At the instant the Cangming Puppet Mech came crashing down, the situation on the main battlefield abruptly reversed.
Konoha's morale surged like an erupting volcano.
Ever since the Ninja World War had broken out, Konoha had been steadily driven back before the Sand-Earth Allied Army's Crimson Sky Puppet attacks.
Today, when the Cangming Puppet Mech appeared, Konoha's shinobi had even fallen into despair for a time. They had never expected the turning point to come so suddenly.
Just as the Cangming Puppet Mech was slaughtering its way through the battlefield, that mysterious Byakugan youth had brought it down with a single arrow.
The moment Konoha's people witnessed the Cangming Puppet Mech crash down, their long-suppressed emotions erupted like a volcano.
Some raised their bloodstained kunai and roared, their voices trembling with wild joy.
Some collapsed to their knees, their fingers digging deep into the mud. Tears mixed with blood and struck the ground, yet they grinned through it.
One Jonin violently tore off his shattered forehead protector, his disheveled hair whipping through the smoke. "You bastard Sand Shinobi! Now it's our turn—"
As if ignited by those words, thousands of shuriken simultaneously tore through the scorched sky.
Konoha's counterattack swept across the battlefield with greater ferocity than the puppet mech's fall, carrying three years' worth of humiliation from retreat after retreat.
The young Genin charged forward along battle lines paved with their seniors' corpses. What burned in their eyes now was no longer fear, but the light called hope blazing upon the Cangming Puppet Mech's wreckage.
For a hundred miles—after pursuing the Allied Shinobi Forces for a full hundred miles, Konoha's shinobi finally withdrew to the border under Tobirama's restraint and rebuilt their defenses.
Neji had not joined the pursuit. He truly did not have a single drop left.
His