Chapter 69 – The Snake Gets Reverse-Killed
Uchiha Dali raced forward at full speed. Just as dawn was about to break, he caught up with the Anbu ninja who had set out the previous day carrying the two advisors' letter of recommendation to the Land of Fire's daimyo.
Sensing movement behind him, the Anbu cautiously halted by the roadside, preparing to set an ambush.
But to his shock, Uchiha Dali silently appeared right behind him.
Dali didn't even bother exchanging words. With a single strike, he knocked the Anbu out cold, then used genjutsu to restrain him against a tree.
After that, he took the letter of recommendation from the ninja.
Opening it up, he confirmed it was indeed personally written by Homura Mitokado and Koharu Utatane, recommending Namikaze Minato as the Fourth Hokage.
Dali's palm tightened slightly.
A blast of Wind Release chakra instantly shredded the letter into dust.
Just as he finished, a sudden sense of unease washed over him.
Instinctively, he looked back in the direction he had come.
"You've been tailing me for a while now. I'll give you that—you've got some skill. Come on out."
Dali's voice was cold and sharp.
"Hehe…"
A faintly sinister laugh echoed from the woods behind him.
Moments later, a figure with long black hair slowly emerged atop a tree.
"To think you could sense me… quite the impressive perception."
The figure soon revealed himself in full.
Dali got a good look at his face.
A tall, thin man.
Long black hair, deathly pale complexion—sickly-looking, yet shrouded in an inscrutable aura.
Combined with that unmistakable voice and sinister smile…
Who else could it be but Orochimaru, one of the Legendary Sannin?
Even though he had already guessed the man's identity, Dali didn't expose him. Instead, he asked curiously, "Who are you?"
"Hehe… You don't even recognize me?"
"A brat like you, and yet you've become one of the Uchiha clan's main forces? Truly unexpected."
Orochimaru chuckled eerily as he strolled forward.
At the same time, he launched a genjutsu attack at Dali.
But what Orochimaru didn't know was that Dali had already seen right through him.
The moment the genjutsu was cast, Dali not only broke free effortlessly, but also activated his Mangekyō Sharingan.
Soon, Orochimaru stood face-to-face with Dali—whose body remained motionless, seemingly trapped in the genjutsu.
"I hear you want to become the Fourth Hokage… Hehe…"
"You're a perfect specimen. Unfortunately, you're in my way. I'll have to dispose of you here."
As Orochimaru spoke, he slowly extended his tongue and pulled the Kusanagi Sword from his mouth.
But just as he was about to make his move, his body suddenly froze—as if turned to stone. He couldn't move a muscle.
And then, the world around him transformed completely.
The forest, the grass, the pale dawn sky—everything vanished.
In their place was a gray, oppressive gloom.
Even more shocking was the fact that Uchiha Dali, who should've been under his control, moved.
Dali curled his lips into a grin and looked at him.
"You…"
Orochimaru's pupils contracted violently.
In an instant, he realized what had happened. "G-Golden Binding Genjutsu…"
His mind was fully conscious.
He could see the real world clearly.
But his body couldn't move at all.
A classic symptom of the Golden Binding Genjutsu.
Dali's eyes narrowed with a smirk as his gaze dropped to the Kusanagi Sword in Orochimaru's hand.
"It looks kind of disgusting… but it seems like a decent weapon. I'll be taking it."
With a clap of his hands, Dali performed a summoning technique and called forth a sealing scroll.
Then, he took the Kusanagi Sword and sealed it inside.
That made five powerful, well-known ninja blades in his possession—including the four he'd obtained earlier.
Orochimaru's eyes flickered wildly with gleams of astonishment as he watched.
"Uchiha Dali, hehe…"
"Your genjutsu is truly impressive. Is it because of those eyes?"
His gaze rested curiously on Dali's Mangekyō Sharingan.
But the moment he spoke, Dali's expression darkened.
"Just now… you tried to kill me, didn't you?"
Orochimaru's face stiffened instantly, pupils contracting again. Realizing things were going south, he stammered, "Y-You… what are you planning to do?"
Dali didn't reply. Instead, his lips curled into a cold, merciless grin.
He reached into the scroll and pulled out the Explosive Blade: Shibuki.
"I've heard this weapon is capable of tremendous physical destruction."
"I've never tried it before, so I'll use your body as a test subject—to see if the legend is true."
As he spoke, Dali channeled his chakra, activating the countless explosive tags embedded along the blade.
With a loud rustle, hundreds—thousands—of explosive tags unfurled, blanketing Orochimaru from head to toe, layer after layer.
Seeing this, Orochimaru's face turned green with terror.
"W-What are you doing?!"
Now he was truly panicking.
Realizing Dali was planning to blow him to bits with all those tags, Orochimaru started to beg for his life.
"Dali… N-No! Please, stop!!"
But his pleas fell on deaf ears.
After wrapping Orochimaru in over ten thousand explosive tags, Dali leapt backward into the distance.
A devilish grin spread across his face.
"Uchiha Dali!!"
"I'll fully support you becoming Hokage!!"
Orochimaru's terrified screams echoed across the forest.
But it changed nothing.
Once Dali had retreated to a safe distance, he decisively triggered the explosion.
BOOM!!!
A massive blast erupted across the pre-dawn sky, casting a blinding light into the heavens.
The earth and sky trembled violently. A giant fireball rose high, rapidly expanding outward in all directions.
The blaze, combined with the shockwave, obliterated everything within several kilometers in an instant.
Watching the sheer scale of the explosion, Dali clicked his tongue in amazement.
"Looks like I went a little overboard. The tag output was a bit too much…"
"Still… I doubt that guy Orochimaru would die that easily, right?"
Muttering to himself, Dali tilted his head with a smirk. "Probably not. He's like an unkillable cockroach, after all."
With that, he turned and vanished into the distance.
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