Chapter 430: Collapse of Faith
In that instant.
Uchiha Obito's hand was mere millimeters from Nagato's eyelids! Seize it! He had to take it back! This was his final hope, the foundation supporting all his actions, all his sins!
However—
A ray of pure white light silently appeared in the gap between Obito's wrist and Nagato's eyes!
It was an energy sphere only the size of a ping-pong ball, radiating quiet and pure white light.
It appeared so abruptly, making Obito's pupils beneath the mask contract to pinpoints!
Death!
That was the sharpest alarm from the soul's deepest depths, the most primal instinct!
Rasengan: Solar Core.
Obito, relying on survival reflexes, forcibly terminated his grabbing motion, madly pouring all his chakra into his Mangekyo!
His body, including that right hand about to touch the white sphere, became ethereal at the critical moment! Merged into another dimension.
The white sphere calmly "passed through" his intangible wrist area.
Then it silently dissipated.
Clearly, the technique's user had reached a realm of perfect control.
Obito didn't even dare look at Naruto or that Uchiha woman again. Their strength far exceeded his own!
The Six Paths of Pain destroyed like toys—he'd already understood he absolutely couldn't match these two.
Retreat!
Without the slightest hesitation, not even bothering to check Nagato or Konan's reactions, Obito's thoughts raced frantically!
HUM!
Space around him twisted violently, forming a vortex-like entrance. His figure was sucked in, instantly disappearing without a trace.
Kamui dimension.
Eternal, lifeless gray tones. Countless massive square stone platforms floated in endless void.
THUD!
Obito's figure fell in miserably, heavily kneeling on one knee on the cold stone surface. The massive impact made his knee ache, but he was completely unaware.
"Hah... haah... haah..."
He gasped violently, chest heaving like bellows. Beneath the mask, his face twisted from extreme emotional impact.
Not merely because of that life-and-death danger just now, but more because... faith's collapse.
"Ugh... aaaah—!!"
Unable to suppress it any longer, he suddenly raised his hand, viciously tearing off that orange spiral mask from his face, violently smashing it to the ground with a crisp "crack!" The mask shattered, rolling into shadows.
What was revealed was that face—half grotesque, half normal, yet equally written with pain, madness, and collapse.
"UWAAAAAAAH—!!"
He raised his head, releasing an inhuman roar mixing despair, rage, unwillingness, and agony! The sound echoed through the empty, deathly Kamui dimension.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Chakra surged madly with runaway emotions!
Thick, twisted wooden vines and trunks like crazily growing monsters burst from the stone surface beneath his feet, from the surrounding void!
They spread chaotically, coiled, tore, madly destroying everything around that could be destroyed—those floating stone platforms were struck with tremendous force, crushed, transforming into smaller rubble drifting in the void.
However, no matter how Wood Release rampaged, no matter how he roared, how he destroyed this space belonging only to himself... that feeling surging from the soul's depths, bone-chillingly cold collapse, was like poison clinging to bone—utterly impossible to dispel.
The Moon's Eye Plan... is fake?!
That ultimate plan instilled in him by Uchiha Madara, which he'd worshipped as sole salvation, for which he'd betrayed everything, massacred companions, instigated war, dragged the entire world into the mire... from beginning to end was merely a deception?!
The Infinite Tsukuyomi... wasn't to create a world with Rin... but to transform everyone into White Zetsu... resurrect that Otsutsuki Kaguya?!
Then everything he'd abandoned, his identity and future as "Uchiha Obito"... every sin he'd committed—releasing the Nine-Tails killing his teacher's wife and countless villagers, manipulating the Hidden Mist creating the Bloody Mist, killing Yahiko, guiding Nagato toward obsession, participating in Tailed Beast capture causing turmoil...
All these abandonments and sins... what they'd exchanged for was merely a massive joke?! A pitiful chess piece identity making wedding clothes for others?!
"No... impossible... I don't believe it...!"
He muttered hoarsely, fists clenched tight, nails digging into palms, blood seeping out. He didn't want to believe! Absolutely couldn't believe! If this were true, then his entire life's meaning would completely become nihility and absurdity! More terrifying than death!
But... the evidence was too obvious.
Black Zetsu... that two-faced guy who'd always been by his side, advising him... had quietly slipped away before Naruto began his story!
His presence completely vanished—even Obito couldn't find the slightest trace. Just before he couldn't restrain himself and wanted to rush out to seize the Rinnegan, Black Zetsu had been "earnestly" dissuading him, saying things like "situation unclear," "plan long-term"...
And White Zetsu... those numerous, seemingly endless white creatures produced by the Gedo Statue... they were actually humans transformed by the Infinite Tsukuyomi a thousand years ago?!
The "tools" and "intelligence sources" he'd always commanded and utilized were essentially countless pitiful sacrifices stripped of humanity and future by Kaguya?!
If his "Moon's Eye Plan" succeeded... all living people, including himself, would become those muddled, thoughtless, manipulable White Zetsu?!
"Hah... haah... haah..."
Obito gasped heavily. The violent emotional impact made his vision darken repeatedly. Information like "Menma is actually Uzumaki Naruto" stirred no waves in his heart at this moment—he didn't care who his opponent was anymore.
The reason he'd recklessly, instinctively rushed out to seize the Rinnegan just now—in his heart remained only one final obsession supporting him from completely losing his mind on the spot.
Rinne Rebirth Technique.
Using the Rinnegan's power to resurrect Rin.
Even if the Moon's Eye was fake, even if the world would be destroyed, even if nothing had meaning anymore... at least, at least bring Rin back!
This was his final mental pillar, the only thing he still wanted to grasp in this absurd and dark world! With the Rinnegan, he could use that technique... he could...
But...
What if the path he'd walked from the beginning was wrong?
What if every choice made by his identity as "Uchiha Obito," from that boulder crushing half his body, witnessing Rin die under Kakashi's Lightning Blade, had step by step entered traps others carefully wove?
Obito slowly knelt to the ground, hands braced on the cold stone surface, head hanging deeply.
A thought he'd never dared contemplate deeply, always covered by obsession and hatred, quietly surfaced in his chaotic mind.
If...
If back then...
He hadn't chosen to follow "Madara"...
Hadn't accepted that "Moon's Eye" theory...
Hadn't worn this mask, hiding his identity...
But instead... returned to Konoha...
This hypothetical thought had barely risen when it branded his already numb soul like red-hot iron, bringing suffocating agony.
He suddenly raised his head, bloodshot right eye wide open, staring at the Kamui dimension's eternal, despair-inducing gray void. His throat could no longer produce any sound.
Only silent screaming, and that completely disintegrating psyche.
"Found you, inferior creature."
Suddenly, an ice-cold voice rang in his ear.
—Who?!
Obito's entire body bristled, violently turning around.
A figure was slowly walking into this absolutely private domain that should belong only to him, Uchiha Obito, from that fissure.
Golden hair, blue eyes. The newcomer's features bore seven or eight parts resemblance to Namikaze Minato, inheriting that "Yellow Flash's" handsome bearing. However, it was his eyes.
The left eye was familiar—belonging to the same lineage's azure blue.
But the right eye—that eye presented an entirely different, unsettling form: pitch-black base like the night sky, and flowing at that blackness's center was resplendent, mysterious golden pupil patterns.
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