For a moment, the earth shook and the mountains trembled.
Behind Madara Uchiha, the enormous Demonic Statue of the Outer Path was summoned, sitting cross-legged in silence on the ravaged lake.
Its withered body showed no sign of life. Like an ancient stone carving weathered over hundreds of millions of years, it was riddled with black rods.
Most striking was the enormous, human-shaped hole in its chest. Its edges were smooth, as though some incomprehensible power had forcibly "scooped" it out.
Yet now, it had long since lost its legendary might.
Like an enormous corpse drained of all vitality, it sat silently on the lake, giving off an air of decay and deathly stillness.
Madara Uchiha gazed at the enormous hole, yet his face showed not a trace of concern.
Instead, his eyes revealed an almost fanatical anticipation.
This terrifying husk, once the strongest Tailed Beast from which the Sage of Six Paths had separated nine great beings, was now merely an empty shell, deprived of its core and left withered and lifeless.
Supplying it with chakra could still allow it to move with difficulty, but when Pero took its core, even its final thread of "life" had been utterly stripped away.
Today, however, its fate would be rewritten.
Once all Nine Tailed Beasts were recovered, the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path could return to its original, complete form.
And Madara Uchiha.
He would become the god who wielded this world-creating power-the Ten-Tails Jinchuriki.
"Come!"
Madara Uchiha slammed his hands together. The immense chakra within him, fused with Senjutsu, erupted like a volcano, pouring without restraint into the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path behind him!
Demonic Statue Chains!
Humm-!
As though a soul had been injected into it, the ashen statue abruptly opened its tightly shut eyes.
He suddenly opened his abyssal maw, unleashing countless chains condensed from chakra and radiating an ominous glow.
Like venomous snakes brought to life, the chains moved at a speed that transcended space.
They blanketed the sky as they shot toward the distant Tailed Beasts, which had just broken free of their seals and were rampaging where they stood.
Roar-!
One-Tail Shukaku was just about to gather wind and sand when several chains bound him tight, leaving him unable to move.
Blue flames ignited across Two-Tails Matatabi's body as she tried to burn through the chains.
But the instant the chains touched her, the flames on her body were suppressed.
Whether Four-Tails Son Goku or Five-Tails Kokuō, the Tailed Beasts struggled every way they could, yet could not leave a single mark on the chains.
Before this absolute suppressive power, originating in the deepest reaches of their bloodline, they all seemed so feeble and helpless.
Their roars turned from anger to defiance, then finally into despairing cries.
Like the most precise predators, the chains instantly wrapped around every Tailed Beast's body, then abruptly retracted.
They dragged them irresistibly toward the statue's abyssal maw!
On a floating rock nearby, the Seven-Tails Jinchuriki, Fū, awakened by the aftershocks of battle, let out a pained groan.
Clutching her agonizing head, she struggled to sit up on the rock.
"What... happened...?"
Her awareness was still trapped in the instant when Madara Uchiha invaded Takigakure and plunged it into a sea of flames. A scarlet, evil Sharingan surfaced in her mind.
Her memories were a tangled mess.
Before she could make out the scene before her.
Whoosh-!!
A black chain gleaming with a spectral light tore through the air with lightning speed and pierced her abdomen with pinpoint precision.
"Aaaah-!"
Fū let out a heart-wrenching scream. Her petite body hung in midair, impaled by the chain, blood gushing out and dripping along it onto the floating rock.
The chain jerked backward. Fū's body abruptly arched, and she could distinctly feel it.
The companion who had been with her for over a decade was being forcibly torn from her soul by an incomparably brutal force!
An enormous mass of emerald-green chakra was forcibly stripped from her body, coalescing in the air into the form of Seven-Tails Chōmei.
The enormous insect-like Tailed Beast let out a mournful cry before other chains immediately bound it, dragging it helplessly toward the statue.
Fū's body fell heavily to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.
Her empty eyes took one last look at the departing Seven-Tails. Like a candle flickering in the wind, her life entered its final countdown.
She slowly closed her eyes.
The Nine Tailed Beasts were gathered together at this moment.
Bound tightly by the Demonic Statue Chains, they floated before the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path, having returned to the place where they were first born.
The oppressive might of the Ten-Tails, originating in the deepest reaches of their bloodline, robbed them entirely of the will to resist.
They had returned to the place of beginnings that had created them.
The Tailed Beasts let out defiant wails.
At last, they became nine torrents of exceptionally pure chakra, each a different color, all swallowed by the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path.
Rumble-!
The final wisp of chakra was absorbed completely.
As the chakra of the Nine Tailed Beasts made it whole, the pale, lifeless shell of the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path began to tremble violently, like a stopped heart beginning to beat again.
Nourished by the immense chakra energy, the enormous hole in its chest healed rapidly, visibly closing.
Beneath its withered skin, it was as though scorching blood flowed through its veins, gradually radiating a vitality that made hearts tremble.
Its shell began to twist, swell, and transform.
Muscles grew wildly. Its skin became tough and brimming with power, a faint metallic sheen flowing across its surface.
From its back, its back, ten thick tails resembling enormous claws suddenly burst free, lashing wildly at the sky.
A casual sweep sent waves hundreds of meters high surging upward.
Its head began to melt and re-form, finally becoming an incomparably enormous eye!
That eye had no white, only concentric rings and nine tomoe resembling blood-red commas!
There was not the slightest emotion in that eye, only indifference and emptiness.
The Ten-Tails!
This Tailed Beast, which did not even exist in legends.
At this moment, it descended upon the world once more.
The five members of the Akatsuki stared dumbfounded at the world-shattering scene before them.
Though they possessed Pero's power, they had never imagined that such an immense, evil, and pure mass of chakra could exist in this world.
That oppressive presence, whose mere existence was enough to distort space itself.
Watching the Ten-Tails slowly stretch its sky-obscuring body, Madara Uchiha revealed an enraptured, fanatical smile.
"Do you see this, Hashirama?" He spread his arms as though embracing his masterpiece. "This is the true power I have sought!"
"Next comes the final step."
His gaze shifted toward the five members of the Akatsuki, his Rinnegan filled with an unquestionable will.
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