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The tournament pressed on.
One after another, several breathtaking battles unfolded.
First came the civil war between the Second and Third Raikage: two identical dark-skinned, muscle-bound giants wrapped in lightning armor, colliding at unimaginable speeds in a storm of pure physical passion.
In the end both unleashed spiritual techniques, but the Third's black lightning proved superior, and he claimed victory.
Outside the screen, the entire group of burly Kumogakure ninjas roared themselves hoarse, pumping their fists and howling like madmen.
As the matches continued, legendary figures from ninja history took the stage one after another, delivering contests of wits, skill, and raw power that left every spectator breathless.
Next was the long-awaited revenge match: Fourth Mizukage Yagura versus Uchiha Fugaku.
Kisame Yagura was without a doubt the most tragic Kage in Kirigakure's history.
For the latter half of his reign he had been completely controlled by Obito's genjutsu, turning the Hidden Mist into a living nightmare.
Had the village not been isolated on its archipelago and hidden behind layers of mist, the other four great nations would have crushed it long ago.
Yagura harbored a burning hatred for the entire Uchiha clan.
Most of the Uchiha, however, had little personal interest in this tournament.
They carried a secret no outsider could ever know: the true identity of Lord Enma himself.
With Lord Enma ruling the Yellow Springs and Izuna serving as His right hand, the Uchiha clan already enjoyed an invisible, transcendent status.
Thus they had simply sent Fugaku as their representative to go through the motions.
Unable to strike at his true enemy, Yagura directed all of his fury at Fugaku and fought like a man possessed.
Do not let the Fourth Mizukage's petite frame and baby-faced innocence fool you; his strength was terrifying.
Even after death and the loss of his jinchūriki powers, he seemed stronger than ever.
His affinity for spiritual energy in particular made even Kaito's eyes narrow in appreciation.
His former signature technique, Water Release: Water Mirror Technique, had evolved into a pure spiritual art.
Yagura conjured four perfect mirror clones of Fugaku that moved and fought in perfect unison with the original, surrounding the Uchiha patriarch in a deadly encirclement.
Fugaku, however, had no real desire to win. He put up a respectable fight, then cleanly conceded.
"He forfeited? …That's fine, actually."
While Sasuke scowled in frustration and disappointment, Kaito felt it was for the best.
In the past, when the Uchiha were constantly suppressed in Konoha, every clansman had acted like a bristling hedgehog—proud, combative, desperate to prove they were not to be looked down upon.
To Kaito, that defensiveness had only revealed how deeply insecure they had been.
Now, with the overwhelming advantage the clan enjoyed in the underworld, their confidence was unshakable. Their minds had grown calm and magnanimous; empty titles and petty victories no longer mattered.
Another grudge match soon followed: Sunagakure's Scorch Release user Pakura versus the Fourth Kazekage, Rasa.
Rasa had once sold Pakura out to Kirigakure in exchange for an alliance, a betrayal that still burned in her even after death.
Though she used no spiritual power in this fight, the sheer freezing hatred in her eyes combined with the blistering heat of her Scorch Release utterly demolished Rasa.
Every word exchanged between them made the Sunagakure ninjas watching from the moon squirm in second-hand shame.
Kankuro pulled his hood down low, silently thanking the gods for the thick layer of face paint that hid his burning cheeks.
He desperately wanted to crawl into a hole and scream at his father.
Because the more he thought about it, the more he realized that ever since becoming Kazekage, the only thing Rasa had ever done right was pan for gold.
Several hours later, the day's matches finally concluded.
Forty-nine contestants, twenty-four bouts.
Of course they couldn't all be held in a single day; the audience needed time to savor each one.
After Izuna announced that the tournament would resume at the same time tomorrow, the illusionary array winked out.
Whether on the moon or in villages and cities across the continent, spectators lingered long after the broadcast ended, still buzzing with excitement and heatedly debating what they had seen.
This was the world's first simultaneous audio-visual broadcast on a planetary scale, and it left everyone stunned.
The primary purpose, of course, was propaganda for the Yellow Springs: to instill reverence for the afterlife in every living soul.
Now everyone understood clearly—no matter how high your station in life, after death your entire existence would be judged.
An unexpected secondary effect, however, was that it quietly began to shift the way ordinary people viewed shinobi.
In the past, to the nobility shinobi were lowly tools—weapons to be pointed, nothing more.
To commoners they were demons, bringers of war and calamity.
But now, match after match had laid bare the overwhelming power, character, and dignity of these legendary ninja.
Common folk began to see them as human beings worthy of respect. Many even picked favorite contestants to root for.
For the nobility, the realization was far more chilling: at this rate, all ten thrones of the Ten Kings of Hell would be occupied by shinobi.
The daimyo and noble families—who had always looked down on shinobi as beneath them—now felt something lodged in their throats.
They still married only within their own class and would never dream of taking a shinobi as a legitimate spouse, yet many were already quietly reconsidering how close they ought to get to these "lowly" warriors.
When Lord Enma noticed these ripples and told Kaito about them as a joke, Ri only snorted dismissively.
He had seen it coming long ago.
Human society in this world was rigidly stratified, and shinobi most of all.
Shinobi had never once tried to step outside the role assigned to them. Like the nobles, they had accepted their place as living weapons.
It all traced back to the era when the Sage of the Six Paths founded ninjutsu.
The Sage had probably feared that people granted such immense power would place themselves above the rest of humanity and shatter society beyond repair.
So he bound shinobi with strict rules and codes.
For a thousand years they had obeyed those rules without question—right up to the present day.
Kaito, of course, was no ordinary shinobi, and his clan had already withered. He didn't particularly care.
Besides, he knew full well that the cycle of reincarnation was slowly stripping chakra from shinobi souls with every generation.
In a few more generations, shinobi as the world knew them would simply cease to exist.
And he had been wondering for a long time: humanity could not be allowed to remain powerless.
Perhaps, once chakra was gone, mankind would finally have to walk a different path.