Faced with Shukaku's enormous claw swinging down, Teizawa's expression finally turned solemn for the first time.
But not because of Shukaku.
Because of what he was about to do.
Question: What kind of Kazekage did Sunagakure need most right now?
Answer: Strength.
Everything else was secondary.
At the end of the day, what Sunagakure needed most was a Kazekage with overwhelming power.
Sunagakure, dead last among the Five Great Nations' hidden villages, had suffered defeat after defeat in war.
That had sharply intensified every conflict, inside and out.
Internally, it was factionalism, cliques, and infighting.
Externally, it was loss after loss, and a village gripped by fear.
That was also why, in the original timeline, so many people disliked Gaara and still had to grit their teeth and accept him as the Fifth.
Because Sunagakure had nobody left.
They couldn't exactly drag out Chiyo, who was already on her last legs, and have her do what the Third Hokage Sarutobi Hiruzen did, coming out of retirement for a second round.
And at a time like this, a strong, hardline Kazekage…
Could unify the internal factions and resist foreign threats, giving the civilians peace of mind.
Otherwise, even if Teizawa's coup succeeded…
There was no way he could twist Sunagakure into a single rope in a short time.
Much less make Sunagakure great again.
So what he was doing now…
Was telling Sunagakure that his rise to Kazekage wasn't just what the people wanted.
It was also because he was strong enough.
And what counted as "strong"?
Everyone had their own definition.
But in Teizawa's eyes, the simplest and most brutal method…
Was to stage a violent visual spectacle.
Right now, under the gaze of everyone in Sunagakure—
Teizawa in midair looked as small as an infant before that colossal claw.
The sheer difference between them made everyone's hearts tremble.
But then—
They saw him move.
Teizawa raised both hands, making a lifting motion.
"What is he doing?!" Temari's forehead was slick with sweat. "Idiot, dodge!"
Yeah. What was he doing?
Almost everyone had the same thought at once.
Yet in that razor-thin instant—
Teizawa murmured in a voice only he could hear:
"Let you natives see what a dimensionality drop looks like."
Then, for the first time, he drove Magnet Release (Jiton) at full power and barked:
"Up!"
Boom—
The imagined scene, like swatting a mosquito, didn't happen.
Under countless eyes, Shukaku's massive claw stopped in midair.
Like something had braced it from below.
"What is that?!"
Someone screamed.
"It looks like… a humanoid?"
"Don't joke. What kind of human is that big?!"
No one could explain.
Everyone stared.
Teizawa still hovered in the air.
And in front of him, sand iron began to pile up in dense waves, gathering and condensing into form.
First, right at the point where it was stopping Shukaku's claw—
Pitch-black sand iron instantly hardened into a gigantic, metal-textured hand.
It clamped down, gripping Shukaku's claw tight.
Then came the arm, the torso, the legs, and finally a head gleaming with metallic luster…
It was a mechanical giant whose size actually exceeded Shukaku's.
And it wasn't done yet.
Next, sand iron continued to condense along the giant's back…
In the span of a single breath,
six pairs of cold, inhuman mechanical wings unfolded behind it.
The entire mechanical titan took shape in less than three breaths.
But in that moment, it stole the breath from everyone watching.
"What is this monster?!"
Even Shukaku's shrill roar carried a note of disbelief.
"Hah…"
Teizawa let out a long breath. Staring at his own handiwork, he frowned.
"As expected. At this volume, controlling it is still pretty taxing."
Then his gaze settled on the enormous tanuki in front of him.
"Right now, I can only maintain this state for three minutes."
"But that's more than enough to beat you into a mangy dog."
With that, Teizawa's body dropped.
He landed squarely on the mechanical giant's brow, then sank into it, merging with the construct.
In that instant, Teizawa opened up every sense he had.
Wrapped in sand iron from head to toe, he used the tactile feedback to feel and control every part of the giant through Magnet Release (Jiton).
It was as if this steel titan had become a magnified version of his own body.
Advance, Gundam.
As that thought crossed his mind—
The titan's fist was already rising, and it smashed down on the stunned Shukaku's head.
Boom—
"AAAAAAH…! What the hell are you?! What kind of monster are you?!"
Half of Shukaku's head blew apart on the spot.
It tumbled back, scrambling to create distance, its beady eyes full of terror as it stared at the mechanical horror in front of it.
In Shukaku's thousand-year life as a tailed beast…
It had never seen anything like this.
"Monster?" Teizawa snorted. "Compared to you, you're the monster."
He pressed in.
Rumble—
Thud. Thud. Thud—
In a storm of earthshaking impacts, the brutal aesthetics of fists meeting flesh played out in full.
Fat and clumsy, Shukaku looked like a fresh recruit in front of that giant.
Every attack it tried, even ninjutsu, was useless against the titan.
If you had to describe it…
It was like a fully armed adult beating the living hell out of a stray dog on the roadside.
For a time, Shukaku was reduced to nothing but a punching bag that could only take hits.
Every punch brought another scream.
It was the kind of sound that made your scalp prickle.
"What… what is that?" The scene hit every Sand shinobi like a hammer.
Some of them even found themselves thinking, for one surreal second, that the arrogant tailed beast looked… kind of pitiful.
"Sand iron can… be used like that?"
Baki, who had lived through the Third Kazekage's era and served under the Fourth, wore a face full of disbelief.
Sand iron could be shaped into all kinds of lethal weapons.
Even huge triangular spikes, shields, and slabs…
That was normal.
But this was the first time he'd ever seen someone condense sand iron into a mechanical giant.
And one this massive.
The more sand iron you controlled, the larger the construct, the more chakra it took.
That meant the Third's sand iron, the Fourth's gold dust, and even Gaara's sand all had practical limits in quantity.
But now…
What Teizawa was displaying here—
How much chakra did it take to pull this off?
Baki didn't even want to imagine it.
At this level, even the Third Kazekage, hailed as the strongest Kazekage, couldn't do it.
And Teizawa was what, still young?
This kind of strength at his age…
Baki felt excitement surge up despite himself.
Maybe… maybe this man really could lead Sunagakure to rise again.
"It's real. It's definitely real."
Just then, Kankurō's nervous muttering drifted over.
Temari and Baki both turned to look at him.
"What do you mean 'definitely'?" Temari frowned.
Kankurō seemed not to hear. Staring at that metal-sheened giant, he swallowed hard.
"Puppet Technique (Kugutsu)… it has to be Puppet Technique (Kugutsu)!"
"My god… so that's how you can use it. You can do this too…"
Temari's mouth fell open.
"P-puppet… Puppet Technique (Kugutsu)?"
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