Ippei Uzumaki, as the red-haired man was called, wiped the blood off his face as he looked with a dignified expression at the samurai standing on the ground.
Previously, I hadn't thought this war would be difficult, since it was known that the Uzumaki clan had a strength advantage over the forces of the ninja continent.
It was for a reason that many sought to break free from the patriarch's control in order to lead the Uzumaki clan to conquer the shinobi continent.
And when the patriarch showed his strength, although he reassured many with ulterior motives, he also increased the confidence of all the Uzumaki and no one believed that he would find it difficult to win this war.
Until now.
Looking at Samurai on the ground and the chakra he felt in his body, he realized that he had underestimated the enemy.
Of course, it wasn't his fault.
No one had imagined that the temples possessed such techniques capable of producing a great amount of power, and when they received the information moments ago, they didn't believe it.
Even when they conquered the land of water, they didn't know that the monks had such abilities.
Or so Ippei believed.
It was the patriarch who personally eradicated the temples, something that initially perplexed everyone when the patriarch himself had made it clear that he would not get too involved in the conquest of the land of water.
But seeing the man in front of him, Ippei could guess why the patriarch did not let the army fight against the temples.
They would be massacred.
Not only did Ippei think the same, but so did the other members of the Uzumaki clan who floated in the air surrounding the samurai on the ground.
They were all high-ranking and powerful members of the army, but even they could not match the power of the samurai on the ground.
'At least he can't fly,' they all thought.
As high-ranking members of the army, they were qualified to learn the technique of flying, therefore they had an advantage against the enemy.
Or at least that's what they thought.
"Do you think you have the advantage being in the air?" Reizo said in a low voice from where he stood while holding his katana.
And although he was several dozen meters away, the Uzumaki in the air could clearly hear what was coming out of his mouth and felt a bad feeling.
Suddenly, the figure of the enemy disappeared and everyone felt their hair stand on end.
Reizo had launched himself flying forward at great speed while leaving a deep footprint in the ground, and arriving in front of an unfortunate member of the Uzumaki clan in the air in 1 second.
And under the astonished gaze of everyone, the man in front of Reizo was cut in half.
"Meiji!" shouted one of the women in the group, who was a friend of the man who had just been murdered.
And with the death of one of them, the rest quickly recovered from their shock and began to move.
"Lightning release…!"
"¡Fine…!"
Demonstrating great teamwork, half of them launched several lightning-like attacks and filled the area where the enemy was, while the others created diamond-seal chains that surrounded the area and connected before forming a Purple barrier.
At that moment Reizo appeared far from the initial location, where the lightning attacks had made the Uzumaki's body disappear, cut in two.
And seeing the barrier that had surrounded the entire area, Reizo sneered as he prepared to slash with his sword.
He had already cut through a barrier stronger than this one, so this new barrier wouldn't withstand a single attack from him.
The redheads around knew that too.
The enemy was too strong and fast to fight with their current abilities.
In addition, they had lost the advantage of the air, since the enemy could also fly.
But they had not created this barrier thinking about defeating or trapping the enemy.
They created it to give them time.
And time for what?
"Seventh door opened: door of commotion!"
Reizo's expression suddenly changed when he found himself surrounded by 9 powerful figures expelling enormous amounts of chakra.
They reminded him of him using the monks' secret technique.
Although they had heard that certain Uzumaki could use a technique to increase their strength, it seemed to have a limit and they had never believed that they would reach such levels.
Ippei and the other 8 members of the Uzumaki clan had opened the seventh gate, pushing their bodies to the limit.
And unlike a normal ninja without any lineage, they were Uzumakis with vast chakra reserves, so one could guess the terrifying scene of 9 blue demonic figures with red hair.
With veins bulging over their bulging muscles, their skin having turned a dark blue color, whether men or women they appeared to be of another race and were no longer human.
But what was striking was that on that blue skin there were fuinjutsu characters all over their bodies demonstrating the secret of their transformations.
Ippei felt his body and knew that he could only fight for 10 minutes before the seals around his body would retract and force him back to normal.
Unlike those crazy people who spend all their time training, they didn't have enough time to waste on physical training.
Instead, they used merit points to take a shortcut.
Before this war, the patriarch surprised them by showing them these seals, and they immediately asked that these seals be placed on their bodies, which would open the gates for them and at the same time withstand the impact their bodies would receive when using the technique.
Of course, those who distrusted the patriarch spent a lot of time checking for any problems or traps in these seals.
But when they found nothing, they had no choice but to use them too, or they would fall behind their colleagues.
In this way, they could save a huge amount of time and effort wasted on physical training.
Of course, the power unleashed by using the seventh gate wouldn't last long, but it didn't require as much training and could be activated in less time during battle.
Otherwise they would have to open the doors one by one, which was not feasible during a battle.
Feeling the power in their bodies, they all became filled with confidence.
And with smiles on their faces, they all charged towards the enemy.
For the first time since receiving his new power, Reizo felt panic and quickly moved his sword, producing a chakra cut.
Against any defense, this chakra cut would pierce through anything.
But this time his enemies were not normal and they struck his cuts head-on.
Using only their fists, the three Uzumaki in the path of the chakra slash struck head-on. And while they were stopped in their tracks, the chakra slash had also vanished into thin air.
The other 6 Uzumaki arrived at Reizo's side and prepared to attack him.
And although Reizo can create those terrifying chakra cuts, he wouldn't be able to stop everyone attacking from different angles, and some of them will be able to connect their blows, ending the battle instantly.
Or at least that's what they expected it to happen.
Reizo knew that if he was hit by those terrifying fists, he would be finished.
Therefore, despite having promised not to delve any deeper into the monks' strange technique, he was forced by circumstances.
BOOOOOOOOOOOM
A terrifying explosion of chakra erupted from Reizo's body and struck the 6 Uzumaki who were seeking his end, stopping them in their tracks.
And before they could react, 3 chakra slashes even more terrifying than the previous ones passed through them and continued their path for kilometers before one of them impacted the city behind them causing a huge amount of destruction while the other 2 chakra slashes impacted the barrier surrounding the city.
The chakra cuts sliced through the barrier as if it were tofu, leaving two huge wounds in it and drawing the attention of spies from the Cloud Village and the rest of the Land of Lightning outside to the battle that was taking place inside.
Unfortunately for them, they could not see the 4 ships at the 4 corners of the barriers working at full power to supply energy to the barrier to keep it stable despite the damage and that it soon began to be repaired.
Inside the barrier, with no time to worry about the civilians killed in the city or the damage to the barrier, the 6 Uzumaki watched in horror as their bodies were cut in half from their waists.
And before them, the figure of Reizo looked at them with a gaze of deep hatred.
Besides not trusting the monks about this technique, the monks themselves had warned him that to use a greater amount of power he would lose a certain amount of vitality.
A sacrifice he was willing to make if it meant defeating the invaders and protecting his country.
The problem was that Reizo planned not to use his full power in order to return to the capital where they would investigate the nature of this mysterious technique of the monks.
But now that plan was in danger because he was forced by the enemy to fight with all the power he didn't want to use.