A secret base located along the eastern coastline of the Land of Lightning.
"Madara, why has the plan turned into this?"
Seeing the appearance of Uchiha Madara under the state of the Impure World Reincarnation, Obito was also completely bewildered.
He had never expected that Konoha would actually have the audacity to resurrect Uchiha Madara—and a Madara in his absolute peak state at that...
"The Kazekage of Sunagakure ruined everything."
Following Obito's explanation, Uchiha Madara gained a general understanding of the friction and scheming between Shiraishi and Akatsuki over the years, as well as the final battle that destroyed the Hidden Rain Village.
Presently, the chakra reserves within the Outer Path Demonic Statue were far from sufficient. Consequently, the number of White Zetsu cultivated was only around twenty thousand.
However, it was still enough to contend with the immediate military situation along the border of the Land of Lightning.
Sunagakure's primary focus was currently directed toward invading the Land of Fire. The individual majorly responsible for the Land of Lightning sector was Nagase Bizen, with Ace acting as the vanguard commander, supported by elite Jonin such as Yamaji Kumtake, Shira,
Compared to the luxurious lineup stationed over on the Land of Fire's end, the offensive forces deployed here appeared slightly thin.
However, by relying on the heavy battleships of Sunagakure's Naval Department and various puppet divisions, their suppression of the Land of Lightning remained exceptionally severe.
The greatest advantage of the Hunter puppets compared to traditional Sunagakure puppets was that they required absolutely no chakra threads for control; they operated entirely via internal regulation through their Reincarnation Cores.
This specific suite of technology originated from the moon's Otsutsuki clan, integrated with an air-vent schematic engineered from the corpses of the Six Paths of Pain, forging a puppet legion that possessed a highly sci-fi aesthetic.
The inherent advantages of White Zetsu could barely be utilized when confronting a massive puppet army. However, they possessed the benefit of immense numbers, which could be considered to have slowed down Sunagakure's aggressive offensive strategy.
As for the Eight-Tails Jinchuriki, his current whereabouts remained unknown. It was glaringly obvious that the Fourth Raikage had decided to protect his younger brother, refusing to let him enter the fray.
The chaotic landscape of the war caused a trace of freezing detachment to surface within Uchiha Madara's gaze.
Obito was left with only a single Rinnegan in his sockets; while this fueled the flames of anger within his heart, it also caused him to begin recalculating his subsequent course of action.
Senju Hashirama and the others had also been resurrected, yet his own faction didn't possess a single Tailed Beast.
The originally promised one hundred thousand White Zetsu were currently reduced to a mere twenty thousand being wasted on the battlefields of the Land of Lightning.
"Yakushi Kabuto, I need you to utilize the Impure World Reincarnation to manufacture even more military assets."
Hearing this directive, Yakushi Kabuto nodded his head smoothly. During his prior tenure lurking within the Root department, Danzo had covertly gathered the cellular tissue of numerous powerful shinobi—including various historical Five Kages from other hidden villages.
Therefore, he was entirely capable of summoning additional combat assets for Madara's utilization.
"Although the Fourth Shinobi World War commencing in this paradigm was entirely outside of our calculations, as long as I, Madara, have returned, the subsequent trajectory of the battlefield will inevitably be dictated by me."
"Is that so?"
A freezing voice suddenly echoed through the chamber as a single individual calmly stepped straight into the Land of Lightning base.
"It's the Mizukage!"
Griping his ruler and clad in full Mizukage attire, Hozuki Kaizuki stepped onto the battlefield out of nowhere. Endless blades of fluid water surged out from all four directions, directly targeting Uchiha Madara's vital points.
Throughout this period, Kirigakure had strictly followed Sunagakure's lead in invading the Land of Lightning. However, as the Mizukage, Hozuki had rarely shown his face in public.
No one had anticipated that the moment he finally surfaced, it would be inside this very base within the Land of Lightning.
"A mere Mizukage... you harbor quite the confidence to stand before my presence?"
Uchiha Madara looked coldly at the oblivious, arrogant Mizukage before his eyes. A powerful, kinetic shockwave abruptly shattered the incoming water blades into absolute mist.
"Confidence?"
Hozuki Kaizuki slowly lifted his head, a specialized Sage Seal mark violently manifesting around both of his eyes.
It was a Sage Mode entirely distinct from Shiraishi's Dragon-Seal Sage Mode; in a fraction of a second, the surrounding water vapor and steam seemed to completely break free from all natural constraints, funneling directly into his immediate perimeter.
Simultaneously in the airspace behind them, a colossal fireball of extreme heat suddenly manifested, condensing beneath the heavens.
"Great Flame Commandment: Flame Emperor!"
Alongside Hozuki Kaizuki, Fire Fist Ace had also materialized on the battlefield. The intensely high-temperature sphere of flame detonated straight down toward the underground facility before his eyes!
Meanwhile, having returned to Sunagakure Village, Shiraishi properly settled Menma Namikaze, whose current psychological state remained slightly unstable.
"In my world, the ultimate annihilation commenced explicitly from the absolute collapse of the Pure Land.
Because the systemic laws and order fell into total imbalance, it ultimately triggered a domino effect of variables, causing the entire world to completely fracture and dissolve into nothingness."
When Menma Namikaze brought up this topic, a look of profound fury and resentment still blanketed his gaze. It was glaringly obvious that the Pure Land had not undergone a natural collapse; rather, it was engineered by deliberate, artificial destruction.
The Pure Land?
Regarding the Pure Land, Shiraishi had previously conducted a degree of academic research into its structural architecture during his deployment of the Impure World Reincarnation.
According to his hypotheses, the existence of the Pure Land was likely a specialized barrier dimension engineered by the Sage of Six Paths to isolate and store the deceased.
The core objective was explicitly to prevent his mother, Otsutsuki Kaguya, from orchestrating a resurrection via the cycle of reincarnation. Thus, he had established this unique sealing barrier.
However, based on what Unohana Retsu had historically mentioned, another distinct possibility was that the underworld or underworld hell of the shinobi continent had ceased to exist due to some ancient cataclysm.
Left with no alternative, the Sage of Six Paths had constructed the Pure Land to serve as a strategic nexus between the living realm and the world of the dead.
The reality that the Impure World Reincarnation could summon historical figures who had passed away ages ago proved everything; their souls had continuously slumbered within the Pure Land rather than entering the standard cycle of reincarnation.
The foundational laws of this world were inherently fractured to begin with; perhaps the entire systemic framework of the Naruto world was simply built upon this paradigm.
Though a multitude of enigmas remained, Shiraishi currently had to rush directly to the frontline battlefields.
Although Kikyo and Unohana Retsu possessed immense combat strength, trying to simultaneously contain four Hokages of Konoha still left them slightly overtaxed—especially considering that powerhouses like Uchiha Itachi, Jiraiya, and Tsunade were also personally anchoring the opposition.
On the main frontline battlefield of Konoha, confronted by the historical God of Shinobi who had once pacified the chaotic era, Kikyo utilized her barrier arts and Sacred Sacred Arrows to lock the First Hokage into an absolute stalemate.
The inherent purification attributes native to a shrine maiden theoretically possessed an instinctual countering efficacy against the Impure World Reincarnation. However, when the opponent sat at a tier as transcendent as Senju Hashirama, traditional purification methods held absolutely zero sway over him.
The combat between Senju Tobirama and Unohana Retsu was exceptionally fierce. Both parties relied on lightning-fast acceleration to launch mutual counteroffensives.
One was a peerless sword master who had historically mastered every blade style under heaven, while the other possessed the absolute authority of the Flying Thunder God speed. The clash between them generated a dizzying, blinding illusion of movement.
However, the longer the battle dragged on, the more alarmed Senju Tobirama became. This woman's innate combat instincts and that torrent of raw, substantial killing intent were something he was encountering for the very first time across his entire life in the shinobi world.
This sheer density of killing intent alone proved that the number of souls who had perished beneath this woman's blade was completely beyond count.
She belonged to the absolute tier of an apocalyptic demon—a reality that stood in absolute, jarring contrast to her previously gentle, refined countenance.
For some inexplicable reason, the disheveled, demonic swordstress before his eyes gave Tobirama a chilling illusion—as if she were a Shinigami emerging directly from the depths of the Avici Hell.
"In that case, Lady Shrine Maiden, you had best watch yourself against this next technique."
Senju Hashirama clapped his palms together firmly. In an instant, his internal chakra reserves erupted and surged outward like a cataclysmic tidal wave.
Wood Style: Shinsu Senju Veritable Thousand Hands!
Conventional Wood Style techniques had already proven entirely useless against the shrine maiden. Consequently, Senju Hashirama directly resorted to a definitive killing art of this magnitude.
Within a fraction of a second, the Wood Style materialized into thousands of colossal wooden arms that plummeted downward with apocalyptic momentum.
The destructive capacity of this move was gargantuan; during the battle at the Valley of the End, Hashirama had utilized this exact jutsu to violently shatter the armor of Madara's Majestic Attire: Susanoo.
The immense collateral damage generated by the clash had physically carved out the Valley of the End itself.
Confronted by Senju Hashirama's definitive absolute strike, Kikyo gripped her arrow tightly. Faced with the full kinetic impact of the God of Shinobi's ultimate move, she felt a profound weight of pressure surface for the very first time.
Right at that exact millisecond, a voice abruptly resonated across the entire expanse of the battlefield:
"Sage Seal of the Ancient Crane!"
A colossal, radiant blue-bird sage seal ascended majestically into the high atmosphere, transforming into a brilliant, crystalline water-flow defensive membrane.
Following the wake of a violently explosive detonation, Senju Hashirama let out a cheerful, hearty laugh: "Haha! To be able to smoothly intercept a strike of this caliber...
it looks like you are the absolute strongest existence within the current shinobi world. For Sunagakure to produce a junior of your tier is truly admirable."
Shiraishi Aoki...
Namikaze Minato, who had been conducting high-mobility tactical support along the flanks, utilized Body Flicker to materialize at the rear, his gaze locking dead-on onto the lone figure suspended in mid-air...
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