Half an hour later—
While leaping swiftly between the trees, Uchiha Kagami's expression suddenly changed. He spun around, gripping a kunai in reverse and slashing behind him.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Four black figures shot toward him, cutting through the air with a sharp hiss.
After a brief exchange of blows, the attackers each landed on separate tree trunks, forming a perfect encirclement around Kagami.
Their formation made it clear — they had him completely surrounded.
"Stop struggling, brat of the Uchiha," one of the Kumo-nin said with a mocking grin.
His gaze fell on Kagami's abdomen, where a long, gaping wound had already soaked through the makeshift bandages with blood.
Kagami didn't reply.
Silently, his eyes turned crimson, three black tomoe spinning rapidly within.
"Don't look into his eyes!"
The Kumo-nin who shouted the warning was clearly the squad leader. Even as he spoke, he lunged forward, swinging his chakra-charged blade.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!"
At the same moment, Kagami flung a flurry of shuriken — and exhaled a massive fireball from his mouth.
The Kumo leader sneered. His blade was already infused with Lightning Release chakra, easily capable of slicing through a low-level Fire Release jutsu like this.
But then—
That supposedly "C-rank" technique suddenly expanded dozens of times in size within a single second, its temperature skyrocketing wildly.
The very air around them distorted and rippled from the heat.
A roaring sea of fire erupted, engulfing the three Kumo-nin standing before Kagami — including the squad leader — in an instant.
At nearly the same time, Kagami leapt from the ground, twisting in midair to avoid a surge of lightning spreading up from below.
In that instant, the three tomoe in his right eye began spinning violently — transforming into a far more intricate and elegant pattern.
"Ama-no-Iwato!"
Before the last Kumo-nin could even comprehend what had happened, Kagami's kunai pierced directly through his heart.
The man hadn't resisted at all.
Once it was over, Kagami staggered slightly but managed to land firmly atop a distant tree branch.
"Huff… huff… huff…"
He panted heavily, clutching his right eye in pain as blood trickled through his fingers.
His exposed left eye didn't bleed, but its veins were bloodshot and throbbing with strain.
It was clear — Kagami couldn't fight much longer.
To finish off all four elite Kumo jōnin instantly, he had been forced to unleash two different Mangekyō Sharingan abilities at once.
'A genjutsu for the right eye? Or some kind of paralysis ability?' Senju Mori pondered, based on the sensory information relayed by Uzumaki Chisawa.
Judging by that last Kumo-nin's blank reaction before dying, Kagami's Mangekyō had clearly trapped him in its illusion.
As for the other three… their fates were uncertain.
Even with Kagami's extraordinary mastery over fire-natured chakra, Mori found it hard to believe that three full-fledged jōnin had been wiped out by a single Great Fireball.
Uzumaki Chisawa seemed to share the same doubt. Though the battle appeared to be over, he kept the Kagura's Mind's Eye fully active, scanning for chakra signatures.
But the next thing Chisawa said left Mori utterly stunned.
"Those three Kumo-nin really are dead. Their bodies have been burned to charcoal — I can't sense even the faintest trace of chakra from them."
Mori exhaled slowly, astonished.
"So his left eye enhances ninjutsu… A Mangekyō ability that strengthens jutsu — how rare."
After gathering all the necessary intelligence, Senju Mori hesitated no longer. Together with Uzumaki Chisawa, he rushed off in the direction of Uchiha Kagami.
...
For an ordinary member of the Uchiha clan, setting aside the well-known risk of blindness from overusing the Mangekyō Sharingan, just activating its eye techniques placed a tremendous strain on the body.
All the more so for Kagami, who had only recently awakened his Mangekyō. He still couldn't wield its power freely.
The bleeding from his eyes was the most common symptom, soon followed by blurred vision, sluggish reactions from chakra exhaustion, overwhelming fatigue — even a stinging pain spreading through every cell in his body.
From a technical perspective, these aftereffects likely resulted from excessive use of yin-nature chakra without enough yang to balance it.
In truth, Kagami was lucky.
A jōnin was no easy opponent to kill. Had even one of those four Kumo-nin survived that battle, Kagami would have been instantly struck down in retaliation.
Enduring the stabbing pain coursing through his body, Kagami staggered a few steps before collapsing back against a massive tree root.
His body — battered, drained of chakra, and pushed far beyond its limits by consecutive high-intensity fights — was now refusing to obey him.
Kagami knew there was little chance of making it back to Konoha alive.
But he didn't regret it.
He was certain that, with both the Hokage and himself having drawn away most of the pursuers, Hiruzen and the others would be able to return safely to the village.
Silently, he made up his mind:
If he lost consciousness before Konoha's reinforcements arrived, he would use the last of his strength to destroy his own Mangekyō Sharingan — to prevent it from falling into enemy hands.
Just as Kagami reached into his tool pouch for another kunai, a startled, disbelieving voice suddenly rang out:
"Kagami?!"
He lifted his head — and with two sharp swishes, two figures appeared before him.
"Mori?! What are you doing here?"
Kagami was equally shocked.
At this close distance, he could clearly see Senju Mori's familiar face and the Konoha forehead protector he wore.
Beside him stood Uzumaki Chisawa, his striking crimson hair unmistakably marking his clan.
The pairing of Uzumaki and Senju immediately put Kagami at ease.
The three-tomoe Sharingan in his eyes slowly faded, returning to their ordinary black pupils.
"I thought it was strange that the people of the Land of Lightning were so eager to sign an alliance," Mori explained smoothly, as though he had anticipated Kagami's question.
"So I took a mission near the Land of Frost and decided to come check things out myself."
There was even a hint of righteous anger in his tone as he continued, "I knew it — those barbarians from Kumogakure couldn't be trusted! So the so-called alliance was just a ploy after all!"
At the same time, Mori subtly began assessing Kagami's condition.
As he spoke, he reached toward Kagami's wounded abdomen and began channeling medical ninjutsu in a natural motion.
For one of the Senju, a clan renowned for its life force and chakra reserves, learning medical techniques was hardly a challenge.
Hearing the words "Kumogakure," Kagami seemed to regain some strength.
He seized Mori's other arm, his face urgent and desperate:
"I'm glad you're here, Mori! Go — save Lord Hokage!"
"The alliance itself wasn't the issue — it was the Gold and Silver Brothers who sabotaged the ceremony! The Second Raikage has been assassinated, and Lord Hokage is fighting Kinkaku and Ginkaku himself!"
But before Kagami could finish speaking, his consciousness suddenly blurred — as though struck by an invisible hammer.
His vision dimmed rapidly, swallowed by a suffocating darkness.
He never noticed the countless inky-black sealing marks spreading from the grass around him, crawling up his body.
A single, bold kanji — "Seal" (封) — had already appeared, glowing faintly on his forehead…