The light gate at the entrance to Wet Bone Forest trembled violently.
Hyuga Xiao stood at the edge of the energy radiation zone, his azure Tenseigan Chakra wrapping around his entire body like blazing flames, visibly clashing with the violent natural energy around him—the air warped into ripples, the ground cracked with fine fissures, and whenever the milky-white energy spilling from the light gate touched the Tenseigan Chakra, it let out a sizzling, corrosive hiss.
"Stop!"
Tsunade's voice carried rare urgency. Her hands formed seals to maintain the entrance's stability, fine beads of sweat appearing on her brow. "If you force your way in like this, the entrance will collapse! Then forget about practicing Sage Art—the spatial coordinates of Wet Bone Forest will vanish forever!"
But Xiao did not retreat.
He raised his right hand, slowly curling his fingers inward. Tenseigan Chakra condensed in his palm into a blue sphere of light that continuously collapsed and expanded. Tiny black cracks flickered in and out within it—the sign of space being forcibly compressed.
"Slug Sage."
Xiao's voice was terrifyingly calm. His azure eyes pierced through the light gate, staring directly at a presence deep within Wet Bone Forest. "You said my bloodline contaminates this sacred land, that we are fundamentally incompatible. Then let me ask you—"
He took a step forward.
The light gate let out a strained wail, its edges beginning to disintegrate into tiny motes of light.
"What if I can control this 'conflict'?"
The instant his words fell, the sphere in Xiao's palm suddenly expanded. Tenseigan Chakra transformed into countless fine threads that stabbed into the violent natural energy around him like living creatures. The energy that had originally rejected him stalled briefly the moment it touched those threads—
Then, it began to be forcibly assimilated.
It was