Answer me, Uchiha Itachi," Yue demanded coldly, eyes blazing with fury. "Look around you—these people you slaughtered were ordinary Uchiha civilians. Most of them didn't even awaken the Sharingan, and some didn't have enough chakra to perform basic jutsu. They were just citizens—men, women, and children who carried the clan name!"
"So what did they do to deserve this?" Yue's voice trembled with restrained rage. "Did they offend you? Were they traitors? What sin justifies murdering toddlers who couldn't even form hand seals? Don't you feel any shame? Doesn't your conscience scream at you?"
Though Itachi was surprised to see him here, Uchiha Yue's sharp rebuke didn't falter. The suppressed anger in his tone carried a chilling edge, and the killing intent he released sent shivers through the air.
He had mentally prepared himself. He had expected to see bodies. But now, standing amid the blood-soaked ruins of his clan, watching the lifeless forms of two- and three-year-old children, something inside him snapped.
He truly wanted to rip open the hearts of Uchiha Itachi and the masked man to see whether those hearts had turned black… or whether they even existed at all.
"That's right! Itachi—you're the son of the clan head! You were supposed to protect us. You were the young patriarch! How could you do something so vile?"
"And that masked man—he has a Sharingan too! He must be Uchiha, yet he joined in this massacre? He's no better than a demon!"
"My son—he was only three! He couldn't even hold a kunai properly! You killed him!" a grief-stricken mother wailed, her voice hoarse from screaming.
"Monsters… you're both monsters…"
As Yue's condemnation rang out, the survivors he had saved joined him. One after another, they cried out in pain and hatred, glaring at Itachi with unrelenting fury.
"…I am sorry," Itachi finally said, his voice low and difficult to hear.
But as he spoke, his eyes once again became resolute—cold, like ice.
Shff!
He vanished in a flash of movement, and in the next instant, a gleaming blade swept toward Yue's neck.
"Hm?"
The sword passed through Yue's throat—or so it appeared. But Itachi immediately realized something was off. There was no resistance, no sensation of contact.
"Wind Style: Gale Palm!"
Before the thought finished forming in his mind, Yue struck back with a blast of cutting wind. The sudden gust exploded toward Itachi's position.
Boom!
The figure of Itachi was hit—only to burst into a storm of black crows, scattering in all directions.
"Wind Style: Thousand-Faced Tempest!"
Without hesitation, Yue formed another hand seal, summoning a swirling barrage of wind blades. The razor-sharp gusts shredded the crows mid-flight, feathers scattering into the wind like ash. But Itachi was nowhere among them.
Yue's Sharingan narrowed. His chakra surged beneath his feet.
Shunshin no Jutsu!
Boom!
An enormous fireball roared down from the night sky, incinerating the rooftop where he'd just stood. The sheer force of the Great Fireball Technique shattered tiles and engulfed the upper floor in flames.
"Tch… That's more like it, Itachi."
Yue reappeared atop a different rooftop, locking eyes with his attacker. "But if that's the extent of your power, you won't be killing me. And you certainly won't be erasing the Uchiha Clan tonight."
Itachi appeared again as well, his face stoic as ever. "So… you already knew. You're even stronger than I thought. That fire jutsu—it wasn't ordinary. And you used Wind Release expertly… I see now. You must have awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan."
"Or… was it you?" Itachi's tone sharpened. "The masked Uchiha who attacked the Hokage Building… the one who impersonated Madara."
As Itachi spoke, his eyes began to change. The swirling tomoe gave way to the familiar pinwheel shape of the Mangekyō Sharingan. His voice was calm, but his posture was guarded.
Even in such a brief encounter, Itachi could already tell—Uchiha Yue was no ordinary prodigy. His chakra control, his tactical precision, and most of all, his killing intent were those of a high-level shinobi. At his age, such strength could only be the result of awakening the Mangekyō.
If Yue wasn't the impersonator, then he was still a threat far greater than any remaining Uchiha.
"Hmph. So I made the first move and you followed through," Yue replied coldly. "But what shocked me most wasn't your betrayal—it was that the heir of our clan, the 'genius' everyone admired, would assist Konoha's higher-ups in destroying our entire bloodline."
"Don't tell me you're really planning to kill even your parents. Even your little brother."
Itachi's face twitched—just barely—but Yue saw it. His spiritual pressure faltered for half a heartbeat.
Despite Itachi's twisted reasoning, despite the path of slaughter he had chosen, the one line he had never truly crossed in his heart… was his love for Sasuke.
Yue's words struck that wound unerringly.
"Heh… Uchiha Yue, was it?"
A new voice echoed across the courtyard. From the shadows stepped the masked man—Uchiha Obito—his voice low and mocking.
"I didn't expect such a wild card to appear among the Uchiha. You've hidden your power well… What's your game?"
Obito's tone turned venomous. His right eye—an ominous Mangekyō—glared at Yue, radiating killing intent that distorted the space around it.
"How strong I am doesn't concern you," Yue shot back, his tone contemptuous. "What's truly disturbing is that you, a fellow Uchiha, have stooped so low. You helped orchestrate the slaughter of your own people."
"If your parents were alive, they'd disown you. And if the woman you loved saw you now… she'd never forgive you."
That last sentence struck deeper than a kunai.
Obito's body stiffened. Beneath his mask, his eyes widened. A tremor ran through him.
Because no matter how far he had fallen—no matter how much he lied to himself—there was one memory that had never died.
Rin.
She had always been his light, his dream, his reason for creating a peaceful world.
But now, with Yue's piercing words dragging the truth into the open, all Obito could see was how hideous he had become—how far he had strayed from the boy Rin once cared for.
"SHUT UP! DIE!!"
Snapping, Obito's Mangekyō flared violently. His figure blurred, and in the blink of an eye, he charged Yue with feral speed.
He no longer cared about the plan, or Konoha, or even Itachi. In his mind, there was only the crushing need to silence Yue.
Only by killing him could he bury his own shame.
Only then could he continue clinging to the delusion that Rin would still understand.