Thud.
Thud.
Inside the sealed chamber, heavy, short, muffled impacts echoed again and again. The sound was like a giant striking a war drum with full force. Each beat sent ripples across the boiling, blazing white lightning plasma.
Stirred by that oppressive rhythm, Danzō felt his own heartbeat begin to synchronize with the "drum."
His heart had to pound at least ten times just to reach the next dull boom. The abnormal cadence was suffocating. The scorched stench in the air drilled into his nostrils, as if his chest were submerged in water. Even maintaining a normal breathing rhythm became painfully difficult.
Before he could steady himself, the girl's submerged silhouette in the lightning pool grew clearer. The ripples widened, and she rose slowly to the surface.
Only then did Danzō see her fully.
She was tall, not slender but faintly full in figure, her build carrying a subtle, healthy strength.
She wore a single-layer black garment, pure and unadorned, which made her skin look like pale jade, luminous and soft. As more of her body surfaced, blue-violet lightning serpents crawled along the curves of her form, bursting and crackling. With each flash of thunder, sparks sprayed in all directions.
The electrical flares were violent, ferocious. In the lightless chamber they stabbed into Danzō's eyes until he could barely keep them open.
After only two blinding bursts, his vision doubled. Pain speared at the corners of his eyes, tears flooding. He raised the back of his hand to cover his left eye, while beneath the bandages his Mangekyō Sharingan opened silently.
But the light only grew harsher.
Pure violet filled his entire field of view, endless and boundless, as if he were staring into an infinite ocean of purple.
Gulp.
His throat bobbed. The anger he'd carried from being stopped at the door had vanished without him noticing, replaced by shock that surged straight from his gut to the crown of his head.
Three times. Five times. Ten times.
His Mangekyō trembled as it examined that violet sea, and he realized the chakra within it was at least twenty times his own.
He had never seen such overwhelming chakra outside of the tailed beasts.
In these five years, what had she become? Had she already brushed the threshold of the God of Shinobi?
While Danzō's mind raced through chaotic guesses, a faint red barrier rose slowly, covering that dense purple ocean. The flashes between his fingers dimmed, and for a long moment no light burst at all.
Only then did Danzō lower his left hand.
Bare shoulders slipped into a white kimono. Her matte silver hair, long enough to trail the floor, coiled itself up behind her head as if guided by invisible hands. The mysterious pattern on her brow slowed, leaving only a trace of deep violet.
With all her otherworldly presence reined in, Konome Taketori was suddenly standing before him.
Five years had not changed her features drastically. The childishness had simply faded, replaced by a softer, more feminine grace. Yet the cold, blade-like aura she once carried had turned unusually gentle.
Her pink lips curved in a smile that felt like spring sunlight.
"Teacher Danzō, what brings you here?"
Staring at this warm, gentle Konome, bright as a small sun, Danzō felt his scalp go numb.
She was more dangerous than the murderous little girl she'd once been.
"You've changed… a great deal." The wariness in his voice practically leaked into the air.
These years, while adapting to his new arm and learning to control Wood Release, he had occasionally summoned Aburame Ryōma and Konome, his two top subordinates, to hear updates on Root.
Konome's change had never seemed this extreme.
But since two years ago, after he discovered Root's "abnormalities," she had become as if she were someone else.
More smiles. A gentler, refined air. A red barrier constantly lingering around her body. Even the Sharingan could no longer read her chakra.
He had only glimpsed that tyrannical chakra response now because she had been training.
And worse than all of that was Kotoamatsukami.
Danzō's right eye sharpened. The four-point pinwheel in his pupil spun, and the eerie Mangekyō power surged instantly, forming a wheel that drilled straight into the barrier.
Like a crawling insect, its tendrils bent and slipped inward, driving toward her brain.
Crack.
It sounded like glass shattering.
The mind-controlling ocular power that should have seized her dissolved in an instant, vanishing from his perception. No matter how he tried to issue commands, it was like throwing mud into the sea. Not a single response returned.
Kotoamatsukami failed.
The Mangekyō Sharingan's so-called strongest genjutsu, Kotoamatsukami, had completely lost its effect on her.
Watching Danzō's face darken, Konome's smile only grew gentler.
Inside her mind, she guided the intercepted Kotoamatsukami power down into the Sharingan hidden within her palm. Three tomoe rotated, linked, and formed the four-point pinwheel pattern. The stolen ocular power was stored away in an instant.
Root and ANBU had no shortage of hardbones, and plenty of them were still Danzō's diehards. Without this steady free supply of ocular power for her clone's research, she would never have brought so many of them under her control.
These years, Danzō had treated his new arm like a beloved toy, hiding in Root's underground base and rarely emerging.
His survival methods were strong. And she didn't want to kill him too early, not when destroying him might also destroy Kotoamatsukami. Besides, her own strength and influence were still accelerating. She had no need to deal with a "leader" who existed in name only.
After five years of Aburame Ryōma's relentless work, and her Yang Release clone's study of Kotoamatsukami…
Root had long since changed hands.
And the status between her and Danzō had, beyond any doubt, reversed.
"Thanks to Teacher's help all these years, your student is deeply grateful," Konome said, and she meant it. Her expression was sincere to the point of solemn.
Danzō had helped her without holding back. If she had reached her current height, he deserved the greatest share of the credit.
To thank this esteemed mentor who had "taught" her so much, she had even prepared a lavish funeral, planning to bury him with full honors.
How merciful and generous of me.
Thinking of that carefully designed execution feast, her blood stirred, even before it officially began.
Danzō's back prickled under her smile.
His muscles tensed on instinct. An extreme sense of danger stabbed into his nerves. The sharp perception he had forged through life-and-death combat screamed warnings in his skull, waking fear buried deep in his core.
For a moment he even forgot why he had come here at all.
Seeing his face grow paler and paler, and hearing him fail to speak for so long, Konome seemed to realize something.
Within her body, flesh-and-blood curse marks crossed and interwove, pressing a certain "presence" even lower.
Only then did Danzō's rigid muscles begin to loosen. Color returned to his bloodless face.
Three years ago, her Sage Body had successfully entered its second stage.
Her chakra and vitality became even more abundant. And whether it was a resonance between her Sage Body and Shikotsumyaku, or something tied to the Byakugan still "stirring" within her, her body temperature rose higher and higher, until her skin was sitting at seventy degrees above freezing.
That was her normal state.
Once she began moving intensely, her blood heated almost instantly, building toward a boil.
A boil in the literal, physical sense.
And it wasn't just her blood. In high-speed motion, the scorching steam in her breath reached a shocking two to three hundred degrees.
Hot enough to steam a tiger.
The strangest part was that despite her internal temperature being so extreme, she felt no discomfort. The more her body boiled, the better she felt. Her strength and speed increased in that heat, and she awakened a peculiar force.
It wasn't chakra. It wasn't a visible energy.
If she had to describe it, it was more like a trait, a pressure, a presence.
Any living being affected by it would feel a terror they couldn't explain.
Like a rabbit facing a tiger.
Muscles locked. Movement failed. Thoughts collapsed under panic. Anxiety, agitation, rage, every hormone tied to fear and emotion surged wildly.
If someone's constitution was weaker, their consciousness blurred. Their body lost the right to act. They would stand in place like lambs waiting to be slaughtered.
At first, she hadn't even realized she was releasing such a presence.
Not until people began unconsciously avoiding her. And when she spoke, or simply drew too close, everyone seemed to lose the ability to refuse. They could only stand there stiffly, helpless.
At the Academy, girls with frailer constitutions, and older elders, would stumble and pale. Stray cats and dogs would collapse into dizzy faintness. Even elite jōnin in their prime like Guy and Kakashi would tense as soon as they sensed it, like cats with fur bristling.
Once she understood, she used her flesh curse marks to seal herself, suppressing that presence down to a level people could barely tolerate.
Later she discovered that as long as she stayed calm, kind, gentle, the effect weakened. But if she grew angry, if she released malice or killing intent, the pressure became overwhelmingly strong.
Just now, training her Lightning Release Chakra Mode had been too exhilarating. She had forgotten to restrain it. And thinking about giving Danzō a funeral while standing too close…
That was why he had been terrified to this extent.
"What did you need, Teacher?"
Seeing his mood stabilize, Konome had no interest in wasting time here.
Guy had missed her graduation ceremony. To make up for it, he promised he'd cook her a feast today.
A feast like that, just like training Lightning Release Chakra Mode, should be handled by the main body.
"N-no… nothing." Danzō's heart hammered wildly. His limbs felt numb and weak. The fear from earlier still clung to his spine.
But he was still Root's leader, not some green boy.
With sheer will, he crushed down his instinctive survival reaction, at least enough to maintain composure on the surface.
"I simply wanted to ask… have you noticed anything unusual in Root lately?"
"I'm usually down here training," Konome said smoothly. "I only go out when there's an external mission. You should be asking Ryōma."
She nearly laughed. Danzō really had no one left if he had come to her with this.
Danzō's eye tightened. Annoyance flared, but the glimpse of that chakra ocean and the lingering terror made him swallow it down. He could only say coldly, "You'll investigate…"
"Sorry," Konome interrupted without giving him an inch. "Starting tomorrow, I won't have much time to come to Root."
Her smile was polite, the words merciless.
"Maybe you didn't know. I've already graduated from the Academy."
She didn't even look at Danzō's darkening face. She walked straight out.
The fox-masked guard waiting outside bowed slightly and followed behind her, both figures slowly swallowed by the shadows.
Inside the sealed chamber, blazing white plasma churned in the thunder pool. The light painted Danzō's grim profile like a sheet of ice.
"Keep Danzō under watch," Konome said quietly.
"Yes!"
In the long corridor of the base, countless Root shinobi lined both sides, heads lowered, waiting as Konome and the fox mask passed.
Trailing behind her, the fox mask couldn't hold back his confusion.
"You provoked him so openly. Why not kill him right there?"
By all reason, it had been the best chance.
He and the Nara brothers were already prepared. The moment Konome gave the order, they would have rushed in to assist in surrounding and killing Danzō.
Instead, she had only riled him up, then let him go.
Konome didn't turn her head.
Her boots, and the stone beneath them, were coated in Earth Release Hardening.
These years, to walk outside normally, she had refined her Earth Release nature transformation to an absurd degree. It was carved into her bones now, cast with pure muscle instinct.
"Ryōma says there are still Danzō's sleeper agents inside ANBU," she said. "They're buried so deep even he can't identify them. They're the hidden landmines Danzō planted under Sarutobi-sensei. They could explode at any time."
Her voice remained calm.
"If I anger him like this, he won't be able to endure it. In a day or two, he'll gather those people to assassinate me."
Her smile was gentle.
"And then we clean them all at once. No loose ends."
"I see." The fox mask understood at once.
He admired her thoroughness. And the more he understood, the more certain he became that choosing to serve Lady Konome had been the right decision.
His disgust and hatred for Danzō only deepened.
Konome's gaze swept across his shifting emotions as she continued toward the surface.
Her Yang Release clone had already破解d Kotoamatsukami. The strongest genjutsu in the shinobi world held no secrets before her anymore, and through that she also discovered its awkward limitation.
Kotoamatsukami's purpose was to win without fighting.
It could only be used as a surprise attack through ocular power. If used head-on, the moment the target realized their will had been twisted, the genjutsu would instantly fail.
That was why, even after replicating Kotoamatsukami, she hadn't used it to forcibly enslave Root.
Instead, she implanted disgust and hatred toward Danzō into their subconscious.
Because Danzō's way of doing things was too absolute, that disgust already existed deep in many hearts. It was only that years of cruel conditioning had crushed their ability to resist.
Now, the genjutsu's power ignited that buried feeling, awakening fractured personalities and lost memories.
When Konome began reshaping Root, making it no longer dark and suffocating, and offering high待遇 and real care to Root shinobi, the contrast became sharp enough to turn disgust into hatred.
Then Danzō punished the training division severely and ordered those children executed.
That hatred hit its peak.
To break Danzō's rule, under hatred and Ryōma's guidance, they gathered around Konome on their own, kneeling and begging her to kill Danzō and save Root from its misery.
As for those still stubbornly loyal, Konome tossed them into the experimental division.
Thud. Thud.
Konome climbed the steps one by one, each step heavy as a bell.
More and more Root shinobi clustered around her. Under torchlight, their shadows covered the walls like a dense black forest.
"Danzō has one more genjutsu," she said. "Kotoamatsukami. It forcibly twists your will, making you abandon everything and devote yourselves to him."
Her voice was soft, but it carried absolute authority.
"So from now on, pair up in twos. If one of you gets hit, the other must remind them immediately."
"Yes!"
"Thank you for the warning, Lady Konome!"
"To twist will itself… such an evil technique. Danzō truly deserves death!"
Listening to the hateful murmurs rolling through the crowd, Konome's smile remained warm and dazzling as she walked toward the underground exit glowing ahead.
Win without fighting.
That was Kotoamatsukami.
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