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*****
Glancing at the card in his hand, Mike materialized it.
In an instant, eight figures appeared at his side.
They wore identical black cloaks embroidered with red clouds, wide-brimmed bamboo hats with wind chimes hanging from them, and nail-polished fingers adorned with rings bearing their personal insignias.
A gust of wind swept past, and a chorus of crisp chimes rang out. Amidst the sound, the eight removed their hats and dropped to one knee before Mike.
The first had long red hair and a frail, almost windblown frame. Most striking of all were his light-purple eyes, patterned with several concentric rings.
The Rinnegan's wielder, the leader of the Akatsuki—Nagato.
The second was a beautiful woman with light-blue hair, a paper flower tucked into it—Konan.
The third was a handsome black-haired man with sharp, jet-black eyes—Uchiha Itachi.
The fourth had a shark-like face, deep-blue hair, and a massive sword strapped to his back—Kisame Hoshigaki.
The fifth was a delicate-looking young man with short red hair—Sasori.
The sixth was a blond man with long hair covering his left eye—Deidara.
The seventh wore a mask and exuded a grim aura—Kakuzu.
The eighth had slicked-back gray hair, light-purple eyes, and carried a scythe shaped like a crescent moon—Hidan.
Mike had manifested eight people in total. As for Orochimaru, Tobi, and Zetsu, he chose not to bring them forth.
"Master."
Whatever memories they held, whatever ambitions or hidden thoughts they carried, to them Mike was their creator, their sole god. His mission was now their only purpose.
Mike regarded them coolly. "Go. Stir up as much chaos as you can."
The eight nodded. At the moment of their creation, Mike had already embedded the relevant knowledge of the current situation into their minds, sparing him the need to explain.
The Akatsuki members rose and quickly vanished from his sight.
From Jason Stryker, Mike had already learned much about this island and Mr. Sinister's operations.
The island was saturated with surveillance and even mutant "radars." Any stranger setting foot here would inevitably be detected within minutes. That was why Mike had cloaked Gwen and the others in invisibility before sending them to the island.
In other words, from the moment he appeared here, it was very likely he had already been discovered.
Mr. Essex—Sinister—was inherently cautious. Even Jason Stryker, who had served him for years, knew nothing of the base's true layout or the precise location of the consciousness backups. That was why Mike hadn't opened a portal directly into the base.
If he charged in recklessly and triggered a battle inside, there was a very real risk of destroying the base in the process. That would mean losing the devices storing Sinister's backup consciousness. Worse, even if Sinister merely grew suspicious, he might deliberately destroy the equipment himself.
If that happened, Tony would have no way of using the base's systems to purge the consciousness backups in other hidden facilities.
This time, destroying Sinister's backup consciousness and his cloned bodies was the true objective. Otherwise, even killing Sinister outright would render the mission meaningless.
Thus, Mike's role was to stage a direct assault on the base, drawing out enemy forces—and ideally, Sinister himself—so that Tony and the others, who had memorized part of the base's layout, could infiltrate undetected.
As for whether Sinister would take the bait…
From Jason Stryker, Mike had learned that Mr. Sinister was a geneticist with an obsessive collector's streak.
If he witnessed the power of the Akatsuki and his clones failed to capture them, there was a very high probability his compulsion to "collect" would drive him to enter the battlefield personally.
So now, Mike's only task was to wait.
Meanwhile, the eight manifested Akatsuki members had already left the beach. They vanished from Mike's sight and entered the dense forest connected to the shore.
Nagato turned to the others. "The usual—pairs of two. Attack the central base."
Two-man cells—their standard combat formation.
The group nodded and dispersed into pairs, fading like shadows into the trees.
Nagato and Konan remained in place for a few seconds. Konan stepped closer, concern in her voice. "Your body?"
Though they were conjured beings, their memories and emotions were very real.
"I've never felt better," Nagato replied with a faint smile.
Their strength and condition depended entirely on Mike.
Hearing this, Konan's lips curved into a soft smile.
Nagato looked toward the island's center, gazing at his hands as he murmured, "If the goal were simply to destroy the base, that would be far easier for me."
With a single Chibaku Tensei, he could obliterate the entire facility.
But destroying the base or killing Sinister was expressly forbidden—Mike's command.
Konan narrowed her eyes and smiled gently. "Come. Let's carry out our master's mission."
Nagato nodded and formed a seal.
"Summoning Jutsu!"
With a burst of smoke, a monstrous bird tens of meters tall appeared before them.
Its feathers were a strange gray-green, its beak massive and yellow, and its eyes—like Nagato's—were patterned with eerie concentric rings.
"Let's go."
Nagato spoke calmly, leaping with Konan onto the giant bird's bowed head.
The bird spread its enormous wings, whipping up a violent gale as it carried the two into the sky.
At the same time, the other six moved toward the central base by their own methods.
The island was not large, and at their speed they would reach the base quickly. Yet even as they advanced, alarms blared within Sinister's facility.
Hearing the piercing wail, Mr. Sinister, who had been working in the lab, frowned. He waved his hand, and several virtual screens lit up before him, showing intruders in matching cloaks.
"Hm? These people? What organization are they from?"
Confusion flickered in his eyes. He had no recollection of any group that dressed this way.
Still, uninvited guests were intruders all the same.
A smile crept across his lips.
Judging by their speed and abilities, they seemed promising. Perfect test subjects for his newest weapons.
With that thought, he began manipulating the controls on his virtual screens.
"Let's start with something simple. Hopefully, they'll surprise me—perhaps even provide some unexpected gains."
He chuckled lowly and released the weapons he had created.
(End of Chapter)