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Three days later, wave after wave of Uchiha clansmen surged from the rear toward the front lines.
At the Uchiha compound.
Many stood ready in full battle gear. At a single command from Madara, the group departed from the homeland that had raised them.
Kagaya watched the entire scene in silence. Throughout the process, Madara never once approached him, never spoke a single word to him, never even glanced in his direction. He simply left the entire Uchiha heartland in Kagaya's hands.
It wasn't that Madara lacked fear of betrayal. Rather, he held an immense, almost unshakable confidence in Kagaya.
As most of the clan marched away, the compound grew eerily quiet.
Kagaya let out a long sigh.
The greatest war of the Warring States era had begun.
There were no earth-shaking omens, no rousing speeches of heroic resolve. The most monumental conflict simply opened its curtains in utter silence.
This was the way of shinobi wars. They required no fanfare. Human lives themselves were the loudest anthem of the battlefield.
*****
At the Senju compound.
Hashirama donned his crimson armor, his expression calm as he turned to his brother beside him.
"Let's go."
Tobirama nodded. "Yeah."
News that the Uchiha were launching an all-out war could never be hidden from the Senju. By now, everyone had pieced it together: Uchiha Madara had almost certainly rejected the truce proposal.
One day later, at dusk, Madara led his Uchiha forces to a vast plain where they met Hashirama at the head of the Senju army.
Seeing his lifelong rival once more, Madara felt an unexpected serenity settle over him. This calm did not come from letting go of anything. It came from absolute clarity about what he would do next: fight with everything he had, defeat Hashirama—and if necessary, kill him.
His goal was crystal clear. He had already settled everything concerning his family and his legacy. What was left to worry about?
The Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan activated silently. A sudden curiosity rose in Madara's mind: with these crimson eyes purchased at the cost of Izuna's life, what would he see when he looked at the murderer Tobirama? Would something special appear?
His gaze shifted. Sure enough, he saw something utterly loathsome.
Tobirama was still Tobirama; the visual pattern hadn't changed. Yet in Madara's eyes, the man had become something nauseating, something repulsive.
This wasn't an effect of the Eternal Mangekyō itself. It was the hatred sealed deep within those eyes that painted Tobirama in such grotesque colors.
At that same moment, Hashirama keenly noticed the abnormality in Madara's Sharingan—the pattern had completely transformed.
Instinctively, he spoke.
"Madara, your eyes—"
Tobirama followed immediately.
"What happened to Izuna?"
Behind Madara, Tobirama did not see his old adversary Izuna. Combined with Madara's apparent refusal of the truce, a dark suspicion instantly formed in Tobirama's mind.
The suspicion was so intense, so horrifying, that it made him lose composure. The moment Hashirama finished speaking, Tobirama blurted out the question without restraint—something he should never have done. This was a conversation between the two clan heads. Who was Tobirama to interrupt at such a moment?
He might be powerful, but in the presence of Madara and Hashirama, he still not there.
Yet the dread was too overwhelming. He couldn't hold back.
The next second, Madara answered.
"My little brother succumbed to the injuries he suffered last time. He died. To protect the Uchiha, he left his power to me."
The words landed like a thunderclap. Tobirama's inner alarm screamed. He had studied the Uchiha clan deeply; his mind ran far darker and more calculating than Hashirama's. He understood exactly what "Uchiha" meant. In kinder terms, they were deeply emotional—capable of irrational acts driven by feeling. In harsher terms, they were a volatile, malevolent clan. When their emotions fractured, disaster followed.
Tobirama subtly turned his head and began signaling the Senju ranks behind him with his eyes.
Retreat. Retreat. Retreat.
Firm, urgent glances demanding the clansmen pull back.
He knew the Uchiha too well. He was one hundred percent certain: Madara's rejection of the truce was almost certainly because of Izuna. And now that Izuna was dead, yet Madara still stood here, it meant he had come with the intent to kill Tobirama himself. Unfortunately, Hashirama would never allow that. Which meant one thing: an inevitable, cataclysmic clash between Hashirama and Madara.
Even Tobirama himself dared not get too involved in a fight between those two. The rest of the clansmen? Participation meant offering their lives.
Unlike Tobirama's decisive reaction, Hashirama—though he had heard of Izuna's death—still clung to hope. He hoped Madara could suppress his personal vendetta for the sake of the wider world.
"Madara, I already sent the truce proposal. If you truly want to protect the Uchiha, you should end this fighting!"
Looking at Hashirama as he spoke those words, Madara was momentarily stunned. In that instant, he could faintly see the shadow of the boy who once skipped stones by the riverbank, dreaming aloud of building a peaceful world.
'What an innocent way of thinking. Hashirama… you really haven't changed at all.'
The thought passed through Madara's mind.
No matter how many wars he had endured, how much cruelty he had witnessed, Senju Hashirama remained Senju Hashirama. His original aspiration had never wavered. He was still that boy determined to create peace.
Sometimes even Madara couldn't help but wonder—perhaps Hashirama had been born into this world for the sole purpose of bringing peace.
To hold fast to one's original heart over so many years—such a simple phrase, yet so impossibly difficult in practice. In all the countless people Madara had met in his lifetime, only Senju Hashirama had truly achieved it.
'But Hashirama… you haven't changed. I, however, have.'
At that realization, Madara gave a faint smile. Seeing echoes of their boyhood warmed something in him. Even if he lost this battle—even if he died—this man before him would surely lead everyone toward the peace they had once dreamed of together.
Yes. He surely would.
With that thought, an immense surge of chakra erupted from Madara's body.
'Now I can fight you with nothing holding me back.'
"Hashirama!!!"
A blue skeletal frame materialized, rapidly cloaked in chakra flesh and muscle.
Susanoo!
'Starting a war like this is undoubtedly disastrous for the Uchiha. But if I had chosen to bow my head after my brother's death, would I still worthy to be called his brother? Would I still be Uchiha? No—that would no longer be me!'
He could never forget Izuna's final words.
Uchiha!
Those weren't merely a plea to protect the clan—they were an endorsement. If revenge was what he desired, then go. Pursue it.
He was Uchiha Madara—not Senju Madara, not Hyūga Madara. Uchiha Madara.
Uchiha!
The colossal Susanoo took form swiftly: a blue humanoid giant, unarmored, nearly fifty meters tall—an awe-inspiring, heaven-piercing colossus.
In the world Kagaya once knew, most houses stood about three meters per floor. By that measure, this Susanoo towered roughly sixteen stories high—a genuine titan that scraped the sky.
And this wasn't even its complete form.
Even setting aside its terrifying scale, the sheer oppressive chakra radiating from it was enough to silence countless onlookers in sheer dread.
Then something even more outrageous happened.
"Wood Release: Advent of a Thousand Flowers!"
Enormous trees erupted from the earth, swiftly encircling Madara's Susanoo and blocking one of its strikes.
Within tens of seconds, a vast "forest" had formed—so immense that even a fifty-meter Susanoo moving within it resembled an ordinary man walking through an ancient primordial woodland.
This was truly a battle of gods. No one in this world had any right to interfere—not even Kagaya.
The Susanoo swept its arm, cleaving through the surrounding vines, and took a step toward Hashirama. But after only a few paces, it dropped to one knee, immobilized.
Madara snorted coldly and scanned his surroundings.
"Pollen poison, is it?"
One of the inherent abilities of Hashirama's Advent of a Thousand Flowers: the blossoms continuously released a toxic mist. The gas didn't kill outright, but it induced unconsciousness. In the original works, even the Five Kage couldn't withstand it. Madara endured, but only barely. The fact that he couldn't move proved how debilitating it was.
Seeing Madara halted, Hashirama quickly spoke. "Stop this, Madara! Continuing the fight has no meaning!"
Madara narrowed his eyes at Hashirama.
"No meaning? Then why did Izuna die?"
Hashirama fell silent. There was no denying it: Izuna's death had been at Tobirama's hands.
Madara's chakra began to surge wildly.
"Because you people killed him!!"
A tremendous pressure exploded outward in all directions. Dazzling blue light flared, blindingly bright.
The Susanoo grew rapidly. When everything finally settled, a true god had descended upon the battlefield.
Silence reigned. Apart from Hashirama, every single person present lost the ability to speak.
Clad in full armor, twin wings on its back, a longsword at its waist—over one hundred meters tall, the perfect-form Susanoo stood revealed in the world.
This was divinity incarnate.
In the face of such indescribable awe, Madara once again declared something to the entire world: his only worthy opponent was Hashirama. Everyone else—without exception—was unworthy.
Cold sweat trickled down Tobirama's forehead. He had always known Uchiha Madara was beyond him, but the gap now felt utterly hopeless.
"Wood Human Technique!"
Yet there was not just one god present.
With a mighty shout, another deity descended.
Nearly matching the perfect Susanoo in height, entwined with wooden dragons—this was Hashirama's Wood Human.
The sheer volume of chakra and colossal scale turned the war into a stage belonging almost exclusively to Hashirama and Madara.
Back at the Uchiha compound.
Kagaya took a sip of water, struggling to suppress the shock roiling inside him. Even from such a great distance, he could still feel the shockwaves rolling in from the battlefield.
Battles capable of reshaping the landscape weren't exaggeration after all.
Those two monstrous chakra signatures were so overwhelming that no matter how far away, they could be felt with perfect clarity.
Standing on high ground and straining to look, he could faintly make out a tiny blue point of light in the distance.
It was terrifying.
A fight like that was far beyond anything the current Kagaya could participate in.
Here's a joke: if Kagaya went all out right now, he might manage to manifest a Susanoo roughly ten meters tall—barely taller than Madara's leg.
"Sir!"
A voice suddenly called from behind. Kagaya turned to see a child, perhaps five or six years old. Anyone older had been dragged off to war. So this little boy was, for the moment, part of the "core strength" remaining in the Uchiha homeland—along with a handful of injured young adults.
"Yes? And you don't have to call me 'sir.'"
Kagaya took another sip of water.
The child shook his head.
"Lord Clan Head instructed us: until he returns, we are to follow your orders. So calling you 'sir' is only proper."
Kagaya raised an eyebrow. Madara truly embodied the principle of "if you doubt someone, don't use them; if you use them, don't doubt them."
"Fine then. What did you come to me for?"
The child lowered his head.
"I would like to ask you a rather presumptuous question, sir."
"Go ahead."
"Sir, in the battle between Lord Clan Head and Senju Hashirama… who do you think will win?"
"What do you think?"
"I think Senju Hashirama will win."
Kagaya looked at the child in surprise. He wasn't startled by the maturity—children in the Warring States era grew up fast or didn't grow up at all. The ones who never matured were already sleeping beneath some unmarked mound. What surprised him was the sharpness of insight.
"Why do you think that?"
The child answered immediately. "Because Lord Clan Head left you here."
The surprise in Kagaya's eyes deepened. He suddenly understood what the boy was getting at.
"Go on."
"Lord Clan Head is an extremely confident man—sometimes to the point of arrogance. Yet before departing for battle, he gave us many instructions and specifically told us to obey you. That means you are the person he left behind to safeguard the homeland. When someone as supremely confident as our clan head still makes contingency plans before marching to war… what does that imply?"
Kagaya couldn't help clapping his hands lightly and finishing the thought.
"It implies that even he has no certainty of victory—or perhaps only a low chance of it. Right? You're quite impressive. What's your name? May I know?"
The child lifted his head, calm and composed.
"Sir, my name is Uchiha Kagami."
'Holy—!'
The instant he heard the name, Kagaya's mind screamed internally.
Uchiha Kagami—who was he? Shisui's ancestor! The very person from whom Kagaya name derives from!
The only Uchiha whom the Second Hokage Tobirama had ever truly trusted!
So this was where he had been all along.
A sudden wave of guilt washed over Kagaya. The foundation of all his current abilities came from teachings passed down by this boy's descendant, Shisui. Even his name had been chosen in homage to the man standing before him. And now here was the original, addressing him respectfully as "sir." How could he not feel guilty?
For a moment, Kagaya was at a complete loss for words.
Seeing Kagaya remain silent, the child asked hesitantly.
"Sir… is something wrong? Is my name strange?"
Kagaya coughed twice to cover his embarrassment, then replied with perfect composure.
"No! It's an excellent name! Whoever gave it to you must have been one of the finest people imaginable!"
In his mind, he quietly added,
'Like me, for example.'