Countless blurred and distorted figures, seemingly composed of pure shadow, were whispering and trading... blood, vast quantities of blood, the blood of various living beings, merging into rivers and lakes... pain, fear, despair, hatred... all sorts of extreme negative emotions acted like fuel... the stream of information came to an abrupt halt.
That mass of black energy seemed to have exhausted the amount of information this slight contact could transmit. It quickly shrank back, re-condensing into a ball, and hovered before Uchiha Shao Yu, flickering slightly as if waiting.
Uchiha Shao Yu closed his eyes, quickly digesting the fragmented information he had just received.
A few seconds later, he reopened his eyes, a hint of realization flashing through his pupils.
He understood.
This mass of energy was not the Evil God itself.
It was more like... an 'intermediary'?
Or rather, a trading port left in the world by some larger, older, more unspeakable existence that could perhaps be called an Evil God?
Its core rules were very simple, and very evil.
Sacrifice.
By offering enough appropriate sacrifices—primarily blood and the specific intense emotions that accompany blood, especially pain and fear—it could exchange them for corresponding blessings or abilities from that unknowable existence it was connected to, depending on the quality and quantity of the sacrifices.
The Old Priest and the others had gotten the direction wrong. They thought this mass of energy was the Evil God itself, believing that through rituals and specific vessels, they could make the Evil God descend or possess them.
In reality, this was just a trading tool. They offered the blood and pain of the sacrifices, which this energy absorbed, and then... theoretically, it could exchange them for things or abilities, such as potential immortality.
Just like Hidan in the original story.
It seemed that in the Old Priest's eyes, the so-called Evil God should have the power of immortality, so the Hidan he created possessed immortal abilities.
The reason the previous sacrifices hadn't succeeded until a Hidan appeared over a decade later was likely because the amount of blood sacrificed wasn't enough. After all, with only these dozen or so ordinary people, how much blood could they really provide?
And just now, after this mass of energy was wounded and weakened, sensing Uchiha Shao Yu's power, it instinctively tried to initiate another kind of contact.
It showed Uchiha Shao Yu its rules and its purpose. Like a damaged mystical creature with basic survival instincts, it was showing its manual to a potential new user.
Looking at the energy ball in his hand, Uchiha Shao Yu felt a bit of desire.
This thing was dangerous, but also... useful.
It wasn't a sentient being with wisdom; it was more like a tool that followed fixed rules.
Using it undoubtedly carried immense risks. Contacting the essence of evil could pollute the mind, the act of sacrifice itself violated common morality, and the power exchanged would inevitably come with unknown costs or side effects.
However, for an Uchiha Shao Yu who was a rogue Ninja in urgent need of power, and who possessed a top-tier ocular technique like the Mangekyo Sharingan—giving him extremely strong resistance to Genjutsu and mental pollution—it was too useful.
And most importantly, if the Old Priest and this group could scrape together enough blood for an immortal body over a dozen years, then for Uchiha Shao Yu, a powerful Ninja, wouldn't getting more blood be effortless?
His gaze swept over the surroundings.
The surviving followers of the Evil God, scared out of their wits, were kneeling on the ground or slumped over.
"What should I do with these people..."
After thinking it over carefully, Uchiha Shao Yu made his decision.
To pull up weeds, one must remove the roots.
Cleaning up the scene and eliminating all witnesses and potential hidden dangers was the cleanest choice and most aligned with his current interests.
With his mind made up, Uchiha Shao Yu's gaze instantly became as sharp as a blade.
He didn't look at the mass of black energy again, as if it no longer existed. His figure suddenly vanished from the spot.
"Puchi!" "Shink!" "Ah—!"
The dull sounds of blades cutting throats and piercing hearts, mixed with short, abruptly ending screams, echoed one after another in the mountain hollow illuminated by the eerie green firelight.
Uchiha Shao Yu's figure moved like a ghost among the dozen or so surviving cultists.
His movements were concise, efficient, and cold. Every strike of his blade precisely harvested a life.
There were no Ninjutsu clashes, no fierce resistance.
These cultists, who had long been frightened out of their wits and had exhausted their strength in the earlier infighting, were no different from lambs to the slaughter before a Kage-level powerhouse who had activated the Mangekyo Sharingan.
In less than ten breaths of time, the last cultist clutched his spurting neck, eyes wide, and slumped to the ground.
In the mountain hollow, aside from the crackling of the bonfire, there was no longer any sound of living things. The thick smell of blood overpowered the previous sweet and rotten scent.
Uchiha Shao Yu flicked the blood off his short sword and sheathed it. Not much blood even stained his body; his movements were clean and efficient.
Only then did he turn his gaze toward the small boy curled up by the edge of the pit.
The boy seemed to have been completely broken by the succession of terrifying sights. His eyes were hollow and numb, showing no reaction to the surrounding slaughter and death, only instinctively hugging his thin, small body tightly.
Should I kill him?
Uchiha Shao Yu shook his head, as if warning himself.
Although he wasn't a soft-hearted person, he couldn't bring himself to kill a child who had done nothing and posed no threat to his safety.
A person should still have some bottom lines.
Uchiha Shao Yu walked up to the boy and crouched down. The boy's hollow eyes met Uchiha Shao Yu's pair of scarlet, strange eyes that held no warmth.
"Sleep."
Uchiha Shao Yu's voice was flat and emotionless. The Mangekyo pattern in his left eye swirled slightly, and a powerful yet delicate Genjutsu force silently invaded the boy's fragile consciousness.
He wasn't simply putting him to sleep; he was using the power of the Mangekyo Sharingan to forcibly erase all memories of tonight from the boy's mind.
From being captured, to the ritual, to his appearance, to the bloody slaughter... all related images were shredded by an invisible force, turning into blurred or even completely unrelated fragments of a broken dream.
This process would place a certain burden and damage on the boy's psyche, possibly leading to a period of mental lethargy or memory confusion in the future, but at least he would no longer remember the specific events of tonight—especially Uchiha Shao Yu's appearance and the key information about this mass of Evil God energy.
Having finished all this, the boy's eyelids closed heavily, his body went limp, and he fell into a deep sleep. Uchiha Shao Yu picked him up and placed him behind a relatively clean rock far from the blood.
He took out a Sealing Scroll from his pocket and placed the mysterious energy mass inside it. This was a high-grade item with a barrier on it, specifically used for storing things.
With everything done, Uchiha Shao Yu did not linger. He took one last look at the sleeping boy.
His figure flickered, like a drop of ink merging into the night, as he quickly left the mountain hollow filled with death and eerie vibes, racing toward the Shoufu Pavilion Inn.
He needed to regroup with Uchiha Mikka and Renka as soon as possible.
He could no longer stay in the Land of Hot Springs. Konoha's pursuers were likely coming soon; it was not a place to stay for long.
Advance chapter available on pãtrêon Got1808