The air froze.
Those battling Senju Hashirama abruptly stopped, all turning toward Jigen with disbelief clouding their expressions.
"Damn it!"
"KILL HIM—SHURA!!!"
Katsumura Yota roared, voice cracking with desperation.
"Activate Shura Mode!!"
This was his hidden trump card—his greatest product of forbidden research.
Katsumura Yota had once studied Kekkei Genkai with Hidan. In fact, many of the strange regenerative properties Hidan displayed had been reverse-engineered by him. But Yota cared little for such arts. His true obsession was the limits of the human body—how far it could evolve.
Only when he hit an insurmountable wall did Jigen enlighten him with Ōtsutsuki knowledge.
From there, Yota began researching Kekkei Genkai, Kekkei Tōta, and even Bloodline Evolution.
But his experiments remained incomplete. As a result, Shura's "Shura Mode" forcibly consumed his life span, prompting Yota to explore cloning and genetic editing to compensate.
When Yota gave the order, Shura let out an earth-shaking roar.
His body began to stretch and distort—bone cracking, flesh twisting—until he towered at nearly ten meters tall.
Three heads and six arms burst forth amid his agonized screams.
Everyone froze in shock.
No one expected this monstrosity to exist.
Shura charged at Hashirama with terrifying speed, shocking considering his colossal size.
His transformation bore a vague resemblance to the Akimichi Clan's multiplication techniques—yet fundamentally, they were incomparable.
The Akimichi enlarged their bodies to raise destructive power, but Shura's strength far surpassed anything their clan could produce.
His blood-red hair faded to a washed-out pale—just like Nagato's after excessive Rinnegan use.
He was burning his life away.
Attacks flooded toward the First Hokage, several containing multiple Kekkei Genkai simultaneously.
The others quickly regained their senses and joined in, unleashing coordinated assaults.
Even Hashirama began to feel pressure under the combined might of everyone at full power.
He finally began to exert his true strength.
Meanwhile—
Jigen, whose heart had just been pierced by Madara, began to undergo a terrifying metamorphosis.
His body was enveloped in a luminous, eerie glow. Strange Ōtsutsuki-shaped runes crawled across his skin like living brands.
Madara observed silently.
"According to future Sasuke's intelligence… this should be the Karma revival."
Once the Karma Seal's host dies, the seal completes its takeover—and Ōtsutsuki Isshiki is resurrected.
But the revival came with a price.
According to the intel, Isshiki would only live for two days.
Simultaneously, the Karma embedded in Kawaki shattered—because once an Ōtsutsuki fully resurrects, all other Karma Seals vanish, leaving Isshiki without a vessel.
This was the perfect chance to kill him.
But was a revived Isshiki truly easy to kill?
Of course not.
In the original timeline, Isshiki had overwhelmed both Naruto and Sasuke and forced Kurama to sacrifice itself. His power defied comprehension. If anything, this Isshiki radiated an even more oppressive aura.
Madara expected Isshiki to clash with him first—
But Isshiki immediately shot toward Kawaki instead.
Faced with mortality, even an Ōtsutsuki chose survival over pride.
Madara was irrelevant in that moment—only a threat to be handled later.
Madara instantly moved to stop him.
A Limbo shadow materialized in Isshiki's path, blocking him.
At the same moment, Madara teleported ahead using Flying Thunder God.
He appeared directly before Isshiki.
Isshiki's brows tightened.
Had someone leaked this secret?
Only a handful of people in the entire world knew of Isshiki's limited revival time.
"So—you intend to stop me? Then you die first."
Isshiki's voice was icy.
Amado Sanzu, who had been watching from the sidelines, quietly slipped away from the battlefield.
Isshiki's revived form radiated far greater power than before.
His strength had risen across all metrics—speed, chakra, durability.
He overwhelmed Madara with apparent ease.
Every technique Madara unleashed—Fire Release, Wood Release, Limbo, Sage Art, Susanoo—
was brushed aside or countered effortlessly.
"Madara!!!"
Hashirama shouted from afar, worry crossing even his battle-hardened features.
He unleashed his full power at last.
A colossal Wood Dragon surged forward, crashing toward Shura.
But Shura seized the Wood Dragon's tail with immense force—
and from one of his hands, a torrent of roaring flames erupted,
racing along the wooden body toward Hashirama.
"No time to waste on you!"
"Wood Release: Deep Forest Emergence!!"
In an instant, colossal trees erupted from the earth, swallowing the battlefield in a raging surge of vegetation.
Using the expanding forest as cover, Senju Hashirama appeared beside Madara and intercepted Isshiki's next strike.
"Madara! Are you alright?" Hashirama asked, voice tense.
Madara wiped the blood trailing from the corner of his mouth and rose slowly, expression firm.
"I'm fine… but this guy's power is completely unfathomable."
His eyes blazed with excitement rather than fear.
The stronger the enemy,
the more thrilled Uchiha Madara became.
At the same moment—
The instant Ōtsutsuki Isshiki revived and his chakra surged through the world, a lone figure on the moon suddenly opened her eyes.
Ōtsutsuki Kaguya.
A familiar chakra signature pierced through space into her senses.
"This presence… Isshiki?"
A subtle tremor went through her body—not of fear toward Isshiki himself, but toward the Ōtsutsuki Clan behind him.
Those who would come if Isshiki fully re-established contact.
Far away, someone else reacted just as sharply.
Naruto Uzumaki.
Even across half the world, that monstrous chakra was impossible to miss.
With his current sensory prowess, Isshiki could hide all he wanted—but once he fought, there was no concealing his existence.
"Tch… that guy Madara. I asked him to locate Isshiki's hiding place, not fight him head-on. Isshiki's not someone you can just rush into."
Naruto grinned, shaking his head.
Then vanished from sight.
At the same time, deep within Sky City, the chakra-detection system began shrieking.
Massive numbers spiked across the display—then flatlined, unable to measure further.
Orochimaru was the first to notice.
He stared at the detector, its screen flickering as the data overflowed.
"This chakra… even more monstrous than a Tailed Beast."
Ōtsutsuki Isshiki's chakra could not be quantified by any system humans had developed.
In recent years, the shinobi world had begun quantifying chakra with standardized measures:
Genin: 1 card
Chūnin: 10 cards
Jōnin: 100 cards
Elite Jōnin: 300 cards
Kage-level: 1,000 cards
Super Kage-level: 10,000 cards
This was the modern baseline.
In the original timeline, Naruto—even while suppressing Kurama—already held hundreds of cards when he first graduated.
By the Fourth Great Ninja War, fully unleashing his power, Naruto's chakra surpassed 10,000 cards easily.
Kurama's chakra itself was on another level entirely—capable of sustaining the entire Allied Shinobi Forces.
Yet even with all that—
Isshiki's chakra far exceeded the scale.
A presence beyond measurement…an existence beyond the system.