As the dagger drew closer, step by step, Nawaki's heart was filled not only with the terror of impending death, but also with anger at his own uselessness.
Perhaps, before this, although the three of them had taken their teacher's guidance seriously, their familiarity with him had made the concept of "death" feel unreal.
But now, under the almost overflowing killing intent and the terrifying atmosphere he had deliberately created, they had long since forgotten that this was a "test."
It was as if they were now facing a powerful enemy ninja, and if they couldn't escape their current predicament, they would really die!
Die, die, die!
Just as Nawaki felt the dagger was about to pierce his body, it suddenly changed direction, stabbing towards Rin who was beside him.
Schlick—
Blood splattered onto his face.
Schlick—
This was Mikoto's blood, splashing directly into his pupils.
He didn't know if it was the blood that had entered his eyes, or if the blood vessels in his own eyes had burst, but he felt that the whole world had turned a bloody red.
And as his state of mind changed, the illusion created by Li Anshi's killing intent also changed.
An endless sea of blood surged, drowning him.
In this sea of blood, the corpses of countless Rins and Mikotos were piled up like mountains, their bones forming a forest...
"Ah, ahhhhhh!"
Nawaki roared, the grief and anger in his heart allowing him to break through the killing intent. He charged at Li Anshi, roaring.
"Foolish."
Seeing this, Li Anshi shook his head. With a flick of the dagger between his index and middle fingers—
Schlick...
Blood splattered. Nawaki looked down at the wound on his chest, and finally, he fell to the ground...
…
"Ah..."
A cry of alarm woke him from his slumber.
"Rin, Mikoto!"
Before he even opened his eyes, he called out their names.
"Nawaki, thank goodness, you're alright!"
Hearing his voice, Rin and Mikoto immediately threw their arms around him, sobbing uncontrollably.
"Rin, Mikoto, you..."
He reached out and gently touched the arms they had placed on him, feeling their warmth. Surprised that they were unharmed, he couldn't help but say.
"Thank goodness. I thought you had both been killed by Sensei Li."
"Oh, right. This is special training from Sensei Li."
At this moment, he finally remembered that they weren't in a real life-and-death battle, but were evading their teacher's pursuit.
However, that illusion had been so shockingly real that all three of them couldn't tell what was real and what was not.
Even now, he could still recall the scene of being so terrified by the immense killing intent that he couldn't even move, and the powerlessness he had felt when he had seen them die in front of him.
"Sensei is too strong!"
"Even without using his flying dagger, he's far beyond what we can handle."
"By the way, where is he?"
After calming down, the three of them separated, looking for any sign of him.
"I'm right here."
Hearing Nawaki finally remember him, he couldn't help but roll his eyes and flick him on the head.
"Ah..."
"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow..."
A large bump quickly formed on his head, making him cry out in pain.
After a while, he finally lowered his hand from the bump and looked at him.
"Sensei..."
"If this were on a battlefield, you would be dead again, Nawaki!"
Ignoring his pitiful act, he said in a deep voice, "Didn't I tell you before?"
"For this special training, I want you to treat it as a real battlefield."
"The moment a ninja regains consciousness, they need to survey their surroundings, to see where they are, and if the environment has changed from before they lost consciousness."
"If there are changes, you need to judge for yourselves whether these changes are beneficial or harmful."
"But, Nawaki, what did you do just now?"
"First, you shouted loudly, exposing your position."
"Second, you saw a familiar face and let down your guard."
"Have you not considered the possibility that Rin and Mikoto are both enemies who have used the Transformation Technique to disguise themselves as your teammates?"
"This..."
He was so thoroughly reprimanded by Li Anshi that his face turned red. He lowered his head and mumbled, but dared not say anything more.
He also knew that his performance had probably disappointed his teacher greatly.
"I'm sorry, Sensei. I have disappointed you."
"No, Nawaki."
"You have not only disappointed me, but also your teammates."
He shook his head and said in a deep voice, "Before, that was the first part of your special training."
"And in this training, Rin's performance was the best, and Mikoto's was second."
"As for you, Nawaki..."
"If there weren't only three of you, my evaluation of you might have been even lower."
"What?"
Hearing this, he couldn't help but look up at him.
If he remembered correctly, in his memory, his teacher had killed Rin and Mikoto first, and then himself last.
After their deaths, he remembered that he seemed to have burst forth with greater strength, breaking through the illusion of killing intent and attacking him.
How was it that in his teacher's words, the evaluation of the two who had been killed first was higher than his own?
It wasn't that he couldn't stand them being better than him.
Rather, he didn't understand what criteria his teacher was using to judge their performance in this deadly game of hide-and-seek.
"It seems you are still not convinced, Nawaki."
He snorted coldly.
"Although this team was formed because Lady Tsunade wanted me to teach you."
"However, since Rin and Mikoto have become my subordinates, I will not hold back in their training either."
"A ninja is at their strongest when they have someone to protect, when they have the resolve that as long as I am alive, no one can harm the person behind me."
"So, in each of your illusions, I killed your comrades first, and then came for you."
Hearing this, he was stunned.
"After Nawaki and Rin's deaths, Mikoto awakened her Sharingan."
"And it was a two-tomoe Sharingan from the start."
"If I'm not mistaken, not all the chunin of the Uchiha clan have awakened a two-tomoe Sharingan."
"It can be said that her strength is now at least ten times what it was before."
"Hehe..."
Seeing him look at her, Mikoto gave a silly laugh. At the same time, her pupils suddenly turned red, and two black tomoe appeared in them.
"Hiss..."
Seeing this, he sucked in a cold breath.
If he remembered correctly, before graduation, even Fugaku Uchiha, whose strength was second only to his own, had only awakened a one-tomoe Sharingan.
During this time, even if Fugaku's talent was good, he would have at most awakened a two-tomoe.
When his teacher had said that her strength had increased tenfold, on one hand, it was because her previous strength was indeed not that great.
But at the same time, it also showed just how much her strength had increased after awakening the two-tomoe Sharingan.
The Sharingan was the Kekkei Genkai that the Uchiha clan was proud of.
And the level of the Sharingan was also linked to their strength.
An ordinary Uchiha, even without awakening the Sharingan, as long as they had the aptitude of a ninja, could reach the strength of a genin with the guidance of their family or the academy teachers.
An Uchiha who had awakened a one-tomoe Sharingan, many could even defeat a chunin.
And an Uchiha with a two-tomoe Sharingan, even within the Uchiha clan, was a part of the clan's core strength. Each one, if taken out individually, was an elite chunin comparable to an ANBU ninja.
The three-tomoe Sharingan was the limit that an ordinary Uchiha could reach.
Every Uchiha with a three-tomoe Sharingan was a well-known figure among the jonin and was the strongest force of the clan.
In the ninja world, it would not be an exaggeration to consider an Uchiha with a three-tomoe Sharingan an "elite jonin."
For an ordinary jonin, if they encountered an Uchiha with a three-tomoe Sharingan one-on-one, they had to flee.
Only with a numbers advantage did they have a chance to fight.
This was a prestige that the Uchiha clan had built over thousands of years with the blood of countless enemies.
Only the Senju clan could be compared to them.
Now that Mikoto had suddenly awakened a two-tomoe Sharingan, even if her previous strength had been average, she was now a powerhouse among the chunin!
Seeing her awaken it, Li Anshi was also a little surprised.
As expected of the one who would give birth to two Mangekyo users in the future.
Mikoto Uchiha's talent is not low either.
If she was interested in continuing on the path of a ninja, it was not impossible that this whole family had the potential to awaken the Mangekyo.
However, he also knew that she had no intention of becoming a ninja.
Perhaps, after their team disbanded, she would marry Fugaku and become the future matriarch of the Uchiha clan.
"Then what about Rin?"
"As for Rin, she has completely mastered the first stage of the Little Li's Flying Dagger."
To be honest, it was not surprising to him that she had mastered it in such a short time.
Among the three of them, although he paid more attention to Nawaki and had invested the most effort in him, if he had to choose the hardest worker among the three, it would have to be Rin!
Ever since he had taught her the training method for the flying dagger, every time he saw her, she was either practicing her throwing technique or retrieving the daggers she had thrown.
It was only natural that she would break through under his pressure.
"Hiss..."
He sucked in another cold breath, feeling his teeth were about to ache from jealousy.
What a joke.
Although she had only completed the first stage, this was the Little Li's Flying Dagger!
Even just the first stage was enough for her to dominate the chunin.
She even had a considerable deterrent effect on ordinary jonin.
From this, it seemed he might be the weakest of the three?
"And you?"
"Nawaki, you tell me, how much did you grow in this special training?"
He gave a wry smile, feeling uncomfortable all over.
Before, he had thought he had grown a lot after breaking through his teacher's illusion of killing intent.
But compared to the two-tomoe Sharingan and the completion of the first stage of the flying dagger, it was nothing.
"Nawaki, your way of thinking is still too primitive."
"After their spirits were greatly stimulated, the first thing both Mikoto and Rin thought of was to use their strongest means to attack me."
"And it is precisely because of this that they both made greater progress after breaking free of my killing intent."
"But what about you?"
He shook his head at him with regret. "Look at you. After breaking free of my killing intent, you just ran at me to attack."
"What? Is the Rasengan I taught you not good enough, or have you not learned any other offensive ninjutsu before?"
"If you had just had a ninjutsu in mind that you wanted to use at that time, then for that ninjutsu, after the battle, you would definitely have had a new understanding."
"It's not impossible that the jutsu you used would have eventually become the core of your future fighting style, and all your other combat actions would just be to serve the use of that jutsu."
"Now you tell me, have you made any progress in your taijutsu?"
He was speechless.
"Then Sensei, can we do it again?"
He looked at him with expectant eyes. "I promise, this time I will definitely use my best ninjutsu..."
"Heh, what a nice thought."
He gave him a flick on the head.
"This kind of special training only has the best effect the first time."
"Now that you know the content of the training, and your bodies have a certain resistance to my killing intent."
"If we continue with this kind of training, if I don't hold back, it might cause irreversible damage to your souls. If I do hold back, it won't have much effect."
"So, the first stage of our special training is considered complete."
"Although your performance was very disappointing to me, the surprise that Mikoto and Rin gave me is enough to offset your foolishness."
"Huh? How can this be?"
For a moment, his disappointed sigh echoed far in the Forest of Death.
"Sensei, then when will the second stage of our training begin?"
The one who said this was Mikoto Uchiha.
Before, her strength had been the weakest of the three.