At a quarter to one in the morning, the door of a side hall in the Daimyo's Mansion was kicked off its hinges.
Madara and Tetsuhiro darted out, and five Anbu immediately took up positions around them.
"Did you spot anything unusual?"
Hyuga Tieban stared with his Byakugan and answered, "Reporting in: nothing unusual. There isn't even anyone nearby."
Inuzuka Hu and Aburame Zhishan also reported finding nothing.
Sure enough, they encountered neither servants nor guards along the way. An eerie air hung over the entire Daimyo's Mansion.
Bang!
The main hall's heavy doors shattered, and the group rushed inside.
"No response from anywhere nearby."
Just then, the hall suddenly lit up.
An energy projection of the Daimyo appeared on the lavish throne before them, seated high above and looking down at them.
He demanded sternly at the top of his voice, "Madara Uchiha, Hashirama Senju! You dare rebel against me!"
Madara sneered and retorted with domineering confidence, "All that matters is that you die."
"Fine, fine, fine! Hashirama Senju, I trusted you so much. I never imagined you were this kind of man!"
Tetsuhiro: "???"
"Not only did you put someone like him in power, you plotted a rebellion and even dared reach into my own domain!"
As the Daimyo finished, a man stepped out from behind the throne. A striking pair of thick eyebrows stood out on his otherwise ordinary face, making him hard to forget.
"Could this man be...?" Before Tetsuhiro could think it through, the man tossed the limp, human-shaped heap in his hand before them...
It was the Daimyo's envoy. From the look of him, he had been tortured terribly before his death.
He had deserved every bit of it.
Tetsuhiro demanded loudly, "The world has suffered under the Daimyo for far too long! You're nothing but parasites feeding off everyone beneath you. If you can't do your job, if you can't give people peace and a future, then step down!"
Heh, rebellion?
"When dignity is trampled at will, resistance becomes humanity's last salvation! It is a ray of light in the darkness, illuminating the path ahead for everyone.
"I will wield thought as my sword to sever these rotten shackles. With an unyielding spine, I will shoulder the banner of resistance, seek peace for the world, and fight for a future for all!"
"You! You!"
The Daimyo choked on his anger, unable to draw breath, his face turning a dark, purplish red.
Every Konoha guard nodded in agreement at those words.
Even the thick-browed man looked at Tetsuhiro with a complicated expression...
"Hahaha!" Madara laughed wildly. "Well said, Hashirama! I've long been sick of watching insects like him lord it over everyone." As he spoke, he raised his right hand toward the Daimyo and clenched his fist.
"Now I can finally crush you myself. Come out!"
"You'll never find me."
Madara seemed unconcerned. Instead, he spoke toward the wall. "I meant you."
"Fire Release-Great Fireball Technique!"
Madara opened his mouth and spat out a massive fireball, sending it hurtling straight toward the wall!
Yet a transparent shield blocked the fireball completely. Then a figure slowly materialized before them.
"You can actually see me? Madara Uchiha, you're rather interesting." Only as the final word left his lips did his appearance fully emerge...
His face was lean and handsome, and the tomoe hanging at his neck gave off a faint glow. Beneath his tall hat, vermilion ceremonial eyebrows further accentuated his cool, aloof bearing. He wore deep-blue hunting robes emblazoned with conspicuous eight-trigram and pentagram designs.
With a bronze mirror in one hand and a staff in the other, he exuded an extraordinary presence.
"Be grateful for my mercy, for I permit you to hear my name.
"My name is-Anpei Minghui!"
"Hmph!" Madara was irritated. This man actually dared put on airs in front of him. "I don't care who you are. Anyone who stands against me dies!"
"Insolence! No one has ever treated me with such disrespect. Your... sins are unforgivable!"
Just as the two were about to come to blows over their exchange, one of Tetsuhiro's guards, Sarutobi Hizayama, delivered a report:
"Lord Hashirama, Yamanaka Jinan, who is handling communications, reports that Lord Tobirama and the others have been exposed. There must be an expert in detection or barriers inside the Daimyo's Mansion!"
"Hm?" Tetsuhiro immediately thought of Anpei Minghui. Judging by his attire, he belonged to a profession famous in Japan—an onmyoji.
Then he was probably skilled with talismans and formations, which would explain why Tobirama and the others had been exposed.
"Damn it!" He remembered watching Naruto at home before he had transmigrated.
"These Japanese guys are ridiculous. They've got incredible strength and armed forces, yet they still bow and scrape before an ordinary man."
Ergou, sitting beside Tetsuhiro, had chimed in, "If it were me, I'd just wipe out the Daimyo, consolidate all the Land of Fire's forces, and launch a surprise attack on the Land of Earth. As long as I could occupy it, I'd have a huge source of recruits!"
"Exactly! If I were the Third or the First, I'd just beat the bastard!"
Bang! Madara had already begun fighting his opponent, and the sound brought Tetsuhiro back to reality.
At that thought, Tetsuhiro cursed inwardly, Ergou, you bastard, you screwed me over! The Daimyo actually has an expert like this at his side.
He quickly ordered Hizayama, "Pass on my orders. Tell them to hold out as long as they can, but retreat first if it becomes impossible. We have our own means of escape here. You five go support them too."
"But Lord Hashirama, you two..."
Tetsuhiro cut him off. "Don't worry about us. The two of us are unrivaled in this world! Follow your orders!"
"Yes!" The five swiftly withdrew toward the doors.
"Trying to escape?" The man who had remained beside the throne suddenly charged out, rapidly closing in on the Konoha guards.
But five thick roots suddenly burst from the floor and tangled around him.
"If you want to attack my subordinates, you'll have to get through me first!"
Despite being stopped, the man wasn't angry. As he dodged, he asked, "You people of Konoha are strange. The guards abandon their leader and flee, while the leader willingly covers their retreat?"
"The strong must do what falls to the strong. Only then can the flame be passed down through the generations. Wherever leaves dance, the fire burns on!" Tetsuhiro shamelessly stole Hiruzen's words.
The man shuddered slightly at that. After murmuring the words once to himself, he looked at Tetsuhiro with admiration. "I never imagined the world held such a hero. Hashirama Senju, I will remember you. My name is-Might Guy!"
"To be honest, I really don't want to be your enemy."
"What?!" Hearing his name, Tetsuhiro suddenly paled in shock. "What is Might Duy to you?" he blurted out.
"My son." The man came back to his senses, a fierce light entering his eyes. "How do you know about him!"
"He... I learned about him through the Toad Sage. His son, Might Guy, is one of the Chosen Ones!"
"What?!" Might Guy wanted to reject such an absurd claim, but he had always kept his son well hidden. No third person could possibly know about him, not even the Daimyo!
That left him wavering...
"Hey! What are you hesitating for? Have you forgotten how I saved your family's lives? You swore an oath to me back then!" The Daimyo had noticed something was wrong with him.
Forget it. He steeled himself and said, "Sorry, but I have to stop you!"
Then he struck a pose that made him look constipated.
That's...! Tetsuhiro immediately thought of that technique.
He silently glanced to the side, where Madara was dancing with Anpei Minghui.
A sea of fire struck the formation, sending ripples across it. Anpei waved his hand, and his talismans turned into a sky full of paper cranes that pecked at Madara's face. Then he glanced into Madara's eyes, and his entire being suddenly fell into another world.
Faced with torment, he remained perfectly calm. Energy surfaced around him, instantly breaking the genjutsu.
In reality, a shikigami-a nine-tailed fox maiden-was standing beside him.
Her kimono left large expanses of skin exposed to the air, and a fox tail swayed behind her.
Once Anpei woke, he wasted no time talking. He summoned two more shikigami and ordered them to attack.
The two men countered each other's moves, probing one another.
Just as the nine-tailed fox maiden caught Tetsuhiro's eye...
Might Guy finished his movements and roared, "Gate of Life-open!"
His face and the skin across his entire body quickly flushed blood-red.
It really is the Eight Gates Formation. Sweat trickled down Tetsuhiro's temples, and he couldn't help thinking, Night Guy should be a technique Guy developed himself. Hopefully this man doesn't know it.
But things have already come this far. I won't back down! He swiftly unleashed Wood Release: Advent of a World of Flowering Trees!
A mass of roots surged from the ground. Four stems stretched upward and produced four huge pink flowers that burst through the roof.
As they bloomed, pollen rapidly spread in every direction...
Not good! Might Guy, who was dodging at high speed, accidentally inhaled some amid his strenuous movements and immediately felt a little dizzy.
The pollen is poisonous!
He immediately opened the Gate of Pain and shot toward the flowers at tremendous speed!
Before you continue