Midsummer, on the banks of the Naka River.
In the woods, Shingetsu swung his unsealed heavy sword so fast it left afterimages.
Every strike looked as if it might split the air in half.
Sweat poured off him, and the muddy ground beneath his feet had been trampled into a mess.
Orochimaru leaned against a tree trunk, spinning a kunai around his finger.
Whoosh.
The kunai shot out with a sharp whistle, flying straight at Shingetsu’s face!
Boom!!!
Shingetsu turned his sword into a shield.
The kunai slammed into the greatsword and shattered into fragments.
In the next instant, Orochimaru appeared in front of him and planted a solid kick in his stomach.
Shingetsu was sent flying and crashed into a tree trunk.
Whoosh—!!
Shingetsu burst out from the spray of wood splinters, sweeping aside the dust as he drove forward, shoulder and elbow moving as one toward Orochimaru’s chest.
Orochimaru raised a hand to block, but the impact still forced him back several steps, his feet carving two shallow grooves into the ground.
Shingetsu gave him no chance to regain his balance.
His fists rained down, every punch aimed at a vital point.
Orochimaru coated both hands in chakra.
He had no intention of clashing head-on with Shingetsu’s raw body.
Half a year had passed.
Shingetsu’s build had not changed much, but his bone density and the toughness of his muscle fibers had increased significantly.
Even without chakra, his fists carried enough kinetic force to shatter stone.
By using the thrust generated from his powerful legs stamping against the air, he could reach speeds comparable to the Body Flicker Technique.
His defense was just as impressive.
Ordinary senbon and shuriken could not pierce Shingetsu’s skin, and his body had a high resistance to poison.
Pure.
That was Orochimaru’s assessment of Shingetsu’s abilities.
A normal ninja refined and stored chakra, then entered a standby state, refining more only after it was consumed.
Put simply, their blue bar filled up, they used skills, then slowly recovered.
Abnormal ninjas, such as Tsunade, could use the Yin Seal to keep accumulating chakra, allowing them to unleash massive amounts of it in a short period once the seal was released.
Shingetsu was the opposite extreme.
He had abandoned the step of accumulating chakra and directly converted his chakra bar into a health bar.
More than that, the ability was closer to a passive effect.
He did not need to deliberately pour chakra into a Yin Seal the way Tsunade did.
Beneath that body was pure violence.
With those factors, Shingetsu’s combat strength was already enough to rival an average Special Jōnin.
Even some older Jōnin who relied too heavily on ninjutsu might be defeated if they were caught off guard.
“Heavenly Restriction…”
Orochimaru laughed in a low voice.
“Abandoning the external manifestation of energy and focusing entirely on the self.”
“It may be called a restriction, but I’m more inclined to see it as an alternative form of evolution.”
“I once met a Steel Release Kekkei Genkai ninja.
He could harden parts of his body to withstand physical attacks.
In terms of hardness alone, he was above you.”
“But that was only on the surface.
His internal organs, muscles, and bones were no different from an ordinary ninja’s.”
“You are strong in every aspect.
Strength, stamina, endurance.
All far beyond ordinary people.”
“If your body’s strength doesn’t affect your lifespan, I would even say you are the more perfect human.”
A gleam had just risen in Orochimaru’s eyes, but it quickly dimmed.
“What a pity.
Your perfect puzzle is missing one piece.”
“Perhaps that is why you named it Heavenly Restriction.
It cuts off your possibility of obtaining the Sharingan.”
“Do you feel disappointed, Shingetsu?”
The Uchiha Clan’s chances of awakening the Sharingan were far lower than the Byakugan, but those with talent should be able to awaken it around the age of ten.
Not long ago, Mikoto had awakened the Sharingan after a training session.
When Orochimaru, who had been away on a mission, heard the news, he immediately rushed back.
He was afraid Shingetsu would feel discouraged because someone close to him had awakened the Sharingan while he could not.
There was someone like that by Orochimaru’s side, so he could not help thinking that way.
Hiruko had been a close friend from the same generation as the three of them, but because his aptitude was inferior to theirs, resentment had taken root in his heart.
Orochimaru had noticed it, but he had not paid much attention.
Hiruko was an adult.
He had assumed Hiruko would come to terms with reality on his own.
But if something like that happened to his own disciple, Orochimaru cared very much.
That was why he had hurried back to offer some comfort.
“Disappointed?”
Shingetsu froze for a moment.
Then, realizing why Orochimaru had asked, he grinned.
“I don’t understand.”
“Orochimaru-sensei, how did you reach that conclusion?”
“When did I ever say I didn’t have the Sharingan?”
The sparring stopped.
Orochimaru frowned and said, “The Sharingan is a Dōjutsu Kekkei Genkai.
Its awakening and manifestation must rely on chakra as a medium.
That is common knowledge, isn’t it?”
He did not explain in greater detail.
Since he had taken an Uchiha as his disciple, the Third Hokage had shown him the Second Hokage’s research on the Uchiha.
When an Uchiha experienced mental stimulation, a special chakra would emerge in the brain and act on the optic nerves, thereby awakening the Sharingan.
Simply put, chakra was the essential key to awakening the Sharingan.
How could Shingetsu, who could not carry out that step, possibly have the Sharingan?
“It is common knowledge, but haven’t you forgotten something even more basic?”
Shingetsu pointed at his own eyes.
“The eyes are part of the body, aren’t they?”
Orochimaru paused, then answered seriously from a professional standpoint.
“Although the eyeballs and brain tissue belong to different systems, there is no doubt that the eyes are part of the body.”
You even know that.
And that Steel Release ninja you mentioned earlier…
you’ve dissected quite a few people already, haven’t you?
“Then would Heavenly Restriction, which strengthens the entire body, be the one thing that doesn’t strengthen the eyes?”
Shingetsu wiped the sweat from his face.
“If I said I’m already in a state of having the Sharingan activated, would you believe me?”
Orochimaru stared at Shingetsu’s dark pupils without saying a word.
Take a guess whether I believe that or not.
Shingetsu thought for a moment, then said, “Orochimaru-sensei, you know about the Mangekyō Sharingan, right?”
“I heard from Hiruzen-sensei that it was the realm once reached by that person from your clan.
The final form of the Sharingan.”
Orochimaru smiled faintly.
“Are you trying to tell me that this black ‘Sharingan’ of yours is the Mangekyō?”
“…You’re the kind of person who, when someone asks you to guess a price, immediately gives a sky-high number.
How boring.”
Shingetsu curled his lip and continued, “When I was four years old, my dynamic vision and insight suddenly improved by a large margin.”
“The difference between a single tomoe Sharingan and an ordinary ninja lies in dynamic vision.
It can predict simple attacks and slightly interfere with an opponent’s judgment.”
“The two tomoe is an enhancement on top of that.
The difference isn’t too great.”
Shingetsu raised three fingers.
Orochimaru listened very seriously, as if he were the student now.
“The three tomoe is the final form of the Sharingan as ordinary people understand it.
It has insight comparable to the Byakugan, can see the Chakra Flow, and can even copy an opponent’s ninjutsu.”
“On top of that, it also has quite powerful Genjutsu abilities.
Without a way to counter it, you can be controlled the moment your eyes meet.”
“That’s why people say you must never face an Uchiha with three tomoe Sharingan one-on-one.”
“In terms of insight alone, my eyes are not inferior to the two tomoe at all.
As for the Genjutsu side…”
A faint, unreadable smile tugged at Shingetsu’s lips.
“Orochimaru-sensei, could you lower your chakra defenses for a moment?”
“Then you’ll understand.”
“Experiencing it yourself will be more useful than anything I could say.”
Orochimaru swallowed, an ominous feeling rising in him.
“I…
won’t be harmed, will I?”
“Relax.
I know what I’m doing!”
After receiving Shingetsu’s promise, Orochimaru lowered his hands, sank his chakra into his abdomen, and tensed his muscles.
He knew full well there would be danger, but Shingetsu’s words had stirred his curiosity.
The depths of Shingetsu’s eyes churned, the pitch-black color swallowed completely by a crimson glow as dense as blood.
A single, utterly pure black tomoe slowly rotated within the scarlet pupil, like the teeth of a blood-red gear locking into place.
Sharingan, open!
A cold, eerie pressure roared outward.
The instant he touched that scarlet gaze, Orochimaru’s narrow golden pupils contracted sharply, and his entire body froze.
In his vision, heaven and earth twisted, then collapsed completely.
His consciousness was forcibly dragged into a deathly silent void.
Within the darkness, a pair of enormous crimson eyes cast down a chilling gaze!