Terumi Mei immediately left Shanks' office to speak with the remaining Kirigakure shinobi. By this point, Guy and Antares had also returned to Uzushiogakure, both still recovering from their recent battle.
The situation on Konoha's side had ended in victory as well. Akatsuki had been completely unsuccessful in capturing the Nine-Tails, forced into a retreat after suffering a thorough defeat. Most of the Akatsuki members who participated had either been killed or severely injured. After all, both Guy and Antares had personally taken to the battlefield, and surviving against opponents of their caliber was an achievement in itself.
The atmosphere within Uzushiogakure had finally begun to settle after the successive battles. However, that peace was short-lived.
Suddenly, another distress signal pierced the Uzumaki Shrine. The alarm immediately caught everyone's attention. It was coming from Konoha. Again.
The moment Guy sensed it, his expression shifted. Without wasting a second, he used teleportation and vanished from Uzushiogakure. His destination: Konoha. He needed to see firsthand what could have warranted another emergency signal so soon after Akatsuki's defeat.
Shanks grew uneasy upon hearing about the distress signal. Something had clearly gone wrong; otherwise, Konoha would never have activated the alarm a second time.
Several minutes passed. Then, Guy's voice echoed directly within Shanks' mind via telepathy.
"Onii-san, Naruto has been taken."
Shanks bolted from his chair. "What?!"
The office shook slightly from the sudden, violent burst of chakra he released. His eyes widened in disbelief. Without hesitation, he fired a telepathic message back.
"How?" His expression darkened. "Didn't Akatsuki already retreat?"
A few moments later, Guy's reply arrived. "Brother, it seems capturing Naruto was never their primary objective during the initial assault."
Shanks frowned. "What do you mean?"
"The attack on Konoha appears to have been a diversion," Guy explained, his voice growing increasingly serious. "They used a hidden counter-sealing technique to completely shatter the barrier. Masked man had planted specialized sealing formulas directly onto the bodies of the White Zetsu army. He deliberately let those clones die scattered across the battlefield at the hands of the Konoha ninja. The moment Antares and I left the village, the traps inside the corpses triggered all at once, overloading and destroying the barrier from the inside out."
The moment Shanks heard that, the gravity of the situation hit him. Konoha's barrier was not merely an alarm system; it served multiple defensive functions.
Guy continued, "As soon as the barrier fell, detecting any intrusion became nearly impossible. And more importantly..." He paused briefly. "The space-time teleportation restrictions contained within the barrier disappeared."
Shanks' eyes narrowed. The pieces were falling into place.
"Taking advantage of that exact window, Masked man must have infiltrated Konoha," Guy said, his mental tone turning grim. "He bypassed all remaining defenses. And then... he took Naruto."
Silence enveloped the office. Shanks slowly clenched his fist, knuckles whitening.
The pitched battle against Akatsuki had merely been a distraction to strip Konoha of its barrier. Once that objective was achieved, Masked man had slipped through the opening to kidnap the boy. It was a calculated, ruthless plan. And unfortunately, it had succeeded.
"Damn it."
For a brief moment, uncharacteristic frustration and anger surged within Shanks. Naruto had been taken right under their noses. No matter how stoic he usually was, such news would anger anyone.
However, Shanks quickly forced the rage down. Anger was useless. Frustration changed nothing. As the Uzukage, he possessed the mental discipline to know that emotions would not solve this crisis. Only action would.
Taking a deep breath, Shanks closed his eyes and steadied himself. When he opened them, his expression had returned to a calm, icy baseline. He reestablished the link with Guy.
"Tell Konoha and the others not to panic."
Guy listened intently.
"When I sealed the Nine-Tails inside Naruto after his birth, I prepared for a scenario like this," Shanks said, his voice entirely steady. "I left a contingency within Naruto's seal." A faint, dangerous smile touched his lips. "The moment someone tampers with the seal on Naruto's body, I will instantly know their location. And when that happens... I will bring him back."
Hearing those words, Guy visibly relaxed on the other end. "I understand, Onii-san."
The telepathic connection snapped shut.
The office fell silent once more. Shanks did not panic, nor did he order a chaotic, worldwide search—that would accomplish nothing. At this moment, conserving strength was paramount. Madara Uchiha had most likely been resurrected. If that assumption held true, the real war hadn't even begun. The Uzumaki siblings would need every ounce of their power for what was coming.
So, Shanks waited. Silently. Patiently.
He sat cross-legged on the floor and entered a meditative state. Minutes bled into more minutes. The office remained completely still as Shanks waited for the trap to spring.
Eventually—his eyes snapped open.
A signal. He felt it clearly. The seal on Naruto was being broken.
The contingency he had left behind activated instantly, beaming the exact coordinates straight into his mind.
Boom!
A terrifying aura erupted from his body. The very air inside the room trembled; papers fluttered wildly, and the walls creaked under the sheer pressure of his power.
Without wasting a single millisecond, Shanks vanished.
The next moment, he materialized inside a dimly lit cave. The air was dark and damp. Massive stone pillars supported the vaulted ceiling of the underground cavern, while faint, scattered light sources cast long, eerie shadows. They were deep underground.
Shanks immediately scanned the perimeter. His eyes locked onto Naruto, who was lying unconscious on the cold ground. Seeing the boy's chest still moving, Shanks inwardly breathed a small sigh of relief.
Then, his gaze shifted to the captors. One of them was Kisame, easily identifiable by the massive, wrapped bulk of Samehada on his back. Standing nearby was another Akatsuki member Shanks didn't recognize.
His eyes narrowed. The atmosphere inside the cave instantly turned suffocating. The moment Shanks materialized, everyone present realized the terrifying truth: the Uzukage had found them.
Finally, Shanks' gaze moved toward the towering Gedo Statue, and his expression hardened. Multiple chakra chains extended from the monstrosity, binding the captured Tailed Beasts. All of them were there. From the One-Tail all the way up to the Nine-Tails. The sight alone revealed just how close Akatsuki was to achieving their ultimate goal.
Then, Shanks looked up.
Standing atop the head of the Gedo Statue was a young Madara Uchiha. Unlike the decrepit, dying man Shanks imagined him years ago, this Madara was overflowing with pristine vitality. His posture was perfectly straight, his body was in its absolute prime, and within his eyes gleamed the Rinnegan. An oppressive, godlike aura radiated from him.
For a split second, Shanks felt the urge to strike immediately. If he unleashed an attack now, he might interrupt whatever ritual Madara was conducting. But the thought vanished as quickly as it came.
Saving Naruto came first. Everything else could wait. Naruto was his nephew; nothing was more important than ensuring his survival.
Madara looked down from his perch, a faint, amused smile playing on his lips. "Shanks Uzumaki," his voice echoed smoothly throughout the cavern. "It has been quite a long time."
Shanks merely let out a cold snort. Ignoring Madara entirely, he dropped to his knees beside Naruto. His hands immediately blurred through a sequence of hand seals. His speed was hypnotic—so fast that even veteran shinobi would struggle to track the movements.
A second later, he slammed his palm onto Naruto's abdomen, causing a complex sealing formula to ripple outward across the boy's skin.
Naruto wasn't dead yet. Thankfully, the extraction process had only just completed. Though the Nine-Tails' chakra had been ripped away, the physical damage hadn't passed the point of no return. Still, the situation was critical. The boy's breathing was shallow, his heartbeat was slowing, and his life force was rapidly draining.
Shanks deployed the exact same vitality seal he had once used to save Kushina. As the formula spread, Naruto's fading vitality locked into place. The process of death was halted. Not reversed, but frozen. At least for now.
Just then—
"You arrogant bastard!" a furious shout shattered the cavern's silence.
Shanks didn't even bother to look up. The unknown Akatsuki member he had noted earlier stepped forward. This man, a missing-nin from Iwagakure and a user of Volcano Release, was twisting his face in absolute rage.
"Didn't you hear Lord Madara speaking to you?!"
Fissures suddenly cracked open across the rogue ninja's arm, and glowing, molten lava began bubbling to the surface. The ambient temperature of the cavern skyrocketed, and the stone beneath his boots began to liquefy.
The man thrust his fist forward. "Volcano Dragon!"
With a deafening roar, a massive dragon composed entirely of churning, molten rock erupted from his arm. The beast surged forward at blinding speed, melting the solid stone floor into a river of slag in its wake. The cavern shook violently as the titanic lava dragon lunged directly at Shanks and Naruto, its jaws gaping wide to swallow them both alive.
Yet throughout the entire cataclysmic display, Shanks remained kneeling beside Naruto. He didn't move. He didn't flinch. He didn't even turn his head.
His entire universe was narrowed down to stabilizing Naruto's condition, treating the incoming, lethal attack as if it weren't even worthy of his notice.