Madara froze for a moment, confusion flitting across his face. But in the next instant, his pupils contracted sharply. Under the gaze of his Mangekyō Sharingan, the weathered man's body suddenly began to blur and distort.
Fast!
This man's speed had reached an unbelievable level. Madara immediately focused his mind, trying to track his movements, but even the Mangekyō Sharingan failed to keep up.
"Observation Haki!"
He activated his Haki, but to his shock, he still couldn't pinpoint the man's location.
"Spiritual Sense!"
A full three-hundred-sixty-degree spiritual scan erupted from him, blanketing the area. Only then did he catch a fleeting afterimage, and at that very moment, Madara realized the weathered man was already right in front of him, his sword raised high and slashing down toward his head.
Strange. Far too strange. The man had clearly approached from directly ahead, yet Madara had detected absolutely nothing until the last second.
"Shinra Tensei!"
Madara's entire body trembled as a powerful, invisible repulsive force burst outward. But what happened next stunned him even more.
The longsword struck the expanding barrier of repulsive force with ease. The barrier shuddered. For the first time, the invincible force of Shinra Tensei had met something capable of resisting it. After a brief stalemate, the barrier actually caved inward, pushing back toward Madara himself.
Impossible. It was completely unbelievable. The sight left even Madara momentarily dumbfounded. How many years had it been? Never before had Shinra Tensei failed like this, and what he was seeing was almost impossible for him to accept.
Boom!
Two breaths later, the sword pressed downward, forcing the repulsive barrier back until it was barely a centimeter from Madara's forehead. It paused briefly, then the impact exploded.
Madara was blasted away. It wasn't that he had failed to withstand the attack; the power behind that sword was simply beyond imagination. It sent him flying hundreds of meters through the air before he finally stabilized himself, landing firmly on the ground.
When he looked up again, his expression had turned incredibly serious. Just as the Shinigami of the Nie Kingdom couldn't understand the powers of Qin's Nation, Madara likewise couldn't comprehend the power of the man before him. Everything about the man's techniques looked absurdly simple, his movements, his dodges, his attacks, every action followed a clear, obvious pattern that anyone should have been able to see right through. Yet the strength he displayed was enough to send chills down one's spine.
"To survive one of my sword strikes without dying is an honor you can boast of for the rest of your life."
The weathered man seemed somewhat surprised that his slash hadn't killed Madara. He raised his head, a faint smile on his lips.
Madara's eyes narrowed. His hands suddenly blurred into a sequence of seals. Then,
"Sage Art: Tengai Shinsei!"
Buzzz,
The sky trembled. A gigantic meteor appeared high above, blotting out the heavens and the sun as it descended. Roaring winds swept across the battlefield as the massive object crashed toward the weathered man.
The man looked up, genuine surprise appearing on his face when he saw the meteor. "Magnificent. To think an outsider could summon a meteor from the heavens." He praised it aloud, yet calmly took a light step forward.
"Flash!"
A burst of light enveloped him. At that moment, nobody could track his figure. In the blink of an eye, he had appeared directly beneath the descending meteor.
"Face the wind!"
"Hasag-e!"
A sword flashed out. The strike was so fast that people instinctively narrowed their eyes, his sword was simply too fast for anyone to react. When everyone looked back toward the sky, the weathered man had already sheathed his sword and was falling back toward the ground.
Meanwhile, the gigantic meteor overhead began to break apart with a deafening roar. First, it split into countless massive chunks, then those chunks split into smaller pieces, and then those smaller pieces shattered again. In the end, the entire meteor turned into nothing more than a cloud of dust filling the sky. As though a violent gale had swept through it, the weathered man's single sword strike had completely sliced the meteor apart.
Thud.
He landed lightly on the ground. Sword in his right hand, he began walking slowly toward Madara.
"Do you have any other tricks? I'm very interested in your abilities." The weathered man smiled with genuine curiosity as he spoke softly.
Madara's pupils shrank, but he said nothing. His hands immediately formed seals again.
"Sage Art: Meteor Fire Sea!"
In an instant, half the sky above them turned crimson. Soldiers from both armies looked up in shock as countless red dots appeared high in the heavens, rapidly growing larger. The temperature in the air skyrocketed, and in the blink of an eye, flames were already burning across the sky.
"Those are meteors!"
"And there are so many of them!"
The Shinigami of the Nie Kingdom pointed upward in horror, unable to stop themselves from retreating.
"Now that's an interesting ability." The weathered man looked up and sighed. "Some of those people who call themselves gods seem capable of similar feats, though their power was far greater than yours."
He stepped forward, his figure vanishing once more. Immediately afterward, his silhouette split into countless afterimages. Each one appeared beneath a falling meteor, drew a sword, and slashed.
Boom!
The entire sky shook violently. Then flames erupted everywhere, blossoming into brilliant fireworks. Two breaths later, the meteors were gone and the flames gradually faded away, leaving Madara's Sage Art effortlessly neutralized.
"Anything else?" The weathered man landed on the ground and asked calmly.
Madara's gaze sharpened. He suddenly inhaled deeply.
"Sage Art: Fire Release, Dragon Flame Song!"
Roar!
Four enormous fire dragons materialized from thin air. They encircled the weathered man, charging toward him with furious roars.
"You outsiders really don't hold back, do you?" His figure flickered within the flames, his voice drifting out alongside them. But the instant all four fire dragons converged on the center, he disappeared again.
"That strange movement technique again!"
Madara's pupils contracted. His Spiritual Sense spread out in all directions as he searched frantically. Within a thousandth of a breath, his body tensed and he looked forward once more.
"He's here again!"
But this time, the man did not attack immediately. Instead, he appeared ten meters away.
"Let's end this quickly." The weathered man gripped his sword. Then he drew it. Then he swung.
"Steel Tempest!"
The words left his mouth as the sword flashed. A gentle breeze appeared before Madara. Within a single breath, the breeze became a gale, and the gale became a tornado. Boundless sword energy surged within it, ripping chunks of earth from the ground as the massive whirlwind shot over a hundred meters into the sky and tore toward him at incredible speed.
"I can't dodge it!" At a distance of only ten meters, Madara realized he had no way to evade the attack.
"Sage Art: Shinra Tensei!"
With a shout, limitless repulsive force erupted from his body as he attempted to withstand the strike. The two forces collided instantly. Madara's pupils contracted, his expression changing dramatically.
At the same time, in the skies above the northern front, the staff members of the Parliamentary Institute suddenly widened their eyes. On the holographic display before them, a gigantic gate reaching into the heavens abruptly appeared.
"The Nie Kingdom's Realm Gate is inside Central 46!"
(End of Chapter)
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