Chapter 207: Fugaku: "You Must Understand My Hardship!"
While the battle intensified on Ikeizumi Uchiha's side, the conflict within the Konoha Police Force building was also reaching its peak.
Fugaku Uchiha wore a grim expression, as if his parents had died.
He looked at Izumi Uchiha with deep disappointment.
This young woman, who once had such a good relationship with Itachi, had changed so much that he barely recognized her. She was even staging a coup against him, the Uchiha clan leader, in public, and there were several non-Uchiha outsiders present.
Facing the young woman's relentless questioning, Fugaku Uchiha clenched his fist, then slowly let go.
Fugaku said expressionlessly: "I have a clear conscience regarding the Uchiha clan, the Police Force, and Konoha Village."
He lowered his gaze, staring at Izumi, and slowly said: "Just because you alone believe I am unqualified to be the Uchiha clan leader and the Police Force Commander does not mean I must resign according to your wishes."
"I became the clan leader and the Commander back then because I had the recognition of the clan members and the approval of the Hokage."
"But what if we don't recognize you now?!" The person who suddenly interrupted was a Special Jōnin in the Police Force. This Special Jōnin was already a member of the Uchiha hardliners and had always found Fugaku Uchiha a profound eyesore.
The Uchiha Special Jōnin said bluntly: "The people who put you in the positions of clan leader and Police Force Commander were the old fogeys of the Uchiha clan."
"Now, those old fogeys have either died at Ikeizumi's hands or have retired and no longer concern themselves with clan affairs."
"It's now time for us, the younger generation, to choose the leader we recognize!"
When his words fell, other Uchiha clan members chimed in: "The moment you decided to protect Itachi Uchiha, you lost the right to lead the Uchiha clan! Not to mention that now, you are blatantly trying to oppose Absolute Justice."
"The Police Force Commander doesn't believe in justice... Ha! If this gets out, you will have completely disgraced the Police Force. What right do you have to lead us?"
Another Uchiha said coldly: "You say you have a clear conscience, which suggests you believe you've contributed to the Uchiha clan, yet we see no contribution from you."
"All we can see is the Uchiha clan being continuously ostracized by the village, and we see you talking to Koharu Utatane in a manner that is almost servile."
"If this counts as contributing to the Uchiha clan, then you might as well openly turn the Uchiha clan into the Hokage's dogs."
"If you did that, I might actually respect you for it. Because you would be openly trying to lead all our clan members to become the loyal servants of the Konoha Elders."
Fugaku Uchiha: "..."
He felt that many of his clan members had a deep misunderstanding of his actions.
He had no intention of being a "loyal servant" to the Konoha Elders.
But in this emotional uproar, Fugaku realized that even if he tried to explain, they probably wouldn't listen. They would only believe what they wanted to believe and what they saw.
Fugaku Uchiha took a deep breath, gazing at the assembled Police Force ninja, but he didn't address them further. Instead, he turned his attention to the other Uchiha clan members present.
Not all of these members were ninja; most were Uchiha civilians who hadn't awakened the Sharingan.
These people were actually the majority of the Uchiha clan.
However, their voices were usually drowned out by the voices of the ninja.
Fugaku Uchiha held a glimmer of hope that these Uchiha civilians, who were quite distant from [Absolute Justice] in their daily lives, might understand the hardships of their clan leader.
"What do you think?" Fugaku Uchiha asked them.
He was trying to give the Uchiha civilians a chance to speak.
But the next second, Fugaku Uchiha regretted it.
"...Lord Fugaku, if you truly cared for the Uchiha clan, why did you protect Itachi Uchiha?" a slightly older, gray-templed Uchiha civilian asked with courage: "Is it because he is your eldest son that you had to keep a massive hidden danger who would eventually massacre the Uchiha clan?"
"Before Ikeizumi Uchiha killed Itachi Uchiha, every one of us lived in constant fear. Afraid that one day we would wake up to see not our family, but the butcher knife in Itachi Uchiha's hand. We were terrified of becoming a casualty of his blade."
"To avoid him, I even secretly moved my child out of the Uchiha clan compound and let him live somewhere else in the village. We... we were already this scared."
He looked at Fugaku and continued: "If Ikeizumi Uchiha hadn't stepped in to stop the ultimately crazed Itachi Uchiha a while ago."
"All of us would have been killed by him! We civilians have no power to resist a ninja!"
The sincere voice of the Uchiha civilian left Fugaku speechless.
Fugaku Uchiha remained silent for several seconds before finally uttering phrases like, "Actions that haven't been truly executed aren't strictly considered evil," "I also had my difficulties; he is, after all, my child," and "Itachi is not as extreme as you think."
However, his heartfelt words only made the Uchiha civilians look at him with even deeper disappointment.
Fugaku Uchiha suddenly realized that his thoughts and the thoughts of his clan members were fundamentally on different wavelengths.
They couldn't understand him, just as he and they couldn't understand Itachi.
"Fugaku..."
An elderly Uchiha civilian coughed. His face, wrinkled with age, said to Fugaku Uchiha: "You have been the clan leader and the Police Force Commander for so long... Alas, if you truly respect the opinions of your clan members as your demeanor suggests, then it is time for you to rest."
"What made you think that Lava Release was my only method?"
Facing the tens of thousands of frantically surging Curse Mark black snakes, Ikeizumi Uchiha clapped his hands together expressionlessly.
"Wind Release: Spiraling Shuriken..."
This was a Rank-A Ninjutsu he had "dropped" from Danzō Shimura.
"Vacuum Serial Great Orb."
Puff! Puff! Puff! Puff In an instant, it was as if dozens of invisible giant cannons simultaneously fired in the narrow corridor.
Translucent "Wind Orbs," each over a meter in diameter and condensed to the point of being almost physical, materialized out of thin air.
The Wind Orbs, carrying a chilling shriek of tearing air, ruthlessly slammed into the black tide of snakes!
The impact of every "Vacuum Great Orb" triggered a small localized storm!
The terrible part wasn't the direct impact force, but the chaotic, super-high-speed vacuum wind blades formed by the extreme compression of the Wind Release!
Slaash!!!
The first wind orb landed in the core of the snake mass. In that instant, the air was immediately sucked out within a radius of several meters from the impact point!
Dozens of hideous black snakes couldn't even let out a death cry. Their iron-hard scales tore and warped like paper, and along with the ninja tools in their mouths, they were forcibly crushed and ripped apart by the invisible, tyrannical wind blades.
They were ultimately ground into a crimson mist mixed with blood foam and metal dust!
"Flesh and blood flying" couldn't even begin to describe this instantaneous, complete disintegration!
Puff! Puff! Puff! Puff!
Subsequent giant wind orbs fell one after another, exploding in bursts of scarlet blood mist throughout the black snake tide, like a devastating sweep.
The mutated scales, which could briefly resist the high temperatures of the magma, were as fragile as thin ice under the extreme cutting and pressure crushing of the Wind Release.
The entire corridor was filled with the stench of blood and pulverized metal dust.
It was a slaughterhouse from hell!
Orochimaru's golden vertical pupils suddenly constricted. Not from heartache over the loss of the snakes, but because one particularly cunning "Vacuum Great Orb," after tearing through every obstacle in its path...
Continued to fly straight toward his face with a chilling whistle, its momentum completely unchecked.
The Kusanagi Sword in his mouth slid out like a nimble snake, leaving behind slick saliva, while its length rapidly retracted to a manageable meter-plus.
Orochimaru swung the sword, slicing through the gigantic wind orb.
There was no earth-shattering collision. The condensed wind orb was precisely split open by Orochimaru's Kusanagi Sword! The chaotic vacuum wind blades and airflow inside the halved wind orb whistled past his body, cutting two deep grooves into the wall behind him.
"Hmm?!"
The next second, Orochimaru's feet suddenly sank into the ground. He immediately looked down and saw that the ground beneath his feet had, at some unknown point, turned into a muddy swamp. Looking up, thousands of black snakes were also trapped in the swamp, struggling and writhing within it.
"Wind and Earth Release Ninjutsu... Is he that proficient in those too?"
Just as Orochimaru's mind was momentarily distracted by the swamp beneath his feet.
A pre-existing, terrifying wave of heat and chakra, seemingly capable of boiling the entire space, suddenly erupted from the direction of Ikeizumi Uchiha!
And it was even more terrifying than any previous instance.
Boom, Rumble, Roar, Roar, Roar
This time, the magma torrent was like the first world-ending breath spat out by a fully awakened, sleeping volcano! It was no longer a horizontal impact but a savage, turbulent pillar that shot straight up into the sky with the absolute determination to incinerate everything!
The crimson pillar of magma effortlessly pierced through countless layers of steel-reinforced concrete. The sturdy structure of the human experimentation research base was like a toy made of paper in the face of this pure catastrophic power.
The entire underground base vibrated violently, groaned, and disintegrated.
Giant metal beams twisted and snapped like noodles, and the alarm was drowned out by the deafening roar of the collapse!
"What is he doing... trying to destroy all my hard work?"
Orochimaru watched the world-destroying crimson pillar of magma penetrate the clouds, staining the thick clouds a thousand meters above with a dark-red hue.
The rolling dense smoke was like a world-ending pillar connecting heaven and earth.
The foul odor of sulfur permeated for several kilometers.
The immense tremor continued incessantly. Crushed rocks rained down into the mud, splashing up murky sludge. A slight, ominous premonition in his heart made Orochimaru couldn't help but continuously stare upward.
"Meteorite..."
"Volcano."
Whether it was an illusion or not, Orochimaru thought he heard a few short words spoken by Ikeizumi Uchiha amidst the noise of the collapse.
......................
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