Noticing Isshiki Otsutsuki's gaze linger on his raised right arm, the corner of Rei Kaguya's mouth curved into a faint, pleased arc.
Plan successful.
The fish had taken the bait.
He was not worried that he would be unable to defeat Isshiki Otsutsuki. According to Naruto Uzumaki's description, once Isshiki was forced to release the Karma engraved on Jigen's body, it meant that he would return to the world in an incomplete state after having once been devoured by the Ten-Tails. Even if he could briefly obtain the ability to use the Otsutsuki clan's strongest power—Shinjutsu—he still could not solve one fundamental problem no matter what.
His lifespan was nearly exhausted.
His endurance was insufficient.
As long as he could not find a suitable vessel to engrave a new Karma upon, every bit of chakra Isshiki used was equivalent to taking one more step toward death.
And the most beautiful part was that the several Kara members who had already received Isshiki Otsutsuki's Karma in Naruto Uzumaki's world had not even been born in this world yet.
In other words, if Isshiki was unwilling to die here, then aside from gambling everything and trying to engrave Karma onto Rei, a person who had accepted Kaguya Otsutsuki's Karma, he had no other choice.
"As long as you do not think of using that Shinjutsu that can shrink you to an invisible size and run away."
Rei kept his expression calm, swung the gray bone blade in his hand, and charged through the air toward Isshiki, who was still hesitating.
What answered him was the sand and shattered stones Isshiki once again resized using Sukunahikona. In their earlier battle, in order to compensate for his other Shinjutsu, Daikokuten, being completely sealed off by Rei's Voidless, Isshiki had already shrunk countless massive rocks shattered during their clashes into fine grains of sand and carried them around himself.
He used them as unexpected shields.
As for Isshiki himself, in the brief moment when Rei's movement was obstructed, he did everything he could to widen the distance between them.
He knew very well that Rei Kaguya's dojutsu, Voidless, had not yet reached the category of Shinjutsu, the highest power pursued by the Otsutsuki clan.
Therefore, the range of space Voidless could seal had to have a limit.
If he could find the boundary of Voidless's sealed space before Rei entangled him again, then he could reverse the offensive and defensive positions between them.
It was true that Rei Kaguya's sudden arrival had caught him off guard. He had even been forced to thaw Karma's complete form, leaving him with little remaining lifespan.
But how could Rei Kaguya possibly not fear the desperate counterattack Isshiki might unleash against the shinobi world if he was driven into a dead end?
Through reports from those irrelevant subordinates, Isshiki Otsutsuki understood very clearly what kind of personality Rei Kaguya possessed.
For him, threatening Rei with the safety of the entire shinobi world and making him reveal an opening through hesitation was a highly feasible plan.
"You want to use your own body to lure me into risking everything and fighting you to the death? The plan is not bad. But I am no mortal shinobi you can manipulate at will. Even if I truly am going to seize your body as a vessel, it will be after I personally grant Karma to you, an insolent junior who dares to defy his superior…"
As Isshiki thought this, he accelerated once again.
While continuously shrinking and enlarging the ancient trees and giant stones blasted loose by his high-speed movement, using them as obstacles to intercept Rei's pursuit, he advanced toward the edge of Voidless's sealed domain with a speed and seriousness he had never displayed before.
Closer.
Closer!
Isshiki Otsutsuki could clearly feel that the spatial freeze Rei had created with Voidless was gradually becoming less powerful as he fled at high speed.
Although it was still not enough for him to tear open a spatial passage large enough to leave, it was already beginning to waver under the impact of his chakra.
So he accelerated even further.
He even abandoned the meaningless obstacles he had been using to block Rei's pursuit and poured all his chakra into rushing out of the other party's sealed zone.
"Sage Art—"
!?
The unfamiliar male voice that suddenly came from the inconspicuous mountain forest startled Isshiki Otsutsuki.
But before he could sense who the other party was, or how he had hidden himself along the escape route Isshiki had chosen, that fighting spirit-filled, magnificent voice roared out the rest of its words.
"Super Massive Tailed Beast Rasengan!"
Naruto Uzumaki, whose entire body surged with majestic Tailed Beast chakra, had perfectly fused that chakra with natural energy, unleashing peerless destructive force. He leapt up, and under Isshiki Otsutsuki's stunned and horrified gaze, smashed his attack into Isshiki's unguarded body.
After entering the Ten-Tails' body and obtaining all the information contained within the chakra of the nine Tailed Beasts, Naruto Uzumaki had accumulated an enormous amount of senjutsu chakra in Ryuchi Cave ahead of time.
Following Rei's arrangement, he had long since hidden near the edge of the Voidless domain Rei had created, waiting for Isshiki Otsutsuki's arrival.
And with the characteristic of senjutsu chakra, which allowed a person in a still state to become one with nature, he successfully deceived Isshiki Otsutsuki, whose attention was almost entirely restrained by Rei.
He found an opportunity to deal a fatal blow to Isshiki, who had no attention to spare for anything else.
The chakra of the nine Tailed Beasts gathered into one.
The massive senjutsu chakra provided by Ryuchi Cave served as support.
On top of that, there was the information engraved inside the Ten-Tails regarding Isshiki Otsutsuki—his personality, combat habits, ninjutsu mastery, Shinjutsu trump cards—and Naruto Uzumaki's own experience of directly defeating Isshiki Otsutsuki in the future.
All of that together formed this unavoidable strike that could be called a certain kill.
"Guh—"
The instant Jigen's body was struck by Sage Art: Super Massive Tailed Beast Rasengan, it spun in place uncontrollably and began collapsing.
Even though Isshiki Otsutsuki had carefully maintained and protected Jigen's body for thousands of years, he could never change the fact that Jigen's body was not fully compatible with his Karma.
That flaw was not very obvious when he was releasing chakra and clashing with enemies, but once the main body suffered an attack, it caused Isshiki Otsutsuki to endure damage far beyond imagination.
Watching Isshiki Otsutsuki's chakra surge out like a tidal wave, yet still fail no matter what to prevent Jigen's body from completely collapsing within the radiance of the Rasengan, Naruto Uzumaki took a deep breath.
Then, facing Isshiki, who now had only half a head left and was glaring at him with eyes nearly splitting apart, Naruto slowly made a thumbs-down gesture and said,
"This strike was for Kurama, who almost died in battle against you, and for the countless shinobi and civilians who were sacrificed because of you…
"Disappear forever, Isshiki.
"And become nothing more than a memory recorded inside the Ten-Tails."
When did I ever fight you?
When did I almost kill that so-called Kurama!?
You bastard, you bastard—
No.
No.
No!!!
I cannot become a memory!
I will not become a memory!
I refuse to become a memory!!!
Isshiki roared silently within the violent explosion. With endless fury and unwillingness in his eyes, he stared fixedly at Naruto Uzumaki's cross-shaped pupils, at the pure chakra-formed Six Paths cloak on his body, and at the Truth-Seeking Balls behind him.
It was as if he wanted, through this method, to engrave all the final anger and curses of his life into the other party's body and soul.
Then, suddenly, he noticed something.
Within the Tailed Beast chakra surging around Naruto Uzumaki, the Nine-Tails' chakra was not entirely harmonious with that of the other eight Tailed Beasts.
That chakra had less past information than the other Tailed Beasts.
But after the present point, it possessed more information than the others.
"It was you…
"It was you!!!
"You were the one who told Rei Kaguya about Momoshiki and Urashiki! It was you! You person from the future!!!"
Isshiki's remaining face twisted.
He had never imagined that his current defeat, even his impending death, had come because a person from the future had appeared and caused him to inexplicably fall into this desperate situation.
He was unwilling.
He could not understand.
He could not figure it out.
"If you cannot figure it out, then think about it slowly. After this, you will have plenty of time to consider exactly how you lost everything you should have possessed, step by step, until you had nothing left at all, Isshiki."
Isshiki Otsutsuki, who had already been launched into outer space by the Super Massive Tailed Beast Rasengan and was about to be annihilated in both body and soul, suddenly heard Rei Kaguya's detestable voice beside his ear.
Then he saw countless meteorites orbiting the shinobi world begin gathering toward him in perfect unison.
A slender, pale hand also descended upon the last small half of his head with overwhelming force, unavoidable.
"Six Paths: Abyssal Star Prison."
A time freeze of the same type as the one that had sealed Kaguya Otsutsuki froze Isshiki's final body and chakra within it.
Afterward, the meteor swarm that had arrived here piled layer upon layer onto that tiny "ice crystal," constantly compressing, constantly condensing.
In the end, it transformed into a transparent prison only half a person tall, yet with a weight close to one-fourth of the moon.
Rei lightly held it in his hand.