The meeting point was an abandoned monastery at the border of Lightning Country.
Sasuke arrived alone, having ordered Team Taka to maintain distant observation positions. They were to watch only—intervene only if he was somehow losing, which he knew wouldn't happen.
His Byakugan detected Itachi's presence before he entered. The chakra signature was strong but... wrong. Flickering. Unstable. The disease was ravaging him from inside.
Sasuke entered the monastery.
Itachi stood in the main hall, backlit by moonlight through broken windows. Black cloak with red clouds. Long dark hair. And those eyes—Mangekyo Sharingan, the distinctive pinwheel pattern spinning slowly.
For a moment, neither spoke.
"Sasuke," Itachi said finally. His voice was calm, but Sasuke heard the underlying exhaustion. "You've grown."
"And you've weakened." Sasuke activated his own Mangekyo—fifty-one nodes blazing in impossibly complex geometric patterns. "The disease is killing you. Your vision is failing. Your chakra reserves are depleted. You're a shadow of what you were."
Itachi's expression didn't change, but his eyes widened slightly at Sasuke's Mangekyo pattern.
"What have you done to your eyes?" Itachi asked quietly. "Those patterns... I've never seen anything like them."
"Collected power." Sasuke stepped forward, his draconic pupils visible even beneath the Mangekyo. "Fifty-one dojutsu absorbed into my Sharingan. Ten Byakugan. Forty-one Sharingan including Shisui's Mangekyo. Every eye I've stolen strengthens my pattern."
"The Dojutsu Hunter." Itachi's voice carried sadness. "The reports were true. You've been murdering Uchiha survivors. Taking their eyes."
"Collecting them," Sasuke corrected. "The clan is dead. I'm preserving their power, concentrating it into one vessel. Making something greater than the sum of scattered remnants."
"By killing innocents." For the first time, emotion entered Itachi's voice. "Children. Healers. People who just wanted to live quietly. You hunted them like animals."
"They had Sharingan. That made them valuable. Their lives were secondary to their eyes." Sasuke's tone was completely devoid of empathy. "Just like yours are."
Itachi's Mangekyo spun faster. "So this is what you've become. Not my brother seeking justice or understanding. Just... a collector. A monster who steals sight."
"Yes." Sasuke activated Dragon Sage Mode.
Purple-black chakra erupted around him. The temperature in the monastery spiked. The ground cracked beneath his feet. And his presence—the sheer concentrated power—made even Itachi take an involuntary step back.
"This is what I've become," Sasuke continued, his voice echoing with unnatural resonance from the natural energy suffusing his body. "I've absorbed the Dragon Vein. Consumed an entire planetary natural energy source. My physical capabilities now match my ocular power."
Itachi stared. "The Dragon Vein... that's impossible. Even attempting to connect to it should have killed you. Absorbing it entirely—"
"Was agonizing. But successful." Sasuke's draconic pupils gleamed within his Mangekyo. "And now I'm ready to complete the final step of my collection. I need your eyes, Itachi. For Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan."
"So the mission was just pretense." Itachi's voice was sad, not surprised. "You never intended to complete the assignment."
"Oh, I'll complete it. After I kill you and take your eyes, I'll gather the intelligence on the Eight-Tails and report back to Pain." Sasuke's hands moved through seals. "I'm professional about my betrayals."
"Then there's nothing more to say." Itachi's Mangekyo blazed. "If you want my eyes, little brother, you'll have to take them."
His hands blurred through seals.
"Tsukuyomi!"
The world twisted.