The scene shifted again.
Tsukuyomi ended, and Kakashi Hatake was finally thrown back into reality from that endless black-and-white hell. The moment his consciousness returned, he started gasping violently, as if he had just survived a torment with no end in sight, then collapsed onto the water below.
"What's wrong, Kakashi? Can't you open your eyes yet?" Kurenai asked at once when she noticed something was wrong.
Kakashi knelt there, breathing hard. "No… not yet."
Asuma also realized the situation was bad. "What happened? He said one sentence, and then you went down."
Barely managing to support himself, Kakashi thought, Three whole days in that world… and in reality it was only an instant?
Then another question rose immediately after that.
But why didn't he finish me?
If Itachi really wanted to kill him, it shouldn't have been difficult at all.
The moment that thought appeared, more and more questions began to crowd Kakashi's mind.
"Oh? You actually survived that without your mind breaking. But then again, Itachi-san, overusing those eyes should be risky for you too, right?" Kisame Hoshigaki asked casually.
At the same time, Itachi's face twitched ever so slightly, as if confirming Kisame's words without needing to say a thing.
Off-screen, Kakashi Hatake had already pulled out pen and paper and begun writing furiously.
Tsukuyomi.
Was it an exclusive ocular ability unique to Itachi Uchiha's Mangekyo Sharingan? Or was it a technique that any Mangekyo Sharingan user might possess in some form?
Within the illusion space, it reconstructed time, space, matter, and even pain. Even an elite jonin like himself, someone highly experienced in both genjutsu and breaking genjutsu, had been unable to resist it. If one also factored in the natural resistance to illusions that the Sharingan itself granted, then Tsukuyomi's effective target threshold was already terrifyingly high.
Possibly even beyond elite jonin.
Even a Kage-level figure might find it difficult to break free.
Kakashi wrote down each of these thoughts rapidly, because for a ninja, intelligence mattered more than almost anything else.
There are no invincible jutsu, only invincible people.
Now that he had obtained crucial information about Itachi Uchiha, he would not make the same mistake next time. At the very least, if he encountered Itachi again in the future, he would never foolishly stare directly into his eyes.
Still, a technique that trapped a person in seventy-two hours of torture…
Even if it did not completely shatter the victim's mind, it would almost certainly inflict severe psychological damage. And that kind of injury was not something ordinary medical treatment could easily heal.
At the same time, Kakashi found himself returning to the same question that his future self had raised in the scene.
Judging by the overwhelming strength Tsukuyomi had displayed, Itachi should have been able to kill him without much trouble. And yet he had not.
Why?
Was it because of their past in the Anbu? Because Itachi had once served under him, and some trace of that old connection remained?
No. Kakashi did not think the answer was that simple.
He quickly wrote down another possibility.
Perhaps Tsukuyomi itself had limits.
From Kisame's earlier words, most people hit by the technique probably suffered an immediate mental collapse. But no matter how monstrous a genjutsu was, it was still a technique. And every technique had some form of constraint. That meant that if a target possessed exceptional willpower, mental endurance, and calmness, they might be able to endure it without breaking completely.
Kakashi continued writing.
To the victim, Tsukuyomi was a full seventy-two hours of torture. But for the caster, using it was likely not effortless either. That could be seen from Itachi's expression. Even though he had tried to maintain his usual composure after activating it, his face had still twitched involuntarily.
That suggested several things.
First, Tsukuyomi's effective range of action might be narrow. It was likely a technique meant for only one target at a time, or at most a very small number of people.
Second, while its power was overwhelming, the price was probably just as severe. That cost included the risk of overusing the Sharingan.
Most people might not understand that point.
Kakashi did.
After all, he lived with that burden every day.
Because he was not an Uchiha, simply using the Sharingan for a short period of time placed tremendous strain on his body and chakra. Overuse would leave him utterly drained and often bedridden afterward.
But Itachi was different.
He was an Uchiha by blood. He possessed the Mangekyo Sharingan and should, in theory, have far greater compatibility with those eyes than Kakashi ever could. And yet after using Tsukuyomi only once, he had already shown signs of overload.
That alone was deeply telling.
Based on the terrifying power Tsukuyomi had shown, perhaps that burden was only natural.
Or perhaps Itachi's body had some hidden problem, something that prevented him from withstanding the strain for long.
Or perhaps the Mangekyo Sharingan itself was a power that imposed a crushing burden on the body, no matter who used it.
There was also another issue that bothered Kakashi more and more the longer he thought about it.
From the beginning of the encounter, Itachi and Kisame had revealed information far too casually.
Their purpose for returning to Konoha.
The existence of the Mangekyo Sharingan.
The burden caused by overusing it.
None of that should have been meaningless information. For ninjas, details like these were often the difference between life and death. And yet the two of them had spoken as though they did not care in the slightest.
Kakashi did not believe that was because they were careless.
Both of them had once belonged to the very top tier of their respective villages. If even they did not understand the importance of controlling information leakage, then there were probably not many people in the world who did.
For a moment, question marks filled Kakashi's mind.
He wrote line after line on the page, but no answer came.
In the end, he could only force himself to keep watching.
Back in the video, Kakashi asked, "Are you looking for Sasuke?"
Itachi's expression had already returned to calm. "No," he said. "We're after the Fourth Hokage's legacy."
The moment those words were spoken, both Asuma and Kurenai visibly stiffened.
As two of Konoha's elite jonin and important members of the village's upper combat force, they knew very well what the Fourth Hokage's legacy referred to.
Naruto Uzumaki.
Or rather, the Nine-Tails sealed inside him.
"Are you talking about Naruto?" Kakashi asked.
Off-screen, Sasuke Uchiha frowned in confusion.
He was not like Kakashi.
Kakashi had always known Naruto's identity. He knew Naruto was the child of his teacher and his teacher's wife. He also knew that the Nine-Tailed Fox had been sealed inside him.
Sasuke knew none of that.
At this point, he had not yet joined Team 7. He had not formed any bond with Naruto, nor had he come to understand him even a little. To Sasuke right now, Naruto was only that loud, troublesome idiot who caused chaos every day and hardly seemed to care about attending class properly.
The only real problem, in Sasuke's eyes, was that this annoying fool kept picking fights with him for no reason at all, as if he had some deep grudge.
Still, Sasuke had seen plenty of loudmouthed idiots before. He did not think Naruto was particularly special.
If there was anything unusual about him, it was this:
That same loud, clueless troublemaker had somehow been placed into the elite class, ending up in the same room as the best students.
The Fourth Hokage's legacy?
What exactly was that supposed to mean?
The question lodged itself in Sasuke's heart and refused to leave.