Sharingan Crushes Fugaku

Iron Fire moved.

He started fast. The force of his foot kicking off the ground cracked the floor into a spiderweb pattern. He lowered his body, drew his right fist back at his waist—the opening stance of the Uchiha Clan's "Interception Taijutsu." First, use speed to suppress the opponent's reaction window, then use the Sharingan to lock down the direction of their muscle movements and defeat them in a single blow.

The fifteen-meter distance took only two breaths beneath his feet.

His right fist shot out. Its target was Mikoto's left shoulder joint. Not a vital spot. A joint.

Cripple her, not kill her.

That was what Fugaku had meant.

Mikoto did not move.

Not because she had no time. Because she had no intention of moving.

When Iron Fire's fist came within forty centimeters of her, her three tomoe turned once.

In Iron Fire's vision, Mikoto's pupils lit up.

They were not ordinary three-tomoe Sharingan—the three tomoe spun faster than those of any clansman he had ever seen. And the brightness was wrong. A normal Sharingan had black tomoe floating against a dark red background. Mikoto's Sharingan was darker still, yet the edges of its tomoe carried an almost imperceptible green sheen.

What was that?

He had no time to think.

Iron Fire's right fist stopped ten centimeters from Mikoto's shoulder.

Not because he wanted it to stop. His body had stopped obeying him.

Genjutsu.

Of course Iron Fire knew the visual genjutsu of a two-tomoe Sharingan. He had guarded against it too. Before throwing his punch, he had deliberately disrupted the flow of his chakra, using the Uchiha Clan's standard "Dojustu Immunity Cycle."

This cycle had never failed during sparring within the Uchiha Clan.

Today, it failed.

The genjutsu that swept forth from Mikoto's three tomoe was not an "implantation type." It was an "overwrite type"—she directly crushed his immunity cycle with denser ocular power, then wrote the command "stop" into his motor nerves.

Iron Fire's brain frantically issued the command to move. His limbs did not budge.

The entire arena fell silent for half a second.

Then Mikoto struck.

The short blade in her right hand left its sheath.

First strike: the flat of the blade slammed sideways into the outside of Iron Fire's right elbow.

The sound of bone cracking.

Clean and sharp. Like snapping a dry branch.

Iron Fire's mouth opened, but before the scream could emerge, the second strike arrived.

His left knee. The blade's flat cut in from the side, precisely wedging into the gap between his kneecap and femur.

Another crisp crack.

This time, Iron Fire screamed.

It was not a shout—it was a muffled roar squeezed out from deep in his throat. His two-tomoe Sharingan trembled violently, and under the stimulation of the searing pain, a crack opened in the genjutsu's restraints.

Iron Fire's left hand swung out instinctively, carrying lingering chakra as it tried to seize Mikoto's wrist.

Mikoto stepped back half a step. Only half a step.

The short blade in her left hand flashed from behind her waist, its flat sweeping upward and striking the ulna in Iron Fire's left wrist.

The third sound of bone cracking.

Iron Fire's left hand went limp. All five fingers lost their grip, chakra spilling wildly through the broken bones.

Mikoto gave him no time to catch his breath.

She stepped forward with her right foot, driving her left knee into Iron Fire's abdomen. The blow was not heavy—it did not need to be. Iron Fire's body had already lost its balance and support.

His knee dropped to the ground.

Left elbow, left knee, left wrist. Three joints. Three strikes.

The whole exchange took less than four seconds.

Before the audience in the arena had even processed the lingering echo of the first bone crack, the match was over.

Iron Fire knelt on the ground, his right arm twisted out of shape, left hand hanging limp, and left knee bent outward at a grotesque angle. His mouth hung open as he breathed in ragged gasps, his two-tomoe Sharingan unfocused.

Mikoto stood before him. Two short blades hung at her sides, their flats spotless—there was no blood because she had not used the edges even once.

The flats of the blades, from start to finish.

This was not a fight. It was a lesson.

In the stands, the intelligence scroll in the Hidden Sand jonin's hand fell to the ground. The bald, burly man from the Hidden Cloud Village stood with his mouth half open, and after ten seconds, he finally forced out a sentence. "She didn't form any hand signs."

That was right.

No Fire Release. No ninjutsu. None of the Uchiha Clan's signature big moves.

A pure demonstration of crushing an elite member of her own clan with nothing but the Sharingan and taijutsu.

In the waiting area, none of the other five Uchiha spoke. The youngest one instinctively shrank back half a step before someone beside him grabbed his sleeve.

High in the stands.

Fugaku's index finger stopped.

His face remained expressionless. More accurately, the look on his face was collapsing from certainty of victory into something indescribable. Iron Fire had been his choice—one of the top three in the clan in taijutsu, specially trained for close-range suppression. His order to Iron Fire had been, "Cripple her within thirty seconds."

Iron Fire had indeed been crippled within thirty seconds. The direction was simply reversed.

In the arena.

Mikoto sheathed her blades. Left hand first, then right. Two soft clicks.

She raised her head, looking past Iron Fire's kneeling body, her gaze shooting straight toward Fugaku in the stands.

"Trash."

Two words. Her voice was not loud, but the arena's amplification carried every syllable into everyone's ears.

She was not talking about Iron Fire.

Iron Fire was only a blade. She was talking about the one who wielded it.

Fugaku's Adam's apple bobbed. The temperature in the entire Uchiha section seemed to drop several degrees—not from cold, but embarrassment.

In front of delegations from three ninja villages. In front of all Konoha.

A Senju Clan woman had crippled an Uchiha, then called them trash.

In the waiting area.

Nawaki rose to his feet.

Applause began with his hands. Once, twice, three times. The rhythm was neither fast nor slow, each clap loud and clear.

Kushina Uzumaki jumped up after him, cupping her hands around her mouth like a megaphone. "Mikoto! So cool! Fight another one—!"

The referee at the edge of the arena looked at Iron Fire kneeling on the ground, then at Mikoto, who had already sheathed her blades and turned away. He raised a hand. "The winner—Uchiha... no, the Senju Clan's Mikoto!"

Mikoto returned to the waiting area. Nawaki handed her a towel. She took it and slowly wiped her hands.

"Were you nervous?"

"A little at the start." She folded the towel and placed it on her lap. "After the first strike, I wasn't anymore."

"Do your repaired eyes work well?"

"Far better than before." Mikoto paused. "Iron Fire's punch trajectories, muscle contractions, chakra flow—I could see everything. Things I once needed intense concentration to catch now felt as natural as breathing."

Nawaki leaned back in his chair, crossing his right leg over his left.

An information gap, when used well, was more useful than any ninjutsu.

Fugaku still did not know that Mikoto's Sharingan had been repaired by Wood Release. His intelligence was still stuck on the old assessment: "Mikoto's ocular power is severely depleted; prolonged battles are unfavorable." That was why he had sent a strength-type fighter like Iron Fire, hoping to drag things out with taijutsu and exhaust Mikoto's Sharingan.

Instead, Mikoto's Sharingan had more endurance than anyone's.

The next few matches held far less suspense. A Hidden Sand chunin was knocked off the platform by a Konoha jonin using Water Release. Two Konoha genin tangled with each other for ten minutes before both collapsed from exhaustion, resulting in a draw.

Nawaki barely watched. He was observing the reactions of every side in the stands.

Hidden Sand was reassessing the Senju Clan's threat level. Hidden Cloud Village was recording Mikoto's combat data. Hidden Mist's pen was still moving.

Good. They had seen almost enough of what they needed to know.

The lottery board spun once more.

The names stopped. In the waiting area, Nawaki felt the atmosphere beside him change.

Kushina Uzumaki glared at the board.

—Kushina Uzumaki VS Nabi At.

Hidden Cloud Village.

Nawaki turned to glance at Hidden Cloud Village's observation section. The bald, burly man's lips curled upward.

Kushina Uzumaki stood up. Nawaki tugged her back.

"Remember, don't expose the Nine-Tails' chakra. Your own strength is enough."

"Got it!"

Kushina Uzumaki vaulted over the railing and landed in the arena.

From the entrance passage opposite her came a boy half a head taller than she was. He had dark skin, a Hidden Cloud Village forehead protector slanted across his head, and both hands tucked into his pockets. His gait was relaxed and careless.

Nabi stopped where Mikoto had stood moments before. He looked Kushina Uzumaki up and down, his gaze lingering on her hair for two seconds.

"Red hair."

He pulled his hands from his pockets. The index and middle fingers of his right hand came together, faint electric arcs dancing at their tips.

"What our Hidden Cloud Village failed to snatch last time—"

Nabi smiled. There was the scorched smell of electric arcs in that smile.

"Would it be too much for me to take it home from here today?"

In the waiting area, Nawaki's smile vanished.