I woke up feeling completely refreshed.
The [Gamer's Body] ensured I never woke up with a crick in my neck, even after sleeping for fourteen hours straight, and completely nullified the physical exhaustion that should have come from utterly destroying three elite courtesans.
I opened my eyes. The massive futon was a tangle of silk sheets and bare, exhausted limbs. Aiko was using my chest as a pillow, her heavy breasts pressed flat against my side. Ren had one leg thrown over my waist, her face buried in the crook of my neck, while Mai was curled up at the foot of the bed, snoring softly with a blissful, drooling smile still plastered on her face.
"Money well spent," I smirked, gently extracting myself from the pile of beautiful women without waking them.
I threw on a fresh, black silk tunic and stepped out of the master bedroom, sliding the shoji screen shut behind me.
I walked out into the living room. Naruto was asleep on the floor, surrounded by a dozen popped and unpopped water balloons, completely exhausted from trying to force his chakra to rotate in multiple directions at once.
"He's got the spirit, but not the brains," I muttered, pouring myself a cup of tea from the small table.
I walked over to the sliding paper door leading to the hallway, intending to ask the staff for some room service.
As my hand touched the wood, my entire body went rigid.
[Observation Haki: CRITICAL WARNING.]
It wasn't a standard ping. The Haki hit my brain like an alarm bell.
Two incredibly dense, terrifyingly cold chakra signatures had just entered the hallway of our floor. They weren't hiding. They were walking slowly, deliberately, projecting an aura of absolute death. One felt like an endless, crushing ocean. The other felt like a cold, bottomless abyss.
"Akatsuki," I whispered, setting my teacup down.
I didn't wake Naruto. I just slid the door open and stepped out into the hallway, closing it softly behind me.
Standing thirty feet away, walking toward my door, were two men.
They wore long, black cloaks adorned with striking red clouds. Straw hats with dangling bells obscured their faces, but I didn't need to see their eyes to know who they were.
"Well," I leaned against my doorframe, crossing my arms. "Room service looks a lot edgier than I remember."
The two men stopped.
The larger one reached up and slowly removed his straw hat. He had pale blue skin, gills on his cheeks, and small, shark-like eyes. He carried a massive weapon wrapped entirely in bandages strapped to his back.
Kisame Hoshigaki. The Monster of the Hidden Mist.
"A kid?" Kisame scoffed, flashing a row of jagged, triangular teeth. "Are we at the wrong room, Itachi? I thought the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki was staying here."
The second man removed his hat.
He was younger, with long black hair tied back in a low ponytail, and deep tear troughs under his onyx eyes. His face was completely devoid of emotion.
Itachi Uchiha. The Clan Killer.
[Target: Itachi Uchiha]
[Threat Level: SS-Rank]
[Status: Terminally Ill / Highly Dangerous.]
[Target: Kisame Hoshigaki]
[Threat Level: S-Rank]
[Status: Bloodthirsty.]
Itachi's cold eyes locked onto me. He didn't activate his Sharingan yet, but the sheer intensity of his gaze was enough to paralyze a normal Jonin.
"He is inside," Itachi said quietly, his voice smooth and detached. "Step aside, child. We have no business with you."
"Yeah, about that," I pushed myself off the doorframe, letting my hands rest loosely at my sides. "The blonde kid in there owes me money. A lot of money. If you take him, I can't collect my interest. So, I'm going to have to ask you two cosplayers to turn around and walk away."
Kisame blinked, genuinely surprised by my sheer audacity. Then, he threw his head back and laughed.
"You've got some nerve, brat!" Kisame grinned, reaching over his shoulder to grab the hilt of his massive, bandaged sword. "I don't know who you are, but I'm going to enjoy cutting your legs off."
"Kisame. We aren't here to cause a scene," Itachi warned softly, though he didn't stop his partner.
"It'll only take a second!"
Kisame lunged. For a massive guy, his speed was horrifying. He crossed the thirty feet in a blur, swinging the heavy, bandaged Samehada directly at my waist in a brutal horizontal arc meant to bisect me.
SWISH.
I didn't dodge. I didn't weave signs.
[Skill: Armament Haki (Hardening) - Maximum Concentration]
My right forearm turned jet black, glistening like polished obsidian. I raised my arm, blocking the massive sword bare-handed.
CLANG!
The impact sounded like a hammer striking an anvil. The floorboards beneath my feet shattered from the sheer downward force, but my arm didn't budge a single inch.
Kisame's shark eyes widened in sheer disbelief. "What?!"
"Samehada eats chakra, right?" I smirked, looking directly into Kisame's shocked face. "A terrifying weapon against ninjutsu users. But my armor isn't made of chakra, fish-face. It's pure, weaponized willpower."
I twisted my wrist, grabbing the bandaged blade. With a violent yank fueled by Uzumaki-tier strength, I pulled Kisame off balance.
Before he could recover, I coated my left fist in Haki and drove it directly into his stomach.
BAM!
Kisame gasped, spitting a wad of saliva as the physical force lifted him off the ground. He flew backward down the hallway, crashing through a wooden support beam and landing in a pile of splintered wood.
"Kisame," Itachi said, his voice finally losing a fraction of its detached calm.
Itachi stepped forward. His onyx eyes instantly bled into a vibrant, spinning crimson.
[Sharingan: Active.]
"You are no ordinary Genin," Itachi stated, staring directly into my eyes. "But brute strength is useless against this."
The world around me suddenly inverted. The colors of the hallway bled to a negative, blood-red hue. The air grew thick, and I could feel the invasive, subtle shift of a high-level illusion trying to hijack my cerebral cortex.
Itachi was trying to put me in a genjutsu just by making eye contact.
[System Warning: High-Level Genjutsu Attempt Detected.]
[Passive Skill: Gamer's Mind - Nullifying external psychological interference...]
The red hue shattered like cheap glass. The hallway returned to normal instantly.
I blinked, tilting my head at the Uchiha prodigy.
"Was that it?" I asked, feigning disappointment. "Was that the legendary Uchiha ocular prowess? I've seen better light shows at the academy."
For the first time, a flicker of genuine shock crossed Itachi's stoic features. His Sharingan spun rapidly, trying to comprehend how a twelve-year-old had just completely ignored a direct, eye-contact genjutsu from an Mangekyou user.
"I'm going to carve him into sushi!" Kisame roared, bursting out of the rubble at the end of the hall, gripping Samehada with both hands. Water began to pool rapidly around his feet.
But before Kisame could launch his jutsu, the sound of a thousand chirping birds echoed from the stairwell.
"ITACHI!"
A figure blurred up the stairs, leaving a trail of blue lightning in his wake. Sasuke Uchiha stood at the end of the hallway, panting heavily, his Sharingan blazing with a mix of absolute hatred and manic desperation.
"Well, well," I muttered, stepping back slightly and deactivating my Haki. "Speak of the devil, and his angsty little brother appears."
Itachi slowly turned his head away from me, his cold eyes landing on Sasuke. "Sasuke..."
"I've waited for this day!" Sasuke screamed, the Chidori in his left hand whining furiously. "I've lived my entire life just for this! To kill you!"
Sasuke charged. He didn't care about me. He didn't care about Kisame. He had tunnel vision on the man who had slaughtered their clan. He thrust the Chidori forward, aiming directly for Itachi's heart.
I leaned against the doorframe, crossing my arms. I didn't interfere. This is family matter. And this delusional boy needed a wake up call.
Itachi didn't even blink. He casually reached out, grabbed Sasuke's wrist just before the lightning could touch him, and effortlessly redirected the momentum. The Chidori crashed into the wall, obliterating the drywall.
With sickening ease, Itachi twisted Sasuke's wrist.
CRACK.
"GAAAAH!" Sasuke shrieked, his lightning dying instantly as his bones snapped.
Itachi didn't stop. He delivered a brutal, merciless knee directly into Sasuke's stomach, lifting him off his feet, before slamming his elbow down on the back of Sasuke's neck, driving his younger brother face-first into the wooden floorboards.
"You are still too weak," Itachi said, staring down at Sasuke's bleeding, broken form. "You don't have enough hate."
Sasuke gasped for air, trying to push himself up with his one good hand. "I'll... kill you...!"
Itachi grabbed Sasuke by the collar, lifting him effortlessly into the air, forcing their eyes to meet. The three tomoe in Itachi's eyes morphed into a terrifying, three-pronged pinwheel.
"Tsukuyomi."
Sasuke froze. His eyes rolled to the back of his head, and an absolutely blood-curdling, horrific scream tore from his throat. It was the sound of a mind being utterly fractured. He went completely limp, dropping to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut.
"Brutal," I commented lazily, clapping slowly. "You Uchihas really need family therapy. Have you guys tried board games?"
Itachi turned back to me, his Mangekyou Sharingan still active. He was calculating the risk. I had tanked Kisame's strike and ignored his Genjutsu.
Before he could make a move, a massive, booming voice echoed from the stairs.
"Ninja Art: Toad Mouth Bind!"
The wooden walls of the hallway suddenly morphed, turning into wet, fleshy, pink esophagus tissue that quickly began to seal off the corridor. Jiraiya stood at the top of the stairs, looking furious, his white hair wild.
"You picked the wrong room to raid, Akatsuki!" Jiraiya roared.
Itachi glanced at the rapidly closing flesh walls, then at Kisame.
"Kisame. We are leaving," Itachi ordered. His right eye bled a single tear of blood. "Amaterasu."
Black, unquenchable flames erupted on the fleshy wall, burning a massive hole right through Jiraiya's impenetrable jutsu. In a blur of speed, Itachi and Kisame vanished through the gap, leaving behind the smell of burning flesh and ozone.
The fleshy walls retreated, leaving the hallway a destroyed, splintered mess.
Jiraiya ran down the hall, looking at the massive crater in the wall, then down at the unconscious, twitching form of Sasuke. Finally, his eyes landed on me, leaning casually against my doorframe without a scratch on me.
"Kenji," Jiraiya breathed, looking at the sheer destruction. "What the hell happened here?"
"Just some door-to-door salesmen, Ero-Sennin," I sighed, stretching my arms.
Author's Note:
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