Boom!
The ground cracked like a spiderweb as Gensou stepped forward, charging once more at the Great Toad Sage.
"Suiton: Mizutama Rentan!"
The Great Toad Sage opened its massive mouth, unleashing a barrage of water bullets the size of cannonballs, each one piercing the air with a sharp whistling sound, hurtling densely toward Gensou.
"Shinra Tensei!"
Gensou extended his hand, repelling all the incoming water bullets with a wave of force.
In the blink of an eye, he closed the gap between himself and the Great Toad Sage.
"Rinnegan..."
The Great Toad Sage's gaze fell on the distinctive purple eyes with swirling patterns. These eyes were not unfamiliar to it; they were the same Rinnegan it had once seen on Ōtsutsuki Hagoromo.
Understanding the capabilities of the Rinnegan, the Great Toad Sage had previously taken advantage of Gensou's stationary position while using a sealing technique, enduring the sea of lava to land a counterattack.
To others, the Rinnegan might seem mysterious and omnipotent, but to the Great Toad Sage, it was not an enigma.
What puzzled the Great Toad Sage was how Gensou had come to possess the Rinnegan. Furthermore, the power Gensou displayed seemed slightly inferior to that of Ōtsutsuki Hagoromo in his prime.
The Great Toad Sage, despite its wisdom, was not omniscient. The glimpses of the future it saw in its dreams were incomplete, leaving much unknown.
This was why Gensou dismissed the sage's warnings and prophecies with disdain.
Boom!
A deafening shockwave echoed.
By now, Gensou had transformed his hand into a blade, channeling a precise structure of senjutsu chakra into it, aiming a decisive strike at the Great Toad Sage.
The Great Toad Sage snapped out of its thoughts. Without moving its massive body, it raised one of its gigantic webbed hands like a mountain, intending to crush Gensou with sheer force.
It was willing to trade its own injury if it meant obliterating Gensou.
Anticipating this, Gensou halted his blade and, with a calm expression, vanished, reappearing beside the Great Toad Sage, ready to strike again.
A gust of wind kicked up sand and dust as the Great Toad Sage, bolstered by senjutsu-enhanced reflexes, leapt backward to create distance.
Gensou extended his free hand toward the airborne sage.
"Banshō Ten'in!"
A powerful gravitational force surged from his palm.
Though the Great Toad Sage wasn't pulled back, the lack of footing in mid-air caused it to momentarily freeze.
Boom!
A sonic boom rang out as Gensou seized the opportunity, rocketing into the air and appearing above the Great Toad Sage. Transforming his blade into a fist, he delivered a powerful downward punch.
The massive body of the Great Toad Sage crashed into the ground with a thunderous impact, like a meteor striking the earth.
A tangible shockwave radiated outward, sending up a thick pillar of dust and debris.
Gensou wasted no time, diving into the smoke to press his advantage, refusing to give the Great Toad Sage a moment to recover.
But just as he entered the mushroom cloud of debris, a shadow, long and fast beyond even the Rinnegan's perception, lunged straight at him with ferocious speed.
It wasn't until it was close that Gensou realized it was a massive, warty toad tongue.
The seemingly soft tongue shot forward like a giant arrow, ripping through the air with unstoppable destructive force.
Gensou's pupils narrowed slightly as he evaded, releasing another Shinra Tensei with his cooled-down interval.
This time, however, the repulsive force that could deflect most attacks merely shifted the tongue's trajectory slightly.
Rip!
It felt as though a speeding truck had grazed his shoulder.
Gensou's left arm went numb instantly.
Glancing at his arm, he saw the toad tongue had torn away a large chunk of flesh, exposing the faint white of bone.
Unfazed, Gensou looked away and raised his bleeding left hand. As he reached for the tongue, the flesh on his arm regenerated rapidly, restoring it to its original state.
With the Yin Seal unlocked and his cells fully activated, Gensou was constantly in a state of "no-seal regeneration."
No matter how severe the injury, it healed in an instant.
As his hand gripped the tongue, prepared to tear it apart, the Great Toad Sage's tongue suddenly recoiled at an unimaginable speed.
Before he could react, Gensou found himself tightly bound as the tongue coiled around him several times.
In that moment, he was reminded of slow-motion footage of a toad's tongue retracting to capture an insect.
True to form, the Great Toad Sage's ultimate attack was to immediately pull him into its mouth, intending to dissolve him within its stomach.
It all happened too fast.
Gensou was on the verge of being swallowed whole.
He had no intention of discovering what millennia of senjutsu influence had done to the Great Toad Sage's stomach, especially given its confidence in devouring him.
In an instant, Gensou's body transformed into mud, flowing out through the gaps in the tongue.
By the time the Great Toad Sage retracted its tongue fully, the mud on the ground had already reformed into Gensou's true body.
Without wasting a moment, Gensou formed a seal. The mud still clinging to the tongue exploded violently.
Boom!
Thick smoke billowed from the Great Toad Sage's mouth.
The pain caused its massive body to shudder.
Mud Release, a Kekkei Genkai Gensou had developed over the past two years through a series of fortunate encounters, was rarely used until now.
Having turned the tables, Gensou didn't let the opportunity slip. He moved swiftly, appearing in front of the Great Toad Sage in an instant.
Extending his hand, time seemed to freeze.
The wind, sand, smoke, and even the enormous Great Toad Sage itself faded into insignificance.
Before Gensou's outstretched hand, a small, jet-black sphere rapidly formed, becoming the center of all attention.
The Great Toad Sage, still reeling from the pain, sensed the sphere's overwhelming energy.
Lowering its head, it saw the black sphere emitting the aura of seven chakra natures, drifting toward it with an almost innocuous lightness.
"Truth-Seeking Ball!!!"
The Great Toad Sage's expression twisted in horror as it recognized the orb.
This was the pinnacle of ninjutsu, once seen behind the figures of Ōtsutsuki Hagoromo and Ōtsutsuki Hamura. It was the embodiment of ultimate destruction.
For the first time in a millennium, the Great Toad Sage smelled the stench of death.
(End of Chapter)
[Check Out My Patreon For +20 Extra Chapters On All My Fanfics!! For Only $5!!][www.p@treon.com/zaelum]
[+500 Power Stones = +1 Extra Chapter]
[Thank You For Your Support!]
The Great Toad Sage had never anticipated that Gensou would possess the devastating Truth-Seeking Ball as a trump card.
There was no time to think further.
With the sphere hurtling toward it at alarming speed and no chance to evade, the Great Toad Sage inhaled deeply, causing its massive body to rapidly deflate, elongating the distance as it released a peculiar croak from its abdomen.
"Senpō: Kawazu Naki!"
The unique auditory genjutsu of Mount Myōboku erupted at full force, attempting to delay Gensou for even a moment.
Gensou hesitated for a fraction of a second but quickly snapped out of it. Opening his fingers, he directed the Truth-Seeking Ball to continue its trajectory.
Although the Truth-Seeking Ball lacked exceptional speed compared to Kekkei Genkai or Kekkei Tōta, its unparalleled destructive power ensured it wouldn't miss a target already within reach.
The genjutsu's effect allowed the Great Toad Sage to slightly twist its body, positioning its left arm as a shield. But that was all it could manage.
In the next instant...
The Truth-Seeking Ball collided with the Great Toad Sage's raised left arm.
At first, there was no explosion, no tearing sound, nor any clash.
When the black sphere made contact with the Great Toad Sage's arm—an arm tougher than steel—it appeared as though a gust of wind had scattered sand.
Visibly, the part of the Great Toad Sage's arm touched by the Truth-Seeking Ball dissolved into nothingness.
The effect resembled Dust Release, but even that would struggle to disintegrate the Great Toad Sage's magically resistant body down to the atomic level.
The Truth-Seeking Ball was different.
Though it couldn't nullify senjutsu, physical contact was another matter entirely.
Without the power of the Six Paths, any living body touching the Truth-Seeking Ball would be wholly annihilated.
At this moment...
The Great Toad Sage's body, tempered over millennia, seemed as fragile as paper.
The Truth-Seeking Ball carved a hole through its arm with the lightest touch.
As the sphere continued forward, the Great Toad Sage's left arm crumbled like a collapsing sandcastle, disintegrating inch by inch.
The Truth-Seeking Ball obliterated most of the Great Toad Sage's left shoulder before hurtling onward, driven by its momentum.
The Great Toad Sage, through sheer will and sacrifice of its arm, barely managed to survive.
Ignoring the pain, it prepared to leap backward, desperate to escape the sphere's destructive radius.
Watching calmly, Gensou uttered a single word.
"Explode."
Boom!
Blinding white light erupted from the Truth-Seeking Ball as it detonated, unleashing a force capable of leveling an entire forest.
A wave of unbearable heat followed.
The Great Toad Sage, closest to the explosion, could only raise its remaining right arm in defense before being engulfed by the blast.
Even as its master, Gensou was forced to retreat swiftly to the edges of Mount Myōboku to avoid the full brunt of the explosion.
From a safe vantage point, he turned to witness the aftermath.
The explosion, far larger than his previous Chō Shinra Tensei, had left behind a towering mushroom cloud.
For a full minute, silence reigned as the dust settled.
Gensou stepped forward, his figure flashing several times before he reached the epicenter of the explosion. A surprised murmur escaped his lips.
"Still alive?"
With a wave of his hand, a gust of wind dispersed the remaining smoke, revealing the scene before him.
A blood-soaked orange toad, roughly the same size as Gensou, panted heavily. Its left arm was missing entirely, and its condition was pitiful. It was the Great Toad Sage.
After enduring unimaginable pain, the Great Toad Sage had managed to shrink its body to minimize the impact area.
Through sheer resilience and senjutsu, it had clung to life, surviving the Truth-Seeking Ball's detonation.
The moment its eyes met Gensou's, the Great Toad Sage suppressed its exhaustion, straightened its posture, and activated the remnants of its senjutsu chakra. Visible wounds on its body began to heal rapidly—save for the obliterated left arm and shoulder, which could never regenerate.
"Such tenacity," Gensou remarked.
He had thought the Truth-Seeking Ball would decisively end the battle, yet the Great Toad Sage had endured.
"But how much longer can you last?"
Gensou spread his hands, and two black rods extended slowly from his palms.
The Great Toad Sage, still in its smaller form, didn't revert to its original size. Instead, it glanced at its missing left arm before turning to Gensou with a solemn expression.
"I take back what I said earlier. As of now, you are not inferior to, and perhaps in some ways, you've surpassed Hagoromo."
Gensou smirked faintly. "Hagoromo? My true goal is to surpass the Sage of Six Paths. By then, you'll no longer be here to make such assessments."
"Is that so?" The Great Toad Sage exhaled deeply, its tone calm. "The Truth-Seeking Ball has given you newfound confidence. Now, show me your next Truth-Seeking Ball."
"If you had only one, you wouldn't have detonated it so easily."
Even after its explosion, the Truth-Seeking Ball wasn't entirely destroyed. For those below the Six Paths level, summoning another would require significant cooldown time.
The Great Toad Sage had gained a thorough understanding of Gensou during their battle.
He was bold yet meticulous, never rash, and always composed.
The fact that Gensou had used the Truth-Seeking Ball so decisively suggested he likely had more.
Sure enough...
Hearing the Great Toad Sage's words, Gensou shrugged lightly.
"I was hoping to surprise you, Sage."
As he finished speaking, Gensou lowered his left hand, gripping the shorter black rod, while his right hand rested the katana-length rod on his shoulder.
At the same time, two newly formed Truth-Seeking Balls appeared, floating effortlessly around him.
With the unsealed Yin Seal, his unique blue senjutsu markings, and the Rinnegan, Gensou had now fully stepped into his peak state.
After mastering the Rinnegan and harmonizing its inherent knowledge of yin-yang and elemental chakra with his own mastery, Gensou had completed the final piece required to create Truth-Seeking Balls.
He had become the third individual, after Hagoromo and Hamura, capable of crafting them with seven chakra natures.
Given his immense strength and foundation, Gensou could produce more than just one at a time.
In contrast, the Great Toad Sage had significantly depleted its senjutsu chakra and lost its left arm.
Clearly, it had reached its lowest point in the battle.
(End of Chapter)
[Check Out My Patreon For +20 Extra Chapters On All My Fanfics!! For Only $5!!][www.p@treon.com/zaelum]
[+500 Power Stones = +1 Extra Chapter]
[Thank You For Your Support!]
ความคิดเห็นย่อย
คุณลักษณะความคิดเห็นย่อหน้าอยู่ในขณะนี้บนเว็บ! เลื่อนเมาส์ไปที่ย่อหน้าใดก็ได้แล้วคลิกไอคอนเพื่อเพิ่มความคิดเห็นของคุณ
นอกจากนี้คุณสามารถปิด / เปิดได้ตลอดเวลาในการตั้งค่า
เข้าใจแล้ว