A Backhanded Slap Across That Old Dog Danzo's Face!

The instant the words "Cutting Technique" slipped softly from Uchiha Xuan's lips.

The once-quiet ground came alive.

"Pfft! Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!"

A series of scalp-numbing muffled thuds rang out through the dark alley.

Ten sharp trees like spears from hell burst out of the ground without warning! They precisely locked onto every Root ninja's position and, at an unavoidable speed, pierced cleanly through their bodies from below.

Blood slowly trickled down the rough bark, taking on an eerie dark-red hue beneath the moonlight.

The ten ninjas hailed as Root elites did not even have time to scream before they were nailed high into the air. Their blank masks shattered from the agony, revealing young faces filled with shock and disbelief beneath them.

Their vitality rapidly drained away as it was devoured by the tyrannical life force of Wood Release.

The entire process had been unimaginably fast.

From Xuan forming his hand seals to all ten elite chunin dying, less than three seconds had passed.

Uchiha Xuan slowly lowered his hands, not even a drop of blood staining his black robe.

He raised his head and looked at the horrifying scene before him, like a painting of hell, his gaze utterly calm and without the slightest ripple.

Wood Release.

This was the divine power of Hashirama Senju, something even Senju Tobirama had longed for but could never master throughout his life.

And yet, it had now been casually unleashed in the form of a "Sage Art" by a twelve-year-old Uchiha boy.

If Tobirama or Danzo had witnessed this scene, they would probably have been scared out of their wits on the spot.

"Danzo..." Xuan looked at the nailed-up corpses, a cold curve appearing at the corner of his lips. "I'll accept this generous gift of yours."

He neither disposed of the bodies nor chose to conceal the matter.

That would have been letting that old dog Danzo off too easily.

What he wanted was to make this matter as big as possible!

In front of all Konoha's higher-ups, he would fiercely return this slap to Danzo's old face!

The next morning.

At the Hokage Building, the senior officials were holding their routine meeting.

Senju Tobirama, Danzo, Hiruzen Sarutobi, and the others sat in the conference room as usual, discussing the village's everyday affairs.

Danzo sat in his seat, his eyelids twitching incessantly as an ominous feeling lingered in his heart.

The ten Root elites he had sent out last night had yet to send back any news.

That was highly abnormal.

Logically, even if the mission had failed, they should have retreated at once and reported the situation.

Could it be...

Just as his thoughts ran wild.

"Bang!"

The heavy wooden doors to the conference room were brutally kicked open from outside!

The huge noise startled every senior official present.

"Who dares cause trouble here?!" Mitokado Homura abruptly rose to his feet and shouted sternly.

Yet when they saw who stood in the doorway, everyone froze.

It was Uchiha Xuan.

He stood there alone and quietly, his face expressionless.

But behind him, chakra threads dragged ten cold, stiff corpses!

Without exception, every corpse had been pierced through the chest by a thick tree, their deaths utterly gruesome.

"Gulp."

The only sound left in the conference room was everyone swallowing.

"Uchiha Xuan! You... what are you trying to do?!"

The instant Danzo saw those corpses, his pupils contracted sharply, and the ominous feeling in his heart surged to its peak!

Because he recognized them. Those corpses were the Root elites he had sent to assassinate Xuan last night!

They... had actually been wiped out?!

And they had died in such a bizarre manner!

Uchiha Xuan ignored Danzo's bluster.

Dragging the ten corpses behind him, he walked step by step to the center of the conference room.

Then he casually flicked his hand.

"Clatter..."

The ten corpses were thrown onto the polished floor like trash, piled into a small mountain of bodies without the slightest respect.

The thick stench of blood instantly filled the entire conference room.

"Good morning, gentlemen."

Xuan dusted off his hands as though he had merely done something trivial.

His gaze slowly swept across every pale-faced senior official present before finally settling on Shimura Danzō's old face, which had already turned livid.

He pointed at the corpses on the floor and spoke unhurriedly.

"Last night, a few insects that didn't know their place tried to take a bite out of me while I was heading home."

"Unfortunately, their teeth weren't very good. Not only did they fail to bite me, I accidentally swatted every last one of them to death."

At that, he paused, a "naive" smile appearing on his face.

He bent down and tore off a patch of skin from the back of one corpse's neck.

On that patch of skin, a strange black curse mark shaped like a tadpole was clearly visible.

The Cursed Tongue Eradication Seal!

The vicious curse mark unique to Danzo's Root members, used to prevent information from leaking!

In all of Konoha, only Shimura Danzō's people bore such a thing!

The evidence was irrefutable!

Uchiha Xuan casually tossed the piece of skin bearing the curse mark before Danzo, as if throwing away a scrap of garbage.

That harmless smile remained on his face, but his words were like an incomparably loud slap, viciously striking Danzo across the face and leaving it burning with pain.

"Lord Danzo."

"Looking at the markings on these insects, they seem rather familiar."

"Their master... you should know him, shouldn't you?"

"I..." Danzo opened his mouth, wanting to defend himself, only to find his throat tightly gripped by an invisible hand. He could not utter a single word.

In an instant, his complexion changed from livid to deathly pale, then from pale to the color of pig liver.

His one eye was filled with shock, rage, and... a deep fear that even he himself had not noticed!

"You... how exactly did you do this?" he murmured in disbelief.