So, had Jiraiya seen the signal or not?
The answer was yes.
But by the time he saw it, the signal was already about to fade. When Yunju left, he had been full of confidence, and Jiraiya trusted him enough that he had never expected Yunju to need help. He froze for a moment, then immediately rushed out.
However, by the time Jiraiya arrived, the fire had already started.
He landed on a tree trunk that had been burned halfway through. The charred wood beneath his feet had lost all resilience and crumbled into charcoal with the lightest step.
A wave of heat swept over from ahead, and the air was thick with tar, ash from grass and trees, and another, heavier smell—the smell of burned flesh and blood.
He stood atop the trunk, his gaze sweeping across the entire battlefield.
Nearly all the ground had been churned up. Nearby gullies fanned out into the distance, interspersed with several deep craters whose bottoms still glowed with dark red embers.
He recognized the shape of those craters. They were high-temperature scorch marks left by Fire Release—not the result of an instantaneous blast, but formed after sustained burning.
Tobi and Zetsu stood at the edge of the burning field opposite him, their backs to Jiraiya as they said something.
They were too far away. The wind and the crackling roar of the flames completely drowned out their voices.
Jiraiya crouched on the broken tree without approaching or moving.
He was watching Tobi's posture, confirming that the other man had no intention of continuing to search for anything.
After a while, Tobi and Zetsu turned at the same time and headed into the forest in the opposite direction. Their steps were quick, as though they still had some final task to complete.
Jiraiya