As soon as Kakuzu finished speaking, he moved with incredible speed and charged straight into the attack.
Sasori was slightly taken aback. This guy is actually a shinobi with a Kekkei Genkai? At the thought, a glint flickered in his eyes.
Diarmuid noticed that look and finally understood why Sasori's previous gaze had felt "off" to him.
"What are you looking at?" Diarmuid asked.
"Would you be interested in letting me research you later?" Sasori asked with a chuckle, his attitude doing a complete 180.
"Research your grandmother! Researching how to turn me into a Human Puppet? Stop slacking and move!" Diarmuid snapped irritably.
Sasori wasn't offended by the curse; he merely nodded with a smile. His expression sharpened as he retrieved a scroll. With a puff of smoke from the unsealed mark, a figure lurched toward the battlefield with incredible speed, albeit in a distinctly ungraceful, hunched manner.
In an instant, Sasori had manifested as Hiruko.
"Water Release: Water Severing Wave!" Kakuzu formed a hand seal. As he stepped into the gravity field, he spat out a high-pressure jet of water.
Kagami grit his teeth, enduring the crushing weight. He performed a one-handed seal and growled before the jet could reach him: "Earth Release: Mud Wall!"
A massive wall erupted from the earth, but strangely, the structure was pitch black. Because it had risen from the ground within the range of Diarmuid's technique, the Mud Wall was immediately saturated by the power of the Dark-Dark Fruit.
Consequently, when Kakuzu's Water Severing Wave struck the "darkened" wall, the high-pressure stream was unexpectedly swallowed whole by the clinging darkness.
Kakuzu's eyelid twitched. Mumbling a curse at his bad luck, he kicked off the ground and leapt into the air.
"Lightning Release: False Darkness!" This time, Kakuzu didn't even use hand signs. His body split apart to release a "man" made of black threads, the manifestation of his Earth Grudge Fear. The masked entity, glowing with the aura of Lightning Release, opened its mouth and discharged two bolts of lightning directly at Uchiha Kagami.
"Lightning Release: Crawling Court!" Kagami's seals were a blur, nearly instantaneous. Two bolts of lightning erupted from his shoulders, intercepting Kakuzu's attack mid-air.
While Kakuzu was still airborne, Kagami's hands moved again, weaving a phantom of seals.
"Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique!" Kagami roared.
Remarkably, this Water Dragon Bullet moved at a velocity far exceeding the norm. A dragon manifested out of thin air, lunging toward Kakuzu and catching up to the naturally faster Lightning Style in a heartbeat.
Then, lightning and water merged. The Water Dragon Bullet's power surged, cloaked in crackling electricity!
"A composite technique?" Surprise registered in Kakuzu's eyes.
Indeed, Uchiha Kagami was a shinobi capable of using four natures. Except for Wind Release, he could manipulate all elemental properties. However, Kakuzu's surprise was fleeting.
Sensing something, Kakuzu formed a seal and shouted: "Fire Release: Searing Migraine!"
Kagami assumed Kakuzu intended to use fire to counter the water and began preparing his next move. However, Kakuzu, who shouldn't have been able to land so quickly, was suddenly slammed to the ground by an invisible force.
Kagami realized instantly: the person wielding that mysterious "Earth Release" was assisting!
The next second, Kakuzu's feet hit the ground, perfectly evading the Water Dragon Bullet. Searing Migraine was no longer a defensive move but a lethal counter; a torrent of flames erupted, instantly engulfing Kagami.
Did I get him? Kakuzu wondered.
But in the next heartbeat, his instincts screamed. He slid to the right just as a cold flash of steel sliced the skin of his arm. Had he not moved, the blade would have pierced his heart.
Uchiha Kagami!
The man who should have been consumed by fire appeared behind Kakuzu's left flank, nearly skewering one of his hearts.
"So, it's not just Uchiha Shisui whose Body Flicker is fast," Kakuzu muttered, wiping blood from his arm. It was a simple comment designed to bait Kagami's attention.
Kagami didn't bite. His blade danced around him in a whirlwind of steel. A closer look revealed his three-tomoe Sharingan spinning frantically.
The sound of clashing metal filled the air. Sasori had fired a barrage of senbon needles from a distance, attempting a sneak attack.
"Such things are useless before the Sharingan!" Kagami declared. While he wasn't an extremist like Madara, he took immense pride in his clan's Kekkei Genkai.
By now, the "field clearing" was complete. Every other shinobi, whether from Konohagakure or Kumogakure, had been swallowed by Diarmuid's darkness. The Gravity Field: Sealed Domain and the Abyssal Darkness covering the area quickly dissipated.
Feeling the heavy burden of the gravity lift, Kagami found it strange. Why cancel the technique now? He didn't ask, though; he simply took the advantage.
"Three of them?" Kagami watched Diarmuid approach. He calculated his odds; if he could take them out, he might still be able to save those swallowed by the darkness. He didn't care about the Cloud ninja, but his comrades had to be rescued if possible.
In a shinobi struggle, there is no "fair play." A duel? Out of the question. The only creed was to kill the enemy as quickly as possible by any means necessary.
Kakuzu and Sasori had no interest in one-on-one combat, and Diarmuid carried no such moral baggage. However, the three were awkward allies; Diarmuid and Kakuzu had some chemistry after six months, but Sasori was a "one-man army" by nature. Cooperation? He didn't know the meaning of the word.
As a veteran, Kagami noticed the lack of cohesion. This was his opening.
No more probing. I must kill one or two of them instantly to survive. If this drags on, I'm finished, Kagami thought.
A look of grim resolve entered his Sharingan. He locked onto Kakuzu.
Kakuzu sensed the killing intent but refused to look Kagami in the eye. Only a fool stares directly into a Sharingan.
Kagami moved. With a burst of speed, he vanished—another Body Flicker.
Kakuzu's arm suddenly detached and elongated, exploding with a mass of black threads. He swept the area in all four directions simultaneously.
Two flashes of cold steel appeared. Kagami materialized behind Kakuzu, his blade severing the encroaching threads. Even as they were cut, the severed threads continued to writhe on the ground.
Sasori ignored Kakuzu's safety entirely. The moment Kagami appeared, Hiruko's mouth opened, unleashing a massive volley of poison-tipped senbon that blanketed both Kagami and Kakuzu.
"Earth Grudge Fear: Flower Bloom!" This time, Kakuzu used a secret technique.
From beneath the earth, countless black threads erupted like vines, tangling around Kagami's feet. Kagami seemed trapped, and Kakuzu acted as if he were willing to die with him.
"Magatsuhikami..." Kagami didn't try to struggle or dodge. He whispered the name of his technique and plunged his blade into Kakuzu's back, skewering him through.
Fortunately for Kakuzu, Kagami lacked intel on his unique anatomy. The blade did not hit a heart, causing minimal real damage. Simultaneously, the swarm of poison needles whistled through the air, covering both men. Kagami's back was riddled with them, making him look like a gruesome pincushion.
"...Got him," Sasori's voice echoed from within Hiruko.
Diarmuid, watching with an analytical eye, hadn't moved. He spoke up: "Maybe not."
"Are you questioning my skill? My poison?" Sasori asked, annoyed.
Truthfully, Diarmuid felt Sasori's current combat power was... mid-tier. Not weak, but not overwhelming. His poison was top-notch, certainly, but Diarmuid valued him for his intelligence-gathering potential, not his brawn. He kept that thought to himself, however, to avoid a fight with the prideful puppet master.
"There is a higher level of the Sharingan. Have you heard of it? It's called the Mangekyō," Diarmuid said.
He had clearly heard Kagami whisper "Magatsuhikami" before the needles hit. It sounded exactly like the nomenclature for Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, or Kotoamatsukami, powers named after the gods.
Kagami, who should have been fatally wounded, slowly turned around. "You know quite a bit. Even within the Uchiha, few know of the Mangekyō..."
The moment he spoke, Sasori's Hiruko suffered a sudden "accident." Countless poison needles were suddenly embedded in Hiruko's own shell. It was as if the attack that hit Kagami had been perfectly "reflected," but the reflection had no trajectory, no trace. It was as if the needles had simply appeared there out of thin air.
If Sasori weren't a Human Puppet inside a puppet shell, that sudden reversal would have ended him. The bizarre abilities of the Mangekyō Sharingan were truly breathtaking.
"Two down," Kagami said softly, his gaze shifting to Diarmuid.
His eyes had changed. The three tomoe had merged into a new, eerie pattern—the Mangekyō Sharingan. Two streaks of blood wept from the corners of his eyes.
Based on this, Diarmuid inferred that while Kagami had the Mangekyō, he hadn't unlocked the secrets of the Eternal Mangekyō. He likely hadn't taken that final step—if he even had a brother to take it with.
"As I thought... the Mangekyō Sharingan..." Diarmuid muttered.
He immediately averted his eyes. A glancing look was dangerous enough; staring directly at a Mangekyō was an invitation to be trapped in a Genjutsu. Having zero experience with Genjutsu, Diarmuid had no intention of testing his luck.
Caution was the better part of valor.
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[1] Magatsuhikami is a kami of disaster, impurity, and misfortune in Shinto mythology.