Chapter 316 – Uchiha Madara Rises in the Dead of Night!
On the border between the Land of Hot Water and the Land of Frost, near the coastline—
The tectonic flow of the Shinobi World, originating from the mountain graveyards scattered across the lands, extended all the way here.
At this moment,
In the stillness of night, before the vast, pitch-black ocean, an old man with withered white hair leaned against a reef, using a scythe as a makeshift cane. He sat quietly in the immense shadow cast by a colossal object, clearly waiting for something.
He tilted his head slightly to gaze at the hazy crescent moon hanging high overhead, frowning as he muttered,
"Bailan, that useless fool—late again?"
"Tch. Should've just killed him last time."
With a cold click of the tongue, his expression grew even darker with impatience.
Just then, the reef beside him began to ripple like disturbed water.
From it, a pale figure wrapped in pitcher plants emerged halfway, wearing a strange, sly grin on his face.
"Ahhh, good evening, Lord Madara~"
"It seems the Third Mizukage has run into… an unexpected individual."
"Bailan? Who did he run into?"
Madara's brows furrowed as he asked in a cold voice.
The so-called Third Mizukage was none other than Bailan—a member of the Snow Clan, like the First Mizukage, Byakuren. Bailan had inherited all of Byakuren's Ice, Water, and Wind Release jutsu.
In the original history, he had attended the first Five Kage Summit as Byakuren's personal guard.
Serving as the personal guard and confidant of the founding Mizukage, he was the obvious choice to succeed the position. However, unlike the Fire, Wind, Earth, and Lightning nations, the second Mizukage turned out not to be Bailan, but the man later known to all—the "Little Mustache," Hōzuki Gengetsu.
The story behind that outcome was unknown to outsiders.
"It's that brat you took an interest in, remember?" Zetsu's face split into a mischievous grin.
"Uchiha Ci!"
Madara's gaze sharpened instantly. His eyes lit up with a pair of eerie, scarlet Three Tomoe Sharingan.
"Four days ago, you changed the plan—you didn't kill the Third Mizukage."
"Hehe... and now that guy's terrifyingly strong!"
Whoosh!
Crack! Crack! Crack!
A colossal blue skeletal Susanoo hand burst into existence, swiftly forming flesh and muscle to become a complete giant hand. It seized Zetsu in its grip, bones creaking as his body was crushed, sounding like a dying rat shrieking in agony.
"Gyaaahhh! Lord Madara! I was wrong!"
Madara stared down at him coldly.
"You said…"
"Uchiha Ci?"
"Didn't you report to me just the other day that brat was still in the Land of Lightning playing childish games?"
After the Hell Valley incident, Madara had ordered Zetsu to track Ci's movements.
He knew all about Ci's experiences in the Land of Lightning, and his plan to make the boy confront reality was proceeding methodically.
But now—
The chosen heir and the pawn meant to manipulate a hidden village were about to clash.
Two individuals destined to become enemies had met prematurely.
No matter how he looked at it, this was Zetsu's failure—an intelligence error!
Zetsu grimaced in pain and explained,
"Lord Madara, the kid meant to hold the Rinnegan is staying close to that brat. I couldn't get too near… It is your eye, after all—"
"By the time I picked up Uchiha Ci's trail, the two were already dangerously close."
"They met on the open sea. There was no avoiding it."
Boom!
Zetsu's white body burst apart, flesh and gore splattering across the reef. Madara abruptly rose to his feet.
He, who had been seated in the shadows and manipulating the entire world's direction from behind the scenes, hadn't expected a slip-up here.
Narrowing his eyes, he gazed out toward the horizon, letting out a long, deep breath.
"I hope… there's still time."
"Before that fool gets forced into revealing Wood Release!"
Madara leaned on his scythe and walked coldly toward the ocean, while behind him, the massive Gedo Statue cast a horrifying, ghostly shadow across the land.
"Otherwise—"
"No matter how much I admire you, Uchiha Ci…"
"If you become an element outside of the plan, you'll have to be discarded."
—
Elsewhere, upon the endless blue sea, a lone boat drifted at the junction between sea and moonlight.
"Damn it, the engine took on water?"
Down in the lower deck, Uchiha Ci held a repair manual and gave two frustrated kicks to the engine belching black smoke. He was clearly starting to feel the urge to scratch his head.
These Lightning Boats were a great innovation, sure—
But with new tech being rushed out so quickly, the support infrastructure just wasn't there yet. Faced with sudden breakdowns like this, he felt completely at a loss.
Ahem. Ci absolutely refused to admit it was because he was racing the boat too hard.
Looking at the increasing pile of disassembled parts at his feet, none of which he could put back together, Ci made a face like a boomer seeing a smartphone for the first time.
"Good thing I'm already on the turtle island's approach route."
"Now I just have to wait for the island turtle to swim over. As for getting back… I'll have to leave that to Orochimaru."
Realizing he had no talent for understanding machines by touch alone, Ci sighed, got up from the floor, and made his way to the deck.
"Well then…"
"With nothing else to do, I might as well test a few of my theories."
Sitting cross-legged on the deck, he glanced at the moon's position overhead.
Estimating that the island turtle would take about another hour to arrive,
Ci had no intention of wasting time.
This trip to Turtle Island was for exploring ways to further enhance his Sage Mode.
The island had two critical locations:
One was the Falls of Truth, which allowed a person to confront their inner darkness.
The other, after passing its test, was a training chamber where one could enter their mental world.
Mastering a Tailed Beast and mastering Sage Power followed a similar logic:
both involved taming a wild force that didn't belong to you.
By using the Falls of Truth to conquer himself and reach a state of mental emptiness, and then awakening his Mutated Sharingan again, he might be able to replicate what had happened in Ryūchi Cave—where, through the cat's-eye stone gifted by Tianxin Snake Princess, he had seen and grasped the high-concentration natural energy flowing throughout the cave.
If successful, it might let him prolong Sage Mode—or at least, accelerate its training speed.
Looking back on it, the moment he touched that stone, it felt like his entire spirit had been cleansed. His mind emptied out completely, achieving a strange state of oneness with nature.
That mental emptiness resembled the state described in the original work—the kind needed to master a Tailed Beast and become a perfect Jinchūriki.
Sneaking back into Ryūchi Cave to scam the White Snake Sage again wasn't realistic.
Plus, when she reverse-summoned him during the Hell Valley incident, he hadn't seen her wearing the cat's-eye stone anymore.
That might mean even in Ryūchi Cave, that kind of stone was a rare treasure.
That aside—
Even before reaching Turtle Island, there was one more thing Ci wanted to test.
Something from his status screen—seemingly powerful, yet up until now, offering him little real benefit—
[Innate Trait: Incomplete Ten Tails Body (S)]!
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