Beneath the Valley of the End Lies an Ancestor!

"Lord Madara, I'm here to pick you up after work."

Uchiha Xuan's soft mutter, filled with a meme from a later age, was utterly insignificant amid the waterfall's deafening roar.

As soon as he spoke, he no longer hesitated.

With a leap, his black figure plunged straight down from the head of the First Hokage's statue, dozens of meters above, like an eagle spreading its wings!

Howling winds whipped past his ears, making his robes flap wildly.

The pool below rapidly expanded in his vision.

Just as he was about to crash into the water headfirst in a perfect upside-down plunge—

"Smack!"

A light sound rang out.

Chakra gathered precisely beneath Xuan's feet. Like a dragonfly touching the water, he landed steadily atop the surging surface.

Beneath his feet, the rushing river roared past, yet he stood as firmly as if on solid ground, completely unmoved.

Water walking really does feel better with a Sage Body. Chakra's practically free.

Xuan quietly bragged to himself.

He raised his head, and those eyes burning with golden flames—his [Golden Flame Divine Eyes]—opened once more!

This time, he focused all his ocular power on probing the chakra underground.

In an instant, the world before his eyes changed.

The solid earth and layers of rock became as transparent as glass.

Streams of chakra, tangled together like a dense spiderweb, appeared clearly within his sight.

And at the deepest point of that intricate "web," a mass of chakra as black as ink, brimming with decay and evil, converged into a single point.

That was Madara's hiding place!

"Found you."

A curve lifted at the corner of Xuan's mouth.

Following the chakra flow, he soon found an entrance on a hidden cliff face behind the waterfall, concealed beneath the curtain of water by both genjutsu and a barrier.

If it had been an ordinary sensory ninja, they would not only have failed to find it—they likely would not even have been able to approach this place.

But before Xuan's mutated [Golden Flame Divine Eyes], such disguises were as laughable as the emperor's new clothes.

"Genjutsu—Release!"

With merely a snap of his fingers, the genjutsu barrier capable of deceiving jonin shattered bit by bit like an illusion reflected in a mirror.

A dark, bottomless cave entrance was revealed behind it.

Complex sealing formulas were also carved around the entrance to prevent outsiders from entering.

"Pretty cautious."

Xuan curled his lip. He had no time to study those complicated sealing techniques.

He chose the simplest, most brutal, and most effective method.

"Earth Release!"

He slammed his hands together, and the vast chakra of his Sage Body erupted!

"Earth Dragon Excavation Technique!"

"Roar—!"

Accompanied by a deafening roar—

The earth and rock before Xuan churned and gathered madly. In less than two seconds, they formed a ferocious earth dragon over ten meters long, made entirely of rock!

"Open it... for me!"

At Xuan's command, the rock dragon roared and slammed its head viciously into the sealed entrance!

"Rumble—!"

The entire Valley of the End seemed to tremble slightly from the violent impact!

Before absolute power, the complex sealing formulas did not last even a second. Together with the entire cliff face, they were blasted open, leaving a massive hole more than five meters across!

A deep, dark passage slanting continuously downward appeared before Xuan.

"Done."

Xuan clapped his hands and stepped into this "VIP passage" he had personally carved out.

The passage was pitch-black, so dark that one could not see one's hand before one's face.

The air was filled with an unpleasant smell of dampness, decay, and a faint trace of blood.

The walls were covered in twisted, strange white plant roots resembling blood vessels.

Xuan knew that all of these had been cultivated from Hashirama Cells.

He followed the passage downward.

The surroundings were terrifyingly silent. Only the sound of his own footsteps echoed through the empty tunnel.

The farther down he went, the clearer that evil chakra fluctuation became.

After walking for an unknown length of time, a faint glimmer of light finally appeared ahead.

Xuan quickened his pace.

When he emerged from the end of the passage, the sight before him suddenly opened up.

A massive underground cavern beyond imagination appeared before him.

Countless ores emitting a faint blue glow were embedded in the cavern ceiling, illuminating the entire space as brightly as day.

At the very center of the cavern sat an enormous hundred-meter statue filled with an ominous aura, cross-legged with all nine of its eyes closed.

The Demonic Statue of the Outer Path!

This terrifying weapon, which would later bring endless despair to the entire Ninja World, stood quietly here at this moment.

And beneath that gigantic statue—

Upon a crude throne carved from stone—

A figure sat silently.

He was an old man... his beard and hair completely white, his body shriveled like a desiccated corpse, countless black tubes connecting him to the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path embedded in his back.

He looked like a living dead man who could be carried away by the wind at any moment.

However—

The instant Uchiha Xuan stepped into the cavern—

The old man seemed to sense something.

His eyelids, like withered tree bark, slowly and laboriously lifted.

He slowly opened his only remaining eye.

It was a legendary eye... covered in mysterious purple ripples, filled with endless majesty and the aura of death!

The Rinnegan!

"Who is it..."

A hoarse, aged voice, as though its owner had not spoken for centuries, slowly echoed through the empty cavern.

"Who has disturbed... this old man's slumber?"

"This old man?" Xuan looked at the withered elder before him, who seemed to be hanging on by his last breath, and could not help laughing.

"Listen, ancestor."

His voice echoed through the cavern, full of undisguised mockery.

"With you looking like you're about to be buried, why are you still putting on such a grand act?"