When Chiya opened his eyes again, the harsh sunlight made him instinctively raise a hand to block it.
Fine dust floated in the light seeping through the gaps between his fingers. The scent of earth and fresh vegetation filled his nostrils.
This was absolutely not the smell that belonged inside the Dragon Vein tower.
He jolted upright. Beneath him was soft moss. Towering trees surrounded him, blocking out the sky.
"Where the hell did I end up? Is this even the ninja world?"
The crimson Sharingan activated. The large trees within his field of vision were actually slightly blurred and doubled.
The Sharingan glowed faintly in the dimness, yet within his vision he could not catch even a trace of any chakra flowing in the surroundings.
He remembered the Dragon Vein going out of control in the final moment. The skeletal frame of Susano'o had shattered within the green energy.
His Susano'o had expanded rapidly and then shifted form, all the way to the third form before it was no longer eroded.
After the Dragon Vein energy dispersed, he ended up in this godforsaken place.
The soft sound of flowing water came from his left.
Chiya pushed aside a hanging vine. A clear, shallow stream was winding its way through the forest.
The water's surface reflected back his slightly pale face. Aside from his hair being a little disheveled and his vision being somewhat reduced, nothing seemed to be particularly wrong.
"System, System!"
"Did I complete my task?"
Chiya stirred his mind.
He waited a moment, and then the system notification tone finally sounded.
[Congratulations, Host, on completing the Dragon Vein Resolution Mission.]
[Reward: One Mangekyō Sharingan Upgrade Card. Upon successful upgrade, it will become the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan.]
[Reward has been distributed. Does the Host wish to use it immediately?]
Chiya did not agree right away. He returned his attention to his surroundings.
He cast a wary look around, then activated the high-speed Body Flicker Technique and moved swiftly through the forest.
After finding a relatively quiet and safe bamboo grove, he silently called out to the system in his mind.
"System, use the upgrade card!"
A cold current of chakra moved through his body. The Sharingan that had just been activated surged with a sudden violent burst of ocular power.
The three-tomoe pattern instantly transformed into a six-petal crimson Spider Lily design.
At the tips of the six petals, a black line appeared on each one, extending all the way to the edge of the eye.
Six straight lines, more like spiral-shaped markings.
As the ocular power surged, the blurry sensation from moments before vanished instantly.
His eyes, and especially his vision, became incomparably sharp and clear.
[Congratulations, Host! Upgrade Card used successfully!]
[Congratulations, Host! Successfully upgraded to the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan!]
Chiya felt the vast ocular power within his eyes, and his mood swelled with excitement.
'Now that I have the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan, I never have to worry about going blind from overusing my eyes again!!'
'The era of being cautious every time I used my eyes is finally over!'
'From now on, I can use my eyes without any restraint!!'
Chiya swept his gaze outward. The fur on the back of a distant rabbit was visible to him in perfect clarity.
'These eyes are truly wonderful.'
'Today, I'll have roasted rabbit.'
A dark crimson glow flashed from Chiya's body.
A large skeletal dark crimson hand reached out and grabbed toward the distant rabbit.
Chiya watched as the hand formed by Susano'o seized the rabbit, which had already fainted.
He drew his kunai and got to work.
"System, pull up my character panel!"
He handled the rabbit while splitting his focus to check his panel.
[Name: Uchiha Chiya]
[Age: 22]
[Chakra: 49 kaka]
[Special Abilities: Senju Clan Constitution, Sharingan (Eternal Mangekyō), Ice Style, Lava Style]
[Skills:
Mangekyō Ocular Jutsu: The Far Shore of the Yellow Springs, Cycle of Cause and Effect, Tsukuyomi
Forbidden Jutsu: Izanagi, Izanami
Sword Mastery, Susano'o, Medical Ninjutsu Mastery, Fire Style Mastery, Genjutsu Mastery, Blade Mastery, High-Speed Body Flicker Technique, Shadow Clone Jutsu, Three Bodies Technique, and others]
Chiya paused his movements.
The smile on his face grew three shades wider.
"Not bad at all. My chakra actually increased by 10 Kakashi's! This trip was truly a great haul!"
Chiya neatly tied the rabbit to a stick nearby and set up a simple frame.
He began to roast it.
Before long, one rabbit was down his throat, barely enough to take the edge off his hunger.
He got to his feet and followed the stream downstream.
The vegetation gradually thinned.
As the distance closed, a run-down village slowly came into view.
The rammed-earth walls were less than two people tall. Several farmers in coarse linen clothing were turning the soil with bone-made farm tools.
When Chiya's figure appeared at the village entrance, the first to notice him was an old farmer who let out a terrified scream.
"Enemy attack! A spy from the Feather Country!"
Drumbeats instantly rang through the village.
More than twenty young and able-bodied men rushed out, holding sickles and hoes, and surrounded Chiya on all sides.
Their skin was dark and weathered. Their hands and feet were covered in calluses. Their eyes shone with a wariness like that of wild animals.
"I'm just passing through!"
"He's lying!"
A gap-toothed boy suddenly shouted.
"You must be their spy. You're here to scope out our country for an attack!"
The crowd immediately grew restless.
Seeing the villagers in the front row already raising their hoes, Chiya silently closed his eyes.
As the battle cries rang out.
Chiya's eyes snapped open.
The Mangekyō Sharingan with its complex patterns appeared before everyone, and an ice-cold, terrifying aura erupted from Chiya's body.
The dark crimson Susano'o condensed in the blink of an eye.
Initial state, first form, second form...
It did not stop until the third form, the Karasu Tengu armor state.
The cold, powerful, terrifying aura made all the farmers who had been advancing tremble uncontrollably.
The few farmers nearest to Chiya were sent tumbling directly by the pressure wave.
In an instant, the entire village fell dead silent.
An elder's wooden staff dropped to the ground with a crisp sound.
Then everyone dropped to their knees in unison, pressing their foreheads to the ground, mouths murmuring prayers that were incomprehensible.
"Amaterasu-Ōmikami..."
"Takemikazuchi-no-Kami has appeared..."
"Please forgive our offense..."
Chiya looked at the group of trembling people and gave a slight shake of his head.
He had wanted to gather some information, and now it had come to this. He had been taken for a divine being.
The elder crawled forward on his knees and held up a necklace of beast teeth in both hands, raising it high above his head.
"Honored Heavenly Deity, please accept our humble offering. We are willing to recognize you as our new lord. We only ask for your protection so our village is not harmed by the Feather Country."
"Wait."
Chiya had no interest in any of these things.
"Do you have any scrolls that record history? Or a map?"
The villagers looked at each other.
Finally a girl with braided hair spoke up timidly.
"Does the great deity mean the rope-knot records used by the shrine maiden? The flood last year washed them away."
Chiya pressed a hand to his forehead.
'Could this be a primitive civilization where even written language has not yet become widespread?'
Damn it. He had been laying groundwork for so long preparing for the Third Great Ninja War, building up the Uchiha, uniting Konoha.
And right when everything was about to kick off, the Dragon Vein just transported him away?
Chiya stirred his mind and asked the system.
"System, System, is this still the Naruto world?"
After receiving a series of busy tones, the system gave no answer.
Chiya looked at the people before him and in the end accepted the beast tooth necklace and slipped it onto his hand.
Right now, the most important thing was to figure out exactly where he was.
The moment Chiya accepted it, a whole new round of bowing and prostrating immediately broke out.
By the time the sun was setting in the west, he had been invited into the largest thatched hut in the village.
Which amounted to nothing more than a few extra animal hide mats on the floor.
After night fell, Chiya stood on the watchtower at the village entrance and gazed into the distance.
Without chakra, the world was eerily quiet. The starry sky was unusually bright.
Suddenly, a streak of white light like a shooting star crossed the northern sky and fell. The flash of chakra that appeared and vanished in an instant made Chiya's entire body jolt.
"Chakra? Could this still be the Naruto world?!"
"That feeling..."
He leaped from the watchtower without hesitation and sprinted toward the direction where the light had disappeared.
The villagers called out in alarm and chased after him, but all they saw was a figure vanishing into the mountain forest under the moonlight.
The bamboo grove rustled in the night breeze.
Chiya slowed his steps. His Sharingan captured the traces of chakra left in the air. It was pure and free of any elemental nature, yet so vast it was staggering.
When he pushed aside the last bamboo leaf, he froze in place as though he had been struck by lightning.
On a moonlit clearing, a silver-haired girl was bent over, gently stroking a wilted wildflower.
She wore a pure white feathered robe, its hem swaying without any wind. Two red cinnabar markings on her forehead shone piercingly red under the moonlight.
Most startling of all were her eyes. Pure white irises with no pupils, yet light like flowing starlight moved within them.
She seemed to sense his gaze.
The girl tilted her head slightly, and silver hair cascaded from her shoulder like a waterfall.
The instant their gazes met.
"You."
Her voice was ethereal, not like that of any mortal.
"You carry something familiar to me."
---
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