The Ten Thousand Immortal Array! Begin!

Countless White Zetsu crawled out of the pit, packed so tightly there had to be tens of thousands of them.

Torifu was far away in the sky. From up there, they looked like maggots, making him feel sick.

Torifu could just about guess what the White Zetsu were planning. Otsutsuki Chenxiang wanted to cleave the moon and save his mother, and finding another Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan in this world would be all but impossible, so he had no choice but to take a dangerous gamble.

"I told you. Changing the plot was never going to be that easy."

Torifu muttered to himself. With so many White Zetsu keeping him occupied, Black Zetsu had surely already taken Madara Uchiha away.

There was nothing he could do. He could only hope this little detour wouldn't affect his KPI.

Once the White Zetsu reached a certain number, they stopped crawling out. This was probably the most Black Zetsu could afford to sacrifice.

After all, he still needed the rest to put on a show when he recruited accomplices into the "Cleave the Mountain and Save Mother" group chat.

'Look, buddy! I've got all these White Zetsu soldiers, and they're yours to command!'

'You're sure to achieve great things!'

Black Zetsu was an odd creature that had lived for so long. Wasn't he bound to have all sorts of ways to sweet-talk these little fools?

Obito Uchiha, Madara Uchiha—ultimately, they'd both become stepping stones for Black Zetsu. Nothing more than pawns.

Hashirama, watching from a nearby mountaintop, had no idea what these white beings were.

They all looked exactly alike. They couldn't be normal people.

Hashirama was worried that if he let these white monsters roam freely, they could seriously threaten the entire Land of Fire!

But if he attacked now, he might provoke the figure in the sky. Hashirama was caught between a rock and a hard place.

Before long, though, something stirred in the sky.

Torifu, high above, slowly rose into the clouds and disappeared from sight.

Just as Hashirama thought the Great Buddha had finally left and prepared to wipe out the white monsters, another strange change began!

All the clouds in the sky began rotating and converging in one direction. Clouds for hundreds of miles around were drawn toward a single point at the center.

When every cloud had gathered together, almost condensing into a tiny white dot in the sky—

It suddenly exploded! The clouds that had clustered together surged outward, spreading from Torifu like a storm.

At the same time, vast amounts of cloud rose higher and higher, forming layer upon layer of cloud rings—nine in all!

"The Ten Thousand Immortal Array! Return!"

At his words, the nine cloud rings instantly transformed into the Nine-Layered Heavenly Palace! Pavilions and towers filled every level. Cranes flew among the clouds, while rare beasts stood atop them, gazing down at the earth!

Then countless beams of light shone from every level. Each one unleashed an overwhelming pressure that swept across the ground!

As the beams faded, figures appeared among the clouds. Some were fat, some thin; they came in all shapes and sizes, men and women alike. Without exception, they wore Jade Crowns and white robes, and carried sharp swords!

Every one of them had the bearing of an immortal.

Tens of thousands of White Zetsu couldn't even stand under the pressure. Hashirama was stunned, having completely forgotten to wonder why it wasn't affecting him.

He had never seen or heard of such a magnificent palace in the sky, let alone one with thousands of people on every level!

Every one of them was many times stronger than he was!

Everything he'd seen tonight was reshaping his understanding of the world. Hashirama wasn't arrogant, but he had to admit that he was the strongest shinobi in the Shinobi World.

Yet there were at least ten thousand people in the sky whose strength surpassed his! And they all seemed to obey the man standing high above them.

"Everything is for the sake of all living beings."

"The Ten Thousand Immortal Array! Begin!"

Torifu formed a hand seal. Countless Cloud Swords rained down like a torrential downpour, ruthlessly reaping the lives of the White Zetsu!

At the same time, all the immortals atop the Nine-Layered Heavenly Palace formed hand seals together. In an instant, lightning, storms, blazing fire, extreme cold, metal, stone, and rain all attacked the White Zetsu below!

If the giant sword earlier had been a force capable of destroying the world, Hashirama couldn't find words to describe this attack.

Lightning and shards of ice struck the White Zetsu with the precision of Heaven's Punishment. A single blow could claim dozens of lives!

Then the flames incinerated every corpse, while metal, stone, and rain steadily filled the cracks in the ground and extinguished the spreading fires!

Under the Ten Thousand Immortal Array's world-shattering assault, the earth's "wounds" were actually healing.

Aside from the scorched earth left by the lightning and fire, the pits and cracks from before had all been smoothed over and disappeared.

All that was missing was a few trees, and it would look just as it had before.

After the relentless "cleansing," not a single White Zetsu remained on the ground. Using a technique like this to deal with a few tens of thousands of White Zetsu was complete overkill.

But for Torifu, he'd spent a year saving up, and this was his one chance to enjoy it! And you wouldn't let him? What kind of person were you?

Thanks to his ancestor's techniques, Torifu could now be absolutely certain that his ancestor wasn't from this world!

Every technique Torifu used required no hand seals, and the energy he used wasn't Chakra.

Torifu couldn't explain exactly what kind of energy it was. He knew nothing about how his ancestor cultivated, after all.

"Ten Thousand Immortal Array, disperse."

At his words, the Nine-Layered Heavenly Palace, along with the cranes and rare beasts, dissolved into mist. The thousands of immortals rode off on rays of sunset light and vanished from sight.

Only then did Hashirama come back to his senses. It looked like the battle was over, and his turn was probably next.

Hashirama felt uneasy. From the way that person in the sky carried himself, he seemed like a friend, not a foe.

Still, it was best to be cautious.

Torifu turned into a shooting star and crossed the distance in an instant, coming to a stop not far in front of Hashirama.

Hashirama, already on edge, jumped in fright. It took him a while to recover before he hurriedly bowed in greeting.

"I'm Senju Hashirama, a junior. May I ask your name, senior?"

Torifu stopped Hashirama and didn't let him bow. No matter how much he used the experience card, at heart he was still Kumonaka Torikaze.

If he accepted his master's bow, it would probably cost him years off his life!

"There's no need. I know what's on your mind." Torifu spoke calmly. His voice seemed to have a magical quality, gradually settling Hashirama's nerves.

In truth, Torifu had simply added a Cleansing Heart Mantra to his words. It seemed to be working well.

"I am the founder of the Kumonaka Clan, Yunzhong Huachen."

Just as he'd thought! Hashirama had suspected from the start that this person might belong to the Kumonaka Clan, but he never imagined he was its founder.

He must be hundreds, maybe even a thousand years old! How could he look younger than Hashirama?

"Thank you for intervening tonight, Senior Yunzhong."

Hashirama meant it. That night, he could say he'd done nothing—and yet everything had been resolved.

Konoha had escaped unharmed. It was a shame Madara had died, but they had both wagered their lives long ago. Hashirama had simply been a little luckier.

Torifu put on a solemn air and waved his hand. "Think nothing of it. That man disturbed the peace of my lonely spirit, so I punished him."

"Come to think of it, do I still have a descendant living in this world?"

(The protagonist can't cultivate immortality! The protagonist can't cultivate immortality!)