"Believe it or not, it's already happening."
A cold smile touched Kakashi Hatake's lips as he looked down at Sarutobi Asuma, who was visibly on the verge of collapse.
"Since your Sarutobi clan decided to target my father, Hatake Sakumo, and has acted so arrogantly in Konoha for so long…" Kakashi's voice was like ice. "Then there's no longer any reason for any of you to exist."
"No!"
In a desperate burst of adrenaline, Asuma scrambled backward, trying to flee. He still had a bright future ahead of him, a life of promise. He was the son of the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi. He couldn't die here, forgotten in a dark alley.
"Heh. Did you really think you could just walk away from this?"
Asuma had barely taken two steps before Kakashi's figure blurred, reappearing right beside him like a phantom. There was a flash of steel, and a spray of blood erupted into the air. With a sickening sound, both of Asuma's legs were severed at the knee.
His body slammed heavily onto the ground. Blood pulsed from the stumps of his limbs, the coppery scent instantly filling the air. An agonizing scream tore from Asuma's throat, a sound of pure, unadulterated pain. As the youngest son of the Third Hokage, he had lived a life of privilege, a prince in Konoha. He had never known true suffering, never sustained an injury this severe. And the one who had inflicted it was Kakashi.
In the future, when teamed up with Naruto Uzumaki, Kakashi might have seemed more relaxed. But this was the Kakashi who had earned the name "Copy Ninja" with a single Sharingan and his own terrifying skill. The number of powerful shinobi he had killed on the battlefield was countless. Even now, not yet at his peak, Kakashi's abilities were far beyond what an ordinary ninja could comprehend.
…
"Your brother is already gone," Kakashi's voice echoed coldly in the alley. "I'll send you to meet him now. A little family reunion."
"No!" Asuma shrieked, his eyes wide with terror. "No! I… I don't want to die!"
His final plea was cut short. With another swift motion, Kakashi's blade sliced through his neck. Asuma's head flew high into the air before landing on the dusty ground with a soft thud. Dark red blood sprayed across Kakashi's clothes, but his visible eye remained perfectly calm, the only change being a deeper, colder light within it.
…
Meanwhile, high above the village of Konoha, the situation grew more tense. Following the appearance of the two members of the Twelve Divine Moons, the air had fallen into a profound silence, heavy with dread. From every direction, Konoha's Anbu members swarmed into position, their white masks looking like skulls in the fading light.
And then, he appeared. Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, the most powerful figure in the village, finally stepped into view, his face etched with grim understanding.
Damn it, he thought, his mind racing. Could the Uchiha clan have actually conspired with Tsukihiko? To do that is to hand our greatest enemy a weapon to use against us!
Just moments before, he had been meeting with the village elders and Shimura Danzo, plotting how to finally deal with the Uchiha clan. He never expected that the Uchiha, after years of patient endurance, would suddenly make such an explosive move. And they hadn't just acted on their own—they had contacted the most terrifying being in the world: Tsukihiko.
The Undefeated Legend.
It was a myth that had haunted the Shinobi World for centuries. Even the most seasoned ninja who had grown up hearing the stories could not forget that name. In the era when Tsukihiko walked the earth, everyone else was merely a supporting character in his story. If he had not chosen to remain aloof from the world's politics, the Five Great Nations and their ninja villages would never have been formed.
Even powerhouses like Senju Hashirama and Uchiha Madara were helpless before him. Whether anyone was willing to admit it or not, there had only ever been two types of people in the Shinobi World during that time: Tsukihiko, and everyone else.
And now, this living legend had appeared in Konoha, just three days after his subordinate Kagaya, to publicly accuse him, the Third Hokage. It was the ultimate humiliation—a direct assault on his power and authority in front of the entire world.
No matter how cunning or patient Hiruzen was, this was an insult he could not bear. But he also knew the unchangeable truth of the Shinobi World: strength was the only thing that mattered.
Konoha and the Land of Fire only existed because of the overwhelming power of Hashirama and Madara. The Tailed Beasts were only distributed among the villages because Hashirama, the strongest of his time, personally proposed it. Absolute strength was the foundation of all authority.
Why had he, the "God of Shinobi," been forced to collude with Danzo to deal with the Uchiha in the shadows? It was the same principle. He simply did not possess the absolute, overwhelming power required to openly destroy one of Konoha's two founding clans.
But now, with Tsukihiko's intervention, the game had changed. The situation had spiraled completely out of his control. Whether he liked it or not, there was no turning back.
…
"And now, we have a gift for Konoha," one of the black-robed figures in the sky announced, his voice carrying across the silent village. "Or more accurately, a gift for Hiruzen Sarutobi."
With a flick of his wrist, two large, cloth-wrapped bundles were thrown from the sky, plummeting toward the ground below.
"What's going on? What are those things!?" a Jonin shouted.
"I don't know, but it must be another one of Tsukihiko's schemes!" another replied.
A wave of panic spread through the assembled Konoha forces as they watched the mysterious objects fall.
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