Nagato forced the Deva Path to take everything.
He drew the chakra and strength of the other five Paths into that single body until the air itself thickened, until even the battlefield seemed to hesitate - as though the world understood that one more step would push it past the point of no return.
Then he released his final trump card.
"Chibaku Tensei (Planetary Devastation)!!!"
But he didn't cast it to seize the sudden jinchūriki who had appeared on the battlefield.
He cast it for one reason only -
Chiba.
Nagato had accepted the truth: as long as Chiba stood, nothing else mattered. It didn't matter how many jinchūriki he captured, how many shinobi fell, or how much blood soaked Turtle Island. Chiba would never sit back and watch his plan unfold.
If Chiba lived, Nagato's dream died.
So he aimed the weight of a newborn "moon" at the man who had shattered every certainty he believed in.
A low roar rolled across the sky.
From the Deva Path's palm, a black sphere formed - small at first, like a seed of darkness. It rose into the air and seemed to swallow the sun's brilliance, dimming the light around it.
Then the pull began.
Gravity exploded outward, as if the world had been seized by an unseen hand.
Turtle Island trembled. The ground cracked - and then tore free. Soil, stone, roots, trees… everything that had clung to the island's shell for years was ripped up in an instant and dragged skyward. Entire slabs flipped as if the land itself were being turned inside out.
This was gravity control taken to its extreme.
The ultimate expression of Banshō Ten'in (Universal Pull) - Chibaku Tensei (Planetary Devastation). Not a simple attraction technique, but a catastrophic law forced onto reality, gathering the world into a single point.
And it wasn't indiscriminate.
Its core was chosen.
The center of that terrifying pull - its heart - hung directly above Chiba.
For a moment, the entire battlefield stopped.
Shinobi who had been screaming and clashing went silent, stunned by what they were witnessing. A man bearing the Rinnegan - the Sage of Six Paths' divine eye - had created a miniature singularity with a gesture. Akatsuki's leader had finally revealed the kind of power that made people whisper the word god.
Jiraiya's breath caught. Even he - who understood too much - couldn't hide his shock.
The jinchūriki, the allied elites, even Akatsuki's own members… most of them had never seen Pain go this far.
Fear became motion.
People fled, scrambling out of the technique's range. It was aimed at Chiba, but its scale was monstrous. Those too close were swallowed. Some didn't even have time to resist before they were yanked into the air and buried under collapsing layers of earth and rock.
Kabuto's Edo Tensei army suffered the most.
They lacked will. They lacked instinct. They lacked the freedom to react like living soldiers. They were dragged upward in droves, pinned under crushing layers of stone - sealed away by the very technique meant to kill Chiba.
Kabuto's face twisted with rage as he forced his strongest "pieces" to retreat, salvaging whatever he could.
The Allied Shinobi Forces pulled back as well. The jinchūriki kept their distance, refusing to approach the black sphere's domain. The battlefield split naturally - Chiba and Pain's clash isolated at the center, far enough away that the strongest could still escape if they moved fast.
But at the core -
Chiba was taken first.
The ground beneath him shattered into a massive slab and flipped upward, dragged into the sky like a page torn from the world. Stone, soil, and debris surged around him, and his body followed - pulled forward by an irresistible force.
A heavy dread spread through the allied ranks.
Miru's expression snapped into panic. Utakata's eyes narrowed.
"Mizukage-sama!" Miru cried, her voice breaking.
Yet Kisame Hoshigaki and Hōzuki Mangetsu only exchanged a faint, confident smile. They didn't mock the fear.
They simply believed.
They had seen Chiba do the impossible too many times.
Nagato clenched his hands and roared, pouring everything into the technique -
even his life.
Chakra flared violently - burning, consuming, forcing Chibaku Tensei to tighten and swell. More land tore free. More forest ripped upward. The forming sphere thickened until Chiba vanished completely beneath crushing layers of stone.
For a heartbeat, it looked absolute.
As if gravity itself had finally won.
Miru screamed again, throat raw. "Mizukage-sama!!!"
Faces across the battlefield drained of color.
Then -
Chiba moved.
And the world saw something it didn't have words for.
From within the forming sphere, an icy pressure erupted - controlled, absolute. Chiba raised a hand, and his Devil Fruit power surged to its highest refinement.
Freeze Space.
Reality hardened.
The space around the black core turned into translucent, ancient ice - so perfect and so complete it looked like the sky itself had been sealed. For a fraction of a second, the pull of that miniature gravity core stuttered…
as if gravity had been frozen.
The mass faltered.
The pull weakened.
Pain's Deva Path widened his eyes in shock.
But Chiba didn't stop. Not even close.
He flowed into Ryūchidō Sage Mode, and natural energy surged toward him as if the island itself were being forced to bow. Then he unleashed Ryūchidō's pinnacle secret art.
"Senpō: Karyū no Jutsu (Sage Art: Transforming Dragon Technique)!!!"
A colossal dragon formed from sage chakra, roaring as it lunged toward the frozen core like a divine spear.
Then Chiba's Mangekyō flared - power stacking, interlocking, sharpening into something monstrous. Five Mangekyō fused into a single, terrifying intensity, supported by Hashirama's cells, pushing dōjutsu output beyond what felt human.
"Susanoo… Kagutsuchi: Yasaka no Magatama!!!"
Black-flame magatama - shaped by Kagutsuchi and burning with Amaterasu - hammered forward in chained volleys, each one a projectile of inextinguishable darkness.
And then came the final weight.
Chiba drew on the power he had gained by fusing the miniature God Tree within himself - the force of a Jūbi jinchūriki compressed into a bomb like a bijū-dama.
A miniature Jūbi bijū-dama.
Smaller than the true Jūbi in scale, yes - but in density and essence, it carried the same terror.
It launched straight into the frozen heart of Chibaku Tensei.
In that instant, the sequence became brutally clear:
Freeze Space could hold gravity still for barely a second.
And in that single second, Chiba fired everything.
Senpō: Karyū no Jutsu.
Susanoo… Kagutsuchi: Yasaka no Magatama.
And the miniature Jūbi bijū-dama.
All at once.
All aimed at the same point.
The sky shattered.
A catastrophic explosion detonated, swallowing the heavens in light and shadow. The roar that followed wasn't merely loud - it was world-crushing. Turtle Island shook as if struck by a god's hammer, and the shockwave rolled across the ocean for hundreds upon hundreds of kilometers.
The flash was so intense many shinobi couldn't open their eyes. Those who stared too long screamed as their vision burned.
The air became a cyclone - an advancing wall of pressure that ripped smoke apart and hurled debris toward the sea. The ground below cracked, collapsed, and caved in, and even the massive turtle beneath the island's shell trembled, its colossal body swaying under the impact.
Chibaku Tensei broke.
Instantly.
Completely.
The gravity core was destroyed, the forming sphere blasted apart, and the sky rained rock and dust like fragments of a shattered moon.
Far away, hidden beyond Turtle Island, Nagato's true body convulsed.
The recoil slammed through him. His chest seized as blood burst from his mouth in heavy sprays. His vision blurred. His limbs felt hollow, as if his life had been wrung out to fuel that final technique.
He realized - too late - that he had burned nearly everything.
When the roar faded, the battlefield fell into stunned silence.
Pain's power had already been terrifying - beyond ordinary shinobi, beyond what even Jiraiya could proudly stand beside.
But compared to Chiba -
Pain looked small.
In a single breath, Chiba had stacked abilities that could each define a legend: Freeze Space, Ryūchidō senjutsu, Mangekyō dōjutsu at an absurd level, and bijū-class destructive force. Any shinobi who possessed even one of those powers would be feared as a top-tier monster.
Chiba wielded them all like breathing.
Like taking a quiet stroll.
The Allied Shinobi Forces stared at their Mizukage with awe that bordered on worship.
Akatsuki's members went pale, as if death itself had stepped onto the battlefield wearing a calm smile.
Their leader's final, all-or-nothing killing move had been crushed - cleanly and decisively.
If even that failed…
Was Chiba truly invincible?
Pain's Deva Path stared up at the shattered remains of Chibaku Tensei, and for the first time, despair bled openly through his expression. The chakra of the other Paths had been drained. The technique had consumed what little remained.
He was empty.
Weak.
Almost powerless.
Then Chiba appeared before him - as if distance didn't exist.
"So that was your last strength," Chiba said quietly. "Pain."
The Deva Path released a long breath. "Yes… it was."
Then, unexpectedly, his tone softened into acknowledgement.
"Mizukage-sama… you truly are the strongest in the shinobi world."
"Even with the Rinnegan… I can't match you."
"It seems this battle is yours."
Chiba's smile was faint, thoughtful. "You're right. Everyone chooses their road. In the end, the shinobi world doesn't belong to ideals - it belongs to the one with the strength to carry their will through."
His gaze sharpened. "You've lost. So the future can only rest in my hands."
Pain nodded. "Agreed."
"My path failed. From here… the shinobi world is yours."
"I understand," Chiba replied.
He stepped closer and reached out.
But even now, Pain refused to surrender completely.
A black receiver rod snapped into the Deva Path's hand, and he thrust it forward in a last, desperate strike.
Chiba caught it -
and allowed it to pierce his palm.
Pain's eyes widened. "You - ?!"
Chiba didn't answer.
He closed his fingers around the rod and let Ryūchidō senjutsu flood his senses. Through the receiver's chakra connection, he traced the signal backward - following it like a thread through darkness, straight to the true body.
Far away, hidden beyond Turtle Island, Nagato's body stiffened.
He felt it.
A gaze locking onto him with terrifying certainty - like a hunter finding the heart.
Nagato's thoughts turned cold.
Using the receiver to trace me… with senjutsu perception.
So he really does know everything about the Rinnegan and Pain.
Chiba's smile returned - thin, calm.
"Next… I'm coming for you."
He pulled the black rod from his own palm -
and drove it into the Deva Path's chest.
The body went limp, collapsing like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
The battlefield held its breath.
Then reality settled.
Pain's Six Paths -
were wiped out.
Chiba had won the decisive battle of Turtle Island.
And as dust drifted down and the sea wind carried away the last echoes of that godlike explosion, one conclusion became inevitable:
Chiba would go to Nagato's true body, end everything at the source -
and take the Rinnegan.
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