Chapter 126: The Nine-Tails Breaks the Seal
A deafening explosion ripped through the quiet night, erupting violently at the front gates of the Konoha Orphanage. The shockwave rattled the windows, instantly startling the sleeping children inside.
Fortunately, the orphanage director had just conducted an emergency evacuation drill earlier that afternoon. Jolted awake by the blast, she quickly roused the panicked children, herding them with practiced efficiency down the narrow corridors and into the reinforced underground shelter beneath the facility.
The booming echo of the explosion immediately alerted the village patrol teams, who were already congregating to reinforce the civilian districts.
"Oh no, that came from the Orphanage!"
Kagami Uchiha's brow furrowed into a deep scowl as he pinpointed the source of the smoke billowing into the night sky. He turned to his subordinates, his voice cutting through the rising chaos. "Split off two elite teams and head straight for the Orphanage. You must ensure the absolute safety of those children."
He gestured toward the flickering fires spreading across the lower rooftops. "The rest of you, head to the civilian district for immediate support. focus on evacuating the non-combatants to the designated shelters. Move!"
"Yes, Clan Head!"
Meanwhile, in the very center of Konoha, Stelle leaped lightly onto the highest sloping roof of the Fourth Hokage's residence. The night wind whipped at her haori as she gazed out toward the distant plumes of smoke and the faint flashes of jutsu illuminating the skyline.
It was exactly as she had predicted. These unseen assailants were deliberately creating widespread chaos in the vulnerable civilian sectors and the Orphanage first, all to draw away the bulk of the village's active ninja forces.
However, this level of distraction was far from sufficient. The standard patrol teams and the Uchiha police force were more than capable of handling a few scattered fires and rogue attackers.
A faint rustle of fabric sounded behind her.
"Hokage-sama!" Kakashi Hatake landed silently on the eaves just a few paces away, rising from a crouch.
"The Anbu has already dispatched two full squads to reinforce the areas currently under attack," Kakashi reported, his visible eye scanning the perimeter. "The remaining operatives are on standby, awaiting your direct orders at a moment's notice."
As the Anbu Commander, Kakashi's primary and most critical duty was the absolute protection of the Hokage. He stepped forward, positioning himself slightly ahead of Stelle, his hand resting casually but firmly on the hilt of his short sword in a textbook defensive stance.
Stelle mentally tallied the major ninja clans that had yet to make an appearance on the battlefield. Considering Konoha's current, rather bloated military strength in this era, she genuinely could not fathom how Black Zetsu intended to lure all her heavy hitters away from her side.
Hiruzen and the other veterans hadn't even arrived on the scene yet. Once they did, what could Black Zetsu possibly accomplish? The mastermind wouldn't be able to do a single thing.
Stelle actually felt a twinge of secondhand anxiety for the shadowy manipulator.
'Oh, Black Zetsu, Black Zetsu...'she mused, shaking her head slightly.'I have practically spoon-fed you the perfect opportunity, but you are just completely dropping the ball.'If this was the absolute limit of his grand scheme, it was going to make things incredibly difficult for her. As the peerless, tragic Fourth Hokage of the new generation, she couldn't just suddenly become weak and vulnerable for absolutely no reason. Taking severe battle damage while protecting the village was much more her preferred style for farming emotional reactions.'If you can't even pull a decent pawn out of your sleeve to trade a few flashy blows with me, I might as well just go rogue and start the Fourth Great Ninja War myself,' she thought with a dry inward sigh.
In the distance, a masked Anbu operative materialized on the adjacent rooftop, having just received a fresh transmission.
"Hokage-sama," the operative called out, kneeling respectfully. "The Yamanaka Clan communications division has relayed an urgent message. In the civilian district, an enemy ninja used a highly unorthodox Earth Release technique to summon a massive horde of corpses directly from the ground to fight. Kagami-sama is currently leading a detachment to suppress them."
Corpses crawling out of the dirt to fight using Earth Release... why did that specific scenario sound so incredibly familiar?
Stelle searched her memories, mentally sifting through decades of anime plots. Then, it clicked. Wasn't this the exact same technique used during that one filler arc in the Shippuden era, when those rogue members of the Twelve Guardian Ninja tried to wipe Konoha off the map?
The Daimyo system had been entrenched in this world for countless generations; it wasn't exactly strange for the feudal lords to have a hidden faction of extreme loyalists at their beck and call.
These current invaders were more than likely the predecessors of those very same filler villains. It brought a strange, almost nostalgic sense of familiarity to the chaotic night.
If that was the case, then alongside the zombie horde, they should also be preparing that specific technique.
Stelle tilted her head back, looking up at the dark, overcast sky.
A forbidden secret technique that was never actually successfully performed in the original series, supposedly capable of turning the entirety of Konoha into a barren wasteland in a single strike. A jutsu touted to be even more destructive than a full-powered Almighty Push.
If they were setting up Limelight, then this entire distraction made perfect sense.
Stelle shifted her gaze to Kakashi and smoothly prepared to drop some heavy spoilers under the guise of omniscience.
"According to highly classified Anbu intelligence records," Stelle began, her tone perfectly even and authoritative, "the technique currently being used to summon those corpses is a forbidden combination of Earth Release and specialized corpse soil. It was developed by a radical faction of loyalists secretly trained directly under the Daimyo."
Kakashi tensed, his eye widening slightly at the mention of the Daimyo's involvement.
"However, their most dangerous asset is not the undead," Stelle continued, pacing slowly along the roof tiles. "It is a cooperative Lightning Release technique known as Limelight. It requires four casters to activate it simultaneously from the north, south, east, and west borders of the village. Once triggered, it will instantaneously incinerate everything within that spatial boundary to ash. They must be moving toward their designated cardinal positions right this very moment."
Kakashi felt a deep wave of shock wash over him. He was completely unaware that the Anbu archives contained such terrifyingly specific intelligence, marveling at the Hokage's depth of knowledge.
A ninjutsu capable of erasing Konoha in a single blinding flash. Just how terrifying was the enemy they were facing tonight?
Could it be that these four unknown shinobi, when working in perfect tandem, possessed a destructive output greater than even the Fourth Hokage herself?
If the Daimyo secretly commanded ninjas of such apocalyptic caliber, why had he endured being politically strong-armed and exploited by the Hokage for so long?
As these grim calculations raced through his mind, Kakashi's grip on his blade tightened. He viewed the upcoming skirmish with an entirely new level of deadly caution.
"Hokage-sama," Kakashi said, his voice low and urgent. "Please grant me permission to lead a specialized hunter team to intercept them immediately., I must request the direct combat assistance of the Elder Advisors. If this technique is as fast as you say, I cannot guarantee the simultaneous elimination of all four targets by myself."
Seeing the sheer gravity etched into the young commander's face, Stelle realized he had completely overestimated the threat level.
She didn't know the exact mathematical scaling of Limelight's destructive power, but she knew for an absolute fact that Asuma could easily solo one of those four casters in the future. If Sakumo went out there right now, it would be a literal one-hit kill speedrun.
"Send immediate word to Hiruzen and Danzo," Stelle ordered, waving a hand dismissively. "Have them coordinate with your squads to intercept the targets and complete the mission."
Once Kakashi vanished into the night with a swirl of leaves, Stelle walked along the edge of the eaves. With a few effortless leaps, she ascended to the highest communication tower in the sector.
A light drizzle began to fall from the heavy clouds above. The Land of Fire truly was blessed with incredibly convenient weather patterns.
Just a few days prior, the climate had felt unusually dry, prompting complaints from the agricultural sector about the struggling crops. The village administration had already been drafting requests to hire a dedicated Water Release team to manually irrigate the outer fields.
But tonight, the heavens generously opened up.
She stood perfectly still in the chilling rain. Slowly, her body became enveloped in a brilliant, crackling aura of purple flames. The ethereal fire danced across her skin, instantly vaporizing the raindrops before they could even touch her clothes.
In the pitch-black, rain-swept night, that towering pillar of purple light acted as a blinding beacon. Anyone within miles could pinpoint her exact location with a single glance.
She was practically screaming at the enemy to come and attack her.
However, even this blatant display of vulnerability wasn't enough. If Black Zetsu was truly committed to causing a village-ending disaster, he needed something much louder and far more destructive than a few lightning ninjas. What else could he possibly use to force her hand?
Stelle's glowing eyes slowly drifted toward the heavily guarded forbidden grounds situated directly behind the Uzumaki Clan's sprawling residential territory.
Of course. The Nine-Tails.
He would absolutely target the Nine-Tails.
Just as Stelle suspected, deep within the dense, heavily warded forest bordering the Uzumaki compound, right at the epicenter of the beast's containment zone...
Takei crept through the underbrush, approaching the massive sealing altar step by agonizing step.
When he finally breached the inner perimeter and laid eyes on the colossal, fiery-red Tailed Beast slumbering restlessly within the glowing golden confines of the barrier, a twisted look of sheer anticipation stretched across his face.
What an unfathomably powerful creature. If this complex cage were to be shattered, allowing the Nine-Tails to run rampant through the bustling streets of Konoha, it would be an absolute masterpiece of destruction.
And the Fourth Hokage, regardless of whether her rumored illness was genuine or a political fabrication, would undoubtedly have to pay a catastrophic price to subdue and seal this monster a second time.
He walked right up to the edge of the golden barrier and reached out, tapping the glowing surface with his index finger. A sharp, localized pulse of resistance flared from the seal, violently flicking his hand away and generating a localized pressure field that kept even the falling rainwater suspended in mid-air.
The barrier appeared deceptively simple from a distance, but up close, the interlocking layers of runic formulas were mind-numbingly complex. With Takei's mediocre grasp of sealing jutsu, there was absolutely no way he could unravel it through conventional means.
Fortunately, the Daimyo's deep-cover spy had provided him with the exact counter-formula required to forcefully bypass the Uzumaki locks.
Takei retrieved a heavy, black-inked scroll from his vest. He pressed the unrolled parchment flat against the golden barrier and slammed both hands onto the activation matrix, violently funneling his chakra into the paper.
The jagged black ink on the scroll began to glow with a sickly light, slowly peeling off the parchment and merging directly into the golden runes of the containment field.
It was working. Takei gritted his teeth and pushed his chakra pathways to their absolute limit, increasing the flow.
However, the sheer volume of energy demanded by the counter-formula was astronomical. Takei's face paled, his breathing turning ragged as he was nearly drained dry, his knees buckling just before the final sequence locked into place.
Countless black seal markings swirled violently around the golden dome like a swarm of locusts. When they finally aligned into a precise geometric pattern, a loud, echoing crack rang out through the forest, as if a massive iron vault had just been forced open. The towering golden barrier flickered, dimmed, and then shattered into a million fading sparks of light.
Back in the Uzumaki compound, the remaining sensory ninjas instantly felt the catastrophic shift in the atmosphere. Panic erupted as they abandoned their posts and sprinted madly toward the forbidden forest.
But they were a fraction of a second too late.
They arrived just in time to watch the last remnants of the golden seal vanish into the rainy night. Immediately after, the ground quaked violently as nine colossal, mountainous tails thrashed upward, completely obliterating the surrounding ancient trees.
"Oh no! The Nine-Tails has broken the seal! It's loose!" a guard screamed, his voice cracking with pure terror. "Quickly, send up the red flare! Notify Hokage-sama!"
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