Chapter 239: Cleaving the Heavens
Uchiha Akira did not stop. His advance was relentless, a force of nature given human form.
The hastily assembled shield wall of Chiyo's puppets, masterpieces of engineering though they were, meant nothing.
Boom!
Akira didn't bother with technique. A single, chakra-infused punch slammed directly into the interlocking barrier of wooden bodies!
Crack! CRACK! CRACK!
The supposedly indestructible puppets, forged from materials harder than steel, shattered like fragile porcelain under the raw, overwhelming force! Splinters flew. Mechanisms popped and died.
Granny Chiyo, manipulating the puppets from afar, cried out as her chakra threads snapped violently. The backlash sent a jolt of pain through her aged, frail body. Her face turned deathly pale!
[Such… monstrous strength!]
"Still not enough."
Akira stood amidst the wreckage, brushing a speck of dust from his pristine Hokage robes.
He looked around, his Rinnegan eyes sweeping over the terrified, scrambling Sunagakure ninja still trying to mount a defense.
He shook his head, a flicker of disappointment in his gaze.
"Your fear... it is still not deep enough. You still cling to hope."
Uchiha Akira slowly brought his hands together, palm to palm, the gesture deceptively simple, almost prayer-like.
"If that's the case..."
His voice dropped, becoming a low, chilling murmur that somehow carried across the chaotic battlefield.
"Then let me show you... what true, absolute despair feels like."
"Wood Release: Deep Forest Emergence!" (木遁・樹海降誕, Mokton: Jukai Kōtan)
RUMBLE RUMBLE RUMBLE—!!!
The very earth beneath Sunagakure began to groan, to scream in violent protest!
Thick, massive tree roots, gnarled and powerful as ancient serpents, suddenly burst upwards from beneath the shifting quicksand foundation of the village! They tore through stone pathways, shattered buildings!
They grew, twisted, coiled, and intertwined at a horrifying speed that defied all natural laws! Trunks thicker than towers shot skyward, blotting out the sun! Branches like grasping claws swept through the streets!
In just a few panicked breaths!
A vast, dense, primeval forest, dark and suffocating, rose violently from the barren desert sand, swallowing the Hidden Sand Village whole!
Countless Sunagakure ninja, caught completely off guard, were ensnared. Entangled by living branches. Crushed by rapidly expanding roots. Impaled by sharpened wooden spikes erupting from the ground!
"Ah ah ah ah!"
"Help!! It's got me!"
"Let me go!! LET ME GO!!"
Screams of terror and agony rose, thick and fast, only to be abruptly choked off as the relentless wood tightened its grip!
In less than a single, horrifying minute.
The entire Hidden Sand Village – its streets, its plazas, its homes – was completely covered, consumed, by this sudden, impossible forest of death.
Thousands of Sunagakure ninja, their limbs broken, their chakra sealed by the wood's absorbing properties, now hung limply from the high branches like grotesque strings of dried fruit. They were alive, but utterly unable to move, stripped of all will and means of resistance.
Only a few powerful Jōnin, along with Rasa, Chiyo, and Ebizō – who had reacted with incredible speed and skill – barely managed to avoid the trees' initial, explosive entanglement.
They gathered together on one of the few remaining clear rooftops, their faces pale masks of utter horror as they witnessed this miraculous, terrifying scene. The complete neutralization of their army in seconds.
"Wood... Wood Release..." Rasa stammered, his eyes wide with disbelief.
"This is... the First Hokage's power..." Ebizō whispered, his usual calm shattered.
Uchiha Akira's figure slowly rose, carried upwards by a growing pillar of wood. He finally landed gracefully atop the tallest, most massive giant tree in the center of the deathly forest, looking down upon the conquered village.
Below him, thousands of Sunagakure ninja hung suspended, like macabre decorations. Only their twisted faces and eyes, filled with extreme, primal fear and utter despair, spoke of the terrifying, living hell they were currently enduring.
Akira looked down at Rasa and the handful of survivors. His voice was calm, almost conversational, yet it echoed with absolute power across the silent, tree-choked village.
"Have you learned how to kneel yet?"
"Ugh… ah… ah… AHHHHHHHH—!!"
Rasa's mind snapped. His eyes turned completely bloodshot. Veins bulged like thick earthworms on his forehead and neck. He let out a raw, guttural, utterly inhuman roar of pure, unadulterated hatred and despair!
"UCHIHA AKIRA!!"
"I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL DRAG YOU TO HELL WITH ME!"
He spun, his eyes wild, locking onto Chiyo, whose face was pale and drawn, her chakra nearly depleted.
"GRANNY CHIYO!"
"Cover me! One last time!"
A trace of fierce, fatalistic determination flashed in Granny Chiyo's cloudy eyes. She understood. This was the end. She nodded heavily, her frail body straightening.
"Lord Kazekage… Go ahead!"
Her voice was surprisingly strong. "This old woman's bones… I'll bury them with you in this sand today! For Suna!"
Chiyo suddenly bit the tip of her tongue. The sharp, metallic tang of blood, the jolt of pain, forced her spirit to rally, to gather the last dregs of her immense chakra reserves.
Her ancient, wrinkled hands flew through seals, faster than they had moved in decades!
"Secret White Technique: Chikamatsu Collection of Ten Puppets!" (白秘技・十機近松の集, Shiro Higi: Jikki Chikamatsu no Shū)
[Inorin's Note: The Chikamatsu Collection is legendary puppeteer Monzaemon Chikamatsu's masterpiece, ten powerful puppets said to have conquered a castle. This technique allows the user to control all ten simultaneously using chakra threads from their fingers.]
With Chiyo's sharp cry, a massive amount of visible, pale blue chakra, completely inconsistent with her withered appearance, erupted from her shriveled body!
The ten damaged, broken puppets scattered around the rooftop, remnants of her earlier failed attack, suddenly spasmed. As if infused with new, desperate life, they staggered back to their feet, joints creaking, chakra threads reattaching!
"GO!" Chiyo screamed, pouring her life force into the command.
The ten puppets transformed into ten blurred white shadows, launching themselves from the rooftop, charging fearlessly, suicidally, towards Uchiha Akira atop the giant tree from all directions!
At the exact same time!
Rasa slammed both his hands onto the rooftop floor!
"Magnet Release: Gold Dust Imperial Funeral!!" (磁遁・砂金大葬, Jiton: Sakin Taisō)
[Inorin's Note: Magnet Release (Jiton) is Rasa's kekkei genkai, allowing him to manipulate Gold Dust. This technique gathers a massive amount of Gold Dust for a large-scale attack.]
RUMBLE—!!
The earth, already ravaged by the Wood Release, vibrated violently again!
Beneath the forest floor, deep within the sands, something moved.
Shining, glittering, golden sand dust surged upwards from beneath the ground, erupting through the roots and soil!
Endless golden sand dust, shimmering like a river of molten gold under the harsh desert sun, shot into the sky! It wasn't just sand; it was heavy, dense, weaponized gold!
Under Rasa's absolute, desperate control, the golden wave coalesced, transformed, rising higher and higher! It became a giant hand, kilometers wide, blotting out the sky, reaching fiercely, unstoppably, towards Uchiha Akira!
This was his ultimate technique! His final gamble! Pouring every last drop of his chakra into one, world-ending blow!
"ALL SUNAGAKURE NINJA WHO CAN STILL MOVE!"
Rasa, even as he controlled the golden apocalypse, used all his remaining strength to issue his final command to the few dozen subordinates below who had fortunately not been completely caught by the Deep Forest Emergence, or had barely managed to break free!
"RETREAT!!"
"GET OUT OF HERE! RUN AS FAR AS YOU CAN!!"
"LEAVE! CARRY THE LAST SPARKS OF SUNAGAKURE WITH YOU!!"
"RUN!!! LIVE!!!"
This was his final act, his final responsibility as Kazekage. To save what little could be saved.
The surviving Sunagakure ninja, hearing the Kazekage's desperate command, first froze in disbelief. Then, tears streamed uncontrollably from their eyes!
"LORD KAZEKAGE!"
"WE WON'T LEAVE!!"
"IF WE DIE, WE DIE TOGETHER!!"
A surviving Jōnin roared, turning back, preparing to charge suicidally towards Akira alongside his Kage.
"GET OUT!!"
Rasa roared without looking back, his focus entirely on his jutsu, on his enemy.
"THIS IS AN ORDER!!"
"THOSE WHO DISOBEY ARE CONSIDERED TRAITORS TO SUNAGAKURE!!"
"TAKE THE VILLAGE'S FUTURE AND LIVE!!"
After speaking, Rasa poured every last shred of his focus, his chakra, his very soul, onto the enemy before him!
The giant golden hand, blotting out the sky, radiating immense heat and pressure, descended with an unstoppable, crushing momentum, grinding trees, rock, and hope into dust in its path!
In the distance, within Konoha's military formation five kilometers away.
Tsunade and Nara Shikaku, along with the other Konoha commanders, looked up at that terrifying, sky-filling golden ocean descending upon their Hokage. All their expressions changed, paling significantly.
"This is… the Fourth Kazekage's Magnet Release..." Tsunade murmured, her fists clenching unconsciously. The sheer scale, the destructive power… it was Kage-level, potentially even beyond.
Her heart tightened with a sudden, sharp worry.
"Akira! Be careful!"
Facing this world-destroying attack, this final, desperate gamble of a dying village…
Uchiha Akira, standing atop the world-tree, merely sneered disdainfully.
"Susanoo."
BOOM—!!!
A terrifying, cosmic surge of chakra suddenly erupted from his form!
Violent, blue-purple energy, like a contained supernova, shot into the sky, tearing through the clouds!
First, the colossal ribs materialized, shattering the upper branches of the giant tree. Then, ethereal flesh and muscle. And finally, the regal, impervious outer armor covering the entire body!
A towering, hundred-meter-tall giant, radiating divine power, rose fully into existence!
Perfect Susanoo descended once more!
Its divine might was like a prison, warping the very air around it!
Before this demonic war god, Rasa's vast golden ocean, his sky-blotting hand, instantly seemed pathetic. Ridiculous. Like a small puddle before a tidal wave.
"This... this is..."
Rasa's entire body trembled violently! His control over the gold dust wavered.
The golden giant hand froze in mid-air, its descent halted by sheer, overwhelming pressure.
"Is this… the Uchiha's Perfect Susanoo?"
"How… How can it be so… powerful?!"
Just as Rasa was momentarily stunned, paralyzed by the sheer difference in scale and power.
The ten secret technique puppets of Chiyo, which had just reached Akira, were utterly, contemptuously smashed into piles of scrap metal and splintered wood by a casual, almost absentminded backhand blow from the Susanoo!
Chiyo coughed up blood, collapsing to her knees as her final chakra threads snapped, her life force extinguished.
Uchiha Akira stood calmly within the diamond-shaped crystal on Susanoo's forehead. He looked down, his Rinnegan impassive, at Rasa, who was now truly nothing more than an ant before him.
He slowly raised his right hand.
The hundred-meter-tall Susanoo simultaneously mirrored the movement, raising its colossal Sword of Kusanagi analogue – a blade of pure, solidified chakra, crackling with black lightning.
There were no superfluous movements. No grand pronouncements.
It was the simplest, most unadorned, vertical slash imaginable.
SCREEECH—!!!
A sound beyond sound. Space itself seemed to tear, to cleave, under the pressure of this single sword stroke!
A terrifying sword wave – a line of pure, focused, annihilating energy, thousands of meters long – swept out horizontally!
Rasa's descending gold dust hand was effortlessly, instantly, split cleanly in two by this impossible sword wave! The gold dust simply ceased to exist where the wave passed.
The sword wave's momentum did not diminish. It continued, unstoppable, and struck the massive, natural rock wall formation behind the Hidden Sand Village! The wall that formed the village's final, ultimate defense!
RUMBLE—!!!
The earth shook violently. Mountains swayed.
The natural barrier, the ancient stone shield that had protected Sunagakure for hundreds of years, was forcefully, cleanly cut through.
A colossal, impossibly deep, perfectly straight chasm was carved through the rock, stretching from one end of the village to the other, vaporizing everything in its path!
The entire Hidden Sand Village, already choked by the deathly forest, was now literally, brutally, split in half by this single, contemptuous sword strike.
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