A blinding white light lit up the sky and covered the earth.
There was no thunder to accompany it.
No deafening explosion.
Only the terrifying shockwave that erupted from the light, so intense that even Tsunade, standing not far away with a hand shielding her eyes, struggled to keep her footing.
Yūhi Kurenai and the others were even worse off, sent flying backward by the force of the blast.
"What was that?!"
Killer Bee, now far from the battlefield and no longer in his Tailed Beast form, had the Fourth Raikage on his back. The two of them looked up at the distant sky where a piercing white light had appeared.
Even from this distance, the brilliance of that light was blinding.
"That wasn't Father's technique…"
The Fourth Raikage's expression darkened. "It must be something the Konoha ninja unleashed. To create such a massive shockwave that it's visible from here… That's insane."
Killer Bee grew tense. "Bro…"
The Fourth Raikage interrupted him, eyes steady. "Keep moving. We have to get out of here quickly. Don't worry about them, if even the Eight-Tails' Tailed Beast Bomb couldn't leave a scratch on Father, you of all people know how tough he is."
Killer Bee took a deep breath, nodded, and quickly carried his brother away.
Farther away...
Hundreds of Konoha shinobi were rushing forward, led by the Uchiha Clan Head, Uchiha Fugaku, and the Nara Clan Head, Nara Shikaku.
Suddenly,
Both Fugaku and Shikaku came to a halt.
The Konoha forces behind them also stopped at once. All eyes turned toward the distant sky, where a dazzling streak of white light had appeared, as if something had exploded in the far-off horizon.
"What the hell is that?!"
A ninja's voice trembled in confusion.
Fugaku and Shikaku didn't answer. They simply exchanged a glance, and in each other's eyes, saw deep shock.
If their instincts were right...
That had to be the aftermath of some kind of attack.
Judging by the distance, it must have occurred near Tenchi Bridge, a place still very far from where they currently stood. And yet they could see the light from here.
How powerful did that attack have to be?!
"The power of a Tailed Beast…" Fugaku muttered, his face more serious than ever.
If the reports were accurate, Kaede had managed to suppress the Eight-Tails' jinchūriki… but what kind of technique could produce this level of devastation?
Shikaku said grimly, "We don't know for sure… But we'd better get there fast!"
Without waiting, he took off running again.
Fugaku frowned slightly. With power like that on the battlefield, what could they even do? Still, orders were orders. They had to support Kaede and Tsunade, though he couldn't help but wonder… were they even still alive?
The white light gradually faded.
Tsunade lowered her arm after having punched the ground with monstrous strength, using the uplifted stone mound as a makeshift shield.
Through her link with Katsuyu, she knew Kaede was still alive, and not seriously injured. She was channeling chakra through Katsuyu to help him recover.
She was also sure of one thing: Kaede had likely burned through all of his chakra with that last strike.
Whoosh,
Tsunade took a breath, leaped onto the top of the stone mound, and looked toward the place where Kaede and the Third Raikage had clashed.
The scene before her left her utterly stunned.
There stood Kaede, his clothes torn to shreds, the Kusanagi sword hanging at his side. Sparks of lightning still flickered faintly along the blade's edge.
And before him...
A massive trench, stretching for more than a thousand meters, cut straight through the land and extended beyond the horizon, as if the entire world had been cleaved in two.
At the closest point to Kaede, the Third Raikage lay motionless on the ground.
His right arm was severed, lying some distance away.
A charred gash split his body down the middle, and his long, pale yellow hair was completely scorched away.
Kaede slowly brought his sword upright, leaning on it for support as he looked down at the fallen Raikage.
"To take a direct hit from Heaven Flash and not die instantly… In terms of defense, you're the strongest shinobi I've ever seen. Not even the Eight-Tails could compare to you."
"…So that move's called… Heaven Flash, huh…" A rasping voice came from the charred lips of the Third Raikage.
"Heh… Never thought I'd fall here… defeated by… a lightning technique…"
He coughed a few times, blood, burnt and black, dripping from the corner of his mouth.
His Hell Stab had been shattered.
He'd once destroyed a Tailed Beast Bomb with it, enduring the entire blast with just his body. But Kaede's last strike… he couldn't withstand it.
The technique combined quadruple-speed movement with the speed of the Fifth Gate, condensed into the Kusanagi sword along with an immense amount of chakra.
The result surpassed even the destructive power of the Eight-Tails' ultimate attack, obliterating his Hell Stab in a single blow.
He remembered from the intel...
The Silver Flash was only eleven years old, wasn't he?
A bitter smile formed in the Raikage's mind. What kind of monster is this kid… To wield such power at that age…
He couldn't even imagine what the shinobi world would look like with someone like Kaede in it.
Other villages would probably suffer for it too… But that was no longer his concern.
His consciousness was fading, until, finally, he slipped into complete darkness.
…
Not far away, Yūhi Kurenai and the others, sensing the complete disappearance of the Third Raikage's chakra, stood frozen, staring in stunned silence.
"The Third Raikage… is dead?!"
Someone muttered in disbelief.
An eerie silence followed.
A gentle breeze rustled the leaves in the distance, brushing past the Konoha ninja with a chill that made their skin crawl.
…
Early in the 44th year of the Konoha.
The Third Raikage of the Hidden Cloud, in order to cover the retreat of the Eight-Tails' jinchūriki Killer Bee and the future Fourth Raikage A, clashed with Konoha's "Silver Flash" near Tenchi Bridge, within the borders of the Land of Fire.
In the end,
The Third Raikage fell in battle.
The battle left behind a massive, thousand-meter-long trench carved into the eastern side of Tenchi Bridge.
Later, this trench was artificially widened and connected to the nearby great river, forming a new tributary that provided water to several distant villages.
Due to the circumstances of its creation, that river would come to be known as,
The River of Thunder's Fall.