The terror on Ōtsutsuki Graywhite's face—and the desperation from his attempted escape—remained frozen in place, as if time itself had reversed upon his body.
"AAAH—! Mercy! Lord River Crab, have mercy!" Graywhite shrieked, his voice cracking in utter panic.
"I'll never cause trouble in other worlds again! I swear! I'll leave this world immediately—never return! Please—!"
His pleas cut off abruptly.
The colossal claw tightened slightly.
There was no earth-shattering explosion. No blood or gore.
Ōtsutsuki Graywhite—the being who had rendered hundreds of shinobi helpless, who treated them as food—was snapped cleanly in two like a brittle biscuit.
The cross-section was smooth as a mirror. No energy leaked. No life force spilled out. It was as if some supreme law had erased all vitality from his existence in a single instant.
The massive claw casually lifted the two halves and tossed them beneath its shell, into a shadowed mouth unseen.
Two soft swallowing sounds followed.
He was eaten.
Just as Graywhite had casually consumed two shinobi moments before, he too was now devoured—by a far more terrifying existence, with even greater indifference.
Silence fell over the basin.
Every shinobi stared wide-eyed, mouths hanging open, minds blank.
That was it?
Ōtsutsuki Graywhite—so arrogant, so untouchable—was simply… snapped and swallowed by a crab?
The sheer contrast left even Karin stunned, the color draining slightly from her face.
For the first time, she understood clearly what it meant that there is always someone stronger.
Her "Demon Child" credentials?
Before an existence like this, they likely weren't even enough to fill the gaps between its teeth.
Just how powerful was this crab?
And from Graywhite's dying screams… it seemed the Divine River Crab enforced some kind of order—preventing beings from other worlds from running amok?
Was it truly a "Divine Beast," safeguarding balance?
Confusion churned through the crowd—but more than that, instinctive awe and fear toward a higher power.
The colossal crab seemed to have merely finished a trivial snack.
Its compound eyes rotated coldly, ignoring the hundreds of pale, trembling shinobi below as if they were dust.
Then—
Its gaze fell upon Karin.
Every shinobi's heart tightened.
And then, a twisted hope surged within them.
Eat her.
Eat the Demon Child.
Locked under that emotionless gaze, Karin felt the hairs on her body stand on end. A sense of crisis unlike any before enveloped her.
She instinctively took two steps back, fists tightening. Forcing an innocent expression onto her face, she even let her voice tremble slightly.
"I'm just a child…"
To the shinobi's disappointment, the Divine River Crab's gaze lingered on her only briefly—as if confirming something—before shifting away indifferently.
Its vision pierced through rock and sealing barriers alike, as though looking directly at the essence of things.
Finally, it focused on the sealed ground at the center of the basin.
Once more, it raised the same claw that had snapped Graywhite in half.
This time, the motion was even more casual.
It did not damage the rock. It did not disrupt the sealing techniques.
It simply made another light clamping motion toward empty space.
"Woof?"
A confused, slightly startled bark echoed.
Under countless stunned gazes, a glossy-furred, seemingly ordinary yellow dog—its expression blank and bewildered—was plucked straight out of thin air.
Its short legs flailed helplessly in midair.
It was none other than Wangcai—the so-called Natural Enemy of Chakra that had made even Naruto Uzumaki and the others wary in the Heavenly Curtain.
Now it hung powerlessly, lifted like a puppy.
The basin fell silent.
Only Wangcai's faint whimpering and the near-stopped heartbeats of hundreds of shinobi remained.
Dangling in midair, Wangcai paddled his little legs uselessly. His canine face was a portrait of existential confusion.
Wasn't he just napping comfortably at his master's feet?
Why had the world flipped upside down?
And this crab—
It smelled…
Hm?
Not edible?
Before his simple dog brain could process further, a furious shout rang out below—voice cracking with indignation.
"You stupid crab! Give me back my Wangcai!"
Karin's face flushed red. The "pet"—and possibly future underling—she had been eyeing for so long had just been snatched away.
Fear and power gaps be damned.
Killing intent surged.
Black-and-crimson demonic chakra erupted around her. Like an arrow loosed from a bow, she shot upward with reckless force, unleashing everything she could muster.
The black-red energy twisted space itself, radiating destructive waves powerful enough to make every shinobi present despair.
Yet—
The Divine River Crab didn't even blink.
With the back of the same claw that held Wangcai—like swatting away a noisy insect—
It gave a casual flick.
Boom.
A dull thud.
Karin's raging chakra storm shattered instantly, dissipating without leaving so much as a ripple.
Her small body flew backward at even greater speed than her charge—like a tennis ball struck at full force—becoming a streak of black-red light that vanished into the distant horizon.
Only a faint, indignant cry trailed behind her:
"I'll be back—!"
And then even that was swallowed by the wind.
No one knew how far she had been sent flying.
With the noisy "little bug" dealt with, the Divine River Crab appeared to have completed its task.
It did not spare another glance at the ant-like shinobi below.
Nor did it concern itself with Karin's unknown destination.
Holding the still-befuddled Wangcai, spatial ripples once again spread around its mountainous form.
In the next instant—
It vanished.
The colossal shadow.
The innocent dog.
Gone without a trace.
As if it had never appeared at all.
Silence returned to the basin.
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