Chapter 90: The Kirin's Wrath
As the thick, chakra-laced fog enveloped the Senju compound, Senju Tobirama's expression turned grim. This was a nightmare scenario. The mist neutralized the Senju's numerical and tactical advantages, while the Uchiha's Sharingan could pierce through it with ease. The battlefield had instantly tilted in the invaders' favor.
"Wind Release teams, disperse this mist! Now!" Tobirama commanded.
"Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!" a chorus of voices shouted.
Powerful gusts of wind shot upwards, tearing at the fog. They didn't clear it entirely, but they forced the heavy, moisture-laden air high into the sky, where it merged with the already dark, churning clouds created by the earlier clash of fire and water. The atmosphere above the village became a volatile, brooding cauldron of natural energy.
"Perfect," Uchiha Raizen murmured, a predatory gleam in his Sharingan. "Let me give you a proper send-off! Lightning Release: Kirin!"
He knew his individual mastery of this S-rank technique was incomplete. To achieve the necessary scale and power, he needed help.
"Lightning Release: Kirin!" he yelled again, a signal to his team.
Over a dozen Uchiha shinobi with Lightning Nature affinity, who had been positioned around him, immediately formed the same complex hand seals. Their combined chakra surged, a massive conduit for the technique. With Raizen's own monstrous reserves acting as the core, the result was a spectacle of pure terror.
A colossal beast of crackling lightning and thunder took form within the black clouds. It was far larger than any single shinobi could have created, its form shimmering with barely contained destructive power, its roar the sound of a thousand storms.
"All Uchiha forces, retreat five miles! Immediately!" Raizen roared, his hands trembling with the strain of controlling the beast.
Without hesitation, every Uchiha not involved in the jutsu disengaged and fled the area at top speed.
On the ground, Tobirama felt a primal fear. The pressure from the lightning beast was overwhelming, a force of nature made manifest. "Earth Release teams! Multi-Layer Wall!" he screamed.
Massive earthen walls erupted around the central village, layer upon layer. It was the strongest area defense they could muster on such short notice.
"Everyone else, fall back! I'll handle this! Shadow Clone Technique!" Tobirama created a dozen clones, preparing a last-ditch defense.
"Elder Raizen, we leave it to you!" the assisting Uchiha called out, releasing their control over the technique and retreating as ordered.
The strain immediately transferred fully to Raizen. This thing… it's tearing itself apart! I can't hold it! "It's all yours!" he grunted to his eight shadow clones. As one, they took his place, their hands rising to guide the cataclysm. The moment they did, Raizen's real body flickered away, putting as much distance as he could between himself and the impending blast.
One by one, the clones vanished under the feedback of the uncontrollable power.
"Earth Release: One Thousand Flying Needles!" Tobirama and his clones acted in desperation. Countless sharpened stone pillars shot up from the ground across the village, a forest of stone meant to act as lightning rods.
KABOOOOOM!
The Kirin descended.
The world turned white, then deafeningly loud. The multi-layered earth walls shattered like glass under the heavenly strike. The concussive blast and the web of lightning that followed washed over the Senju compound. While the thousand stone pillars successfully diverted and grounded a significant portion of the power, saving countless lives, the devastation was still immense. Hundreds of Senju were struck down, their bodies convulsing or lying still, the air thick with the smell of ozone and scorched earth.
"He actually… used the stone pillars to disperse the lightning's force," Raizen observed from a distance, a grudging respect in his tone. "Impressive."
"Uchiha Raizen!" Tobirama screamed, his voice raw with pain and fury as he looked upon his wounded clan. "I will see what else you have!"
"Not much," Raizen replied calmly, stepping back into view. "Just one more of those."
Thanks to his system reaching Level 8, he now had a one-time, chakra-free use of any SSS-rank ninjutsu, including the Kirin. The cooldown cloud in the sky was irrelevant to his system-granted ability.
"What are you babbling about?!" Tobirama scoffed, though a trickle of dread ran down his spine. "The clouds are gone! You have nothing to power that technique!"
Raizen had to admire him. After seeing the Kirin only once, Tobirama had already deduced its reliance on pre-existing atmospheric conditions. His genius was undeniable.
"Your disbelief doesn't change reality. Lightning Release: Kirin!"
Raizen invoked the technique from his system. Without any gathering clouds, without any hand seals, a second colossal lightning beast materialized directly above the village, its electric roar echoing the first.
Tobirama's face paled. This was impossible. It defied every law of ninjutsu. He knew he might survive, but his clan, already reeling, would be annihilated.
Just as the second Kirin began its descent, a familiar, immense chakra signature bloomed at the edge of the village.
"Wood Style: True Several Thousand Hands!"
A statue of a bodhisattva with a thousand arms, so vast it dwarfed the village, erupted from the ground. And from the statue's summit, a voice thundered, filled with a protective fury Raizen had never heard from him before.
"Wood Style: Lightning Absorption!"
Senju Hashirama had returned.