"How is this possible... Who is it?!" Kushimaru shouted, his face smeared with blood as he tossed aside the Kiri shinobi in front of him.
At the instant of the explosion, Kushimaru had extended the Longsword: Nuibari and pinned the Kiri shinobi in front of him in place, using the man as a shield to withstand the massive shockwave and chakra blast.
"It's an ambush!"
"Konoha has gone insane... All their strongest shinobi must have come after us! The Hokage is trying to drag Konoha down with us in mutual destruction!" Jinpachi Munashi also threw aside the Kiri shinobi in front of him and wiped the blood from his face.
"Are they just abandoning the other battlefields?!"
The Heartless Pair had reacted in exactly the same way...
When there was nowhere to dodge, they could only borrow the comrades standing in front of them for a moment.
Neither of them realized that all of this had been done by Hiruzen alone.
They both assumed that Konoha's strongest shinobi had all been deployed and had somehow set up an ambush for Kirigakure in advance.
The smoke had yet to clear, and waves of scorching heat were still rising from the blasted earth.
The surviving Kirigakure shinobi had not even recovered from the earth-shattering bombardment of elemental techniques—
When Hiruzen had already charged straight into their formation!
He swung the halberd Enma had transformed into, gathering chakra along its blades and carving out one slash of light after another, each as dense and crimson as blood mist!
The halberd blade swept across the battlefield.
The sharp crack of snapping metal and the dull crunch of shattering bones overlapped, while blood splashed across Hiruzen's pitch-black battle armor like spilled ink.
Wherever he passed, Kiri shinobi fell in swaths like wheat before a scythe!
"Th-This... is he even still a shinobi?"
Jinpachi stared dumbfounded at Hiruzen's display.
Hiruzen tilted his head slightly, narrowed his eyes, and recognized the weapon Jinpachi was gripping tightly in his hand.
The Blastsword: Shibuki.
'The Seven Ninja Swordsmen...'
A thought stirred in Hiruzen's mind.
The halberd shaft, originally around twelve feet long, suddenly extended. Its metal pole grew wildly like a living thing, while blood-red chakra blades surged over the halberd heads on both sides.
Hiruzen bent his legs slightly.
His waist and back suddenly exerted force—
And boiling steam erupted from his entire body!
Boil Release Chakra Mode: Unmatched Monster Strength!
His arms swung horizontally with crushing force!
The entire halberd, now extended to dozens of meters in length, swept around him as its center. Driven by terrifying strength, it carved out a circular arc of destruction spanning dozens of meters!
The extended halberd blade never slowed in the slightest.
First, it smashed through several hastily erected water walls.
Then it swept every Kiri shinobi along its path into the air.
Their screams were drowned out by the sonic boom as they silently departed for the Pure Land.
"Is that fucking thing even human?"
Jinpachi's hands began trembling involuntarily.
He and Kushimaru were known throughout the shinobi world as the "Heartless Pair" because whenever they encountered weaker enemies, they often enjoyed toying with and torturing them for amusement, and even treated shinobi from their own village with extreme cruelty.
But that so-called heartlessness had nothing to do with powerful fighting spirit.
It was simply bullying and humiliation born from their complete lack of respect for the weak, backed by their own superior strength.
Once they encountered a shinobi overwhelmingly stronger than themselves, the mentality that relied on malicious impulses to excite them collapsed in an instant.
They could no longer muster even the most basic will to fight.
In that regard, they were worse than ordinary chūnin.
'Run!'
That was the only thought left in Jinpachi's mind.
Kushimaru was no different.
The Heartless Pair were heartless no longer.
All that remained in their hearts was fear.
The two of them desperately fled toward the central army formation, terrified that if they were even one second slower, that horrifying demon god would notice them!
The two ran side by side.
But then, terrifyingly, a sonic boom rang out behind them like the tolling of a funeral bell.
The boiling mist surrounding Hiruzen vanished.
In its place appeared an armor of crackling lightning!
Speed Form: Lightning Release Chakra Mode!
Hiruzen rapidly caught up to the Heartless Pair.
But he didn't use the Enma war halberd in his hand.
Instead—
He simply crashed straight into them from behind!
In an instant.
Jinpachi and Kushimaru felt as though they had been struck by a tailed beast.
Their bodies were launched through the air like cannonballs, every bone in their bodies shattering and their internal organs rupturing. Blood flooded their eyes as they collapsed limply onto the ground like dead dogs.
"Coming through..."
Hiruzen narrowed his eyes and continued charging straight ahead.
He was rather disappointed in these two members of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen...
As opponents, they should at least have possessed the bare minimum of fighting spirit.
If Jinpachi and Kushimaru had overcome their fear and made full use of their ninja swords and every resource at their disposal, perhaps they could have risked their lives to exchange at least one move with Hiruzen.
At the very least, they wouldn't have died so miserably.
But the moment fear flooded their hearts, the fighting spirit sustained by their malicious nature crumbled instantly, leaving them unable to bring out even one-tenth of their true strength.
Hiruzen had no idea whether they regretted their decisions...
But regret was useless now. If they had anything to say, they could take it up with the Sage of Six Paths in the Pure Land!
"Good!"
Hiruzen roared.
In front of him, a Kiri shinobi wielding the Twin Swords: Hiramekarei charged at him fearlessly, violent chakra surging from the blades.
At his rear flank, Kurosuki Raiga and Jinin Akebino burst out of the ground one after the other.
Electricity crackled around the Kiba wielded by Raiga, while Akebino's Bluntsword: Kabutowari tore through the air with a heavy whistle.
There were still members of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen who had the courage to face a powerful enemy and retain at least a basic will to fight.
They were, after all, the elite among Kirigakure's elite...
Hiruzen neither dodged nor retreated.
Chakra poured into the Enma war halberd, and its blade suddenly extended wildly once again, piercing straight through both the man and the chakra shockwave released by the Twin Swords: Hiramekarei!
Hiruzen lowered the war halberd and raised both arms horizontally, directly blocking the attacks from the Kiba and Kabutowari!
"This..." Raiga felt as though he hadn't struck a person at all.
He had struck a mountain.
Most terrifying of all, as the wielder of the Kiba, anyone struck by his blades should have been instantly paralyzed.
But when the blades came into contact with Hiruzen, who was clad in Lightning Release armor, the electricity instead surged backward into Raiga's body, leaving him feeling as though his arms were about to lose all strength.
A vicious gleam flashed through Akebino's eyes as he roared: "Die! Break through everything, Kabutowari!"
Kabutowari was a very unusual "sword." In essence, it consisted of an axe and a hammer connected together.
The method of using it was to first strike the target with the axe, then smash the hammer against the axe to trigger the special chakra within the weapon, producing an extremely powerful armor-breaking effect.
It was exceptionally effective against enemies with astonishing defenses.
At least throughout Jinin Akebino's past battles, he had used Kabutowari to kill countless enemies clad in heavy armor or those who believed their defenses were extraordinary...
The hammer slammed down onto the axe, unleashing a tremendous penetrating force!
But Hiruzen's arm merely gave a slight, almost perfunctory shake.
"Finished playing around?"
Hiruzen's gaze sharpened.
The lightning surrounding his body dispersed, and he carelessly formed a hand seal.
In that instant, immense gravity seemed to descend from the heavens and press down upon Raiga and Akebino.
They could barely remain standing.
Even lifting their arms became extremely difficult.
Anyone who recklessly entered his gravity field without considerable skill in Earth Release or exceptionally powerful physical capabilities would end up exactly like the two of them...
Hiruzen threw his punches without hesitation!
One punch each.
The tremendous force punched straight through both men's chests.
At this point—
Five of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen had already been killed by Hiruzen!
The only ones remaining were Suikazan Fuguki and Biwa Jūzō.
Because Jūzō had hidden himself along the rear flank from the beginning, and had also been fortunate enough to avoid the worst of the Combination Five Release Barrage, he immediately hoisted Zabuza onto his shoulders after getting back to his feet and fled without looking back.
Fuguki had also been lucky enough to survive.
Unlike the Heartless Pair, who had completely lost their nerve, or the other three members of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen who had still wanted to exchange blows with Hiruzen, Fuguki immediately turned and ran toward the Third Mizukage...
Because he frequently dealt with the Third Mizukage and also served under Genji.
Fuguki understood very clearly just how large the gap was between so-called Seven Ninja Swordsmen who were "close to Mizukage level" and shinobi who genuinely possessed Kage-level combat power...
If they joined forces under the right terrain and at the right opportunity, then perhaps they could put up a fight against a Kage.
But if their formation was already in chaos and they simply rushed him all at once, the gap was far too great...
High in the distant sky—
Hōzuki Gengetsu and Mū silently watched the scene below.
Although Madara had only asked Gengetsu to come and apply pressure to Hiruzen, at Gengetsu's request, his old nemesis Mū had also been brought along to assist him.
For example, helping with invisibility, sensory work, and similar tasks.
It also meant Gengetsu had someone to discuss plans with on the way and someone to keep him entertained...
"No..."
"Wasn't Sarutobi Hiruzen Senju Tobirama's disciple... no, wait, the disciple of the God of Shinobi?" Gengetsu felt as though his memories were getting scrambled.
He and Mū were around the same age as Izuna and Tobirama. They were all powerful shinobi who had come out of the Warring States Period, so they had either personally seen or heard about the appearance of a certain Shinobi World's Shura in his younger days.
For example, what he looked like when wearing that pitch-black battle armor...
"Why the hell does he look so much like Uchiha Madara?!"
"Apart from wielding a war halberd instead of the Uchiha Gunbai, not having a Sharingan, and not using Susanoo, what exactly is the difference between this and the Shinobi World's Shura in his youth?"
Gengetsu covered his face.
The reaction of the Kiri shinobi below irritated him even more.
As a battle maniac, Gengetsu had nothing to say about Hiruzen killing so many Kiri shinobi.
That was simply how war worked.
And Kirigakure had been the side that launched the attack on Konoha in the first place.
But could this village finally fix its old problems?
Back when he and Mū had infiltrated Kirigakure, Gengetsu had already been furious that after all these years, the village still lacked sensory shinobi.
And now that war had actually broken out, sure enough, that weakness had immediately screwed them over!
The reason Hiruzen's Combination Barrage had been so devastating was precisely because the Kiri shinobi lacked the intelligence that sensory capabilities would have provided. As a result, their elite force had been wiped out in one fell swoop!
"There are still differences..."
Mū's muffled voice sounded out.
"Uchiha Madara wasn't this direct or violent when he was young. The name 'Ghost of the Battlefield' was associated with precision and elegance. Didn't you notice that Sarutobi Hiruzen barely even bothers dodging attacks?"
"And the tremendous strength produced by the changes in nature and form of his Boil Release is astonishing..."
"Also, why is this guy so proficient in such an advanced Lightning Release Chakra Mode? If I didn't know he was the Hokage, I'd think that bastard Second Raikage had come charging over here!"
Mū felt a little dizzy.
Because it wasn't only Kirigakure. Iwagakure had also joined this war and would be fighting against Konoha.
And his beloved disciple was outstanding in every respect. Whether in character or talent, he was first-rate. He could even skillfully use the extraordinarily difficult Dust Release and had developed his own understanding of it...
It could be said that he had inherited the core of Mū's legacy.
But there was one particular problem.
Ōnoki had a severe case of "Uchiha Madara phobia," stemming from the intimidation the Ghost of the Battlefield had subjected master and disciple to shortly after Konoha's founding.
After returning to Iwagakure, Ōnoki had constantly asked him about Madara out of fear. Although he gradually overcame that fear later on, it had nevertheless left him instinctively wary of anyone with Uchiha blood.
But after seeing Hiruzen's combat power, Mū was deeply worried.
How was Ōnoki supposed to deal with a Hokage like this?
Compared with the Five Releases used by ordinary shinobi, Dust Release wasn't particularly slow to activate.
But in a battle between top-level shinobi, unless the user entered a state where chakra was constantly erupting at full intensity, Dust Release imposed demanding requirements on the conditions needed for its activation...
And judging by the speed Hiruzen had displayed, hitting him with Dust Release would clearly be extremely difficult.
'The only option would be to let the Hokage get close and use the Detachment of the Primitive World Technique...' Mū murmured to himself.
That was the ultimate form of Dust Release, possessing an enormous area of effect.
Only something like that could indiscriminately engulf Hiruzen within its attack range.
But the Detachment of the Primitive World Technique required an enormous amount of chakra.
Dust Release was already an extremely chakra-intensive technique to begin with, which meant Ōnoki would need to be at full strength from the very start.
If Mū himself was in his "divided state," he couldn't even use ordinary Dust Release, despite the division only reducing his chakra by half.
And in a normal duel, even the probing exchanges alone could consume an unknown amount of chakra.
What Mū didn't know was that Hiruzen had mastered a peculiar technique called "Spirit Release."
It might not necessarily be able to reduce a Kekkei Tōta into an ordinary turbulent mass of non-elemental chakra, but it could at least disrupt part of Dust Release's structure, greatly weakening its disintegration ability.
"Forget about Dust Release for a minute. Tell me what the hell I'm supposed to do about Kirigakure first..."
Gengetsu covered his face.
He genuinely had no idea what to do with his own village.
If they fought, charging headfirst into Konoha like this was practically indistinguishable from suicide...
But if they didn't fight, that lunatic Kiritori had already turned domestic affairs into a complete disaster.
He had even managed to create something like the "Bloody Mist," a system that would have been considered extreme even during the Warring States Period...
Either way, they were screwed.
"I remember Kiritori wasn't particularly intelligent. He even managed to lose to you. But he shouldn't be this incompetent..."
Mū narrowed his eyes.
"How could he fail to judge even the most basic situation? Apart from Kirigakure's isolationist policies, I'm afraid Senju Tobirama must have fed Kirigakure false intelligence!"
"I understand now..."
"That bastard never actually thought Konoha was weak or that it needed some kind of reform..."
"He clearly thinks Sarutobi Hiruzen is far too peace-loving. Despite being his disciple, Hiruzen is following the path of the God of Shinobi. He possesses enough power to dominate the entire shinobi world, yet he's still pursuing mutual benefit with Amegakure. What Tobirama wants is conquest!"
"Sarutobi Hiruzen refused, so Senju Tobirama forcibly ignited the flames of war across the shinobi world..."
"That's way too extreme!"
Even the usually calm Mū was starting to lose his composure.
"What kind of sensei does that?! What's wrong with Sarutobi Hiruzen following the First Hokage's path? Isn't this basically forcing an honest man down Uchiha Madara's path?!"
"Senju Hashirama is his older brother, for crying out loud! Wasn't Senju Tobirama the person most wary of Uchiha Madara?"
"And now look at him. He's actually come around to the Ghost of the Battlefield's way of doing things..."
Mū took a deep breath.
He truly wanted to send out a call to the entire shinobi world for Hashirama to return!
Someone needed to hurry up and rein in the rampaging Senju Tobirama. Who could possibly have imagined that the original Darkness of the Shinobi, who hated Madara so much, was now manufacturing a second Ghost of the Battlefield with his own hands?
The Senju and Uchiha were truly a bunch of incomprehensible lunatics!
"Fair is fair, there's really nothing strange about it. That's exactly how shinobi from the Warring States Period tended to think."
Gengetsu replied numbly.
"Weren't you and I the same as Senju Tobirama before? We even killed each other over some spoils of war. We're probably the last people qualified to criticize him."
"As for the false intelligence..."
"Would you give an enemy nation accurate intelligence? Starting a war when you don't even have the ability to assess the situation is simply incompetence. I'm not going to defend that useless Kiritori. He's a complete amateur when it comes to warfare!"
Gengetsu might normally be somewhat eccentric, but when it came to warfare, his judgment was first-rate.
In his eyes, Kirigakure's allocation of combat forces was extremely unreasonable, its organizational discipline was abysmal, and the Third Mizukage's method of deploying virtually the entire army at once was so absurd it was beyond belief...
Unless it was the final decisive battle, who the hell fought a war like this?
Obviously, the vanguard should first spread out the battle line, probe the enemy step by step, and then advance gradually according to the situation. If everyone simply swarmed forward at once, they were practically begging to have a large-scale destructive ninjutsu thrown in their faces...
Forget Hiruzen's masterful Combination Five Release techniques.
Even if Gengetsu himself were the one attacking, against a concentrated Kirigakure army with no sensory ninjutsu, a single Steaming Danger Tyranny would already be more than enough to make them suffer...
"It's over..."
Mū folded his arms across his chest.
"The vanguard has completely collapsed..."
From high in the sky, Gengetsu could clearly see that after the Hokage had so valiantly led the charge himself, the morale of the Konoha shinobi had soared!
Large numbers of Kiri shinobi had lost their will to fight amid the collapse, scattering around like headless flies...
And the Konoha shinobi had already counter-encircled them!
"It's that Hyūga again..."
Hizashi caught the attention of both men.
As they fled, many Kiri shinobi cast the Hiding in Mist Technique while running, trying to use the mist as cover for their retreat. This was also Kirigakure's solution to its lack of sensory ninjutsu.
If everyone's sensory capabilities were blocked, both sides would be brought down to the same level. Then Kirigakure could use its wealth of experience to kill the enemy.
That was the so-called "Silent Killing" method...
But Hizashi's Byakugan could see through everything.
At this moment, he had already entered his cursed-seal state and was hovering in midair with a winged flight ninja tool. Storm Release crossbow bolts compressed to the absolute limit were blowing apart the heads of Kiri squad leaders one after another...
"Drop your weapons! Kneel on the ground! Hands behind your heads! Surrender and you will not be killed!"
As Hizashi and the other Konoha shinobi continued killing the enemy, Tenzō amplified his voice with chakra and shouted: "This is the promise of Lord Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen!"
"If you want to live, this is your last chance!"
Interestingly enough—
Tenzō hadn't invoked Sarutobi Hiruzen's name at first.
But no one had listened to him. The Kiri shinobi seemed completely terrified, preferring to have their heads blown apart by Storm Release crossbow bolts or be killed by other Konoha shinobi rather than believe any nonsense about being spared if they surrendered...
Yet the moment Sarutobi Hiruzen's name was mentioned, some Kiri shinobi actually believed it.
They dropped to their knees, trembling uncontrollably, placed both hands behind their heads, and waited for a miracle to descend upon them.
"Sealing Team, move in!"
Tenzō smiled and shook his head.
So the Hokage's reputation and his name for being honorable had taken root this deeply...
Even Kirigakure knew about it?
The Konoha shinobi of the Sealing Team stepped forward.
Rather than a Sealing Team, however, it would actually be more accurate to call them a "Prisoner Processing Team."
They had mastered the Fūinjutsu: Heavenly Prison, seized from Hōzuki Castle in Kusagakure.
The technique used very little chakra to create a precise mark that sealed the chakra within a shinobi's body. The moment the target tried to mobilize their chakra, it would feel as though raging flames were burning through their Chakra Pathways...
However, applying the mark required the target to have almost completely given up resistance, so it was normally used on prisoners and was also exceptionally well suited to processing captives on the battlefield.
"Look at how properly layered their force composition is! They don't have many people, but they've got everything they need—even a unit specifically for processing prisoners!"
Gengetsu cursed under his breath as he watched the Konoha shinobi take the Kiri shinobi prisoner, though he felt somewhat better inside.
Not bad...
At least they would keep their lives.
"What are you planning to do? Are you going to intervene now?" Mū asked quietly.
"Let's see how Kiritori responds..."
Gengetsu's face darkened.
"He has a method of controlling the Three-Tails. I hope he can at least show some of Kirigakure's spirit and pride. He'd better not completely disgrace the title of Mizukage in his generation!"
...
A short while later.
At Kirigakure's central army formation, the Third Mizukage had naturally noticed that something was wrong...
The collapsing Kiri forces and the violent chakra explosions were simply too conspicuous to miss.
Fuguki came stumbling and scrambling over, panting heavily as he dropped to his knees before the Third Mizukage.
"Mizukage-sama, disaster! It's a disaster!"
"We were ambushed by the Third Hokage! Our elite forces have been almost completely wiped out, and more than half of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen are dead!"
The Third Mizukage's expression instantly darkened to the extreme.
Impossible!
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