Bone-chilling groundwater swept Ling ever downward. Absolute darkness surrounded him, and only the roar of rushing water filled his ears. Agonizing pain shot through his left arm, his chakra was nearly exhausted, and the mental pressure from the instant he had met the Rinnegan of Pain's Deva Path still lingered.
He fought through the pain and dizziness, trying to steady himself in the torrent. His Jōgan barely opened in the darkness, revealing only blurred outlines of energy-the faint natural energy within the underground river itself, and the dormant radiation of minerals buried deep beneath the earth.
He could not determine his bearings or sense the world outside. Like a fallen leaf caught in a whirlpool, he could only drift with the current.
After an unknown length of time, the current gradually slowed, and the river widened. Ling seized the chance to grab a protruding rock with his still-mobile right hand and laboriously drag himself onto a narrow gravel bank.
He collapsed onto the cold stones, gasping for breath. The icy air stung as it entered his lungs. His left arm hung limply at his side, clearly broken. He tried to muster chakra, but a parched, burning pain spread through his chakra pathways. He could no longer sustain his Sharingan, and it quietly faded.
A dead end.
He gazed up into the endless darkness overhead, clearly hearing rainwater seep through the rock and drip down. What happened up there? How were Fox and Azure Phoenix? Could they escape that monster with the Rinnegan?
A crushing sense of helplessness welled up within him. An S-rank mission... Against absolute power, even so-called elite Anbu could not withstand a single blow. The orange-haired man's gaze had been so indifferent that it inspired despair.
He closed his eyes and forced himself to calm down. Now was not the time for despair. He had to survive.
He struggled into a sitting position and clumsily examined his left arm with his right hand, confirming that his ulna was broken. He tore out his cloak's lining and used the relatively straight stones he could find nearby, along with strips of cloth, to fashion a simple splint and bandage. The intense pain left him drenched in cold sweat, yet his movements were exceptionally steady.
After tending to his injury, he began trying to mold chakra. The process was slow and painful, like digging for fresh spring water in cracked earth. The pitch-black Fragment against his chest remained dormant, failing to supply energy as it usually did, as though it, too, had been cowed by the Rinnegan's gaze.
Just as he concentrated on recovering, an extremely faint vibration, nearly drowned out by the rushing water, came from deep within the rock beneath the gravel bank.
It was neither the current nor an earthquake. It was a kind of... low, rhythmic hum, like some enormous machine at work, or the beating of a heart.
Ling's eyes snapped open. His Jōgan struggled to focus again, turning toward the source of the vibration.
His vision penetrated the surface rock and extended downward. Roughly a hundred meters below, the energy distribution showed unnatural distortions and concentrations. It was not a naturally formed mineral vein, but the outline of... an artificial structure? It seemed fairly large and structurally complex. Unlike any chakra response he had sensed before, it possessed an ancient, weighty quality.
What shook him even more was that, at that very moment, the pitch-black Fragment against his chest actually gave off a distinct warmth again! And this time, what it resonated with was not some distant, unknown location, but the artificial structure buried deep beneath his feet!
The resonance was stronger and more direct than ever before, like iron and a magnet drawing each other close.
Here... deep beneath the Land of Rain, something sharing this Fragment's origin was buried too? Was it another Fragment? Or something sinister like that ancient Scroll? Or... something else?
Thinking of the seemingly all-seeing Rinnegan of Pain's Deva Path, along with the Rain Tiger at Will Technique that blanketed the entire country, Ling arrived at a startling conjecture-could the Akatsuki's decision to establish its base in Amegakure also be connected to whatever lay underground?
Could the energy source or central control hub of the sensory barrier covering the Land of Rain be down here?
The thought sent a chill through him. If that were true, he had escaped the wolf's den only to enter the tiger's jaws! He was almost directly above the enemy's "heart"!
He had to leave this place immediately!
He forced himself to his feet and looked around. Here, the underground river split into several branches, their destinations unknown. His Jōgan could not penetrate far enough to investigate the end of each passage.
He carefully sensed the strength of the Fragment's resonance, trying to determine which passage would lead him away from the underground structure. Yet the Fragment's resonance seemed to be everywhere, with only slight variations in strength, making it difficult to pinpoint a direction.
While he hesitated, a faint sound, distinct from both the current and the underground hum, drifted from the depths of one of the branches.
Was that... the sound of dragging chains? And... extremely faint, intermittent... sobbing?
Were there living creatures this deep underground, besides that ancient structure? Or... someone trapped here?
Ling's heartbeat quickened involuntarily. Should he risk following the sound to investigate, or choose a seemingly quiet passage and escape as quickly as possible?
He glanced at his broken left arm and felt the emptiness of his chakra reserves. In his current state, any mishap could prove fatal.
But the sobbing wound around his heart like spider silk. Here, beneath the Land of Rain controlled by the Akatsuki, an imprisoned being... who could it be? Could it be connected to the secret underground?
Reason told him to get away immediately, but some intuition deep within him, along with the strong resonance the Fragment continued to send in that direction, pushed him toward another choice.
He drew a deep breath of cold, damp air, and a glimmer of resolve flashed in his eyes.
He cautiously began walking toward the passage from which the chains and sobbing sounded, advancing step by step into the darkness.
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