Yugito stared blankly as she locked eyes with the miniature Two-Tails inside her. Carl raised a hand and dispelled the gravity field. The Raikage, who had just gotten back on his feet, surprisingly did not continue his attack. No matter how reckless he was, at this point he had to realize the vast gap in power between his side and Carl.
With a heavy expression, the Raikage looked at Carl. Both tailed beasts of the Hidden Cloud Village had already been taken by the other party. What would happen next?
Were they going to occupy the Hidden Cloud Village?
Obviously, this was pure overthinking. For someone like Carl, who possessed an entire world, making a special trip just to occupy a single village would be laughable—something that would make people in the pirate world laugh their teeth off.
Once Kaguya finished digesting the chakra of the Two-Tails and the Eight-Tails, Carl spoke calmly.
"All right. Things here are settled. Time to head to the next stop."
As he finished speaking, Carl activated Yomotsu Hirasaka, and a pitch-black spatial portal materialized out of thin air.
Seeing the three of them turn around as if they were about to leave just like that, the Raikage finally couldn't hold back and shouted,
"W–wait a moment!"
"Hm?"
The three turned back. An impatient look appeared on Lily's face as she said,
"You're really annoying. Want to die?"
Several strange, jet-black arrows twisted into shape at Lily's fingertips. Having already experienced Carl's power firsthand, the Raikage no longer dared to underestimate this bizarre ability and immediately activated his Lightning Armor at maximum output.
Carl raised his hand and lightly patted Lily on the shoulder.
"Easy, easy. No need to get so worked up. And you—stop crackling with electricity already. It's noisy."
Lily clicked her tongue, turned her head away, and said nothing more. The Raikage, for his part, obediently deactivated his Lightning Armor as well.
Carl smiled faintly.
"That's more like it. If you ended up destroying the village over a moment of impulse, you'd go down in history as a sinner, Raikage."
The words were spoken lightly, but the Raikage did not dare doubt their weight. The other party truly possessed the power to wipe out an entire village.
Using the calmest and most polite tone he could manage, the Raikage asked,
"May I ask… before coming here, did you also… reclaim the chakra of other tailed beasts?"
The loss of the tailed beasts was already a done deal. At this point, the Raikage just wanted to know whether other villages had gone through the same thing as the Hidden Cloud Village. Misery loves company—human nature at work.
Carl's answer made him let out a long sigh of relief.
"Besides your Hidden Cloud Village, there's also the Three-Tails from the Hidden Mist Village, and the Five-Tails from the Hidden Stone Village. Mm… next should be the One-Tail…"
Two major villages had already lost their tailed beasts, yet the Hidden Cloud Village hadn't received a single piece of news. This alone showed how fast the other party's actions were—and it also meant that when the Hidden Mist Village and the Hidden Stone Village faced Carl, their situation was absolutely no better than that of the Hidden Cloud Village… no, it had to be even worse.
After all, among the Five Great Ninja Villages, the Hidden Cloud Village was solidly in the top two, if not the strongest.
Thinking of this, the Raikage decided he needed to send people to verify the situation with the Hidden Mist Village and the Hidden Stone Village as soon as possible. No—better yet, he would go himself. With such a terrifying existence beyond the scope of ninjas appearing in the ninja world, the leaders of the ninja world had to gather and seriously discuss countermeasures.
Just as the Raikage was thinking about his upcoming visits, Yugito suddenly gathered her courage and shouted at Carl,
"Th-thank you very much!"
Thanking someone who had just taken away her tailed beast—this caused the expressions of the Hidden Cloud Village ninjas to turn extremely strange. Some wanted to say something, but considering Carl was still present, they swallowed their words.
Carl glanced at Yugito and chuckled softly.
"If you're going to thank anyone, thank Kaguya. I didn't really do anything."
Yugito shook her head.
"No. Matatabi told me that without your approval, with that person's personality, she would never have done something like this. It also asked me to pass on its thanks to you."
Carl neither confirmed nor denied it.
"What a grateful little kitty. Not bad—you're much better than this bunch of roughnecks."
Hearing this, Yugito's pretty face flushed red. Hearing only the first half, one would naturally think Carl was referring to the Two-Tails. But combined with the latter half, that "little kitty" seemed to be referring to her…
After saying this, Carl didn't linger any longer. He waved at Yugito and said with a light laugh,
"Well then, see you."
With that, Carl turned around and walked into the black spatial portal together with Lily and Kaguya. Soon after, both they and the portal itself completely vanished from the sight of everyone in the Hidden Cloud Village.
...
After the three left, the Hidden Cloud Village side fell into a brief silence. Then many people suddenly collapsed onto the ground, muttering in a daze,
"They finally left… Who on earth were they? This feels like a dream…"
And really, who could have imagined that before today, the Hidden Cloud Village—one of the undisputed strongholds of the ninja world—would be directly barged into by three people, who then seized both of its tailed beasts right in front of all its top combatants?
The Raikage clenched his teeth and suddenly looked up at Killer B and Yugito, shouting,
"B! Yugito! You two already know who those three are, don't you?! Tell me—who exactly are they?!"
Killer B hadn't even finished organizing his thoughts when, with a poof, a small puff of smoke burst from his shoulder. As the smoke dispersed, a tiny Eight-Tails appeared, looking unexpectedly cute.
The appearance of the Eight-Tails caused everyone present to freeze. The Eight-Tails waved at the crowd like a beckoning cat and said,
"Killer B and Yugito did the right thing. Those three just now are not something you humans can oppose."
Someone couldn't help but ask,
"What do you mean? Are you saying they aren't human?"
The Eight-Tails nodded.
"That's right. To you humans, they are gods. How could human strength possibly contend with divine power?"
As soon as those words fell, the expressions of the Hidden Cloud Village ninjas changed drastically. The Eight-Tails then revealed Kaguya's identity. While not everyone had heard of the title Rabbit Goddess, the higher-ranking ninjas knew a thing or two about it.
The Raikage's facial muscles twitched violently. He clenched a fist and said through gritted teeth,
"The legend of the Rabbit Goddess is actually real… Th-this is a joke, right?!"
The Eight-Tails continued,
"As for the remaining two, I don't know their identities either. But judging from the Rabbit Goddess's attitude toward them, that man's power is only above hers."
Recalling how he had just been toyed with by Carl like a child, the Raikage loosened his clenched fist, and his arms dropped limply to his sides.
The Eight-Tails was right. In front of these so-called gods, the power of ninjas was nothing but a joke.
After all… they were facing the true progenitor of chakra.
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+80 chapters on p@treon/tambeerg