"Senjutsu…"
"Looks like every technique you use is the most troublesome kind."
Even if, for some reason, the facts truly were as Hagoromo had said, and he temporarily could not use that powerful "Lightning Release" mode, senjutsu was still not a technique to be underestimated. Sage Mode was even less something that could be dealt with simply.
Compared to Hagoromo's artillery-style Lightning Release, Nagato's understanding of senjutsu was far more limited. At least he had fought Hagoromo before, but he had not expected the other party to change his playstyle again this time. Nagato was now facing his first experience with senjutsu…
This time, he did not have Teacher Jiraiya feeding him practice moves. What he faced right from the start was perfect Sage Mode.
A technique's power was closely connected to how mysterious it was. Taking Nagato's Deva Path powers as an example, there was naturally no need to say much about the power of Shinra Tensei and Banshō Ten'in. But after the specific details of those two techniques became known, their threat to Hagoromo had long since decreased greatly. In fact, as long as he was on guard, they posed almost no threat at all.
That was Nagato's greatest disadvantage in this battle.
Hagoromo had seen almost all of his moves.
By contrast, what about Hagoromo?
There were many of Hagoromo's techniques that Nagato had never seen before.
For example, now that Hagoromo was not using Lightning Release, he still had senjutsu. It was only natural that Nagato would find this troublesome.
Of course, Nagato was not someone who had remained stagnant. The fact that he could use the Rinnegan to this degree was enough to prove his talent. By now, the potential he had displayed in the past had already turned into strength.
This battle of Hagoromo's was absolutely not something that could be described with the words "stomping noobs."
A brand-new chakra mode was equivalent to facing a brand-new enemy. So first, Nagato needed to probe him… Back then, he could openly call himself a god in front of Hagoromo, but now, whenever he could act cautiously, he would absolutely do so.
And so…
At this moment, a violent force of air came from behind Hagoromo, as though in the next instant, a sharp sword would pierce through the back of his head!
Unfortunately, for Hagoromo in Sage Mode, that "next instant" would never arrive.
Hagoromo swung his arm, turned around, and raised his forearm behind him. With a sharp slap, something sticky and adhesive wrapped itself around his arm.
Then Hagoromo twisted his elbow and clenched his hand, grabbing that wet, strip-like object in his grasp.
Immediately afterward, Hagoromo suddenly exerted force with one arm. That thing instantly stretched taut like a rope bearing enormous strength. As his physical abilities in Sage Mode erupted, the huge creature connected to the other end of the strip-like object was directly dragged toward him at extreme speed.
Boom!
The air before him seemed to be slammed into the ground with tremendous weight, producing a huge tremor and roar. After being smashed down, that transparent thing gradually revealed its shape.
A lizard? A chameleon?
In any case, what Hagoromo had pulled over was this sort of summoned beast.
He had very inhumanely grabbed its tongue.
And it was not over yet. Hagoromo raised the chakra blade in his right hand and lightly slashed downward from above. With an almost imperceptible sense of resistance, that wet tongue was directly cut off.
Before the lizard could let out a hiss, an even heavier sound rang out.
An even larger strip-like object descended from the sky.
Nagato had summoned a lizard.
Hagoromo had summoned his Big Sis.
Katsuyu descended from the sky, first smashing the lizard until it saw stars, and then her lower abdomen began to dissolve. Immediately afterward, she wrapped the lizard inside herself…
To be honest, Katsuyu somewhat missed the days when she often accompanied Tsunade. Although Tsunade had a bit of a temper, compared to her, Hagoromo was undoubtedly more "respectful." But whenever Katsuyu was summoned by Hagoromo, he often made her digest all sorts of strange things, from civil engineering materials to various disgusting creatures. He had everything covered.
Did he really treat Big Sis like Big Sis?
Although the handling method exceeded imagination, it was not outside Nagato's expectations that the lizard was dealt with in one move. From this brief exchange, he could at least determine two things: in Sage Mode, Hagoromo's sensory ability and physical ability had both been greatly enhanced.
So, while Big Sis Katsuyu was displaying her powerful digestive capabilities, Nagato decisively retreated.
Nagato seemed to be attempting some kind of strategic relocation, but Hagoromo clearly would not give him such an opportunity. What if, during the process of relocating, the other party simply ran away?
And so the pursuit began.
Hagoromo was obviously much faster, but Nagato was clearly more familiar with the terrain. The two of them darted and shifted between Amegakure's forest of towers. Then, at the next turn, Nagato disappeared.
In his place, a black dot slowly floated toward the sky.
Although Nagato came from the Uzumaki clan, his parents had died early. Clearly, an Uzumaki with inheritance and an Uzumaki without inheritance were not the same sort of creature. No matter what, he could not be considered proficient in sealing techniques.
In terms of the number of sealing techniques he had mastered, Nagato was absolutely not as rich as Hagoromo. Moreover, those were not sealing techniques belonging to the Uzumaki clan, but dōjutsu belonging to the Rinnegan.
But the number of sealing techniques one had mastered had nothing to do with the strength of the sealing techniques one could use. Although Nagato did not have many sealing techniques, every one of them belonged to the most powerful category.
Among the powers of the Deva Path, there was one that Hagoromo had never witnessed before.
That was the ultimate sealing technique before his eyes: Chibaku Tensei.
At least, that was what Nagato thought.
Strictly speaking, Hagoromo truly had never seen this technique before. He had only seen a certain chakra essence use a similar technique on a slightly larger scale.
That one was called Six Paths: Chibaku Tensei.
The tiny difference between the two was that the former could not even completely seal the Nine-Tails, while the latter had trapped the Ten-Tails for a thousand years without being broken through.
As Hagoromo moved toward Nagato, he raised his head and looked diagonally at the black dot in the sky. Under the effect of the immense gravitational pull, everything around them had already begun to float into the air against gravity. But Hagoromo somehow felt as though "after seeing the vast ocean, no other water could impress him."
Such a large-scale sealing technique actually failed to move him.
After all, he had already witnessed what the Sage of Six Paths truly was.
This was already Hagoromo's third battle against the Rinnegan. Therefore, the hidden sealing technique that Nagato believed only he knew about was already perfectly clear to Hagoromo.
Besides, even without the Sage of Six Paths, Hagoromo would still know that the Rinnegan possessed the ability to create celestial bodies.
The core of Chibaku Tensei began to pull at Hagoromo's body, but that was as far as it went.
Hagoromo had no desire to be stuffed into another lump of earth like that, and his method of dealing with it was exactly the same as last time.
Hagoromo raised one arm, and a Reverse Four Symbols Sealing Technique scroll flew into the air. Under the combined effect of Hagoromo's strength and the gravitational pull in the sky, it rapidly approached the core of Chibaku Tensei.
Just as it barely entered the effective range of the Reverse Four Symbols Sealing Technique, Hagoromo had already completed his hand seals. Immediately afterward, a huge black sphere opened in midair.
This was a contest between sealing techniques.
If one were to ask whether the Reverse Four Symbols Sealing Technique could still take effect after Chibaku Tensei had fully formed, that would indeed be hard to say. But if it directly attacked the core of Chibaku Tensei before the technique formula fully unfolded, then the destructive power it produced was absolutely complete.
As the Reverse Four Symbols Sealing Technique opened and annihilated everything within its range, the fragile core of Chibaku Tensei's power was destroyed along with it.
Immediately afterward, that upward gravitational pull was forcibly cut off. In fact, throughout this brief process, Hagoromo had not even stopped pursuing him.
Who knew whether Nagato had expected that his ultimate move would fail to delay Hagoromo even slightly…
However, as Hagoromo closely pursued Nagato's chakra, he suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of danger.
Did it come from his perception, or from instinct?
Hagoromo did not know. But in an instant, he stopped advancing and instead retreated, pulling away immediately.
Then, at the very spot where Hagoromo had just been standing, a semi-transparent dragon-shaped object suddenly burst out!
Fortunately, that thing did not possess high-speed movement ability. Otherwise, Hagoromo would have stepped right into it.
After missing with one strike, that thing retreated again. Then Nagato walked out step by step.
At this moment, he had changed into a form that looked extremely ominous.
His entire body was wrapped in that semi-transparent substance, almost like some kind of chakra mode. Or rather, it looked more like an alternative tailed-beast cloak.
Ten tails with "dragon heads" swayed behind Nagato, making him look like an alternative Ten-Tails' jinchūriki.
It did not matter that Chibaku Tensei had failed, because this next move was his true killing blow.
Hagoromo's feeling and his decision to retreat just now had undoubtedly been correct, because the current Nagato truly could not be touched.
This was a killing technique Nagato had brought out by using the Rinnegan's second layer of power while also borrowing the power of the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path.
Only by combining, solidifying, and maintaining the Human Path's "soul devouring," the Preta Path's "demonic pounce," and the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path's "chakra dragon" had this chakra mode been created.
But rather than calling it a chakra mode, it would be better to call it a roaming Total Sealing Technique.
Its effect was also very simple.
Whoever touched it died.
As long as one came into contact with this thing, both body and spirit would be erased.
So Nagato once again extended that injured, bloodstained hand toward Hagoromo, and then he said:
"Banshō Ten'in!"
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