The leaders at the bottom of the four great ninja villages weren't clueless. Most of these people had been through wars and killed people.
But the wars they had experienced were just small team structures. Losing one or two people in a team was considered a major loss. If an entire team died, that was already outrageous.
But on this battlefield, they saw people around them falling in masses, without any sign of stopping.
It was still war, but the sheer brutality of this battle made these war veterans feel fear.
Yet on this battlefield, these people seemed crazy. No one felt sad for the sacrifice of their comrades, because they knew they could be the next to die.
Only frantic fighting, fighting as if they'd lost their minds, and then, falling.
Blood stained the land red. It was raining from the sky, and the rain washed the battlefield again and again, but the pungent smell of blood still wouldn't go away.
It was at this moment that the Marine leaders realized they couldn't keep dying. They couldn't keep sacrificing themselves. What was the point of such a terrible battle? Peace? It was never about peace.
The fallen bodies were all meaningless sacrifices, for the pirates, for the Marines, and especially for them.
Even if they won this war, the victory would mean all ninjas would disappear, vanish from this age.
At first, it was just ninjas against pirates. But with the appearance of the celestial beings behind the nobles, things were no longer so simple.
Even the World Government turned a blind eye. They needed the power of the ninjas and were willing to give them what they wanted.
But when the ninjas were no longer useful, when they had no power left, when everything belonging to the "villages" was broken down, then the ninjas would cease to exist.
They weren't people of the World Government, just "allies." What they had done was enough.
"Retreat!!"
In the sky, a large number of puppets descended. The puppets were covered in Sea Stone, which blocked some of the Devil Fruit users among the pirates, giving the retreating Marines some breathing room.
Taking advantage of this fleeting opportunity, the ninjas of the great villages stepped forward, and a huge stone wall instantly separated the battlefield.
This large-scale Ninjutsu couldn't stop the strong, but they didn't need to stop the strong, just most of the pirates.
On this kind of battlefield, even if the strong dared to charge forward, they would be surrounded and attacked.
"What's going on!!"
The faces of the several Kage fighting Orochimaru in the sky were unreadable. The sacrifice was too great. Just one exchange had resulted in such a heavy cost.
They thought they were well prepared enough, but everything that happened on the battlefield was telling everyone that they had underestimated the pirates.
"Let's go!!"
Seeing that the fleet had retreated from the battlefield, A pulled Killer Bee and the other Kage back as well. Orochimaru's pressure wasn't that great, because Orochimaru didn't have the kind of attacks that could threaten the lives of these top-level strongmen.
So, besides being a little disheveled and suffering some minor injuries, they didn't get hurt much more.
Seeing his opponents leave, Orochimaru just looked away coldly, not continuing to chase.
In fact, if it went on any longer, Orochimaru wouldn't be able to suppress the mark hidden in his body.
Orochimaru had covered up the will of the world aimed at Shanks with his own will, hiding it away.
If Orochimaru's will fluctuated too much, that will would leak out directly and then be rapidly consumed.
It was like Orochimaru was carrying a bomb and fighting others. What was certain was that this bomb wouldn't kill Orochimaru himself, but for others, maybe not.
Orochimaru slowly fell from the sky. The pirates had begun cleaning up the battlefield.
Hiruko was covered in blood, holding his forehead. The blood wasn't his, but his brain was about to explode.
"What power did you use? I almost didn't react."
Hiruko's tone was clearly angry. He felt like he had been tricked by Orochimaru.
"Just a power similar to Naruto's, a response to the will of the pirates, or more accurately, a response to my will."
Orochimaru looked at Hiruko in front of him. Clearly, Hiruko had directly erased his will's mark.
"But the things on you really have nothing to do with me. That's all your own response."
Orochimaru explained. He really didn't do it. If Hiruko didn't acknowledge him, he wouldn't be affected. But Hiruko acknowledged him and then erased the influence of his will. It would be strange if nothing happened.
"Next time, study this kind of thing carefully before using it. I don't want the entire pirate crew to be a bunch of idiots."
Hiruko said through gritted teeth. If he hadn't realized that this thing had an effect on the brain, he wouldn't have risked clearing it away.
A normal person's body simply couldn't handle this kind of move.
Simply put, Orochimaru's will response effect was fine, it was perfectly correct.
But a normal person's body was too weak. The pressure of the will would make the body stronger. The general process was that natural energy was forcibly broken down, life energy was injected, and then it caused imbalance.
Spiritual power couldn't fully support such vitality, but the power of will locked in the spiritual power and life energy.
So this was the result. The faster the power increased, the more serious the imbalance, because the body's power had exceeded its limit.
Once certain powers exceeded the limit, it was normal for them to affect the mind.
Back then, Orochimaru's body holding the Dragon Vein with the world's will was the same result. The longer he held it, the greater the burden, and the eventual outcome would be becoming an idiot.
And now, Hiruko had discovered the situation of these pirates.
"Moreover, this power is too strong. This kind of power."
Hiruko was afraid. This power was a power that could truly change the world, giving his subordinates such a powerful boost.
That meant that from now on, one person's strength could affect the entire pirate crew.
"This is just the beginning, and not everyone can master this power, plus there's the side effects of this power."
Orochimaru looked at his subordinates in the distance. In the crowd, he saw a pirate carrying a large knife, blankly picking his nose.
Without even thinking, that guy's brain definitely had a problem. Their pirate crew could never recruit such an idiot.
"So what's this so-called will response? I mean, what's your will response?"
Hiruko asked. He didn't know anything about this.
"The essence of will response is still connected to the world's will to some extent. My will response is to enhance physical fitness. The stronger the will, the stronger the enhancement, and it can give your body will resistance."
"All of this power comes from this world."
"Wait, what's will resistance?"
Hiruko was completely confused about these things outside of Chakra, especially will, which was completely untouchable, even you could only describe it as… conceptual.
Spiritual power could be felt, but will, what the heck could you do with that?
"I don't know. I guess it's the kind of thing I developed when I fought Shanks.
Maybe it's just being able to reduce all kinds of damage."
Orochimaru frowned. He didn't know how to explain this.
As for why his body was like this back then, Orochimaru could only say it was because of Shanks.
More precisely, he was beaten into it by Shanks.
Shanks in God Avoidance state, every slash was a terrifying attack beyond the world's will. Orochimaru was completely taking a beating.
And every hit was real damage. If he hadn't been holding the Dragon Vein, connected to the world's will, and his recovery speed hadn't been ridiculously strong, he would have died long ago.
But since he didn't die, he must have gotten something out of it.
Will resistance was beaten out of him, and Orochimaru traded his brain for it.
So Orochimaru really didn't use this power randomly. He had practiced it it himself.
With Orochimaru's current body, even if the Third Hokage used the Reaper Death Seal again, the God of Death might not be able to pull out Orochimaru's soul.
"So what's Naruto's will response?"
"Not sure yet, but it should be related to Chakra."
"And Shanks's, probably related to exceeding the limit."
Orochimaru was most curious about what Shanks's will response was. Judging from Shanks's personal characteristics, the most likely thing was exceeding the locked limit.
But it was hard to say.
"But currently, in the ninja world, besides Shanks and me, and Naruto, who has received Shanks's guidance, no one else should be able to use this power."
"The requirements for this power are too high. It requires not only a person's power, but also the power of the world."
Orochimaru explained. Naruto had indeed done it, but he wasn't strong enough.
Of course, the celestial being of the World Government should also be able to do it, but currently the will of the World Government's earthly paradise was not enough to support this kind of move.
But the path the other party was taking could clearly lead to this road, just needing enough sacrifice.
The current World Government was clearly doing just that.
In fact, Orochimaru wasn't wrong. The earthly paradise's sacrifice flow could really be regarded as a form of will response.
On the other side, after the four great ninja villages had finished counting the battle losses, everyone's faces looked bad.
"A total of more than 30,000 sacrifices…"
"Just the first battle, 30,000 people all died."
"…"
"What the heck are those pirates? How could they suddenly become so strong? It's not power a normal person would have."
"I don't know, maybe only celestials…"
"I might know something…"
In the corner, sitting on the ground, covered in bandages, Killer Bee raised his head.
"Do you guys remember Uzumaki Naruto?"
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