The moment the words left his mouth, Uchiha Kai's figure blurred once more.
Shhk—shhk—shhk!
Three sharp directional shifts completed in an instant. Behind him, three fully solid afterimages appeared—tinted faintly purple, crackling with traces of lightning.
Phase Rush.
A short-range spatial dash that allowed him to freely return to any one of the afterimages.
Unpredictable. Untraceable.
Pure misdirection.
For the first time, the mechanical eye within Asura Path faltered.
It stared at the four figures in front of it, processors stalling.
Which one was real?
Which one should be targeted?
If it carpet-bombed everything, would the damage even be enough?
The hesitation lasted less than a heartbeat.
But for a fight at this level, that was already fatal.
Pff—pff!
The overcharged weapon systems let out a distorted whine, energy reaching critical instability.
In the same one-thousandth of a second—
Kai was already behind him.
No flourish. No wasted movement.
His right hand, wrapped in Nine-Tails chakra, plunged straight through the mechanical spine.
Crack—crack-crack!
With a brutal twist, internal components were ripped free, scattering across the ground.
BOOOOOOM!!!
Asura Path's body detonated from within.
Blinding light erupted, followed by a storm of molten fragments and shattered metal spraying in every direction.
When the smoke cleared, only a scorched crater remained.
Drip.
Drip.
The rain, which had unknowingly paused, finally began to fall again.
No one spoke.
No one breathed.
Every gaze was locked upward, necks craned so stiff they ached, eyes stretched wide to the brink of tearing.
Five Paths.
Five Paths of Pain—erased.
Instantly.
From initiation to conclusion, it was so fast that most of them hadn't even seen the process.
The battlefield was dead silent.
Gulp.
In the muddy water, Kisame swallowed unconsciously, fingers digging into the ground just to stop himself from making a sound.
His shark-like eyes were stretched wide, filled with nothing but terror and confusion.
What… just happened?
The leader of Akatsuki.
The Six Paths of Pain.
Five of them—gone.
Those were gods.
Untouchable gods wielding the Rinnegan.
Yet now…
The world had quietly transformed into something he no longer understood.
After a brief hesitation, Kisame relaxed completely.
He let the mud wash over him.
For realism's sake, he even sank himself deeper, letting sludge cover his body until not even his bandaged sword was visible.
If monsters were fighting monsters, the smartest move was to pretend to be dead.
Nearby, Itachi pressed a hand to his chest.
The shock in his Mangekyō had yet to fade.
Fast.
Too fast.
Kai's movements were beyond what even his eyes could properly track.
Not even the Mangekyō could fully follow it—only fragmented shadows remained.
And that familiar ability…
The one so disturbingly similar to the masked man's—
It left him silent.
Kai has already stepped into a realm I can't comprehend…
A strange thought surfaced in his mind.
Even if Shisui and I fought together at our peak… could we really compare?
His lips curved into a faint, bitter smile.
"So that's it… all those questions he used to ask me weren't curiosity."
"They were mercy."
At least this way…
Sasuke would have someone watching over him.
Beside him, Jiraiya tried to rub his face, only to poke himself in the eye.
The oil paint on his face had long since smeared into a mess.
At this point, he looked less like a legendary Sannin and more like a dazed clown with bulging frog eyes.
As for summoning the two Great Toad Sages?
Forget it.
Even if the Great Toad Sage himself came, it probably wouldn't matter.
Just a single Rinnegan-summoned Hellhound had pushed him this far.
And the kid above?
He wiped out five Paths in seconds.
"…Is that brat really ten years old?"
In the end, Jiraiya swallowed hard and made up his mind.
Once he got back to Konoha, he would personally convince that old man to step down.
Five Rinnegan eyes had been slapped aside like flies.
If Kai ever wanted the Hokage seat, it wouldn't take more than a finger.
"Mo-mo-monster… he's definitely a monster…"
From the pig-plant submerged in the mud, White Zetsu's voice trembled.
But Black Zetsu said nothing.
The dark half of his face was heavy with an emotion he hadn't felt in centuries.
Unease.
Could he really revive Mother…
in a world where someone like this existed?
The thought made his mind waver.
Then, suddenly—
A mad, echoing laugh surfaced in his consciousness.
Uchiha Madara.
"Yes… only Madara can oppose him!"
"Looks like the plan needs to speed up."
Black Zetsu's eyes flicked around restlessly.
Above the battlefield, Konan hovered in midair, her paper wings frozen in place.
Her pupils had shrunk to pinpoints.
Reflected within them was that youthful figure standing amidst ruin—half god, half demon.
For the first time since adulthood…
She felt genuine fear.
"Na… Nagato's Six Paths… reduced to this?"
"Is this really something a human can do?"
Her gaze sharpened.
"And that time-space technique… no—"
Her brows furrowed.
"…Why does it look so similar to the masked man's?"
Far away.
More than ten kilometers from the battlefield.
Inside a dark, damp cave—
"PFF—!"
Nagato suddenly spewed a mouthful of blood.
Dark, almost black, it splattered across the stone floor.
His already skeletal body turned even paler.
But he ignored it.
For the first time in over a decade, something unmistakably human appeared in his Rinnegan.
Shock.
Then hesitation.
Then rage.
"Cough… cough…"
"Even at fifty percent control, the Six Paths should crush any Kage…"
Another mouthful of blood spilled out before his breathing steadied.
Five Paths destroyed.
The backlash alone was enough to tear his body apart.
But as he recalled those distorted spatial vortices, Nagato wiped the blood from his lips, eyes darkening.
"That ability…"
"It comes from the same source as 'Madara's,' doesn't it?"
He lifted his gaze into the darkness.
"Uchiha Madara…"
"I need an explanation."
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