The Clan's Future? Listen to Me, or Get Lost

After dealing with Uchiha Kagami, more than half of Xuan's resistance within the clan was gone.

The next targets were much simpler.

Those hawks centered around the Police Force, the so-called "radicals."

To put it bluntly, they were a bunch of muscleheads blinded by hatred.

They hated the suppression from Konoha's upper ranks and longed to reclaim the glory that belonged to the Uchiha clan through force.

But their greatest problem was that they had no leader and courage without strategy.

The current clan head, Uchiha Setsuna, leaned toward the hawks, but constrained by his position, he was always overly cautious when doing things.

There was no use reasoning with a bunch who only recognized fists, and empty promises would not work either.

The only effective method was to be crazier than them, harsher than them, and use overwhelming power to grind the pride they cherished beneath his feet!

The night grew deeper.

Deep within the Uchiha compound lay a hidden underground training ground.

This was the secret gathering place of the Police Force's upper ranks, the core members of the radicals.

At this moment, dozens of Uchiha elites wearing Police Force armbands were gathered together, arguing red-faced.

"Lord Hokage has gone too far! He actually put Xuan under house arrest! This is a naked humiliation of our Uchiha clan!"

"That old dog Danzo deserves to die even more! He actually slandered Xuan as a spy! I say he's the cancer of Konoha!"

"Clan Head! We can't keep enduring this! Gather our men and fight them!"

The crowd was fired up, killing intent boiling over.

Uchiha Setsuna sat in the seat of honor, rubbing his throbbing temples with a helpless, irritated expression.

Fight? With what?

Just the few hundred men of their Police Force, against all of Konoha and the ANBU? That would not be an uprising. That would be suicide!

"Shut up, all of you!" Setsuna slammed his palm against the table, silencing the uproar. "The enemy is in the shadows while we are exposed. Lord Hokage's attitude is still ambiguous. That brat Xuan also made a spectacle of himself at the Hokage meeting and is now under strict surveillance. If we act rashly now, we'll only hand them ammunition!"

"Then are we just supposed to watch them keep Xuan under house arrest, watch them shit on the heads of our Uchiha clan?!" a hot-tempered squad captain, Uchiha Yan, roared indignantly.

"I..."

Just as Setsuna was about to speak, the heavy iron door of the training ground suddenly let out a teeth-grinding screech of twisting metal.

Boom!

With a deafening blast, the massive iron gate, weighing over a thousand pounds, was sent flying inward by an irresistible force!

The gate slammed into the wall, sending shattered stones flying as dust billowed everywhere.

The training ground instantly fell silent.

Every hawk, including Clan Head Setsuna, reflexively drew their ninja swords. Pairs of scarlet Three-Tomoe Sharingan lit up in the darkness as they stared fixedly toward the door.

Who was it?!

Who dared to storm the secret base of the Uchiha Police Force?!

The dust slowly dispersed.

A slender figure strolled in beneath the moonlight, unhurried and unbothered.

His hands were in his pockets, his expression lazy, as though he had not barged into a secret gathering filled with killing intent, but was merely taking a walk through his own backyard.

"I say, it's the middle of the night. You're making such a racket. Are you going to let people sleep or not?"

His crisp voice echoed through the empty training ground.

Once they saw the intruder's face clearly, everyone froze.

"Xuan?!"

Uchiha Setsuna's eyes widened as if he had seen a ghost.

"Aren't you under house arrest at home by Lord Hokage's ANBU and Danzo's Root?! How are you here?!"

The radicals also looked at one another, their faces filled with disbelief.

They knew exactly how tight the surveillance outside was.

How had this brat slipped out without anyone noticing?

"House arrest?" Xuan chuckled, his tone filled with undisguised disdain. "Those worthless scraps outside are worthy of calling it house arrest?"

Ignoring the dozens of ninja swords pointed at him, he walked straight to the center of the training ground, his gaze slowly sweeping across everyone present.

"I didn't come here tonight to listen to you complain like a bunch of bitter women."

Xuan's voice gradually turned cold.

"Nor am I interested in playing some childish game of 'perishing together with Konoha' with you."

The moment those words fell, the radicals exploded.

"You brat! You dare say we're playing a childish game?!" Uchiha Yan was the first to leap out, her Three-Tomoe Sharingan glaring fiercely at Xuan. "Don't think that just because you showed off a little at the Hokage meeting, you can boss us around here!"

"What do you know about the clan's glory?! What do you know about bleeding and sacrificing for the clan?!"

The other members also echoed her words, their gazes toward Xuan full of anger and contempt.

In their eyes, Xuan was merely a brat who relied on clever words and petty tricks, surviving the Hokage's hands only through luck.

"The clan's glory?"

Xuan looked as though he had heard the greatest joke in the world.

Slowly, he spoke one word at a time.

"Coming from cowards like you, who only know how to rage helplessly in a basement and don't even have the courage to draw your swords against the Hokage?"

"You're courting death!"

Uchiha Yan was utterly enraged.

With a roar, her hands formed seals in an instant, and a blazing fireball burst from her mouth, shooting straight toward Xuan's face!

Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique!

In such a cramped space, the attack was nearly impossible to evade.

Uchiha Setsuna wanted to stop her, but it was already too late.

Yet facing the flames rushing at him, Uchiha Xuan did not even raise an eyelid.

He merely slowly opened the eyes that had been half-closed all along.

Buzz!

A brilliant golden gleam burst forth within the dark underground training ground!

They were not ordinary Three-Tomoe Sharingan.

They were mysterious, noble pupils whose edges burned with patterns of golden flames!

[Golden Flame Divine Eyes], activated!

At the same time, an indescribably terrifying aura erupted from his seemingly slender body like a volcanic explosion!

It was an absolute pressure that fused the immense vitality of the Basic Sage Body with the [Dragon Might Aura] exchanged from the system!

Boom!

The invisible pressure swept through the entire training ground like a tangible wave of air.

The Great Fireball, hot enough to melt steel, was crushed apart as though an invisible giant hand had seized it the instant it came into contact with that wave!

It turned into scattered sparks and vanished into the air.

But this was only the beginning.

That pressure, enough to make their souls tremble, came crashing down upon every hawk present like Mount Tai itself!

"Th-This... what kind of power is this?!"

Uchiha Yan bore the brunt of it. She felt as though she was not facing a twelve-year-old boy, but a terrifying ancient beast awakened from the primordial wilderness!

The fear originating from deep within her bloodline made her legs begin to tremble uncontrollably.

Thud!

She lasted less than two seconds.

This captain, famed for her bravery within the Police Force, felt her knees give out and crashed heavily to her knees before Xuan. Cold sweat instantly drenched her entire body.

Her proud Three-Tomoe Sharingan involuntarily regressed into ordinary black eyes beneath that godlike pressure. She could not even maintain the most basic ocular power!

Thud!

Thud!

Like a chain reaction.

Dozens of Uchiha elites, including Clan Head Uchiha Setsuna.

Under the crushing force of that absolute power, all their pride and all their defiance were utterly shattered.

Like dominoes, they fell to their knees one after another, their bodies trembling uncontrollably. None of them even had the courage to raise their heads and look Xuan in the eye.

Silence.

Throughout the underground training ground, aside from the crowd's heavy breathing and chattering teeth, no other sound could be heard.

Uchiha Xuan looked down upon these clansmen, who had been arrogant and domineering moments earlier but were now kneeling like quails.

There was not a trace of pity in his eyes, only the cold indifference of an emperor.

He slowly withdrew his pressure, his Golden Flame Divine Eyes shining in the darkness.

"Can you listen quietly while I speak now?"

No one answered, and no one dared to answer.

Xuan withdrew his gaze in satisfaction. Though his voice was not loud, it rang clearly within the depths of every soul.

"I don't care what you thought before, and I don't care who you listened to before."

"From today onward, the Uchiha clan can have only one voice."

"That is my voice."

He paused, his blade-like gaze sweeping across the room.

"If I say I will lead the Uchiha to the peak, then you will put away that pointless hatred and serve as my stepping stones."

"If I say we are leaving Konoha, then even if there is a mountain of blades and a sea of fire ahead, you will jump in without hesitation."

"In short, the clan's future is mine to decide. Otherwise, get out of the Uchiha clan!"

Xuan's tone was domineering, arrogant, and left no room for compromise.

"I've said my piece. Who agrees?"

He lowered his head slightly, looking down at them.

"Who objects?"

The entire room was dead silent. No one dared speak.