While Arima was reviewing the information in his mind provided by the system, Isshiki was silently observing his every move from within the lab.
In order to properly control this once-in-a-millennium "vessel," Isshiki had to monitor Arima's post-awakening behavior closely.
At the same time, he needed to continue testing the effectiveness of the Deep Mind Manipulation Jutsu based on Arima's responses.
From Arima's performance just now, although he failed to awaken the Tenseigan, Isshiki was, overall, very satisfied.
After leaving the lab, Isshiki walked straight into the room where Arima was staying.
Seeing him arrive, Arima immediately stood up, ready to bow in greeting.
Isshiki waved his hand dismissively. "No need for formalities when we meet again. We are both 'vessels', our status is equal."
Though Isshiki said it casually, Arima picked up on a deeper meaning.
Originally, Arima had thought that Isshiki had painstakingly searched for a vessel purely for his own reincarnation.
But now it seemed his consciousness had long been corroded by the chakra of the Otsutsuki clan stored within the seal.
In other words, Isshiki had always been just a discarded vessel himself.
Despite being shaken by this realization, Arima's expression remained calm. He carefully concealed any emotional fluctuation to avoid arousing Isshiki's suspicion.
Isshiki took a seat opposite him, eyes fixed on Arima's left eye. "Why didn't the Tenseigan awaken?"
Arima first shook his head, then nodded, before replying, "I have a theory, now I just need to test it."
He then summoned several scrolls via summoning jutsu. Sealed within them was the chakra he had absorbed from Isshiki during their battle in the desert.
Unsealing each scroll one by one, Arima used the seal on both hands to absorb all of the chakra. The system instantly converted it into virtue points, nearly 50,000 in total.
This sequence of actions revealed something new to Isshiki.
It seemed Arima had already become proficient in using the seal to absorb chakra, indicating that at least 10% of the consciousness within the Kama had thawed.
And the more frequently Arima used the Kama seal, the faster that consciousness would thaw, meaning the faster his mind would be eroded and assimilated.
Isshiki was pleased to see that Arima showed no resistance or aversion to using the seal. All his prior efforts on Arima's left eye had not been in vain.
But something puzzled him, despite absorbing such high-quality chakra, there was still no change in Arima's left eye.
Arima's expression carried a hint of regret. "The chakra in these scrolls still isn't enough to awaken the Tenseigan."
Isshiki asked curiously, "Didn't you only use a single Ten-Tails fragment to awaken the Rinnegan before?
I've studied that fragment, it only held about ten percent more chakra than what you just absorbed."
This was the first time Arima had heard directly from Isshiki about the existence of the Ten-Tails.
That confirmed his earlier suspicions, the nine Tailed Beasts were all originally fragments of the Ten-Tails. Clearly, the Sage of Six Paths was its first jinchūriki.
But this raised even more questions in Arima's mind. Who, or what, was Isshiki really? How did he have access to Ten-Tails?
He shook his head and set aside those thoughts, replying, "Not ten percent, ten times more."
Before Isshiki could ask further, Arima explained, "That fragment had absorbed vast amounts of chakra from the Zero-Tails and Moryo.
You probably didn't account for that. Also, at the time, my Rinnegan was only one step away from awakening, so it didn't take as much Ten-Tails chakra to trigger the change."
Isshiki turned this explanation over and over in his mind.
Though he remained highly cautious of Arima, the truth was that he had never believed in the Mind Manipulation Jutsu's perfection.
In fact, he didn't believe any technique could be truly perfect.
And anything involving the Ten-Tails was something he treated with utmost seriousness.
Sensing Isshiki's ongoing wariness, Arima decided to press advantage through strategic retreat.
"That meteorite supposedly fell from the sky two hundred years ago. Maybe there's a Ten-Tails fragment on the moon."
Isshiki shook his head, sighing. "About fifteen years ago, the Ten-Tails' husk on the moon was already summoned away. After I reawakened, I scoured the entire ninja world and found no trace of it."
What Arima didn't know was that his offhand remark had accidentally hit upon the truth.
Not only had the moon once held a Ten-Tails fragment, but even now, a woman from the Otsutsuki clan remained sealed deep within its core.
Isshiki had no intention of revealing this to Arima. Until the Kama seal in Arima thawed at least halfway, Isshiki would never lay all his cards on the table.
And the sign that the Kama seal had reached that threshold would be when Arima successfully activated its first transformation.
As for Jigen, his own Kama seal had already thawed eighty percent, allowing him to freely use its second transformation.
But his physical body could no longer bear the Otsutsuki soul, forcing him to seek out a new vessel.
After thinking it over, Isshiki said, "Wait a moment. I'll retrieve ten times that amount of Ten-Tails chakra for you."
With that, he opened a space-time portal and vanished.
Arima's heart surged with joy. He had calculated the equivalent virtue point cost based on how much energy it took to awaken the Rinnegan, and it worked.
He had successfully tricked Isshiki into giving him ten times the chakra that had been stored previously.
Of course, he only dared to bluff like this because he had hidden trump cards. Against someone as unpredictable as Isshiki, he would normally be far more cautious.
But by sheer luck, this move had dispelled much of Isshiki's suspicion.
Before long, Isshiki returned, with a coffin in tow.
Arima immediately recognized it as the Yin-Yang release sealing tool that had been used to imprison him.
Isshiki said, "Get ready. This is quite a large amount of chakra, about half of what the One-Tail possesses."
Arima had intended to absorb the chakra directly through the Kama seal, but the sheer amount caught him off guard.
"I can't absorb that much so quickly," he admitted. "A lot of chakra would be wasted. It's better to seal me into the coffin again."
Isshiki was skeptical. "You can still circulate chakra while sealed?"
Arima pointed to his right eye. "With the Rinnegan, I might just be able to manage. If not, I'll reseal the chakra into my body using a more stable technique after I come out."
Isshiki didn't question him further and resealed him inside the coffin.
The interior was a void of lifeless silence.
The first time Arima had been sealed inside, Isshiki had suppressed all his chakra, leaving him unable to resist.
But now, using the Rinnegan's ability, he successfully delayed the seal's suppressive effect.
Taking advantage of the moment, Arima rapidly absorbed all the chakra in the space using the Kama seal, converting it entirely into virtue points.
To him, the energy represented by virtue points far surpassed even Ten-Tails chakra.
As the last of the chakra was absorbed, the coffin's sealing power suddenly surged.
Caught off guard, Arima didn't even have time to check the system notifications. In order to stay conscious, he quickly used the system to forcibly awaken the Tenseigan.
Fifty thousand virtue points vanished from his account, and his left eye finally evolved.
With the awakening of the Tenseigan, Arima's mind was flooded with new memories, of powerful abilities and techniques.
The most exhilarating were the Tenseigan Chakra Mode, Yin-Yang Release, Truth-Seeking Orbs, Silver Wheel Reincarnation Explosion, and Golden Wheel Reincarnation Explosion.
He also gained greater control over gravity and repulsion, space-time techniques, long-range chakra absorption, and advanced puppetry.
To resist the increasing suppression, Arima activated the Tenseigan Chakra Mode.
His body was instantly cloaked in glowing green chakra, forming an elegant, mysterious chakra robe. Six Truth-Seeking Orbs floated behind him.
The Tenseigan's power thrilled him, but even more unexpected was what came next.
Only under this new mode could Arima move freely within the coffin, unbound by the seal.
He turned to check the system to see how many virtue points the Ten-Tails chakra had earned him.
What he saw made his heart skip a beat.
His balance now exceeded 1.5 million virtue points, meaning he had gained an additional one million points just now.
Checking the log, Arima saw that the system had just erased one-tenth of the Ten-Tails' consciousness.
This baffled him. 'How could there be a consciousness hidden in pure chakra?
Just like with the Kama seal's chakra… What is the true relationship between the Otsutsuki and the Ten-Tails? Are they of the same origin? Symbiotic? Parasitic?'
Before he could dwell further, the sealing space suddenly collapsed, and he found himself back in his room.
Isshiki had remained nearby and had sensed when the chakra had been depleted. He immediately released the seal, allowing Arima to return to the living world.
Arima was still in Tenseigan Chakra Mode.
Isshiki studied his now-mystical appearance and quickly understood.
Arima's left Byakugan had evolved, and not just awakened, but completely bypassed the Tenseigan's latent development stage.
Isshiki took in the sight with a satisfied expression, his creation had turned out well.
In his assessment, Arima's current power under Tenseigan Chakra Mode was somewhere between the first and second state of the Kama seal.
In a direct confrontation, Isshiki's second state would still utterly crush him.
Arima saw that Isshiki remained unfazed by his new form and realized that the gap in their strength remained vast. He would need to bide his time.
As he planned his next steps, Isshiki casually remarked, "Seems like someone in your little village is acting up.
Just a bunch of weaklings pecking at each other, but you should probably handle it yourself."
Then he added, "Do you want Hanzo to go with you?"
Arima shook his head. "No need."
With that, he used Kamui and returned to the shinobi world.
Night had fully fallen, a round moon hanging high in the sky. After spending so long in a space without sun, moon, or stars, the time distortion left him slightly disoriented.
From the surrounding architecture and the clothing of nearby people, he quickly realized he was in the Land of Iron, a place where samurai were common.
After orienting himself, Arima set off at once for Konoha Village.
A sense of unease crept into his heart. If nothing major had happened, Isshiki wouldn't have bothered to mention it. To him, even a full-scale ninja war was barely worth noting.
And as Arima feared, within the Uchiha clan's territory in Konoha, a dramatic upheaval was already underway.
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