Arrival

Five enormous beasts closed in.

The Two-Tails' blue flames burned so fiercely that the air warped. Molten rock dripped from the Four-Tails' lava fists. The Five-Tails lowered its head, aiming its five horns at Ryuto. The great bird circled overhead, while the stone tortoise blocked off his retreat.

Ryuto panted heavily, his arms trembling.

He had only thirty percent of his ki left. He could barely even run.

"Roar!"

The Two-Tails moved first, swiping a claw down.

Ryuto rolled aside. The claw skimmed past his back, gouging three deep furrows into the ground.

The Four-Tails' fist came crashing down right after it.

Ryuto crossed his arms and took it head-on.

"Bang!"

He went flying again, this time snapping a half-burned tree in two. Wood splinters pierced him all over.

He climbed up and spat out the bloody foam in his mouth.

No.

A few more hits, and I really will die here.

The five tailed beasts did not wait for him. The great bird dived, its wings whipping up wind blades, while the stone tortoise opened its mouth and spat clods of earth like cannonballs.

Ryuto dodged through the gaps between their attacks, growing more and more bedraggled.

He failed to dodge one clod of earth, and it slammed into his shoulder.

"Crack-"

A bone cracked.

Ryuto grunted, half his body going numb.

His protective layer of ki was as thin as paper. It could not stop the attacks at all.

In the distance, Uchiha Izuna slowly stood up and wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, his Sharingan fixed on Ryuto.

"Just about done," Izuna said. "Nearly out of ki, aren't you?"

Ryuto did not answer.

He was dodging the Five-Tails' charge. He jumped, and Kokuō rushed beneath his feet, plowing up the ground.

His legs buckled when he landed, and he nearly dropped to his knees.

His ki really was almost gone.

He could not use the Flight Technique, and even his high-speed movement had slowed to a crawl.

"Let's end this." Izuna raised a hand. "Take him down."

All five tailed beasts moved at once.

The Two-Tails breathed fire, the Four-Tails swung its fists, the Five-Tails charged, the great bird dived, and the tortoise spat earth.

The attacks came from every direction, sealing off every angle.

I can't dodge this.

Watching the beasts rush toward him, Ryuto had only one thought.

Go for broke.

He drew a deep breath-not through his mouth, but inward through every cell in his body.

Squeezing himself dry.

He forcibly wrung out the last scraps of ki from his marrow, from between his muscles, from every place that was nearly depleted.

Ki erupted from beneath his feet.

"Flight Technique!"

He shot into the sky like a rocket.

The five tailed beasts' attacks collided beneath his feet. Flames, lava, earth, and wind blades exploded together, and a wave of heat surged upward on his heels.

Ryuto rose fifty meters into the air and stopped.

He looked down.

Below him, the five tailed beasts looked up, scarlet Sharingan patterns spinning in their eyes.

The Uchiha ninja surrounded them, some forming hand seals as they prepared the next wave of attacks.

Izuna watched from below, his Sharingan calculating.

Ryuto brought his hands together at his waist.

All his remaining ki surged into his palms.

It was not a gradual gathering. It was extraction, compression, a reckless pouring of everything into them.

Golden light shone from his palms, faint at first, then brighter and brighter, more and more blinding.

It was not the warm light of the sun, but a violent, unstable golden light that seemed ready to explode.

"Still trying?" Izuna frowned. "You're spent."

Ryuto did not hear him.

All his attention was on his palms.

Ki spun wildly, compressing, then compressing again.

His arms shook, not from fear, but because he could not control them. The energy was too violent, like a bomb about to explode in his hands.

"Ka..."

He spoke, his voice hoarse.

"Me..."

The golden light had grown too bright to look at.

Below, the Uchiha ninja instinctively raised their hands to shield their eyes.

"Ha..."

Ryuto thrust both hands forward from his waist.

"Me-ha!!!"

"Boom-!!!"

It was not a beam of light.

It was a tsunami.

A torrent of golden energy more than five meters across erupted from his palms. Rather than shooting straight down, it spread in a fan, covering the entire area below.

It was slower than the previous two attacks, but wider and more violent.

The instant the pillar of energy struck the ground.

The world went silent for a second.

Then-

"BOOM!!!"

The ground exploded like a block of tofu stomped on by a giant.

It did not merely blast open a hole.

It blasted open an immense crater more than thirty meters across, its bottom out of sight.

Dirt, stones, trees, rubble-everything vaporized the instant it touched the golden energy.

A shock wave burst outward in a ring.

"Whoosh-!!!"

Centered on the immense crater, violent waves of air swept in every direction.

The five tailed beasts took the brunt of it.

The Two-Tails was overturned by the blast and rolled more than a dozen times across the ground, half its blue flames extinguished.

The Four-Tails was driven backward, only steadying itself by driving its lava fists into the ground.

The Five-Tails was flung away outright, crashing through a wall that had still been standing.

The great bird was struck by the shock wave in midair. Its wings tilted, and it plunged to the ground.

The stone tortoise suffered the worst. It had been the closest, and the energy grazed half its shell, erasing it outright and exposing the flesh made of chakra inside. It howled in pain.

More than thirty Uchiha ninja were all blown away like fallen leaves swept up by an autumn wind.

They crashed down everywhere, some hitting trees, others tumbling into the rubble, unable to get up for a long while.

The entire battlefield fell quiet.

Heat rose from the immense crater. At its bottom lay molten, glasslike material, still glowing red.

Ryuto descended from the sky.

His feet touched the ground. He swayed, then dropped to one knee.

"Cough..."

He coughed up a mouthful of blood, not from internal injuries, but from overexertion.

His body felt hollow, as though it had been drained dry.

Not a drop of ki remained.

He could not lift his arms. His legs trembled, and his vision kept going dark.

But he did not collapse.

Forcing himself to hold on, he knelt there on one knee, panting.

In the distance, the Uzumaki clanspeople were utterly silent.

Everyone stared openmouthed at the immense crater, then at Ryuto kneeling there.

"Holy... holy shit..." a young Uzumaki clansman murmured. "Is... is that something a human can do?"

Mito Uzumaki braced herself against the cover, her fingers white from gripping it.

She looked at Ryuto, then at the crater.

That last strike had been more powerful than the previous two combined.

But the price was obvious, too.

Ryuto could not even stand steadily now.

"Is he..." Rena clutched Mito's arm, her voice trembling. "Is he all right?"

Mito said nothing.

She looked in another direction.

At Uchiha Izuna.

Izuna stood more than twenty meters from the immense crater. When the shock wave had come, he had used the Body Flicker Technique to dodge it and escaped its reach.

But his expression was grim.

His Sharingan were still bleeding, and the two trails of blood at the corners of his eyes had not dried.

He looked at the immense crater, then at Ryuto kneeling there.

All five tailed beasts had been driven back by a single strike.

Though they were not dead, they certainly would not be able to fight again anytime soon.

More than thirty clansmen lay scattered across the ground. Few could stand.

And Ryuto, though kneeling, was still alive.

Izuna wiped the blood from the corners of his eyes.

"We can't accomplish this," he said quietly.

His voice was not loud, but the Uchiha ninja around him all heard it.

"Lord Izuna?" A ninja who could still move struggled to his feet.

"Retreat," Izuna said coldly. "Take the wounded and go."

"Then... what about him?" The ninja pointed at Ryuto.

Izuna glanced at Ryuto.

Ryuto knelt there with his head lowered, panting, but his body remained tense, not relaxing.

Like a beast that was exhausted but had not yet fallen.

"He..." Izuna had only just begun.

He stopped speaking.

It was not just him. Everyone across the entire battlefield felt a pressure.

It was not a fluctuation of chakra.

It was something purer, an oppressive weight bearing down like a mountain, making it hard to breathe.

It slowly spread from the edge of the battlefield.

Ryuto raised his head.

His strength and ki were exhausted, but his perception remained.

That pressure pricked his skin like needles.

Danger.

More dangerous than Izuna's Susanoo, more dangerous than all five tailed beasts combined.

He turned toward the source of the pressure.

At the edge of the battlefield, beside a charred tree.

A figure stood there. No one knew when he had arrived.

Black hair danced wildly.

It was not the wind blowing it. The chakra emanating from his body made his hair float on its own.

He wore Uchiha clan clothing, with an enormous Gunbai on his back.

Most striking of all were his eyes.

Scarlet.

Sharingan.

But they were neither three-tomoe eyes nor the intricate Mangekyo pattern Izuna had.

It was a simpler pattern, but one that made the heart pound even harder.

He just stood there, motionless.

But the air across the entire battlefield seemed to have frozen.

All the Uchiha ninja froze. Even the wounded dared not groan.

Izuna turned, saw the man, and paused in surprise.

"Big brother?"

The newcomer did not look at Izuna.

From beginning to end, his eyes fixed on only one person.

Ryuto.

His scarlet Sharingan locked onto Ryuto like a wild beast fixing on its prey.

Ryuto knelt there and met those eyes.

For an instant, he felt as though he had been thrown into an ice pit.

Cold.

Not the temperature, but killing intent.

Pure, undisguised killing intent-a desire to fight, to conquer, to tear him apart.

The man slowly raised his foot and took a step forward.

Just one step.

With a crack, a fissure split the ground.

"Madara... Uchiha."

The name surfaced in Ryuto's mind.

He knew who it was now.

Madara Uchiha looked at Ryuto for three seconds.

Then he spoke.

His voice was not loud, but every word seemed to strike the heart.

"You're the kid who uses that strange power?"