---
Megumi stood with his back facing the three Root operatives.
The sound of their fallen masks hitting the ground drew them out of their shocked state.
"Hey Alex, get me my weapon." Megumi's voice was calm.
[Your weapon is now deposited inside your shadow box, ready for use.]
Megumi reached his hand into his shadow and pulled out a dagger. The weapon immediately transformed into a three-section staff.
Megumi gripped the edge of the staff, now facing the three operatives directly.
The three Root ninja circled him, their hands forming seals in unison.
"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!"
Flames engulfed Megumi, who remained standing in the middle without any plan to block the attack. The fire burned intensely until it exhausted itself. When the smoke cleared, it revealed Megumi with his clothes burnt away, but without a single scratch on his body.
He bolted forward, smacking one side of the staff across the face of the ninja directly in front of him, breaking their formation. He could sense a stronger prey not far away, so he lost interest in fighting these three weak operatives.
"Stop, you basta—" The ninja tried to overwhelm him with numbers, exploiting his apparent lack of focus.
But Megumi had already grown frustrated with these insects. He killed them before they could even sense it coming. Their bodies slumped to the floor, their blood painting the ground crimson red.
"Pathetic monkeys." Megumi now held the Inverted Spear of Heaven, swinging the weapon to remove the blood staining its blade.
His attention shifted to the Root ninja using Shadow Binding Jutsu on the dogs.
"Wait... it can't be." That was the reaction of both Kuromaru and the Root ninja, because the boy walking toward them was the same boy pronounced dead—their target.
The Root operative couldn't cancel his jutsu because the dogs had been threatening him ever since he'd stopped them.
"A Nara clan member. What a beautiful scene." Megumi's tone was cold.
He walked so slowly that both the Root operative and Kuromaru felt as if pressure was being applied directly to their chests. They couldn't breathe. The aura emanating from Megumi sent shocks down their spines.
Megumi maintained his unhurried pace until he pulled a familiar move. The Root ninja blinked, and Megumi had closed half the distance. He blinked again, and Megumi appeared directly in front of him. The operative tried to cancel the jutsu and flee, but what he saw instead was an unfamiliar blade stabbing through the side of his head, penetrating his brain and emerging from the other side.
"You need to help Tsume immediately!" Kuromaru urged Megumi, who was busy extracting information from the dead Root operative's memories.
*Just a low-rank bug,* Megumi thought inwardly, still sifting through the man's past memories.
"Elders of the Nara clan selling out their own people to Danzo. Well, I'll deal with you later." Megumi spoke in a low tone until he heard a dog giving him orders.
"Who do you think you are, ordering me around, dog?" Megumi had already picked up Kuromaru with one arm, strangling him.
The other dogs barked but didn't attack. "Stay back and keep quiet!" Kuromaru commanded his pack. He could tell something was fundamentally different about this boy. He'd been present when Megumi was a baby, but the creature before him now was not the same child. He was looking at a monster in human flesh.
"Please help Tsume. She was the one who gave us orders to protect you. And where is Hana?" Kuromaru explained quickly, trying not to provoke this monster further.
"She's fine and alive." Megumi answered, then dropped him.
As he turned to leave, he noticed that some life forces were dying while others were on the verge of death.
"Hey Alex, can my clones use RCT?"
[Yes, host. They can heal like you if they have a substantial amount of cursed energy, but they cannot heal souls as you can. You can see through multiple clones and crows without needing the same restrictions that bind them.]
"Okay then."
Kuromaru couldn't explain how a dead Megumi was now alive, but with only one arm visible. "You should put on something. You're naked."
Megumi stopped, touching his waist. A pair of black pants materialized on him. His shadow began spreading outward, and a clone emerged, this one appeared different because it had both arms intact.
"Stay and protect these dogs and the girl with the baby." Megumi gave the instructions, and he confirmed through the clone's vision that the system's words were true.
"Hey Alex, is there no way I can stop this shared vision?"
[Of course you can, with just a toggle: on or off.]
Megumi immediately switched it off, as he wasn't yet used to seeing more than his own point of view. He left the clone to find Hana and baby Kiba.
---
On the other side of the compound, the battle between Tsume and the Root captain raged on.
"What did you do to my people, you bastards?"
Tsume was on one knee, overwhelmed by numbers. Not a single member of her clan was anywhere to be found to support her.
"We drugged your clan well, and we have members stationed throughout who will knock out anyone who investigates. Your clan members won't notice anything until morning." The Root captain's voice was deliberately provocative.
Then the unthinkable happened.
Every Root member supporting the captain collapsed. Only the captain remained standing.
Both the captain and Tsume were astonished by the attacker's speed and efficiency in killing those operatives.
The captain went to check on the closest body and saw that the killer was a veteran—their wounds were on vital points, ensuring immediate death without struggle.
"Who are you? Show yourself!" The captain screamed at the top of his lungs. "You are going against village orders by attacking the village's darkness protectors!"
Only silence descended on the battlefield, the air thick with tension.
Then a sound of a weapon being dragged across the floor could be heard behind Tsume, who couldn't move as she had exhausted her chakra. She could only pray this person was on her side.
The Root captain could see a boy no older than six walking behind the wounded woman. This boy had strange markings covering his body, his eyes were pitch black, and he held a blade that looked bigger than his arm, yet he carried it effortlessly.
Megumi now stood behind Tsume and dropped the weapon into his shadow box. His hand began glowing as he rested it on Tsume's shoulder, healing her lost hand, regrowing it along with the other cuts on her body. Only her chakra reserves remained depleted.
"What a terrifying healing ability." The captain could only watch, now understanding why Lord Danzo wanted to capture this boy for research.
"Hey brat, thank you. You came back to life just like your mother said you would." Tsume was relieved seeing that Megumi was alive, meaning her daughter was safe as well. "I don't have enough chakra left to fight this guy, so I'll keep claiming that the Hokage wants to take your corpse."
"He's not an ANBU from the Hokage. He works for someone who thinks he'd be better as Hokage. Am I not correct, Root Captain?" Megumi explained as if it meant nothing.
"You look like the man who beheaded my mother." Megumi picked up the Inverted Spear of Heaven, then tilted his head toward Tsume. "You should leave now because this guy isn't walking out of here."
*He was the one who killed Kaede,* Tsume thought. Then she heard him say she should leave. She couldn't refuse, because she could sense the same malevolent energy that had occurred minutes ago emanating from him again.
"What can you do with one arm? Or does your healing only apply to others and not yourself?" The captain asked through his cracked mask, one eye looking down on the kid, forgetting that this was the same child who had just killed his subordinates.
"Join Root, and you can be forgiven for the crimes you just committed. If you refuse, your head will return with me to Lord Danzo."
"One arm?" Megumi noticed he hadn't regrown the arm that had been cut off by that fool.
His left arm began regenerating, flesh and bone reforming until it was complete.
"Now we're good to go." He flexed his left arm, testing its mobility.
The weapon transformed into Playful Cloud.
Megumi moved faster than the captain could sense, hitting him with a devastating combination of strikes. Each blow landed with bone-crushing force, sending the captain staggering backward.
*Now I see why Toji was able to outclass Dagon in his domain with a single technique,* Megumi thought. *No emotions means no signals to alert enemies of incoming attacks—the same way he was able to sneak attack Gojo without killing intent.*
The captain couldn't explain how this child's power exceeded his own as a seasoned ninja. With the remaining chakra he had left, he decided to buy time to escape.
"Earth Style: Earth Dragon Jutsu!"
A dragon formed from earth attacked Megumi without restraint, opening its massive jaws ready to swallow him whole. The earth dragon's mouth snapped shut around Megumi, consuming the top half of his body.
"Is this over?" The captain couldn't believe his eyes that simple jutsu had actually hit Megumi.
*Thud!*
The captain looked down to find his chest pierced with the same weapon the kid had been holding.
"Sorry I didn't give you an honorable fight, but I'm a sorcerer, not a ninja." Megumi's voice rang out from behind him.
"You're... going down with me!" The captain activated the paper bomb attached to himself while gripping the blade piercing his chest.
The explosion engulfed them both in flame and smoke. When it cleared, only Megumi remained standing in the scorched crater. "Well, that's the advantage of being immortal."
He attempted to read the man's brain, but a seal made the brain explode. "Too bad for you, Danzo. I'll still learn everything you're hiding."
He confirmed that this man was not the one who killed his mother. *What a poor soul.* Through the fragmented memories, he saw where every Root member was stationed throughout the compound.
Megumi ran across the locations where the Root members were positioned, using the Inverted Spear of Heaven to cancel the barrier, which surprised the operatives monitoring it from their posts. The barrier disappeared in an instant.
Curiosity killed the cat. One of the Root members reached out his hand to confirm why the barrier was gone, and he lost that hand instantly.
His scream alerted the others, but it was too late. Everyone died without knowing what killed them.
Megumi stood on the rooftop, soaked in blood not his own, but his victims'. His pitch-black eyes surveyed the compound below, emotionless and cold.
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