Chapter 254: Resurrection and White Tide
The coffin was enveloped in a vibrant green light.
Life energy surged from it, so potent that even the dead wood wrapped around the coffin began to sprout fresh green buds.
"Oh no! He's resurrecting someone!"
Ōnoki's expression changed sharply. "I don't know who it is, but if he's summoning them now… they must be someone dangerous."
"One Nagato is already bad enough. If another monster appears—"
"Move!"
Before he could finish, the other four Kage had already rushed forward.
If ninjutsu wouldn't work, they would try taijutsu.
Due to his age, Ōnoki could no longer keep up physically, so the others were the ones who launched the offensive.
Now that Nagato had descended from the sky, he was finally within reach—no longer so evasive.
But—
"Be careful! I'm sensing a massive chakra reaction underground!"
Jiraiya, trailing behind Darui who surged ahead cloaked in lightning, shouted a warning.
The ground suddenly trembled.
A vast swarm of chakra signatures burst forth from underground—ninjas had been hiding below the surface and were now converging rapidly toward them.
The area surrounding the coffin and Nagato remained still, but everywhere else began to quake violently—as if the earth itself were groaning.
Then—
With a deafening crack, the surface ruptured.
One after another, pale and corpse-like figures clawed their way up from the soil.
Grotesque, twisted, and hollow-eyed—they resembled the undead horrors from ancient records.
They didn't speak. They simply charged forward like frenzied beasts, hurling themselves at the four advancing Kage with no fear of death.
"Get out of my way, you freaks!"
Jiraiya's eyes narrowed. It only took one glance to understand these weren't elite foes. Their chakra flow was crude, unstable.
Darui, leading the charge, swung his sword and cleaved a White Zetsu clean in half.
But—
Before he could react, the bisected creature wasn't dead.
With terrifying tenacity, the top half lunged forward mid-fall, grabbing Darui's ankle in a death grip.
"What the hell are these things?!"
Darui looked down in shock. The half-body clung to him like a parasite—its face contorted with a twisted mix of hunger and malice.
Worse still—its flesh became fluid-like, creeping upward along his leg like living clay.
Darui's chakra was being siphoned away.
"It's Wood Release!"
Jiraiya and the two toad sages arrived at the rear, slightly behind the others due to their slower pace.
When Jiraiya saw the green, sap-like fluid leaking from the wounded White Zetsu—rather than blood—a memory surfaced.
"These things… they've been infused with Hashirama's cells. When we fought the Kirigakure invasion years ago, we found traces of this sap on the battlefield."
"We tested it. It contains blood components, but also plant matter. The tissue was partially lignified—like tree bark."
"Their bodies aren't fully human. They've lost vital functions—like pain reception."
As he spoke, Jiraiya drove a kunai into a White Zetsu's chest.
The creature spasmed… then slowly hardened into bark and collapsed like a felled tree.
"As long as their heart and brain remain intact, they're like walking corpses—indifferent to injury or pain."
Back then, it was just Shikaku's hypothesis. Now it was confirmed in battle.
More White Zetsu poured out of the ground—swarming from all sides.
Silent. Relentless.
They surrounded the Kage like a white tide. Even Ōnoki, positioned in the rear, came under attack.
"They can absorb chakra too!"
Darui's eyes narrowed as he shook off several clinging White Zetsu. Their half-liquefied limbs still tried to drain his energy.
He paralyzed one with lightning, then bisected it again—this time ensuring the head was destroyed.
"Magnet Style: Iron Sand Rain!"
Countless black iron needles rained from above, tearing into the horde like a steel storm.
"There's no time to waste!"
Mei Terumi, her expression icy, took a deep breath.
"Boil Release: Acidic Mist Technique!"
A thick, syrup-like acid surged from her mouth, powered by chakra.
It spread into a dense river of steaming liquid, melting through White Zetsu as it advanced.
Their resistance was weak—poor chakra control, little coordination—but they were fearless and endless.
Wave after wave surged forward without hesitation.
That meant one thing:
Whoever—or whatever—was inside the coffin… was critical.
"I… I can't move!"
Gasping, Darui ripped his sword free from a corpse and staggered back, flinging off more of the creatures latched to his body.
The others were in the same state.
They were no longer standing on solid ground.
They stood atop corpses—upon a mountain of bark and twisted limbs.
But the tide never shrank.
The coffin glowed ahead, pulsing with light… but it remained distant, unreachable behind the wall of flesh.
These White Zetsu were buying time with their lives.
And that made what was coming… terrifying.
"You've mastered both Boil and Lava Release? Impressive girl," Ōnoki muttered as he hovered overhead, observing Mei's acidic river sweep across the battlefield.
His body ached. His age held him back.
But he couldn't just stay behind.
The others were struggling on the ground.
From the sky—he could do what they couldn't.
"Dust Release: Detachment of the Primitive World Technique!"
Ōnoki formed a seal mid-air and unleashed his cube of annihilation downward.
The energy beam fired into the mass of White Zetsu.
They had no chakra absorption like Nagato.
No evasive tactics.
Just blind numbers.
And that made them the perfect target.
In that instant, the super-advanced escape technique—said to be capable of erasing everything—finally showed its true power.
The dazzling cube transformed into a blinding beam of white light, slicing through the battlefield with a deafening metallic screech.
Anything it touched—any White Zetsu wrapped in that deathly glow—was instantly turned to dust. Obliterated. Gone.
"Hey, hey, hey, old man, watch it!"
Jiraiya narrowly evaded the beam that incinerated a White Zetsu beside him. He barked in protest, "If that thing hits one of us, the ninja world's screwed!"
"With the speed of Dust Release, if you can't dodge it, you don't deserve to be a village's Kage."
Ōnoki's response was light, even amused—humor clashing against exhaustion.
They had been fighting for too long.
And still, there was no victory in sight.
Since joining the battle, they had poured everything into the fight—yet the Akatsuki kept revealing secrets, weapons, and plans far beyond anything known to the Five Great Nations.
Each new revelation increased the burden on the Five Kage. This wasn't an organization a single village could hope to handle.
The bitterness between nations had been cast aside, if only temporarily.
Faced with enemies like Nagato and Black Zetsu, they had no choice but to unite.
And this wasn't even the worst of it. Uchiha Madara hadn't shown himself. The tailed beasts—still unaccounted for.
If they hesitated now, if they failed to act decisively here—then the Five Great Nations might truly be finished.
In a twisted way, Nagato had been right:
Sometimes, it takes a greater enemy to force unity.
"So…"
No matter how many White Zetsu there were, no matter how unrelenting, they were nothing against Ōnoki's Dust Release.
His sweeping strikes carved across the field like a divine blade, reducing everything to pits of emptiness.
The earth itself resembled a watermelon sliced cleanly in half.
"What a terrifying technique…"
Jiraiya squinted, eyes half-lidded as he observed the devastation.
Even the two Toad Sages on his shoulders looked mildly shaken.
Up until now, they had assumed Ōnoki had declined with age.
That the power of a true Kage had left him.
But they'd underestimated him.
His Dust Release was more than enough to turn the tide of a war—if this had been a conflict between villages, not a joint operation against Akatsuki, Ōnoki would've stood at the top.
Especially Rasa—he shivered involuntarily.
Back in the Land of Waves, he had clashed with Ōnoki briefly.
He had only tried to stall him, never daring to fight head-on.
Now he realized: had he made the mistake of engaging directly back then, he might not be alive today.
"Then... it's your turn now."
Panting, Ōnoki slowly descended.
His chakra reserves were nearly depleted, but his last attack had decimated more than half the White Zetsu on the battlefield—along with their scattered, withering corpses.
"Rest up, old man."
Darui steadied his breathing. "We're going to need you again soon."
His eyes locked onto the glowing coffin in the distance—still untouched.
Jiraiya and the others followed suit.
Maybe they had been enemies once...
But right now, facing Akatsuki, they were comrades. Warriors with one goal.
"Charge!"
Darui sprinted forward.
He was the youngest among them—yet in this battle, the bravest.
Boom!
Before they could mount another offensive, a thunderous crash erupted.
A pitch-black coffin fell toward them like a meteor.
"Huh?!"
Darui reacted in an instant, slashing upward with a fierce swing that sliced the coffin lid clean in half.
A violent gust whipped his hair back, then surged past him, brushing the others as their cloaks billowed under the impact.
"It's coming…"
High above, atop a mountain, Ryosuke muttered gravely.
Beside him, White Zetsu and Shanks—now freed from Black Zetsu's control—felt an unexplainable change in the atmosphere.
The air had grown dense.
Cold.
Unbreathable.
It was the first time Shanks had ever felt human emotion radiating from Ryosuke.
But this... this wasn't emotion expressed normally.
The sky began to churn.
Clouds swirled.
The wind froze.
The mountain beneath them trembled.
Shanks' eyes widened.
This wasn't human.
This was divine.
Emotions affecting the natural world?
That was myth made manifest.
And the strangest part? Ryosuke hadn't done anything.
He was simply... reacting.
To what—or who—was inside that coffin.
"The person inside… might be the purest being in this world besides me."
Ryosuke smiled faintly, as if he already knew Shanks' question. "Honestly, if I didn't have certain... unique powers, there's no way I could beat him."
Yes, even though Kaguya Ōtsutsuki was stronger in terms of sheer lifeform tier...
Ryosuke valued Uchiha Madara far more.
Kaguya was a god—born into power, elevated by fruit, cloaked in legend.
But her will to fight? Weak. Her instincts dull.
She was a figurehead. Not a warrior.
Even if her abilities could help him grow, she would never truly be his rival.
But Madara...
Even without fighting, Ryosuke could feel the gap between them.
He wouldn't say he could never surpass him.
But he would never say he couldn't be matched, either.
Unlike Kaguya, Madara had climbed to the top with nothing but vision, hatred, and strength.
Naruto. Sasuke. Madara.
These were names Ryosuke would never look down on.
They weren't gods.
They were men—
And yet, somehow...
That made them even more dangerous.
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