The Hokage's Cold Gaze and the Boiling Nine-Tails Chakra

It was like a fire burning straight into the marrow.

Baishi sat in the broad Hokage chair. The skin on the back of his hand had reddened slightly under the Nine-Tails Chakra spilling from Kushina. The moisture in the air evaporated in an instant. Every breath carried the sharp stink of sulfur and the charred smell of the solid-wood floor.

Click.

Baishi gently set his cracked teacup on the desk. The faint sound vanished beneath the roar of burning Chakra.

Kushina was wrapped in a translucent cloak of gold and crimson. Two thick Chakra tails thrashed through the air, shredding the portraits of past Hokage on the wall. Her once-clear eyes had turned into dark-red slits, stained by the Nine-Tails' savagery.

"Baishi! What are you waiting for?!"

Kushina stared at the Water Mirror suspended in midair. Her voice was hoarse with fury she could barely contain.

In the Water Mirror, Orochimaru's pale, arrogant face had been magnified several times over. The snake stood on the corpse of a Hyuga Branch Family ninja, mocking Konoha's helplessness. Behind him, the Mutant stitched together from Wood Release and Ice Release picked up a severed limb, stuffed it into the gaping hole where its mouth should be, and chewed.

Blood, torn flesh, and Orochimaru's sickening laughter came through the Water Mirror like barbed needles driven into Kushina's nerves.

"They're Konoha ninja! That disgusting snake dares to treat them as food on our own ground!" Kushina's chest heaved. Her nails dug deep into the back of Baishi's chair, while the solid-wood armrest groaned under the heat and crumbled into black ash. "Let me go! I'll go to the Forest of Death right now, peel that snake's skin off, and burn that monster to ashes!"

In the corner, Mikoto Uchiha stumbled back from the violent heat.