Hearing him, Nawaki slowly raised both hands. His expression was slightly grave, but his voice was perfectly calm.
"If you're going to attack, then be ready to leave your life here."
Kakuzu's face remained expressionless as he replied in a low voice,
"Don't worry. You'll be the one to die here. Even Lord Aizen won't blame me for killing you after you disobeyed orders."
As Kakuzu's words, tinged with murderous intent, fell over the scene, the air around them seemed to freeze!
A bloodthirsty atmosphere enveloped the area, as if a fierce battle could erupt at any moment!
The Konoha shinobi fell silent, watching Nawaki with concern as he stood there, perfectly calm.
Meanwhile, elsewhere on the Konoha battlefield,
a vast, dense forest lay shrouded in darkness. Many shinobi were hidden in concealed spots around its perimeter.
Some were from Konoha, some were Rock Ninja, and some were Sand Ninja. There were all kinds.
For some reason, though they knew of one another's presence, none of them tried to seek out their opponents. Instead, they crouched silently where they were, as if waiting for something!
A huge clearing in the dark forest looked as though a beast had torn it apart!
Dozens of enormous fissures, each more than ten meters long, scarred the ruined ground. The once-hard rock had crumbled into gravel scattered around them.
Deep, pitch-black pits of unknown origin were also scattered across the shattered clearing.
The thick trees that had once surrounded the area had fared even worse. They looked as though some giant beast had smashed them apart, their broken trunks jagged and rough!
"Haah... haah..."
At that moment, a harsh, bellows-like panting sounded from a concealed spot beside a distant tree trunk.
Hiruzen Sarutobi, his ninja clothes in tatters, crouched there. His gaze swept