Counterattack During the Escort

The morning mist had yet to disperse from the stone bridge.

Lin Feng was escorted between two ninjas. Thirty zhang below his feet, the raging current crashed against the stone piers with a dull roar.

A searing pain suddenly flared at the back of his neck.

It was no ordinary pain.

It was like a red-hot iron rod being driven straight into his spine. The black patterns of the Curse Seal pulsed beneath his skin, resonating with something in the ninja ahead's chest—

A sealing scroll.

Lin Feng did not raise his bowed head. Only the Sharingan hidden beneath his bangs turned one tomoe in the dark red glow.

Ahead. Ninja A stepped onto the third bluestone slab of the bridge. His right hand had remained over the front of his chest. He stood slightly to the left because a loose stone slab lay on the right side of the bridge; when he had stepped on it earlier, it had wobbled faintly.

Behind him. Ninja B's kunai was aimed at Lin Feng's lower back. Three inches higher was his kidney. His breathing was half a beat faster than the other two, and ever since the escort began, he had kept tilting his head to the left—watching the direction of the current below.

To the right. Ninja C stood farthest out, his center of gravity slightly tilted back. With every step, he made sure the front half of his foot was firmly planted before he dared move.

He was afraid of heights.

0.7 seconds.

The three men's positions created a visual blind spot through the bridge's curved surface and the refracted mist. The instant Ninja A turned his head to check the road ahead, his peripheral vision would leave Lin Feng for 0.7 seconds; whenever Ninja B tilted his head left to watch the current, his attention would leave the back of Lin Feng's head for 0.7 seconds; every time Ninja C lowered his head to check his footing, his blind spot was likewise 0.7 seconds.

Those 0.7 seconds would not occur at the same time.

Unless someone deliberately gave them a reason to shift their attention at once.

"Uchiha brat."

Ninja B's voice came from behind him, and the tip of his kunai pressed forward half an inch.

"Where exactly did Shisui hide 'that thing'? Tell us, and Lord Danzo might spare your life."

Lin Feng kept his head lowered, his shoulders trembling faintly.

He deliberately made his breathing sound weak.

"...Under the third cedar behind the watchtower."

His voice was hoarse, as if his throat were full of bloody foam.

"I sealed the entrance with genjutsu... no one without Uchiha blood can undo it."

Ninja B froze for an instant.

The information was too specific. It gave the tree's location, the type of seal, and the condition for removing it.

He did not immediately decide whether it was true.

So he turned to look at Ninja A—the one responsible for verifying intelligence in the squad.

In that instant.

All three of them made a mistake.

Ninja A turned back and met Ninja B's gaze, his mouth opening to question the information.

Ninja B waited for Ninja A's judgment, and the fingers gripping his kunai loosened by half a joint.

Ninja C had just stepped onto a moss-covered slab. He lowered his head to check his footing, his hand leaving the ninja tool pouch at his waist.

0.7 seconds.

They overlapped.

The single tomoe in Lin Feng's right Sharingan spun through the mist.

He did not form hand seals.

Because Shisui had taught him—genjutsu was fundamentally the disruption of chakra flow, and hand seals were merely an aid. A true Uchiha could invade directly through the Sharingan.

The black patterns of the Curse Seal on his left arm suddenly surged.

Pain.

Pain so intense that even his bones convulsed.

Yet that pain was like a red-hot blade, cutting through every distracting thought in his chakra pathways. Instead, the Sharingan's vision became clearer through the agony. The chakra flows of the three men appeared like three bright lines, exposed amid the mist on the bridge.

The hand seals were completed inside his sleeve.

Genjutsu: Fox's Dream.

The stone bridge suddenly changed in Ninja A's eyes.

The bluestone slabs beneath his feet peeled away one by one, dropping into a bottomless black abyss.

He looked down.

He saw himself standing on the last remaining slab.

Cracks were spreading from its edge toward the center.

"A! By your feet—"

Ninja C's voice exploded through the mist—because he had been looking down at his footing, he was the first to notice the anomaly beneath Ninja A.

But he did not see an abyss.

He saw a pale arm reaching out from the stone slab, gripping Ninja A's ankle.

"...Damn it, it's genjutsu!"

Ninja A's scream tore through the morning mist.

He saw the abyss surge upward and swallow his legs. He saw the stone bridge vanish. He saw himself falling.

He jumped.

In reality, he leaped into the empty space on the right side of the bridge—where there was no railing.

The scream of someone losing their footing was so real that even Ninja C instinctively stepped aside.

Splash.

The sound of something falling into the rapids came from beneath the bridge.

But that splash was not Ninja A.

Ninja A's body was still in midair.

The splash had come from a stone Lin Feng had kicked down earlier.

And at that very instant, a kunai sliced across Ninja A's throat.

A mist of blood sprayed into the morning fog.

Lin Feng did not pause. The black patterns of the Curse Seal spread from his left shoulder to his collarbone, then coiled like snakes up his throat. Every pulse in his blood vessels brought searing agony.

Yet through the pain, his Sharingan clearly reflected another sight—

The second tomoe.

Then it spun.

The third tomoe.

The Three-Tomoe Sharingan emerged.

"You dare—"

Ninja B's furious roar burst from behind the bloody mist.

His body had already reacted—the kunai flew from his hand, grazing Lin Feng's ear before embedding itself three inches deep into the stone railing behind him.

But Lin Feng was no longer there.

He kicked off Ninja A's corpse, using the force to launch himself backward. He only stopped when his back slammed into the side railing of the stone bridge.

Ninja A's body tumbled off the bridge. A third splash sounded as it hit the water—this time, it was a real corpse.

Lin Feng pressed his right hand over his left shoulder. The black patterns of the Curse Seal had already formed an incomplete rune beneath his Adam's apple. Every swallow felt like swallowing blades.

But his voice remained steady.

"There are plenty of things I dare to do."

He raised his head, his Three-Tomoe Sharingan glowing a dim red through the morning mist.

"For example, making you throw Danzo's scroll into the river too."

Ninja B and Ninja C instinctively retreated half a step.

Only three people remained on the bridge.

One severely injured Uchiha.

Two Root ninjas who did not dare attack recklessly.

Ninja C's hand was already pressed against his ninja tool pouch, his fingers gripping the pull ring of a distress flare. Ninja B's Sharingan—no, he did not have the Sharingan. The instant his eyes met Lin Feng's Three-Tomoe Sharingan, he looked away, because he had been trained not to make eye contact with an Uchiha.

"Call for reinforcements."

Ninja B's voice was low.

"His left arm is already useless. Just stall him."

Ninja C pulled the ring.

The flare exploded in the mist, blooming into a dark purple burst of smoke.

Lin Feng did not stop him.

He merely used the lingering light from the flare and formed hand seals with one hand.

Body Flicker Technique.

His figure vanished from the spot.

When he reappeared, he was already on the rocky bank below, battered by the rushing current.

Ninja A's corpse floated in the shallows.

And Lin Feng was pulling the sealing scroll from its chest.

The scroll's outer layer was engraved with Root's specialized sealing formula, identical to the one he had seen in the archives. The patterns gave off a faint hum the instant they touched Lin Feng's palm—while the Curse Seal on his left arm pulsed as well.

Resonance.

Lin Feng bit open his right thumb and smeared blood over the seal of the scroll.

The sealing formula did not resist.

Because the Curse Seal had caused his chakra fluctuations to temporarily synchronize with Danzo's formula.

The scroll unfolded.

Lines of tiny writing emerged in the ink amid the morning mist.

The more Lin Feng read.

The slower his breathing became.

"...'Living Transplantation: Sharingan Forced Awakening and Kotoamatsukami Sealing Formula'..."

His voice was soft beneath the roar of the rapids.

But every word was like a nail.

"Conditions for activation: the recipient must possess a deep chakra connection with Shisui..."

At the end of the scroll, a line of notation lay quietly amid the ink.

"Suitable subject: No. 001—Lin Feng."

Lin Feng looked at his own designation.

The Curse Seal on his left arm suddenly burned violently.

It was not pain.

It was the sensation of being watched.

Every hair on the back of his neck stood on end. At the edge of his vision, the Sharingan automatically caught sight of the top of a distant cedar—a white eye-shaped mark was slowly emerging in the air.

Danzo.

Through the Curse Seal, he had traced this location in reverse.

But at the same time, another chakra fluctuation came from even farther away.

Faint.

But awakening.

Shisui.

Lin Feng tore off the core portion of the scroll and hid it against his body inside his clothes. He clenched the remaining pieces in his hand, his five fingers tightening.

Then he threw them into the rapids.

The scroll rolled twice in the white water before sinking into a deep pool.

Lin Feng pressed a hand over his left shoulder. The black patterns of the Curse Seal had crawled past his Adam's apple and spread to the edge of his jaw. Every heartbeat sent chakra rampaging through his meridians, as if it would burst his blood vessels.

But he could still run.

He turned the pain into fuel for his Sharingan.

He turned the scroll's secret into a weapon for his counterattack.

Then he headed toward the Uchiha Clan Grounds.

Under Danzo's gaze.

He vanished into the depths of the forest.