"You know too much. So your life ends here."
The Masked Man flicked his sleeve, and a pile of pitch-black chains clattered onto the ground.
He clasped the ends onto his wrists, then lunged forward, reaching straight for Fugaku Uchiha's face.
Fugaku threw a kunai.
It passed cleanly through the Masked Man's head—and Fugaku himself then slipped right through the man's intangible body.
The Masked Man was suddenly behind him, yet the black chains linking his wrists were still hanging right in front of Fugaku.
Seeing the chains so close, Fugaku instantly understood the man's tactic.
He drew another kunai and struck the chain.
A sharp clang rang out.
Just as he suspected—the chains didn't phase out with the Masked Man's body.
His aim was to bind Fugaku with the chains, then finish him off.
But Fugaku's battlefield experience far surpassed his.
He quickly hurled several more kunai. They looked ordinary, but were specially commissioned from Nekobaa—much heavier than standard ones, and far more forceful. They knocked the chains off-angle at once, and even dragged the Masked Man back several steps.
The Masked Man might have a Mangekyō Sharingan, but Fugaku could see his combat instincts were lacking. That only confirmed what he already believed: this man could not possibly be Madara Uchiha—the legendary figure who survived the Warring States Era and stood shoulder to shoulder with the First Hokage.
Still, even with weak combat experience, his raw power made up for it.
His ability to selectively turn intangible was dangerously tricky, and Fugaku could sense the man's chakra reserves far exceeded a normal human's. Even his recovery rate was comparable to shinobi from the Senju or Uzumaki clans.
The Masked Man sneered. "I have plenty of time to waste on you. But the Nine-Tails has already left its Jinchūriki. Not even Minato Namikaze can stop Konoha from being destroyed now."
Fugaku had already gathered most of the intel he could from the Masked Man.
Staying in a prolonged fight would do him no good.
The ideal outcome was capturing the man alive to hand over to Konoha's interrogation unit. Failing that, killing him and preserving the body for Inoichi Yamanaka's intelligence division would suffice.
He narrowly dodged the massive shuriken launched from the mask's eyehole, though the attack shredded the Police Force armband on his arm.
"So it really is a space–time dōjutsu."
But throughout the clan's entire history, none of the Uchiha who awakened the Mangekyō had ever possessed a space–time ocular ability.
Which meant the enemy could only be an Uchiha whose bloodline had been lost outside the clan…or a hidden descendant within the clan who had awakened a Mangekyō Sharingan in secret.
"You and Minato Namikaze really are troublesome." The Masked Man narrowed his eyes, his assault growing even fiercer.
Caught between attacks that phased through reality and massive ninja tools appearing out of nowhere, Fugaku Uchiha was beginning to struggle. Even when he landed a hit, unless the jutsu dealt overwhelming damage, the enemy's wounds healed astonishingly fast.
"Fire Release: Great Dragon Fire Technique!"
A massive dragon of flame coiled its long, blazing body around the Masked Man.
The moment he slipped out of the fiery vortex using his Kamui Form, a second "Fire Release: Great Dragon Fire Technique!" roared toward him.
This was the strongest Fire Release technique Fugaku could use at the moment. The B-rank jutsu devoured his chakra, and firing it twice in a row left him drained for several seconds.
He'd expected such an attack to seriously injure the Masked Man. Instead, the man sacrificed his right arm to block his vital points, then used the opening to pull his entire body into a swirling vortex.
Fugaku froze—before he could even search for the man's new position, a chilling killing intent struck him from behind.
He'd underestimated him due to lack of intel.
The Masked Man had never once used his space–time dōjutsu to completely retreat into that dimension before.
A kunai shot toward Fugaku's throat. His Sharingan tracked the movement perfectly, but after firing two B-rank Fire Releases in succession, his body lagged half a beat.
"—!!"
Fugaku's eyes widened, locking onto the Mangekyō pattern hidden behind the hollow of that orange mask.
And then, in that split second, everything changed again.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!"
"Shadow Clone Technique!"
Two young voices rang out at the same time.
A Shadow Clone appeared beside Fugaku and shoved him hard out of the attack range. It was struck in his place and burst with a poof.
At the same time, a massive Great Fireball roared toward the unprepared Masked Man.
Fugaku stared in shock.
Who—?!
In the blazing light of the fireball, the silhouettes of two youths gleamed sharply. With his Sharingan active, Fugaku saw they both wore Konoha forehead protectors. One of them, a black-haired boy, was dressed in the blue Uchiha-style attire worn by young clan members.
As the Great Fireball surged toward its target, there was no time left for the Masked Man to dodge.
Phase through it?
No. Too troublesome. Dealing with Fugaku was already irritating enough—he didn't need two extra brats appearing out of nowhere.
And he recognized these brats.
They were the ones hiding in the shadows with that other Minato.
Back then, he had seen Rin… the Kakashi of that era… and—
The boy who had not yet fallen into darkness, bright, alive, and living by the creed of "Comrades First."
Obito Uchiha.
...
At this point, the Masked Man hardly knew who he was anymore.
Maybe the only identity that still made sense—the only one he could cling to—was Madara.
But even so, he needed answers from these two brats. Who were those people who appeared in Kushina's delivery room that night?!
If it wasn't a genjutsu, then why had there been a living Rin, a proud Kakashi, and… an Obito who had never fallen into darkness?
Thoughts flashed through his mind in an instant. In the real world, his body responded with a single motion—
A massive gourd-shaped fan erupted from the vortex in his right eye's void, perfectly blocking Sasuke Uchiha's Great Fireball.
With his arm still bound by black chains, he gripped the fan's slender handle, holding it before him as he murmured:
"Uchiha… Reflection…"