The five towering gates formed an absolute, inescapable prison. They bore a passing resemblance to the Rashōmon gates, but their aura was entirely different. The five gates were meticulously carved with incredibly lifelike murals of celestial demons, malevolent spirits, wrathful gods, and bloodthirsty rakshasas. The sheer pressure radiating from them was enough to shake a person's very soul.
The Five Fire Gods' Gate was one of the few S-rank Fire Style jutsu preserved within the Uchiha clan's ancestral shrine. It was an exceptionally practical, high-tier Ninjutsu that seamlessly integrated trapping, offense, and defense into a single technique. While its raw destructive output was slightly lower than specialized, single-target S-rank Jutsu, its versatility and massive area-of-effect made it far more dangerous on a battlefield.
The only flaw was its astronomical chakra cost.
Xuan watched Madara, whose palms were slammed into the dirt as he continuously pumped torrential amounts of chakra into the Jutsu. Xuan shook his head silently. The amount of chakra Madara was outputting had already exceeded the requirements for two standard S-rank Ninjutsu. Comparing oneself to this monster truly was a fast track to an early grave.
Suddenly, the demonic murals carved onto the five gates erupted with blinding light. Torrents of incandescent, white-hot chakra flames violently spewed inward. The entire space trapped within the gates was instantly reduced to an apocalyptic sea of fire. Aside from the suffocating, scorching heat, nothing else could be sensed.
"If you had a Jutsu like this, you should have used it from the start! Dawdling around like that gets people killed!" Xuan casually criticized, displaying absolutely zero tact as he admired the spectacular inferno.
Cough...
Madara coughed violently. His entire body trembled uncontrollably. Blood continuously spilled from the corners of his mouth, and thin crimson lines began tracking down from his nostrils and ears. "Shut... the hell up with your sarcastic remarks..." he wheezed weakly. "If you have a trump card, use it now! He's still holding on... I can't keep this up much longer..."
"How many seconds?"
"Three, at most."
"No problem."
Xuan stopped joking. His expression turned dead serious as he stared intently at the five towering gates. The three tomoe in his left eye began spinning with frenzied, blinding speed.
He was silently counting down in his head. He couldn't activate Kamui right now. Akikaze was currently completely enveloped by the Five Fire Gods' Gate. If Xuan triggered his spatial distortion now, the Kamui vortex would target the massive flaming gates themselves. Trying to forcefully drag a colossal, S-rank chakra construct of that magnitude into his pocket dimension would place an utterly unimaginable strain on his optic nerve. Xuan strongly suspected his left eye would instantly explode if he tried.
Therefore, he had to wait. He had to perfectly time his strike for the exact microsecond the gates collapsed.
One... two... three...
The exact second three seconds passed, the towering gates violently crumbled into ash.
"Kamui!" Xuan roared.
The faint outline of a triangular pinwheel materialized within his left eye. The space directly around Hyūga Akikaze violently warped and twisted.
"Eight Trigrams: Mountain Crusher!"
A blinding beam of hyper-condensed chakra violently erupted outward—one of the absolute strongest offensive techniques in the Hyūga clan's Gentle Fist arsenal, rumored to possess enough raw destructive power to obliterate a small mountain.
Inside the crumbling inferno, Akikaze was panting heavily. His body was covered in severe, blistering burns; he had clearly taken heavy damage. However, having danced on the razor's edge of life and death countless times, the Elite Jōnin knew perfectly well that the exact moment an enemy's ultimate attack ended was often their most vulnerable opening. Therefore, the second the flames died, he immediately launched his strongest counterattack, desperately hoping to seize the initiative.
Hm?
Akikaze suddenly frowned in confusion. His body felt incredibly heavy. A split second later, he realized it wasn't his body that was heavy—the very fabric of space around him was crushing inward, violently twisting into a vortex...
"Xuan! Dodge!"
Madara roared at the top of his lungs, forcefully dragging his exhausted, battered body to the side to avoid the incoming beam of pure destruction.
I want to dodge too, you idiot! But I'm actively channeling Kamui right now! A herd of alpacas wildly stampeded through Xuan's mind.
It wasn't technically impossible to dodge while casting Kamui, but the intense ocular focus severely crippled his physical reaction speed; there simply wasn't enough time to move out of the beam's path. As for using the Flying Raijin to teleport away? If he did that, this golden, hard-fought opportunity would instantly vanish. Kamui still needed exactly one more second to completely shred Akikaze and drag him into the void.
In that microsecond between life and death, countless thoughts raced through Xuan's mind. He had once heard a rumor in his past life that a cockroach's IQ temporarily skyrocketed to 240 in the exact moment before it was crushed. He had no idea if that was true, but right now, he felt his own IQ had definitely shattered the 240 barrier.
Because in that fraction of a second, he remembered a method to take an Elite Jōnin's ultimate attack head-on without moving a single inch.
Under normal circumstances, trying to tank the ultimate strike of an Elite Jōnin was suicide; even a Kage-level powerhouse would be heavily wounded. Naturally, this didn't apply if you possessed an immortal body, the Hundred Healings Mark, or a Sage's physique.
However, in the original story, there was a specific Jutsu that could completely rewrite reality, freely converting the boundary between illusion and reality, life and death. Furthermore, it was a Jutsu that any Uchiha could instinctively comprehend the moment they awakened a fully matured three-tomoe Sharingan.
Izanagi! The ultimate forbidden Jutsu sealed away by the Uchiha clan. A technique capable of overwriting reality to undo the user's death. The absolute price for casting it was the permanent loss of the Sharingan used.
The devastating beam of chakra violently pierced straight through Xuan's chest. He didn't flinch. He didn't move a single muscle. His left eye remained dead-locked onto Hyūga Akikaze.
The space around the Elite Jōnin twisted to its absolute limit. One second later, the vortex collapsed into a microscopic spatial singularity, completely erasing Akikaze from existence.
[Ding! Quest Completed: Sabotage the Hyūga Clan's Grain Hoarding Operation and assassinate the Hyūga Jōnin. Reward: 10,000 Points.]
The exact moment Akikaze was swallowed by the void, the System's emotionless voice chimed dependably in Xuan's mind.
Thud.
Xuan collapsed face-first into the dirt, muttering weakly, "Scamming piece of trash System... That was an Elite Jōnin, you bastard. Since when are standard Jōnin that heaven-defying..."
"Xuan!"
Dragging his exhausted, bleeding body, Madara frantically rushed over. "Hey! Say something! Are you dead?!"
"I wouldn't die even if you did," Xuan cursed irritably, his face still planted in the dirt.
"If you can still curse me out, that means you're still breathing." Madara patted his chest, letting out a massive sigh of relief. He knelt down and inspected Xuan carefully. He frowned in deep confusion. "Wait... this isn't right. I clearly saw that massive chakra beam blast a hole straight through your chest. Where is the wound?"
Madara scratched his head. Suddenly, his face went completely pale. He forcefully grabbed Xuan by the shoulders and hauled him up.
Just as he feared, the Sharingan in Xuan's right eye had turned completely dull and milky-white. All the vibrant, demonic light had vanished from the pupil.
"You used Izanagi!" Madara's voice was incredibly heavy, trembling with thick, crushing guilt. He covertly clenched his fists. This is all my fault. If I hadn't dragged Xuan along to complete this stupid mission, none of this would have happened. We wouldn't have run into an Elite Jōnin, and Xuan wouldn't have been forced to use a forbidden Jutsu like Izanagi. Losing a Sharingan was a devastating, irreversible tragedy. To an Uchiha, losing an eye meant half of their entire potential as a shinobi was permanently crippled.
"It's fine," Xuan said, swatting Madara's hands away. He quickly closed his right eye and immediately opened the System interface in his mind.
Glancing at his balance, he saw a clean 30,000 Points. A quick calculation confirmed the math: 10,000 points for completing the quest, 10,000 points for killing the Elite Jōnin, and his previous balance of 10,000 points.
"System, hurry up. Restore the ocular prowess of my right eye."
[Restore Ocular Prowess: 10,000 Points. Confirm redemption?]
"Confirm."
A miraculous, soothing warmth flooded into his deadened right eye. When Xuan opened it a second later, the milky-white film was completely gone. The blood-red iris had returned, and the three tomoe were spinning clearly and powerfully within.
Witnessing this impossible transformation, Madara's eyes nearly popped out of his skull. He was absolutely certain he hadn't hallucinated—Xuan's eye had been permanently blinded by Izanagi! Yet, in the literal blink of an eye, it had completely restored itself to perfect condition!
"Wh... what the hell is going on?!" Madara stammered, completely dumbfounded.
Xuan flashed a cheeky grin. "You wouldn't understand. It's an advanced application of my space-time Ninjutsu. You seeing me get pierced by that beam was actually just an optical illusion."
He spouted complete and utter bullshit with a perfectly straight face. No matter what happened, he could never, ever admit to using Izanagi. If word got back to the clan that he had used the forbidden Jutsu and somehow recovered his vision perfectly, the consequences would be catastrophic. Tajima was already deeply suspicious of him just for inventing a few new Jutsu; if he pulled off this miracle, the clan elders would probably strap him to an operating table and dissect him alive. At the very least, he'd be locked in an interrogation cell and tortured for his secrets. Xuan had zero doubt Uchiha Tajima was ruthless enough to do exactly that.
Having thoroughly deflected Madara's questions, Xuan let out a long breath and slowly stood up. "Let's go. Time to head back to the compound. And for the record, I am never, ever taking a mission with you again. Every single time I follow you, I end up fighting for my life against impossible odds. You should just legally change your name to 'Uchiha Death Trap.'"
As they bickered and limped away, their silhouettes slowly faded into the distance.
Speaking of which, Xuan suddenly thought, if I manage to save up enough points in the future... doesn't this mean I can literally just keep Izanagi active and fight like an immortal god?
Mulling over that terrifyingly overpowered prospect, the two boys disappeared into the dark, boundless forest.
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