The symphony of destruction began its most violent overture three seconds after Mizuki Han pressed the button.
It wasn't a single deafening blast, but a dense, unrelenting chain of collapses that started deep beneath the earth—enough to make anyone's blood run cold!
"Boom—r-rumble!"
The first to give way were the load-bearing pillars in Sector B-3, at the very bottom of the underground base. The Explosive Tags Mizuki Han had placed there precisely destroyed the core supports holding up tens of thousands of tons of rock and steel.
Like a giant beast with its backbone torn out, the massive underground fortress let out its first groan of agony.
Mizuki Han held Haku tightly against him, bracing himself against the crushing force pressing in from every direction. He could feel the metal floor beneath them buckling upward at a terrifying angle. Under stress beyond its limits, the sturdy alloy let out a shrill, tortured screech as it twisted out of shape.
"Crack—crack—"
A jagged fissure suddenly appeared in the ceiling above them. Like black lightning, it spread across the entire passage overhead in an instant!
Then countless chunks of concrete, each larger than a person's head, came pouring down like a torrential rain, tangled with severed cables spitting sparks!
"Brother Han!"
Haku screamed, her voice warped by overwhelming terror. In her world, the sky and earth had turned upside down, and up, down, left, and right had lost all meaning. Everything around them shook, tore apart, and collapsed as if some invisible ancient demon were crushing this steel hell into a ball of scrap.
Mizuki Han said nothing. He only wrapped his one good arm even more tightly around the girl in his embrace, like an iron clamp. Pain flared from his severed arm. Each tremor felt like countless red-hot needles twisting through his nerves. But his dark eyes remained terrifyingly clear.
He paid no attention to the falling boulders or the deadly poison mist that had already crept to their feet.
Through the widening cracks and layers of darkness, his gaze pinpointed the next blast site: Sector C-5, beneath the Interrogation Department!
"Rumble—!!!"
A duller, more terrifying blast than all the previous explosions combined came from that direction.
It was the unstoppable destructive force of hundreds of kilograms of Explosive Tags detonating at once in an enclosed space!
If the earlier explosions had merely made the giant beast groan, this one had snapped its spine!
A visible ring of destruction erupted from Sector C-5 and spread wildly in every direction! Every wall, passage, and room in its path was torn apart, pulverized, and swallowed by the force as easily as paper!
The passage in Sector F where they stood was no exception.
With a teeth-grinding shriek of tearing metal, the floor beneath them suddenly dropped!
Weightlessness!
Mizuki Han's pupils contracted. He realized at once that the supports beneath their section had been completely destroyed. They were falling...
A gale surged up from below, whipping his tattered clothes.
The yellow poison mist was also swept away by the sudden change in airflow, vanishing into the air around them as an even deadlier, invisible poison.
But Mizuki Han had no time to worry about that.
As they fell, an even grander, more awe-inspiring, and more terrifying sight unfolded before him.
Through the enormous breach that had torn open above them, he saw it!
He saw the headquarters building rising aboveground, the symbol of the Mist Anbu's power and authority!
The foundations of the building, usually so heavily guarded and steeped in a murderous air, were now sinking at a visible rate. Cracks spread like a web across its sturdy outer walls, while enormous chunks of stone and glass curtain wall plunged down like waterfalls.
Inside the building, the lights were blazing. He could make out countless panicked figures running in every direction. Their frantic screams of alarm were drowned out by the earth-shaking roar.
Around the Anbu headquarters, more buildings aboveground were also crumbling like toy blocks in this unprecedented, man-made earthquake.
A pillar of fire burst from the Energy Hub's surface entrance, dyeing half the night sky an eerie blood-red. Dense black smoke surged skyward like a demonic dragon, tangling with the ever-present fog of the Village of the Bloody Mist.
Screams, shouts of command, the thunder of ninjutsu... Countless sounds mingled together, composing a symphony of destruction at its most chaotic.
This was his handiwork.
This was Mizuki Han's most furious and complete response to the cold world that had tried to crush him!
An indescribable, icy pleasure rose from deep within him. It wasn't bloodthirsty madness, but the satisfaction of overturning the board entirely and dragging every lofty player down into the mire—a feeling of absolute control.
The Mist Village's higher-ups, hiding behind the scenes and certain they could control everything—what expressions were they wearing now?
"Boom—crack!"
Another blast jolted Mizuki Han back to reality.
Their fall abruptly slowed, as if they had struck a layer of structure that hadn't fully collapsed. The tremendous recoil brought blood to his throat. He nearly spat it out, but forced it back down.
He looked around and saw that they were in a vast, semi-open space made up of twisted rebar and shattered layers of rock. Below them lay a bottomless abyss swallowed by darkness and dust. Above was the burning wreckage of the surface, where fireballs and chunks of stone continued to fall.
This was no longer the neatly structured underground base.
This was a steel graveyard, collapsing by the second.
"Cough... cough, cough..." Haku broke into a violent fit of coughing. Her little face was blackened by soot, and her eyes were bloodshot, but she still clung tightly to Mizuki Han as if he were the only piece of driftwood in a collapsing world.
Mizuki Han calmly scanned the surroundings.
He was searching.
Searching for the most crucial part of his plan—the key to his escape: the rising hot air currents!
The chain explosions had destroyed the load-bearing structures, but they had also ignited the underground energy pipelines and supplies. The terrifying heat would inevitably produce powerful updrafts, strong enough to carry everything upward!
There!
His gaze locked onto a massive broken pipe nearby, spewing blue flames! The air around it visibly shimmered from the heat. Gusts of scorching wind howled upward from that direction!
That was their way out!
But just as he prepared to take Haku toward it, the only mostly intact platform beneath them let out its final groan.
"Creeeak—"
The last reinforcing bar supporting the platform snapped amid a skin-crawling metallic groan!
The ground vanished beneath them!
The two of them plunged straight down into the endless abyss once more!
The wind howled in their ears as countless pieces of rubble whipped past them.
At last, utter despair filled Haku's eyes.
Yet as they plunged toward hell, Mizuki Han—whom she held tightly—made a move she couldn't understand.
He released his one good arm, the arm that had been shielding her.
The wind pulled them slightly apart.
Then he looked at her with eyes as cold as ice, flickering between firelight and darkness.
His lips moved, and his hoarse voice reached Haku's ears with perfect clarity.
"Hold on to me with all your strength."
Before the words had even faded, a surge of pure, ice-blue chakra burst from his battered body!
The chakra didn't take on an offensive form. Instead, it spread rapidly across his back like living vines.
Amid the howling winds and flying rubble, framed by the sea of fire and wreckage, a huge pair of wings made of pure, shimmering ice crystals slowly unfurled behind him!
In the collapsing ruins, the gravely wounded Han planned to harness the powerful updrafts from the explosions and form an Ice Release Glider, carrying Haku through the flying rubble and out of the underground base. Could this insane plan possibly succeed?
Before you continue