"Attack!"
The roar split the air as countless jutsu shot toward Susanoo like a swarm of angry hornets.
High above them, Amamiya Raizen watched from within his blazing avatar, his eyes cold and unblinking.
"So this again?"
His voice was low, mocking. "You think you can cage me twice?"
Susanoo's massive arms flexed. The chains binding its limbs snapped apart like threads.
From atop its shoulder, Raizen raised the Sword of Amaterasu, black fire gathering along the blade's edge.
"Die!"
The sword fell.
A storm of black flame swallowed the battlefield, burning through soil, steel, and hope alike.
Below, the Hyūga Coalition watched the infernal sword descend, despair flashing in their eyes. Against such power, their courage seemed pathetic—a candle before a typhoon.
"Hold your ground!"
Sarutobi Sanbei's roar cut through the chaos. He glared up at the towering Susanoo, bloodshot eyes blazing with defiance.
"Earth Style: Grand Rampart!"
His palms struck the ground. Chakra surged. The earth heaved upward, forming a massive wall of packed soil that shielded the Hyūga ranks just as the Amaterasu blade crashed down.
BOOM!
The explosion shattered the air. Chunks of molten earth flew like shrapnel, yet the wall—Sanbei's full-powered defense—held. Barely.
"Fight back!"
Sanbei's voice cracked from strain. His face flushed crimson, yet he stood tall.
Seeing him resist, the Hyūga shinobi felt shame burn through their fear.
"Amamiya Raizen's gone too far!" someone shouted. "There's a thousand of us—if we can't kill him, we'll make him bleed for it!"
"Kill him!"
The cry spread like wildfire.
One by one, the coalition shinobi surged from behind their defenses, charging at Raizen with suicidal resolve.
"Fire Style: Great Fire Annihilation!"
"Wind Style: Breakthrough!"
"Lightning Style: Thunder Flash!"
Flames, wind, and lightning tore through the air.
The combined chakra of hundreds of shinobi painted the battlefield in chaos, their attacks exploding against Susanoo's armor in brilliant, futile bursts.
"Earth Style: Heaven's Burden!"
Sanbei slammed his hands together again, summoning an enormous dome of clay that formed in the sky and came crashing down upon Susanoo, pinning its massive frame for a heartbeat.
Raizen sneered. "Cute trick."
Susanoo's arms heaved. The giant tore through the clay prison and hurled the fragments back into the enemy ranks.
The falling debris crushed dozens of shinobi; screams echoed, then silence.
Susanoo stomped once. The shockwave rippled outward. Hyūga warriors were sent flying, coughing blood before they even hit the ground.
"Unite your attacks!"
Sanbei's voice cracked as he rallied the survivors. "Focus your jutsu together!"
For the first time, Raizen's smirk faltered.
A single jutsu meant nothing. Ten? Still manageable.
But hundreds, synchronized—each chakra stream amplifying the next—became a force that could shake the heavens.
The combined blast of seven or eight hundred shinobi surged forward, the sheer power of it rivaling a Tailed Beast Bomb.
Raizen's eyes burned crimson.
"Amaterasu!"
"Flame Control!"
Black fire coalesced before Susanoo, folding and twisting into a massive shield.
The moment the coalition's combined ninjutsu struck, the world turned white.
BOOOOOOM!
The explosion ripped through the battlefield.
Winds roared outward, uprooting trees and sending shinobi tumbling like leaves.
Even Susanoo—complete and monstrous—staggered back several steps under the impact.
When the smoke cleared, Raizen saw it: a gaping hole burned through his Amaterasu shield, cracks spider-webbing across Susanoo's chestplate.
"So even this 'absolute defense' has limits…"
He stared at the fractures, lips curling in grim understanding.
Power isn't absolute. Even Madara's Susanoo fell under the Dust Release of the Third Tsuchikage.
Every jutsu, no matter how divine it seems, has a counter.
His arrogance faded, replaced by something colder—clarity.
"Still," he muttered, gaze falling upon the battered Hyūga ranks, "for you people, this much is overkill."
Susanoo's massive hand reached for the sword once more.
The blade ignited again with the black fire of Amaterasu, its heat warping the air.
The coalition shinobi could only watch, frozen by dread, as the sword rose high above them—
and fell like the judgment of a god.
...
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