You were the one who started cheating

"Hajime Naruto, you bastard..."

His lips twitched slightly. Purple light flickered in Sasuke's eyes as he glanced at the seal on Naruto's lower abdomen, which seemed to have changed without either of them noticing. He was momentarily speechless.

He shook the scraps off his hand and casually kicked Danzo's corpse, seemingly ignoring it completely.

It looked like his earlier suspicions had actually come true...

Thanks to his butterfly effect, Naruto seemed to have picked up some ridiculously overpowered cheats too...

"Watch out!"

But just as Naruto was about to say something to Sasuke, who was looking his way, his expression changed sharply. In his Malice Perception, that pitch-black mass of malice, so thick and utterly unconcealed, had reappeared the instant it vanished-and now it was behind Sasuke, who seemed to have let his guard down!

The air abruptly contracted. Danzo appeared behind Sasuke, completely unharmed. A glint of triumph flashed through his cold eyes as his hands rapidly formed hand seals.

Wind Release: Vacuum Serial Waves!

Violent gusts erupted from Danzo's mouth, forming enormous slashing waves in the blink of an eye. The invisible, savage wind blades swept out like crescent-shaped sickle weasels.

Seeing the anxiety on Naruto's face only made Danzo more smug. They were nothing but two brats who didn't know how high heaven was or how deep the earth ran. He wouldn't hold back in the slightest because of their identities or ages. Anyone who dared oppose him, old or young, had only one road ahead: death.

(Hiruzen Sarutobi: Who the fuck are you taking a shot at, Danzo?! I'm the Hokage!)

Yet just as the wind blades were about to slice Sasuke into countless pieces, Danzo caught a hint of amusement in Naruto's eyes directly opposite him.

Not good!

Danzo knew this feeling all too well. Just moments earlier, when he had nearly stabbed Sasuke to death with a kunai, he had sensed something wrong at precisely this point. That time, Sasuke had caught the kunai between two fingers. This time...

Bzzzt!

Clang-

With a buzzing sound, the wind blades struck something solid, sending out a series of thunderous crashes and kicking up a huge cloud of dust. Through the morning mist, a faint blue light glimmered.

This was beyond anything he had expected. That hint of amusement in Naruto's eyes, especially, made it seem as though he and Sasuke had known about his Izanagi all along.

How was that possible?!

Glancing at the five scarlet Three-Tomoe Sharingan faintly glowing red beneath the bandages around his right arm, Danzo suppressed his unease and formed hand seals again.

"Heh heh heh heh. Our clan's secret technique, Izanagi? So you really are in contact with the culprit behind the upheaval ten years ago. Just what I'd expect from you. Forget refusing to give anything to the village-when it comes to selling it out, you're certainly an expert."

Sasuke's calm voice drifted out, making the veins on Danzo's forehead bulge. How was that selling out the village? Could anything Root did be called betrayal? And another thing! It wasn't that he refused to sacrifice himself for the village! It was called giving gradually, giving slowly-making planned contributions! This innately evil Uchiha brat could only use his filthy heart to judge Danzo's open and honorable deeds!

He opened his mouth and spat out more bursts of wind. But the moment they entered the morning mist, a flash of blue smashed them apart. The howling gale scattered the dust, revealing the enormous silhouette within.

"Susanoo? Impossible!" Unable to maintain his composure any longer, Danzo cried out in shock.

Sasuke was still standing in the same spot, but a gigantic, translucent blue skeleton now enveloped him. At some point, his left eye had taken on the shape of a triangular shuriken.

Mangekyō Sharingan: Kamui!

"Heh. Even an old dog like you can have the First Hokage's Wood Release and the Uchiha's Three-Tomoe Sharingan. As a descendant of the Sage of Six Paths, why shouldn't I have a Mangekyō Sharingan?"

Feeling the changes within himself and the Mangekyo activated by vast amounts of vitality, spiritual energy, and chakra, Sasuke carefully savored how it differed from using Shisui's, Itachi's, and the others' eyes. He casually hurled a spear formed from lightning.

At this point, Kakashi still hadn't used Kamui. Like a divine treasure concealing its own brilliance, it remained dormant. Unless he realized he possessed a Mangekyo, experienced a violent emotional upheaval, poured a huge amount of chakra into it under extreme circumstances, or encountered some other such trigger, it would remain in its three-tomoe state.

But in the hands of Sasuke, a member of the Uchiha Clan, things were different. They naturally possessed the chakra pathway that outsiders lacked, linking directly to the eye. On top of that, he had a power bank, a first-aid kit, and an Asura-brand power bank thrown in for good measure. It took only a few dozen Kakashis' worth of chakra to activate the Mangekyo with ease.

At that thought, Sasuke couldn't help curling his lip.

Giving it back to Kakashi later would really be letting him off cheap. Not only had I activated his cheat, I'd have to give the bastard a power bank too. Otherwise, with his mana pool, he'd be spent after two Kamu­i.

"Hey, hey, hey! Sasuke! Since when could you use this Susanoo thing too?!

"And I've been wanting to ask for ages-why can I smell Kakashi-sensei in your eye?!"

Hearing Naruto's voice, equal parts envy and indignation, Sasuke felt good all over. He even completely forgot about Danzo relentlessly bombarding him with Wind Release from a distance.

Showing off really was best done in front of people you knew. Bringing Naruto along had truly been a brilliant decision.

Listening with satisfaction to Naruto's defeated-dog howls, Sasuke failed to notice the thoughtful look on his face. He turned his gaze slightly toward Danzo.

Through his Purple Demon Eye: Mangekyo Mode, which had been elevated by its fusion with the Mangekyo, Sasuke could clearly see the abnormalities in Danzo's right arm: its unusually vigorous vitality and the five scarlet eyes, four open and one closed.

There was also that other ordinary Three-Tomoe Sharingan hidden behind the bandages.

"So those clansmen who went missing really did fall victim to your poisonous hands, you old dog."

His lips curled downward. Sasuke reached to his waist and pulled out a wrist guard marked with a vine insignia, his gaze turning cold.

Long ago, he, Itachi, and the others had checked the clan's roster. Only a handful of clansmen with Three-Tomoe Sharingan had gone missing during the war, and their fates were all unknown.

By ordinary logic, an unknown fate meant they were dead.

Add in the Shinobi World's law of blame, and those Sharingan had most likely ended up in Danzo's hands.

But Sasuke wasn't worried in the slightest about Danzo's half-baked Izanagi. The version he used was completely neutered. Even his arm was a directly transplanted arm rather than a cellular transplant, making it a neutered version of an already neutered version. In Obito's hands, Izanagi could last at least five minutes. In Danzo's, it was merely one minute of invincibility.

"!!!" Ignoring the latter half of Sasuke's remark, Danzo realized with some frustration that he had already lost count of how many times Sasuke's words had made him lose control of his emotions.

But it really was hard to keep them in check. No one could stay calm when an enemy who couldn't possibly know their trump cards casually laid them bare as though they were common knowledge. At any rate, Danzo couldn't understand how Sasuke knew about the Hashirama cells in his arm.

But so what if he knew?!

Glancing at the four Three-Tomoe Sharingan still open on his arm, then staring directly into Sasuke's left eye, Danzo's face flashed with madness. He abruptly formed hand seals and pointed downward. Almost instantly, several Root elites emerged from the earth. Kunai, kikaichū, and other attacks hurtled toward Sasuke and Naruto in flawlessly coordinated succession.

With his subordinates buying time and the Uchiha Clan's mysterious Izanagi at his disposal, Danzo was confident he could seize Sasuke's left eye. If he could take that Mangekyo, tonight's trip would have been worthwhile!

He drew a kunai with one hand, intending to pierce the Susanoo. At the same time, he activated the Body Flicker Technique, tightened his right-hand grip, and thrust forward!

Root Secret Technique: Kunai Stab Susanoo!