1020 AD, 2nd Month of 12, Six-Kilometres South of Kamakura City, Japan, Planet Sky

Uehara was currently in a building that was clearly falling apart. But what was most important was that he was standing on a massive inscription circle with a radius of ten-metres. The moment he had stepped on it, it had began glowing in a neon-pink colour.

Uehara was still calm and cool-headed in a situation that would no doubt leave many panicking. This was due to his experience as an assassin.

With his eyes glowing golden in colour, he began analysing the circle, reading the energy it was giving off rather than the inscription characters themselves. By reading the energy, he would be able to accurately determine the energy signature of the one who supplied the circle the energy, how strong is the inscriptionist who drew the circle and what is the circle supposed to do, and also other miscellaneous matters.

Having got down a quick read of the energy, he was able to gather a few things.

[Four humans wrote the inscription making this circle, and they’re weak from what I can gather. Their aim was to use ki to sever the thread binding Chizuki’s soul to mine. It’s surprising how they added a ki dome that was supposed to imprison me. Unfortunately…]

He lifted his foot up.

[They wouldn’t be able to bind even the five-year old me.]

BOOM

A simple foot stomp coated in nature chakra was able to break the circle. Although the stomp was simple and looked weak from the observer’s point of view, the force behind the stomp caused so much damage and released such an intense shockwave that the building collapsed instantly.

As the dust cleared, it gave rise to a crater with the rubble acting as a sort of ring. The clearing was wide and could form a lake if filled with water.

Uehara was currently standing at the centre of the crater with a calm expression on his face.

[I can sense about sixteen ki signatures and four chakra signatures approaching me from the west. They’re still quite a way off. I will intercept them.]

…

Twenty-men were currently running from the bunker where they held Chizuki and Sakura to the site where the inscription circle was. Hiro, the one who drew the circle had alerted them that someone had appeared there and that they should hurry.

Right now, they were a few kilometres away from reaching the location and they were looking forward to see the existence that could turn the feeble Lady Chizuki into someone they had to constantly drain of chakra just because her rate of chakra regeneration rate was just that frightening.

They could even vividly remember how happy their master, Yaroi, was when he found out about the high chakra regeneration rate of his sister. He had also ordered them to keep a close eye on the inscribed circle, which lead to their current situation of going to check it out.

As they ran under the cover of the forest, all of them suddenly stopped when they saw a boy wearing a black coat standing just a few hundred-metres away from them.

The shinobi leading in front communicated with the rest using hand-signs. He went by Shadow.

‘Ignore him.’

All of them vanished as they covered the perimeter to move around Uehara. But imagine their surprise when they saw how Uehara’s eyes always followed the leader.

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This time, Shadow was completely surprised and even stopped for a few seconds just to make sure Uehara wasn’t coincidentally looking around in his direction. His hands started to shake a bit when he realised that Uehara was looking straight at him. He was about to suggest taking him out when Uehara suddenly vanished.

He had a bad premonition in his heart.

“Formation 1!”

All twenty of them got ready for an impending attack but after a few minutes passed, it never came. One of the martial artists was about to tell Shadow to move on but as he was about to speak, an unfamiliar voice came from behind.

“Incompetent. You have now outlived your purpose.”

““WHAT?!””

It was then that all of them felt reality break. When the darkness receded, they all found themselves tied up by tree roots.

One of the shinobi instantly realised what happened.

“Illusion…”

Before the rest could even understand what happened, the roots pierced all of them through the hearts. Their deaths were quick and painless.

Uehara vanished from the scene and headed north, leaving their corpses to be dragged underground and be used as nourishment for new trees to grow.

Although he could’ve teleported to where Chizuki and Sakura were, he had sensed another chakra signature coming from the north.

…

Hiro was rushing through the forest as fast as he could.

[I have to warn them! I have to stop them!]

After the twenty of them left, he tried reconnecting to the inscription circle to find out what happened to it and the results had him gasping for breath.

Even now as he rushed south, he still couldn’t believe it.

[If someone was truly able to break my inscription, then they are much, much stronger than anything we can handle.]

As he pushed himself to run even further, his vision suddenly grew dark.

[W-what’s happening?!]

…

“So that’s how they managed to capture both Sakura and Chizuki.”

Uehara dropped Hiro’s corpse and let it get pulled into the ground by tree roots.

[I had two ways of tracking Chizuki. One was through the soul-link and the other was through the mark on her chest. Yet, this human managed to obscure both of them. I’ll have to do something about that before I go to sleep.]

Closing his eyes, he tried to feel out for Chizuki’s location again. After a while, he opened his eyes in disappointment.

[I can only get the general vicinity and not the precise location. This most likely means wherever they have her is sealed off. Unfortunately, even this human didn’t know what that seal was.]

Mentally berating himself for not thinking about a possible scenario of his people being captured, a swirl of darkness covered him before he vanished.

…

“Little sister. It’s already been five days now. No one is coming to help you. Now be good and tell your elder brother how you got this powerful…or do you want me to kill your little friend?”

Chizuki stared at her elder brother, Yaroi, with a gaze that could kill. The three of them were in an underground basement that had illumination inscriptions all over the stone walls, allowing for adequate lighting.

Chizuki was in a glass cage that had hundreds of inscriptions written on the steel framing. There was a grey teapot with the tube part placed against the glass. It was about thirty-centimetres in height and its function was to drain all the chakra that Chizuki managed to regenerate.

Next to Chizuki’s cage was Sakura who was also in a similar cage. Unlike Chizuki, she was unconscious due to the copious amounts of ki that had invaded her body, resulting in severe ki poisoning. Right now, there was a terrible reaction being caused in her body due to her chakra and ki clashing. Even if she had very little chakra right now, she could regenerate enough chakra in thirty-minutes to combat the ki. Unfortunately, like how there was a teapot hooked to Chizuki’s cage, there was also one that was plugged too her’s as well.

Yaroi had just increased the amount of ki released from the massive grey jar in the middle that stored it.

“Look at her little sister. With all the ki assaulting her body, she’ll die soon…unless you talk.”

Chizuki just stayed silent. Although her eyes were filled with hatred, she never once showed any signs of breaking.

Yaroi’s smile was fading by the minute.

[Does she not care that her friend will die?!]

Unfortunately, before he could anything else, he suddenly felt an overwhelming pressure descend upon him, forcing him to kneel.

Before he could even sputter out a word in shock, he felt a hand grab him on the back of his neck.

“So this is where they were. If there wasn’t such a dense amount of ki in this area, it would’ve taken me longer to find them. Now then, human.”

If Yaroi had any thoughts of looking back, they were completely gone now. He could feel the gaze of whatever was behind penetrating deep into the back of his skull.

Uehara waved his other hand towards the cages. A wave of chakra surrounded the cages, suppressing the ki that was previously overflowing.

With a crushing gesture of his hand, all the talisman papers responsible for gathering and releasing the ki were ripped apart and the glass cage holding the two girls were crushed. As for the two chakra-absorbing teapots, they slowly floated over to Uehara and landed on his side.

Yaroi wanted to speak but before he could, he saw dozens of roots pierce his arms and drag him face-first to the floor from his previous kneeling position. He tried to scream but he couldn’t. Something was preventing him from screaming and that made the pain worse. Droves of tears and snot were what his body chose to improvise with.

Uehara ignored him and instead appeared next to Chizuki.

“Ah!”

“Shush.”

Uehara placed his hand on Chizuki’s head and started refilling her with his chakra.

“You did well.”

“M-Mm.”