The ruins of the Kaguro altar smoldered. Broken stone, shattered bones, and the fading remnants of a once divine light littered the ground. Raizen stood amidst the wreckage, his body trembling from the ritual's aftermath. His skin burned as though seared by fire, his Sharingan flickering wildly between eternal crimson and a strange silver hue that did not belong to the Uchiha.
The Guardian's broken mask lay before him, its hollow eye sockets staring upward as if mocking him.
Raizen clenched his fist. This power… it's not mine to wield. Yet, I must.
But power came with consequence. Already, whispers gnawed at his mind—ancient voices of the Kaguro clan, half-warnings, half-temptations.
> Kaguro Voices:
"You are not chosen… yet you have taken."
"You carry the curse we bore—the very curse that led us to extinction."
"Will you walk the same path, Raizen Uchiha?"
His breath grew heavier. "I did not endure this to fall to the same fate… I will bend this curse to my will."
As he staggered forward, a familiar sound reached his ears—bells.
A soft chime, rhythmic, deliberate. From the shadows of the valley, the monk Raizen had encountered earlier stepped forward. His robes were stained with ash, but his calm smile remained unchanged.
"You survived." The monk's voice was neither congratulatory nor condemning—it was a simple truth.
Raizen's eyes narrowed. "You… knew this power was here."
The monk tilted his head. "I knew someone would seek it. The Kaguro's hatred lingers for a reason."
Raizen's hand twitched toward his blade. "Then why didn't you stop me?"
The monk's eyes sharpened, for the first time showing a flicker of steel beneath the calm.
"Because this world may one day need you. But tell me, Raizen Uchiha… are you its salvation, or its destruction?"
The air thickened. Raizen could feel the monk's chakra—not immense in scale, but sharp, precise, honed like a blade. This man was no mere wanderer.
Raizen stepped closer, his bleeding eyes glowing faintly. "If you stand in my way… you'll have your answer."
The monk sighed softly, shaking his head. "So it begins. The path you walk now… is not one you can turn back from."
Behind them, the ruins groaned as though the Kaguro altar itself rejected Raizen's survival. The voices in his mind whispered once more—louder, hungrier.
> "You carry our vengeance now… against the Ōtsutsuki… against the world itself."
Raizen tightened his grip on his blade. "Then let the world curse me. I'll bear it."
And so, with his body scarred and his soul burdened, Raizen left the valley.
Each step carried not only his will… but the wrath of an extinct clan whose shadows now walked with him.
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