"Then allow me to test your strength, Hokage!"
The Third Raikage roared.
Terrifying lightning erupted across his body as he activated the Lightning Release Chakra Mode with extraordinary proficiency, arcs of electricity crackling violently around him.
Hell Stab: Four-Finger Nukite!
The Third Raikage didn't hesitate.
He opened with his most lethal technique, using lightning to fully stimulate his body before concentrating all of that destructive power into his hand—the ultimate expression of Nintaijutsu!
Ōnoki floated into the air.
Under his control, the ground beneath Hiruzen's feet turned thick and viscous, churning violently.
A pale Dust Release barrier formed between his hands as he stared fixedly at Hiruzen, waiting for the right opportunity.
Hiruzen suddenly smiled.
He'd just realized that perhaps there was a little Uchiha in him too.
At least when it came to his love of copying other people's techniques.
In his current combat system, the two abilities that had proven the most practical really were the Lightning Release Chakra Mode and Dust Release...
His self-developed Spirit Release might have been overwhelmingly powerful, but there simply weren't many situations that actually required him to use it.
In the next instant, lightning even denser and more powerful than the Third Raikage's erupted around Hiruzen's body.
Following the Raikage's example, Hiruzen casually raised four fingers of his own—
And charged straight into him!
The Third Raikage's eyes flew wide open!
Just who the hell was the Raikage here—you or me?!
In the distant battle formation, the Fourth A stared at the scene in stunned disbelief. As an expert in the Lightning Release Chakra Mode himself, he could tell at a glance just how proficient the Hokage was with it...
He was an expert among experts!
Even his old man might not be able to match him...
'They're too fast...'
A trace of helplessness flashed through Ōnoki's mind. His Dust Release wasn't slow by any means, but keeping up with those two was simply beyond him.
In his previous clashes with the Raikage, if they ever wanted to settle things decisively, they would have to get within close range—one using the One-Finger Nukite while the other used Dust Release: Detachment of the Primitive World Technique...
Victory or defeat would come down to whether Dust Release activated first or the Nukite struck first...
After the lessons of the Second Shinobi World War, however, both sides had kept themselves restrained.
Hiruzen and the Third Raikage collided head-on!
Thunder boomed.
The shockwave generated by the lightning instantly filled the battlefield with crackling arcs of electricity, as though they had suddenly stepped inside a thundercloud!
"What a body..."
Hiruzen gave a carefree smile as steam began rising from his arm. With the tremendous strength provided by Boil Release, he overwhelmed the Third Raikage's raw power!
The Third Raikage's fingers buckled instantly.
Hiruzen's hand drove straight into his chest and sent him flying!
Blood scattered across the ground along the Third Raikage's trajectory...
"How is that possible?!"
Killer B and the Fourth A couldn't help shouting.
That was a body even a Tailed Beast Ball couldn't break through!
What neither of them knew was that the Tailed Beast Ball's greatest strength lay primarily in its enormous blast radius. The combination of Yin and Yang chakra at its core couldn't really be called particularly sophisticated.
Against bodies like those of the Raikage and Hiruzen, a Tailed Beast Ball simply lacked sufficient single-target penetration.
"Rather than saying the Lightning Release Chakra Mode is vulnerable to Wind Release..."
"It would be more accurate to say that the ultimate sharpening of Lightning Release itself is the best way to pierce lightning armor. Lightning against lightning, so to speak..."
Hiruzen murmured as the Third Raikage charged at him again.
He had already seen through the Lightning Release Nukite...
It was actually somewhat similar to the Eight Gates.
The reason the Raikage didn't immediately go all out with the Nukite wasn't because he didn't want to.
It was because he couldn't.
Those initial Nukite charges were essentially a warm-up. By repeatedly accelerating forward, he mobilized and stimulated the enormous amount of chakra within his body, gradually preparing to concentrate all of it into a single point...
'I'm only imitating it through technique.'
'But some of the principles behind this seem transferable to the Eight Gates. Maybe they could reduce the burden on Duy when he uses them...'
The battle wasn't even over yet, and Hiruzen was already thinking about the list of spoils he'd collect after winning.
'Maybe I could try learning the Eight Gates myself?'
'My control over my body is pretty good now, especially with the dual circulation systems...'
A thought stirred in Hiruzen's mind.
He had found another avenue for improving himself.
Taijutsu had traditionally been considered the lowest of the three fundamental shinobi disciplines—ninjutsu, taijutsu, and genjutsu.
But now that Hiruzen had reached an entirely different level, he'd realized something.
Physical damage would always be the most straightforward kind of damage.
No complicated tricks, no nature transformation or shape transformation.
Just pure kinetic energy!
And that could become another trump card of his.
Kaguya silently watched everything unfold.
She had originally intended to offer a few critiques, but now she kept quiet.
Because Kaguya had suddenly noticed a problem...
Why were the shinobi here using ninjutsu to improve their own physical abilities?
Shouldn't your physical capabilities simply be whatever your natural attributes allowed?
Chakra could be used like this?!
Kaguya's most frequently used technique was called Eighty Gods Vacuum Attack. Put simply, she used an enormous amount of chakra to form fists and then punched them out one after another...
Pure overwhelming power.
Not a trace of technique.
Naturally, Hiruzen couldn't possibly imagine Kaguya's utterly privileged perspective.
Even he had never considered abandoning technique.
After all, technique was a multiplier for one's basic capabilities. The two had always complemented each other...
Hiruzen faced the Third Raikage with one hand and Ōnoki with the other.
Chakra erupted!
Boil Release–Lava Release Composite Kekkei Genkai: Molten Mist Technique!
Dust Release: Detachment of the Primitive World Technique!
Along the Third Raikage's path, molten lava mixed with an extraordinarily corrosive acid mist and erupted around him in an instant, almost as though it had been generated by a dōjutsu!
Scorching magma mingled with intensely corrosive mist. The extreme heat of both combined with the powerful acid, making it cling to the Third Raikage's body like something that simply refused to let go...
Even with a body far tougher than a skeletal Susanoo, he could barely withstand it. The surface of his body began showing signs of dissolving...
Yet the Third Raikage gritted his teeth and used the pain to drive himself forward...
He understood now.
He couldn't afford to get dragged into a prolonged battle with Hiruzen.
There was simply too large a difference in their respective levels.
The Third Raikage had always taken pride in his stamina. In war, even if he had to fight for three days and three nights, he believed he'd still have plenty of strength left to spare...
But against an opponent like Hiruzen, he had to play every trump card he possessed from the very beginning.
Otherwise, after only a few exchanges of being worn down and maneuvered around, he wouldn't even have enough left to continue fighting.
This was an entirely different kind of battle...
On the other side, Ōnoki's eyes trembled as he watched Hiruzen use Dust Release with even greater proficiency than himself.
Two pillars of light collided!
"That's Dust Release?"
"I heard reports from the Land of Water that the Hokage could use Dust Release, but I thought it was just psychological warfare..."
Rōshi muttered, completely bewildered.
"And that Lava Release too!"
The Four-Tails inside him went silent.
Because he actually recognized Enma—or rather, he recognized the monkey clan...
Several centuries ago, they had practically been one family!
So why was his own jinchūriki this pathetic while some mere summon got treated so well?
Unfair!
White light appeared in Hiruzen's eyes.
The power of Spirit Release erupted and instantly struck Ōnoki in the form of a dōjutsu, throwing the chakra inside his body into disarray.
Then Hiruzen looked toward the Third Raikage...
The Spirit Release dōjutsu struck him as well. Although the violent Lightning Release Chakra Mode offered a certain degree of resistance, the physical stimulation it provided still dropped sharply...
His forced transition into the One-Finger Nukite was interrupted!
By now, Kaguya was staring blankly.
It wasn't that Hiruzen's techniques seemed particularly powerful to her...
Rather, she suddenly felt that Hiruzen's entire combat system looked strangely similar to her own!
And Kaguya wasn't imagining things.
Her own combat system included a technique called Amenominaka, which used the Root Time-Space as the nexus connecting five other dimensions.
During battle, she could switch the surrounding dimension to gain a home-field advantage.
There were dimensions of acid, lava, ice, extreme gravity, and desert...
Didn't Hiruzen's acid mist and lava correspond almost perfectly to two of her dimensions?
And Spirit Release in particular...
Kaguya might not have been especially accomplished when it came to other combat techniques, but there was one technique she had honed to perfection—the move she relied upon above all others and the greatest reason she'd been able to succeed with her surprise attack...
All-Killing Ash Bones!
Within Spirit Release, Kaguya could faintly sense the concepts of 'dismantling' and 'annihilation.'
As someone intimately familiar with that principle, she caught it immediately.
'Could this really be fate?'
A strange thought emerged in Kaguya's mind.
At that moment...
Hiruzen pointed one hand toward the sky and the other toward the earth.
Earth Release: Added-Weight Rock Technique—Gravity Field: Full Power!
The gravity field he normally used to temper his own body erupted violently.
For a single instant, it became an irresistible giant hand that dragged in Ōnoki, temporarily incapacitated in midair, and the Third Raikage, whose Lightning Release Chakra Mode had been partially disrupted...
'This is bad. I can't use Dust Release...'
Feeling the chaos inside his chakra network, Ōnoki couldn't stop a wave of despair from rising within him.
Hiruzen's combat system was unlike that of any other shinobi in the world.
It exhausted Ōnoki both mentally and physically...
'I'm a shinobi! If you won't even let me use ninjutsu, how the hell am I supposed to fight you?'
If Hiruzen were merely absorbing his techniques, that would have been one thing. Ōnoki was the Tsuchikage; it wasn't as though he'd never seen Kirigakure's Dark Release before. At least absorption still left room to maneuver around its range and rate...
But this?
White light flashed from the man's eyes and effectively sealed his chakra from a distance.
How was anyone supposed to deal with that?
Even Mangekyō abilities weren't this shameless!
As the Third Raikage and Ōnoki hurtled toward Hiruzen, both Kage still maintained their combat instincts, struggling to use the kinetic energy from the gravitational pull itself to launch another counterattack...
Hiruzen smiled faintly.
'Ice Age...'
A hazy frost spread from beneath his feet.
In an instant, thick ice engulfed both Ōnoki and the Third Raikage, leaving only their heads exposed.
The entire battlefield fell utterly silent.
Spirit Release gathered around Hiruzen's hands, white light flickering over both fists.
He punched outward to either side as though striking empty space itself, and the invisible shock marks almost seemed visible!
The still-burning lava, crackling lightning, and chakra-saturated scorched earth across the battlefield rapidly lost the structures maintaining their forms under the violent shockwaves, dissolving back into formless chakra...
It was almost like a purification, washing the remaining ninjutsu from the entire battlefield.
Then Magnet Release activated.
Sand swept across the ground like a broom, leveling the cratered battlefield.
As for when exactly Hiruzen had learned Magnet Release...
Fugaku spent practically every day in Konoha boasting about how powerful his Magnet Release was and enthusiastically encouraging everyone to join his 'Uchiha Magnetic Style.'
Hiruzen had watched him through his crystal ball for a while during some free time...
And learned it.
All one could really say was that Fugaku apparently had some talent for teaching.
At least Hiruzen thought so.
After all, he'd learned it...
No one had expected the Hokage's battle against two Kage to end in such a crushing display.
It looked less like a battle and more like an Academy teacher instructing students who had just enrolled.
For a moment, Kaguya could only stare.
Wait...
What was this supposed to mean?
Now even the extreme-gravity dimension and desert dimension matched?!
'This...'
'What is going on?'
Kaguya sank into thought.
Could someone be setting all this up specifically for her?
But there shouldn't be anyone in the shinobi world capable of arranging something like that.
Hagoromo, the only one with the ability to do so, would never allow her to escape the seal on the moon. Besides, after splitting the Ten-Tails apart, that rebellious son of hers must have suffered an enormous loss of vitality himself...
Considering that the contingency he left behind only activated if he was dead or otherwise gone, he was probably dead.
"You..."
"How are you using gravity without letting it affect you?"
Kaguya thought back over Hiruzen's battle.
The first thing she'd noticed was that this man seemed to have actual logic behind the way he fought. There was a clear method to how he used his techniques, and he never showed the slightest panic or uncertainty...
Kaguya—who, in another timeline, had once been hit by Amaterasu and immediately turned and fled—was deeply puzzled.
To be fair, everyone had been confused by that one.
Even Madara, before becoming the Ten-Tails' jinchūriki, had stood perfectly still after being hit by Amaterasu.
Yet the progenitor of chakra herself had covered her face and run!
One could only say that she'd shown the so-called strongest physical dōjutsu, Amaterasu, the utmost respect...
And now Kaguya had noticed another blind spot.
Why wasn't Hiruzen affected by his own technique?
Which brought to mind a certain progenitor of chakra who, after entering her own extreme-gravity dimension, had actually been hindered by the intense gravity to the point that she could barely move.
She hadn't even known to aim her All-Killing Ash Bones higher to compensate...
And missed again and again!
"What did you say?"
Hiruzen listened as the Konoha shinobi erupted into heartfelt cheers for him.
Even though he had strongly forbidden people from calling him the Strongest Hokage, someone still shouted the slogan at that moment.
Then it spread.
The chanting grew increasingly synchronized.
Hiruzen turned around and gestured for the Konoha shinobi to stop chanting that inappropriate slogan.
Then some genius in the crowd apparently had another flash of inspiration and started shouting that 'Hashirama-sama has returned!'
On one hand, the villagers had clearly run out of ways to praise their Hokage.
On the other...
Kaguya's question had genuinely caught Hiruzen off guard.
What was this mysterious woman talking about?
Was she pretending to be stupid?
"What are you talking about?"
Hiruzen repeated the question, then suddenly had an idea.
"I mean, your question contains a great deal of wisdom. It may sound rather fundamental at first, but sometimes the most fundamental principles are precisely the hardest to apply properly. So why don't you explain your question in a little more detail..."
"We can discuss it properly. I'm sure there are things I can learn from you as well."
Kaguya's eyes lit up.
She seemed to have genuinely found someone she could communicate with!
Even among the Ōtsutsuki Clan, very few people supported Kaguya's long-standing argument that 'having overwhelming stats actually makes you the hardest kind of fighter to control properly.'
Quite a few clan members who lacked those overwhelming stats had even taken personal offense and started resenting her for saying it!
"How do you make your own gravity field not affect you?"
Kaguya asked, doing her best to sound profound and inscrutable.
Hiruzen fell silent anyway.
Generally speaking, this was the sort of question Academy students asked...
Because it really was that basic.
It was like asking why Mei's own Boil Release acid mist didn't harm her and why she could stand inside it safely, or why Rasa and the Third Kazekage didn't need to dodge their own Magnet Release fields...
Any halfway competent jōnin possessed a basic understanding of regulating their own techniques.
For the 'Professor of Ninjutsu,' it was even more fundamental—something so basic it could be glossed over like forming hand seals.
Hiruzen thought the question through several times and still couldn't find any hidden profundity in it...
Einstein, Newton, and Gauss could all show up together, and one plus one would still equal two!
"This is how you do it..."
Hiruzen manipulated the chakra within his body, constructing an extraordinarily precise model that displayed the basic structure and operating principles of the ninjutsu within Kaguya's field of vision.
He practically took the entire concept apart piece by piece and laid it out for her, trying to make sure she understood.
Kaguya watched with dawning realization.
There were still some parts she didn't understand, but her social awareness finally kicked in.
She chuckled.
"Of course. I understand all of it!"
This time, however, Hiruzen wasn't going to be fooled so easily.
Someone who could ask a question like that...
He was suddenly beginning to suspect that perhaps she wasn't pretending to be stupid.
Perhaps there really was something wrong with her...
Nobody would take an act this far!
But at that very moment...
Something unexpected happened!
An enormous wooden dragon roared out from beneath Hiruzen's feet.
The Hokage's eyes narrowed, and he immediately evaded the extraordinarily dense Wood Release construct.
Above them...
Six resurrected Kage dressed in black robes emerged slowly from underground, accompanied by the Second Kazekage Shamon in his enhanced Impure World Reincarnation body.
Seven people in total.
The Second Tsuchikage looked at Ōnoki and sighed.
"What a sorry state you're in..."
The Second Raikage and the Gold and Silver Brothers looked toward the Third Raikage.
All three shrugged together.
They didn't say anything...
They understood perfectly well how miserable it felt when someone who relied on overwhelming stats suddenly ran into someone with even higher stats.
"Good to see you again, Mizukage!"
Only Gengetsu cheerfully waved.
Then he seemed to get scolded by someone and quickly forced his playful expression back into something serious.
Uzumaki Ashina, meanwhile, had been staring intensely at Hiruzen with shining eyes from the moment he appeared.
Madara was wearing Tobi around his body.
The Wood Dragon was his latest idea...
He had absorbed Hashirama's power, and he also had Tobi, a child of the God Tree.
Combining the two and pretending to be the inheritor of Hashirama's will so that he could lead the Crimson Organization and mediate conflicts throughout the shinobi world...
It made perfect sense!
As for why he'd gone this far, it was because Hiruzen had now become so powerful that continuing to impersonate a second-rate figure like 'Senju Tobirama' could no longer meet the intensity required if an actual fight broke out...
There was one thing Madara hadn't considered.
He believed there was no possible way Tobirama could possess Hashirama's power.
But after countless rumors had passed from mouth to mouth, a certain Second Hokage had nearly become the ultimate scapegoat of the entire shinobi world.
Both the supposed limits of his abilities and his research capabilities had been exaggerated into something almost monstrous...
Forget replicating his own elder brother's techniques and cells...
People were practically one rumor away from claiming that Tobirama had once experimented on the Sage of Six Paths himself!
Madara floated high in the air, looking down at Hiruzen with amusement in his eyes.
"The Crimson Organization now makes its official debut before the shinobi world!"
"I am the inheritor of Hashirama's will, and I hereby intervene to bring an end to this war..."
"This war is over! In the name of the Kage of previous generations, we will assume control of Kumo and Iwa. Konoha can withdraw now..."
The Third Raikage and Ōnoki's expressions changed drastically.
But nobody cared about them anymore.
Hiruzen narrowed his eyes.
After this encounter, he was now certain of Uchiha Madara's identity.
And the meaning behind Madara's words was painfully familiar.
It was the same overbearing-parent routine as always.
Just as Konoha was about to reap the rewards of victory, Madara had arrived with the equivalent of:
'I'll hold on to your New Year's money for you.'
If Konoha withdrew now, then what happened to the war reparations?
"There's something wrong with the presence surrounding that man!"
Kaguya's voice suddenly became extraordinarily serious as she warned the person with whom she'd formed this strange connection.
"Be careful! If he unleashes his full power, you won't be able to defeat him..."
She had sensed Isshiki!
Isshiki, however, hadn't sensed Kaguya.
Hiruzen's Ten Thousand Seals Body Integration Seal naturally functioned as an isolation barrier, and Hiruzen himself had never been branded with a Kāma.
Hiruzen's eyes flashed.
Had the other deus ex machina ended up attached to Uchiha Madara?
It was difficult to say whether that was good news or bad...
"Try to keep him calm. Don't fight him head-on. Ideally, find some way to drive him away..."
Kaguya said gravely.
"The more of that power he uses, the faster Isshiki will take over this vessel!"
But after thinking about it, Kaguya realized that might be asking too much of Hiruzen and sighed.
Now that Isshiki had appeared, she became considerably more straightforward.
He was the most terrifying enemy she had ever faced.
Even the Sage of Six Paths couldn't compare.
Hagoromo was family, after all...
'So I shouldn't fight him?'
A thought stirred in Hiruzen's mind.
He had a good solution.
If what they needed was someone to break up a fight...
He happened to know an expert!
The Hokage brought his hands together.
You want to use Impure World Reincarnation?
Then I'll use Impure World Reincarnation too!
A coffin slowly rose from the earth.
The lid opened.
A man stepped out, stretched lazily, and looked around with an almost adorably blank expression before his face filled with astonishment.
"Huh?"
"What are all of you doing here? What's going on?"
The First Hokage, Senju Hashirama...
Had returned to the shinobi world!
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