Hyuga Gakuya's fist collided mid-air with Kaguya's own, erupting into a shockwave of terrifying power. The entire lava world trembled from the force of their clash.
Not far off, Sasuke and Naruto weren't sitting idle. Sasuke activated his Susanoo, launching arrow after arrow in an attempt to disrupt Kaguya's movements.
Naruto, drawing on the power of the Nine-Tails, formed a massive Tailed Beast Bomb and hurled it at her.
Kaguya was forced to divert her attention to block their combined assault, giving Gakuya the upper hand in their duel.
Seizing the moment, Gakuya ramped up his offensive. Each punch carried enough force to tear the heavens asunder.
Kaguya's expression darkened. She hadn't expected Hyuga Gakuya to be this powerful.
Even one-on-one, she might not be able to take him down—and now she was being besieged by multiple powerhouses.
"Mother, send them to different dimensions. Pick them off one by one and drain their chakra," Black Zetsu urged again.
"Very well," Kaguya replied, opening a black portal behind her and stepping into it without hesitation.
This was her Kekkei Mōra at work—a unique ability that allowed her to conjure rifts in space and travel freely between dimensions. Though not as fast as Flying Thunder God or Kamui, it was versatile and had fewer restrictions.
Moments later, two black portals silently opened behind Naruto and Sasuke. Kaguya reached out from within, aiming to drag them into the frozen dimension.
Others might not have noticed her maneuver, but Gakuya's Tenseigan caught it all clearly.
Without hesitation, he activated Kamui, phasing through the portal and entering the frozen world alone. He appeared behind Kaguya and, with a swift motion, grabbed her by the neck and hurled her backward into an icy mountain.
Kaguya, with the battle instincts of a Genin straight out of the academy, hadn't anticipated his sudden appearance.
She crashed into the mountain with full force, her body punching a human-sized hole through the ice.
…
Behind Gakuya, nine Truth-Seeking Orbs spun into motion, forming a silver storm in his outstretched hand.
"Silver Wheel Reincarnation Explosion!"
The storm surged forth from Gakuya's palm, engulfing Kaguya's location in a blinding tempest of silver light.
Minutes passed before the swirling winds began to fade. But Kaguya's figure was nowhere to be seen.
Suddenly, countless ice spikes erupted from the ground and surrounding cliffs, all converging toward Gakuya.
Another of Kaguya's powers—by merging with nature, she could manipulate the environment itself to attack her enemies.
But something like this wouldn't even scratch Gakuya.
With a thought, his nine Truth-Seeking Orbs fused into three Wind Shuriken, each imbued with his ocular power and wind-nature chakra.
"Wind Style: Truth-Seeking Shuriken!"
It had been a long time since he used this technique.
The three spinning shuriken launched outward, circling him once before shredding every ice spike in the area.
"To be honest, giving you these abilities was a waste. Why don't you hand them over to someone who can actually use them?" Gakuya taunted, hoping to provoke Kaguya.
And provoke her he did.
Two spatial rifts opened—one before and one behind him—and from them shot two ashen bone spears aimed at his chest and back.
Gakuya's Rinnegan glowed. The bone spears halted mid-air, frozen by his ocular power.
All-Killing Ash Bones.
Touch one, and you're annihilated—your cellular structure rewritten, your body dissolving like a reanimated corpse undone by its summoning.
A more refined and terrifying version of the Shikotsumyaku.
Then, Gakuya did something that made even Kaguya's eyes widen in disbelief.
He shifted slightly, then reached out with a glowing golden hand and grabbed one of the bone spears.
And he didn't stop there.
With no hesitation, he stabbed it into the palm of his own left hand.
His flesh began to crumble, the effect spreading rapidly across his body.
"Is he insane?!" Black Zetsu shouted in shock.
But the next moment left both Kaguya and her son speechless.
The decay… reversed. The damage healed in the blink of an eye.
Time Rewind.
Gakuya had used his power to restore his body.
"I see now…" he muttered, using the experience to understand the composition of the All-Killing Ash Bones—how they were formed, how they functioned.
Their structure was surprisingly similar to the Truth-Seeking Orbs. The Orbs were forged from the fusion of all seven chakra natures, and this bone technique followed a similar principle.
Suddenly, gray bone spikes erupted from Gakuya's back. He now held a bone spear identical to Kaguya's.
It shimmered with a dangerous light as he lifted it with a smirk, gazing in Kaguya's direction.
"Looks like I've mastered it."
Kaguya and Black Zetsu were beyond stunned.
The once-confident voice of Black Zetsu now trembled.
"Impossible… How can this be possible?!"
Kaguya's eyes were wide with disbelief. Not in her wildest imagination had she thought someone could so easily grasp the power of her Kekkei Mōra.
She instinctively stepped back.
"Who are you? A prodigy of the Main Branch? Or something else entirely?"
Gakuya sneered. "Who I am doesn't matter. What matters is this—today might be your end, Kaguya."
Kaguya's gaze turned fierce.
"Arrogant fool! Even if you've mimicked part of my power, don't think that's enough to defeat me!"
"Mother!" Black Zetsu called anxiously. "Take him to the Ancestral Realm! End this quickly! He's provoking you on purpose—he wants to learn your techniques!"
Kaguya took a deep breath and merged again with the world around her. The frozen realm began to quake as towering ice pillars burst from the ground, crashing toward Gakuya.
But he didn't flinch.
He swung the All-Killing Ash Bone in his hand, obliterating the falling ice in a single sweep.
Kaguya then appeared before him—and the next moment, the two vanished, transported into the Ancestral Realm.
…
Gakuya surveyed his surroundings. Using the Tenseigan, he analyzed the very structure of this space.
The Ancestral Realm was created using the chakra of those trapped in the Infinite Tsukuyomi. It was the core world, linked to all other dimensions.
In this world, Kaguya could absorb chakra from those caught in the genjutsu to restore and amplify her own power.
Even the God Tree's massive reserves of chakra couldn't all be stored in her body—this realm served as her external storage space.
Gakuya watched as chakra streams surged from the ground, flowing into Kaguya's body.
Her aura climbed higher and higher—her chakra returning to its peak.