Shikatoki had no idea what the cult leader had said, but the followers below had become completely fanatical.
He quietly assessed the strength of the Cult of Jashin.
Most of its members were ordinary people.
Only a handful possessed chakra.
As for the so-called cult leader, his chakra reserves were decent—barely around Jōnin level.
Once Shikatoki confirmed that, he saw no reason to keep hiding.
He stepped directly out of the shadows.
“Cult Leader.”
Shikatoki’s voice was calm, yet carried an undeniable authority.
“I’m rather interested in this so-called Jashin of yours.”
“Would you mind introducing me?”
The cult leader frowned at the stranger who had suddenly appeared.
“Who are you?”
“You don’t need to know.”
Shikatoki’s expression remained indifferent.
“Right now, I want to meet this Jashin.”
“Insolence!”
The cult leader shouted furiously.
“Lord Jashin is not someone you can simply meet whenever you wish!”
“Only those who offer sacrifices to Lord Jashin are permitted to stand before him!”
Shikatoki disappeared with the Body Flicker Technique.
In the next instant— his hand clamped around the cult leader’s skull.
Creak…
The immense force made the man’s bones groan.
“You—!”
As the pressure around his skull grew stronger, fear finally appeared in the cult leader’s eyes.
The cult leader was afraid.
His followers, however, apparently had no understanding whatsoever of the difference in strength between the two sides.
“What are you doing?!”
“Release the Cult Leader!”
“How dare you disrespect Lord Jashin!”
“We’ll use you as a sacrifice!”
“That’s right!”
“Kill him!”
Shikatoki looked calmly at the brainwashed cultists.
“Beyond saving.”
“Then die.”
The cult leader’s shadow was pulled from his body.
He might not have been anything impressive by shinobi standards, but he was still a ninja.
Against ordinary civilians— he was more than enough.
Before long, every cultist had been slaughtered.
Only the cult leader remained.
“Don’t kill me!”
“Please don’t kill me!”
“I’ll tell you anything you want!”
The man was so terrified that he had wet himself.
Shikatoki frowned in disgust.
He released him and stepped several paces back.
“I want to meet Jashin.”
“I’ve never met Lord Jashin either!”
The cult leader spoke frantically.
“I don’t know how to meet him!”
“Then why did you create the Cult of Jashin?”
Shikatoki narrowed his eyes.
“Where did this Jashin come from?”
“There’s an altar!”
Desperate to survive, the cult leader confessed everything.
Shikatoki nodded.
“Good.”
“Take me there.”
The altar wasn’t located inside Yugakure.
It was out at sea.
After travelling for an unknown distance, they were surrounded by nothing but ocean.
The cult leader finally stopped.
“Here?”
Shikatoki looked around suspiciously.
There was nothing but seawater in every direction.
“Yes!”
“Right here!”
The cult leader suddenly formed hand seals.
An altar appeared beneath Shikatoki’s feet.
Then— a crimson light erupted.
“Become a sacrifice to Lord Jashin!”
The red light swallowed Shikatoki whole.
The sensation was familiar.
Spatial power.
Just before he was completely teleported away, Shikatoki’s natural energy surged outward, carrying his soul power with it.
Crack!
The cult leader’s soul was shattered.
His triumphant laughter abruptly stopped.
His empty body crashed onto the surface of the sea before slowly sinking beneath the waves.
Shikatoki’s vision flashed.
When it returned— he found himself in a place filled with blood.
The metallic stench was overwhelming.
“Where the hell did I get sent?”
Shikatoki frowned.
“Is this even still the shinobi world?”
Suppressing his discomfort, he began moving forward.
Before long, he reached a vast river— composed entirely of blood.
Shikatoki stopped.
Suddenly— a tentacle made of blood shot from the river.
“What the hell?!”
Shikatoki rapidly dodged.
“Sacrifice…”
A deep, muffled voice echoed through the space.
The blood river began churning.
All around him, the surrounding blood trembled violently.
Then— an enormous creature rose from the river.
Tentacles covered its entire body.
Its appearance was so grotesque that simply looking at it felt like his sanity was dropping by the second.
“Is this Jashin?”
Shikatoki dodged another attack while complaining.
“Why doesn’t it even have a humanoid form?!”
He shouted toward the creature.
“Are you Jashin?”
He tried to communicate.
The creature clearly had no interest in conversation.
It simply continued attacking.
Shikatoki took a deep breath.
Sage Mode activated.
The incoming tentacles were instantly shattered.
He attempted to pull out the creature’s shadow.
As expected— nothing happened.
This monster didn’t seem to possess anything resembling a shadow.
“If you really are some kind of evil god…”
Shikatoki’s eyes narrowed.
“Then the Shinigami’s power should work on you, right?”
“You’re both gods, after all!”
Soul power wrapped around Shikatoki’s body.
Every strike he landed caused cracks to appear across Jashin’s soul.
Each time— the creature released a miserable shriek.
Yet before long, the damage to its soul would completely repair itself.
“You really are immortal!”
Shikatoki frowned.
“You can even regenerate your soul?!”
Things had suddenly become troublesome.
Hidan’s immortality in the original story was just that— immortality.
His body still needed Kakuzu to stitch it back together when it was damaged.
The creature before Shikatoki, however, was different.
Not only could it not die— it could regenerate itself.
“If I can’t kill you…”
“Then I’ll seal you!”
A large number of black chains emerged behind Shikatoki.
They weren’t the Uzumaki Clan’s Adamantine Sealing Chains.
These were merely imitations.
Shikatoki had reshaped his shadows into chains and combined them with his modified Sealing Technique.
The result was his own—
Pseudo–Adamantine Sealing Chains.
As for why he had gone out of his way to make them look like chains?
There was only one answer.
They looked cool.
The black chains wrapped around Jashin’s tentacles.
The Sealing Technique automatically activated.
Jashin reacted as though it had encountered its natural enemy.
Its tentacles frantically retreated toward the blood river.
“As long as it works!”
The chains continued advancing toward the creature’s main body.
Huge quantities of natural energy were consumed.
Jashin’s movements became slower and stiffer.
“Almost there…”
Suddenly— the blood river erupted.
The creature before Shikatoki released an enormous surge of unstable energy.
From the perspective of the soul— its soul was rapidly expanding.
Shikatoki’s eyes widened.
“Holy crap!”
“You’re going to self-destruct?!”
“Don’t do this to me, bro!”
Boom!
A massive explosion swept through the entire space.
Shikatoki could only expend a huge amount of natural energy to tightly stabilise his own soul.
He had seen this method in anime before.
In essence— by keeping the soul completely stable, he could become immune to physical damage.
But this was Shikatoki’s first time actually attempting it.
And given the current situation— he didn’t exactly have another choice.
The explosion finally ended.
Every piece of clothing on Shikatoki’s body had vanished.
But his body itself was completely unharmed.
“This ability is ridiculous!”
He looked himself over in amazement.
“Though the consumption is a little insane.”
That single defence had consumed nearly ninety percent of his natural energy.
Shikatoki looked toward Jashin.
As expected— its body was already rapidly regenerating.
Then he noticed something.
“A red gemstone?!”
At the centre of the regeneration process was a crimson object roughly the size of a jewel.
Shikatoki didn’t hesitate.
The black chains shot forward again— straight toward the red gem.
The reaction was immediate.
Jashin panicked.
Its regeneration speed suddenly surged.
Shikatoki directly formed a Massive Rasengan in his hand.
He slammed it into the creature’s centre.
Boom!
The newly regenerated flesh was blasted apart, exposing a huge opening.
The chains shot through.
They wrapped tightly around the red gemstone.
“No!”
Jashin finally spoke in a pleading voice.
Shikatoki ignored it completely.
You ignored me when I wanted to talk.
Now you’re the one who can’t afford to ignore me.
The gemstone was ripped free.
It landed in Shikatoki’s hand.
“This should be Jashin’s core.”
The blood river instantly became still.
All the surrounding blood stopped moving.
The monstrous Jashin collapsed into a pool of blood and flowed back into the river.
[Special Item detected.
This item can be converted into a Template.
“Yes!”
The crimson gemstone in Shikatoki’s hand suddenly released a powerful suction force.
All the blood in the surrounding space began rushing toward it.
Ten minutes.
Half an hour.
An hour.
It was still absorbing.
Shikatoki wasn’t in a hurry.
He sat cross-legged and began restoring the natural energy he had consumed.
An unknown amount of time passed.
Then— the familiar notification sounded.
[Conversion complete.
Please inspect the result yourself.]
Shikatoki opened his eyes.
There was no longer a single trace of blood anywhere around him.
Only bare stone remained.
[Special Template: Jashin]
[Jashin: Unique Template.
Grants an immortal body.
Once added, this Template cannot be removed.]
Shikatoki immediately tested it against Sage Mode.
[Jashin — Compatibility: Extremely High: Perfectly compatible with natural energy.
Grants mastery over the power of immortality.]
“As expected!”
Shikatoki’s eyes lit up.
“Add it!”
[Template successfully added.]
[Sage Mode: Automatically absorbs natural energy and gradually replaces chakra with it.]
[Added Templates:]
[Shinigami: Grants mastery over the power of the soul.]
[Jashin: Grants mastery over the power of immortality.]
“Immortality…”
A burning light appeared in Shikatoki’s eyes.
In a supernatural world— what was the ultimate pursuit?
Wasn’t it eternal life?
He didn’t know whether this immortality had an upper limit.
But within the shinobi world—
Shikatoki felt that he had truly gained the possibility of becoming undying and indestructible.
“These so-called gods—the Shinigami, Jashin…”
Shikatoki began thinking.
“They probably aren’t gods in the conventional sense.”
“They’re more likely some kind of energy-based life-form that naturally exists in this world.”
“That would explain why they’re so compatible with natural energy.”
The familiar sensation appeared again.
This time— the power originated from his blood.
“Don’t tell me this is going to take another year…”
Shikatoki’s thoughts gradually slowed.
Just like the previous time.
To him, it felt as though only an instant had passed.
But after his experience with the Shinigami— who knew how much real time had actually gone by?
“Whatever.”
“I should figure out how to get out first.”
Shikatoki looked around.
He suddenly missed Minato.
If Minato were here, one Flying Thunder God jump would solve everything.
But now—
Shikatoki had to find his own way out.
He carefully searched the surroundings.
Before long, at the bottom of what had once been the blood river, he discovered a stone tablet.
Shikatoki jumped down and approached it.
The writing carved into the tablet was extremely ancient.
He couldn’t understand a single word.
Shikatoki reached out and touched it.
A sensation both familiar and unfamiliar came from the stone.
“This feels like…
fūinjutsu.”
He frowned.
“But this sealing technique is ridiculously ancient.”
Shikatoki sat down in front of the tablet and began studying it.
As things stood— breaking this seal appeared to be his only way out.
The Land of Demons.
“Lady Priestess!”
“Something terrible has happened!”
“An ancient sealing tablet has developed cracks!”
The priestess sitting at the head of the room paused with her teacup halfway to her lips.
“How is that possible?”
Akane’s face filled with disbelief.
Akane— the current priestess of the Land of Demons.
“It’s true!”
“I’ll go see it myself.”
Akane immediately forgot all concern for decorum and hurried out.
“Lady Priestess, please slow down!”
“The carriage is already prepared!”
Her attendant rushed after her.
Deep within a forest in the Land of Demons— an ancient ruin had already been surrounded by soldiers.
Akane stood before a stone tablet.
Her expression was grave.
“This tablet is incredibly ancient.”
“Whatever monster is sealed inside cannot possibly be ordinary.”
“We absolutely cannot allow it to break free!”
She immediately issued orders.
“Prepare the necessary materials.”
“I’m going to reinforce the seal!”
“Yes!”
The Land of Demons primarily dealt with the demon Mōryō.
But as a nation governed by priestesses, it also contained many other sealed monsters.
Mōryō was simply the most active among them.
Akane stared at the cracked tablet, her brows slowly furrowing.
“Why didn’t my prophecy warn me beforehand?”
“And even now…”
“It’s still telling me there’s no danger.”
She frowned.
“Does that mean I’ll successfully repair the seal?”