"Oi, Kirigakure—nothing needs to be said for our village! That man is our First Mizukage!"
Kisame glanced toward the Iwagakure and Kumogakure positions, a savage grin spreading across his shark-like face. "It's not their turn yet! Let them see the loyalty of the new Kirigakure to the Mizukage!"
"Well said for such a big brute…" Jinzaburo cast Kisame an unexpected look, then broke into a vicious smile. "But you're right! Our Kirigakure will always be Kazuki-sama's strongest arm of support!"
All of Kirigakure's shinobi poured their chakra into Kazuki.
And nearby, the revived Second Mizukage, Hōzuki Gengetsu, could only twitch his small mustache in exasperation at hearing the younger generation of his village call Kazuki the First Mizukage.
But after a moment's thought, he sighed, shrugged helplessly, and joined the ranks as well.
New Kirigakure, old Kirigakure—
Such distinctions no longer mattered. After hearing of the "Blood Mist Village" that would have arisen in a shinobi world without Kazuki, Gengetsu could only feel deep gratitude that his village had once been tied by fate to him.
And in the other hidden villages—Sunagakure, Amegakure—similar scenes unfolded.
Everyone chose to support Kazuki!
"How can we let outsiders charge ahead of us?" Shisui's eyes spilled with tears of blood. Seeing his brother open the Death Gate to face the enemy, his heart felt torn apart.
"Shisui, Duy, Tsunade!"
Senju Tobirama's roar cut through the battlefield with commanding force: "Duy, open the Eight Gates Formation! Shisui, extend your ocular jutsu across the entire shinobi alliance! Tsunade, use the Strength of a Hundred Technique to regulate and channel as much chakra to Kazuki as possible!"
"It isn't just Kazuki who will open the Death Gate—none of us have any retreat left! We must make that damned Ōtsutsuki Myōshiki witness the power of the entire shinobi world blazing to life!"
Might Duy's figure shot forward like lightning, placing himself at the vanguard. He took the lead in opening the Eight Gates—all the way to the Death Gate!
Right behind him, Might Guy appeared like his shadow, father and son together unleashing the Death Gate!
"Everyone—unleash all your potential with me, and give everything to support our savior!" Shisui's voice carried both fury and grief, his words choked with sobs as blood poured from his eyes like a river.
Those in the shinobi world who could not use the Eight Gates Formation—
Once they willingly accepted Shisui's ocular jutsu, they too entered an alternate state akin to the Death Gate, burning themselves to fuel Kazuki!
Tsunade's body was entwined with the dark markings of the Strength of a Hundred Technique. Her teeth clenched tight as her eyes locked unshakably on Kazuki.
The Sage of Six Paths and his younger brother, Ōtsutsuki Hamura, exchanged a glance. In each other's eyes they saw the same resolution.
As the so-called former guardians of the shinobi world—
The moment Kazuki opened the Death Gate without a word, both of them had already prepared themselves to risk their lives fighting by his side!
At this moment—
All living beings of the shinobi world, from the Five Great Villages to the smaller hidden villages, from the Three Great Sage Regions to the Nine Tailed Beasts and the two sages, were driven into a state close to the Death Gate, giving everything they had to empower Kazuki's all-out gamble!
Kazuki felt the power within him surge madly upward. From the corners of his golden eyes, two trails of blood-red tears slid slowly down.
Dojutsu: Kagutsuhane!
Dojutsu: Kanayano!
After opening the Death Gate, Kazuki overdrew his life force a second time, massively amplifying his physical strength.
"This… Kazuki has no intention of surviving this, does he?" Senju Tobirama's brows furrowed tightly.
He truly feared that even if Kazuki defeated Myōshiki, he would die afterward!
"Tobirama, everything will depend on you!" At that moment, Kazuki's voice suddenly rang out within Tobirama's mind.
"Besides Myōshiki, there is another Ōtsutsuki—one even stronger than him—watching this battle…"
Tobirama's heart jolted in shock.
Even with his intelligence, he realized this was a dead man's game.
Whether they could even defeat Myōshiki was uncertain—and now there was another, stronger Ōtsutsuki lurking in the shadows?
What were they supposed to do?!
"Tobirama, from my judgment, they are not of one mind… You know my ocular jutsu. From that hidden Ōtsutsuki, I have already obtained his dōjutsu."
Kazuki spoke in a rapid rush: "He and Myōshiki most likely are not of one mind. My guess is that he's waiting for the divine husk of the Ōtsutsuki God that I found—planning to swoop in after my battle with Myōshiki and take everything for himself!"
"You saw that Ōtsutsuki's ocular jutsu, didn't you? It's extremely effective for seizing both the will of the planet and the power of the Ōtsutsuki God!"
"But it can't be used directly. I can't judge what kind of abnormalities might occur if those two forces were to descend upon my body. Besides, if Ryōshiki realizes I've copied his ocular jutsu, he'll surely cut into the battlefield at once!"
"Tobirama—you, whose soul is bound with mine—you can help me unleash Ryōshiki's ocular jutsu!"
Kazuki's figure appeared before Senju Tobirama, seizing his shoulder with a firm grip: "Rather than say I opened the 'Death Gate' and 'Kagutsuhane' to boost my combat power, it's better to say I did it to create an even greater commotion—to cover for you when you unleash 'Sumeru Vishnu'…"
"And if the Gaia Consciousness and the power of the planet descend upon me and cause abnormalities, it will also give Ryōshiki a chance to mistake it as nothing more than side effects from my overdrawing strength!"
At that moment, Senju Tobirama felt as though the weight of an entire planet had been dropped onto his heart.
Kazuki's life, the future of the shinobi world—all of it rested in his hands…
"Leave it to me, Kazuki! I'll find the perfect moment!" Tobirama drew in a deep breath, then pressed his hand down on Kazuki's shoulder in return. Their Mangekyō eyes met squarely.
"I will never let you lose!"
"I've always believed in you, Tobirama…" Kazuki smiled faintly, and his figure faded away.
Outside—
Frenzied, blood-colored steam tore apart the heavens.
Kazuki slowly rose into the air from a massive crater that seemed to pierce into the earth's crust.
"Myōshiki… kept you waiting, didn't I?"
Myōshiki looked at him with playful disdain, a cold smile spreading across his face.
"A fine trump card…"
"But useless."
"You're quite remarkable. For a lifeform born on such a remote planet, even if you borrowed Lord Shibai's power, to have reached this point is still worthy of praise…"
Myōshiki looked Kazuki up and down. His expression was indifferent as his gaze swept over the blood-colored steam dragon, surging and boiling like a tidal wave. From the black eyes lining his arms flashed a cold light as he let out a faint laugh.
"Your ability to replicate the dōjutsu of others is one worthy of renown even among the Ōtsutsuki Clan. But unfortunately, once you've fallen under my dōjutsu—Shinjutsu: Shiva's Karma Dance—this battle is already over."
"And as one who has become the target of Shiva's Karma Dance, you can no longer replicate this dōjutsu." Myōshiki spoke with complete confidence.
In the alternate space, Ryōshiki listened to Myōshiki's words and gave a slight nod.
On this point, he more or less agreed.
The so-called Shiva's Karma Dance was a special dōjutsu that Myōshiki could use only after entering his second stage. Its ability was to curse the enemy, siphoning away their power at an ever-increasing rate.
Not only that, once the curse accumulated to a certain level, it would cause the enemy's resistance to Myōshiki's attacks to drop sharply, while their own state became fragile and vulnerable.
In this cycle of weakening the enemy and strengthening himself, combined with his dōjutsu that could foresee the future, Myōshiki was virtually invincible.
When faced with a troublesome foe, Myōshiki would first curse them, then use his foresight to fight while retreating, wearing them down until their strength had been drained to the point they could no longer match him. At that moment, he could simply turn and finish off an already fragile opponent with ease.
When faced with an enemy of equal or lesser strength, once they fell under Shiva's Karma Dance, it was essentially equivalent to the battle being decided from the start.
To defeat Myōshiki, one either needed a special technique that prevented them from falling under Shiva's Karma Dance in the first place—such as Ryōshiki's Shinjutsu: Sumeru Vishnu—
—or else possess power so overwhelming that even at the very onset of the curse, when Myōshiki foresaw the future, he could not escape and was cut down on the spot!
Otherwise…
Once the curse began, with every second the battle continued, the scales of victory would tilt further and further toward Myōshiki.
This was precisely why there were whispers within the Ōtsutsuki Clan that Myōshiki was, in fact, the strongest among them.
Because his dōjutsu, in its way of fighting, was indeed unimaginably powerful—the two abilities complemented one another, forming an unbreakable cycle that allowed him to crush the weak effortlessly and even challenge those beyond his level.
"I can't let Myōshiki drain too much of Uchiha Kazuki's power…" Ryōshiki's eyes flickered as he fixed his gaze on the two figures locked in combat, deep in thought.
"The best outcome is for Uchiha Kazuki to still have a trump card that can wear down Myōshiki's state… If he doesn't, then I'll have to intervene early."
"Though Myōshiki and I have already reached the limits of what our talents can achieve, even if he extracts Kazuki's power he cannot truly preserve and internalize it. But in the short term, it can still increase his combat strength."
Within the alternate space, Ryōshiki constantly calculated, adjusting his plans in response to the shifting battle, determined to make himself the sole victor of this war.
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