The enormous fireball in the sky pressed lower and lower, filling the air with the stink of scorched rock.
The smell scratched at my throat and made me want to sneeze.
I craned my neck, the raging wind pulling my coat collar so tight that my neck ached.
Sweat streamed down my forehead and into my eyes, stinging until I couldn't stop blinking.
The damned wind plastered my few stray hairs against my forehead. They felt sticky and miserable.
That lump of rock was enormous. It blocked out half the sky.
The meteor's flames lit the mudflat below a blazing red, like a vat of freshly molten iron.
I spat out a mouthful of dry foam, only for the heat to evaporate it before it hit the ground.
It left nothing but a white mark on the wooden dragon's head and a scorched smell.
My throat was so dry it felt like it was smoking. All the water I'd drunk last night had escaped as sweat.
Madara stood in the muddy pit below, arms folded across his chest, looking up at me.
His cracked corpse-face radiated madness, the corners of his mouth stretched high.
He hadn't taken a word I'd said seriously.
His battered red armor rattled in the wind, shedding scraps of metal.
"Crush it? You Senju brat, you're getting a little too carried away with your boasting."
Madara sneered, his voice shredded by the crushing wind.
It sounded like a broken clay pot scraping against a shovel. It grated on my ears.
"This is the power of a god. Tengai Shinsei."
"You insects deserve to be ground into sludge in the depths of despair."
"Not so much as a sliver of bone will remain."
I rubbed the aching back of my head and scraped my soles hard against