"Sage Art: Wood Release: True Several Thousand Hands!"
The moment Shinichi's voice fell, the earth split apart.
With him at the center, the rocky ground around Iwagakure cracked open from within. Layers of stone buckled and rose, as if something buried deep underground was forcing its way out.
Then, under the eyes of the Iwagakure forces, a giant wooden Buddha broke through the mountains and rose into the sky.
It kept rising and rising...
The Wood Human that had towered over the battlefield now looked small before it, while the Flowering Tree World beneath it seemed no different from weeds. Even the Iwagakure army was swallowed by its shadow.
Finally, the giant Buddha stopped at nearly four hundred and fifty meters tall. Its solemn face looked down on the battlefield with half-closed eyes, while countless wooden arms spread behind it in dense layers, blocking out the sky like a vast halo.
For a moment, even the battlefield seemed to fall silent.
Ōnoki looked up until his neck hurt, his face stiff with fear.
Beside him, Kitsuchi stood motionless, Akatsuchi had barely pulled himself from the rubble, and Kurotsuchi looked ready to collapse.
Among the Iwagakure ninja, whether veterans or newly arrived reinforcements, all doubt vanished at that moment. Before something of that scale, courage was meaningless.
Kitsuchi forced himself to recover and looked toward Ōnoki.
"Fa... Father..."
His trembling voice pulled Ōnoki back from the daze.
Ōnoki took a deep breath and looked across the battlefield. He saw the shaken army, the pale faces of Kitsuchi and Kurotsuchi, and the thousand-armed Buddha towering over everything like something from a nightmare.
Could they keep fighting? No. At this point, it would no longer be a battle, only slaughter.
Iwagakure could not be destroyed here. He was the Tsuchikage. Even if he had to bow his head and swallow his pride, he had to find one last chance for the village.
"Wait!"
Ōnoki shouted with all the strength he had left.
Shinichi looked down from atop the giant Buddha. He said nothing, but he did not attack.
Seeing that, Ōnoki endured the sharp pain in his lower back and forced his remaining chakra to move.
"Earth Release: Light-Weight Rock Technique."
His injured body slowly rose into the air. Even now, he tried to preserve the last dignity of a Tsuchikage.
When he rose high enough, he saw the giant Buddha's face more clearly. Above it, Shinichi stood with Sage Mode markings across his face, his expression colder than before.
"Lord Shinichi!"
Ōnoki shouted again.
"We... surrender!"
Those words seemed to drain the last of his strength, but he forced himself to continue.
"Your goal has already been achieved. Iwagakure has seen your power. Soon, the entire Ninja World will know that a new God of Shinobi has appeared."
Every word tasted humiliating, but it was the only way left to keep his village alive.
"So please stop. Iwagakure is willing to sign an alliance treaty with Konoha on any terms you demand!""
After saying that, Ōnoki trembled slightly in the wind. At that moment, he no longer looked like the Ōnoki who had fought through the Second and Third Great Ninja Wars. His ambition and pride had been crushed beneath the shadow of the giant Buddha, leaving only an old man lowering his head so his village could survive.
Below, the Iwagakure army held its breath, all eyes fixed on the top of the giant Buddha. Shinichi looked down at Ōnoki for a moment before speaking.
"Alliance treaty?"
Shinichi repeated the words, and Ōnoki's heart sank.
"It seems, Ōnoki, you still don't understand your position." His voice carried across the battlefield, calm and cold. "I don't need an alliance. What I need is submission."
Ōnoki's face stiffened as Shinichi continued, "Submit to my power. Submit to the coming new era."
For a moment, Ōnoki's mind went blank, and his vision blurred. First, he saw Senju Hashirama in a Hokage hat, smiling brightly. Then the image shifted into Uchiha Madara in red armor, looking down with wild arrogance.
Shinichi, Hashirama, and Madara overlapped in Ōnoki's trembling eyes until he could no longer tell them apart.
Atop the giant Buddha, Shinichi's expression did not change.
Madara had once tried to suppress the Ninja World through fear, only to be stopped by Hashirama. But this era was different.
There was no second Senju Hashirama, and there was no one who could stand beside Shinichi, let alone suppress him.
'Only after seeing the end for themselves will they understand what awe means.'
Shinichi slowly pushed his clasped hands forward.
"So feel it."
His voice rang clearly across the battlefield.
"Thousand-Armed Strike."
The giant Buddha moved, and the countless wooden arms behind it unfolded at the same time before crashing down toward the battlefield below. For an instant, the sky disappeared.
Ōnoki's eyes widened as countless wooden fists filled his vision. Below, Kitsuchi, Kurotsuchi, and the Iwagakure ninja could only stare as the attack came crashing down.
"No...!"
His roar was swallowed by the sound of the strike.
The first wave landed, and the ground shook violently as craters opened one after another.
Iwagakure's fortifications collapsed beneath the wooden fists. Roads, outposts, stone walls, and mountain paths were smashed apart in an instant.
Then came the second wave, the third, and the fourth. The arms fell like a storm, covering the northwest of Iwagakure in a crushing rain of wood and senjutsu chakra.
The surviving Iwagakure ninja scattered in every direction, but there was nowhere to hide from an attack that covered the battlefield itself.
Shinichi stood atop the giant Buddha with his hands still pushed forward. There was no anger on his face and no joy either. He simply watched as everything below was buried beneath the Thousand-Armed Strike.
A surrender spoken before the strike was only fear of death, and that was not enough.
Shinichi wanted Iwagakure, and soon the entire Ninja World, to understand what awaited those who stood against his will.
The Thousand-Armed Strike continued until the battlefield itself had changed shape. Only after the last wooden arm slowly retracted did the roar finally fade.
Dust covered everything, and for a long time, no one could see what had become of the battlefield. Only after the wind began carrying it away did the scene slowly emerge.
The northwest of Iwagakure was no longer recognizable.
The mountain range was gone.
The rocky terrain that had served as Iwagakure's natural barrier had been flattened, along with the roads, outposts, and fortifications built across it. In its place stretched a vast new plain.
Silence returned, heavier than before. Then, from the edges of the plain and the scattered craters, weak cries began to rise.
The surviving Iwagakure ninja stood frozen where they were. Some stared at the missing mountains, some at the giant Buddha, and others at the ground beneath their feet, unable to accept that this was still the Land of Earth. No one spoke of fighting anymore.
Far away, on a mountain peak overlooking the battlefield, White Zetsu stared with his mouth open.
"This is the first time I've ever seen a battle on this scale."
Beside him, Black Zetsu ignored White Zetsu's shock and glanced at the masked figure standing nearby.
"So, Obito... do you have anything to say?"
Obito said nothing. His body was tense, and his Mangekyō Sharingan remained fixed on the flattened battlefield below. Even after the dust began to settle, he did not move.
Seeing this, Black Zetsu felt a trace of satisfaction. This was exactly the effect he wanted.
Only after witnessing power like this would Obito understand the gap between them. Then, he would have no choice but to return to the path of resurrecting Uchiha Madara.
Still, Black Zetsu was not fully satisfied. This alone might not be enough to make Obito abandon his own plans.
Fortunately, he had already found another piece to use.
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