Late into the night, Yasuka listened to the rhythmic, soft breathing of Naruko and Haku sleeping soundly beside him before carefully slipping out of bed.
By this time, the Susanoo had completely vanished.
Yasuka pulled up his talisman progress panel and discovered that the Sheep Talisman had reached 23%, while the Snake Talisman had smashed past the 65% benchmark.
If nothing unexpected occurred, the next talisman to unlock would undoubtedly be the Sheep Talisman.
“Seriously, out of all of them, it just had to skip the Ox and the Rabbit.”
Yasuka knit his brows.
What he lacked most right now were absolute means of retaliation and escape.
Fortunately, the absolute invisibility granted by the Snake Talisman was still highly functional; at the very least, it ensured he wouldn’t be left entirely defenseless.
Still, seeing the progress advance so rapidly allowed Yasuka to finally breathe a sigh of relief.
For the percentage to jump this much, Shisui must have survived the ordeal.
As if to validate his deduction, a faint rustling sound drifted in from the backyard.
Activating his invisibility, Yasuka glided out to investigate.
The moment he spotted Itachi supporting Shisui, his vigilance instantly melted away.
“So, you didn’t die after all?” Yasuka asked, his tone laced with exasperation.
“I’m sorry…
No…
I mean, thank you, Yasuka.”
Shisui had originally assumed that the amulet Yasuka gave her was merely a sentimental parting gift.
She never expected it to possess the reality-defying capability to mend her broken body—and to mend it almost completely.
The sole issue remaining was that because she had firmly believed she was at death’s door, she had voluntarily gouged out her own eyes and handed them to Itachi.
Consequently, she was currently completely blind.
“What happened to your eyes?”
Yasuka found it highly bizarre.
The latent energy sealed within that amulet was more than enough to fully replenish Shisui’s visual prowess.
How could she possibly still be blind?
“I…
I gouged them out…” Shisui’s voice grew increasingly faint.
She felt an overwhelming urge to find a hole and crawl into it; after all, she had delivered such a grand, tragic final speech, only to unexpectedly survive the night.
“…”
If it were anyone else, Yasuka would have outright called them a brainless idiot.
But since it was Shisui…
forget it, the girl was simple-minded anyway.
“Yasuka, what should Shisui do now?”
On the journey back, Itachi had already pieced together the full sequence of events.
At the same time, she found it utterly surreal; Shisui, who had consistently placed absolute faith in the village, had actually chosen to resolve things through such an explosive methodology…
“Keep her here with me.”
Yasuka was entirely out of moves when it came to Shisui.
Left to her own devices out there, she probably wouldn’t survive the week.
“But the Anbu…”
“Don’t worry, I’ll handle it.”
Yasuka offered no further elaboration.
He directly took Shisui from Itachi’s support and signaled for the younger girl to depart immediately, lest she leave behind any incriminating evidence for the village to seize upon.
“Shisui…
take care.”
The moment Itachi vanished, Shisui’s awkwardness magnified tenfold.
Yasuka had meticulously provided her with a flawless ultimate trump card, yet she had foolishly gone ahead and ripped her own eyes out anyway.
“I’m sorry…
I…
I really am a fool.”
Shisui actively lowered her head and admitted defeat.
At a time like this, playing the fool was infinitely better than facing Yasuka’s unfiltered wrath.
“Alright, hurry up and get inside.
I’ll help you get a new pair of eyes.”
Yasuka rolled his eyes, scooped Shisui up into his arms, and carried her back to his room.
Sensing her body suddenly floating off the ground, Shisui instinctively leaned her weight against him.
Though her vision was entirely dark, Shisui’s sense of hearing had become profoundly sharper than usual, allowing her to clearly map out the heavy, rhythmic thumping of Yasuka’s heartbeat against his chest.
Unfortunately, before she could enjoy the sound for much longer, Yasuka set her down on the mattress and instructed her to lie still.
As a practicing physician, Yasuka did not rely solely on the Horse Talisman; he had genuinely mastered a vast array of medical sciences and traversed the Shinobi world strictly under the identity of a doctor.
Only when encountering an anomaly that lay entirely beyond the realm of human medicine would he utilize the Horse Talisman.
Otherwise, if he casually cured absolutely everything with a wave of his hand, it would inevitably invite dangerous avarice from powerful factions.
“Relax.
This might get a bit itchy.”
Yasuka placed his hands gently over Shisui’s hollow eye sockets.
The restorative power of the Horse Talisman instantly surged forward, beginning to organically synthesize a brand-new pair of eyes for her.
Sensing certain fundamental genetic flaws inherent within her bloodline’s eyes, Yasuka estimated that if he cleanly repaired these discrepancies during the reconstruction process, the result should logically manifest as the Eternal Mangekyō.
Adopting a trial-and-error mindset, Yasuka set to work mending the flaws.
“Ngh…”
A strained, muffled groan escaped Shisui’s lips.
The sheer agony of having one’s eyes reconstructed from scratch was infinitely more excruciating than the act of gouging them out.
Yet, keeping Yasuka’s stern warning firmly in mind, she gritted her teeth and endured it no matter what.
The exact moment the new eyes achieved total completion, Shisui let out one final groan and lost consciousness, slipping into a deep swoon.
Yasuka carefully re-examined her newly formed eyes.
Once he verified that the integration was flawless, he seamlessly shared a portion of the Snake Talisman’s power with her body.
As long as Shisui refrained from initiating an offensive strike, the absolute concealment of the Snake Talisman ensured that even if she were to casually drink, dye her hair, and hit the club right in front of Yugao, nobody would ever detect a single trace of her presence.
The following morning, the atmosphere blanketing Konoha grew tangibly oppressive.
Although the Third Hokage had placed a strict gag order on the incident and officially written off the previous night’s cataclysm as a foreign infiltration attempt, the civilian population and the various noble clans remained deeply unsettled.
This anxiety was particularly acute among the Jonin who had personally participated in the containment effort against Shisui.
That god-like display of overwhelming devastation was a sobering realization—had Shisui not deliberately held back her killing intent, the vast majority of them would have been laid out in body bags.
*Do not provoke the Uchiha.* This rapidly solidified into an absolute consensus among everyone in the village, save for Danzo.
Meanwhile, the Uchiha faction managed to ascertain the raw truth through their own specialized intelligence channels.
This caused the pro-coup faction within the clan to gain immense political traction, but they were now faced with a glaring existential paradox:
Where exactly was Shisui?
If she was missing, who was going to lead their revolution?
Aside from Shisui, who else possessed the sheer power required to spearhead a coup?
Following Shisui’s massive rampage, both Konoha and the Uchiha clan fell into a highly bizarre equilibrium.
Konoha was deeply terrified of a Shisui whose current status remained entirely unknown, coupled with the profound vulnerability caused by the sudden crippling of their active Jonin forces.
The Uchiha, on the other hand, were patiently biding their time for their legendary champion to return and lead them to overthrow the leadership so she could claim the mantle of Hokage.
Yet, at the absolute epicenter of this brewing political maelstrom, Shisui herself was currently sprawled out in Yasuka’s residence, sleeping like a log.
Though her final stand had ended in a thoroughly battered state, the aftermath of that explosive rebellion had left her feeling an unprecedented sense of profound liberation.
For the sake of the village, she had bled dry and given her absolute all in the Third Shinobi World War; for the sake of the Uchiha, she had burned her own eyes to ash.
As of today, whether to the village or to her clan, she no longer owed a single debt of obligation.
With the crushing weight of the world finally lifted from her shoulders, she naturally slept exceptionally sweet and deep.
She was ultimately awakened by the rich, savory aroma of cooking food.
Opening her eyes only to encounter a field of pitch-black darkness, Shisui let out a somewhat bitter, downcast sigh.
*In the end…
it couldn’t be cured, huh?*
“Time for breakfast, fool.”
Yasuka entered the room, carrying a bowl of medicinal porridge while speaking in his usual exasperated tone.
Seeing her touching the bandages over her eyes while sighing in self-pitying defeat, he realized he truly could no longer harbor any expectations for her intellect.
“Yasuka?
I’m sorry…
You don’t have to take my eyes to heart.
Being blind is infinitely better than being dead anyway.”
Shisui proactively offered words of comfort to Yasuka, silently urging him not to feel guilty over failing to restore her sight.
Yasuka’s mouth twitched slightly.
He stepped forward, clicked off the lights, shut the door to ensure complete darkness, and smoothly unraveled her bandages.
The moment a faint sliver of ambient light pierced through Shisui’s field of vision, she instantly clapped her hands over her face, groaning in sharp discomfort.
“Is there a slight possibility,” Yasuka remarked flatly, “that a brand-new set of eyes requires a bit of time to adapt?”
“Uh…”
Shisui’s face flushed with a fresh wave of profound embarrassment.
Yasuka, however, was too lazy to tease her further; he efficiently re-tied the bandages and began feeding her the medicinal porridge spoon by spoon.
“Um…
Yasuka, what exactly should I do moving forward?”
“Stay right here.
You haven’t cleared your medical fees or the tab for that amulet yet.”
“Oh…”
Although Yasuka’s tone carried its usual layer of cold detachment, Shisui could keenly feel the underlying warmth and care packed into his words.
What was it that people called this specific personality trait again?
A *tsundere*?