.

Shin-getsu's eyes turned ruthless.

He grabbed the last kunai on the ground and forced himself to stand, using every bit of strength he had left.

One step.

Two steps.

Three steps.

With every step, he felt as if his body were falling apart.

The Root ninja struggled to lift his head, his eyes finally changing.

"What do you think you're doing?"

Shin-getsu did not answer.

He walked up to the Root ninja and gripped the kunai with both hands.

The Root ninja roared.

"How dare you!"

Squelch!

The kunai pierced his neck.

Fresh blood sprayed out.

The Root ninja's body convulsed violently, his eyes filled with disbelief.

He never imagined that he would die at the hands of a nine-year-old Uchiha brat.

Even less did he expect that this brat, despite being so severely wounded, would still dare to deliver the finishing blow.

Shin-getsu looked down at him, his voice hoarse.

"Remember this in your next life."

"Don't treat the Uchiha as mere materials."

The Root ninja's pupils gradually dilated.

He breathed his last.

At the same time, a system notification chimed.

[Killed one Root Special Jonin.]

[Obtained Green Trait: Short Sword Mastery.]

[Obtained Green Trait: Chakra Control.]

[Detected that the host has continuously altered a fatal causal chain.]

[Obtained Blue Trait: Combat Intuition.]

[Host's current life status is critical. Merge traits: Basic Taijutsu Enhancement, Mental Resistance, Chakra Control?]

Shin-getsu did not hesitate.

"Merge."

The next instant, a cold force surged into his body.

The pain did not vanish.

The wounds did not heal immediately either.

But Shin-getsu clearly felt his spirit, which had been on the verge of collapse, stabilize.

His chaotic chakra also began to flow once more.

Deep within his body, in particular, it felt as if a faint, warm current was repairing the most fundamental damage.

Although it was slow.

At least it kept him from passing out on the spot.

The sound of footsteps in the distance grew closer.

The Uchiha patrol team was arriving soon.

Shin-getsu looked down at the two Root corpses.

He was very clear on the situation.

If his clansmen saw this scene directly, things would become very troublesome.

A nine-year-old Uchiha orphan killing two Root ninjas in self-defense.

It was too outrageous.

The clan would be shocked.

The higher-ups of Konoha would be wary.

Danzo, even more so, would stop at nothing to kill him.

Therefore, he had to change the narrative.

Shin-getsu took a deep breath and forced himself to walk over to the first Root corpse, rummaging through the body to retrieve some ninja tools and an unmarked token.

The people of Root were very cautious.

They carried nothing on them that could directly prove their identities.

But it didn't matter.

He didn't need proof.

He needed suspicion.

As long as the Uchiha suspected the higher-ups of Konoha, the rift would continue to widen.

And he could use this very crack to grow.

Shin-getsu dragged his heavily wounded body to the edge of the fire.

Then, he raised his hand and slashed his own chest once more, viciously.

Blood gushed out.

The excruciating pain made his vision go black.

Yet, his eyes remained terrifyingly calm.

To deceive others, one must first deceive the scene itself.

The next moment.

The Uchiha patrol finally arrived.

Leading them was a young Uchiha man in his twenties, his three-tomoe Sharingan already activated.

He looked at the burning wooden house, then at the blood-soaked Shin-getsu, and his expression changed drastically.

"Shin-getsu!"

"What happened?!"

Shin-getsu's body swayed, as if he could no longer hold himself up.

He pointed toward the corpses in the ruins, his voice weak and filled with terror.

"Someone... wanted to capture me..."

"They said..."

"I am a specimen..."

Before he could finish his sentence, Shin-getsu closed his eyes and collapsed.

In the final second before losing consciousness.

He heard the system's notification chime.

[Host has successfully alerted the Uchiha clan grounds.]

[The original death side-quest has been completely diverted.]

[Obtained special reward: Sharingan proficiency increased.]

[Current Sharingan evolution progress: One-tomoe, thirty percent.]