"Your battle is with me—" Sasuke whispered, his tone incredibly sharp and mocking. "Not with children. Try to keep up... if your eyes can even track my movements."
The black flames flared violently around Sasuke's sword, casting dark shadows across his face as the ultimate clash was set.
Sasuke's cheeky, mocking lines hit exactly where it hurt. Hikaru's calm face completely twisted with rage. The bait had worked perfectly.
Before Hikaru could even move, Sasuke snapped his fingers, and a wave of black Amaterasu flames erupted directly in front of Hikaru's body.
"AMATERASU!!!"
The unquenchable fire roared, threatening to swallow him wholetra Panicking, Hikaru quickly focused his right eye. "Kūkai[1]!" he shouted.
A small spatial portal opened right before the flames could touch his skin, rapidly absorbing the black fire and pulling it into his dimension to save himself.
But as the flames vanished, a dark, wicked smile returned to Hikaru's face. He locked his left eye onto Sasuke, activating the supreme power of his left eye.
Suddenly, the entire atmosphere inside the room changed. To Sasuke's eyes, an immense, terrifying amount of spatial chakra began to gather around him.
The air literally began to rip and tear apart, forming a giant, black crack right beneath Sasuke's feet.
The physical pressure from this black portal was unbelievable. The entire world seemed to twist as extreme gravitational forces slammed down onto Sasuke's body.
The gravity was so intense that it felt like it was crushing his bones and tearing his muscles apart. Sasuke let out a sharp gasp, his body giving away under the immense weight as the dark crack trapped him completely, leaving him severely damaged and unable to move.
Inside his mind, Sasuke's thoughts raced as he felt his body being ripped apart by the heavy gravity. 'Temporal rupture[2]... damn it! Not right now!'
But Sasuke was a master tactician. Even while facing extreme pain and reality-bending gravity, his mind remained completely clear.
He knew how the illusion worked. He knew that what his brain was experiencing wasn't reality, but a complete hijack of his senses.
Sasuke opened both of his Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan eyes wide, forcing himself to look past the fake gravity.
His Kusanagi sword, still heavily smeared with the burning black flames of Amaterasu, was clutched firmly in his left hand. Because his senses were completely inverted by the Hiakru's Takemikazuchi, his brain was screaming at him that his right hand was the one holding the weapon.
'Right hand... right hand...!' Sasuke screamed inside his own thoughts, forcing his mind to override the illusion.
Instead of moving his right hand, Sasuke deliberately forced his actual left hand to move. With a swift, powerful motion, he swung the flame-coated Kusanagi sword downward, cutting a clean circle into the space right near his feet.
The Amaterasu-bathed blade sliced through the spatial coordinates, completely breaking the frequency of the trap.
TAAARRR!
The sound of a portal dimension-ripping sound echoed through the room. In a flash of black fire, the gravity vanished, the black portal shattered like glass, and Sasuke completely disappeared from the spot, escaping the deadly trap.
Meanwhile, outside the shattered entrance, the air was thick with drifting ash. Kakashi was actively helping Kurenai support Asuma's weight, keeping the young boy upright as they stumbled away from the collapsing shop.
Kurenai looked pale, her arms trembling as she held tightly to Asuma's torso while Kakashi supported his side.
Suddenly, Kakashi's sharp eye caught a shadow moving through the dense haze of dust. Someone was walking right past them, heading straight toward the danger zone of the dango shop.
"Wait! Don't go in there!" Kakashi called out sharply, his voice raspy from the smoke.
The figure did not stop. They kept walking forward with steady, stubborn steps, completely ignoring the warning.
Kakashi turned his head to his comrade.
"Kurenai, hold Asuma! You have to take his full weight for a second."
"Right, I've got him," Kurenai replied quickly, bracing her feet and shifting Asuma's heavy, unconscious body entirely into her own arms.
She understood the situation perfectly without needing another word, immediately locking her focus on keeping the boy secure.
With his hands now free, Kakashi quickened his pace, stepping up directly behind the reckless intruder.
"What do you think you are doing?!" Kakashi scolded loudly, his voice filled with strict authority. "This is a restricted combat zone! You need to turn back right now!"
The person didn't answer, her body tensing up. She was a pale girl, and her hair was tied up neatly into two distinct, familiar buns on her head.
Losing his patience, Kakashi moved fast to stop her from taking another step toward the fight. He grabbed her from behind, forcefully pulling both of her arms straight up into the air. He gripped both of her wrists firmly, pinning her hands high above her shoulders so she couldn't reach for any weapons or step closer to the shop.
"Let go! Let go of my hands!" the girl cried out, twisting her wrists as she tightly closed her eyes in fright and frustration.
"Look at me," Kakashi commanded firmly. "You need to escape to the shelters immediately."
The girl slowly opened her eyes. The moment her gaze met Kakashi's exposed eye, both of them froze. Their eyes grew incredibly wide in pure shock.
Kakashi gasped slightly under his mask, recognizing her features instantly.
The girl stared at him, her lips trembling as her mind raced back to a completely different time and place.
"You are..."
"You are..."
"The kid from Tetsu no Kuni..."
"Kakashi-sensei..."
It was none other than Tenten.
Inside the ruined dango shop, the space where Sasuke had vanished remained empty. Frustrated but driven by an intense obsession, Hikaru did not hesitate.
He immediately activated the advanced mechanics of his Kūkai. Because Sasuke had cut himself out of the immediate area using
Kagutsuchi: Totsuka, Hikaru could not track him instantly; he was forced to search through his alternative dimensions one by one to hunt down his target.
He focused his left and right eye, manually tearing open a swirling spatial doorway into the first blank void. Empty. He closed it and snapped open another pocket dimension. Still empty.
With a low hiss of irritation, Hikaru forced his chakra to open a third gateway.
This time, the portal ripped wide open to reveal a strange, isolated dimension filled with towering, jagged pillars of cold, dark stone beneath a starless sky. Sitting calmly on the edge of a broken stone pillar right inside that dimension was Sasuke.
His dark cloak hung loosely over his shoulders, and his Kusanagi sword rested horizontally across his knees.
The moment the portal cracked open, Sasuke didn't even flinch. He merely tilted his head and looked up, his Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan eyes staring at Hikaru with pure, annoying indifference.
Sasuke let out a quiet, mocking exhale. "Since when did you become so lucky—?" Sasuke spoke smoothly, his voice echoing perfectly through the open doorway, "That on your third try, you are able to find an enemy?"
Sasuke remained perfectly still inside the foreign dimension, making no effort to step back into the real world.
Hikaru wasn't bothered by the disrespect at all. A confident, mocking smile returned to his face as he stood on the safe side of the portal. He raised his arm, gesturing casually with his fingers in a slow 'come out'.
"Come out, Sasuke—" Hikaru said smoothly, his tone sounding entirely relaxed. "I won't attack you."
Sasuke didn't move an inch. He just sat on the stone pillar, staring blankly at Hikaru as if he were looking at a pathetic amateur.
Seeing that his psychological bait wasn't working, Hikaru let out a short, amused laugh. He lowered his hand and shrugged his shoulders, pretending to play fair to lure his opponent out.
"Ok, fine—" Hikaru said, his voice dripping with an arrogant promise. "I won't use any visual powers."
Only then did Sasuke finally decide to move. He slowly stood up from the stone pillar, gripped his sword, and walked forward through the swirling threshold of the portal, bringing the two Uchiha face-to-face once again in the center of the ruined room.
Hikaru stretched his arms out calmly, a mocking smile on his lips. "On the count of three, we will resume fighting. Deal?"
Sasuke adjusted his grip on his sword, his face entirely unreadable. "Fine."
Hikaru's smile sharpened. "One..."
He slowly closed both of his eyes, cutting off his immediate vision.
"Two..." Hikaru called out.
Sasuke's eyelids closed as well, plunging his world into absolute darkness. The silence inside the ruined dango shop became heavy, suffocating, and loaded with immense suspense. The entire battle hung on a single fraction of a second.
"Three!" Hikaru shouted.
Instantly, both Uchiha opened their eyes and exploded into motion. They didn't strike horizontally across the floor; instead, they both leaped violently upward, launching themselves toward the broken roofboards to take the high ground.
As Sasuke went into the air, a strange sensation hit his brain. He felt his legs pushing off the air itself, but his mind suddenly screamed that he was falling down instead of climbing.
The inverted logic of the battlefield twisted his orientation completely. Forcing his willpower past the confusion, Sasuke adjusted his core mid-air.
'Jump down...!' he screamed inside his thoughts, intentionally reversing his muscles to successfully launch his body up toward the rafters.
But Hikaru was already waiting for him.
High above the ground, Hikaru opened his left eye wide. The crimson Mangekyo eye spun like a lethal wheel, locking onto Sasuke at point-blank range.
'Meikyōgetsu!' Hikaru's mind screamed with a dark, triumphant roar. 'Have my countless versions fight him!'
The moment Sasuke's gaze made direct visual contact with that spinning eye, a cold shiver ran down his spine. 'Oh, shit...!!'
Sasuke thought, realizing he had walked straight into the activation threshold of the sensory dominance.
Sasuke's boots slammed heavily back onto the dusty floorboards of the shop as he dropped from the ceiling. He quickly shook his head to clear his vision, but the trap had already snapped shut. The technique completely hijacked how his brain decoded the space around him.
When Sasuke looked up, his chest tightened. He didn't see just one opponent anymore.
A massive, terrifying crowd of Hikarus stood before him. Countless versions of the scarred Uchiha filled the ruined building, stretching from wall to wall.
They looked completely identical, smelled the same, and radiated the exact same threatening chakra signatures.
Normally, an Uchiha or a Hyuga could rely on their eyes to instantly separate truth from trickery. But Meikyogetsu defied those rules entirely—to their legendary vision, the illusions and the real Hikaru looked exactly the same.
Sasuke gripped his Kusanagi sword, his eyes darting frantically across the sea of duplicates. His sensory training was useless; his brain was entirely convinced that every single copy was 100% physically real. He had no idea who the real one was.
Suddenly, one of the countless Hikarus broke from the crowd, rushing directly toward Sasuke with a raised blade.
Instead of panicking, a dark, dangerous smirk suddenly played on Sasuke's lips. He didn't need to guess which one was real.
"Amaterasu!!!" Sasuke screamed.
Instead of launching a single attack on a specific one, Sasuke focused the absolute power of his eye control.
He violently released the unquenchable black flames, shaping them into a towering, solid wall of pitch-black fire that erupted on all four sides of his body. The blazing barrier closed instantly, forming a protective, destructive box around him.
The black fire roared, melting the floorboards and casting deep shadows across Sasuke's face. No matter how many versions Hikaru threw at him, none of them could enter the circle without being turned to ash.
The towering walls of Amaterasu hissed and crackled aggressively. The supernatural heat turned the air inside the ruined dango shop into a suffocating place.
Safe behind his pitch-black fortress of Amaterasu, Sasuke kept his Kusanagi blade raised, his breath coming in steady, controlled rhythms. The black flames completely devoured his sightlines. He could not see anything outside—but he knew Hikaru could not see in, either.
'He can try any trick he wants...' Sasuke thought coldly, his left Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan tracking the raw chakra of his own black barrier. 'But the moment his real body tries to cross this fire, he will burn to ash.'
But outside the blazing black walls, the real Hikaru stood perfectly still. His lips curved into a dark, knowing smile. He did not need to throw a single physical punch or kick. He had already won the battle inside Sasuke's mind.
Through his left eye, Meikyōgetsu, Hikaru completely warped Sasuke's chakra perception and awareness. He rewrote the data before Sasuke's brain could even process it. Hikaru did not change a single physical thing in the room; he simply changed Sasuke's absolute internal certainty.
Suddenly, to Sasuke's eyes, the black flames of his own absolute defense began to fail. The blazing walls did not just vanish—they seemed to turn entirely into solid ice!
A freezing, supernatural frost crawled across the floorboards, and the temperature inside the box dropped to a deadly, freezing zero in a fraction of a second.
The cold was unbearable. To Sasuke's rewritten nervous system, his blood felt like it was freezing solid inside his veins. The fake frostbite was so perfectly translated into his brain that Sasuke's lungs seized. He let out a sharp gasp, his limbs turning stiff and heavy under a freezing pain that felt 100% real. His brain, operating on its own flawless tactical logic, completely accepted the lie.
'Damn it...!' Sasuke screamed in his thoughts, his mind racing through the freezing pain. 'Ice Release?! How can he combine Water and Wind Style out of nowhere to stop my Amaterasu?! That's impossible... he does not possess a Kekkei Genkai connecting his bloodline to ice!'
Trusting his strategic instincts, Sasuke forced his willpower past the shock. He knew he needed to destroy the trap. His Kusanagi sword, still heavily smeared with the unquenchable black flames of Amaterasu, was clutched firmly in his actual left hand.
But Meikyōgetsu had completely inverted his physical feelings—his brain was screaming at him with absolute certainty that his right hand was the one holding the steel!
'Right hand... right hand...!' Sasuke roared inside his own mind, fighting his own nervous system.
Deliberately forcing his true left hand to move against his brain's frantic commands, Sasuke swung the flame-coated Kusanagi downward in a swift, powerful arc, slicing a clean circle into the space near his feet. The Kagutsuchi: Totsuka was activated!
TAAARRR!
A heavy, ripping roar of Kagutsuchi: Totsuka echoed through the shop, sounding like a massive scroll being violently torn in half. In a flash of black fire, Sasuke's blade sliced the literal coordinates of the room, shattering the illusion like glass. The crushing cold and the white frost vanished into thin air.
But as the smoke cleared, Sasuke's chest tightened. He was not outside. He had not escaped. He was still standing in the exact same spot inside the ruined dango shop!
There was no Ice Release. There never was. Hikaru had not used a single physical jutsu.
Sasuke had just used his ultimate, high-tier Kagutsuchi: Totsuka to slice into completely empty air, wasting a massive chunk of his own chakra to escape a trap that existed entirely inside his own head!
"Fascinating, isn't it?"
Hikaru's calm, mocking voice drifted through the haze. He was standing five meters away, completely relaxed, his hands casually resting in his pockets. His complex Mangekyo Sharingan spun in a slow, elegant rhythm.
"You cut the coordinates flawlessly, Sasuke," Hikaru chuckled, his tone dripping with psychological malice.
"A brilliant counter-measure. Except... I never used an ice jutsu. You just exhausted your own eyes to flee from absolutely nothing."
Sasuke's eyes remained wide, but his Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan did not bleed—it merely pulsed with intense anger. The realization hit him like a physical blow, sending a wave of rare panic through his chest.
He did not even know what this power was! It was not a standard genjutsu; his Sharingan had not detected a single ripple of disrupted chakra. The illusion and reality felt entirely, horrifically identical.
Realizing he was dealing with an unpredictable sensory monster, Sasuke gripped his sword, his breath ragged.
He could not trust his sight, his hearing, or his chakra tracking. Every instinct told him to fall back and analyze the patterns of the enemy's eye.
Sensing the tactical shift, Hikaru's smirk faded into a cold, calculated expression. He had achieved his psychological objective — he had shattered Sasuke's absolute confidence.
But Hikaru also knew the limits of Meikyōgetsu. Maintaining this level of multi-sensory domination was bleeding his own chakra dry. He needed to withdraw before the technical inconsistencies of the lie exposed themselves to Sasuke's sharp intellect.
With a smooth motion, Hikaru leaped backward, his right eye spinning rapidly as he triggered his space-time move.
"We will finish this another time, Sasuke—" he spoke calmly.
The air behind Hikaru violently rippled, tearing open a swirling, portal of his Kūkai. He began to sink into the dimensional portal, preparing to vanish into his secure pocket dimension.
But Sasuke was still a predator. Even with his senses reeling, his instinct for the hunt overrode the confusion. The moment the spatial portal groaned open, the distinct tearing sound anchored Sasuke to reality.
He did not look at Hikaru's face. He focused entirely on the heavy rift in space.
"You aren't running anywhere! !" Sasuke roared.
Lacing his remaining chakra into his legs, Sasuke lunged forward, executing a blinding Body Flicker Jutsu. He swung his Kusanagi sword, the edge instantly erupting with the Amaterasu of Kagutsuchi: Totsuka.
Before Hikaru could fully submerge into the void, Sasuke's Kusanagi blade sliced through the empty air right across the dimension portal which Hikaru had just opened.
The supernatural, compressed heat of the Amaterasu flames violently collided with the portal, aggressively absorbing and consuming the spatial energy of the portal.
CRACK!
The opening of the portal fractured like brittle glass under the black flame slash. Hikaru's Kūkai portal collapsed instantly, completely neutralizing the gateway and violently forcing Hikaru back into the physical world.
Hikaru stumbled onto the ash-covered floorboards, his breath catching as a small amount of black fire singed the hem of his dark cloak.
He looked up, his arrogance finally giving way to a sharp, dangerous focus. The portal was gone, the dimension was locked, and Sasuke stood directly between him and the exit, his black-flame blade smoking heavily in the dim light.
He slowly looked up, his breathing ragged, his teeth gritting together in anger. The calm, psychological game was officially over.
"YOU ARROGANT, INSUFFERABLE PEST!!!" Hikaru snarled, his voice dropping into a dark, vicious register as he glared at Sasuke.
"YOU DARE THINK YOU CAN LOCK ME DOWN?! YOU ARE NOTHING BUT A THIEF LIVING IN THE SHADOW OF A DEAD CLAN'S POWER!"
Sasuke didn't step back an inch. He stood perfectly between Hikaru and the exit, his Kusanagi blade smoking heavily in the dim light, his Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan locked onto his target with terrifying, cold aggression.
"Shut your mouth..." Sasuke whispered, his tone cutting through the heat like a frozen blade. "You talk too much for a coward who tries to run the moment his tricks fail. Look around you. The portal is gone. The dimension is locked. You aren't playing puppet master anymore, Hikaru..."
Sasuke raised his sword, the black flames of Amaterasu flaring up violently along the steel.
"Now—" Sasuke growled, his voice dripping with absolute threat. "Let's see how well your eyes track my blade when I take them out of your skull!"
The ghost had been grounded, and the hunter was refusing to let go.
---
⚡NEXT CHAPTER⚡
The snow-covered past refuses to stay buried...
Far beyond Konoha, forgotten traces of a lost journey begin to surface once more.
Meanwhile, the battle reaches its breaking point.
A hunter cornered. A ghost grounded. A clash that should have ended in blood.
But just as fate prepares to choose a victor—
A flash of yellow cuts through the darkness.
The Fourth Hokage enters the battlefield!
👉Chapter 40: Relics Of The Lost Timeline: The Fourth Arrives
SNEAK PEEK LINES 💬
"...Our younger selves will reach the era of Sandaime..."
"Wooo... easy with those katanas!"
---
—With love, one forehead poke away from collapse,
Sakura Shinomiya 💫
---
[1] Note: Kukai is the visual powers which Uchiha Hikaru obtained by awakening the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan just like Kagitsuchi:Totsuka of Uchiha Sasuke.
[2] Note: Temporal Rupture is not the name of Uchiha Hikaru's eyes but an offensive attack which increases the gravity by the power of his left Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan.