185. Moon

The tension from their recent competition had settled, and once again the Uchiha Haruka family courtyard was filled with a cheerful atmosphere.


The three girls, each with a purple mark on their foreheads, had set aside their rivalries and were now animatedly sharing their experiences with the Yin Seal, creating a lively scene.

The dark night sky did nothing to dampen their enthusiasm. As Uchiha Eimi brought out her secret homemade sweet drink from the house, the energy of the gathering reached its peak.

“This drink is to celebrate your success in training. Cheers!”

Smiling, Eimi raised her glass of fragrant, mysterious drink and called out cheerfully.

“Cheers!” x3

The three girls, caught up in the excitement, raised their drinks and prepared to indulge.

“Ugh! It’s so spicy!”

Senju Itama, who had never tasted alcohol before, took a sip of the mysterious drink only to spit it out like a spray of water jutsu. She gasped for air, her face scrunched up in distaste.

“Hmm? Isn’t Itama old enough to drink by now?”

A few drinks in, Uchiha Eimi's elegant face had taken on a slight blush, and she asked in a tipsy tone, raising an eyebrow in surprise.

“No way! I’m only seventeen!” Itama retorted, cheeks puffed with irritation.

“Oh dear, I must have been fooled by that mature transformation earlier. It really made you seem all grown up!”

Eimi, still harboring a playful grudge from earlier, couldn’t resist a jab.

“Mother, I’m not old enough for alcohol either. Please give me a different drink.”

Uchiha Haruka, ever cautious, sniffed the drink and decided against it. Seeing Itama's reaction only confirmed her decision as she politely asked Eimi for a non-alcoholic version.

“Oh, my dear, all this effort, and you still don’t get it!” Eimi sighed dramatically, reluctantly swapping Haruka's drink, her eyes betraying playful exasperation.

Meanwhile, Uchiha Hikari, unfazed, chugged her drink down and wiped her mouth with a grin. “More, please!”

“Finally, someone who can handle a drink! Haruka, you two head to the kids’ table,” Eimi teased, pouring Hikari another drink.

“Old woman,” Itama muttered under her breath, annoyed by Hikari’s smug expression.

“Hm?” x2

Eimi’s sharp hearing didn’t miss a beat. “Itama, what did you just say?” she asked, her scarlet eyes narrowing, a chill to her tone.

“Nothing, nothing!” Itama quickly backed down and made her way to the kids’ table.

As the festivities continued, Uchiha Haruka seemed to sense something and glanced up at the full moon with a hint of longing in her eyes. “Where did Mr. Gin go?”

“Oh, that curly-haired ape left a note about some urgent mission. I bet he’s out carousing. Probably with some other woman!” Itama, who was visibly tipsy despite spitting out the drink, muttered groggily.

“Thud!”

Hikari, now slightly drunk, slammed her empty glass down. Her red eyes flashed as a faint pink aura appeared behind her, wielding a menacing cleaver. “If he’s out with another woman, I’ll cut off his...!”

“I’m in!” Itama, her cheeks flushed, raised her glass and shouted in agreement.

Surprisingly, the two rivals had found common ground in their indignation.

As things began to escalate, the only sober one, Uchiha Haruka, sipped her sweet drink and looked up at the beautiful moon. “Wait, do you see something on the moon?” she asked, squinting.

“Huh? Are you drunk already?” Itama replied, not even bothering to look.

“No, seriously. Look!” Haruka insisted, activating her Sharingan for a clearer view. She could see, faintly, a moving shadow on the bright surface of the moon, like a butterfly gracefully dancing.

“Well, there really is something up there,” Hikari admitted, now looking through her Mangekyou Sharingan to get a closer look.

Itama scoffed, unimpressed. “Come on, there’s always been people on the moon.”

“She’s drunk. Ignore her,” Eimi laughed.

“I'm serious!”

“That curly haired ape told me there are relatives up there!”

Seeing that no one believed her, Senju Itama slapped the table and repeated Uchiha Gin’s words.

“Gin was just fooling around,” Uchiha Hikari replied dismissively.

“Then, Itama, who’s relative?” Uchiha Eimi, now intrigued, asked while swirling her drink playfully.

“Ours,” Itama replied, feigning seriousness.

“Looks like she’s really drunk,” the others concluded, more convinced than ever that Itama was rambling nonsense.

After all, the Uchiha and Senju clans had no common relatives.

“So beautiful… I wonder if Mr. Gin can see it,” murmured Uchiha Haruka, enchanted by the butterfly-like shadow moving on the moon, her eyes glazed with fascination.

The scene shifts to the moon.

Inside the castle of the Otsutsuki clan leader, a woman named Tsukihime stood in a striking outfit, her once clear eyes now vacant, overtaken by an urge for destruction.

She extended her hands, gathering a bluish orb of energy. Even Uchiha Gin couldn’t help but take notice.

I could… probably handle one shot of that… he thought, assessing the attack.

“Master Gin, thank you for teaching me that technique,” Otsutsuki Akemi, a towering figure, turned away, her pale eyes filled with gratitude.

With the butterfly transformation technique she had learned, she felt emboldened.

"Clan Leader, I’m no longer the Otsutsuki Akemi you can easily manipulate!” she declared, steadying herself as the energy in her surged to the surface, her gaze fixed firmly on the now berserk Tsukihime.

“Ahhh! The pain! It’s too much!”

The butterfly technique, with its intense absorption power, was drawing out years of pent-up energy within Akemi, making her feel as though countless tiny knives were carving into her flesh.

Despite the agony, she held on, determined to protect the man behind her.

“Butterfly Transformation Jutsu! Morph!”

As the stubborn energy was drained from her, Akemi's massive form began to shrink rapidly, like a balloon losing air, raising a huge cloud of dust that momentarily obscured everyone’s view.

“Cough, cough…”

Uchiha Gin, coughing from the dust, struggled to open his eyes. Before he could see Akemi clearly, he heard her familiar voice, brimming with excitement.

“Master Gin, I think I did it!”

As the dust cleared, a pair of enormous blue-green butterfly wings came into view, each spanning dozens of meters—and they were still expanding, rising higher until they poked through the towering roof of the castle.

“Boom!”

Sure enough, the ever-growing wings pierced through the ceiling, creating a huge hole. The roof collapsed entirely before the wings finally stopped expanding.

Just then, Otsutsuki Tsukihime, emerging from the smoke, wasted no time.

She unleashed the charged energy orb directly at Uchiha Gin, showing no hesitation.

“Oh, so we’re fighting already?”

Locked onto by the orb, Uchiha Gin scratched his head in resignation. Couldn’t we just settle this peacefully? A bit of teamwork is good for everyone, right?

As the orb approached, a faint but familiar red gleam reappeared in Gin’s tired eyes, and a chilling power radiated from him, causing a hidden consciousness nearby to react instantly.

“Huh? It’s the aura of Hagoromo! After hiding so long, he’s finally showing his true colors!”

Sensing the aura, a presence wrapped in intent made its way toward the castle where Uchiha Gin stood.

He may be strong, but I have Susanoo

“Bang! Snap!”

Just as Uchiha Gin was about to enter his “mecha,” two delicate white hands appeared, effortlessly catching the two incoming energy orbs.

With a crisp sound, those powerful chakra balls, like eggs, were crushed in the mysterious hands, dissipating into a blue mist.

“I’m just giving you a heads-up. I am… extremely powerful.”