The sphere stopped expanding.
It hung silently in midair as rain washed over its surface. Shattered stone and mud had fused around it, transforming it into a colossal gray egg.
Everyone thought it was over.
Mei collapsed to the ground, her face deathly pale.
Konan turned and began walking toward Nagato.
Darui, Yugito, Kakashi, Akatsuchi, and the others had just rushed out from around the street corner. When they saw the enormous sphere floating overhead, they froze in their tracks.
"That kind of power..." Kakashi swallowed hard.
Guy's expression turned grave. "The enemy is incredibly strong!"
"You've got to be kidding me." Darui's usual laziness vanished, replaced by solemn disbelief. "So this is the power of the Rinnegan?"
Yugito bit her lip without saying a word, but the turmoil on her face was impossible to hide.
If she was honest with herself, she knew she could never have evaded an attack like that.
Kurenai and Ino were equally pale. For a moment, they simply stood there, too stunned to know what to do.
"An ant will always be an ant." Nagato panted softly. "It's over."
No sooner had the words left his mouth than...
Rumble!
A deafening explosion tore through the sky.
The sphere cracked.
But the rupture had not come from the outside.
It came from within.
A fissure spread from the center of the sphere, branching like lightning across its surface. Like a spiderweb, it grew wider and denser with every passing second.
Chunks of stone broke loose and crashed into the ground, blasting out deep craters.
Nagato's pupils contracted violently.
"Impossible... Chibaku Tensei... How could it...?"
More and more cracks appeared as the sphere began to collapse.
An arm thrust out from the rubble.
Its hand closed around a boulder and crushed it.
Then came another arm, followed by a head, shoulders, and finally an entire body...
Teizawa emerged from the shattered stone.
Several holes had been torn through his dark-gold robe. His hair was disheveled, and a thin trickle of blood ran from the corner of his mouth.
Yet his eyes remained bright, and his steps were as steady as ever.
He raised one hand.
A torrent of pitch-black iron sand surged from his body and shot toward Nagato.
Nagato immediately unleashed Shinra Tensei, repelling the iron-sand needles.
This time, however, there were simply too many of them, and they were moving far too quickly.
Shinra Tensei knocked one wave aside.
Another surged forward immediately, like a tide, like a waterfall, an overwhelming storm of iron sand bearing down on Nagato.
"How... How did you escape?!"
Nagato's voice trembled.
Teizawa wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and looked at him.
There was no emotion whatsoever in those deep eyes.
"Chibaku Tensei is powerful, but it has one fatal weakness: its core."
His voice was quiet, yet every word rang with the clarity of an inscription carved into stone.
"Destroy the core, and the seal collapses."
Nagato's pupils contracted again.
The core...
Chibaku Tensei's core was the focal point where its gravitational force converged.
Teizawa had located it at the exact moment the sphere took shape.
Then he had shattered it with a single punch.
"You..."
"I told you, I know everything about your abilities."
Teizawa raised his hand.
Countless iron-sand needles gathered before him, merging into a long, pitch-black blade. Its tip pointed straight at Nagato.
"Surrender, Nagato. You're no match for me."
Teizawa's voice remained soft.
"And your plan was wrong from the very beginning."
Nagato's lips trembled.
How could he possibly admit that he was wrong?
Rage and disbelief churned within his Rinnegan, along with a trace of confusion even he could not explain.
His hands trembled.
Whether from fury or because Teizawa's words had struck a nerve, even Nagato himself could not say.
Teizawa stared at him, speechless inside.
There was no reasoning with a madman.
He had barely said anything, yet this guy was already falling apart.
Still, Chibaku Tensei had been quite the move.
If Teizawa hadn't known about the core's weakness in advance, he might really have been sealed inside.
It seemed he would have to push Nagato even harder if he wanted to complete the system's mission.
Drawing a deep breath, Teizawa raised his voice so that it carried across the battlefield.
"Nagato, you're wrong. You've been wrong from the very beginning."
His voice echoed through the curtain of rain, drowning out both the thunder and the wind.
"You want to turn the tailed beasts into weapons and use them to intimidate the Great Nations. You think fear can suppress war..."
"To me, that childish idea is nothing but garbage!"
Nagato's entire body jolted.
He nearly toppled from the decrepit mechanical apparatus.
His hands clamped around the armrests so tightly that his knuckles turned white. His chest heaved like an overloaded engine on the verge of exploding.
"You..."
His voice was as rough as though his throat were filled with sand. He could not even force out a complete sentence.
"There are countless ways to pursue peace."
Teizawa's voice turned cold. Each word was like a blade driven into Nagato's heart.
"Yet you chose the stupidest one."
Nagato clenched his teeth, his lips still trembling.
"What other way is there?"
The words came out as a roar.
"How could people from Great Nations like yours ever understand the suffering of smaller nations?"
"You possess fertile land, abundant resources, and enormous populations. You'll never understand..."
"You'll never understand the misery of small nations struggling to survive between you, or the despair of the weak people you treat as pawns and cannon fodder!"
"Hmph..."
Teizawa snorted, making no attempt to conceal his mockery.
"Do you know why wars happen?"
Nagato froze.
"Because resources aren't distributed equally," Teizawa explained calmly, as if he were teaching a class. "Land, people, minerals, food, water..."
"Some nations have them, while others don't. Those without them try to buy what they need. When no one will sell to them, or they can't afford the price, they resort to taking it by force."
"From the Warring States Period until now, every war has ultimately been fought for the sake of利益."
He paused before continuing.
"You think you can create peace by intimidating every nation so thoroughly that none of them dares to start another war? Keep dreaming."
"As long as利益 and desire exist, war will never disappear."
"You might frighten them into submission for a while, but you can't keep them afraid forever."
"Once the nations recover, once they discover a way to counter your tailed-beast weapons, war will erupt again. And when it does, it will be even more brutal than before..."
"Because everyone will know you possess nuclear weapons. Everyone will fear you, and everyone will want to destroy you before you get the chance to strike first."
Nagato's brow furrowed slightly.
To his surprise, Teizawa's argument made sense.
The Great Nations would never sit back and wait for their destruction.
They would pour everything they had into developing enough power to oppose the tailed-beast weapons.
They would create stronger ninjutsu and even more terrifying weapons.
They might even start another Great Ninja War to do it.
When that happened, far more people would die than before.
It would be like a line of dominoes.
The moment the first one fell, all the others would follow, triggering an unstoppable chain reaction.
"Then tell me... What other way is there?"
Nagato's voice had grown quieter.
The condescending arrogance from before was gone. In its place was a faint desire to learn.
The moment he asked that question, everyone fell silent.
Konan of the Akatsuki, Obito hiding in the shadows, and Kakashi, Yugito, Darui, Akatsuchi, and the others still rushing toward the battlefield...
Every gaze converged on Teizawa.
Some seemed to be awaiting his answer.
Others merely wanted to hear what other earth-shattering declaration this young man, bold enough to challenge the most powerful forces in the ninja world, could possibly make.
Teizawa swept his gaze across them, a mocking smile curling at the corner of his lips.
"The people of your ninja world are all a bunch of idiots."
Everyone stared at him in confusion.
What did he mean?
Your ninja world?
Wasn't he also part of the ninja world?
Why had he included himself in the insult?
"Hashirama was an even bigger moron."
Teizawa did not speak loudly, yet each word struck the ground with unmistakable weight and echoed through the rain.
"He self-righteously created the one-nation, one-village system, believing that he had ended the wars of the Warring States Period."
"He never realized he was merely nurturing even larger wars..."
"The First Great Ninja War, the Second, and then the Third... Far more people died in those wars than in all the minor skirmishes of the Warring States Period."
"So as far as I'm concerned, Hashirama..."
"Was a fucking idiot."
(End of Chapter)
[Get +30 Extra Chapters On — P@tr3on "Zaelum"]
[Every 300 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter Drop]
[Thanks for Reading!]