Bountiful Gains, Izumi's Transformation, and the Bloody Mist Village

The damp chill deep within the underground base gradually receded as strips of incandescent lights flickered on section by section along the corridor.

The heavy steel blast door rose, the sound of metal grinding echoing through the empty passageway.

Ye walked at the front of the group, the hem of his black robes swaying with each step as cold wind poured in through the doorway.

Kabuto Yakushi lagged half a step behind, raising a hand to adjust his round glasses while his gaze remained fixed on the sealing scroll on Ye's back.

Izumi Uchiha silently followed at the rear, holding three young children who had been frightened into unconsciousness.

After entering the innermost sterile laboratory, Ye casually tossed the three sealing scrolls from his waist onto the experimental table.

The collisions landed with dull thuds, and the scrolls rolled across the cold metal surface.

Kabuto knew what was inside. He pressed a hand over the scrolls, blue chakra glowing around his palm as he directly released the seals.

All the spoils from this excursion were exposed beneath the cold lights as three clouds of white smoke rose in succession.

A thick stench of blood spread through the room. The severed arm, covered in pallid flesh, lay across the table, with more than a dozen Three-Tomoe Sharingan embedded in it.

Beside it sat a special container holding Shisui Uchiha's Mangekyō Sharingan. On the far right was an ancient parchment scroll, its surface flowing with black-and-white chakra.

Kabuto's hand hovered in the air for a long while without falling, his breathing turning uneven.

There it all was before him: the Hashirama Cells Lord Orochimaru desired, along with those Sharingan.

When his eyes moved to the final parchment containing the advanced analysis of Yin–Yang Release, Kabuto did not even want to blink.

Lord Ye had gone out once and uprooted Konoha's Root completely. That forbidden knowledge was enough to touch upon the rules behind the Shinobi World's creation.

The gaze behind his lenses grew increasingly feverish, and Kabuto's Adam's apple bobbed as the thought passed through his mind.

Ye glanced at the severed arm on the experimental table, then raised a hand and pointed at the container holding the eyeball.

"Move faster on the First Hokage Cells experiments... work the Yin–Yang Release data into them and get rid of every side effect."

"That Mangekyō... keep it separately. Use the best culture fluid, and don't let any more ocular power leak out."

"Understood... with this data, the two core machines at the Konoha Research Department can be activated immediately!"

Kabuto bowed in acknowledgment, then put away the severed arm and began the cleanup.

Ye left the laboratory and entered the medical isolation room next door.

The chests of the three Uchiha children rose and fell faintly as they lay on the hospital beds.

Her skin had gone bloodless from clenching too hard, and Izumi Uchiha stood guard beside the beds with her fingers tightly intertwined.

Her eyes were vacant and unfocused, her face covered in dried blood and dust.

Ye's gaze fell on Izumi's face. He pulled over a metal chair and sat before her.

Scenes from Uchiha Clan Massacre Night flooded her mind again, and Izumi's shoulders began to tremble.

Gushing blood had splashed across her face when her mother's heart was pierced from behind by an elder trusted by the clan.

Those familiar faces twisted grotesquely as they wielded their ninja blades. Uchiha Itachi's cold face and blood-dripping sword advanced toward her again and again.

The Uchiha Clan had slaughtered one another after Konoha's upper ranks issued the extermination order.

From beginning to end, it had all been a lie. They claimed they had sacrificed every elderly person, woman, and child in the clan for peace.

The clan was a lie. The village was a lie too.

A low roar forced its way from her throat. Izumi's chest heaved violently, and her breathing grew increasingly ragged.

Her optic nerves endured an unprecedented chakra impact as grief and hatred surged straight into her mind.

Ye remained seated in silence as he watched the hatred within her continue to grow.

He needed a sufficiently useful tool.

Two trails of bloody tears ran down Izumi's pale cheeks from the corners of her eyes before finally dripping onto her collar.

The three tomoe in her eyes spun so quickly they became afterimages, and she raised her head.

The temperature inside the isolation room rapidly dropped. Immense ocular power released an icy chill as chakra underwent a qualitative transformation within her eye sockets.

The three tomoe twisted inward, connecting head to tail toward the center, before finally settling into the shape of a red spider lily.

The Mangekyō Sharingan had awakened.

The glass instruments on the table trembled and clinked softly as genjutsu ripples swept through the entire isolation room.

What finally broke through the limits of her bloodline was this mutated ocular power, born from despair and catalyzed by Ye's rescue and Izumi's admiration for him.

A muffled thud sounded as Izumi's knee struck the hard floor tiles.

She knelt on one knee before Ye, ignoring the searing pain in her eyes.

There was no trace of weakness left in those crimson eyes. When she looked up at Ye, there was only fervor and morbid loyalty.

"Lord Ye... this life of mine is yours. These eyes are yours too."

"From now on... I am your blade!"

The red spider lilies in her crimson pupils turned slowly as she braced herself on her knee and rose.

"Wherever you point, I'll kill my way there!"

The hatred buried in her eyes could no longer be concealed when she mentioned Konoha.

"Those people in Konoha... they all have to die!"

Ye rose from his chair and walked over to Izumi. He extended his right hand and stroked down her black hair.

"Fine. Remember what you just said."

He withdrew his hand and turned toward the isolation room's entrance.

"Go wash your face. Come find me in the strategy room later."

Half an hour later, the huge map in the center of the underground strategy room was illuminated beneath dim yellow tactical lights.

Izumi Uchiha had washed away the blood and changed into black combat attire, standing on one side of the long table. Kabuto Yakushi and Yakushi Nonō stood on the other.

With a faint crease between her brows, Nonō pushed a stack of financial reports to the center of the table.

"Lord Ye... Konoha has frozen half our funds."

Her fingertips slowly traced the figures as she opened the report.

"We took quite a bit of hard currency when we evacuated, but with how quickly these research projects are burning through money, along with the expansion of the intelligence network, what remains... will last three months at most."

After a brief pause, Nonō drew out two more lists of bases and spread them before everyone.

"The two bases within the Land of Fire were taken out by the Anbu. We can't operate there anymore."

Kabuto took over, lifting a hand to adjust his glasses.

"That old man, the Third, has truly abandoned all shame. The manhunt is even crazier than expected."

Rows of densely packed names reflected in his lenses as he placed several casualty reports beside the map.

"That five-hundred-million-ryō bounty has attracted a large number of bounty hunters. Our outer scouts have suffered severe casualties. If this keeps up, the Anbu will uproot our intelligence network sooner or later."

Ye tapped the tabletop rhythmically with his fingers as he listened to the report.

The three people on either side of the long table stared at the map without daring to lose focus, listening to the calm tapping sound again and again.

Ye withdrew his hand. A moment later, he threw out a specially made kunai drawn from his ninja tool pouch.

The blade sank deeply into the wood, crossing the entire map before pinning down an offshore island in the lower-right corner.

Looking at Kirigakure in the Land of Water, all three pairs of eyes fell upon that stretch of sea.

"The Land of Fire is a bone with no meat left on it."

His gaze passed over each of their faces as Ye braced both hands against the table's edge and leaned forward.

"We're going to the Land of Water."

A crisp metallic clink echoed through the strategy room as he flicked the ring at the end of the kunai.

"The Blood Mist Policy is about to drag that country into ruin. It's the perfect place for us to relocate."

The red spider lily pattern flickered faintly in the depths of Izumi's eyes as she stared at the kunai on the map.

Anyone who blocks Lord Ye's path will die. Killing intent flooded her mind once more.

Information about the Land of Water raced through Kabuto's mind, and he narrowed his eyes.

It was a closed, xenophobic place that revered slaughter, but its dangers and rewards were equally astonishing.

"Make preparations. We leave tomorrow."

Ye straightened as he began assigning tasks.

"The base enters maximum silence. Activate all defensive barriers."

His gaze finally settled on Nonō after passing over Kabuto and Izumi.

"Kabuto and Izumi come with me. Nonō, you hold down the fort."

A faint smile appeared at Ye's lips as he pulled out the kunai and let it spin nimbly between his fingers.

They say the Fourth Mizukage is just an unfortunate fool controlled by genjutsu.

What does it mean to crush someone with ocular power? Let those fools who only know how to slaughter each other see it with their own eyes.

A torrential storm was about to descend, and muffled thunder rolled across the sky from beyond the door.