BOOM.
When Ikki's makeshift Tengai Shinsei—that mountain of solid rock—collided with the earth, the world went white. The resulting shockwave was visible to the naked eye, a concussive ring that expanded like a tactical blast, dragging a wall of pulverized dust and debris in its wake.
For ten kilometers in every direction, the Land of Earth buckled. The tectonic impact sent tremors through the crust, splitting the ground into jagged fissures that wound across the landscape like a nest of starving pythons. A massive spiderweb of cracks consumed the valley. Mountainsides made of ancient, stubborn stone were simply uprooted, tossed into the sky by the sheer force of the impact before disintegrating into gravel.
Silence followed, heavy and suffocating.
As the dust began to settle and the tremors faded into a low hum, three figures dragged themselves upright. Tsunade, Orochimaru, and Jiraiya stared at the horizon, their faces frozen in masks of pure, unadulterated disbelief.
The landscape they had been fighting in was gone. Where there had once been a jagged mountain range, there was now a thousand-meter-wide basin, as smooth and hollowed out as a bowl. In the center of that crater lay a single, shattered boulder.
There were no Iwa shinobi left. Not a single one.
"Hundreds of them..." Jiraiya rasped. His voice was thick with blood and dust. Leaning on Tsunade for support, he stared at the site of the natural disaster. Then, his heavy gaze shifted to the distant figure in the center of the devastation—a massive man in a black suit, looking as unbothered as if he'd just finished a light morning stroll. "Is this really the man who stood above the God of Shinobi?"
Orochimaru stood nearby, Jiraiya's weight shifted onto his own shoulders. His amber, serpentine eyes were narrowed, flickering with a dizzying mix of horror, shock, and a dark, obsessive kind of admiration.
"The legend of the Sengoku era," Orochimaru whispered. "He's not a man. He's a cataclysm."
Tsunade didn't speak immediately. She frowned, her eyes searching Ikki's face as he began to walk toward them. Her expression shifted from shock to a strange, distant yearning, as if a locked door in her mind was suddenly being pried open.
"I've... I've seen this before," she murmured. "This feeling."
Memory surged back to her—vivid and nonsensical. She remembered being a small child, crying inconsolably. Not even the First Hokage's goofy antics or the Second's stern presence could quiet her. Finally, Tobirama had sighed, performed the Flying Thunder God technique, and whisked her away to a secluded forest.
There, a giant of a man had stood before her. To stop her tears, he had reached down, uprooted a small hill, and kicked it like a ball into the horizon.
She had stopped crying instantly.
As Ikki approached, a grin spreading across his weathered face, she pointed a trembling finger at him. "It was you! You're the one who used a mountain as a soccer ball!"
Jiraiya choked on his own breath. "He pulled up a mountain?"
"To use as a ball?" Orochimaru muttered, his mind reeling.
The Sannin shared a look of mutual realization. No wonder Tsunade had grown up to value raw, overwhelming power above all else. Her childhood "nanny" was a man who played catch with geological features.
"Haha! I didn't think you'd actually remember that, Little Tsuna!" Ikki laughed, the sound booming through the crater. His eyes softened as he looked at her. Most of his contemporaries were long since buried; seeing the granddaughter of his old friends grown and strong brought a genuine warmth to his chest.
"Of course I remember!" Tsunade cried, stepping forward to grab his massive arm. Adrenaline and relief washed over her, and for a moment, the fearsome Sannin looked like a little girl again. "I've lived my whole life without seeing anyone else do something so absurd—not even my grandfathers. But they never told me who you really were! I thought you were just some wandering uncle. Why didn't they tell me?"
"Don't go blaming Hashirama and Tobirama," Ikki said, patting her golden hair with a hand the size of a dinner plate. "They promised me they'd keep my retirement a secret. The fact that they brought you to see me at all was their way of making sure I'd recognize you... and that I'd step in if the world ever tried to break you."
He understood it now. The Senju brothers had been playing the long game. They never asked him for help during the wars or the Uchiha crises; they saved their 'favor' for the one thing they loved most. Their legacy.
"So... you really came all this way just for me?" Tsunade asked softly.
"Why else would I leave my fishing spot?" Ikki smiled. Then, his ears twitched. His head turned toward the center of the basin. "Stay here for a second."
He turned and strode back into the heart of the crater. There, lying amidst the rubble, was the broken form of Kitsuchi. He had lost half his lower body in the impact, his life force flickering like a candle in a gale.
"Iron... Fist..." Kitsuchi wheezed, his eyelids fluttering as he sensed the giant looming over him.
His face was a roadmap of agony—fear, awe, and a crushing sense of remorse. If he had been more decisive, if he had reined in Huoguang's ego, perhaps he would be retreating with his men right now instead of dying in a hole.
"Are you here... to finish it?" Kitsuchi whispered, a bitter smile touching his lips.
Ikki looked down at the Tsuchikage's son, his expression unreadable. "Kill you? Who do you think you are?"
Kitsuchi flinched.
"Just because you're the son of a Kage doesn't mean you're special," Ikki grumbled, his voice cold. "In my eyes, you're just another nameless brat who didn't know when to walk away. You aren't even worth the effort of an execution."
He turned his back on the dying man, the dismissal more painful than any physical blow. To the Iron Fist, the pride of Iwagakure wasn't a fallen foe—he was simply irrelevant.