Chapter 324: Brother, You Promised to Protect the Uchiha, Right?
Izuna's face filled with confusion as he lowered his gaze to his own hands—covered in cracks.
Those cracks weren't scars. More like marks indicating departure from the living realm. Cold. Lifeless. Radiating a wrongness that didn't belong to this world.
In his living era, no technique like Summoning: Impure World Reincarnation existed—no methods for toying with dead souls.
Death had been a clear concept for him. Battle. Fall. Consciousness sinking into eternal darkness or returning to the Pure Land.
So initially he'd assumed his omnipotent brother had simply saved him. Never suspected he'd been yanked from the afterlife after dying.
But now, Izuna's fingertips brushed across his palm. The sensation felt wooden—like touching pottery related to himself yet separated by a layer. His heart vaguely understood something.
His current "existence" existed between life and death—blurred and eerie. He couldn't position himself.
"We're both already dead?" Izuna murmured in confusion.
"That's right! You're both quite dead!"
Yasushi popped up again, tone cheerful as though sharing amusing trivia—though his eyes gleamed with chaos-seeking malice.
"Oh, and by the way—Senju Hashirama killed your brother Madara!"
Yasushi continued stoking Izuna's fury.
"What?" Izuna predictably exploded with rage. Killing intent erupted skyward from his body.
"SENJU HASHIRAMA!!!"
Izuna roared furiously while whirling toward Madara.
Veins bulged along his neck. His Sharingan manifested uncontrollably under extreme anger—crimson Mangekyou spinning madly.
That gaze held fury, disappointment, and an almost despairing pain of "I knew it would be this way."
"This is your so-called reconciliation?"
"This is the peace you wanted?"
"This is your self-proclaimed friend?"
Izuna roared at his brother with an expression of hating iron for not becoming steel.
His voice trembled from extreme emotion yet proved sharp as a blade—slicing through Madara's attempts at burying painful Valley of the End memories.
"It wasn't like that." Madara wore an exhausted expression but couldn't avoid explaining.
"What happened that day... was actually my fault."
"I... betrayed our friendship first."
Madara's face filled with heaviness, heart overflowing with pain. That day's resolve and stubbornness had completely vanished—only infinite regret remained.
"I was deceived and manipulated. I made wrong judgments, betrayed Hashirama first, wanting to destroy the shinobi world order he'd established."
Madara painfully admitted his past mistakes. But the pain in his heart made him unwilling to discuss this topic further. He sighed while waving dismissively:
"That was only part of the plan. I didn't actually die. Don't listen to this guy's troublemaking!"
Hearing Yasushi was sowing discord, Izuna's sharp gaze immediately glared over—cold scrutiny intertwined with undissipated killing intent falling upon Yasushi.
But Yasushi said nothing. He merely smiled while revealing his Mangekyou Sharingan.
That unique, powerful pattern slowly rotated in Yasushi's eyes, emanating profound yet familiar dojutsu fluctuations.
For Izuna, this pattern proved more convincing than any words.
This was the Uchiha bloodline's exclusive proof—symbol of power and bonds.
As expected, Izuna immediately beamed with delight. The fury on his face was instantly replaced by emotions mixing surprise, kinship, and hope.
Bloodline recognition immediately overwhelmed his slight doubts about Yasushi.
"Oh, so you're also our Uchiha clan member!"
"This is wonderful!"
"Besides my brother and me, the Uchiha finally have another Mangekyou Sharingan!"
"With such a powerful clan member existing, the Uchiha clan's prosperity is just around the corner!"
"Hehehe..." Yasushi's smile didn't reach his eyes as he grinned. An icy bucket of water poured directly onto Izuna's head.
"For Lord Izuna's information—the current Uchiha clan has been completely exterminated."
Light, casual words contained more destructive power than any technique.
Each word resembled poisoned ice picks viciously chiseling into Izuna's newly kindled hope—utterly extinguishing it in boundless darkness and deathly silence.
"What?" Izuna paled with shock. "Impossible!"
Izuna's pupils contracted sharply. Color drained from his face instantly. His already dim skin from Edo Tensei now revealed deathly grey defeat.
He whirled around, looking at Madara. His voice suddenly shot higher, carrying a drowning person's desperate urgency and fear while grasping at driftwood.
"Brother, you promised me! You promised to protect the Uchiha properly!"
"The Uchiha clan can't be extinct. He's lying, right?"
He lunged forward, gripping Madara's arm tightly—fingertips nearly embedding into that Edo Tensei-constructed body.
Those always-bright, sharp eyes now brimmed with disbelieving pleading, locked desperately onto Madara's face.
But facing his brother's expectant gaze, Madara had no response.
He couldn't even utter "I'm sorry"—because that promise's weight far exceeded what words could bear.
His brother's trust and pleading in that gaze now transformed into scorching branding irons, burning silently against his soul.
Finally he could only slowly lower his head, unable to look at Izuna.
By now, Madara had deeply recognized his mistakes. He absolutely couldn't say things like "the clan members betrayed me first."
Before reality's tragedy, all excuses proved pathetically weak.
Whether Black Zetsu's deception or the clan's choices, the final cause and effect pointed toward his failures as clan leader, as older brother, as promise-maker.
Proud as he was, even he now lowered the head he'd thought would never bow.
His heart filled with tremendous regret. Why had he been so easily deceived back then, single-mindedly pursuing eternal peace for the shinobi world—even forgetting his promise to his brother?
All along the way, he'd only chased that illusory phantom while allowing the lights he should have protected to extinguish one by one in history's dark night.
That remorse wasn't sharp pain—but cold, viscous despair permeating every crevice of his soul.
Seeing his brother's expression, Izuna's entire heart plunged into an ice cavern.
That final thread of desperate hope completely froze and shattered in Madara's silent, bowed posture.
An invisible chill suddenly shot up Izuna's spine, instantly spreading to all four limbs—making even his fingertips turn icy and numb.
Izuna staggered back two steps. His fingers gripping Madara's arm also released powerlessly.
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