Only one Sharingan left.
Sasuke's voice echoed in Naruto's mind through their chakra link, sharp and precise like the confirmation of a hunter locking onto its prey.
The newly revived Danzo could barely stand.
He collapsed onto one knee, his left hand clamped desperately over the single remaining Sharingan on his arm. The eye was bloodshot, twitching violently, as if struggling against the fate waiting for it.
His breathing was harsh, ragged, and broken, like an old bellows tearing itself apart. Every inhale carried the copper taste of blood and a trembling rooted in his soul.
Izanagi allowed him to turn death itself into illusion for a brief window, reversing any fatal injury.
But each activation consumed one Sharingan. And it demanded a massive amount of chakra.
For Danzo to use it nine times already meant he had pushed the First Hokage's cells in his body to their absolute limits.
Now he no longer looked like a hardened schemer or a powerful elder.
His face was nothing but fear, exhaustion, and a kind of madness that comes only from being cornered by death too many times.
He stared at Sasuke, who stood in the distance drawing back another arrow on his glowing purple bow of Susanoo. He stared at Naruto too, who flickered from one Flying Thunder God marker to the next with a cold smile at the corner of his mouth.
And on Danzo's face, the final flame of hope guttered out completely.
No matter how much he wanted to resist, Naruto and Sasuke's teamwork, the instant teleportation, and the overwhelming field control of Susanoo had left him with no chance at all.
Sasuke's eyes gleamed with frost. The violet chakra arrow left the string, tearing the air apart with a shrill whistle as it raced toward the kneeling Danzo.
It was too fast. Danzo had no time to think, no time to weave seals, no time for anything.
"No!" His final scream twisted out of his throat as he raised his right arm on pure instinct.
It made no difference.
The arrow passed through him like a heated blade slicing through butter. It punched a hole straight through his chest and pinned him brutally against a shattered slab of stone.
Chakra detonated inside him. His chest caved in and tore apart, his organs collapsing under the blast. Life vanished in an instant.
On his arm, the final Sharingan convulsed once and shut forever, as though someone had blown out a dying candle.
The ten respawns of Izanagi were finished.
Danzo revived again.
But every eye on his arm was now closed.
Which meant the true horror began.
A new and violent mutation erupted from Danzo's right arm.
A raw, animalistic scream tore from his throat as an agony beyond death consumed him. The grafted cells of the First Hokage, which once provided immense chakra and sustained Izanagi, were now unleashed without the Sharingan suppressing them.
His skin writhed as though hundreds of serpents slithered beneath it. The dark bark-like surface split open, revealing pulsing wooden tissue that pulsed and twisted with unnatural growth.
Blood mixed with sharp wooden spines burst from his flesh. The corruption crept rapidly up his arm, racing across his shoulder and toward his neck.
The cells of Hashirama Senju were devouring him, converting their dying host into something wooden and monstrous.
"My arm! Cut it! I must cut it off!"
The terror of being consumed alive triggered Danzo's last surge of will.
His trembling left hand forced chakra into shape, forming a blade of wind.
He knew this was his only hope of slowing down the mutation: sever the very arm that gave him power and now sought to claim his life.
He aimed the chakra blade toward the base of the transforming arm.
But just as he was about to strike, the air rippled.
A golden blur appeared beside him.
Naruto.
His Mangekyo eyes glowed with six-pointed stars, cold and merciless. There was not a drop of pity in his expression, only a bitter satisfaction meant for a long overdue reckoning.
"Trying to save yourself?" Naruto's voice was low and sharp. "Danzo, you don't deserve salvation. Uncle Fugaku and Aunt Mikoto would never forgive you."
Before Danzo could react, Naruto's hand shot out.
A crisp crack echoed across the battlefield.
Naruto grabbed Danzo's left wrist and snapped it cleanly with perfect precision.
Danzo howled. His hand fell limp. The wind blade vanished.
His final chance of escape was gone.
Naruto's right hand, glowing with golden Sage Chakra, slammed onto Danzo's mutated shoulder.
Or perhaps onto what had once been a shoulder. Now it was a grotesque mass of writhing wood and flesh.
"You crave Wood Style so badly," Naruto murmured, lips curling into a chilling smile. "Let me help you enjoy it."
A flood of Sage Chakra, mixed with Naruto's own potent Wood Style chakra, surged into Danzo's body like a broken dam releasing a tidal wave.
The First Hokage's cells reacted violently.
Like adding boiling oil to a raging fire.
Danzo's inner life force was drained in seconds.
Wooden lines spread across his skin in a frenzy, swallowing him whole.
"No. No! You can't use Wood Style! How can you " His scream turned into a gurgle.
Naruto ignored him.
Danzo's face shriveled and hardened, transforming into rough dark bark. His bulging eyes dulled instantly and froze in place, becoming lifeless wooden knots. His mouth twisted open in a silent scream that hardened into a warped hollow in the trunk.
From his limbs, countless green shoots and thick roots erupted, stabbing into the ground, anchoring his transforming body.
Within a few breaths, the man who had once led the secret Root organization was gone.
In his place stood a massive tree, twisted, grotesque and filled with the lingering echo of agony.
The distorted trunk retained a faint outline of human form, but most of it had become snarled branches and gnarled roots entwined like chains of grief and madness.
The tree loomed in the center of the crater like a silent monument to the cruelty of this battle.
A faint breeze brushed past.
The branches trembled softly, whispering with what felt like Danzo's final, unwilling sob.
Naruto lowered his hand, staring at the wooden statue with a calm, icy detachment.
Sasuke dispelled Susanoo and walked up beside him. His Mangekyo eyes narrowed as he studied the warped tree.
"Hmph. What a fitting end."
His voice carried a cold satisfaction. "A twisted body for a twisted life. Farewell, rat of the Root."