Uchiha Demon Dragon - Chapter 8

Chapter 8: The Art of Deception and the Prankster’s Talisman

For the next seven days, the isolated, frost-covered running track of the new Uchiha compound became Yami’s entire world.

He didn’t bother practicing his punches. He didn’t practice his kicks. He didn’t even attempt to mold his chakra into the shape of a fireball. From the moment the sun crested over the eastern mountains to the moment it dipped below the western horizon, Yami ran.

He funneled every single drop of his rapidly growing chakra pool into the Rabbit Talisman, pushing his tiny body to the absolute brink of exhaustion, resting just long enough for his passive regeneration to kick in, and then running again.

On the morning of the Ninja Academy Entrance Exam, Yami lay flat on his back in his bedroom, staring at the wooden ceiling while gasping for air. His legs felt like they were made of vibrating jelly, but a massive, triumphant grin was plastered across his sweaty face.

He mentally summoned the system interface.

—

[Shendu System]

Health: 100%
Chakra: 37/325

Talisman: Tiger Lv3 (40%), Pig Lv2 (66%), Dragon Lv2 (3%), Rabbit Lv2 (7%), Monkey Lv1 (2%)

—

“Level two,” Yami whispered breathlessly, pumping a weak fist into the air. “I actually did it.”

The grind had been agonizing, but the payoff was astronomical. Hitting Level 2 on the Rabbit Talisman hadn’t just made him slightly faster; it had fundamentally shattered the physical limitations of his age. When he pushed the maximum allowable chakra into the Talisman now, his movement speed was roughly equivalent to his father’s top speed.

Hanta was a veteran Chunin of the Military Police Force. He had survived a war and years of active duty. For a six-year-old kid to casually match a veteran Chunin’s speed—and even touch the absolute baseline of an early-stage Jonin’s velocity—was terrifying.

But this newly acquired, monstrous speed had immediately presented a massive, life-threatening problem.

At Level 1, the tunnel vision had been disorienting. At Level 2, moving at the speed of a veteran Chunin without any sensory enhancement was practically suicidal. The world didn’t just blur; it completely dissolved into an unrecognizable, streaking mess of light and color. Yami had nearly impaled himself on a stray tree branch during his final training session because he simply couldn’t see it coming.

Running at this speed without the Sharingan was impossible. The human brain, especially a child’s brain, simply couldn’t process kinetic information that fast.

So, Yami had been forced to activate his Sharingan. The moment he fed chakra to his optic nerves, his newly evolved Double Tomoe spun to life, and the chaotic, blinding blur of the world instantly snapped into perfect, slow-motion clarity. He could see every falling leaf, every speck of dust, and every obstacle with flawless precision while moving at supersonic speeds.

It was perfect. Except for the glaring fact that he absolutely refused to let anyone know he had awakened the Sharingan.

To solve this dilemma, Yami had taken a portion of his weekly allowance and sneaked into the civilian commercial district. He had returned with a pair of perfectly round, pitch-black sunglasses.

He sat up from his futon, reached over to his desk, and slipped the dark shades over his eyes. He looked at his reflection in the small mirror. He looked completely ridiculous, like a tiny, blind musician.

The door to his room suddenly slid open. Hanta stood in the doorway, already dressed in a sharp, formal kimono for the Academy induction ceremony.

Hanta took one look at his son, blinked slowly, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Yami. What exactly is on your face?”

Yami adjusted the frames, pushing them up the bridge of his nose. “They are sunglasses, Dad. Do they look cool? I think they make me look incredibly mysterious. Like a seasoned assassin.”

Hanta let out a heavy, exasperated sigh, walking into the room and sitting on the edge of Yami’s futon. “They make you look like a civilian merchant trying to hide a black eye. Take them off, Yami. We are going to the Academy today. You need to look presentable.”

“I can’t take them off, Dad,” Yami replied smoothly, turning to face his father. “I have to wear them for my tactical advantage. You see, since you taught me the Body Flicker, I’ve been practicing it a lot. But when I move that fast, the wind aggressively whips into my eyes. It makes them water, and then I can’t see where I’m going. The glasses block the wind.”

It was a perfectly logical, completely plausible excuse for a child experimenting with high-speed movement.

Hanta’s expression softened slightly, but he still looked deeply conflicted. “Yami, I understand the practical application. But you need to understand the cultural implications. Uchiha shinobi do not wear sunglasses or visors. Ever.”

“Why not?” Yami asked, tilting his head. “If it stops the wind, isn’t it just a smart tool?”

“It is a detriment to our primary weapon,” Hanta explained patiently, tapping the corner of his own eye. “Our clan excels in visual Genjutsu. To trap an opponent in an illusion, we require direct, unobstructed eye contact. Wearing dark lenses creates a barrier. It makes it significantly harder to cast a Genjutsu, and it signals to the enemy that you are actively handicapping yourself.”

Hanta leaned forward, his voice dropping an octave into a more serious tone. “Furthermore… our eyes are our absolute pride. The Sharingan is the physical manifestation of our bloodline, a gift passed down from our ancestors. To hide your eyes behind dark glass implies that you are ashamed of them, or that you are trying to hide something.”

Yami remained perfectly still, though his heart did a nervous little flutter. ‘He definitely suspects something,’ Yami thought.

Given how absurdly fast Yami had been running on the track, and knowing the theoretical necessity of the Sharingan to process that speed, Hanta had likely already deduced that Yami had awakened his Dojutsu. But Hanta probably assumed it was just a faint, single-tomoe Sharingan, awakened by the trauma of Shin’s recent death.

“I’m not ashamed of our clan, Dad,” Yami said softly, his voice carrying a genuine sincerity. “But I don’t care about looking proud. I don’t care about showing off to the other kids, or intimidating people. You told me that fear keeps a ninja alive. I want to survive. If wearing these glasses keeps the wind out of my eyes so I don’t crash into a wall and die, then I’m going to wear them. Survival is more important than pride.”

Hanta stared at his son through the dark lenses. The profound pragmatism coming from a six-year-old was always jarring, but Hanta couldn’t find a single flaw in the logic. After a long, tense moment, the stern father let out a quiet chuckle.

“You are a very strange child, Yami,” Hanta said, reaching out to gently flick the brim of the sunglasses. “Fine. Wear your tactical wind-blockers. The proctors might think you have an attitude problem, but it will certainly make you memorable. Let’s get moving. Your mother is going to have a fit if we are late.”

As they walked out into the living room, Yami smiled behind his dark lenses. The plan had worked flawlessly. People would definitely see his monstrous speed, see the sunglasses, and immediately theorize that he was hiding a newly awakened Sharingan to combat the tunnel vision. It was an open secret. But because of the dark glass, the ‘level’ of his Sharingan—the fact that he possessed a Double Tomoe at six years old—would remain an absolute, impenetrable mystery.

While Aru fussed over Yami’s collar and handed him a packed lunch, Yami’s mind drifted to the newest addition on his system panel: the Monkey Talisman.

He had unlocked it completely by accident three days ago.

While resting between his brutal sprinting sessions, Yami had been casually reading through the standard Ninja Academy preparatory textbooks his father had bought. He had flipped to the section detailing the three basic Academy jutsu: the Clone Jutsu, the Substitution Jutsu, and the Transformation Jutsu (Henge no Jutsu).

As he read the theoretical breakdown of how a ninja molds their chakra to physically alter their external appearance into an animal or an inanimate object, the system had chimed.

‘The Monkey Talisman grants its bearer the magical power of shapeshifting, enabling the transformation of living beings or inanimate objects into anything of the user’s choosing.’

At first, Yami had been thrilled. Shapeshifting was an incredibly versatile espionage tool. But when he immediately tried to use the Talisman to transform into his father, the system had blocked the action, prompting him with an error message: ‘[Memory Bank Empty. Host must physically observe and scan a target before initiating transformation.]’

It turned out the Monkey Talisman functioned like a highly advanced, magical 3D scanner. It had a memory backup drive that was currently completely empty. He couldn’t just imagine a dragon and turn into one; he had to physically see the target, lock his eyes onto it, and let the system copy its exact physical parameters.

He had tested this new mechanic on his three-year-old sister, Aki.

While she was playing with her blocks in the living room, Yami had activated the Talisman and “scanned” her. Then, standing in the hallway out of sight, he channeled his chakra into the Monkey Talisman.

The transformation was instantaneous and flawless. Unlike the standard ninja Henge, which was essentially a dense shell of chakra wrapped around the user, the Monkey Talisman physically altered Yami’s biology. He shrank. His voice changed. He became an absolute, perfect, genetic replica of Aki.

He had walked into the kitchen, perfectly mimicking her high-pitched voice, and successfully scammed Aru out of two extra sweet buns before retreating to his room and dispelling the magic.

However, the system had laid down strict, undeniable ground rules regarding the transformations. The shapeshifting was purely physical and cosmetic.

If Yami somehow managed to sneak a peak at the legendary Ten-Tails, he could use the Monkey Talisman to transform into a massive, terrifying, ten-tailed monster. He would look exactly like it, and he would possess the physical weight and size of it. But he would ‘not’ gain its apocalyptic chakra reserves, its Tailed Beast Bombs, or its nature transformations.

“Which is completely fair,” Yami had reasoned to himself at the time. “Otherwise, I could just look at Madara Uchiha from a distance, turn into him, and instantly gain the Rinnegan and the Susanoo. The system is broken, but it’s not ‘that’ broken.”

But the true, terrifying potential of the Monkey Talisman wasn’t using it on himself. The Talisman’s lore specifically stated it could transform ‘living beings’. Plural.

Yami had the ability to force a transformation onto someone else.

If he was locked in a life-or-death battle with a Jonin assassin, Yami could theoretically channel his chakra through the Monkey Talisman and forcibly turn that elite killer into a harmless, squeaking rat.

Of course, the system clarified that it wasn’t an absolute, unbeatable insta-kill. Forcing a transformation on a hostile target functioned identically to a Sealing Jutsu (Fuinjutsu).

If the opponent had monstrous chakra reserves or incredibly potent spiritual energy, they could forcefully break the transformation from the inside out.

The strength of the “seal” depended entirely on the level of the Monkey Talisman and the amount of chakra Yami pumped into the initial cast.

At Level 1, with his measly 300-something chakra, Yami couldn’t dream of turning a Kage into a rat. They would simply shatter the magic instantly. But a distracted Genin? A civilian bandit? They would be permanently stuck squeaking in the dirt until Yami decided to release them.

“Yami, are you listening to me?” Aru’s voice snapped him back to the present.

She was kneeling in front of him, adjusting the dark sunglasses on his face with a look of mild exasperation. “I said, make sure you listen to the proctors. Do exactly as they say. The Section A examination is highly competitive. Don’t be nervous, but don’t be overly arrogant either. Just show them your speed.”

“I will, Mom,” Yami smiled, hugging her briefly. “I’m going to do great.”

“We know you are,” Hanta said, placing a heavy, reassuring hand on Yami’s shoulder. “Let’s go. It’s time.”

The walk to the Ninja Academy was a sobering experience. The bustling, vibrant streets of the main village were a stark contrast to the quiet, isolated, and increasingly tense atmosphere of the Uchiha compound. Civilians went about their daily lives, merchants yelled out their prices, and the smell of roasting meat and fresh bread filled the air.

As they approached the massive, multi-story building that served as the heart of Konoha’s educational system, the sheer scale of the event became apparent.

Hundreds of children, ranging from six to eight years old, were gathered in the massive front courtyard, accompanied by their anxious parents. The overwhelming majority of them were civilian children, dressed in standard clothes, looking terrified and excited in equal measure. These were the kids aiming for Section B—the Regular class. They would be the standard, reliable foundation of the village’s future forces.

Hanta led Yami past the massive crowd, heading toward a smaller, heavily guarded side entrance reserved specifically for the Section A applicants.

There were far fewer people here. Only about fifty children stood in this designated area. As Yami looked around through his dark lenses, he recognized the distinctive markers of the noble clans. He saw children with the pale, pupil-less eyes of the Hyuga clan standing rigidly with their strict parents. He saw a chubby boy nervously eating a bag of chips, bearing the swirl markings of the Akimichi.

These were the prodigies. The heirs. The future elite.

“Wait here, Yami,” Hanta instructed, guiding him to an empty spot against the brick wall. “I have to present your enrollment papers to the desk. Stay out of trouble.”

“Yes, Dad,” Yami agreed, leaning back against the cool brick.

As his father walked away, Yami slowly scanned the crowd again, and his breath hitched slightly.

Standing a few yards away, completely isolated from the nervous chatter of the other children, was a boy with raven-black hair tied into a loose, low ponytail. He wore a simple, dark, high-collared shirt bearing the Uchiha crest on the back. The boy was small, but his posture was impossibly composed, his dark eyes staring blankly at the Academy doors with an expression of profound, unsettling maturity.

Itachi Uchiha.

Yami swallowed hard, his hands subtly curling into fists inside his pockets. Seeing him in the anime was one thing, but standing just ten feet away from the boy who was destined to slaughter his entire family sent a cold, primal shiver down Yami’s spine.

‘He’s exactly my age,’ Yami thought, forcing himself to steady his breathing. ‘He hasn’t even started the Academy yet, but he already moves like a seasoned killer. Fugaku really has been training him since he could walk.’

Yami deliberately looked away, not wanting to draw the prodigy’s attention. He thought about the rest of the canon timeline to ground himself. Where were the main characters?

He quickly realized the absurdity of the timeline. Naruto Uzumaki, Sasuke Uchiha, Sakura Haruno, Hinata Hyuga—the core cast of the entire series—were currently infants. They were barely a year old, likely sitting in high chairs at home, completely oblivious to the brutal, war-torn reality of the village. They wouldn’t even step foot in this Academy for another five or six years.

Yami was part of the lost generation. The buffer generation that existed between the heroes of the Third War (like Kakashi and Guy) and the heroes of the Fourth War (like Naruto and Sasuke). His generation was the one being rapidly pushed through the system to fill the body bags required to keep the borders secure while the village rebuilt its strength.

He didn’t recognize a single other face in the crowd. They were all background characters. Cannon fodder.

“Attention, all Section A applicants!” a loud, authoritative voice boomed across the courtyard.

A tall, scarred Chunin wearing the standard Konoha flak jacket stood at the top of the stone steps, holding a clipboard.

“The examination hall is now open,” the proctor announced, his sharp eyes sweeping over the children. “Parents are to remain outside. Applicants, form a single file line and proceed through the double doors. When your name is called, you will step onto the testing floor and demonstrate your requested specialty. Let’s move!”

Yami pushed off the wall, giving his father a quick, reassuring wave before blending into the line of children.

The examination hall was massive, resembling an indoor gymnasium more than a classroom. The polished wooden floors gleamed under the bright fluorescent lights overhead. At the far end of the hall, a panel of three severe-looking Chunin instructors sat behind a long wooden desk, holding grading rubrics and pens.

The testing was brutal and efficient. There were no written tests, no trick questions. It was a raw display of talent.

Yami watched as a Hyuga boy stepped forward, assumed the Gentle Fist stance, and expertly struck a series of wooden targets, demonstrating flawless chakra control. He was immediately passed.

Next, an Akimichi boy used the Partial Expansion Jutsu to enlarge his fist and shatter a massive boulder. Passed.

A civilian boy tried to perform a basic clone jutsu, but his chakra control was pathetic, resulting in a pale, floppy illusion that immediately dispersed.

“Failed. Report to the Section B registration desk,” the head proctor stated coldly. The boy ran out of the hall, crying.

The standard was incredibly high. If you didn’t have a clan technique or a massive, noticeable advantage, you were rejected without a second thought.

“Itachi Uchiha,” the proctor called out, his voice echoing in the large hall.

The murmurs in the room instantly died down. Even the strict instructors leaned forward slightly. The reputation of the Police Chief’s eldest son preceded him.

Itachi walked to the center of the floor, his face an emotionless mask. He didn’t speak. He simply raised his hands, his fingers blurring into a sequence of hand seals so fast that most of the children couldn’t even track the movement.

‘Tiger—Boar—Ox—Dog—Snake.’

He didn’t announce the jutsu. He simply drew a kunai from his holster, infused it with a violent, crackling surge of raw, visible chakra, and threw it at the furthest target dummy. The kunai embedded itself to the hilt, and the dummy exploded into a shower of splinters from the sheer kinetic force.

The instructors didn’t even consult each other.

“Pass. Next,” the head proctor announced, looking thoroughly impressed.

Itachi bowed respectfully and walked to the ‘accepted’ side of the room, not making eye contact with anyone.

The line slowly dwindled. Some passed, many failed. Finally, Yami stood at the front of the line.

“Yami Uchiha,” the proctor called out, looking down at his clipboard, and then looking up at the small, dark-haired boy approaching the center of the floor. The proctor’s brow furrowed in deep annoyance. “Applicant, remove those ridiculous sunglasses immediately. This is a formal examination, not a festival.”

Yami stopped in the exact center of the polished floor. He didn’t reach for his glasses. He stood perfectly straight, his hands hanging loosely at his sides.

“With all due respect, Proctor-sensei, I cannot remove them,” Yami replied, his voice calm, clear, and projecting perfectly across the silent hall. “They are a necessary medical precaution for my demonstration.”

A few of the other children snickered. The head proctor’s face hardened. He did not like backtalk from six-year-olds.

“Is that right?” the proctor challenged, leaning forward over the desk, his pen tapping aggressively against the wood. “And what exact ‘medical precaution’ requires you to wear dark lenses indoors?”

Yami offered a small, polite smile. Behind the dark glass, he silently pushed a fraction of his chakra toward his eyes, feeling the Double Tomoe Sharingan spin to life, sharpening the world into razor-focused perfection.

“I specialize in the Body Flicker Jutsu, sir,” Yami stated simply. “The lenses prevent the wind from blinding me.”

The three instructors exchanged highly skeptical looks. The Body Flicker was a D-rank supplementary technique. For a six-year-old to claim it as their specialty was highly unusual, as most children lacked the chakra control to move more than a few feet without stumbling.

“Very well,” the head proctor said, his tone dripping with doubt. “Your target is the red painted square on the wall directly behind us. It is fifty meters away. Show us your Body Flicker. You may begin when—”

Yami didn’t wait for him to finish the sentence.

He didn’t form a hand seal. He didn’t bend his knees to telegraph the movement. He simply channeled a massive, calculated burst of his chakra directly into the Level 2 Rabbit Talisman.

‘BOOM.’

The sound of displaced air cracked through the gymnasium like a localized thunderclap.

Yami vanished from the center of the floor. He didn’t blur; he simply ceased to exist in that space. The sheer kinetic force of his departure kicked up a massive gust of wind, blowing the grading papers clean off the proctors’ desk and sending them fluttering into the air.

Less than a fraction of a second later, Yami was standing perfectly still, exactly one inch away from the red painted square on the wall behind the instructors’ desk. He hadn’t skidded. He hadn’t lost his balance. His dark sunglasses were still perfectly positioned on the bridge of his nose.

The entire hall fell into a state of absolute, deafening silence.

The children stared at the empty space where Yami used to be, their mouths hanging open. Even Itachi Uchiha’s eyes widened slightly, his stoic mask slipping for just a microsecond as his brain registered the impossible velocity he had just witnessed.

The three Chunin proctors slowly, mechanically turned their heads in their chairs, looking behind them.

Yami stood there, looking up at them through his dark lenses, an innocent, polite smile on his face. He wasn’t panting. He wasn’t sweating.

“Was that demonstration sufficient, Proctor-sensei?” Yami asked quietly.

The head proctor swallowed hard, looking from the small boy back to the empty center of the room. A six-year-old had just crossed fifty meters instantaneously, without hand seals, and stopped with pinpoint precision. The implication was terrifying. To move and stop like that, without suffering catastrophic tunnel vision… the boy had to possess the Sharingan. And to need dark glasses to hide it? The kid was a monster pretending to be a civilian.

The proctor quickly scrambled to gather his scattered papers off the floor, his annoyance entirely replaced by deep, professional respect.

He cleared his throat loudly, trying to regain his composure.

“Yami Uchiha,” the proctor announced, his voice slightly shaky but booming through the hall. “Passed. Welcome to the Genius Class.”