"Crash—crash—"
As shards rained down, a small footprint branded with golden-red magatama was exposed to everyone's view. Immediately after, Ginkaku's body swayed, and just before he could fall flat on his back, Kinkaku, quick-eyed and quick-handed behind him, caught him in one grab.
It turned out that in that exchange of kicks just now, although Senju Hi Shin, positioned on the right, had held every advantage of timing and terrain, Ginkaku's defense had been astonishing. Even if she traded injury for injury, she had still been destined to lose.
But in that dead end, a variable had just so happened to appear. The wound on Ginkaku's chest, the one Danzo had punched through with Butt Release, became the turning point for Senju Hi Shin's counterattack.
On top of that, the Nine-Tails had poured the essence of life into her for one final dance, giving Senju Hi Shin even more confidence that she could pull off the kill.
And the result was just as she had imagined. Even though Ginkaku's kick had forced her transformation to come undone, in the instant before that, she had poured every last bit of her own strength and the Nine-Tails' into the wound on Ginkaku's chest.
As for what came after, she could only leave it to fate.
"This is..."
Looking at the red magatama radiating an eerie aura from the dark footprint, Kinkaku's brows immediately furrowed into a deep scowl.
"Big Brother... Pfft!"
The pale-faced Ginkaku had just been about to say something reassuring, but in the next second, great amounts of blood spilled from his mouth and nose. His once-robust body also shriveled at a visible speed, the flame of his life on the verge of going out.
And the culprit behind it all was the strange-auraed magatama on his chest.
"It's Baryon