Rokuro returned straight to his living room via the Flying Thunder God, then released his Transformation Jutsu.
"You're back? You're not hurt, are you?"
Uchiha Ashikaga walked toward him. Rokuro shook his head.
"The so-called Strongest Hokage—what a joke. Now I understand why he let Danzō persecute the Uchiha. With his current strength, there's no way he could hold the village together anymore."
Ashikaga sighed softly.
"He's simply old. If he truly were as he pretended to be all these years, perhaps he could've kept his seat as Hokage. But the man's a hypocrite—through and through."
She shook her head, no longer wanting to talk about it. To her, Konoha's overall strength had been declining for years. Just when the village had a chance for revival under Namikaze Minato, the Nine-Tails' incident struck—snuffing out that spark in an instant. It was as if some invisible hand was deliberately holding the village back from advancing.
"Mom, I'm going to sleep."
"Take a bath first."
"Hai, hai…"
In his previous life, Rokuro only bathed once a week. After reincarnating here, he was forced to bathe daily—and by now, he'd gotten used to it.
Soaking in the warm water, he slouched back in the tub, his mind running through post-battle reflections.
"I feel like I'm getting my priorities backward. Combat experience is important, sure—but when you're overwhelmingly strong, it doesn't matter all that much. Hiruzen Sarutobi had decades of experience, yet he still got tossed around like a rag doll under Shinra Tensei. Instead of wasting time building experience, I'd be better off learning more forbidden techniques."
"Besides, I've got plenty of funds right now. Crafting more ninja tools is still the fastest way to strengthen myself."
After his bath, Rokuro returned to his room, took out his chakra armguards, and began cleaning the sweat off them.
Then his face suddenly changed.
Inside the armguards, the Nine-Tails' chakra was rapidly diminishing.
"What the…? Did the Nine-Tails break the seal? No, impossible. My seal is far stronger than the ones used for jinchūriki. The Nine-Tails I sealed only has about a tenth of its true power—it shouldn't be able to break free!"
Rokuro hurriedly entered the inner seal space—only to find the Nine-Tails' presence alarmingly weak.
When the beast saw him, the fox burst into hysterical laughter.
"Damn Uchiha! Don't think you can keep using me! I'll come back for revenge one day—just you wait!"
Rokuro quickly activated the sealing array, but to his surprise, the formation was completely intact—no damage at all.
That meant the Nine-Tails hadn't broken the seal.
"You… you're killing yourself?!"
"Ha ha ha! Took you long enough to figure it out! That's right! If I can't break this cursed seal, then I'll die on my own terms!"
Rokuro was speechless. He had never heard of a Tailed Beast committing suicide—until now.
"Nine-Tails, are you insane? You're the mightiest of the bijū! If you die like this, your eight little siblings will laugh at you!"
"Nice try, but you won't trick me again! And this isn't really suicide—my true body's still inside the jinchūriki. This is just a fragment! When this one dies, I'll simply return to my real body. I won't truly die!"
Rokuro tried to halt the process with his sealing arts—but it was futile. The Nine-Tails wasn't dying in a physical sense; it was dissipating.
After all, Tailed Beasts were masses of living chakra, held together only by their will. Once they relinquished control, they naturally dispersed.
The seal could restrict a beast's movements or extract its chakra—but it couldn't preserve its form.
"Nine-Tails, even if you kill yourself, you'll just end up back in the jinchūriki's cage. You won't be free. What difference does it make?"
"Oh, there's a big difference! That jinchūriki brat is much easier to handle. Once I'm back, I'll take control again! But you, Uchiha Rokuro—without my power, your precious ninja tools won't even work properly. Let's see how cocky you are then!"
With a roar of mocking laughter, the Nine-Tails self-destructed. Its chakra burst outward, scattering into a blinding surge of energy.
Rokuro swiftly activated his sealing arts to salvage as much as possible—but what remained was just inert chakra now.
Finite. Non-regenerative.
The Nine-Tails' chakra within him had become an irreplaceable resource.
Exiting the seal space, Rokuro scratched his head.
"Should've treated that beast a bit better… Feels like killing the goose that laid the golden egg. Oh well—what's done is done. No use regretting now."
Regret wasn't in his nature anyway. When he first began collecting the Nine-Tails' chakra, his plan was simply to take whatever he could. The fact that it had unexpectedly formed a mini version of the Nine-Tails had just been a bonus—and now, that bonus was gone.
"Guess my trial run on a max-level account just expired. Not a big deal."
"By my calculations, the remaining Nine-Tails chakra should still power five or six more Shinra Tensei. I'll have to conserve it—use my own chakra for daily jutsu from now on. Ugh… this'll age me faster."
He had noticed this issue ever since refining his first wisp of chakra.
Ninjas were supposedly superhuman—yet their lifespans were often shorter than ordinary people's.
Even without factoring in those who died in battle, ninja aged far more rapidly.
The "goddesses" of the original timeline—by their thirties, they already looked like middle-aged women.
Men fared even worse. Take Hyūga Hiashi, for example: in his fifties, he looked closer to seventy. And that was the clan head—wealthy, well-fed, and well-maintained.
It could only mean one thing: being a ninja was literally a life-burning profession.
Unless one had an immense chakra reserve like the Uzumaki or Senju clans, the stronger you grew, the faster you aged.
"No wonder Orochimaru went mad chasing immortality. A ninja's body really isn't built to last."
"But there's no way I'd ever use that fragile Reincarnation Technique of his. If I'm going to seek eternal life, I'll do it properly—by perfecting my bloodline and evolving toward the Ōtsutsuki lineage. Once I reach that level and devour the God Tree's fruit… that'll be true immortality."
It wasn't mere fantasy—Rokuro truly intended to do it. But for now, it remained only a blueprint, far from realization.
"The immediate goal is to perfect the Uchiha bloodline—to fully awaken Indra's genes. But before that, I need to meet with Uchiha Setsuna. Hopefully that old man can deliver; otherwise, I'll have to abandon the Uchiha path altogether."
The next morning, after breakfast, Rokuro visited Setsuna's home.
As soon as they met, Rokuro skipped all pleasantries and went straight for the jugular.
"Elder… do you want to see the Uchiha rise again?"
END OF CHAPTER
35 CHAPTERS AHEAD!!
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