NYP Ch. 118

It was another clan meeting day for the Uchiha.

Shisui had just finished briefing Minato on the latest developments within his clan. He left the Hokage Building and started making his way toward the Naka Shrine, where the meeting would be held. The sun was beginning to set.

He was maybe three blocks from the compound when a figure stepped out of an alley directly into his path.

Danzō.

Shisui stopped immediately, Minato's warning from earlier flashing through his mind. His eyes sharpened and his right hand moved subtly to rest on the ninja tool pouch at his waist.

"Danzō-sama, is there something you need?"

Danzō took a step closer, then another. His cane tapped rhythmically against the street as he approached.

"I've heard you intend to persuade Fugaku to have the Uchiha abandon their actions against the village. Is that true?"

Shisui's feet shifted slightly, widening his stance and creating more distance between them.

"That's right. The Uchiha are part of Konoha. I'll make the clan understand that we can't turn on our own people."

"The Fourth Hokage has worked hard to integrate the Uchiha into the village since taking office," Danzō said calmly. "Your clan supported him for a long time. Yet now you choose confrontation anyway, even planning a coup. So tell me, Shisui."

He took another step forward.

"How would you persuade someone as stubborn as me? Someone who doesn't change their mind easily?"

"I—"

Danzō exploded into motion, his left hand shooting toward Shisui's face. His fingers aimed directly for the young Uchiha's right eye.

The three tomoe in Shisui's eyes spun violently.

Danzō's body froze. His hand stopped centimeters from Shisui's face.

Shisui grabbed Danzō's wrist. "You'll wake up soon enough."

He released his hold and turned to leave, and as he did, pain exploded in his gut.

WHAM!

A fist drove into his abdomen. The impact folded him in half, driving all the air from his lungs. Blood sprayed from his mouth as he doubled over, eyes going wide.

Danzō stood beside him, perfectly fine. The figure caught in the genjutsu dissolved like mist.

Before he could even react, Danzō struck again. Punch to the head, kick to the ribs, elbow to the spine. Each strike came from an angle Shisui couldn't defend against, his body still locked in pain from that first blow. His vision blurred and his thoughts scattered. The world tilted sideways as consciousness started slipping.

Through the haze, he felt Danzō's hand clamp into his hair. A moment later, he was airborne, hurled upward.

Gravity took over, and he began to fall. As he dropped, Danzō's hand swept past his face one last time.

SLASH!

Blood erupted.

Agony tore through Shisui's skull as fingers dug into his eye socket and wrenched hard. Tissue tore as nerves screamed, and the world turned red.

A Mangekyō Sharingan came free in Danzō's grip, trailing strings of gore.

Shisui hit the ground. He clutched at his face instinctively, his hand coming away slick with blood that poured endlessly from the ruined socket. His remaining eye locked onto Danzō.

The war hawk was unwrapping the bandages around his own face. As the cloth fell away, it revealed his right eye. Shisui watched as the eye's color drained.

"Izanagi," Shisui whispered, understanding crashing down on him.

Danzō had used a forbidden technique capable of rewriting reality itself just to ambush him. The sheer waste of it was almost more shocking than the attack itself. Danzō held up Shisui's Mangekyō, examining it.

"This eye will serve as my new right eye," he said. Then his gaze shifted back to Shisui's remaining eye, and his smile widened. "As for the other one... I'll take that too."

A dozen Root ninjas emerged from the shadows, surrounding Shisui in a tight circle.

Shisui forced himself to move despite the pain threatening to drag him under. His hands blurred through seals, muscle memory taking over where conscious thought failed.

"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!"

Chakra gathered in his chest and throat, building pressure before erupting outward. A massive sphere of flame roared to life, expanding rapidly as it hurtled toward Danzō and his Root operatives. The heat was intense enough to warp the air.

The Root ninjas moved as one, their hands forming identical seals.

"Water Release: Wild Water Wave!"

Torrents of water burst from their mouths, converging into a wall that crashed into Shisui's fireball. The collision created an explosion of steam that instantly engulfed the entire street.

HISSSSS...

White mist billowed everywhere. Visibility dropped to nothing within seconds.

Shisui didn't waste the opportunity. He channeled chakra through his body and activated his signature technique.

Body Flicker Technique.

His form blurred and vanished, moving faster than the eye could track. By the time the steam began to clear, he was already gone.

"After him! Don't let him escape!"

The Root ninjas scattered immediately, leaping to rooftops and racing through alleys in pursuit of their target.

Danzō remained standing in the street. He looked out at Konoha painted gold and red by the setting sun. His gaze dropped to the Mangekyō Sharingan in his palm. It was still pulsing faintly.

Soon, he thought. Once I transplant this eye, my power will reach an entirely new level.

A shadow moved.

Something fast, too fast to track properly, lunged at him from the side. His instincts screamed danger but his body was already moving too slowly. The figure closed the distance in a heartbeat.

SLASH!

A kunai cut across his wrist. Pain erupted as the blade carved through skin, muscle, and bone. He felt his hand suddenly go light. The section of his palm holding Shisui's Sharingan separated from his arm. It fell, taking the Mangekyō with it. Blood streamed from the stump, soaking everything beneath it.

The masked figure's other hand shot out and caught the severed piece mid-fall, plucking the Sharingan from dead fingers. Then that same hand formed a fist and drove into Danzō's face.

CRACK!

Bone crunched. Danzō's head snapped back from the impact.

Before he could recover, the masked man grabbed his hair, exactly as Danzō had done to Shisui moments ago. He yanked upward viciously, hurling the man into the air.

As Danzō fell back down, fingers jammed into his right eye socket. The already-dead Sharingan that had burned out from Izanagi was torn free.

SQUISH!

Finally, the masked figure pivoted and drove his foot into Danzō's chest. The kick sent him flying backward several meters. He crashed into the ground hard, clutching at his ruined face and bleeding wrist.

"Why..." Danzō gasped, looking up at the tiger-striped mask through his remaining eye. "Did you tell me about Shisui's information just so you could—"

The masked figure didn't respond. He simply examined the two Sharingan in his possession. Then he pocketed them and walked forward.

Danzō quickly pushed himself upright despite the pain. His hand moved to his weapons pouch, fingers closing around a kunai. When the figure closed the distance, his hand shot out and grabbed Danzō's hair, yanking his head back roughly.

Danzō's free hand came up fast, driving the kunai toward the figure's exposed wrist. The blade struck and sank into flesh.

No reaction.

The figure's other hand came up, palm pressing flat against Danzō's forehead.

WHAM!

Danzō felt his skull cave inward, bone fragmenting under pressure that seemed to come from nowhere. His vision went white, then red, then black. The last thing he registered was the crunch of his own brain matter being compressed.

His body went limp.

Three seconds later, reality twisted.

He appeared about five meters away, fully intact, gasping for air. Izanagi had activated again, rewriting his death as an illusion. Another Sharingan on his right arm turned grey and lifeless.

Eight left.

The figure was already moving toward him again.

Danzō formed hand seals rapidly. "Wind Release: Vacuum Wave!"

A blade of compressed air shot from his mouth. The figure dodged to the left, and the attack missed, carving a deep gouge in the ground behind him.

Danzō used the opening to create distance. This opponent could be hit when attacking. That was the opening he needed.

The figure circled to the side.

Another vacuum blade followed. This time, the figure leapt over it and closed the distance while still airborne. Danzō hurled a kunai, an explosive tag wrapped tightly around its handle.

BOOM!

Smoke and debris erupted. But the figure emerged completely unharmed, landing in a crouch and launching forward immediately.

Danzō brought his cane up defensively but the figure batted it aside. A fist crashed into his jaw. Before he could recover, a knee drove into his solar plexus.

The figure grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into the ground. Then he raised his foot and brought it down on Danzō's head.

CRUNCH!

Reality twisted as Izanagi rewrote death.

Danzō reappeared behind the figure this time, already moving. His hand blazed with wind chakra, fingers extended like a blade. He drove it forward, aiming for the spine.

The figure twisted fast, but not quite fast enough. The wind-enhanced strike caught his left arm just above the elbow, cutting deep and severing it completely.

Blood sprayed across Danzō's face.

The figure disengaged immediately, creating distance between them as his severed arm hit the ground.

Danzō wiped the blood from his eye, breathing hard but feeling a surge of satisfaction. "Finally drew blood from you. Not so untouchable after—"

His throat constricted.

The words choked off. He tried to inhale but his airway had sealed shut. His hand went to his throat, confusion turning to alarm as his lungs burned for oxygen.

What the hell?

The realization hit him a second before consciousness slipped away. Something was in the blood. His vision collapsed inward, sound stretching and warping as his legs failed him.

Izanagi activated.

Danzō appeared near the position where he'd died, gasping and immediately stumbling backward. The blood had been poisoned. Some kind of contact toxin that worked through skin absorption or inhalation.

Before he could reach safety, something tore through his back. He looked down and saw fingers pushing out through his chest, wrapped tight around his still-beating heart. Then the hand clenched, and his heart ruptured.

Danzō's body went limp as the hand withdrew. He pitched forward, blood pouring from the gaping wound.

Reality twisted again, and another Sharingan turned grey.

When Izanagi reformed his body, he saw what had killed him. The arm he had severed moments earlier was moving back toward the figure. As Danzō watched, it reached the stump above the elbow and reattached itself without a trace.

The figure flexed his restored hand, testing the reconnection. Then he started forward again.

Danzō materialized farther away this time. Only six Sharingan were left. He had already died four times in less than two minutes, yet his opponent showed no sign of slowing.

The figure advanced one more step and stopped.

Multiple chakra signatures were closing in at high speed. The sounds of the fight had finally drawn notice. ANBU were only seconds away.

Smoke suddenly erupted from the figure's feet, forming thick clouds that spread rapidly and obscured everything. Danzō raised his hand in defense, wind chakra gathering as he prepared to blow it away.

By the time the smoke cleared, the figure was gone.

Root operatives materialized around Danzō moments later.

---

The masked man appeared in a secluded forest far from the ambush site. Trees towered overhead, their canopy swallowing the last of the daylight. Fallen leaves covered the ground and crunched softly underfoot.

He pulled out a sealing scroll and unrolled it across the ground. His hands pressed against the paper and chakra flowed through the seal matrix.

POOF!

A glass container appeared in a puff of smoke. It was filled with green nutrient solution that sloshed gently as it materialized.

The masked figure placed both Sharingan into the container. Shisui's Mangekyō floated beside Danzō's lifeless eye, suspended in the preserving fluid. He watched them for a moment, then resealed the container back into the scroll.

As he tucked the scroll away, his hands came together in a seal. His head snapped toward a large tree about twenty meters away.

His form flickered and appeared beside the trunk in an instant. His fist cocked back and drove forward.

BOOM!

The tree trunk exploded on impact. Splinters and bark scattered in all directions. The ground collapsed beneath the point of contact, sending dirt erupting into the air. A white figure was hurled from its hiding place and crashed into the earth several meters away.

The masked man walked over calmly. He reached down and grabbed the creature by its strange green hair, lifting it easily.

White Zetsu.

Its pale face was twisted in surprise and pain.

Another sealing scroll appeared in the masked man's free hand. He activated it, drawing the White Zetsu into the seal as its body dissolved into a swirl of ink.

He stood motionless and extended his senses outward, searching for any other presence that might have witnessed what had just occurred.

There was nothing. The forest was empty except for him.

Satisfied, he vanished and emerged in a new location, even more remote than the last. A rocky outcropping lay beneath his feet, far from any roads or settlements. He surveyed the area one final time, confirming that he was completely alone.

Then there was a flash.

Kenji appeared beside the masked figure.

The ambush had been carried out entirely by his new puppet, the Human Puppet. It was the most human-like creation he had ever made. There was no way to tell it apart from a real person.

He examined the puppet's condition. The left elbow showed some damage where Danzō's wind-enhanced strike had severed it, but the self-reattachment mechanism had functioned perfectly. The synthetic blood system had also performed exactly as designed.

The "blood" wasn't biological at all. He had embedded specialized sealing matrices throughout the puppet's artificial tissue, each one containing a concentrated poison mixed with a liquid base that mimicked blood's appearance and consistency. When the puppet's outer layer was damaged, the seals ruptured and released their contents. From an external perspective, it looked identical to normal bleeding.

The poison was a modified toxin taken from Suna's records. It acted rapidly and could be absorbed through skin contact or inhalation. Once exposed, respiratory paralysis followed within seconds. It was perfectly suited for an opponent who would not anticipate a puppet possessing a functioning circulatory defense system.

The field test had exceeded his expectations. Danzō had fallen for it completely, never suspecting that the "blood" was a weapon. The shock on his face when his throat had seized up had been deeply satisfying to watch through the puppet's sensory link.

Originally, Kenji had meant to kill Danzō outright after he ignored the warning and crossed the line anyway. He was a cancer in Konoha's government. His existence served only to spread suffering and manipulation. But the sheer number of Sharingan embedded in that arm had complicated things. Each eye represented another life.

Four deaths in rapid succession had barely made a dent in his reserves. And then the reinforcements had started closing in. Staying any longer would have risked exposure. Better to withdraw with what he'd accomplished and reassess.

He'd warned Minato about Danzō, and the Hokage had kept Shisui's information confidential. Under normal circumstances, the war hawk shouldn't have known anything about Shisui's Mangekyō Sharingan.

But Kenji had still worried that events might unfold as they had in the original timeline. Danzō stealing Shisui's eyes had been a catalyst for the massacre. So he'd stationed a puppet near the young Uchiha as a precaution, just in case.

What was meant as insurance had proven necessary. Events had played out almost exactly as he'd feared, with only one variable changed, this time, Danzō hadn't gotten to keep his prize.

From the war hawk's words during the confrontation, it wasn't hard to deduce that Obito had been the one to feed him intelligence about Shisui's abilities.

That didn't surprise him much. White Zetsu was constantly monitoring Konoha, and aside from Sage Mode's enhanced perception, ordinary sensory techniques struggled to detect them when they were hiding properly. Shisui, despite his considerable talents, didn't have the tools to notice the surveillance.