A few minutes earlier on Hiruzen's front
Hiruzen and Chiyo were in a deadlock. Chiyo, however, was worse, with dozens of injuries and sweat staining her body, the battlefield littered with dozens of puppets.
"You're a clone, aren't you?" Chiyo asked out of nowhere, breathing raggedly.
Hiruzen Singhing didn't bother to refute, simply asking, "How'd you know?" with a slight frown
Chiyo hearing this chuckled, "I'm not an idiot. Throughout this whole battle you've avoided using chakra and remained on the defensive, making sure not to take any hits. So why else would the man known as the professor for his mastering of the 5 nature types not use them? Because he's alone with a limited amount of chakra," Chiyo said, offering her analyses.
"You're not wro—" Hiruzen was about to answer, but both shinobi's eyes were drawn to Hiruko's battlefield, where a black hole was slowly expanding.
"What the—" Hiruzen and Chiyo started at the same time as the black hole suddenly exploded into nothingness, a major shockwave rippling across the forest, even knocking Hiruko and Chiyo off balance.
Looking at each other, both silently offered a momentary truce before using Body Flicker to see what was going on.
Upon arriving, the duo was met with complete devastation and a 10-meter-deep hole; hundreds of trees broken at their stumps were nowhere to be found, as if they had disappeared.
Hiruzen's mind when seeing this immediately went to his problematic student. 'Hiruko?'
Chiyo, also in shock, scanning the area, saw the body of one of her subordinates.
Flickering over to the body of Kyousuke Chiyo was surprised to see half his body missing. Kyousuke smiled slightly at seeing his leader. "Kyousuke, what happened here?" Chiyo asked.
Kyousuke, hearing Chiyo's question, immediately shivered in fear, his voice quiet as his life came to an end. Kyouske mumbled.
"Lady Chiyo, no matter what, make sure my body is taken for mind reading; the village must know about that Demon Child—he's a living singularity…And tell Pakura Daddy loves her," Kyouske said as his eyes closed, his life fading, and his soul drifting to the pure land.
"Chiyo—" Hiruzen said, his arm reaching toward her.
Chiyo, however, swatting Hiruzen's hand away, a tear falling down her face, said, "You win, Hiruzen, but rest assured I will make sure the whole world knows his name, that all of them will wish to kill him." Chiyo said emotionally as she picked up Kyousuke's body.
Hiruzen, hearing this, sighed, 'Peace seems like an impossible feat.' Hiruzen thought as he went to look for the kids.
—
In a cave away from the battle
Hiruzen, tracking the kids to a cave a ways away from the battle, was met with the solemn figures of Jiraiya, Orochimaru, and Tsunade.
The three sensing his presence immediately looked up in anticipation, but seeing it was Hiruzen, they were noticeably disappointed.
Tsunade, seeing Hiruzen, immediately got up despite Jiraiya's protest.
"Where's my brother! What happened to my brother? This is all your fault; you knew he wasn't ready to take on three Jonin, yet you let him, and now my brother is missing," Tsunade said, full on crying as her tiny fist lightly hit Hiruzen as her tears stained his clothes.
Orochimaru in the back glared at Hiruzen with unreserved hostility, while Jiraiya kept his eyes on the floor, his thoughts a mix of Hiruko and the jutsu Tsunade used.
"I know, children, this is on me." Hiruzen said solemnly he didn't know where Hiruko was or if he was even alive.
"Yes, it is," a voice came from behind Hiruzen.
Everyone turning to see it saw Aarata and the actual body of Hiruzen; Arata, holding his unsheathed sword, glared at Hiruzen with anger about what type of teacher sends a clone on a mission with his students.
"Dad!!" Tsunade said, running to Arata and jumping into his arms, her tears flowing stronger. "Is Hiruko gone—?" Tsunade asked, scared, what her dad might tell her.
At this question everyone in the cave turned to Arata, even Hiruzen, who still had no idea whether his student was alive or dead.
Arata, catching his daughter, hugged her strongly, afraid to let go.
"Yes, he's alive, Tsuna. Your grandmother emplaced a tracking seal onto him when he first moved in. As for his exact location, that is unknown; it's reading as not in our dimension, meaning we can't get an exact location. And since we don't know where or how he even got there, we can't help him." Arata said, sighing, he didn't know how Hiruko managed to get to another dimension or how to help him return.
"I think I know how he got there," Tsunade said, speaking up, remembering something.
"That idiot—he's a genius." Tsunade exclaims,
"What, Tsunade?" Arata asked, confused.
"During our battle I used the Katsuyu summoning contract to heal Hiruko, Jiraiya, and Orochimaru, and Hiruko saw me performing it." Tsunade said excitedly this meant Hiruko was alive.
"What does that have to do with anything?" Jiraiya asked, scratching his head sheepishly.
Hiruzen, speaking up and answering Jiraiya's question, said, "When making a contract with a specific summoning clan, there's a possibility that some in those clans can use a technique called reverse summoning, which allows the caster to be summoned to the area in which that summoning beast lives. Hiruko, who saw Tsunade use the summoning technique, must've used it and did a reverse summoning to escape the blast of his technique," Hiruzen said.
"But there's a small problem: Hiruko isn't contracted with the slugs of Shikkotsu Forest," Arata said, highlighting a problem with their theory.
"A contract isn't technically needed; it'll result in you being pulled to a random summoning clan area, though this is dangerous since not all clans are human-friendly, and Hiruko would've been taking a giant gamble since there's no telling he would've summoned something with reverse summoning capabilities." Hiruzen rebutted.
"So what you're saying is Hiruko is trapped in a separate dimension alone with a possibly dangerous beast." Orochimaru asked, his gaze sharpening dangerously at Hiruzen, who was the cause for this.
Arata, though angry, didn't want things to escalate; at the end of the day, Hiruzen was still Hokage, and he knew his mother would handle it once they returned, so he changed the subject.
"Look, kids, the most we can do is head back to the village and hope Hiruko returns safely." Arata said as the group left the cave and headed back to Konoha.