The World Government's artillery support filled the nearly ten thousand shinobi on the battlefield with delight, but it also left many of them deeply unsettled.
They remembered that the World Government had been their enemy not long ago.
If these demons had not appeared, and if they had continued resisting, perhaps artillery fire as powerful as "small Tailed Beast Bombs" would have rained down on their heads—or flown straight into their villages.
The main issue was that the Ninja Villages of the Shinobi World truly had no good way to deal with beyond-visual-range bombardment launched from dozens of kilometers away.
All they could do was follow the direction of the incoming shells, locate the artillery positions, and find a way to destroy them.
"They're here!!"
Onoki and Rasa, high in the air, were the first to spot black dots appearing one after another along the horizon behind them.
Looking closer.
Those black dots were armored convoys stretching for dozens of kilometers, thousands of vehicles strong.
Shells still streaked across the sky overhead with shrieking whistles, continuously crashing into the distant hordes of demons.
The enormous commotion instead concealed the rolling rumble of the armored vehicles as they advanced.
But as the distance between the two sides steadily closed, the shinobi naturally noticed that the true reinforcements had arrived.
The artillery support was certainly welcome.
But what they really needed was someone to take over the defensive line for them.
They had no choice. They truly could not hold on much longer.
Very soon.
When the convoys of the 3rd Division and 5th Division reached a point roughly two hundred meters from the Allied Shinobi Forces, they began parking their armored vehicles side by side, rapidly constructing temporary defensive fortifications.
At the same time, black-robed figures emerged from the convoy and