Xuan Shi barely moved his lips.
Only a faint breath carried his words.
"If we return to that point in time... Shisui will still be alive."
His words were like an invisible bolt of lightning, instantly shattering the eternally frozen mask on Itachi's face.
Itachi jerked his head up.
The indifference and deadness in his scarlet Sharingan crumbled in an instant, and his pupils trembled violently.
Shisui.
The man who had been both mentor and friend.
The figure on the cliff who had entrusted him with his eye, then resolutely leaped into the Naka River.
That was the wound in Itachi's heart that would never heal, and the greatest punishment he suffered for his own helplessness.
Could he... see him again?
Could he stop that tragedy?
Even if there was only a one-in-ten-thousand chance.
Itachi took a deep breath.
The hand he'd held suspended in midair no longer hesitated. He thrust it forward and grabbed Xuan Shi's hand.
Their hands clasped tightly together.
Cold.
Steady.
"If you dare deceive me..."
Itachi's voice was low and hoarse, trembling with an emotion he'd suppressed to the limit.
Xuan Shi didn't answer. He only tightened his grip.
The next second,
Itachi closed his eyes.
His Mangekyō Sharingan, already awakened, spun wildly beneath his eyelids.
An enormous, heart-stopping surge of chakra poured through their clasped hands like a burst dam.
Unlike the blue chakra of ordinary clan members,
Itachi's chakra was a deep red.
Cold, razor-sharp, and heavy with the stench of blood and despair.
The instant this power entered the formation's core,
Vmmm—!
The patterns etched into the ground blazed to life.
The unstable light seemed to have been fed high-grade fuel. It steadied at once, shining several times brighter.
The complex circular formation had all its gaps filled.
The strongest corner had fallen into place.
In Xuan Shi's mind, the system alerts rang out like crazy.
[High-intensity S-rank chakra source detected!] [Mangekyō Sharingan resonance confirmed!] [Charging efficiency increased by 300%!] [Current charge progress: 85%...88%...]
It worked.
Xuan Shi released his hand and stepped back, taking his place at the very center of the formation.
The underground chamber was now filled with dazzling chakra light. Several thousand Uchiha sat cross-legged, each with a stream of light extending from their body and converging at Xuan Shi's feet.
Like countless rivers flowing into the sea.
The air was as thick as glue, and every breath took all their strength.
Xuan Shi looked around.
He saw the sweat on Fugaku's face, Mikoto's hands holding Sasuke tightly, and Yashiro gritting his teeth as he persevered.
He had to make everything clear.
This was a gamble, with everyone's lives at stake.
"Listen up!"
Xuan Shi channeled chakra into his throat, his voice rising above the formation's hum.
"This is not a space-time transfer jutsu!"
"This is not the Flying Thunder God!"
"What we're doing is turning back time!"
A stir swept through the crowd, but it quickly died down.
Xuan Shi raised one finger, his gaze sharp as a blade.
"Once this jutsu begins, there's no going back."
"The bodies you're sitting in now will die completely, unable to withstand the tearing force of space and time."
"Even your souls could become lost during the journey and be utterly destroyed."
"This is a one-way ticket."
"We'll abandon these bodies and everything we have in this world, taking our memories back to the bodies we had several years ago."
Xuan Shi paused, his gaze sweeping over the mothers holding their children.
"In other words,"
"when the sun rises, several thousand corpses will be left in this chamber."
"In the eyes of everyone in this world, the Uchiha Clan... will have been wiped out."
Silence.
Only the sound of dust sifting down from overhead broke it.
The price was too great.
It meant they had to "die" once first.
"Are you afraid?"
Xuan Shi shouted.
Nobody spoke.
In a corner, a young woman holding a baby raised her head.
Her face was pale, her lips cracked, but her eyes shone startlingly bright.
"As long as my child survives..."
The woman bowed her head and rubbed her cheek against the sleeping baby in her arms. "This body was meant to take the blade for them anyway. What does it matter if it rots here?"
"She's right!"
An old man beside her tossed away his cane and formed hand seals. "I've lived long enough! If we can go to a future without killing, they can toss these old bones wherever they like!"
"Then let us die!"
Yashiro roared, his chakra surging once more. "As long as that old dog Danzo doesn't get what he wants!"
No one backed down.
No one was afraid.
When despair reached its limit, death became a kind of release.
If they were doomed to be lambs led to slaughter in this world, they might as well leave their bodies for the enemy and let their souls become vengeful spirits, crawling back into the past.
Xuan Shi looked at the resolute faces around him.
His heart pounded violently in his chest.
This was the Uchiha.
This was what it meant to be Uchiha.
"Good."
Xuan Shi nodded and turned to face the formation's core.
The numbers on the system panel kept changing.
[92%...93%...]
Almost there.
Just a little longer.
Just then,
Rumble—!!!
A muffled boom sounded from overhead.
The entire underground chamber shook violently. Countless stones and clouds of dust fell from the ceiling, striking the crowd and drawing cries of alarm.
"What's happening?"
"An earthquake?"
Fugaku sprang to his feet and looked up at the ceiling.
As clan head, he knew the Naka Shrine's barrier better than anyone.
"Someone's attacking the barrier!"
Fugaku's expression changed dramatically. "And they're... destroying it by force!"
Pfft!
The Third Elder, who had been maintaining the outer barrier, suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood and crumpled to the ground.
"Clan head..."
The Third Elder weakly pointed upward. "That's... Wind Release... and a summoned beast..."
"They're here."
Xuan Shi narrowed his eyes.
They were faster than expected.
With the chakra of several thousand people gathered here, they were like a bonfire blazing in the night. There was no way to hide it. Shinobi on the level of Danzo and Obito could smell it from several kilometers away.
Boom!
Another explosion rang out.
This one was louder and closer than the last.
A crack split the rock overhead, and dirt mixed with tree roots tumbled down.
A nauseating, rank wind seeped through the gap.
It was the scent of a giant summoned beast.
"Hold them off!"
Yashiro tried to stand, only to realize he'd poured all his chakra into the formation. He could barely stay on his feet.
"Don't move!"
Xuan Shi barked, stopping him. "No one moves! If the chakra supply is cut off, the formation will collapse! Everyone will die!"
"But..."
"No buts!"
Xuan Shi stared fixedly at the system panel.
[96%...97%...]
Just a few more seconds.
Just a few seconds.
"Take the gamble!"
Xuan Shi shouted, "Pour all the chakra maintaining the barrier into the formation too! Forget what's overhead! Let them smash through!"
They were risking their lives.
Abandon their defenses and push for the finish.
If they were interrupted before it was done, everyone would be wiped out.
Fugaku gritted his teeth.
"Do as the commander says!"
He roared and was the first to release his defensive jutsu, squeezing out every last bit of chakra and pouring it underground.
Itachi didn't move either.
He remained in the same hand-seal stance, brows knitted, sweat sliding down his cheeks.
He was taking the gamble.
Betting on Xuan Shi's promise.
Rumble...
At last, the rock overhead gave way.
A huge claw tipped with sharp talons smashed through the ceiling.
Moonlight poured down like a waterfall.
Then came a howling gale.
It was Shimura Danzō's summoned beast, Baku.
A tremendous suction force instantly formed a vortex in the chamber. Several clan members who had run out of chakra were even lifted into the air and slammed hard against the wall.
The barrier had fallen.
The underground chamber beneath Naka Shrine, the Uchiha's last refuge, lay completely exposed to the enemy.
Every clan member looked up in terror at the enormous hole.
Several figures stood along its jagged edge.
At the very front stood a masked man wearing a black robe adorned with red clouds.
Obito.
He stood there, looking down at the thousands of Uchiha clan members seated cross-legged, a flicker of astonishment in his lone eye.
He had expected the Uchiha to fight back.
He had expected an ambush.
But he hadn't expected to see this.
Thousands of people sat gathered together, without weapons or defenses, simply releasing chakra like mad.
The scene didn't look like they were preparing for battle.
It looked more like some ancient, deranged sacrificial ritual.
"Uchiha..."
Obito's voice sounded strangely distorted in the wind. "What the hell are you doing?"
From the shadows behind him, Danzo emerged, leaning on his cane.
Greed and murderous intent filled his one visible eye.
"Whatever they're doing,"
Danzo ordered coldly, "kill them all. Leave no one alive."
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Dozens of Root shinobi leaped down through the hole, their Ninja Blades gleaming coldly in the moonlight.
Obito raised his hand as well.
Space began to twist.
Destruction was right before them.
Even a single second was all it would take for the slaughter to begin.
Xuan Shi raised his head.
He looked at the masked man standing in the moonlight.
He looked at the killers descending from above.
He looked at the Baku that was about to devour everything.
He didn't dodge.
He wasn't afraid, either.
Instead, an incredibly radiant smile spread across his face.
It was the manic laughter of someone watching his prey fall into a trap.
It was the relief of someone finally set free.
"It's too late, Obito,"
Xuan Shi said softly in his mind.
"Goodbye."
"And... thanks for the assist."
On his retina,
the red progress bar finally reached its end.
[Charge complete.] [Current family prosperity: 5.] [Cost: All.] [Execute?]
Xuan Shi's consciousness slammed into the word "Yes."
Without the slightest hesitation,
all the prosperity instantly dropped to zero.
[Causal Judgment System...Clan-Wide Regression...Initiate!]
Humm—
Time seemed to stop at that moment.
The Root shinobi leaping through the air froze in place.
The twisted patterns of space around Obito solidified.
Even the moonlight pouring down came to a standstill.
Then,
a light.
A white light ten thousand times brighter than the sun burst forth from beneath Xuan Shi's feet, from within every Uchiha clan member, and from deep beneath the Naka Shrine.
There was no sound.
The light had swallowed it.
The white glow instantly filled the entire chamber, burst through the ceiling, broke through Obito and Danzo's blockade, and flooded Konoha's night sky.
In that instant,
everyone in Konoha woke.
They saw a white sun rise over the Uchiha Clan Compound.
The light swallowed everything.
It veiled all the darkness, all the conspiracies, all the bloodshed beneath a field of pure white.
The world.
Restarted.
Before you continue