Chapter 85: Reclaiming the Eye
Moonlight flowed like water, spilling across the forest clearing. Menma stopped walking and surveyed the surroundings—the terrain was open with sparse trees, making this the perfect place to settle grudges.
He glanced sideways at Shisui beside him. "It's up to you now. Don't move around—you'll be fine."
Shisui's brow furrowed slightly. He vaguely guessed Menma's intention—he was probably going to be used as bait. But he didn't understand what value he still held to attract Danzō.
Having lost his right eye with greatly diminished combat ability, he should be completely useless to that man...
As thoughts churned, complex emotions spread through Shisui's heart. Menma was going to move against Danzō—this fact brought him neither vengeful satisfaction nor the urge to intervene.
Even though Danzō had stolen his eye and driven him to leap from the cliff, what rose in his heart wasn't hatred, but deep sorrow and disappointment.
As an Uchiha genius and Konoha shinobi, an Uchiha attacking the leadership would be tantamount to starting civil war.
But Menma was different.
This man had no factional constraints—he simply wanted to eliminate Danzō. And himself... was destined to become an accomplice.
Night wind stirred, Shisui's black hair swaying slightly. From tonight on, he would no longer be Konoha's Uchiha Shisui, but a missing-nin who'd betrayed his village. This realization made his chest feel stuffy, yet strangely liberating.
Menma paid no attention to Shisui's wandering thoughts. He raised his hand, fingertips gently touching the hollow of Shisui's right eye—still pitch black, unlike his left eye which had been fitted with a three-tomoe Sharingan.
"Crazy Diamond."
With the whispered words, an azure Stand materialized in the moonlight. Restoration power suddenly activated, strange fluctuations rippling through the forest outside Konoha.
Some phenomenon beyond reason was quietly occurring nearby.
---
On the stone path of the Uchiha compound, a Root ninja's voice carried hesitation beneath his mask. "Danzō-sama, the body count is complete and all accounted for... but..."
"But what?"
"All the corpses' eye sockets... are empty."
Danzō's brow instantly knotted like twisted rope, wrinkles deep enough to trap flies. He slammed his walking stick against the ground—the Sharingan, those treasures he'd dreamed of, had all vanished without a trace?
'Could it be that bastard Itachi...'
His lone eye beneath the bandages flashed with sinister light. He'd thought tonight would bring two birds with one stone—eliminating the Uchiha threat while harvesting numerous Sharingan. But now...
"Keep searching! Cut open every corpse and check!" Danzō's voice seemed squeezed through clenched teeth. "Someone must have—"
Before he could finish, a strange palpitation suddenly came from his right eye socket. That Mangekyō Sharingan he considered his greatest trump card—the eye stolen from Shisui—was now violently convulsing!
"Ugh!"
Excruciating pain crashed over him like a tide, forcing Danzō to clutch his right eye. The next second, something even more terrifying happened—
Squelch!
Accompanied by a wet sound, that precious Mangekyō Sharingan actually broke free from its socket! Bandages soaked with blood as the crimson eyeball seemed alive, drilling out through gaps in the wrappings.
"Danzō-sama!"
Two Root ninja watched in shock as Danzō suddenly hunched over, their voices showing rare panic beneath their masks. Then they witnessed the most bizarre scene of their lives.
A crimson eyeball slowly emerged from the bloody bandage gaps around Danzō, trailing nerves and blood vessels, floating in mid-air as if pulled by invisible threads.
The Mangekyō Sharingan's pattern appeared eerily beautiful in the moonlight before suddenly accelerating toward the distance!
Danzō raised his head, his remaining left eye widening to its limit. Having lived most of his life, he'd never witnessed such an absurd scene—an eyeball running away on its own?!
What kind of evil jutsu was this? Who was controlling it?
But now wasn't the time for thinking!
"Forget about me!" Danzō tore off his bloody bandages, revealing the hollow, bleeding socket. "Catch up to that eye!"
At the other end of the forest, Menma's spiritual power suddenly exploded. Invisible chains desperately yanked at the flying eyeball. The Mangekyō traced crimson afterimages through the air at unbelievable speed.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Danzō and his two trusted subordinates leaped frantically through the treetops, the old man's heart pounding like drums as ominous premonitions grew stronger.
'The Mangekyō suddenly leaving my body... this is most likely a trap!'
But even knowing he might be walking into a snare, he had to jump in. Kotoamatsukami's value was simply too high—not only concerning Konoha's safety, but his ultimate trump card for claiming the Hokage position!
"Speed up! Absolutely cannot let—"
His words cut off abruptly.
When the three burst through the final grove, moonlight suddenly blazed bright. In the center of the clearing ahead stood a black-robed figure wearing a fox mask, and that escaped Mangekyō Sharingan now floated above his palm.
"Good evening, Elder Shimura... you finally came."
Menma's voice slowly echoed through the night, his gaze beneath the fox mask ice-cold and piercing. The Mangekyō floating in his palm still dripped blood, its crimson pupil reflecting Danzō's twisted features.
The air instantly froze.
Killing intent swept across the clearing like a storm, even the moonlight seeming stained blood-red.
Whoosh—!
Suddenly, blindingly bright purple script flared on both sides of the clearing's ground. The barrier techniques of the South and North Dipper Sages activated simultaneously, sigils moving like living creatures across the earth before weaving into massive sealing arrays.
BOOM!
Purple light barriers shot skyward, completely sealing the entire area.
Danzō spun around to find himself and the two Root ninja trapped within the barrier—or more accurately, all three had been caged inside this prison!
Menma slowly tucked the Mangekyō Sharingan into his sleeve.
"Well then..."
Temperature inside the barrier plummeted, visible breath misting in the air. Menma's voice tolled like funeral bells in Danzō's ears.
"—stay here forever."