ROAR!
Not far away, a ferocious beast's roar echoed as the shimmering silver cloud of scale powder finally dispersed, revealing the scene within. Everyone still present turned their heads sharply. Jizo and the Seven-Tails Jinchuriki, Yuito, had separated.
Jizo stood quietly, sword held loosely in one hand. He didn't appear significantly injured.
Across from him, however, the chakra cloak enveloping Yuito pulsed with even greater intensity. Three tails composed of churning, blood-red chakra now lashed violently behind him. And beside the third, a smaller fourth tail was rapidly coalescing. Soon, it solidified completely.
Yuito's Jinchuriki transformation was deepening. Waves of oppressive red chakra radiated outwards from his body, pressing down on the surroundings.
"It's the Jinchuriki!" Seeing Yuito's terrifying state, the three remaining Hozuki Castle prisoners scrambled backward hastily.
Whoosh!
With four tails now fully formed, Yuito vanished from his spot, reappearing instantly as he charged Jizo once more. As his transformation deepened, his power surged exponentially.
BOOM!
A violent explosion erupted where Jizo had been standing. The Jinchuriki's raw strength had gouged a massive crater in the earth.
Jizo reappeared a short distance away. Before he could react further, Yuito was upon him again. Jizo's expression tightened as he flickered away again to evade. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The two figures blurred across the battlefield, their high-speed clashes leaving a trail of devastating impacts and sonic booms in their wake.
Witnessing the sheer destructive intensity of their fight, everyone else retreated further, their faces pale with shock. The scale of this battle was simply overwhelming! They couldn't possibly hope to intervene in a clash like this.
Glancing towards Tatsuya and Pakura, who had also moved back, both Inoue and Suien felt a crushing weight in their chests. Any hope of victory seemed to have vanished. Their only remaining chance rested entirely on the Seven-Tails Jinchuriki, Yuito.
CRUNCH!
Another sickening impact rang out. Jizo was sent flying by a direct punch from Yuito, crashing into the ground hard enough to create yet another crater. Brushing dust from his clothes, a slightly paler Jizo climbed to his feet. His right arm hung at an unnatural angle; Yuito's blow had nearly snapped it clean off. This time, Jizo was clearly on the losing end.
Hahh... Jizo took a deep, steadying breath, his expression hardening as he assessed the further transformed Jinchuriki across from him.
Fwish. With a whisper of displaced air, Tatsuya appeared at Jizo's side.
"Alright," Tatsuya said calmly. "Time to go all out."
"Are you certain?" Jizo asked, a hint of confusion in his voice. "If we do that, the secret of the Mangekyo Sharingan will be exposed, won't it?" Although they were original body and clone, their thoughts weren't perfectly synchronized at all times. Exposing the Mangekyo Sharingan hadn't been part of Tatsuya's original plan.
"We're past worrying about that now," Tatsuya replied. "Against a Jinchuriki running wild like this, only your Mangekyo Sharingan—or my direct intervention—stands a chance of suppression." He shrugged slightly. "Besides, I'm quite curious myself to see just how much power those eyes can truly wield, enhanced as they are by the Hashirama cells within your body." As he finished speaking, an undeniable spark of intense curiosity—almost fervor—ignited in Tatsuya's eyes.
"Understood," Jizo replied simply.
FWOOSH!
Instantly, the three tomoe in Jizo's eyes began to spin violently, blurring and merging into the distinct straight-tomoe pattern of Uchiha Teru's Mangekyo Sharingan. Simultaneously, an immense surge of vibrant, sky-blue chakra erupted and began coalescing around him.
Ribs formed first, followed by ethereal musculature and glowing energy pathways. Then, pieces of black, bird-like armor—Karasu Tengu armor—snapped into place over the spectral form. Finally, a massive, sky-blue chakra blade materialized in the giant's hand.
Within moments, a colossal, sky-blue humanoid figure stood upon the battlefield, clad in Tengu armor and wielding the enormous chakra sword: the Susanoo.
Encased within the crystalline structure at the giant's brow, Tatsuya and Jizo stood side-by-side. Tatsuya placed his right hand lightly on Jizo's back, steadily channeling his own chakra into the clone. Jizo's modified body couldn't generate sufficient chakra on its own; to manifest and sustain the Susanoo at its peak, a continuous supply from Tatsuya was necessary. Together, they had manifested the Susanoo's fourth—the armored—form.
"What... what is that?"
"Is that... the power of a god?"
Watching the titanic Susanoo materialize, Inoue, Suien, Muko, and the few remaining fighters were utterly stunned, frozen in disbelief. This divine power, capable of shattering any conventional battle balance, was far beyond anything an ordinary shinobi could ever hope to confront.
"RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!" Farther away, the rogue ninja who had paused to spectate instantly broke into a terrified sprint, fleeing without a second thought. In the ninja world, aside from a legendary, fleeting glimpse attributed to Shisui Uchiha during a battle in the Land of Hot Water, the mythical power of the Susanoo hadn't truly manifested before the eyes of the world in a very long time.
Yuito, now manifesting four tails, felt an overwhelming sense of danger emanating from the Susanoo. Even more potent red chakra boiled furiously from his body. Behind him, a fifth tail began to take shape. Simultaneously, a sphere of dense, swirling purple-black chakra—a Tailed Beast Ball—rapidly condensed before his maw.
Several meters across, the unstable sphere launched forward with terrifying speed, streaking directly towards the sky-blue Susanoo.
BOOOOM!
The night sky ignited with blinding light. A deafening explosion ripped through the air, and a massive mushroom cloud billowed upwards, the shockwave flattening nearby trees.
"Such destructive power..." Pakura whispered, her expression deeply serious as she shielded her eyes from the blast. Facing an attack of that magnitude head-on... she knew she wouldn't stand a chance.
"Big Brother Tatsuya!" High on the walls of Ansei Hall, Guren watched, her face etched with worry.
A gentle breeze stirred the air, gradually clearing the smoke and dust. Everyone stared intently. The colossal form of the Susanoo stood revealed—seemingly pushed back only a couple of steps by the blast, its ethereal armor unscratched.
"It... it took it?" Seeing the Susanoo standing virtually unharmed, expressions of stunned disbelief spread across the faces of the onlookers.
"So this is the true power of the Uchiha...?" one of the remaining Hozuki Castle prisoners breathed in awe.
Hahh! Having weathered the Tailed Beast Ball, Jizo directed the Susanoo. It drew its immense chakra blade. The sword, easily over ten meters long, swung down in a devastating horizontal arc. Yuito, in his Tailed Beast form, narrowly dodged the blow. CRACK! RUMBLE! The sword carved a long, deep scar into the earth where he had just been.
The Susanoo advanced, relentlessly pursuing Yuito, its massive blade swinging again and again. Yuito desperately evaded, firing off more Tailed Beast Balls, each one exploding against the Susanoo's nigh-impenetrable defenses. Their clash had escalated far beyond the realm of conventional shinobi warfare, becoming a battle between monsters.
RUMBLE... BOOM! Outside Ansei Hall, the ground shook violently and repeatedly as the sounds of cataclysmic impacts and explosions filled the night.
"We're leaving," Inoue finally said after several minutes of silent, horrified observation. His voice was heavy with resignation. "Ansei Hall... it's beyond our reach."
Faced with the Susanoo, which seemed like a veritable god of war, Inoue, Muko, and the handful of survivors knew they were utterly powerless. Even if all ten remaining Kusagakure shinobi charged together, they'd likely be cut down in a single sweep. Any thought of sneaking past the battle to infiltrate Ansei Hall for the formula and medics was now unthinkable suicide. It was painfully clear from the ongoing fight that Takigakure's Jinchuriki, Yuito, was being overwhelmed. Any rash move would likely draw the Susanoo's immediate attention, and that would mean certain death.
Muko remained silent, offering no objection. After witnessing Jizo's power, and now this... any alternative plans had evaporated. Besides, their Hozuki Castle contingent had been coerced into this fight from the start; they had no loyalty here.
Nearby, Takigakure's Suien also said nothing, though bitter resentment welled up inside him. Survival came first. He had to escape. As for Yuito... he was on his own now. May fortune favor him.
And so, as the destructive chase between the armored giant and the Tailed Beast continued to scar the landscape, Inoue, Suien, Muko, and the last remnants of their force vanished into the night, following the panicked retreat of the rogue ninja.
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