As twilight gathered from all sides, the orange-red setting sun plated the buildings of Konohagakure with a layer of warm gold.
The figures of Minato and Takuno stepped out from the main gate of the Uchiha clan grounds, their strides carrying a trace of heaviness.
Although the outcome of the negotiation on this trip was within expectations, and could even be said to have reached a certain delicate balance, a premonition of an impending storm weighed heavily upon Minato's heart.
Between the village and the Uchiha clan, that moment which would decide each other's destiny was already close at hand.
"Still worrying over the matters of the Uchiha clan?" Takuno's voice rang out from his side.
Minato nodded slightly, "Yes, Takuno-senpai. Although Clan Head Fugaku's current attitude is clear, the radical faction suffered heavy losses this time, and they will absolutely never quiet down just like this. Undercurrents are surging, and I am afraid it will be difficult to calm them."
Takuno nodded thoughtfully, asking as if casually: "Shisui... his stance is still resolutely standing on the village's side, right?"
Compared to himself, Minato, as the Fourth Hokage, had more frequent contact with that young Uchiha genius who possessed the strongest genjutsu, "Kotoamatsukami."
At the mention of Shisui, Minato's tense expression finally eased up, and the corners of his mouth uncontrollably curled into a gratified arc.
"Yes, this point is beyond doubt. Speaking of which, I also did not expect that his sense of belonging to the village would be so pure and profound." He paused, thinking of Fugaku.
By comparison, Clan Head Fugaku chose to stand on the village's side, but the weight of interest-weighing considerations accounted for a large proportion; of course, the village's powerful strength also played a decisive suppressing role.
If the strength of both sides became unbalanced or close... under such a hypothesis, Fugaku's stance would be full of variables.
Takuno listened quietly, a sharp glint flashing across his deep eyes.
He fell silent for a moment, suddenly tossing out an extremely subversive idea: "Lord Hokage, have you ever considered... letting Shisui 'stand' over to the opposite side?"
"Hmm?" Minato's footsteps ground to a halt, turning his head to look at Takuno, a trace of astonishment flashing across his azure eyes first, before being rapidly replaced by deep thought.
He instantly grasped the profound meaning contained within his senior's words, "Takuno-senpai, you mean...?"
"Precisely." Takuno nodded with certainty, his tone becoming exceptionally solemn, "If Shisui consistently guards Konoha with the power of the Mangekyō Sharingan, it is certainly a powerful aid for the village.
However, this will also bury an illusory seed within the Uchiha internally, especially in the hearts of those radicals, causing them to mistakenly believe that as long as they possess the power of the Mangekyō, they can challenge the village, and even change the landscape.
This kind of superstition regarding the Mangekyō Sharingan might become the root of infinite future turmoil."
Saying this, Takuno paused, continuing seriously.
"Therefore, rather than letting this hidden danger repeatedly breed in the future, it is better to use this opportunity to make them thoroughly recognize a fact.
Namely, that even the strongest Mangekyō Sharingan is merely the light of a firefly in front of the village's overall will and power.
Letting the object of their superstition completely shatter is better than a hundred futile warnings."
Minato's expression turned thoroughly serious; he stopped his pace and fell into thought.
A moment later, he slowly nodded, decisiveness revealing itself in his eyes: "What senior says is extremely true. This line of thought... I will consider it carefully."
The atmosphere eased slightly, and a gentle smile resurfaced on Minato's face as he looked sincerely toward Takuno.
"Speaking of which, I have not yet formally congratulated senior. Congratulations on completely inheriting Tsunade-senpai's mantle; your utilization of Chakra Enhanced Strength is perfected to mastery, and your strength has greatly risen. This is the village's fortune."
Hearing this, Takuno modestly waved his hand instead: "Lord Hokage overpraises me. I am still far from Lady Tsunade's realm."
At the very least, regarding the amount of chakra stored inside the Strength of a Hundred Seal, he was far from being as vast and majestic as Tsunade.
Minato merely let out an understanding smile after listening.
In his view, the precision of power and control the other party displayed at this moment had already reached a level on par with Tsunade.
This strength was already a mainstay pillar of the village.
With the conversation arriving here, the two came to a tacit stop at a fork in the street.
Minato turned to walk toward the brightly lit Hokage Building; since the follow-up matters of the Uchiha still needed to be processed, he was definitely going to work overtime today;
Takuno let out a sigh, his figure like merging into the shadows, noiselessly vanishing in the direction leading toward the Anbu Headquarters.
The Hokage of Konoha hadn't even left work; how could a subordinate possibly leave work?
However, before Shisui finished his mission and returned later on, no major events should happen, and he could also continue to busy himself with his own affairs.
...
Under the cold laboratory lights, Takuno's figure stood silently before a precise apparatus.
That was precisely the special instrument capable of assisting him in opening the Sharingan.
During this period of time, he had also carefully examined his own mental state multiple times.
Ever since that "memory excision" carried out in order to eradicate the device's side effects, he had repeatedly confirmed that no substantial sequelae were left behind.
The only leftover was perhaps a near-instinctive resistance deep within his heart; he was unwilling to touch or recall the specific feelings during that excision process.
Whenever his thoughts slightly brushed against that instant, even if it was just a fleeting glimpse, a bone-chilling coldness would instantly surge up along his spine, his hairs standing on end as a sense of horror arose spontaneously.
That tearing-soul-like agonizing pain was something Takuno, recollecting it to this day, still incomparably clearly deemed as an absolute torture that humans could not easily endure!
As for those crucial memory fragments that had been cut away, he had also already utilized the "Transformation of the Soul Technique" to investigate deeply.
The result was reassuring; they had already turned into purely blank regions, as though they had never existed, without a single bit of interference toward his current thinking and actions anymore.
Other than that, there was just a state of mental lethargy that lasted for a period of time that wasn't considered long.
Up to this point, a perfect and controllable solution chain had finally been found for the device's sequelae.
The first step, with the help of the power of the "Falls of Truth," was to completely strip away the influence brought by the negative emotions and mental shock carried by that specific memory beforehand;
Immediately following as the second step was the implementation of the precise "memory excision," completely erasing this memory and causing it to thoroughly lose the possibility of affecting him subsequently.
Ultimately, the price he needed to endure merely remained that one deeply ingrained, shudder-inducing pure pain.
In this way, the risk of the device had been reduced to the minimum.
Although he was absolutely unwilling to taste that bone-deep agony a second time, after weighing the pros and cons, Takuno would still choose to do it.
Being unwilling far from represented fearing!
In front of his pure desire to become stronger, what did even fear count for?
More importantly, having mastered this set of solutions, he saw a huge space for efficiency improvement; he could drastically shorten the recovery interval after each use of the device!
Of course, the improvement in efficiency similarly represented that the frequency of memory erasure would also rise.
Takuno took a deep breath, a resolute color showing in his eyes.
He did not hesitate any longer, turning around with swift and neat movements, and once again lay down inside that cold device capsule body.
...
The next day, Takuno gazed intently at himself in the mirror; within those iconic blood-red eyes, three pitch-black tomoe were slowly rotating, permeating a power that was even deeper and more bizarrely demonic than yesterday.
His fingertips unconsciously brushed past his eye sockets, and he could clearly perceive the surging of ocular power; indeed, after another attempt last night, the ocular power of these eyes had taken another step forward.
However, that heavy iron door leading to the Mangekyō Sharingan still remained completely motionless.
What made his heart even heavier was that a strong premonition was becoming clearer and clearer.
Relying solely on the painful stimulation and ocular power growth brought by this "device" before his eyes seemed to be... an entirely unviable dead end.
The opening of the Mangekyō probably required a deeper, more extreme kind of opportunity.
He also could not determine exactly what kind of path was the correct path belonging exclusively to him, Takuno, to open the Mangekyō.
Takuno let out a sigh; the road ahead was blurred, but standing still would only make the goal even more unreachable.
No matter what, the accumulation of ocular power itself was not a futile effort.
Since he temporarily could not find that correct "key," then he would continue to hone the already existing "blade."
No matter how microscopic the elevation of ocular power was, it was after all a real and solid accumulation of strength; even a mosquito's leg, no matter how thin, was still meat.
Perhaps one day, this continuous accumulation of quantitative change would, at some unexpected critical point, trigger that dreamed-of qualitative change?
Although this thought carried a trace of helpless self-consolation, it was also the only faint hope that could be grasped currently.
He lightly pressed his temples; right now, there was still a problem that needed solving—the "sequelae" after using the device.
The feeling after this use was similar to that very first time; if one did not deliberately go to scrutinize it carefully, that subtle sense of anomaly was nearly impossible to capture, as if a very faint thin gauze was merely draped over his spirit.
But Takuno knew that this influence was imperceptible; one use might yield no feeling, but...
When he used it multiple times, that symptom of being unable to completely control his own emotions would appear once again.
Therefore, to be safe, the process that should be walked still had to be walked!
Kumogakure, Falls of Truth—here he comes!
Benefiting from the backhand left behind at the Falls of Truth last time, Takuno's process of entering Turtle Island this turn was exceptionally smooth.
With the help of that Kumo ninja serving as the "key," he stepped onto this waterfall bearing the trial of truth once more without any obstacles.
Facing the Falls of Truth again was completely different from the thrilling shock of last time; this turn's baptism appeared much calmer.
Moreover, those haunting memory phantoms condensed from past obsessions and pain did not resurface again.
This was undoubtedly a certain signal that those intentionally erased memories had already been completely dispelled, no longer having any impact on him.
As for the new "memory bodies" sparked by the waterfall's power and derived from his current state of mind?
For Takuno, it was something that could be "solved" very easily.
Up to this point, the first stage of eliminating mental hazards was declared to have reached a successful conclusion.
Next up was the second stage: completely erasing that segment of memory from the deepest part of consciousness.
The word "erasing" sounded simple, but the pain it brought was far beyond what ordinary people could imagine.
When this process truly initiated, Takuno's body instantly tensed up like a bowstring, his jaws clenched tightly, and blue veins bulged violently on his forehead.
An agonizing pain that went deep into the marrow and tore at the soul swept over like a tsunami, submerging him instantly.
Even if this was already not the first time enduring it, and could even be said to have been experienced several times, this pain originating from the core of the soul did not have the slightest tendency to become accustomed due to the increase in frequency.
Every single time, it was like falling into a brand-new abyss of purgatory.
When this inhuman torture finally receded slowly, Takuno seemed to have all his strength drained away, his spirit also lethargic to the extreme.
He barely supported his body, sitting cross-legged on the spot, a sense of fatigue flooding over like a tide.
However, he did not choose to fall asleep with his head down like an ordinary person would.
Sleep, this resting method that was only natural for ordinary people, had up to this day been nearly eliminated by him from his daily options.
He was currently carrying out a more exquisite and demanding substitution.
Attempting to transform the exploration process of normalizing Sage Mode into a special kind of "rest."
His goal was to let the state of high focus and the mind sinking into an empty, clear realm required when condensing Sage chakra replace traditional sleep.
This was by no means an easy matter; the initial attempts were simply like an idiot raving about a dream, his mind wavering unstably between condensing chakra and relaxing into a daze of sleep, simply unable to attend to both.
But Takuno relied on his astonishing willpower to temper it day after day.
At this moment, his cross-legged posture appeared fatigued, yet his breathing gradually adjusted to a unique and stable rhythm.
His consciousness was not completely awake, nor was it thoroughly asleep, but had rather entered a wondrous state of "semi-sleep."
One part of his mind still maintained the guidance and condensation of the natural energy within his body, while another part sank into a deeper level of rest.
Although this state could not yet completely replace the comprehensive recovery effect brought by deep sleep, Takuno could clearly feel the minute progress brought by every single attempt.
He believed that as long as he walked unremittingly along this path, there would eventually come a day when, even at a time of completely sinking into dreamland, his body could, as if possessing autonomous consciousness, continuously deploy the most refined Sage chakra.
Of course... just how long was this road, and where lay the finish line?
Even Takuno himself was unclear; that answer would perhaps only be known when he broke through.
And precisely during the days when Takuno was immersed in *Cultiv*.
A crow interrupted his training, bringing a piece of information.
His subordinate had discovered the traces of the Six-Tails Jinchūriki!
Takuno rubbed his forehead; although his spirit had not completely recovered yet, it was not a big problem.
This time he had only erased one segment of memory, and the impact caused to him was far from being as large as last time.
The whereabouts of the Six-Tails Jinchūriki, Utakata, because of his constant evasion of Kirigakure's pursuit, were not so easy to determine.
Therefore, since it was found this time, he could not afford to miss this opportunity!
If he let the other party hide away once more, who knew when the next time he could find him would be!