Chapter 36

"You call those busted weapons... too green."

As Vermilion Bird spoke, he tore off his red-cloud cloak.

The body he revealed looked as if it had been cast from iron.

Under the sunlight, it even gleamed with a cold metallic sheen. "Steel Release?!"

"Damn it, this thing..."

Nagasawa Uchiha gritted his teeth, a trace of blood seeping from the corner of his mouth.

Vermilion Bird's words were still hanging in the air when Nagasawa Uchiha suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood, his body going limp. "Lord Nagasawa, put me down. I can hold on."

"You—"

"Kid, who do you think you're looking down on?"

A voice rang out from behind Sasuke.

Vermilion Bird, a former elite jonin of the Hidden Stone Village.

Back on the battlefield, he had shoved his teammates into a pit to use them as stepping stones, then run off on his own.

After defecting from the village, he had joined the Akatsuki. By being ruthless and utterly decisive, he had worked his way up into a core member, and the Vermilion Bird Ring in his hand was his badge of identity.

When this man made a move, he never dragged his feet.

So he gave Nagasawa Uchiha no chance to catch his breath at all.

The moment the man flew out, his fist was already following. "Fire Release—"

Bang!

Before Nagasawa Uchiha could even get his Fire Release out, he took a heavy punch to the face and blacked out on the spot.

Vermilion Bird grabbed Sasuke in passing, lifted him up, and brought him before his eyes. "A little brat like you?"

"So many of my men died because of you."

"Those were brothers I'd been through life and death with."

"Tell me, can we leave this debt unsettled?"

"Pfft—"

Sasuke had just tried to activate Susanoo when his right arm suddenly went numb.

Immediately after, searing pain exploded, shooting straight to the top of his skull. "Ah!"

The scream tore through the air. "Tsk. My brothers didn't scream that loudly when they died."

"You really are just a little brat."

"But one arm isn't nearly enough to pay the debt—"

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!"

Several shuriken suddenly shot in from the side.

Several pairs of Sharingan locked onto Vermilion Bird at the same time. "Not slow, are you?"

"Looks like my timing was a little off."

"But that's fine. The trump card is in my hand."

Vermilion Bird bent down, picked up the kunai on the ground, and lightly pressed it against Sasuke's neck.

The blade slid across, and beads of blood seeped out. "Sasuke!"

"You... had better let go."

Uchiha Itachi's voice was trembling, but his gaze was frighteningly cold.

He was completely different from the man who usually always wore a smile. "Threatening me?"

"Fine. I'll give you two choices."

"One, dig out those eyes of yours. Looking at them annoys me."

"Two, I dig out this little brat's eyes."

Vermilion Bird turned his wrist, moving the kunai before Sasuke's eyes.

The cold metal pressed against his eyelid, and Sasuke's whole body stiffened.

He had indeed transmigrated here, but this was the first time in this life that someone had held a knife against his eyeball. There was no way he could keep his composure. "I'll dig them out!"

"As long as you let Sasuke go, I'll trade!"

Itachi shouted without the slightest hesitation. "Itachi!"

Uchiha Fugaku let out a low roar.

He knew very well that someone like Vermilion Bird would never keep his word. Even if Itachi really dug out his eyes, Sasuke still might not live.

But that was his son.

The words reached his lips, yet in the end, he still could not say the three words "don't mind him." "Big brother..."

"Thank you."

Sasuke's originally panicked gaze suddenly lit up the instant he saw Itachi.

The corner of his mouth even tugged into a smile. "Sasuke, you—"

"No!"

Blood suddenly surged from Itachi's eyes.

The three tomoe spun wildly in his pupils.

The next instant—

The Mangekyo Sharingan opened.

The chakra erupting around Uchiha Itachi was as restless and frenzied as a wild beast.

Shisui and Fugaku, standing beside him, were both stunned.

The Uchiha Clan's third pair of Mangekyo had appeared just like that.

If this had been any other time, Fugaku would have been happy for quite a while. But at this critical moment before him, his youngest son Sasuke was...

That's right. After hearing what Itachi said, Sasuke had directly rammed his own neck into the kunai. "Hm?!"

"You..."

"Pfft..."

Before Vermilion Bird could figure out what was going on, his body was suddenly swallowed by a mass of black fire. "The Uchiha's ocular power?!"

"You..."

"Where is this?"

As Vermilion Bird panicked, he discovered that his entire body had been nailed to a cross.

Uchiha Itachi stood before him, holding a long blade. "This is my Tsukuyomi Space..."

Itachi calmly explained his own technique.

As he spoke, the blade stabbed into Vermilion Bird's body again and again.

Inside the genjutsu, the sensation of pain was magnified by who knew how many times.

All the hatred in Uchiha Itachi's heart turned into the force behind each downward stab.

Inside the Tsukuyomi Space, the shrill screams never stopped.

In the real world. Bang!

After Vermilion Bird endured Amaterasu's burning, he had also survived the thousand cuts of Tsukuyomi Space.

Uchiha Itachi slowly walked to the place where Vermilion Bird had just fallen. "Where's Sasuke?!"

Only then did Itachi realize that there were no traces of Sasuke's remains anywhere around.

As soon as Itachi threw out those words, everyone began searching for Sasuke.

But after searching for a long time, they did not find even the slightest trace.

After Vermilion Bird died, at least some ninja tools and a ring remained.

Sasuke had carried quite a few things on him too. There was no way all of them had been burned completely clean by Amaterasu's flames. "That just now... was only Sasuke's Shadow Clone?"

Even as Itachi said it, he felt that something was wrong.

Even if it had only been a clone, it should have disappeared the moment its arm was torn off.

The blood just now had truly sprayed out. "Expand the search area and keep looking."

"Report the situation to the Hokage immediately."

"Shisui, you go back first. Call out every Uchiha ninja who can still move, and search for Sasuke together."

"The rest of you, form teams of ten. If you run into the enemy, send a signal at once. Anyone who receives the signal is to rush over immediately as support."

"Clean out the enemy and find Sasuke!"

Uchiha Fugaku's face darkened, and he made the decision on the spot.

Once he gave this order, all the clansmen activated their Sharingan without a word, formed teams on their own, and spread out in every direction.

In the shadows, Obito Uchiha's expression did not look good.

No matter how he thought about it, he had never expected this kind of situation.

A single kid had actually driven the Uchiha this insane.

On top of that, Uchiha Itachi and Fugaku each had a pair of Mangekyo. Even Obito could not guarantee that he could escape unscathed.

After all, before the Mangekyo Sharingan, his intangibility might not be so useful anymore.

Which pair of Mangekyo wasn't an unreasonable thing?

"Notify the Akatsuki. Everyone withdraw."

"If this pack of madmen really goes crazy, it'll be a huge headache."

After Obito Uchiha said this, he sank straight into the ground and disappeared.

The remaining person stared coldly ahead for a while with his Rinnegan.

In the end, he still listened to Obito's suggestion and ordered a full retreat.

The Akatsuki members hidden in the dense forest immediately set out and withdrew completely.

Some unlucky ones happened to run into Uchiha members during their retreat.

They failed to escape and were directly swallowed by the Uchiha's fury, losing their lives there.

As for the Root Organization members they ran into, they were not killed—they were knocked unconscious, sealed up tight, and prepared to be taken back to Konoha.

This wave swept through like a storm, so there was no way it could be hidden from Hiruzen Sarutobi inside Konoha.

In the Hokage's office, Hiruzen Sarutobi sat there, his expression somewhat complicated.

Right now, the Uchiha looked quite obedient, but he still could not set his mind at ease.

He felt that they had to wait until Shisui, Itachi, Sasuke, and the others of this generation grew up and completely took over the Uchiha Clan. Only then would things truly be stable.

The current Uchiha were still a thorn.

As for Danzo?

If this operation went well, Danzo might be finished outright.

But if Danzo really died, what would happen if the Uchiha turned hostile?

Sure enough... balance still had to be maintained, didn't it?

"Lord Hokage, we need support."

"Please give the order."

Shisui Uchiha looked at Hiruzen Sarutobi, who sat there in silence, and felt somewhat anxious.

Whether it was for the clansmen still outside or to find Sasuke, he had to lead people out in the shortest possible time. "I understand."

"This is a passage order. Take as many people as you want."

"I will send Anbu to act with you."

"As for the issue of Danzo Shimura that you reported, I will investigate it immediately."

Hiruzen Sarutobi nodded and made the decision.

Shisui, a strong Uchiha who had awakened the Mangekyo.

The ocular technique of those eyes, along with his loyalty to the Will of Fire.

Hiruzen Sarutobi could not let Shisui's heart grow cold. "Thank you, Lord Hokage."

Shisui took the passage order, gave a single word of thanks, and vanished directly from the room.

Very soon, in the Uchiha Clan, all ninjas whose eyes had awakened to two tomoe or above were led out of Konoha. "What are the Uchiha going to do?"

"All the experts in their clan have come out. Looks like they're going to protect the village."

"Why is there suddenly a combat deployment like this? Are we going to war again?"

"The Uchiha... protecting the village?"

"I used to think they were kind of scary, but when I'm standing behind them, I actually feel pretty at ease."

People in the village began discussing the Uchiha.

It was different from the old tone of disgust, fear, and disdain.

This time, the tide of opinion slowly gained some positive words.

It had to be said that after Shisui Uchiha became the deputy head of the Police Force, the Uchiha's reputation had indeed improved somewhat.

Meanwhile, in the Uchiha clan grounds, inside Sasuke's room. "Ugh... I still can't move?"

"Damn system, couldn't you explain it clearly? You call this a tiny little side effect?"

Sasuke gritted his teeth and used all his strength just to squeeze out that sentence to curse the system.

After completing the previous mission of surviving under Obito Uchiha's killing intent, the system had given Sasuke a special item—the Substitute Scarecrow.

[Substitute Scarecrow: System reward. Its only function is to help the user block one instance of fatal damage.]

[After use, the user will be sent to a preset coordinate point.]

[PS: Friendly reminder, after the Substitute Scarecrow is used, there will be a tiny little side effect.]

And now, Sasuke, who could not even lift a single finger, was experiencing that tiny little side effect the system had mentioned. "Someone hurry up and find me..."

"If no one finds me soon, this body's really going to be done for..."

Sasuke's head hurt terribly.

He had thought he would be killed by that Vermilion Bird, but he had never expected that in the end, he would actually have to lie in this damn place and wait to starve to death.

From head to toe, inside and out, he could not squeeze out even the slightest bit of strength.

If he did not get something into his stomach soon, he really was going to die here.

But at this moment, basically everyone in the Uchiha clan had run out to look for him.

Those two guys, Itachi and Shisui, would never come this way.

The only one he could still count on was his mother, Mikoto.

But Sasuke did not know that the moment his mother heard he had vanished, she had put on armor, picked up her weapons, and left Konoha village with Shisui. "Forget it!"

Sasuke gritted his teeth and completely gave up on the idea of waiting for someone to save him.

He simply closed his eyes and forced himself to start scraping chakra out of his body.

As long as he could squeeze out even the tiniest bit, he could activate the magatama on his chest.

Then he just had to release the Imperial Arm Susanoo.

With that guy around, there was no way he would starve to death.

Damn it, he really could not show off blindly anymore.

This time, he had almost shown off his own life away.

Forcing himself to refine chakra, every cell in Sasuke's body screamed.

His body had already collapsed to its limit.

Refining chakra now was practically suicide.

The problem was, not refining it also meant death.

At most, he would just lie there and wait to die.

Sasuke: I'd rather stand and gamble everything.

[Warning, detected that the host's body is about to be ruined. Stop this self-destructive behavior immediately!!!]

[Warning, detected that the host's body is about to...]

[Warning...]

The system kept ringing nonstop too. "Fuck, are you annoying or what?!"

"Turn off the prompts!"

"Even if I'm going to die, I'm dying by my own hands!"

After experiencing that last brush with death, Sasuke's heart had only grown fiercer.

Without another word, he shut off the system prompts and continued madly refining chakra.

Whether he could live or not, he had to take this gamble.

The blood flowing in his bones would not allow him to accept fate.

His cells, which had already been close to drying up, were squeezed like this and directly began dying off in large patches.

His consciousness also grew more and more blurry.

Was he really going to die miserably in this godforsaken place?

Get the hell ** out here!

Sasuke suddenly erupted with astonishing willpower.