The suffocating, monochromatic void that had swallowed the border did not linger.
As Ikki slowly retracted his right arm, the violent black ripples dissipated, and the familiar, vibrant colors of the world bled back into reality. The glaring sun beat down on the desert once more.
Baki, Yashamaru, and the rest of the Sand vanguard blinked, shielding their eyes. Looking at one another, they saw only deathly pale, terror-stricken faces. It was as if their very souls had just been subjected to a horrifying psychological shock.
"Are... are we alive?" someone whispered, patting their chest. "We're completely fine!" another gasped, a hysterical edge to his voice. "Could it be? Was the legend of the Iron Fist just an empty bluff?!"
But down in the epicenter, Rasa, Chiyo, and Ebizō were drenched in a cold, paralyzing sweat.
"Look! The Kazekage's spears!" The Sand shinobi finally noticed the anomaly.
The hundreds of dense Gold Dust Lances launched at Ikki hadn't hit their mark. Instead, they were frozen perfectly in mid-air, held suspended just inches from Ikki's body by a terrifying, invisible atmospheric pressure.
Before anyone could even process the sight, a gentle breeze swept past.
The solid gold constructs instantly vaporized, turning into a fine dust barely visible to the naked eye. The sheer kinetic force of the punch hadn't just stopped the gold; it had utterly annihilated its molecular structure, crushing the heavy metal into sub-atomic nothingness.
Just as Baki and his men dared to exhale, assuming the attack was over... reality caught up.
KABOOM!
A catastrophic sonic boom, dwarfing the roar of a Tailed Beast Bomb, violently detonated in their ears. It sounded like hundreds of thunderbolts striking the earth simultaneously. A cataclysmic, invisible shockwave tore across the desert. The thousand Sand shinobi standing on the frontline couldn't even blink before the force slammed into their chests like a barrage of artillery shells.
Ribs fractured. Lungs violently compressed. A collective spray of blood misted the air as a thousand elite shinobi were simultaneously launched backward off their feet, groaning in agony.
Then, the earth gave way.
The peaceful desert screamed, violently quaking as the ground beneath them collapsed into a massive, cavernous abyss. The vanguard troops who had just been thrown through the air suddenly felt their stomachs drop as they plummeted into the newly formed gorge.
Those stationed further back—and the Konoha observers hiding miles away—stared at the collapsed desert in absolute, mind-numbing horror.
"What kind of crater is that...?" Tsunade whispered, her voice trembling.
"That's... that's a fist print."
Standing on her distant vantage point, Tsunade could see the true scale of the devastation. It wasn't a mere crater. It was a flawless, apocalyptic imprint punched directly into the earth by a titan. Up close, without a Byakugan or a Sharingan to process the sheer scale of the destruction, the Sand shinobi could only perceive it as a bottomless gorge.
"Is this... the legendary Iron Fist?" Shikaku Nara's jaw hung slack. In the face of this absolute, physics-defying violence, the legendary intellect he was so proud of felt as flimsy as wet paper.
Choza and Inoichi exchanged a look of pure, unadulterated dread. Suddenly, a profound sense of pity washed over them. The samurai and shinobi of the Warring States who had died to Ikki's fists were the lucky ones. But the ones who survived? The First Generation Kage? Madara Uchiha, the Asura of the Shinobi? What kind of suffocating, lifelong nightmare must they have lived, knowing this monster walked the same earth?
Pfft!
Down in the deepest epicenter of the colossal fist print, Rasa, Chiyo, and Ebizō violently expelled mouthfuls of blood mist. Their bodies seized, their internal organs vibrating from the residual kinetic shockwave, and they collapsed into the dirt like snakes with their spines removed.
"The Iron... Fist..."
Chiyo lay paralyzed at the bottom of the crater. Her eyes were dull, completely hollowed out by fear and despair. Standing directly in the path of that punch had shattered her mind far worse than it had the soldiers observing from afar.
"To think... we actually believed we could climb this mountain," Ebizō wheezed, staring blankly up at the clouds. A miserable, self-deprecating smile stretched across his bloodless face.
"Make way... hahahaha... I ordered the Iron Fist to make way..."
A broken, maniacal giggle bubbled up from Rasa's blood-stained lips. He lay twisted in the dirt, his eyes wide and totally unhinged.
Hearing their Kazekage's insane, hysterical laughter, a profound wave of grief washed over Chiyo, Ebizō, and the surviving Sand army. They knew the truth. Ikki's punch hadn't just annihilated the gold dust. It hadn't just shattered the desert or broken a thousand shinobi.
It had utterly pulverized the pride, the dignity, and the spirit of the Fourth Kazekage.
And with a single, careless swing, Ikki Shinomiya had unilaterally crushed the war effort launched by the Hidden Sand's three strongest pillars, bringing their pathetic little game to a definitive end.
A/N: For this week, every 100 Powerstones will get ya'll an extra chapter! Thank you!