The moment the template integrated, his mind had been drowned in visions. Not just battle techniques or chakra mastery — but entire lives.
He saw himself as a boy again, not in Gotham, but in Konoha. Training beneath the gaze of the clan, praised as a prodigy. He remembered holding his infant brother Sasuke, promising silently to always protect him. He remembered fire jutsu, water jutsu, shuriken drills — the natural genius that flowed like breath.
And then the darkness.
The suspicion. The whispers of revolt. The orders from Konoha's elders. The night when crimson eyes saw his own clan fall one by one, cut down by his blade. The tears he never let fall as Sasuke's scream echoed in the night.
Itachi Wayne collapsed to his knees in his Gotham room, clutching his skull as the flood of memories ripped through him. His breath came in ragged gasps.
"They… were my family…" His voice trembled, though he knew logically they weren't. Yet his heart — his soul — felt otherwise. The sorrow wasn't foreign. It was his.
The weight of Itachi Uchiha's sins fused into his being, the grief of impossible choices pressing down on him like iron chains.
Something inside him snapped — or perhaps awakened.
His Sharingan spun wildly, the tomoe twisting, merging, bleeding into something darker. His vision sharpened into painful clarity, black flames licking at the edges of his mind.
The Mangekyō Sharingan had opened.
And with it came power. Terrible, beautiful power.
The crows in the rafters screeched, scattering into the night as if they too felt the awakening. Shadows bent toward him, chakra swirling violently before settling like a storm contained.
The System chimed softly.
[Template Memory Integration Complete]Memories integrated: Childhood, Shinobi Training, Genius Intellect, Strategic Personality, Empathy, Clan Massacre.Note: Emotional weight and trauma fully transferred.
[Mangekyō Sharingan Awakened]Abilities Unlocked:
Tsukuyomi (Incomplete)
Amaterasu (Black Flames)
Enhanced Genjutsu & Perception
Mangekyō Potential: Susanoo (Locked)
Itachi sat still, eyes burning with the crimson-black glow of his Mangekyō. He felt the immense energy surging through him, but also the ache — the deep sorrow embedded in every fiber of his soul.
And yet, through the pain, he smiled faintly.
"…So this is the price of true power. Burdens. Sacrifice. Guilt." He closed his eyes, breathing deeply. "If I must bear them… then I will."
Days passed. Gotham didn't know what had changed, but whispers spread faster than the plague.
Criminals swore that red-eyed illusions drove men to madness, their minds shattered in an instant. Others said a warehouse had been consumed by black flames that even water could not extinguish.
The underworld now feared two names: Batman, a shadow in the making… and the Uchiha Phantom, a ghost who haunted their nightmares.
But Itachi Wayne no longer thought of himself as phantom.
He was shinobi, genius, strategist, bearer of sorrow.
Not just Bruce Wayne's cousin. Not just a boy with a system.
He was Itachi Uchiha — reborn.
And with Mangekyō eyes now open, his path in this world of gods had only begun.