Who Weeps for the Puppets?

That so-called "iron" was now roaring madly within his arm.

This was no ordinary metal, but a torrent of chakra condensed to the extreme. Every grain of iron sand carried the Third Kazekage's towering rage and unwillingness at the moment of his death.

Like countless starving leeches, they frenziedly gnawed at Xuan's meridians, trying to devour his consciousness completely and turn him into a Magnet Release puppet that knew only slaughter.

Bone-piercing cold and boiling magma coursed through his body at once. Beneath the skin of Xuan's left arm, the fine iron-sand particles were no longer merely drifting about. They began converging into grotesque runes that glimmered with ominous light.

The warning on the system interface had shifted from red to a glaring blood color, while piercing alerts thundered wildly through his mind: "Warning! Warning! The host's nervous system is undergoing high-intensity consciousness erosion! Synchronization rate has exceeded 30%. Signs of collapse detected in the consciousness sea!"

The illusion in his vision became clearer and clearer, as though that yellow-sand battlefield lay right before his eyes.

He could hear the wind's wails, smell the sweet stench of blood, and even feel the resolve and tragedy of that puppeteer from the era of the First Kazekage, clutching his forehead protector tightly in the final moment of his life.

This obsession had crossed time and space to drag him into an endless abyss called "protection."

"Give up, outsider." Chiyo Saori's voice was like a clear spring, calmly cutting through the chaos. "The Third Kazekage's will is not something you can control. It will turn you into a weapon—the strongest weapon of the Hidden Sand Village."

There was no threat in her words, only the coldness of a stated fact.

The remaining eight puppets stood in a row behind her. Chakra threads glimmered faintly at their joints, poised to strike—both a deterrent and a silent negotiation.

"Misleading nonsense!" Akasuna Guiyan's patience had long run out. Killing intent blazed in his eyes as the long blade in his hand hummed. "Captain, don't let him fool you! This brat is full of tricks. We must kill him immediately and reclaim the core!"

His figure flashed, and his blade tore through the air with a shrill whistle as it chopped straight for Xuan's head.

Yet a chakra thread faster than the blade suddenly snapped taut. Like the toughest spider silk, it wrapped precisely around his wrist and prevented him from advancing another inch.

"I told you, if he dies, we all die with him." Without turning around, Chiyo Saori's voice grew several degrees colder. "Once the will inside the core loses restraint, it will use this body as its center and turn everything within ten li into a Sand Iron hell. Akasuna Guiyan, do you want the entire border of the Land of Wind to become a dead zone?"

Akasuna Guiyan's face flushed red, but he could not refute her.

He could feel just how terrifying the energy leaking from Xuan's body was. It was a pure, destructive force.

Chiyo Saori ignored him and fixed her gaze on Xuan again, her terms clear and direct. "I'll help you suppress the Kazekage's will, but you must agree to two conditions. First, preserve the consciousness within the core. You may not erase it. That is respect for the departed Kage. Second, you must never use this power to start a war."

Xuan's lips twisted into a mocking curve with difficulty. Sweat slid down his pale cheeks, but the defiance in his eyes did not diminish in the slightest.

"I never make deals," he said hoarsely, every word seeming to squeeze out through clenched teeth. "I only make... choices!"

Even so, he understood his situation better than anyone.

This power had already exceeded the normal processing limits of Myriad Phenomena Devouring.

It was not an inanimate thing. It was alive!

If he were completely assimilated by this will, he would become a mobile catastrophe even more uncontrollable than a tailed beast.

By then, forget achieving his goals—even Madara in the Hidden Leaf Village and Kaguya on the moon would likely regard him as the highest-priority threat to eliminate.

"Captain, his chakra is losing control!" Saeki Ryosuke's forehead was beaded with sweat. As a sensory ninja, he could clearly "see" the terrifying storm raging within Xuan's body. "The core's frequency is too high! We need an equally powerful guide to soothe it through resonance! The guide must possess both enormous chakra reserves and peerless precision of control!"

Those words awakened Chiyo Saori. She no longer hesitated and instantly formed hand seals with both hands!

Bzzzt—!

The resonance structures within the chests of the eight puppets behind her activated at once. This was no longer the prelude to a murderous attack, but a low, pure hum.

The sound seemed to carry a strange rhythm. It pierced through the air and acted directly upon the rampaging iron sand within Xuan's body.

Guided by that resonance, the frenzied magnetic currents actually slowed for a brief moment.

An opportunity!

A sharp glint flashed in Xuan's eyes. Enduring the agonizing pain of his brain being torn apart, he suddenly activated his ability.

"Myriad Phenomena Devouring: Reverse Stripping!"

He was actually applying the law of devouring in reverse!

A powerful repulsive force erupted from within him. Rather than devouring everything outside, it forcibly expelled the energy inside him that did not belong to him!

Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!

Strands of black magnetic current mixed with bloody mist were forcibly stripped from the pores of his left arm. They floated in the air like writhing ink.

Meanwhile, the resonance of Chiyo Saori's puppets was like an invisible net, precisely catching the expelled violent energy and channeling it underground, weakening it layer by layer.

One worked from within, the other from without.

One forcibly expelled it, while the other gently guided it.

Two utterly different powers formed an exquisite cooperation at this moment.

As time passed, the grotesque runes on Xuan's arm gradually faded. The iron-sand particles beneath his skin also slowly fell silent, returning to the coldness of metal.

The blood-red battlefield illusion in his vision, like a sand painting scattered by the wind, finally vanished completely.

After a long while, the energy storm within the canyon finally subsided.

Xuan slowly rose to his feet. His left arm was still somewhat numb, but the heart-rending pain had disappeared.

He lightly rotated the Mangekyō Sharingan in his left eye, and the cold system prompt sounded at the proper moment:

"Warning lifted. Residual Magnet Release energy has been preliminarily stabilized and has reached temporary symbiosis with the host's nervous system. Limited Energy Mimicry use is available for 3 minutes per day. Record new energy template: Energy Mimicry: Magnetic Current Control?"

Record it, Xuan silently said in his heart.

The next instant, a brand-new realization surged into his mind.

His understanding of magnetism and control over iron sand seemed innate.

He slowly raised his right palm, and with a thought—

A mass of jet-black iron sand materialized in his palm, swiftly condensing into a miniature vortex spinning at high speed.

The vortex's shape, its energy fluctuations, even the faint sound made by the iron-sand particles grinding against one another, were exactly the same as the Sand Iron Meteor used by the puppeteer codenamed Crow earlier!

No, it was even more condensed, even purer!

Chiyo Saori's pupils abruptly constricted. At last, a crack appeared in her eternally icy expression.

"You... how is that possible? You copied Hidden Sand's secret technique?"

This was no longer imitation. It was a perfect replication!

And because the quality of Xuan's chakra was higher, the technique was even more powerful than the original!

Both she and Saeki Ryosuke could see it clearly. That was not the core's power, but a Magnet Release effect Xuan had simulated using his own chakra!

"I don't need any inheritance. I only need results." Xuan lowered his head to glance at the iron-sand vortex in his palm, then casually crushed it into dust.

He raised his eyes, his gaze sharp as a blade as he stared directly at Chiyo Saori. "Your Hidden Sand Village abandoned the dignity of the strong long ago. Your higher-ups are weak and incompetent. They can only secretly transport even the Third Kazekage's relics like thieves, terrified that the other great nations will discover them."

His voice was not loud, yet it struck the hearts of the three Hidden Sand ninjas like a heavy hammer.

"Since you can't protect this power, and can't use it properly, then let me decide its future." Xuan took a step forward, his presence overwhelming, as though he were the master of this canyon.

He paused, then cast out bait Chiyo Saori could not refuse.

"Come with me. I can let you rebuild the Hidden Sand's puppet army with your own hands—an army stronger than anything before it, armed with the resources of the entire shinobi world."

The resources of the entire shinobi world!

Those words were arrogant to the extreme, yet they carried an irresistible magic.

Chiyo Saori's breathing stopped for an instant.

She looked at the man before her. Mysterious, powerful, and wildly ambitious, he was like a bottomless vortex.

For a long time, only the sound of wind filled the canyon.

At last, Chiyo Saori flicked her wrist. The chakra thread wrapped around Akasuna Guiyan's hand silently retracted.

She neither agreed nor refused. She merely looked at Xuan with those calm, ancient-well eyes and spoke five faint words:

"Prove it to me."

The night wind grew more biting, sweeping shattered sand from the ground and blurring the moonlight.

Amid the ruins, two figures stood side by side: one the guardian of an ancient inheritance, the other a proud and unrestrained plunderer. An alliance unknown to anyone quietly took shape amid the scent of blood and iron.

Yet neither of them noticed that beyond the silent canyon, heavy, orderly footsteps were drawing closer.

The sound was skillfully concealed by the wind, but it carried an iron-like rhythm, as though a silent army was gathering in the darkness and silently encircling the area.

The darkness before dawn was always the first to be soaked in killing intent.