Cough, cough~
In the forest far from the main battlefield, Danzo Shimura painfully pushed himself up from amidst the swirling dust and smoke. Tatsuya's previous punch had indeed been incredibly powerful, catching Danzo completely off guard and injuring him more than he'd anticipated.
After staggering to his feet, Danzo carefully sensed the situation on the distant battlefield. His already grim expression darkened further. Without a moment's hesitation, he turned and fled, heading towards the outskirts of Konoha Village. Tatsuya's decisive and overwhelming attack was entirely outside the scope of Danzo's meticulously laid plans. And once Tatsuya had made his move with such ferocity, Danzo knew his ambitions, his entire scheme, were utterly finished. His opponent possessed an absolute, insurmountable advantage in strength.
Back when he had first sensed Tatsuya unleash the terrifying Heaven and Earth Giant technique, Danzo had realized, with a chilling certainty, that he was already completely incapable of defeating Tatsuya. This young man was an unparalleled powerhouse, as overwhelmingly strong as the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, had been in his prime—a force capable of suppressing everything and everyone. Faced with such a staggering disparity in power, relying on numerical superiority was simply not enough to bridge the chasm. And Danzo, for all his resources, simply didn't have enough subordinates, enough cannon fodder, to even attempt to fill that gap.
Now, Danzo could only abandon everything—his plans, his organization, his lifelong ambition—and flee Konoha. At this desperate moment, Danzo couldn't help but think of the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi. Perhaps Hiruzen had been right all along; perhaps only the intangible bonds of kinship and loyalty, things Danzo had always disdained, were the only true way to restrain a force of nature like Tatsuya Akimichi.
Danzo abandoned his two hundred plus loyal subordinates and fled. Without a shred of hesitation.
In the distance, due to the fierce battle raging between the Military Police Force and Root, a large number of Konoha ninja were continuously dispersing, desperately trying to avoid being accidentally injured in the devastating crossfire. However, they soon discovered that this precaution seemed almost unnecessary. Because they were fighting within the confines of Konoha Village, the vast majority of Root ninja hadn't dared to use large-scale destructive ninjutsu when the battle began. But by the time they might have wanted to unleash such devastating techniques, it was already far too late.
On the battlefield, Tatsuya relentlessly threw kunai, each one meticulously marked with his special Flying Thunder God seal formulas. After activating Sage Mode, Tatsuya's physical abilities and sensory perception had been tremendously enhanced. He fluidly and interchangeably used the Body Flicker Technique and the Flying Thunder God Technique, his entire being like an avenging phantom, constantly flashing across the battlefield with impossible speed. Every Root ninja he targeted basically had no chance of escape. They found it incredibly difficult, often impossible, to withstand even Tatsuya's seemingly ordinary taijutsu attacks, each blow carrying devastating force.
This was a one-sided slaughter. Towards these Root ninja, who had been completely brainwashed, their minds twisted by Danzo's insidious indoctrination, Tatsuya had no intention of showing any mercy.
In just a few short, brutal minutes, more than half of the two hundred plus Root ninja Danzo had brought with him were systematically slaughtered by the combined, overwhelming efforts of Tatsuya and the Uchiha clansmen. The remaining Root ninja finally broke. Their fanatical resolve shattered, they no longer mindlessly charged at Tatsuya, their disciplined formations dissolving into panicked flight.
Nearby, the Konoha ninja who had been watching the battle unfold all had complex expressions of profound shock and perhaps a touch of unbearable pity on their faces. Danzo's cowardly flight and Root's utter, catastrophic rout unfolded before their very eyes. If they hadn't witnessed it themselves, they would have found it incredibly hard to believe that Root, an important and deeply entrenched shadowy power within Konoha Village, could meet such a swift and ignominious end.
Seeing that the battle was effectively decided, Tatsuya gave a meaningful glance to Shisui and Misuke, then his figure flickered and vanished from the spot. He was going to pursue Danzo; Shisui and Misuke would remain behind to handle the aftermath and secure the remaining Root operatives.
"Stop them!" Watching the Root ninja scattering and fleeing in all directions like frightened rats, Nara Shikaku quickly and decisively ordered the Hokage's ANBU and the Jonin Squad ninja behind him. Previously, he hadn't immediately participated in the battle initiated by Tatsuya between the Military Police Force and Root, perhaps due to political considerations or a desire to assess the situation. But now that the outcome was clear, he couldn't allow these dangerous Root ninja to escape and disperse into the wider world. This shadowy group, the "Darkness of Konoha," had all been meticulously trained by Konoha, consuming countless village resources in the process, and they were intimately familiar with much of Konoha's most sensitive intelligence. If they were allowed to escape, it would undoubtedly have a huge and detrimental impact on Konoha Village.
With a series of rapid, flickering movements, dozens of Hokage's ANBU and Jonin Squad ninja immediately joined the fray, moving to intercept the fleeing Root members. Hearing Nara Shikaku's order, Yamanaka Inoichi and Akimichi Choza also led their clan's elites to participate in the cleanup operation. Seeing this, the Hyuga clan, Inuzuka clan, Aburame clan, and other prominent ninja clans also quickly followed suit, their members fanning out to secure the area.
Soon, only one ninja clan remained awkwardly on the sidelines, not joining the fight. They were the few remaining members of the Shimura clan. The current Shimura clan was a pale shadow of its former strength and influence; its power had already fallen outside the top five ninja clans in Konoha. Although Danzo's personal strength and status within the village's shadow hierarchy were high, as the autocratic master of Root, he had merely treated his own clan as a disposable pawn, a tool to be exploited for his own ambitions, rather than a legacy to be nurtured. After years of Danzo's exploitation and neglect, the Shimura clan now had a very weak presence and little influence within Konoha.
The current head of the Shimura clan was Shimura Shinya. He was deeply dissatisfied with Danzo's long-standing practice of tying the clan's fate so tightly and dangerously to Root. This was also the primary reason why he hadn't led his few clansmen to actively help Root earlier in the confrontation.
"Let's head back first," Shimura Shinya said with a soft, weary sigh, looking at the numerous corpses littering the ground, a grim testament to the battle's ferocity. Their Shimura clan was powerless to participate in this brutal struggle for power and influence. Shimura Shinya also didn't know what fate awaited the Shimura clan now, with Danzo's apparent downfall. Perhaps, he mused with a flicker of grim hope, without Danzo—that detestable, self-serving old man who never truly considered the clan's best interests—they might actually be able to rebuild and develop better in the future.
Outside Konoha Village, Danzo's figure leaped continuously and desperately through the treetops, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He had to escape this dangerous place as quickly as humanly possible. Danzo planned to seek refuge with Orochimaru. Having now irrevocably abandoned Konoha Village, this seemed like his best, perhaps only, viable option. After all, the two of them had cooperated, however uneasily, for a long and significant period in the past.
Suddenly, Danzo's expression changed drastically as he fled, a sense of mortal danger washing over him. His body immediately twisted in mid-air, attempting to dodge an unseen attack.
But it was too late!
Behind Danzo, a figure suddenly flickered into existence—Tatsuya. A devastating blow, filled with immense, focused power, slammed directly into a vital point on Danzo's back.
Crack~
With the sickening sound of breaking bones, Danzo's body was almost blasted in half by the sheer force of the impact. His body was sent hurtling through the air by the tremendous force. Just as Danzo's battered form had flown a few meters, his entire being suddenly vanished like a phantom, shimmering out of existence. The phantom flickered and disappeared. A few seconds later, Danzo's figure reappeared in the sky above a nearby forest, his breathing ragged, his face contorted in pain and fury.
This time, Danzo didn't try to run anymore. He had just used Izanagi to alter the reality of having suffered Tatsuya's devastating, potentially fatal, blow.
Danzo turned around, his expression grave and filled with a dawning despair as he stared at Tatsuya. He was absolutely certain that Tatsuya had just used the Flying Thunder God Technique to appear directly behind him, bypassing all his defenses. At this point, Danzo understood with chilling clarity that Tatsuya must have planted a Flying Thunder God seal formula on his body during that previous, seemingly minor, attack.
Escape was now utterly useless. No matter how fast he was, could he possibly outrun the Flying Thunder God Technique, which allowed for direct, instantaneous spatial teleportation? Danzo wasn't prepared to just sit there and wait for death either, not without a fight. He began to form hand seals with trembling fingers, preparing for a final, desperate, last-ditch struggle.
Poof! A cloud of white smoke erupted, and the massive, grotesque form of Baku, his personal summoning animal, appeared beside Danzo, its trunk-like snout twitching. Danzo's hands continued to form seals without pause, unleashing one Wind Release ninjutsu after another in a desperate attempt to create an opening.
"Heh! Let's see how many Sharingan you have left now," Tatsuya said with a cold, merciless sneer, looking at Danzo's desperate, futile struggles. After speaking, he flickered and vanished from the spot.
A few minutes later, the battle was over.
On the ravaged ground, Danzo's corpse lay silently, his ambition finally extinguished. With Tatsuya's special Flying Thunder God seal formula planted on him, he hadn't even had a chance to use his final trump card, the Four Symbols Seal, to take his enemy down with him. Danzo's right arm, the one grotesquely implanted with numerous Sharingan, had completely disappeared, leaving behind only a small, wood-like stump, a testament to the Hashirama cells that had once sustained it. Under Tatsuya's relentless and overwhelming assault, after all the Sharingan on Danzo's right arm had been exhausted, their power depleted in futile Izanagi uses, the delicate imbalance of Yin and Yang within his modified body meant he could no longer suppress the rampant, consuming power of the First Hokage's cells.
Danzo Shimura, the Darkness of Konoha, was finally dead.