---
As the bandage on his arm fell off, Danzo's arm appeared pale, from the palm all the way to the shoulder. Three red jade Sharingan were embedded along his arm, with a wrinkled self-portrait of a head etched on his right shoulder.
Orochimaru, lurking in the shadows, couldn't help but feel surprised. He knew that Danzo had Hashirama's cells transplanted into his body. Likewise, Orochimaru was aware that Danzo had one Sharingan transplanted into his arm, but he never expected there to be so many.
A sneer crept onto Orochimaru's face. "No wonder the Uchiha clan was exterminated. This was probably all pushed by you, the old dog, Danzo."
Danzo proudly displayed the Sharingan across his entire arm, a faint look of satisfaction on his face. These were his proudest creations—he had dug out those three-magatama Sharingan from the eyes of the Uchiha clan.
He turned to Kirito, expecting a reaction. Danzo thought Kirito would be shocked, but there was no sign of it. Kirito remained unfazed, his expression calm as ever.
Danzo raised an eyebrow, a hint of confusion creeping into his voice. "Kirito, do you know what these are?" he asked, his tone laced with curiosity. "Do you have any idea how much effort I put into collecting them?"
Kirito glanced coldly at the Sharingan embedded on Danzo's arm. "Izanagi, right?" he asked, his voice indifferent. "I wonder if those Sharingan can last until the old monkey comes to rescue you."
Danzo's pupils constricted in surprise. He had not expected Kirito to name the Uchiha clan's forbidden technique so casually.
Kirito's words shattered Danzo's sense of control. He was taken aback, struggling to comprehend how this young man knew about his trump card. "How do you know this? Who are you?"
Meanwhile, Orochimaru, who had been observing from the shadows, was deep in thought. "Izanagi? So that's what it is," he muttered, finally understanding why Danzo had implanted so many Sharingan.
Izanagi, one of the Uchiha clan's ultimate techniques, allowed the user to turn an unfavorable event within a set time frame into nothingness. The user could select only the beneficial aspects of reality, erasing the rest. Time itself seemed to bend when it was activated, and even death could be reversed.
"Today has been quite an eye-opener," Orochimaru chuckled, grinning widely at the revelation.
Danzo, infuriated, sneered at Kirito. "Ignorant child, you know nothing! We'll see who dies today!" His hands formed rapid seals.
"Wood Release: Root Burial!"
Suddenly, the ground beneath Danzo's exposed arm trembled. Branches burst forth, wriggling like giant pythons, and swarmed toward Kirito.
Boom! Boom! Boom! One after another, branches shot out from beneath Kirito's feet, thrashing in the air.
Kirito smirked. Behind him, a towering tree grew rapidly, its vines twisting through the air. In a flash, Kirito's form vanished, encased in the wooden cocoon, his head the only part exposed.
Danzo smiled cruelly, thinking his attack had worked. But his smile faltered as he quickly formed another seal.
"Wind Style: Shuriken!"
A large vortex of wind spiraled in Danzo's hand, rapidly rotating. Without hesitation, he threw the high-speed wind shuriken directly at the wooden cocoon around Kirito.
"Sizzle!" The shuriken cut through the air, heading straight for the target.
But when the shuriken reached the cocoon, something unexpected happened. The wind shuriken sliced through the wood, but instead of cutting into Kirito's body, it seemed to pass right through him.
In an instant, the cocoon disintegrated, and Kirito's form was shattered into countless golden particles of light, vanishing like smoke in the air.
In the blink of an eye, Kirito reappeared, standing calmly in front of Danzo, his expression unchanged. His eyes were cold and unwavering.
"This… this…" Danzo stammered, his face pale as shock flooded his mind. His most powerful attacks had been useless.
Before Danzo could recover from his shock, Kirito moved in a blur, his body a streak of light. He rushed to Danzo's front and, without hesitation, pointed a finger at Danzo's head.
A brilliant beam of light shot out, piercing Danzo's skull in an instant. A deafening explosion rang through the air, and Danzo's head exploded like a watermelon, spraying blood and brain matter everywhere.
The space was filled with the thick stench of blood as Danzo's lifeless body crumpled to the ground.
Swish!
Just as Danzo's body hit the floor, his Izanagi activated, reversing time to the moment before his death. He was resurrected, standing once more, still stunned by the destruction.
But before he could react, one of the Sharingan embedded on his arm exploded.
"Bang!"
The once-powerful eye shattered into pieces, falling to the ground.
Danzo's eyes widened in disbelief as he looked at the empty hole in his arm. His precious Sharingan, the result of his careful manipulation and sacrifice, had been destroyed. How could this have happened?
The eyes were implanted with his own blood, valuable and irreplaceable.
"How could it explode like that?" Danzo muttered, his voice strained with panic. He knew the drawbacks of Izanagi—blinding the user's eye after activation—but he never anticipated that Kirito's attack would be so forceful that it would cause the Sharingan to explode outright.
Danzo looked at the debris on the ground, feeling as though his heart had been crushed. The Sharingan was gone, and there was no way to restore it now.
Kirito watched indifferently, not saying a word, his gaze fleeting as he glanced at the pieces of shattered eye on the ground.
Danzo, trembling with rage, slowly raised a finger toward Kirito. "You…"
Before he could finish, Kirito was there in a blur, his fist driving into Danzo's chest, crushing his heart in an instant.
The Root ninjas watched in stunned silence, their minds shattered by what they had just witnessed. Their leader, Danzo, had been casually destroyed as if he were nothing more than an ant under Kirito's power.
"The leader…" they whispered, exchanging confused glances, unsure of what to do.
Seconds later, Danzo was resurrected once more, his Sharingan flickering weakly in the dim light. But his fear was palpable now, and the last of his precious eyes were all but spent.
As his enemies pressed on, Danzo realized that he had no way out. He had fallen into an inescapable trap.
"Do you really want to activate that eye?" Kirito asked, his voice cold as ice.
At that moment, Danzo's heart skipped a beat.
He was left with only one final chance: Shisui's Kotoamatsukami, the strongest illusion that could control anyone's will.
Kirito froze. He recognized the Mangekyō Sharingan on Danzo's eye. This technique was dangerous, and Kirito knew it. But there was no time for hesitation.
Danzo, feeling his victory slipping away, slowly began to untie the bandage covering his final eye.
Kirito's eyes narrowed.
"Not today," he said coldly, and before Danzo could finish his motion, Kirito lashed out with a single slash, destroying Danzo's last Sharingan.
"We'll settle our scores later," Kirito added as he turned and left the room, his calm expression never faltering.
Danzo, resurrected once again, could only stare at his arm, now empty of all but three remaining Sharingan. The rest had been torn from him in the blink of an eye. His face twisted with rage as he gritted his teeth.
"Kirito…" he muttered darkly, as the Root ninjas looked on in stunned silence.
The battle was far from over, and Danzo knew that the end was near.
---