Dead silence is the hunter's best disguise.
The sand stopped flowing, and the wind seemed to be strangled by an invisible hand.
Xuan's figure sitting cross-legged was like an ancient stone sculpture blending into the night. Only his slightly opened right eye was the only living thing in this dead silence.
In that eye, the strange runes slowly flowed, which was his pupil technique [Void Devour·Return to Ruins].
In his field of vision, the world presented a different scene - there were traces of energy invisible to the naked eye that were slowly dissipating in the air, like ripples on the water.
That was the "sonic trace" left by the power of Word Spirit that shook the atmosphere when he simulated Gyuki's roar not long ago.
He is reviewing the game, imprinting every trace of energy dissipation trajectory in his mind to calibrate the accuracy of the next launch.
This is the ultimate form of control, and it also gives him the confidence to dare to stir up the entire Shinobi World alone.
The mind sinks into the body, and in the meridian network at the throat chakra, traces of highly compressed chakra are buzzing and resonating at a specific frequency, like a harp about to play a movement of destruction.
At the moment when the resonance reached the critical point, a cold mechanical sound sounded in his mind.
"Tip: Preparatory protocol is being activated..."
"Target 'Thunder Eye' mental band locked..."
"Matching successful. Word Spirit resonance channel has been established."
The corner of Xuan's mouth raised an imperceptible arc.
That night, the resonance stone deliberately left in the ruins of Amegakure was never the end of the plan.
It was just a bait, a stone thrown into a murky pond, with the purpose of alerting the poisonous snakes under the water that they thought were well hidden.
"Master Xuan."
Saori appeared quietly behind him and handed over a piece of paper as thin as cicada wings.
There are traces of being burnt by fire on the edge of the paper, and above it is the encryption code dedicated to Hidden Cloud Village. It is obviously a fragment of the secret report that was sent out at great cost.
"The information is confirmed." Saori's voice was very low, with a hint of solemnity. "'Thunder Eye' was secretly transferred immediately after he fell into coma. The location was the bottom floor of 'Thunder Prison Corridor'. Third Raikage personally took action and placed the highest-level 'Silent Barrier' around him."
She frowned and analyzed. "This reaction speed and alert level indicate that they have realized that there is some external force that can directly interfere with or even control the consciousness of Sharingan holders. They are scared."
"It's okay if you're afraid." Xuan's smile deepened, and there was a cold joy in his voice, "Once people are afraid, they will make mistakes and... move around."
He stretched out his left hand and forced out a drop of bright red blood with a faint golden glow from the tip of his index finger.
This drop of blood is suspended in the air, exuding amazing life energy.
Xuan gently dropped it on the special resonance stone covered with ancient patterns in his palm.
The blood was quickly absorbed, and the entire stone seemed to come alive, and the internal lines began to glow slightly.
Xuan closed his eyes, and an obscure, ancient syllable that did not belong to any language of this era slowly spit out from his throat--
"Kusaen."
This word seems to contain some kind of taboo rule from the beginning of the world.
The sound waves did not spread outward, but turned into countless invisible energy threads, accurately wrapping around the resonance stone. Then, like a stone thrown into the sea of time and space, it instantly penetrated the barrier of space and was transmitted to the distant Land of Lightning.
At the same time, deep underground, Land of Lightning, Kumogakure, is an absolute restricted area known as "Thunder Prison Corridor".
This place is covered with tens of thousands of Lightning Release charms all year round, and the air is filled with skin-numbing electric charges.
On the bottom floor, in the center of a cell made of pure chakra conductive metal, the Hidden Cloud Village ninja code-named "Thunder Eye" suddenly opened his eyes!
There was no white in his eye socket, it was pitch black, only the Three-Tomoe Sharingan in his right eye was spinning crazily.
But what was different from before was that he let out a howl that was not human-like, but more like a mixture of metal friction and the roar of a beast.
"Ho--!"
The expressions of the two Hidden Cloud Village elite Jonin who were guarding outside the barrier changed drastically, and Hand Seals immediately prepared to step forward to suppress them.
However, they were horrified to find that all the metal walls and railings in the entire passage, and even the Kunai in their hands, were trembling and buzzing at high frequencies at this moment, as if an invisible prehistoric beast was breathing heavily against their ears.
The trembling that originated from the depths of their souls made it almost impossible for them to maintain the Hand Seals gesture.
"Thunder Eye" in the cell has no reaction to anything outside.
The three Tomoes in his Sharingan gradually blurred as they rotated at high speed. Finally, with a crisp "click" sound, a tiny crack opened on the surface of his eyeball!
Blood gushed out along the cracks and streaked across his twisted cheek, looking extremely hideous and terrifying.
He stared at the void in front of him, as if he saw some terrifying existence that ordinary people could not understand.
His whole body was shaking violently, and he used all his strength to squeeze out a broken and frightened word from his throat:
"... and here it comes... that... that name that shouldn't exist..."
On the desert, Xuan accurately sensed the spiritual feedback that spanned thousands of mountains and rivers.
The smile on his lips grew stronger, with a hint of mockery.
"It's not the name, it's the so-called order that you rely on and are proud of that is being torn apart by my own hands."
He slowly opened his eyes, turned to Saori, and said in an unmistakable tone, "Start the second stage of [Illusion: Dust Reflects Thousand Elephants]. Use my chakra fluctuations as the core to simulate twelve completely different movement trajectories, completely breaking up our whereabouts, and turning all pursuers into headless flies."
"Yes!" Saori took the order and started Hand Seals immediately.
Xuan Ze took out a small crystal bottle from his arms. The bottle contained crystals extracted from the golden tears remaining in the Silver Crow claw.
[Myriad Phenomena Devouring System, start.]
[Target: Kagura Contract residual rune structure.]
[Task: Reverse analysis, not cracking.]
Xuan's right eye glowed brightly, and a massive flow of information poured into his mind.
He does not need to decipher this "Kagura Contract" derived from the ancient Kaguya Clan, because deciphering means confronting the rules.
And what he wants to do is a more advanced game than confrontation--
Counterfeit.
Use the rules, play with the rules, and eventually, become the new rules.
Time passed by minute by second, the night was getting darker, and it was the third watch when the yin energy was at its strongest.
Xuan's hands moved so fast that only afterimages were left, and the last seal was formed.
He slowly injected a piece of energy that had been reconstructed by [Myriad Phenomena Devouring System], imitating the "Kagura Contract" command fluctuations, but mixed with his unique Word Spirit frequency, into the golden tear crystal.
Buzz--
The crystal made a soft sound, and there was an imperceptible darkness in the originally pure golden light.
"Go."
Xuan flicked his finger, and the crystal turned into a stream of light, which was accurately caught in the beak of Silver Crow hovering in the air.
Silver Crow let out a crisp chirp, flapped its wings and flew high, galloping towards the southeast.
Its target is an abandoned observation tower half-covered by yellow sand three hundred miles away - it is a signal relay station left over from the former "Akatsuki" organization. It is secretive and efficient.
When Silver Crow embedded the tampered crystal into the broken formation eye groove on the top of the tower, a sudden change occurred.
In an instant, the entire tower, which had been silent for more than ten years, from the bottom to the top, all the rune veins were activated at the same time, glowing with a strange red light.
A pseudo "watch order" that mixed Kagura Contract majesty and mysterious Word Spirit formed an invisible pulse with the tower as the center, and was broadcast instantly, covering a radius of hundreds of miles.
The content of the instruction is simple but fatal:
"The target is out of control and the rebellion is confirmed. Clear the agreement and implement it immediately."
At this moment, whether it is in the bustling town of Fire Country, or in the remote island of Land of Water, or in the rock fortress of Land of Earth... there are countless "contracts Executors" hidden in the darkness of various countries. Something on the waist or arm as a token of the contract begins to heat and vibrate at the same time, and the killing order from the highest authority is received in the mind.
They rose in silence,
A grand siege directed by Xuan himself, targeting "one of our own people", began.
Xuan slowly stood up and stood on the top of the high sand dune.
The strong wind rolled up his clothes and made a hunting sound.
In his right eye [Void Devour: Return to Ruins], the distant end of the sky was clearly reflected, and several chakra beams representing powerful ninjas suddenly lit up, and then quickly disappeared, like a ferocious beast preying in the dark night, showing its fangs.
"They thought they were hunting me."
He faced the wind and whispered to himself, not loudly, but with a kind of indifference that controlled everything.
"But in fact, it was me who used the rules they believed in most to ignite wildfires of suspicion and killing among them."
The moment he finished speaking, an old and peaceful voice seemed to have passed through the whistling wind and sand and sounded directly in his heart.
"Nine Crow Calls has not yet fallen, but the midnight bell has been sounded by you in advance."
It's blind monk Jueyue.
"Did you hear it? Xuan." The voice carried a hint of inexplicable emotion, "That is the sound of the chains of order being broken one by one."
Xuan's eyes flashed suddenly, and he suddenly understood.
The chess game he laid out not only triggered those contracts Executors.
This "bell" that he had tampered with awakened people to more and more terrifying existences.
The real hunt has just begun.
The night has become darker.
The chakra light pillars that lit up due to hunting in the distance gradually extinguished, and the world seemed to have returned to peace.
But beneath the calm, there is an undercurrent that is more turbulent and deadly than before.
The wind stopped and the sand became quiet. In the darkness before dawn, countless pairs of eyes were slowly opening from all directions.