Within the dim underground expanse, the smoke from the summoning ritual gradually thinned.
Orochimaru stood atop Manda's head, his vertical golden pupils flashing with a cold light. He stared at "Shura," who had retreated calmly to maintain distance after the successful strike. A tumultuous sea of emotions churned in his eyes—a volatile mixture of the humiliation of being toyed with, wariness of an unknown power, and a primal, explosive rage at having his boundaries crossed.
"A hundred sacrifices? I'll bring you a thousand!" Orochimaru's raspy voice was thick with murderous intent. Having been made a fool of twice by Shura, the Sannin's fury had finally reached its boiling point.
"Hmph, you said it, not me!" Manda roared. His titanic body crushed the cavern walls, sending a rain of jagged stone downward as his massive tail whipped toward Menma.
Menma looked up at the giant serpent, whose head nearly grazed the ceiling, and knit his brows slightly.
"With a body that size, are you trying to bring the whole cave down?" Menma muttered to himself. He knew he had to end this quickly. If Orochimaru found himself outmatched, he could simply use a Reverse Summoning to escape to Ryuchi Cave. But if Manda collapsed the cavern, burying the Iburi clan in the process, Menma would be the one losing out. After all, he already considered this smoke-shifting clan his private property.
"In that case, let's use this." Menma's left hand drew several specialized kunai, while his right began to condense a Mini Spiralling Ring.
Unlike the standard Spiralling Ring, which was comparable in size to a Rasenshuriken, this "Mini" version was only the size of a fist. However, the density of the hyper-compressed dark chakra within—encircled by a planetary ring of Wind Style energy—was high enough to make one's heart skip a beat.
This was an enhanced variant Menma had developed in the Limited Tsukuyomi world. If the Spiralling Ring was the baseline, the Mini version was its concentrated evolution, leading eventually to the Great Spiralling Ring—a technique capable of rivaling the Calamity of the Heavens.
As Manda's tail tore through the air in a horizontal sweep, the kunai flew toward Orochimaru like silver streaks of lightning. Standing atop the serpent's head, Orochimaru shifted his body just enough to let them whistle past, the gale from the blades fluttering his long black hair.
His hands blurred into seals, preparing a counterattack. Even if he couldn't kill Shura, he would level this cavern to the ground and make the traitorous Iburi pay in blood.
However, just as Orochimaru's fingers locked into the final seal and Manda's tail pulverized the ground where Shura had stood, the target vanished.
An invisible killing intent erupted directly behind Orochimaru!
"What!" Combat instincts forged through decades of life-and-death struggle caused his muscles to lock tight.
But it was already too late—
BOOM—!!!
The Mini Spiralling Ring slammed ruthlessly into Orochimaru's kidney area. The hyper-compressed dark energy detonated upon impact. Already wounded, nearly half of Orochimaru's midsection was shredded by the combined force of the dark and wind-natured chakra. It felt as though a prehistoric beast had taken a massive, jagged bite out of his torso.
Menma, having materialized instantly behind him, gripped a specialized kunai in his left hand while his right hand's strike sent both Orochimaru and Manda crashing downward.
Rumble—!
Manda let out an agonized shriek as the shockwave slammed his massive skull into the earth, creating a crater that spider-webbed across the cavern floor. The summoning jutsu forcibly unraveled.
"Cough..."
As Manda vanished, Orochimaru was left slumped in the depths of the crater. But a moment later, the body—nearly torn in two—began to liquefy. A pale, slender arm thrust out from Orochimaru's own maw, followed by a second Orochimaru clawing his way out of his own throat.
When the fresh, molted body fully emerged, slime-covered fingers pushed aside wet strands of hair to reveal a pair of serpent eyes burning with both a thirst for knowledge and raw malice.
Orochimaru-Style Substitute Jutsu—one of his signature escape techniques.
"How... how do you know the Flying Raijin!" Orochimaru's voice trembled with excitement, his tongue reflexively flickering over his lips.
He had combed through his memories of every Konoha ninja, from the late Second Hokage Tobirama Senju to the Fourth Minato Namikaze, and even Minato's personal guard. None of them fit the profile. It was as if Shura had appeared out of thin air!
Had his combat intuition not forced him to prepare the substitute jutsu in advance, that terrifying orb would have severed his spine.
Flying Raijin... and a technique that mirrors the Rasengan... Orochimaru's nose twitched as he wiped blood from the corner of his mouth. His mind raced back to the Fourth Hokage, who had supposedly died three years ago on the Night of the Nine-Tails.
Could it be Minato Namikaze? No... impossible... I saw the burial of Minato and Kushina with my own eyes... Sweat beaded on Orochimaru's forehead. He had been a high-ranking official during the Nine-Tails incident and had attended the funeral. With his expertise in human anatomy, he knew those corpses were genuine. Furthermore, he had personally secured samples of Minato's cellular tissue later on.
None of the clues fit. Yet, one thing was certain: the man before him was undoubtedly a ninja of the Leaf!
By now, the Death God and Jade Maiden had escorted the Iburi clan to safety. Only Menma and Orochimaru remained in the vast, hollow space.
"Is that all you've got?" Menma's footsteps echoed in the sudden silence.
Under the flickering lamplight, Shura walked slowly toward Orochimaru. With every step, the invisible pressure in the room intensified. Even for a Sannin, the weight of the aura was suffocating. It reminded Orochimaru of the crushing presence of Hanzo of the Salamander during the Second Ninja War.
Meanwhile, Menma was contemplating how to bring Orochimaru to heel. The man's scientific mind was peerless, but his pride was equally immense. He wouldn't submit easily; he was a man who dared to covet the Rinnegan of Nagato and the Sharingan of Itachi Uchiha.
With Menma's current strength, total control was impossible without something like Shisui's Kotoamatsukami.
And yet...
Menma continued his leisurely stroll around the perimeter of the crater. Below him, Orochimaru clutched his side, his serpent eyes fixed on Shura with the venomous focus of a cornered viper.
"I'd advise you to use the Living Corpse Reincarnation sparingly," Menma said, his voice dropping to a low, resonant tone.
For a moment, Orochimaru was stunned. Then, his pale face contorted into a bizarre, twitching grimace.
"No... you couldn't possibly know... the Living Corpse Reincarnation..." A wheezing laugh escaped his throat, his fingers spasming against his face in agitation.
That forbidden jutsu—developed in secret and never yet performed—was his ultimate key to immortality. He was certain he hadn't breathed a word of it to anyone!
"Intriguing... how very intriguing..." Orochimaru held his wounded gut with one hand while covering half his face with the other. The eye peering through his fingers was alight with madness.
"Attacking the Leaf, raiding the Cloud, claiming to be Danzo... a jutsu nearly identical to the Rasengan, mastery of the Flying Raijin, the ability to intercept my escape routes with surgical precision, knowledge of my Hashirama cells, and now... knowledge of a ritual I have never once cast..."
Suddenly, the laughter died. Orochimaru lowered his hand, his expression becoming hauntingly lucid.
"You are a ninja of the Leaf! But you are not a ninja of this era!"
Orochimaru straightened his back, staring at the masked man with the ecstatic fervor of a scientist discovering a new world.
He shouted, "You've come from the future... haven't you, SHURA?!"
Menma: ...Huh?