"You're next."
Uchiha Gen'yō's utterly emotionless voice rang in Owl's ears like a death knell.
The shadow of death enveloped Root's ace captain more completely than ever before!
"Bastard! Don't underestimate Root!"
A trace of madness and resolve flashed through Owl's eyes!
As the sharpest blade in Danzo's hands, surrender had never been in his vocabulary!
"Secret Technique: Heart of Earth Grudge Fear!"
Owl tore open his shirt, revealing his grotesque chest covered in stitches!
The stitches on his chest burst apart. Dozens of black, tentacle-like threads surged wildly out of his body!
Still-beating hearts were attached to the ends of those black threads!
This was Takigakure's forbidden technique, Earth Grudge Fear!
Danzo had actually used even this forbidden technique on his own subordinates!
"Even if I die, I'll tear a chunk of flesh off you!"
Owl roared. The black threads instantly wove themselves into a massive black net that descended over Uchiha Gen'yō's head!
Every thread was coated in viciously sinister chakra. Anyone caught in them would have their life force drained dry in an instant!
"Cheap tricks."
Faced with this bizarre and powerful forbidden technique, Uchiha Gen'yō's expression did not so much as flicker.
He merely shook his head disdainfully and grasped the Lightning Flame Tachi at his waist, which he had obtained from the ninja tool storehouse.
"Let me show you what true power is."
Hum!
Gen'yō slowly drew his blade.
As the blade emerged inch by inch, a heart-stopping aura of sharpness instantly filled the entire valley!
The Lightning Flame Tachi's blade had become darker than the night itself. It seemed capable of devouring all light.
Along its edge, tiny spatial cracks could faintly be seen forming and vanishing without end!
Having absorbed the power of Kamui, the Lightning Flame Tachi had evolved into a spatial divine weapon!
"Sever."
A single icy word left Gen'yō's mouth.
He did not even use any elaborate move, merely swinging casually forward at the black net rushing toward him.
There was no earth-shattering sound.
There was no dazzling display of light.
Only a black thread so fine it was almost invisible flashed through the air.
The next second.
Time seemed to stand still at that moment.
The savage expression on Owl's face froze instantly.
He saw a straight slit open neatly down the middle of the enormous net woven from Earth Grudge Fear's black threads.
The cut was as smooth as a mirror!
Then his body suddenly felt light.
He looked down, his pupils widening to their limit!
He saw an identical straight, thin black line running down his body from between his eyebrows to his crotch.
He could not even feel the slightest pain!
"Wh-what is this..."
Those were the last words Owl left in this world.
Before his voice faded, his body, along with every Earth Grudge Fear tendril and heart extending behind him, slid silently apart along that thin black line.
Split in two with one stroke!
No!
This was not severing!
In the distance, Tsuchikage Ōnoki saw it perfectly clearly!
Uchiha Gen'yō's slash had never touched Owl's body at all!
What that slash had cut open was space!
It was the rules!
It had forcibly erased a thin line of Owl and the space behind him from this world!
He sucked in a breath.
Even with Ōnoki's composure, he could not help drawing a sharp breath at such an attack that defied all norms.
He suddenly realized how laughable his earlier belief that Uchiha Gen'yō was merely a formidable young man had been!
How was this a human?
This was clearly a god wearing human skin!
"Captain!"
"Captain Owl!"
Seeing their leader killed instantly by such a bizarre slash, the remaining dozens of Root ninja lost their last shred of psychological resistance!
"Run! Run!"
"We're no match for him! Hurry and inform Lord Danzo!"
Fear spread like a plague.
They abandoned their encirclement and scattered, fleeing desperately in every direction.
"Only thinking of running now?"
"Too late."
Holding the Lightning Flame Tachi, Uchiha Gen'yō walked slowly toward the fleeing Root ninja.
With every step, his killing intent grew stronger.
At that moment, his strangely shaped Mangekyo became demonic eyes of death that reaped lives!
"Kamui Wide-Range Distortion!"
Terrifying ocular power erupted from his left eye once again!
The ground beneath the fleeing Root ninja suddenly began to undulate and fold like waves!
"Ah! My leg!"
One ninja screamed. His left leg sank straight into folded space and was forcibly crushed into pulp!
"Help! What the hell is this?!"
Another ninja was launched into the air by a suddenly protruding rock, then crushed into a meat patty between two closing sections of space!
At that moment, the entire valley became a meat grinder under Uchiha Gen'yō's control!
Space was the sharpest blade in his hands!
He did not even need to act himself. A mere glance could leave these so-called elite ninja without an intact corpse!
"Please, don't kill me! Don't kill me!"
One Root ninja who had luckily escaped the spatial distortions suffered a mental breakdown at the hellish sight.
He dropped straight to his knees and desperately kowtowed to Gen'yō, begging for mercy.
"I can tell you all of Lord Danzo's secrets! Just spare my life!"
But all that greeted him was Uchiha Gen'yō's emotionless face and an icy verdict.
"I'm not interested in a dead man's secrets."
The moment he finished speaking, the space above the pleading ninja's head suddenly collapsed.
A massive boulder weighing several tons appeared out of thin air and crashed down!
Boom!
After a dull thud, only an indistinct smear of blood remained on the ground.
A one-sided massacre!
An utter feast of slaughter!
Uchiha Gen'yō walked slowly through pools of blood and severed limbs, yet his white robes remained spotless.
Every swing of his blade and every shift of his gaze claimed several lives!
The Root elites whose very name struck terror throughout the Shinobi World were as fragile before him as lambs awaiting slaughter!
Floating in midair, Ōnoki had become completely numb from watching.
Only one thought remained in his mind.
Thank goodness!
Thank goodness I chose to cooperate rather than make an enemy of this monster!
Otherwise, the ones lying on the ground right now would probably be my Iwagakure ninja!
In less than five short minutes.
Deathly silence returned to the valley.
Apart from Uchiha Gen'yō and Ōnoki, not a single standing figure could be seen.
Dozens of mutilated corpses lay strewn across the ground. The thick stench of blood almost filled the entire valley.
Root's elite pursuit force had been wiped out!
Uchiha Gen'yō sheathed his blade, his movements as elegant as if he had just finished a magnificent sword dance.
He took a pristine white handkerchief from inside his robes and gently wiped nonexistent dust from the hilt.
Then he turned and looked at the sole survivor, whom he had deliberately left alive.
It was Crow, the Root member whose limbs he had broken with Susanoo during the slaughter and whom he had tossed into a corner like a dead dog.
"Can we have a proper chat now?"
That devilish smile appeared on Gen'yō's face once again.
Just what did he want to obtain from this survivor?