Until this moment, Kushina finally noticed that there was still someone else in the house. At the moment between life and death, her usually carefree mind suddenly became sharp, and she understood that this was Minato's arrangement.
"Makoto, it's you. Sorry to trouble you with taking care of Naruto. But could you step outside for a moment? In these final moments, I want to quietly stay with Naruto."
"No problem, Kushina-senpai. But I'm going to extend those final moments for you just a little."
This onee-san truly possessed authentic Uzumaki bloodline—the kind with extremely high purity. Even after having the tailed beast extracted, her vitality was still astonishing.
Of course, the rate at which it was draining was also exceptionally fast. However, if an ordinary jinchūriki encountered this situation, they would die on the spot. She could at least still hold on for half a day.
With a thought, Makoto instantly entered Sage Mode. Then he quickly formed hand seals, pressing his right palm against the sealing position on Kushina's abdomen.
Sage Art: Fūinjutsu: Two Forms Seal!
The original tailed beast seal had already disappeared, and a new seal spread over it.
Neat and symmetrical runic patterns crawled across her entire body. Then they contracted, gathering at her lower abdomen. Within the outer Four Symbols Seal, they transformed into a two-toned yin-yang fish pattern.
The body's yin and yang reconstruction was successfully completed.
Not only that, the colors of yin and yang were deeper than during the last experiment, already approaching pure black and white.
This change was brought about by Makoto's improvement in his yin-yang attribute training. The current Two Forms Seal was more complete than it had been more than a month ago, and its effect was also stronger.
The originally weak Kushina suddenly froze.
She discovered that the life force that had been rapidly draining from her had stopped in an instant, as if someone had forcibly interrupted it.
This onee-san realized that she might not have to die after all.
She propped herself up with both hands and sat on the bed, staring in disbelief at her abdomen. The seal there felt both familiar and unfamiliar to her.
As a sealing master, her professional instinct kicked in.
"What kind of sealing technique is this?"
"Two Forms Seal."
"Its function is to stop my life force from draining, right?"
"To be precise, the extraction of the Nine-Tails disrupted the yin-yang balance inside your body. This ninjutsu reconstructs that balance within you. Two Forms refers to yin and yang."
"That's really amazing. Did you develop it specifically for me?"
"Yes. After I learned about the matter of the tailed beasts, I looked into some of the secrets of jinchūriki. Thank you for teaching me sealing knowledge, senpai. So I developed this ninjutsu as a return gift from a student to his sensei."
"Makoto, thank you." After thanking him, Kushina looked lovingly at Naruto sleeping beside her and asked, "I… how long can I still live? Don't lie to me—I can feel that there is still a trace of life force continuing to drain."
Now that she was out of mortal danger, she slipped back into her usual way of speaking.
"With your abundant life force, living another twenty years won't be a problem. But I'll keep growing too, Kushina-senpai, so you should have confidence in me. Once I perfect this ninjutsu, making sure you live to die of old age won't be a problem. In any case, you'll definitely live long enough to hold your grandchildren."
"That's great. I believe in you." After saying that, she remembered Minato's behavior and said unhappily, "Minato knew too, didn't he? Did you two team up to hide it from me?"
"..."
"All right, I'm fine here already. Hurry and go help Minato. The enemy... is very mysterious."
"Then I'm going. See you again in a bit."
...
Outside, chaos reigned. The whole of Konoha had turned into a complete mess.
With something as huge as the Nine-Tails suddenly descending on the center of Konoha, no one could take that calmly.
At this moment, the giant fox was raging. One step could crush a house, and with one swipe of its claw, it could send the Konoha ninja charging forward flying away.
It was no different from swatting mosquitoes.
The surrounding civilians all fled for their lives, retreating toward Konoha's other two evacuation points.
The shelter beneath the Hokage Rock was definitely no longer an option. The Nine-Tails was standing not far from it, and it could easily be caught in the destruction. The ninja responsible for evacuating the civilians understood this clearly, so they guided the flow of people away to both sides.
The Nine-Tails paid no attention to those ants. It was searching for its target, and then it saw that man—the Fourth Hokage, Namikaze Minato, standing atop the Hokage Rock.
At this point, the Nine-Tails was still under Obito's control, and the one he most wanted to kill was also his own teacher.
What admirable filial piety.
In his view, Kushina was as good as dead. Now, as long as he killed Minato and then let the Nine-Tails rampage through Konoha for a while, the result of this trip would count as a complete success.
Under his control, the Nine-Tails opened its mouth and condensed a Tailed Beast Ball, then fired it directly at Minato.
The enormous physical sphere of energy was incomparably heavy, destroying the buildings along its path the whole way.
This was near the Hokage Building, the very center of Konoha. If anyone inside had not evacuated yet, they were basically doomed.
Fortunately, Minato was not weak either. He quickly formed hand seals and used Flying Thunder God: Guiding Thunder, teleporting the dangerous Tailed Beast Ball to a place much farther beyond the back mountain.
The violent explosion lit up that part of the sky like broad daylight, and the huge noise shook heaven and earth.
A tailed beast was a natural disaster. This was the proof.
When Makoto came out, this was the scene he saw.
Minato had neutralized the Tailed Beast Ball attack, but the danger had not yet been resolved. A gloved hand was quietly reaching toward Minato's back.
Minato's perception was strong and his reactions sharp. He quickly turned around and struck at him with a kunai, but astonishingly, the three-pronged kunai passed straight through masked Obito's head.
When it passed through his hand, masked Obito materialized and grabbed the wrist of the hand with which his teacher held the kunai. "Your opponent is me, and... this ends here."
After finishing his showy remarks, he prepared to use the Kamui dōjutsu to absorb Minato into the shared space he and Kakashi possessed.
Whether the Flying Thunder God could escape from that space—no one knew. But it was worth a try. If it worked, he would not even need to make a move; Minato could simply be trapped inside until death.
Unfortunately, before his dōjutsu could even begin, he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his chest. Obito looked down and saw that a short ninja blade had pierced straight through him from behind.
Turning his head, he saw only a brat wearing an ANBU mask, who had appeared behind him at some unknown moment.
Who are you? How did you get here? Why did you stab me?
The poor Obito wanted to question him, but the truly heart-piercing pain only forced a miserable scream from him. Immediately afterward, the Hashirama cells throughout his body went berserk, and countless sharp wooden spikes burst out, turning him into a hedgehog.
Minato quickly leapt away, landing atop the head of the Third Hokage's stone visage. Seeing the scene before him, he was stunned.
"Who exactly are you? You can even use Wood Release?"
Obito could not answer. His body went limp, and he collapsed headfirst to the ground.
The one who had delivered the fatal blow from behind was naturally Makoto.
At that moment, Obito had been gripping Minato's arm, while Minato held his Flying Thunder God kunai—and the Flying Thunder God mark could be shared between them.
Seeing that situation, how could Makoto hold himself back? He instantly teleported over to Obito to exchange some heartfelt words with him.
Makoto also jumped up beside Minato. "So this is Wood Release? That really is dangerous."
As the Fourth Hokage, Minato's first concern upon seeing Makoto was not the village, but his wife.
"Makoto, how is Kushina?"
"No problem. Her vital signs have already stabilized."
"That's good!" Minato let out a sigh of relief. Only then did he turn his attention to the rampaging Nine-Tails. "We have to move that thing outside the village."
Makoto grabbed him. "I'll handle it. Go after that guy. Since he has Wood Release, the stab through the heart just now might not have killed him."
Minato did not hesitate. "All right. Be careful."
"Don't take too long. I won't be able to hold the Nine-Tails for very long."
"Understood." With those words, Minato disappeared.
When Makoto had just stabbed Obito through the heart, Minato had not simply stood there doing nothing. Cleverly, he used his other hand to leave a Flying Thunder God mark on him. Before he could follow up with another ruthless strike, Obito's Wood Release had already gone berserk.
Well… Makoto had left one too.
Now, Obito's body was covered with marks left by the two of them.
Only at this moment did the Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, arrive near the Nine-Tails with his people. His thinking was the same as Minato's—they had to move the giant beast outside the village.
But he did not know the Flying Thunder God.
He could only deal with it head-on.
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