Chapter Fifteen: Scorched Earth

"I think I can sense the little rabbit from Iwagakure lurking around, sneaking about as if too cowardly to face me," Hakuki shouted every few minutes, scanning the surrounding forest with the Scrying Stone.

The Scrying Stone, a free trinket from the League of Legends, capable of revealing stealth units.

Although he had easily killed two chunin, with his strength not even up to a genin and only a single offensive skill, killing an experienced jonin from Iwagakure was out of the question. He couldn't risk giving the enemy an opportunity for assassination. He could only intimidate him from the start and use words to bluff him; otherwise, if the jonin performed a silent beheading technique, he'd be off to joke with White Zetsu in the afterlife.

Not until his fifth shout did the Scrying Stone finally pick up the shadow of the Iwa jonin underground, creeping closer with Earth Style, preparing to launch a sneak attack.

This jonin was a master of Earth Style assassination. The leader of the Konoha patrol had fallen to his ambush.

"This time, it's not a rabbit… More like a ridiculous mole!" Hakuki raised his bloodstained butcher knife and hurled it with all his might. It landed directly above the sneaking Iwa ninja!

But a jonin is a jonin—quick and decisive. Before the blade struck the ground, a man in his thirties with gray-yellow bandages wrapped around his face leapt out.

"You're the one who killed Daiwa and Shi Yi?" Retsudo demanded, frowning. He had been hunting two Konoha genin when he heard Shi Yi's dying scream. He immediately went into stealth and hurried over, only to be forced out of hiding just as he prepared to strike.

Though it was just a battered blade with little attack power, who could say what attack might come next? Now that his stealth was exposed, death could descend at any moment.

"Indeed, it was me. Pity those two were too weak, died too quickly, and left me feeling unsatisfied. Having returned from the rifts of the underworld, I hope you can last longer, let me savor pain I haven't felt in ages." Hakuki twisted his neck, a cocky grin hidden beneath his mask.

He wasn't playing Dr. Mundo this time.

"Who are you?" Retsudo's brows knitted tighter. From this masked man's words, he sounded like a resurrected powerhouse, one who had died yet returned…

"Who am I… Hahahaha…"

"Hahahaha…"

Hakuki threw his head back and laughed wildly, eyes fixed on the tallest peaks along the Fire and Earth border.

"That's where I once stood.

Those rugged mountains forged my arrogance.

There, Onoki once crawled at my feet.

It seems the ninja world has been at peace for too long.

A few petty skirmishes have made you forget the terror you once felt under my dominion.

My name… is Madara Uchiha!

Ages may have passed, but it’s true—I have returned from the Pure Land, and your corpses shall pave the way for my next legend…"

Hakuki’s wild laughter scorned the world.

His arrogance belittled all creation.

Only one who had stood at the summit of the ninja world could laugh with such grandeur, as boundless as the sea. Just from this laugh alone, Hakuki had outshone Obito by leagues—Obito, who bore Madara’s name with empty bravado while serving as comic relief for the Akatsuki, was utterly unworthy of it.

A Uchiha who cannot laugh wildly is not fit to bear the name.

Now, Retsudo was nearly convinced, his heart sinking to absolute zero. The ninja world had so many bizarre techniques—he'd even seen a talking toad—but to run into someone who’d been dead for decades and returned from the underworld?

When he was young, the Third Tsuchikage Onoki had once been forced to his knees by a single glance from this man. Far from hiding this story out of shame, Onoki used it as motivation for his training, making Madara his lifelong goal.

Unfortunately, by the time Onoki gained fame, Madara was long dead. The two never met in battle—a lifelong regret for Onoki.

Retsudo, whose very name bore the character for "earth," was a true heir of Iwagakure and even shared distant kinship with Onoki, so he knew the tale well.

"I must find a way to escape… and deliver the news of Madara Uchiha's revival to Lord Tsuchikage!" Retsudo faltered.

"This time, I am stronger than ever. This time, I will make the entire ninja world prostrate itself at my feet. Unfortunately for you, you won't live to see that day! Now face the pet I brought back from the underworld!" Hakuki wove his hands through a flurry of chaotic seals, so fast they blurred together, then jammed both thumbs beneath his mask into his mouth and bit down hard.

"Summoning Technique: Primal Terror!"

"Damn… It looked so easy and cool in the anime, but it hurts like hell!" Hakuki screamed inwardly. The pain from his thumbs shot straight to his heart, nearly bringing tears to his eyes.

(As a dedicated author, I often mimic my characters' actions and expressions. So yes, I bit my thumb, and now I'm typing through tears.)

But after all this acting, he couldn't just stop and say, "Wait, hang on, biting my thumb hurts too much—I'm done pretending." Swallowing his tears, he forced his jaw to clamp down, ignoring his thumbs' protest, and bit through. Blood spurted forth as he slammed his hands to the ground.

"EX: Terror, activate!"

The EX-boosted terror skill plunged the entire area into darkness. A massive black shadow loomed behind Hakuki, like a living demon brandishing a battered scythe, draped in tattered cloth, ready to pounce at any moment.

"Fiddlesticks has returned… Doom is nigh… I will suck out your brain…"

A raspy, chilling voice echoed from the abyss, the kind no living thing should be able to produce.

Countless black crows erupted from the shadow, shrieking as they soared through the air, their cries like the mutterings of a nightmare, drilling unbidden into Retsudo's mind.

"What… what kind of monster is this?! Run or die here!" The thought echoed in Retsudo’s mind. Though he was far from helpless, he hurled a smoke bomb as standard retreat protocol, shrouding the area in haze.

"Hmph! Have the moles of Iwagakure lost all courage? Already trying to flee?"

"In my presence… kneel!"

Hakuki’s roar was as though he truly had become Madara Uchiha, standing atop the ninja world and gazing down in disdain. The grandeur of his aura was like a tidal wave overwhelming all before it.

"Tryndamere's Mocking Shout!"

Retsudo, in full retreat, shuddered violently, trembling like a chick in a storm, legs weak and nearly buckling, his speed faltering.

Even if he couldn’t kill his foe, Hakuki had to sell the act completely. Otherwise, once the terror effect faded and Retsudo realized he’d escaped Madara Uchiha unscathed—just tricked by a genjutsu—he might return to finish the job.

The Scrying Stone swept through the smoke and instantly spotted Retsudo. Hakuki picked up his butcher knife and hurled it, and Retsudo, still shuddering with fear, couldn't dodge—he took the blade to his right leg.

The jonin's immense chakra offered some defense, so it didn’t sever the limb.

"Ghostwalk, activate!"

As a summoner spell, Hakuki hadn’t selected Ghostwalk before, since resetting it required a fortune in gold coins. It was better to pick it only when needed.

"Ghostwalk: ignore unit collision, massively increase movement speed for 20 minutes."

Hakuki’s body glowed with a faint blue light, becoming as light as a feather. With a slight push, he shot forward three meters.

"Poor little rabbit, so scared you can’t even run? Then become another soul beneath my blade! Hahaha…" Hakuki wore a cruel smile, brandishing the Plague Butcher’s Knife as he closed in on Retsudo.

"Move! Move, damn it!" Retsudo screamed inwardly, but his legs were as limp as noodles, powerless beneath the terror—a fear he’d never felt, not even as a genin.

He looked back to see Madara Uchiha—shadowed by a demonic specter—chasing after him with a bloodied butcher knife. His heart plummeted, his face turned deathly pale, and he could only flee for his life like a terrified rabbit, limping and stumbling.

Plague Butcher’s Knife!

Plague Butcher’s Knife!

Hakuki didn’t dare get too close, wary of a desperate counterattack, so he kept hurling the knife, piling on the psychological pressure: "Run… run… your terror is the finest tribute to my return…"

"Earth Style… Earth Style…" As time passed, Retsudo gradually adapted as the terror effect faded, but a simple Sand Veil took him more than a dozen trembling hand seals to complete. He stomped hard on the ground, sending stones flying.

"Earth Style: Smoke and Sand Mirage…"

A storm of sand and stones pelted Hakuki's mask, blinding him and stinging his skin, slowing his pursuit. Even a basic misdirection jutsu had such power—one step further and Hakuki risked being counter-killed.

A jonin's strength was never to be underestimated. Scaring him off was already a testament to Hakuki’s acting. Killing him would require more attack skills.

Luckily, the emergency mission only required saving the Konoha patrol. Letting Retsudo escape might slightly affect his evaluation at worst.

"Let's leave it at that…" Hakuki had barely breathed a sigh of relief when—

"Kid! Mama’s here to save you!"

A white blur shot from the ground, crashing into Retsudo. Its rope-like body unfurled, transforming into a tentacled octopus, wrapping Retsudo tightly.

Crackling—the sound of bones being crushed.

White Zetsu’s body twisted like a wrung-out towel, spinning 720 degrees, blood spurting meters from his pores…

"Damn…" Hakuki's jaw dropped, unable to close for a long while.

"You really are the most dazzling kid in the ninja world! That Madara aura is perfect!" Uzumaki White Zetsu had seen it all!