Guidance

Awakening the Rinnegan required combining Indra's Chakra with Asura's Chakra to draw out the Sage of Six Paths' Chakra.

Neji didn't know whether Indra's and Asura's Chakra alone would be enough, or whether the person awakening it also needed the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan first.

But even if the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan was necessary, Sasuke could meet that requirement. His path had already been laid out for him.

Once he grew strong enough, his dear older brother would deliver the material needed to create the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan: another pair of Mangekyō Sharingan.

Neji himself leaned toward the belief that awakening the Rinnegan required a pair of Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan as its foundation.

"Sasuke," Neji said, "before you can awaken the Rinnegan, your Sharingan may need to undergo another transformation."

"What do you mean?" Sasuke asked.

"Do you know about the Mangekyō Sharingan?" Neji looked at him. "According to our Hyuga Clan's records, Madara Uchiha, the Asura of the Ninja World who founded Konoha alongside the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, possessed the legendary Mangekyō Sharingan."

"The Mangekyō Sharingan..." Sasuke repeated, his voice turning cold. "Yeah. I know about it. I even know how to awaken it."

"You do?" Neji was a little surprised. He hadn't expected Sasuke to know that already.

Sasuke nodded. "Uchiha Itachi has that legendary visual Dōjutsu bloodline ability too. The night he slaughtered our clan, he showed me his eyes. Their pattern was far more intricate than the ordinary Three-Tomoe pattern."

"That bastard told me that if I awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan, there would be three people in the world with those eyes." Sasuke gave Neji a long look, then continued, "He said the way to awaken them was to kill the person closest to me. A friend or a family member—it didn't matter."

"What?" Seeing that look on Sasuke's face, Neji flashed him a challenging grin. "You're not thinking of killing me to awaken them, are you?"

"Hmph!" Sasuke gave a disdainful snort. "I'm not an animal like Uchiha Itachi. No matter what, I'd never kill a friend. So what if I never awaken the Mangekyō Sharingan?"

"I won't follow the path that bastard Uchiha Itachi set for me. One day, I'll stand before him and tell him that even without the Mangekyō Sharingan, I can defeat him and avenge my parents and my clan!" Sasuke's resolve was unmistakable.

"That's the spirit!" Neji clapped him firmly on the shoulder. "Whatever else happens, I'll help you with that."

"Heh." Sasuke smiled with stubborn pride. "I appreciate it, but I'll defeat and kill Uchiha Itachi myself!"

"Anyway, back to the point. Awakening the Rinnegan may require the Mangekyō Sharingan first," Neji said.

"So an ordinary Sharingan can't become a Rinnegan through yin and yang power alone?" Sasuke asked thoughtfully.

"Maybe, but not necessarily. The Rinnegan and the Sharingan aren't successive stages of evolution. They exist in parallel, and each has its strengths," Neji explained.

"Of course. The Uchiha Clan's Dōjutsu could never be inferior to the Rinnegan!" Sasuke puffed out his chest.

"Then what about your Tenseigan? Can the Byakugan evolve into something like the Mangekyō Sharingan?" Sasuke asked.

Neji shook his head. "The Byakugan has nothing like that. They differ only in how strong and how pure their Eye Power is. The purer the Byakugan, the stronger its Eye Power."

He paused, then continued, "My Byakugan is exceptionally pure, so its Eye Power is strong enough to decipher the contents of that Hyuga stone tablet."

"I see!" Sasuke thought back to Neji's Byakugan. Since awakening his Sharingan, he really had sensed that Neji's Eye Power was far from ordinary.

Sasuke couldn't help envying Neji. The Byakugan might not have as many abilities, but at least awakening it was easy. The Uchiha Clan's Sharingan was nothing like that.

Changing the subject, Sasuke asked, "Neji, do you think the Hokage was strong enough to kill everyone in the Uchiha Clan in a single night?"

Sasuke had been thinking about this for a long time. He already had an answer in mind, but he still wanted to hear what his only friend thought.

"Heh." Neji laughed dismissively. "That's ridiculous. Your clan had so many Jonin, and your father was a powerful ninja who earned a name for himself during the Third Shinobi World War. Even if he wasn't quite at a Kage's level, he couldn't have been far off. How could the Hokage wipe out the Uchiha alone?"

"So Uchiha Itachi really did have an accomplice." Hearing Neji say it confirmed Sasuke's suspicions.

"Of course he did. And that accomplice must have been exceptionally strong. Thirteen-year-old Uchiha Itachi couldn't have pulled that off by himself," Neji said pointedly.

Uchiha Itachi had not just one accomplice, but more than one. Obito Uchiha was one of them, and Konoha itself might well have been another.

Without Konoha covering it up, how could the villagers have gone until the next day without learning that the Uchiha Clan had been wiped out?

Without Konoha covering it up, how could every sound of the fighting have been concealed?

Of course, Sasuke wouldn't think that far yet. But with Neji guiding him, he would realize it sooner or later as he grew stronger.

"Don't rush to take revenge. Right now, the most important thing is getting stronger," Neji reminded him.

Sasuke nodded. He understood that, but knowing it and putting it into practice were two different things. He often couldn't keep his anxiety in check.

Uchiha Itachi had already been so powerful at thirteen. Who knew how much stronger he had become in the years since?

There was no way Sasuke could feel no anxiety at all.

"Besides the Rasengan you taught me, is there any other way to get stronger?" Sasuke asked. "There's still a year until graduation. I can't practice the Rasengan openly, and school is a waste of time anyway. I'd rather train."

"Taijutsu," Neji answered. "Yours still needs work. You're an Uchiha with an awakened Sharingan, so you have plenty of room to improve."