Hashirama Senju stared at the rising monitor screens beneath his feet, his face twisted into an expression of profound, utter bewilderment.
Ever since his reincarnation, this look of baffled confusion had become his default.
The modern Shinobi world was overflowing with bizarre, incomprehensible inventions.
High-speed rail? Mobile phones? It was all entirely over his head. Take Sunagakure, for example.
Why would anyone build a village like this?
A gleaming metallic shell wrapped the settlement in concentric circles, resembling rolling hills of steel, with a towering metal spire piercing the desert sky in the center.
With the brutal sun blazing overhead, why would they willingly trap themselves inside a metal box?
Being afraid of death was one thing, but this kind of bunker defense seemed practically suicidal.
Wasn't it boiling in there?
Wouldn't it feel like baking inside a sealed oven?
In reality, with the defense grid activated, the interior of the enclosed Sunagakure was perfectly chilled and ventilated.
As a staunch advocate for energy efficiency, there was no way Mufasa would let all that raw desert solar energy go to waste.
Whenever sunlight struck the metal shell, the specialized energy-absorbing materials woven into the hull instantly converted the heat into electricity, powering the village and filling the backup storage grids.
Hashirama didn't understand any of the science.
But what baffled him most was Mufasa's sheer, unyielding stubbornness.
Facing a united Allied Shinobi army of three hundred thousand troops, Mufasa still refused to surrender.
Even after Hashirama had staked his own legendary reputation, promising to personally guarantee the safety of Mufasa and his villagers, the Kazekage had rejected him outright.
"Oh, about that," Mufasa laughed, his voice casual and breezy. "I know you're in a rush, but I'm telling you to take it easy."
"If I don't beat you down, you won't surrender," Hashirama stated, though his face still betrayed his utter confusion.
"Thank you for your kindness, Lord Hashirama," Mufasa replied smoothly, "but I think we're going to have a fight." He added a helpful warning. "By the way, you'd better pull Konoha's forces back a bit. It would be a shame if you got caught in the crossfire when things kick off."
Hashirama barked a laugh, exasperated by the sheer arrogance. "You are still so stubborn. Then I will shatter your illusions." He stepped back from the front lines.
Raikage Ay laughed boisterously. "I told you talking was useless! If you want him to behave, you have to use my cannon."
Hashirama gave a reluctant nod. "Then I'll leave it to Kumogakure."
Ay waved his hand, signaling his troops. "Start charging!"
The Cloud Ninja immediately began channeling their raw energy into the massive, mounted Chakra Cannons. Elsewhere on the battlefield, Obito stood at the head of his White Zetsu army. With a casual flick of his wrist, he deployed a massive swarm of automated drones to bombard the village.
Inside Sunagakure's central command tower, Mufasa opened a secure comm-link to his department heads.
"Are we ready for Kumogakure's Chakra Cannons?" Mufasa asked.
"We are ready," Sasori's voice crackled over the radio.
"No unexpected variables?"
"None," Sasori replied confidently. "According to our analysis, while their cannons possess immense raw power, they cannot adjust their trajectories on the fly. Based on the position of their artillery, we have calculated the exact arc of their fire. Our personnel and equipment are perfectly positioned at the predicted impact zones. The moment the blasts hit, we will absorb them."
At that very moment, countless Sand Ninja stood on standby behind the fortified walls facing the artillery. The village's exterior wasn't just a physical barrier; it was an advanced energy-absorbing shell lined with specialized materials capable of drinking raw chakra. This meant Sunagakure could harvest the enemy's jutsu just as efficiently as it harvested the sun.
Mufasa stroked his chin, a highly satisfied smirk spreading across his face. 'Very good. I genuinely hope those Cloud Ninja put some elbow grease into this. Their cannons might just top off my city's power reserves.'
Mufasa's grand blueprint to completely transform Sunagakure was ready, save for one crucial element: power. The sheer volume of energy required to overhaul an entire village was staggering. To bypass this bottleneck, Mufasa had decided to take a calculated risk. He would take the Cloud Ninja's bombardment head-on and steal their chakra.
"Let them charge it up," Mufasa said, casually watching the monitor screens as the Kumogakure forces funneled power into their weapons.
Outside, the Kumogakure artillery crews were straining. Powering twenty colossal cannons simultaneously demanded an astronomical amount of chakra. The Cloud Ninja channeled their reserves in massive rotating shifts. Even Raikage Ay stepped up to contribute. This barrage was a matter of Kumogakure's pride; it absolutely could not fail.
Ay poured his soul into the grid, his Lightning Release chakra flaring so brightly he looked like a human thunderbolt. Torrents of electrical energy surged into the heavy artillery. The muzzles of the Chakra Cannons sizzled, spitting wild arcs of blue lightning into the air.
"Charge at fifty percent!" an artillery commander barked.
"Charge at seventy percent!"
The blinding flashes at the muzzles grew increasingly intense.
The smile on Mufasa's face widened with every percentage point. But his good mood soured a moment later.
Spotting the nearly fully charged cannons, Obito decided to capitalize on the momentum. He commanded his White Zetsu army to launch their drone fleet. The ominous, high-pitched whir of rotors tore through the desert air as a massive swarm of black drones rose from the ground. There were so many that they literally blotted out the sun, casting a long, dark shadow over the battlefield.
Mufasa scowled. 'I'm standing here, politely waiting to absorb your artillery, and you have the nerve to drop trash on my roof?'
"My lord," Sasori warned over the comms, "we cannot allow those drones to bomb us indiscriminately. They could damage our absorption nodes and introduce unpredictable variables."
When preparing to swallow a barrage capable of shattering the moon, any variable was a deadly one.
'Damn it,' Mufasa cursed internally. 'You try to be a good host, and this is the disrespect you get. Fine. Wait right there.'
"Leave the swarm to me," Mufasa grunted.
He launched himself out of the command center, flying straight up to the very pinnacle of the tower. Standing against the howling wind, he raised a hand toward the heavens. Violent arcs of lightning erupted across his body, acting as a beacon.
"Tengai Shinsei: Orbital Strike!"
Far above the atmosphere, a heavily modified satellite received the electromagnetic signal and immediately broke orbit, plummeting toward the earth.
'Trying to play with drones in front of me?' Mufasa sneered internally. 'Let me show you what a true next-generation strike looks like.'
Down below, the Allied Shinobi Forces watched Mufasa hover above the tower. Seeing the Kazekage's familiar posture, Obito felt a sharp spike of panic.
"Everyone, focus your attacks on him!" Obito shouted to the commanders. "We cannot let him complete that jutsu, or we're all dead!"
Raikage Ay flatly ignored him. "My cannons are fully charged and ready to fire. I don't care what he's doing in the sky. It has nothing to do with me."
Given the sheer lack of shinobi capable of flight, and the fact that the artillery was already primed, Obito's frantic screaming fell on deaf ears.
'Fine,' Obito gritted his teeth. 'If no one else will stop him, I'll do it myself.'
He frantically keyed his controls. "Deploy all drones! All of them!" Obito pushed the swarm into overdrive, fully intent on blasting Mufasa out of the sky.
The whirring noise swelled into a deafening roar. The sheer density of the drone cloud cast the entire Kumogakure camp in darkness. There had to be eighty, maybe a hundred thousand of them.
Mufasa watched the dark, mechanical storm approaching and couldn't help but feel a twinge of grudging admiration.
"When in doubt, throw numbers at the problem," Mufasa mused. 'No wonder Sunagakure's drone accessory sales have been through the roof lately. This idiot bought our entire stock.'
"But I've told you before," Mufasa said aloud, his voice carrying over the wind. "Numbers are useless against me."
While Mufasa continued guiding his descending satellite, the drone swarm rapidly closed the distance. The dense formation shifted, resembling a colossal black hand reaching out to crush him.
He didn't even have to lift a finger to defend himself. Down in the village, the automated defense grids tracked the threat.
"Anti-air cannons, fire," the automated system chimed.
Sunagakure's surface-to-air batteries roared to life. A relentless barrage of flak tore into the mechanical hand, shredding the outer layers of the swarm. But there were simply too many. Despite taking heavy losses, the drone cloud continued its relentless advance toward Mufasa.
Obito smirked beneath his mask. "Hmph. Let your turrets shoot. As soon as those drones get close enough, the million paper bombs attached to them will detonate. You're dead, Mufasa."
But in a battlefield ruled by the Kazekage, accidents were guaranteed.
Bzzzt.
High above Sunagakure, the falling satellite pierced the clouds, trailing violent sparks of atmospheric friction and raw lightning.
Mufasa looked at the incoming drone swarm and smiled lazily. "Come on down."
He snapped his fingers. "Lightning Storm."
The orbital satellite received the detonation code and instantly ruptured. A blinding flash of pure white light eradicated all shadows on the battlefield. Countless tendrils of high-voltage lightning radiated outward, weaving into a massive, inescapable electromagnetic grid in the sky.
The Allied Shinobi shielded their eyes, many crying out as the brilliant flash temporarily blinded them.
The sprawling net of lightning slammed into the drone swarm, instantly frying their circuits and triggering the millions of paper bombs. A deafening symphony of crackling explosions ripped through the air. Thousands of miniature fireballs bloomed overhead, rapidly chaining together until a massive, singular mushroom cloud painted the desert sky.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The shockwaves rattled the earth, the chain reactions echoing for what felt like an eternity.
When the blinding light finally faded, the shinobi lowered their arms and stared upward in stunned silence.
The drone swarm was gone. Not a single rotor, chassis, or speck of ash remained. The explosion had been absolute. The only thing left in the sky was the faint, lingering electrical discharge of the destroyed satellite.
Obito stood utterly paralyzed, his heart twisting in his chest. 'My money... all my funding... vaporized in a single second.'
Having effortlessly swatted Obito's fortune out of the sky, Mufasa couldn't resist twisting the knife. He amplified his voice to boom across the Allied camp.
"How was that? Did you honestly think you could hit me with a weapon I invented? What a fantastic waste of money!"
Obito clenched his fists, wishing the desert sands would swallow him whole.
Raikage Ay scoffed, looking at Obito with open disdain. "I told you those toys were useless. Now step aside and let my cannons do the real work."
Ay tilted his head back and roared up at the Kazekage. "Mufasa! Do you dare take a direct shot from Kumogakure?"
Beneath his bravado, Ay was slightly uneasy. If Mufasa dropped a Lightning Storm on his artillery batteries right now, it would be a disaster.
Mufasa readily agreed. "Sure!" he called back. "But let's establish some ground rules. I'll stand perfectly still and take your best shot. In exchange, you stand still and take one punch from me. We don't interfere with each other's attacks. Sound fair?"
Ay scoffed. 'How powerful can one punch possibly be?'
"You have a deal!" Ay shouted. "No interference!"
"Perfect," Mufasa replied. Instead of returning to the safety of the command tower, he remained suspended in the sky, his hands glowing with a condensed sphere of radiant energy—like holding a miniature sun.
"You guys can fire first!" Mufasa offered generously.
Ay turned to his artillery commanders. "Are we at maximum capacity?"
"One hundred percent charged, Lord Raikage!"
Ay thrust his fist forward. "Fire!"
"FIRE!" the Cloud Ninja echoed.
All eyes turned toward the artillery line. The twenty massive muzzles shrieked with the sound of tearing metal and rolling thunder. The concentrated chakra at the barrels burned as bright as supernovas. Knowing what was coming, the veteran shinobi immediately threw their arms over their eyes.
BOOM! BOOM!
The Chakra Cannons unleashed their payload. Thick, blinding columns of pure energy blasted outward, resembling twenty colossal spears of light piercing the heavens. The beams shifted in iridescent hues, tearing through the air with such catastrophic force that the very fabric of space seemed to warp around them.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The energy spears slammed directly into Sunagakure's frontline defensive wall. The sheer kinetic force of the impact triggered a violent earthquake, violently shaking the entire village.
Bzzzt!
The cannons didn't just fire a single blast; they unleashed a sustained, continuous beam. Twenty rivers of blinding chakra linked the Kumogakure artillery directly to Sunagakure's outer shell. The collective energy of the Cloud Ninja was pouring into the village, meant to overload its defenses and vaporize it into slag.
But the apocalyptic explosion Ay was anticipating never happened.
The Raikage blinked, lowering his arms. "...Huh? What's going on?"
Behind the armored walls, the Sand Shinobi had been waiting.
The initial kinetic impact of the Chakra Cannons had been genuinely terrifying, effortlessly punching through the first few layers of composite plating. But Sunagakure was ready.
"Deploy the absorption puppets!" a commander ordered.
Rows upon rows of specialized mechanical puppets rushed to the breach, throwing their arms wide to physically intercept the raging chakra streams.
The raw heat and energy instantly melted the vanguard of puppets into glowing slag.
But the moment one fell, another stepped over its molten remains to take its place.
Wave after wave of mechanical soldiers were sacrificed, disintegrating into base molecules just to blunt the initial, devastating spike of the artillery strike.
Once the destructive surge leveled out into a steady, manageable beam, the Sand Shinobi deployed their true countermeasures.
"Release the Samehada units!"
From the subterranean tunnels, a dense, skittering swarm of engineered, biomechanical creatures—cloned from the chakra-eating sword Samehada—flooded the impact zones.
Moving like an army of ravenous ants, they latched onto the twenty glowing breaches and began greedily devouring the incoming chakra.
The moment a unit gorged itself to maximum capacity, it scurried back to the village's central grid, violently regurgitating the stolen energy directly into Sunagakure's power reserves.