"It's going to self-destruct!"
Nagato's voice crashed over the silent battlefield like a boulder.
The nerves of the surviving ninja, who had only just begun to relax, snapped taut again. Self-destruct? A three-hundred-meter-tall monster fused from countless Kekkei Genkai—if it blew itself up, its power would be enough to wipe this stretch of ocean, along with every living thing in it, off the map.
Panic had no time to spread. The energy core, compressed to its absolute limit, didn't erupt in the devastating flash and heat they had expected.
The cracked Rinnegan core was like a dead star. After swallowing every last glimmer of light and energy—even Sasuke's Amaterasu flames—it fell completely silent.
Then, a change occurred.
The three-hundred-meter-tall Giant Soldier, its enormous body woven from countless tentacles, began to dissolve. It wasn't collapsing or crumbling; it was melting like a gigantic wax statue beneath the blazing sun. Thick black liquid dripped from its body and fell into the swirling vortex below.
The instant each drop of black liquid touched the seawater, it writhed and reformed.
One, ten, hundreds...
Brand-new humanoid creatures, about three meters tall, rose from the vortex. Each had a different form, as if designed for a specific purpose.
Some were covered from head to toe in flowing blue armor. Their bodies glistened with moisture, and they radiated pure Water Release Chakra.
Some had lithe bodies, with blue-green currents swirling around them and limbs as sharp as blades.
Others were squat and heavy, their bodies covered in brown, rocklike shells that shimmered with an earthy yellow light.
Still others were wreathed in crackling arcs of electricity, radiating a ferocious aura.
"What are those?" a Leaf ninja murmured.
The Chakra signatures of these newly emerged monsters were nowhere near as terrifying as the Giant Soldier's had been. But