Chapter 38: Susanoo [Combined Chapter]

Listening to Uchiha Akihiko's voice on the verge of collapse, Ling frowned, "Akihiko, your heart is in turmoil."

"My heart is in turmoil?" Uchiha Akihiko sighed, his voice still hoarse, "How can it not be in turmoil? I can even foresee my limited future -

Use this powerful cursed force to fight to the last moment, and then die in front of Kazuhiko, so that he can inherit this power and repeat my tragedy! Ling, don't you understand? Pursuing this so-called, higher-level power will only lead the Uchiha to a dead end! There is no so-called future for our clan at all!"

"Really? You think so..." After a long silence, Ling let out a long sigh, "No wonder, the opening of the Sharingan is always accompanied by violent emotional ups and downs, and there are the most tragedies around us.

However, Akihiko, the future of the clan will never be tied to the so-called bloodline limit. Uchiha can still show his strength without the Sharingan, but after leaving the Uchiha, the Sharingan is at most just a beautiful eyeball that will constantly consume chakra and backfire on the owner.

No matter how the world changes, what will resound through this ninja world will always be the name of Uchiha, not the Sharingan. Akihiko, don't let the power of the bloodline limit affect your will. It is people who control the bloodline limit, not the bloodline limit that controls people."

This time, Uchiha Akihiko remained quiet, but after a brief silence, his voice was full of ridicule and sadness, "I am so stupid, just like an idiot, actually talking to you who can't understand the power of the Mangekyo... That is the power of God, how can there be no difference between God and man?

Well, that's enough. After losing your eyes, you are no longer the one who can walk far ahead of us and lead us forward - just go home and continue to indulge in that false happiness. I have surpassed you far now."

"Akihiko, you believe too blindly in the power of bloodline limit."

Uchiha Akihiko stopped the step he was about to take, but this time his voice was completely cold, "Are you despising me and these Mangekyō Sharingan eyes that represent power?"

"No, I'm just stating a fact." Ling's expression remained calm. "You've been overwhelmed by Qiu Yan's death and the sudden power. If you can't keep calm, you won't be able to surpass me even if you have the strongest power."

"Then you can give it a try," the pattern on Uchiha Akihiko's scarlet eyes continued to disperse into three magatama and then gathered again, and a hoarse voice squeezed out from between his teeth, "Come and try this powerful force born of despair yourself. I will use my strength to tell you what the gap between humans and gods is!"

"Okay, then wait until your injury is healed--"

"Right now! Go to the training ground!" Uchiha Akihiko stared at Ling, "Don't even think about running away - under these eyes, you won't have a chance."

Ling let out another long breath, but this time his voice was filled with obvious fatigue and sighs, "…if you insist."

Uchiha Akihiko snorted coldly and walked in front to lead the way. Ling also followed his pace, tapping his sword and staff. They passed through the clan territory one after the other. As they walked, the two of them had a fighting spirit directed at each other but did not deliberately conceal it, which attracted the attention of many clan members.

The tribesmen who were not familiar with the two of them looked over and then looked away. It was normal for people of the same generation to have conflicts and fights - besides, they were just two kids, what could possibly cause any trouble?

But those who were familiar with the two were struggling over whether to follow and see what was going on. Those who were more sensitive to politics even ran towards the elders' department, intending to inform the elders of the incident - after all, looking at the posture of the two, it was clear that this was not an ordinary exchange.

Uchiha Akihiko was once a strong contender for the young clan leader. He chose to conflict with Ling when Ling became blind and the clan was re-electing for the successor. This was undoubtedly a signal for various factions in the clan to start taking sides - even if the two parties in the conflict had never thought about it.

As the clan leader, Uchiha Tajima also received the report. When he heard the news, his eyebrows knitted together and he stood up with a serious face, "Izuna, I'm sorry, you eat first, I have to go take a look."

Izuna was a little stunned, but still nodded obediently. However, after watching Uchiha Tajima leave with his clansmen, he sat alone at the table. He looked at the sumptuous meal but had no appetite. He just bent his legs silently and curled himself up into a ball.

He doesn't like eating alone.

……

More and more tribesmen fell behind Ling and Uchiha Akihiko, but it was too late to change places. Ling subconsciously raised his hand to rub his forehead, thinking about the various possibilities after the outcome of the battle, but before he could think deeply, Uchiha Akihiko's cold and stiff voice came over -

"Go ahead, don't say I didn't warn you."

Ling slowly drew out his staff knife, tapped the ground with the tip of the knife, and let out an imperceptible sigh, "...Come on."

After hearing the conversation between the two, the tribesmen who were still training stepped back to make room for them.

Seeing that the entire training ground had been cleared, Uchiha Akihiko's gaze fell on Ling again. He was now a little calmer and began to think about how he could make such a bad incident have a good outcome. But when he saw that Ling was just standing there indifferently, waiting for him to attack, an anger that was not understood by others was ignited again.

Yes, Ling simply could not understand what he had been through, let alone, could not understand what kind of power he had gained.

[It would be nice if we could use this to drag him down from the altar. ]

This thought just popped up briefly and could no longer be suppressed. Uchiha Akihiko licked his cracked lips, and his blood-red eyes became more and more eye-catching in the dusk.

[Yes, Uchiha people admire the strong. As long as I defeat Ling, I will have absolute say among my peers. Furthermore, why should I give up the position of clan leader to Madara? As long as I become the clan leader, I can assign clan members to avenge Akihiko. Ah, yes, as long as I can get the power...]

At this moment, the pattern in Uchiha Akihiko's eyes finally stopped changing, and froze on that gorgeous yet slightly weird pattern.

And the moment Uchiha Akihiko made up his mind, Ling, who was standing opposite him, felt the tangible hostility and became more cautious.

The two of them just stood opposite each other in the field, and no one from the tribesmen around them spoke up to urge them or question why they hadn't started yet.

As the sky darkened, Uchiha Akihiko finally realized that this confrontation would only put him, who was already exhausted, into an increasingly unfavorable situation. He couldn't help but let out a light click, then reached out and grabbed a few shurikens from the ninja tool bag behind his waist. With a flick of his wrist, the shurikens drew arcs and flew towards Ling Fei at a tricky angle.

Accompanied by a few crisp sounds of metal clashing, all the shurikens shot by Uchiha Akihiko were cut into two halves by Ling and fell to the ground.

Uchiha Akihiko was not surprised by this. It would be better to say that his purpose was to let Ling break these shurikens - to be more specific, to prevent Ling from having the opportunity to use chakra perception again.

After all, Ling's eyes are blind, and he can only rely on chakra perception to sense the outside world. As long as he doesn't give Ling the opportunity to sense the outside world and forces Ling to passively accept attacks and be exhausted from coping, he will be invincible!

Although he felt his actions were despicable, Uchiha Akihiko showed no mercy. He stared at Ling without blinking, quickly forming seals with his hands, guiding the chakra to gather in his chest and highly compressing it, and then blowing it all out of his mouth - the chakra that had undergone a fire attribute change immediately turned into a ferocious and mighty fire dragon, roaring towards Ling with a momentum of not giving up until the death.

[Fire Style: Great Dragon Fire Technique! ]

Before the fire dragon got close, the heat wave it brought with it hit him in the face, burning the hair on his forehead, but it did not cause any fluctuation in his expression. In fact, Ling's body had to react one step ahead of his thoughts - his right foot moved back slightly, his center of gravity sank, a bluish glow appeared on the blade in his hand, an airflow that was invisible to the naked eye wrapped around it, and then he suddenly raised it and slashed at the mighty fire dragon.

The moment the fire dragon touched the sword blade, it devoured the wind-attribute chakra wrapped around the blade. Its body suddenly grew again, but like a fish on the hook, it moved in the direction of Ling's sword.

Ling did not directly divert the direction of the fire dragon, but instead held the hilt of the sword with more and more force with both hands. When the blade rose to its extreme, he let the side of the long sword draw an arc, and then swung it back suddenly, sending the more powerful fire dragon back to Uchiha Akihiko along the same path.

Uchiha Akihiko naturally did not dare to fight head-on with the fire dragon that had already gone out of his control, so he dodged. However, his dodging caused disaster to the tribesmen who were standing behind him and watching the excitement and who were unable to dodge in time. They all retreated further away from the fire dragon, cursing. A few unlucky ones even took off their burnt coats and threw them on the ground.

Realizing the intensity of the fight between the two, the earth-attributed tribesmen who were watching joined forces to form seals and erect a thick earth wall around the training ground to prevent the two from affecting them again.

But the response of these tribesmen did not affect the two people fighting in the field. Taking advantage of the hiding of the fire dragon, Ling had already rushed in front of Uchiha Akihiko, and swept out with the long sword in his hand, forcing Uchiha Akihiko to jump and bend backwards.

After succeeding in one move, Ling was relentless and stepped forward again, forcing Uchiha Akihiko to dodge in the direction he intended. The blade wrapped in light blue airflow slashed straight down, aiming straight for Uchiha Akihiko's throat - he actually wanted to decide the outcome with this one blow!

But at this moment, something strange happened.

A huge bluish-white skeleton appeared out of thin air and directly deflected Ling's long sword. Just as Ling was surprised, a whistling wind came from the left, and a fist made of bluish-white bones hit Ling's body heavily. The speed was so fast that Ling didn't even have time to curl up his body to reduce the damage.

Ling, who was knocked flying by the skeletal fist, rolled all the way and hit the earth wall, with half of his body embedded directly in the wall. The earth wall built by the tribesmen to facilitate their actions now became the culprit that aggravated his injuries. Ling coughed up blood as soon as he struggled to land, and his entire left arm hung down limply.

But at this moment, compared to the injured Ling, Uchiha Akihiko, who was protected in the middle by blue-white ribs and skeletal arms, was obviously more eye-catching. The onlookers were discussing what kind of ninjutsu this blue-white skeleton was and how to deal with it.

Naturally, this discussion could not avoid looking at the protagonist Uchiha Akihiko. Some of the clan members who had already opened the three magatama clearly saw the blood line on Uchiha Akihiko's throat. They immediately stopped looking at Uchiha Akihiko and turned their gaze to Ling who was reconnecting his dislocated left arm on the sidelines. They couldn't help but feel sorry for him while admiring him.

The battle between the two is a long story, but in fact, from the time Uchiha Akihiko threw the shuriken to the time Ling was knocked away by the blue-white bones, it was only less than two minutes.

Ninja is such a profession. Unless they deliberately avoid it during training, winning or losing, or life or death with their opponent is just a matter of moments.

Uchiha Akihiko covered the blood line on his throat and laughed bitterly. His mind finally calmed down. He thought that after obtaining the Mangekyō Sharingan, he would be the undisputed number one in strength among his generation. But now...

Uchiha Akihiko looked through the gaps between the ribs of his pale skeleton at Ling who had stood up again with a complicated expression, "I lost. Although I'm not in good shape, I've lost...

But, Ling! Did you feel it?! This absolute power! Whether it's strength, speed or defense, it can do it! As long as we have it, we——"

Ling faced the direction of Uchiha Akihiko, gritted his teeth and connected his left arm, "Shut up."

Uchiha Akihiko stopped talking and looked at Ling who knelt on the ground again, "Ling! Admit it! This kind of power is unstoppable!"

"I said, shut up!" Ling stood up with the long sword, and couldn't help coughing up some blood, but the smile on his mouth widened instead, "This battle is not over yet - don't use poor condition or unequal strength as an excuse, in a battle between ninjas, no one will hold back on the enemy because of these.

I originally wanted to cut open your trachea and let the medical ninja treat you, but now it seems that I have one more thing to cut into pieces."

Uchiha Akihiko frowned again, "Okay, then go ahead and try. I've already lost, so just attack!

As long as you can break this [Susanoo] and hit me, I will command you in the future without second thoughts - you can even ask me to dig out my eyes and give them to you!"

"It's really tempting - but forget about digging out your eyes. After all, blindness is quite uncomfortable..." Ling wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth with his still trembling left hand, and crouched down like a beast about to pounce. "But you said you would do whatever you want, so I won't be polite -"

As Ling's voice rang out, the long sword in his hand was once again wrapped with green wind-attribute chakra, but this time the wind-attribute chakra wrapped around the sword was no longer a light wind vortex, but a thin but sharp blade that seemed to be able to cut everything into pieces.

At the same time, fine light blue electric light began to jump on Ling's body. Clear muscle lines appeared on his exposed forearms. Feeling the numbness and pain caused by the lightning chakra flowing through his body, the smile on Ling's mouth became more and more arrogant. He raised his head to the direction of Uchiha Akihiko and said, "...Are you going to do it?"