Knowing It Was a Trap, He Still Had to Step In!

The hexagonal pattern in Uchiha Fugaku's eyes slowly turned, its crimson glow especially harsh in the afternoon sun. Chakra surged from his body, sending a visible ring of air rippling across the ground.

"Yongye!"

"You've gone too far!"

Uchiha Yongye looked at them, the corners of his mouth slowly rising.

Kurenai light flared in his pitch-black eyes. Three Tomoe appeared around his pupils, then spun faster and faster until they blurred together, their edges impossible to distinguish.

At the center of the spinning pattern, the image of a fox slowly emerged.

Nine tails spread outward from the center of his pupils, each a curved line forming a strange, magnificent design against the Kurenai backdrop.

Their tips curled upward like nine flames dancing in the wind!

The Mangekyō Sharingan!

Hiruzen Sarutobi stopped dead.

He stared at the Nine-Tailed Fox pattern in Yongye's eyes, his pupils shrinking to pinpoints. His hands clenched and relaxed at his sides, then clenched again, his palms slick with sweat.

Uchiha Fugaku's eyes went wide, the hexagonal pattern slowly turning within them.

He stared at the Nine-Tailed Fox. His lips trembled, and an indistinct sound escaped his throat.

He could feel the Eye Power in Uchiha Yongye's eyes—deep, surging, far beyond anything he had expected.

That ocular power poured from those crimson eyes and spread like a tide, engulfing the entire hall.

Before it, his own Mangekyō Sharingan was a candle flame beneath the blazing sun, its light almost completely smothered.

Fugaku sensed the Nine-Tailed Fox pattern in Uchiha Yongye's eyes begin to change. Not the pattern itself, but the Eye Power flowing through it in a way he had never seen.

Unease gripped him. Something terrible had happened, he was sure of it, but he had no idea what.

His instincts were right. Yongye was activating