Chapter 1: Farewell Under the Moon, Beginning Under a Foreign Sky**
The moon hung in the night sky, cold and indifferent, bathing the surroundings in ghostly silver light. It illuminated a field scarred by craters and the marks of a recent, furious battle. The air was thick with the smell of ozone, smoke, and... blood. Amidst this chaos, Uchiha Madara lay on his back, arms spread wide. His famed armor was shattered, his black clothing soaked in dark stains, and his breathing was a rasping, intermittent whistle in his chest. He stared into the boundless heights, at that very moon which had once been part of his mad plan. Now it seemed merely a cold witness to his downfall.
Footsteps. Heavy, slow, sinking into the churned earth. Madara didn't turn his head. Only his scarlet Sharingan eyes, dulled by pain and exhaustion, flickered away from the moon for a moment before returning to it.
"Hashira...ma?" Madara's voice was like the creak of dry wood in the wind, stripped of its former power but still carrying echoes of indomitable will.
The silhouette drew closer, heavily sinking to the ground beside him. Dust puffed up in a small cloud. Yes, it was him. Senju Hashirama. His face was etched with weariness and sorrow, bitterness over countless losses frozen in the lines around his mouth and eyes. But his gaze, fixed on his dying friend-enemy, held no gloating, no triumph. Only deep, unending grief and... understanding.
"Yes, it's me, Madara," Hashirama replied quietly. His eyes slid over Madara's mutilated body – the sunken chest, the unnaturally twisted arm, the cloudy gaze. Horribly emaciated. Dying. Every breath was visibly laborious for Madara.
Madara slowly, as if his neck were made of lead, turned his head to meet Hashirama's gaze. A bitter smirk touched his parched lips. "Seems like... neither you nor I... achieved our goals... succeeded." His words rang with the bitterness of defeat, the realization of decades of struggle and hatred rendered futile.
Hashirama sighed, his gaze momentarily drifting somewhere far away, into the past or a phantom future. "That's... the difficult part, Madara. Everyone's task... is to do all they can while they live... and then... hope that future generations... will finish what you couldn't." His voice, always so confident, sounded weary, yet held a glimmer of that same unwavering faith that had always infuriated Madara.
"And you're as naive as ever," Madara hissed, his eyes finding the moon again, cold and distant. "Guess you were always... an optimist. But perhaps... that is the right way. My sword is shattered... but your dream... still lives." Something unexpected resonated in his words – not an admission of being right, but rather... a weary regret over his own mistake.
"We both rushed too much," Hashirama said, his hand involuntarily clenching into a fist. He saw the shadow of weakness deepening on Madara's face with every passing moment. "We should have... not tried to realize the dreams ourselves... but rather... cared for those who would come after us. Entrusted our dreams to them. Nurtured them, taught them... not used them as pawns." Bitter insight, paid for with the blood of sons and the shattering of the first dream of peace, sounded in his voice.
Madara laughed hoarsely, the laughter turning into a coughing fit. "So... I would have failed anyway... since I always hated... those who came after me. Saw them only as weakness... tools... or threats." His gaze grew sharp again, full of old animosity, but now laced with the bitterness of self-exposure.
Hashirama shook his head softly, memories flashing in his eyes. "As children... you once said... that we are shinobi. We don't know when we'll die. And so that no one... has to die... we just needed to open up to each other. Pour each other a glass... like brothers." He fell silent, then a faint, sad smile touched his lips. "But now... we both will die... and now... now we can drink together. Like old friends."
He looked at Madara, whose eyelids were beginning to droop heavily. Consciousness was slipping away. His chest barely rose. It seemed the end.
"Friends... yes..." Madara whispered, his voice barely audible, as if coming from a deep well. "But... perhaps... it's possible... Yes... You know... Hashirama..." He paused, gathering his last strength. "I have... one last chance... I can... Reincarnate... Live anew... Start... with a clean slate... This time... live... the right path..."
His eyes closed completely. His breathing became almost imperceptible. Three seconds of silence passed, broken only by the wind rustling over the ravaged earth. Hashirama looked at him, disbelief, hope, and a wrenching pain mixing in his gaze. He was already about to utter his friend's name for the last time...
*Click.*
Madara's eyes snapped wide open.
But these were no longer scarlet Sharingan. Nor the Eternal Mangekyō. Pupils and sclera had vanished, dissolved into concentric circles of a complex, pulsing purple pattern. Rinnegan. Both eyes. They burned with a cold, abyssal light, absorbing the lunar radiance. His entire wasted appearance was momentarily transformed by this icy, alien power.
Hashirama recoiled sharply, his eyes wide with genuine, unfeigned astonishment. "What?! Madara! You... you can reincarnate? And live anew? Start with a clean slate?" His voice trembled, but not from fear – from a sudden flare of pure joy *for his friend*. That joy held not a trace of envy or doubt, only the sincere thought: "You *can* be saved!"
The purple rings of the Rinnegan slowly rotated, focusing on Hashirama's face. Madara spoke, his voice still weak, but now carrying a steely will fueled by this last chance. "Yes... I could... start everything anew... But... I lack... chakra... and vital... Yang chakra... If I had... my former level... I could recreate... a youthful version... of my body... Or... a newborn... infant... or... any other age..." He drew a painful breath. "At this moment... with my current... Yang chakra... I can do nothing... The only thing... I can do... preserve the Rinnegan... use the remaining Yang chakra... activate... the ocular technique... 'Rinnegan Reincarnation'... seize... a recently deceased... person... alter... their appearance... to match mine... completely... changing their DNA... to mine..."
Understanding illuminated Hashirama's face. He looked at his hands, at the dimmed but still potent Senju chakra within. "I see... That kind of situation... Vital Yang chakra... I cannot help with... But Yin chakra... I can transfer..."
Without a second's hesitation, Hashirama raised his hand. His palm glowed with a cold, deep blue-violet light – the purity of Yin chakra, the power of spiritual energy. He placed his palm firmly yet gently on Madara's abdomen, right above his depleted chakra source.
Madara shuddered. His Rinnegan flared brighter. The purple circles began rotating with increasing speed, turning into whirlpools. He felt a powerful, cold current pouring into him – pure, concentrated Yin chakra from Hashirama. This wasn't just energy; it was a final gift, an act of absolute trust and... forgiveness. The Rinnegan greedily absorbed it, transforming it into fuel for the incredible technique. Hashirama felt his own strength rapidly draining, his face paled, but his hand didn't waver. He gave what was needed, holding nothing back.
When the flow ceased, Hashirama withdrew his hand, letting it drop to his knee. He looked exhausted, yet calm. Madara's body glowed from within with a ghostly blue-violet radiance, the Rinnegan blazing like two purple suns. Madara slowly turned his head, his alien eyes locking directly onto Hashirama's. There was no trace of the old hatred or arrogance. Only a deep, unfamiliar complexity of emotion.
"Hashirama..." his voice, strengthened by new power, sounded clearer, yet with an uncharacteristic... warmth? "I... cannot express in words... how grateful I am... for your support... and help. You always knew... how to stand by me... even when I... didn't deserve it. And I... am endlessly grateful... for that. For everything."
Hashirama smiled weakly, weariness mingling with relief on his face. "No need... for thanks, Madara. I... am genuinely glad... I could help you... in your need. Go on..." he made an effort, and an old, good-natured grin touched his lips. "Start over. And... this time... don't mess it up, alright?"
Madara looked at him for a second. Then a hoarse but genuine laugh burst from his chest. Hashirama joined in – first quietly, then louder. Their laughter, the laughter of mortal enemies and long-time friends, merged into one, echoing across the devastated field under the cold moon. They laughed at the absurdity of life, at the futility of struggle, at the unexpectedness of this finale. They laughed until Madara's breath caught, his laughter turning into a cough, then fading away.
He drew a deep breath, and his face grew stern, resolute. The Rinnegan ignited with such intensity that their blinding purple light eclipsed the moon's. "Well then..." Madara's voice rang out firm as steel. "Let's begin."
He focused. The rotating patterns of the Rinnegan became solid purple discs. The air around him vibrated, humming with a low-frequency drone. The last drops of his own chakra, the life force gifted by Hashirama – all was drawn into the vortex spinning within his eyes.
Then something unimaginable began.
The edges of Madara's body began to *dissolve*. Not melt, but break apart into myriad minuscule, violet-glowing particles – pure energy and matter disassembled down to atoms. The process was both eerie and beautiful. First fingers, then hands, chest, legs... His physical form dissolved like a sandcastle under a wave, turning into a cloud of shimmering dust, held together only by the focusing power of the Rinnegan.
Hashirama watched, mesmerized and shaken, his heart constricted by farewell. He saw Madara's face, the last part, dissolve into the radiant mist. Only the two blazing Rinnegan remained, hanging in the air like two purple suns. They slowly drew closer, their light merging into one, and they... *fused*. Into one, larger, incredibly bright sphere of radiant purple energy, pulsating with unbelievable power.
And then this unified Rinnegan *shot forth*. Not a beam, but a bolt of pure space-time force. It struck the void before it.
*Cr-r-rack!*
The sound was like the tearing of the very fabric of existence. A black, violet-flickering crack gaped in the air. It breathed absolute void, the cold of non-being, and alien, incomprehensible energies. It was a portal. A rift between worlds.
The Rinnegan, like a bullet shot from a sling, hurtled forward and *plunged* into that black fissure. It vanished within it faster than thought. And at the same moment, as if a wound on reality's body was healing, the spatial crack snapped shut with a deafening *SNAP!*, leaving behind only trembling air and... emptiness.
Senju Hashirama sat alone amidst the ruined field. The moon still shone coldly. Where his eternal rival and friend had just died and been reborn, nothing remained. No body, no energy. Only memory and silence. He took a deep breath, an unwept tear mixed with a shadow of hope standing in his eyes.
"Farewell... my friend," he whispered into the silent night. The word "friend" hung in the air, filled with the entire complexity of their century-long history.
* * *
**Another Dimension. World of Cultivation. Deep Forest. Early Morning.**
The air here was different. Thick, humid, saturated with the scent of unfamiliar flowers, rotting leaves, and... something else. An intangible yet palpable *heaviness*, a vibrating energy permeating everything – the earth, the trees, even the air itself. This was "ambient energy" – the vital force of this world.
On a clearing, bathed in the first rays of sunlight piercing through giant, strangely shaped fern leaves, hung a small, barely noticeable distortion. Like a bubble on water. It quivered.
*Pfft.*
A quiet sound, like a soap bubble popping. The distortion ruptured, revealing for an instant a tiny, dark fissure – no larger than ten centimeters in diameter. Out of it slipped... an eye. One. Purple. Concentric ring patterns pulsed faintly on its surface. Rinnegan.
It hung in the air for a second, seemingly disoriented. Then the patterns on it flared brighter, and an invisible wave of energy – a scanning pulse – rippled out in all directions, piercing the trunks of ancient trees, sweeping across mossy ground, probing every stone within a six-hundred-kilometer radius. Somewhere far off, mighty spirit beasts roared, sensing the intrusion. Somewhere, an old master meditating paused for a moment, feeling a strange surge. But here, in this backwater, there was no one powerful nearby.
The scan ended. The Rinnegan shot sharply downward, towards the base of a huge boulder covered in blue moss. There, in the shadow, lay a body.
A man. Appearing around fifty. Dressed in rough, worn clothes like a hunter or forest wanderer. But this wasn't just sleep or rest. His face was twisted in a death grimace of pain. His torso was mutilated by a horrific wound – a deep, jagged slash from the ribs down to the lower abdomen, as if from a giant beast's claws. Inside was empty. Intestines... missing. The ground around was sticky with clotted blood. Death had occurred recently, a few hours ago. From shock and blood loss.
The Rinnegan hovered over this body. Purple light poured from it, enveloping the dead flesh. Then it smoothly descended, not touching, but seeming to *superimpose* itself onto the corpse's forehead. And began to *work*.
First, the edges of the monstrous wound lit up. Flesh, vessels, skin – all began to shift, knit together, as if under the invisible needles of the most skilled surgeon. Blood evaporated. Dirt vanished. The terrible hole in the abdomen sealed shut, leaving behind only smooth, whole skin. But this was only the beginning.
Then the body *stirred* from within. A faint but eerie crunching sound of bones breaking and realigning was heard. Joints popped. The figure under the purple light began to change. A hunched back straightened. Flaccid muscles swelled with strength, the body's contours becoming youthful, athletic. The face... wrinkles smoothed out as if erased by an eraser. The features of the coarse, haggard face began to melt and rearrange. The nose lengthened, the chin sharpened, cheekbones became high and defined. The skin lightened, becoming almost porcelain.
And the hair... The dead man's short, gray, dirty hair began to grow rapidly. It lengthened, lightened to a dazzling white, and flowed down, reaching his thighs, forming a lush, snow-white mane. The signature white hair of Uchiha Madara.
The Rinnegan's purple light began to dim. Its work was complete. It seemed to *draw itself* inward, into the forehead of the new body, leaving behind only a faint purple glimmer deep within ordinary, still-closed eyes. The body on the ground no longer belonged to a nameless hunter. It was *perfect*. The body of Uchiha Madara at the peak of his strength, around thirty-five. Strong, flawless, breathing with health. Clad only in the tattered rags that had once been clothes.
The new body's chest jerked sharply upward. Eyes beneath the lids darted. The fingers of one hand twitched.
*Gasp!*
A sharp, convulsive, first breath in the new world. Air saturated with alien, thick energy burned the lungs. Eyes – ordinary, dark, almost black – flew wide open. A hurricane of emotions raged in them: shock, confusion, remnants of the agony of the previous death, torturous memories of dissolution... and blinding pain from the bright morning sun piercing through the foliage.
Uchiha Madara sat bolt upright. His hand instinctively clutched his stomach – where a moment ago a mortal wound had gaped. But under his fingers was only smooth, whole skin. He felt his face – sharp features, smooth skin without wrinkles. He grabbed a strand of hair – long, white as snow. He looked at his hands – strong, with long fingers, *his* hands. But... not his. Someone else's memories? No. Emptiness. Only the physical shell had been borrowed and reshaped.
*Where am I?* flashed through his consciousness, still muddled but already fiercely clinging to reality. He inhaled through his nose. The smell of forest, earth... and something else. *This energy... It's everywhere. Thick. Alien. Like water... no, like honey. Nothing like this in our world... Senju nature chakra? No. This is... something fundamentally different.* His shinobi instincts screamed alarm. This energy surrounded, enveloped, pressed. It was omnipresent.
He tried to focus inward. Chakra... Yes, it was there! His own, familiar, like part of his soul. But it seemed... a tiny drop in this ocean of external "ambient energy". And it was calm, almost dormant. And the Rinnegan... He *felt* it. Somewhere deep in his consciousness, in the forehead area. Asleep? Altered? Suppressed by this alien force? *How do they interact? How to control it?*
Madara lifted his head. His black eyes, sharp and analytical like a bird of prey, scanned the surrounding landscape. Giant trees whose trunks could serve as fortress walls. Strange flowers glowing softly blue in the shade. Unseen insects with iridescent wings. The air vibrated with the hum of unfamiliar cicadas and distant, powerful roars that made the earth tremble. This wasn't just a different forest. This was a *different world*. A world saturated with energy he didn't understand. A world where the rules were unknown.
A bitter smirk touched his lips. "Hah... 'Clean slate'?" he whispered hoarsely, his voice sounding unnervingly young in this silence. "No. Uchiha Madara remains Madara." He stood up, feeling the unfamiliar lightness of a young, strong body clad in rags. His gaze, filled with old, unquenchable ambition and burning curiosity, swept over the giant trees, peering into the mysterious depths of the forest, where unknown beasts roared and where, he sensed, sources of immense power lay hidden.
"But the rules..." He clenched his fist, feeling the rough fabric of the shirt and the strength of the muscles beneath it. "Seem to have changed... drastically."
He took a step forward, into the dense, energy-breathing forest. A step into the unknown. A step into a new game.
"Let's begin then..." his whisper was swallowed by the roar of a distant spirit beast. "This time... I'll play by my own rules."