Ino’s world melted when she heard “Tsukuyomi”, and as if with a blink of an eye, she suddenly found herself strapped to a cross in a strange black and white world.

Out of nowhere, a sword was plunged into her abdomen by Itachi as he appeared in front of the cross that was restraining her.

Ignoring the sword, Ino spoke just as Itachi was about to open his mouth.

“Is this technique what you used to fuck up your brother’s mind so expertly that he won’t recover in his lifetime?” Ino nonchalantly raised her eyebrow and curiously asked while looking around the strange space she had found herself in.

Not expecting such a question or nonchalance, Itachi momentarily paused. Ino inwardly smirked.

Itachi frowned and gave Ino a long, silent look. Only after a few seconds did he finally speak again, “So, my brother is a weakling who could not withstand Tsukuyomi?” He impassionately answered with a question of his own, but Ino was an expert at reading people. His body language was very well controlled, but she could still see small hints that betrayed his concern for his brother.

She mentally snickered in satisfaction just as another sword was plunged through her chest and promptly ripped out. Sure, Ren told her that Itachi killed his clan for his brother, or some nonsense like that. But she needed a confirmation of her own. And the way this big, bad, mean S-rank rogue ninja reacted? Oh, yes. Sasuke was definitely his weak spot.

That made Ino feel… mischievous.

When Ino didn’t comment further after his question, Itachi felt a bit irritated and his eyes subtly narrowed. Two swords pierced Ino through her shoulders, right where nerve clusters were located. That always made people scream themselves hoarse in Itachi’s experience.

Ino stayed silent, and Itachi’s lips pursed.

“The next seventy-two hours will be like this.” He spoke a similar speech he gave Kakashi and stuck another sword through Ino’s abdomen, right where very tender muscles were located. And as he intently watched her reaction, he was pleased to note the small tremor in her eyes that signified she felt the stab.

“Heh.” Ino chuckled, “No wonder Sasuke is such a poof, only paying attention to Naruto.” Well, that wasn’t really true? He paid more attention to Hinata than was appreciated, but Itachi wouldn’t know that, now, would he? Ino mirthfully smirked, “Turns out his dear brother played poke the boy with him for so long that he came to love being poked.”

The insinuation did not fly over Itachi’s head, with the skin around his eyes tightening being the only sign of his flaring anger as he maintained his expressionless face.

“Any Yamanaka could tell you that the younger Uchiha is irrecoverably mentally scarred. And now I can see why.” Ino raised her head and looked at the dark red sky with a red moon looming above her. She had to admit, it was an oddly beautiful place. “You tortured your brother until he broke, and there is nobody who could properly put his pieces back together.” She said with barely restrained hilarity as she brought her eyes down and fearlessly looked Itachi directly into his Sharingan eyes.

Itachi halted, just for a moment. And Ino noticed the small tremble in his wrist. But it was gone as soon as it appeared, and Ino felt yet another sword piercing her, through her crotch this time.

Grunting, she also chuckled. Hah. Somebody was properly pissed.

“Honestly, I kind of admire your ruthlessness.” Ino sighed, ignoring Itachi’s increasing temper. “Killing Sasuke would have been kind. Letting him live is only prolonging his suffering. Especially after you put him through a full course of torture like this.” She hummed, almost letting out a bark of laughter as she noticed Itachi’s grip on the sword subtly tighten.

“You must have truly despised your brother.” Undeterred even as her right thigh was pierced, Ino continued speaking, “What are your plans, I wonder? Are you going to wait until he has a wife and children before killing them in front of him, too? Maybe you could play more poke-poke with him afterwards?” She playfully suggested, absolutely gleeful when Itachi pierced her other thigh, but this time, there was a certain level of vindictiveness in his movement.

A normal ninja would not have noticed, but Ino was delighted at the knowledge that she was getting to him. Everybody always said how cool and unshakable the Uchiha prodigy was when the topic steered his way, but turns out, she was good enough to make him lose his cool.

How could she not be proud of that?

“You are annoying.” Itachi gently said, a small, barely noticeable, grim, and tense smile appeared on his face. For the first time in a long time, he actually wanted to dish out pain and suffering on his victim.

Suddenly, several crosses with other Inos appeared with their own Itachi in front of them, and as these Itachis stabbed the Inos, Ino inwardly noted that the pain that suddenly flooded her mind was multiplied.

Again and again, the Itachis kept stabbing the Inos with barely restrained resentment. Through the searing hot pain, Ino idly noted that if nothing else, the Uchiha knew his list of most painful spots to stab his victim well. As a fellow sword user, she was quite impressed.

That said, there were certain spots… She really didn’t need to know how it felt to have a sword pierced through them.

After what felt like several dozen minutes, Itachi finally stopped and took a small step back.

Ino’s body relaxed and slumped down on the cross, but once again, she spoke before Itachi could open his mouth, showing that she was not as affected as he probably hoped for.

“Oh? You are done?” Ino smiled a surprisingly pained smile. Even with her mental control, this technique was brutal, and the amount of agony her mind was put through was starting to show. “It’s kinda unimaginative, to be honest.”

Nevertheless, she was still quite nonchalant as she spoke before she rolled her eyes at Itachi. “You men and your fixation on penetration. Did you really have to stab me in the crotch and ass so much?” She huffed in exasperation, and Itachi almost let out an aggrieved whine full of frustration.

He managed to recollect his cool in time, though. Only his cheek twitched in irritation for a second before he suppressed even that reaction, and his unamused gaze fell on the slumped girl on the cross.

“I told you that you will suffer for the next seventy-two hours. Seventy-one hours, fifty-nine minutes, and fifty-nine seconds remain.” He said with a cold finality.

He expected to see despair creeping into Ino’s eyes as she realized just how much suffering she was going to go through in her immediate future, but Itachi had to blink in surprise when the blonde girl grinned at him instead.

“Heh. I don’t fucking think so.” Ino said with a defiant streak, and Itachi opened his mouth, about to tell her that there was no way to break out of this technique when…

Itachi found himself strapped to a cross with another Itachi standing in front of him, and Ino, still strapped to her own cross, was opposite him behind the second Itachi. He owlishly blinked.

‘What the-‘ He mentally started saying in absolute bewilderment when the Itachi in front of him silently plunged the sword through his crotch.

In that moment, all the pain that Ino’s mind had recently gone through was reflected into Itachi’s mind, causing him to go through it in but one moment.

Itachi’s vision went blank white as hot, searing agony flooded his body and mind. He heard himself gasp, and his body violently thrashed around as he lost control of his bowels.

It took Itachi ten seconds of the worst suffering in his life to overpower whatever the girl had done with his control in the Tsukuyomi world.

Instantly, he found himself in his previous position, still standing in front of Ino, who was smugly grinning at him even though she was still strapped to the cross.

He realized his agony was… genjutsu? Itachi frowned. It didn’t feel like genjutsu. It couldn’t be genjutsu. Suddenly, he felt way less safe in his Tsukuyomi as he had to admit he had no idea what the hell the Yamanaka had done to him.

He was fine. His mind, his body, even his bowels. Only a faint echo of suffering remained from the unsettling experience. He warily looked at the restrained girl, who looked amused as he gripped his sword.

He hesitated.

Should he stab her again?

Before he could decide, Ino spoke, getting his attention. “Alright. It’s quite bothersome to pretend that I can’t just ignore ninety percent of the mental pain you are trying to inflict on me. I can still feel one tenth of it, so I guess, good job? Your technique is amazing as far as mind techniques go. But I am a Yamanaka, you idiot Uchiha.”

The cross disappeared, and Ino was suddenly standing in front of Itachi with complete nonchalance, unrestrained. No matter how much Itachi strained his control of Tsukuyomi, he could not restrain her again, and a spike of apprehension rose higher inside his mind with every failed attempt.

His stance became guarded as he prepared for a confrontation. He had never thought Tsukuyomi would be countered, but here he was. A bit of his apprehension must have shown in his eyes because Ino’s grin widened.

“I had fun studying your mental technique while you were shoving swords into the mental representation of my body. It has its rough edges,” Ino wiggled her hand in a so-so gesture, “but it is quite an interesting technique. I might even make something similar with the data I gathered here.” She hummed, sounding excited at the prospect.

Itachi realized with a sinking feeling that he was never in control. Not once since he had used Tsukuyomi.

“That said, I got all I could from this, so I wanna try my swordsmanship against you next. Ta-ta.” Ino playfully said, and the bewildered Itachi found himself again in the real world, tears of blood streaming out of his throbbing eyes as he stared at the amused Yamanaka.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep