Chapter 6: The Legendary Ocular Art
Half an hour later.
As Uchiha Kagami leapt between branches, his expression suddenly shifted.
He spun mid-air, gripping a kunai in reverse and slashing behind him.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Four black silhouettes pierced through the air, attacking in quick succession.
After a brief exchange, the assailants broke away, each landing atop a different tree trunk around him.
Their positions formed a perfect encirclement.
"Stop struggling, Uchiha brat."
The leading Kumo-nin sneered.
His gaze slid toward Kagami's abdomen—where a deep, gaping wound had turned his makeshift bandages crimson.
Kagami said nothing.
But his eyes silently bled into scarlet, three tomoe spinning in their sockets.
"Don't look at his eyes!"
The squad captain barked the warning, lunging forward with his lightning-charged blade.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!"
Kagami flung a wave of shuriken as a massive fireball erupted from his mouth.
The captain's sneer deepened.
With Lightning Release strengthening his blade, cutting through a low-level fire jutsu was trivial.
But the next moment—
That "C-rank" fireball expanded dozens of times over in less than a second, its heat surging to monstrous levels.
The air twisted.
Space itself seemed to warp from the temperature.
A roaring inferno swallowed three of the Kumo-nin—including the captain—in an instant.
Kagami leapt, narrowly avoiding a spread of lightning racing across the ground behind him.
At the same moment, the tomoe in his right eye began to spin violently—
reshaping into a far more intricate, elegant pattern.
In the final Kumo-nin's stunned gaze, Kagami's kunai plunged into his heart.
The man never resisted—not once.
When it was over, Kagami staggered, barely keeping his balance as he landed on a distant treetop.
"Hah… hah… hah…"
He panted heavily, clutching his right eye. Blood streamed from between his fingers.
Even his left eye, though not bleeding, was webbed with crimson vessels.
The truth was clear:
Kagami knew he could not endure a prolonged battle.
To eliminate the four elite Kumo-nin in an instant, he had forced himself to use two Mangekyō Sharingan techniques at once.
---
"His right eye… a genjutsu? Or some kind of immobilization ability?"
From Uzumaki Chizawa's sensory report, Senju Morin silently analyzed the situation.
Judging from the Kumo-nin who died without resisting, the man had clearly fallen under Kagami's Mangekyō ability.
As for the other three…
Whether they were truly dead was still uncertain.
Even though Uchiha Kagami had displayed astonishing mastery over fire-nature transformation, Senju Morin still found it hard to believe that three full-fledged jōnin could be taken out by a single Great Fireball.
Uzumaki Chizawa clearly shared the same doubt.
Though the battle looked finished, he kept Kagura's Mind's Eye fully active.
But what he sensed next shocked even Morin.
"The three Kumo-nin… they really are dead. Burned completely to charcoal. I can't sense the slightest trace of chakra from any of them."
"So his left eye enhances ninjutsu… truly a rare Mangekyō ability."
Now certain of Kagami's condition and abilities, Morin didn't hesitate.
He and Chizawa burst forward, racing toward the Uchiha's location.
---
For an ordinary Uchiha, leaving aside the blindness caused by overuse, just activating a Mangekyō Sharingan technique placed a tremendous strain on the body.
And Kagami had awakened his Mangekyō only recently.
He could hardly wield its power smoothly.
Blood tears were merely the most visible symptom.
Then came blurred vision, sluggish reactions from chakra depletion, whole-body weakness, and cellular pain—
aftereffects caused by overusing Yin Release in the absence of sufficient Yang Release to balance it.
In truth, Kagami was lucky.
Jōnin were not fodder.
If even one of those four Kumo-nin had survived the inferno, Kagami would've been killed instantly.
Enduring the stabbing, burning ache throughout his body, Kagami stumbled a few steps before collapsing against the massive tree roots behind him.
His battered, overdrawn body resisted even the act of supplying him with more chakra.
He knew he was unlikely to make it back to Konoha.
But he did not regret his choices.
He believed that with the Hokage drawing off most of the pursuers, Hiruzen and the others would surely escape safely.
Kagami had already resolved:
If Konoha's reinforcements didn't reach him before he passed out, he would destroy his own Mangekyō eyes with his remaining strength.
Just as he reached into his pouch for another kunai—
"Kagami?!"
A shocked voice rang out.
Kagami lifted his head—
swish, swish!
Two figures suddenly appeared before him.
"Morin?! What are you doing here?"
Kagami was equally astonished.
At this distance, he could clearly see Morin's face and familiar Konoha forehead protector. The red-haired shinobi beside him was unmistakably an Uzumaki.
Seeing a Senju-Uzumaki pair together eased Kagami's tension; his exerted Sharingan faded back into ordinary black pupils.
"I felt something off about Kumo's eagerness for an alliance," Morin replied smoothly—as if rehearsed.
"So I accepted a mission near the Land of Frost. Figured I'd check things out."
His tone carried just the right amount of indignation toward Kumo.
"I knew those Kumo brutes couldn't be trusted! So the alliance was just a trap after all?"
Morin didn't forget to take the chance to examine Kagami.
Even as he spoke, he placed a hand on Kagami's abdomen, naturally channeling medical ninjutsu.
For a Senju—whose vitality and chakra reserves were famously high—learning medical ninjutsu was hardly difficult.
Hearing the word "Kumo," Kagami suddenly regained a spark of urgency.
He grabbed Morin's arm tightly.
"You came just in time, Morin! Hurry—go save the Hokage!"
"The alliance itself wasn't the problem—Gold and Silver betrayed the Land of Lightning! The Second Raikage has already been assassinated! Lord Hokage is fighting the brothers himself—"
But before he could finish, Kagami's consciousness was struck by an overwhelming blow.
His vision dimmed instantly, swallowed by thick darkness.
He didn't notice—
that countless inky-black sealing scripts were crawling across the grass toward his body.
Nor did he see the bright, unmistakable "Seal" character forming on his forehead…