When Akira sealed away Itachi's body, everyone found his actions to be entirely reasonable. After all, the shinobi clans valued their bloodline limits imnsely and strictly prevented them from being taken by outsiders. If circumstances allowed, they would bring their clan mber's body back, and if not, they would destroy it.
Otherwise, for clans like the Hyuga or the Uchiha, even a corpse would attract those eager to harvest their eyes.
Zetsu, hiding in the shadows, was actually distrustful of Itachi.
Considering Itachi's background as the eldest son of the current Hokage, Zetsu suspected that Itachi might be pretending to cover their retreat as an excuse to rejoin the Leaf Village. Therefore, on Obito's instructions, Zetsu used his stealth technique to monitor him.
To his surprise, the final outco was Itachi's death at Sasuke's hands.
Not only that, but Itachi's body was also sealed within Akira's scroll.
A sealing scroll could only seal non-living objects, not the living-this was basic shinobi knowledge.
Weapons like swords and spears could be sealed, but living beings could not.
So when Akira sealed Itachi's body away, Zetsu was sure that Itachi was truly dead.
"It seems Uchiha Itachi really did sacrifice himself for our retreat," Black Zetsu said solemnly, his voice tinged with surprise.
"Yeah, I always found Itachi hard to figure out. Even now that he's dead, I still can't fully understand him," White Zetsu added, his tone much lighter, yet still marked by bewildernt.
"Alright, let's move. Regardless, Itachi used his life to buy us so ti." With Itachi's fate confird, Zetsu saw no reason to stay any longer and gradually sank into the ground, disappearing from sight.
Elsewhere, Deva Path Pain and the others had already retreated, while Naruto was still in the cave, trying to talk Nagato into peace.
But it was at that mont that Jiraiya and the others barged in.
Jiraiya inford Naruto that the fight outside had ended, and that the Six Paths of Pain might arrive any mont, leaving no ti for idle talk with Nagato.
Nagato's willingness to talk was clearly just a stalling tactic.
Hearing this, Naruto realized ti was of the essence. Without further delay, he quickly left the cave with Jiraiya and the others. Although only the frail Nagato remained inside, he was still the real Pain, a wielder of the Rinnegan and capable of summoning the Gedo Statue. Even if they fought together, they weren't confident they could defeat him.
If they got dragged into a prolonged fight, the Six Paths of Pain could return at any ti.
Therefore, Jiraiya led Naruto away.
Nagato simply watched them leave, making no attempt to stop them.
Nagato knew well enough that if Jiraiya and the others were intent on leaving, his current state would make it impossible to hold them.
Thus, Naruto and Jiraiya reunited with Akira and the others after leaving the cave.
To most of the other shinobi, today's battle was rely about defeating the Akatsuki, and they didn't see much in terms of achievent.
Only Itachi had been killed, and this attack on the Akatsuki wasn't considered a perfect victory.
But to Akira? His initial goal had been to transplant Itachi's Mangekyou to Sasuke.
Now, Itachi had followed the script he himself had written.
So, to Akira, the mission had been successfully accomplished.
After a half day's ti, Nagato returned to the cave, and the surviving Akatsuki mbers regrouped there. They all had somber expressions.
The fact that Akira had launched an assault right into their headquarters unnerved all the Akatsuki mbers.
Usually, it was the Akatsuki attacking others-when had they ever been the ones under attack?
This was a bitter pill to swallow.
Moreover, now that their headquarters had been discovered, wouldn't they constantly have to worry about Akira and the others launching more attacks?
"Zetsu, you're back!" As various Akatsuki mbers voiced their opinions, Nagato spoke up.
Zetsu erged from the ground, nodding, "I'm back. I saw Itachi's fate with my own eyes." "Really? How is he?" Nagato asked.
"He stayed behind to cover our retreat, and he's dead. I saw it myself, and Akira even sealed his body in a scroll," Zetsu replied.
"So, Itachi really did die," Nagato sighed.
The other Akatsuki mbers had mixed expressions.
In the end, Itachi had died for the team, and this loyalty touched them deeply.
Most of them hadn't expected Itachi to go to such lengths, and his actions truly surprised them.
"Itachi, it seems I never really knew you," Kisa finally said, a note of sadness in his voice.
Many others nodded in agreent at Kisa's words.
Indeed, no one had thought that Itachi would sacrifice himself for the Akatsuki.
Normally, Itachi didn't show such a deep commitnt to the organization.
It goes to show, sotis it takes a crisis to reveal one's true nature.
"Alright, let's move on. Thanks to Itachi's sacrifice, we now need to be even more careful. We need to relocate the Akatsuki headquarters," Nagato said after a mont of silence.
"Right, we should start moving our base as soon as possible.
"It was just the Leaf's high-level shinobi this ti.
"But what about next ti? Could it be the entire Leaf Village attacking us?
"Or maybe even a full-scale assault by the Five Great Nations?"
"So, our top priority now is relocating the Akatsuki base."
As Nagato finished speaking, each Akatsuki mber nodded in agreent.
anwhile, Akira and his team were on their way back to the Leaf Village. Over the past few days, Sasuke had been in low spirits.
Naruto noticed too and, for once, refrained from arguing with Sasuke. Instead, he even tried to create so silly distractions to lift Sasuke's mood.
But it didn't seem to work much.
After traveling for several days, one night, after finishing his chakra training, Akira glanced
out the window at the moonlit sky.
He happened to see Sasuke leap onto the roof, sitting there alone, gazing at the moon.
"Sigh, looks like it's ti to play the role of the caring big brother," Akira thought, sighing
slightly to himself.
He then used Body Flicker to appear beside Sasuke and sat down as well.
"Akira, why do you think Itachi did it?" Sasuke turned to look at Akira, asking the question
that had been weighing on his mind.
This was what had confused Sasuke for days.
How could Itachi raise a hand against the Uchiha clan but then sacrifice himself for the
Akatsuki?
No matter how much Sasuke thought about it, he couldn't make sense of Itachi's actions.
"I don't want to talk about Itachi just yet. I want to discuss the Mangekyou Sharingan with you," Akira replied, looking at Sasuke.
"Mangekyou?" Sasuke turned his head, looking puzzled, clearly not understanding Akira's
intent.
"Sasuke, tell it's been almost six months since you awakened your Mangekyou
Sharingan. Have you noticed your vision becoming blurry sotis?" Akira asked.
"Huh!?" Sasuke's face changed at Akira's words.
Indeed, recently his vision had been blurring occasionally. He originally thought it was due to fatigue or just a random occurrence. But hearing Akira's question, Sasuke's expression
darkened. Could it be that this wasn't just a coincidence?
"The Mangekyou Sharingan grants great power, but it cos with a major drawback. The more you use it, the more your vision deteriorates, until eventually, you go completely blind," Akira said bluntly, noting Sasuke's reaction.
POWER STONE!!!
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