Chapter 480: Illusions within Illusions

Each second was filled with excruciating pain, leading only to death.

Blades slicing flesh and breaking bones, repeating in an endless cycle, like an eternal loop with no reprieve.

In this blood-red world, every time Ye Zi resurrected, he maintained a cold smile, like a needle pricking at Fugaku's composure, making his expression subtly shift.

An hour had passed. Sixty minutes, equaling 3,600 seconds. And every second brought hundreds of blades.

This was a torture so indescribable that words failed to capture its severity. Yet, why did Ye Zi remain silent, merely frowning without a single scream, even keeping that icy smile on his face?

This illogical situation made Fugaku frown slightly.

He refused to believe that Ye Zi's pain tolerance could be so high. There had to be a reason behind it.

"Is it his dojutsu at work?"

Fugaku's cold gaze fell on the Mangekyō Sharingan in Ye Zi's right eye. He couldn't discern the cause but could only speculate as such.

However, having entered this space, enhanced by Omikami, even if Ye Zi managed to break Tsukuyomi, he would directly leave the space, not remain here.

The unending torture of "a thousand blades piercing the heart" continued, with Ye Zi repeatedly reduced to a heap of mangled flesh, only to restore his form moments later.

"Strange, isn't it?" Ye Zi said with a cold smile after another resurrection.

Fugaku said nothing. If one hour of torture couldn't kill Ye Zi, then he would continue for two hours. If two hours weren't enough, then three. He would persist until Ye Zi died.

Each resurrection allowed Ye Zi to utter only one sentence.

"Your dojutsu is impressive.

Your eyes are excellent...

Therefore, your eyes...

I'll take them."

Four sentences, four deaths.

Hearing Ye Zi's fragmented words, Fugaku's eyes filled with murderous intent. Abandoning "a thousand blades piercing the heart", he conjured a pit of molten lava to throw Ye Zi into, or used a massive mountain to crush him alive.

Every conceivable form of torture, designed to inflict pain, was employed by Fugaku in this space.

Naturally, Ye Zi endured all the corresponding pain. Yet his icy smile became a nightmare within the Tsukuyomi space, constantly reminding Fugaku of one thing: It's useless.

Another hour passed, yet the anticipated scene failed to occur.

Ye Zi was still there, intact and unharmed, not driven to death by the torment.

Fugaku's once-calm demeanor finally cracked.

"Impossible." He stared intently at Ye Zi. This shouldn't be happening. The pain meant to torture someone to death hadn't achieved its intended result.

"It's about time," Ye Zi remarked calmly, his limbs being gnawed by countless insects.

The pain he had endured during this time, though intense, had been weakened by Tenjin to within his tolerable range. His unyielding willpower allowed him to endure.

Now, the genjutsu energy absorbed by Tenjin had reached its limit, rendering the foundation of this genjutsu space fragile. Ye Zi could break free at any moment.

Boom!

The insects devouring his limbs exploded into particles, disappearing into the blood-red air.

His limbs, which had been reduced to bones and scraps of flesh, instantly restored themselves. Ye Zi shattered the torture rack and landed on the ground unscathed.

Fugaku's expression twisted in shock and disbelief. The Tsukuyomi space showed no obvious signs of collapse; everything seemed normal. Yet Ye Zi's actions were anything but normal.

The Tsukuyomi's effects were clearly still active, but Ye Zi had broken free of the rack on his own and even dispelled his genjutsu assault?

"What... did you do?" Fugaku's arms, previously crossed, dropped instinctively to his sides. That sense of control he'd relied upon masked the reality that the genjutsu energy sustaining the Tsukuyomi space had been drained to an empty shell.

Ye Zi didn't answer. Instead, he raised his right hand, staring at it intently.

"This feeling is truly remarkable. I've never paid much attention to genjutsu before, thinking its role in battle was minimal, even negligible."

A small amount of chakra condensed in Ye Zi's right hand, forming a ping-pong-sized sphere, flickering with black lightning threads.

"But the dojutsu residing in the Mangekyō has completely overturned my perspective. Genjutsu is powerful and practical, and from now on, I will make good use of it."

Ye Zi looked at Uchiha Fuqiu and smiled coldly. The nearly saturated genjutsu energy stored in his Tenjin constantly reminded him of one fact:

Genjutsu is powerful. And his Mangekyō eye was capable of elevating genjutsu to its pinnacle. His dojutsu, Tenjin, represented the ultimate expression of genjutsu.

He was eager to see the effects of releasing Tenjin but there was no need to use it here.

The chakra sphere, entwined with black lightning threads, suddenly expanded a thousandfold, forming an immense, terrifying chakra orb.

In this genjutsu space, constructed purely by imagination, anything was possible.

Before the colossal chakra orb, both Ye Zi and Fugaku seemed minuscule. The faint threads of lightning coursing through the orb were comparable in size to their bodies, a testament to the orb's vastness.

Fugaku was no longer the sole authority in the Tsukuyomi space. Ye Zi had integrated into it, using imagination to materialize anything such as the terrifying chakra orb now in his hand.

"This is impossible…!" Fugaku muttered in disbelief. It was a bizarre feeling, despite the Tsukuyomi space still being intact, he could no longer control Ye Zi.

"There's nothing impossible about it. Your dojutsu is useless now. In fact, I should thank you. As a token of my gratitude, let me give you a taste of what I just experienced."

Ye Zi smiled coldly and hurled the terrifying chakra orb toward Fugaku. The latter tried to erase the orb with his willpower, but it was futile. All he could do was widen his eyes as he was engulfed by the endless pitch-black radiance.

The scene shifted instantly.

The darkness in Fugaku's eyes was swallowed by light, and the next moment, he found himself back in the blood-red world. Corpses littered the ground, and broken blades and shattered swords lay scattered across the floor.

"Huh?" He suddenly realized that he was now bound to the torture rack, while Ye Zi stood 100 meters ahead, arms crossed, staring at him expressionlessly.

The positions had been reversed.

A profound sense of confusion appeared on Fugaku's face. Around him, hundreds of blood-red blades floated in the air.

"Why is this happening?" he muttered, bewildered and lost. It was as if he were stuck in a swamp, no matter how much he struggled. It felt like trying to peel off sweat-soaked clothes, managing to remove them halfway before being unable to continue. Though he was breathing normally, it felt as though he were suffocating.

It was strange and excruciatingly uncomfortable.

Ye Zi, naturally, didn't bother to explain.

The genjutsu energy that formed the Tsukuyomi space had been almost completely absorbed by him, leaving behind an empty shell. Ye Zi had then infused the drained Tenjin energy into the hollow Tsukuyomi space, rebuilding its foundation and seizing control over its original structure.

Now… the roles were reversed. The one being tortured was Fugaku.

It was clear what would happen next. When Tsukuyomi ended, Fugaku would be defeated. In the real world, where only a single second would pass, his chakra would be entirely depleted.

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Currently on Chapter 530 - Pain's Descent on The Hidden Leaf