Back when Minato and his group first encountered Madara, there was a huge misunderstanding. They met while exploring under the sea.
When Minato's team sent over a video call invitation, Madara simply ignored all of them.
In the end, unable to stand the constant disturbance, he finally answered, and when the stunned Minato and the others began questioning him, he boldly declared: "I stole the detector. Mind your own business."
At that critical moment, Minato just happened to be unable to contact Shin. As a result, the group tacitly decided to bring the detector to the sea surface, where they launched into an earth-shaking battle.
This, of course, was intentional on Madara's part.
In truth, ever since regaining his peak strength, he had been itching for an opportunity to "dance" again, but Shin simply refused to take the bait. So he wanted to see whether these few youngsters, who had been making quite a name for themselves in the shinobi world, were qualified to make him dance.
What he didn't expect was that they would give him such a satisfying fight. If he hadn't eventually used the power of the Rinnegan, he might have taken a serious loss.
Over the past few years, Minato, Fugaku, Hizashi, and Kushina had all undergone multiple evolutionary experiments.
This had greatly boosted each of their strengths, their physical bodies growing ever tougher, and their chakra reserves reaching astonishing levels.
Minato, in particular, had already mastered the Third Stage of Flying Thunder God, allowing instantaneous teleportation without relying on the technique's markings.
On top of that, he had the massive and near-limitless chakra supply from Samehada. With the Lightning Release Chakra Mode, his speed, offense, and defense reached their peak.
He could unleash almost any ninjutsu instantly, and with Shin's help, had developed devastating techniques like Wind Release: Rasenshuriken.
He also commanded an endless array of sealing jutsu, plus sage techniques capable of massively amplifying any ninjutsu.
It was no exaggeration to say that Minato's strength was now on par with Hashirama.
And it wasn't just Minato, Fugaku and Hizashi had also reached top Kage-level power.
Fugaku had awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan.
His left eye's ability was genjutsu, which he named Mirage.
It was a mass hallucination technique, somewhat similar to the Second Mizukage's clam genjutsu, trapping enemies in an illusory mirage where everything they saw was fake.
As the caster, he was naturally unaffected.
Once Mirage was activated, the enemy became nothing more than lambs awaiting slaughter.
His right eye's ability was Amaterasu, which unleashed wide-ranging black flames that burned the target until nothing remained, the flames never fading until their prey was consumed.
This power clearly ran in the family, just like with his two sons.
Moreover, Shin had assured him that he needn't fear overusing his eyes, even if he went blind, Shin had a way to restore his sight and grant him the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan.
Fugaku believed this completely.
After all, not only had Shin achieved this himself, but he had even given Fugaku's father the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan and cured his bloodline disease.
This allowed him to fight without restraint.
Combined with his mastery of Phantom Body Flicker and countless copied jutsu, his combat power was terrifying.
As for Hizashi, his Byakugan's purity was now the highest in the clan. His detection range exceeded three kilometers, with perfect 360-degree, no-blind-spot vision.
He could also apply the Byakugan flawlessly in battle, reading an opponent's every move, as well as the nature and flow of chakra inside their body, allowing him to perfectly predict their actions.
A person's movements might deceive, but when performing a certain ninjutsu, the chakra's attribute and flow pattern were fixed.
You couldn't possibly perform a Fire Release while channeling water chakra inside your body. Even more impossible would be to perform Technique A while having the chakra flow pattern of Technique B.
By analyzing an opponent's movements together with the nature and flow of their chakra, and adding in the wealth of experience he had accumulated from countless battles and training, the moment the enemy made a move, Hizashi would instantly know their next action and make a perfect preemptive counter.
Moreover, Hizashi had developed a new ability for the Byakugan: if he focused his gaze on a person, the Byakugan could, through a burst of chakra, cause a momentary block in the opponent's chakra flow.
Prediction plus disruption allowed him to easily seize any opening for a one-hit kill.
That's why fighting him was extremely frustrating.
Many members of the Hyūga clan could predict an opponent's moves, but to reach Hizashi's level was almost unheard of.
Unless you could completely crush him with overwhelming power, he would restrain you as if he possessed future sight, locking you down completely.
And now, he had mastered ninjutsu of all chakra natures, capable of both long-range and close combat, making his strength truly terrifying.
In the entire shinobi world, the only ones capable of overpowering him through sheer force were Shin, Madara, and Minato. No one else had that qualification.
As for Kushina, ever since becoming the Nine-Tails' jinchūriki, she had become a true humanoid beast.
Following the advice of Mito before her death, Kushina had tried to build a good relationship with the Nine-Tails after becoming its host.
At first, the process did not go smoothly.
But later, with Shin's help, the Nine-Tails' consciousness was separated from its physical body, allowing it to take the form of a small fox and roam outside the seal at will.
Over time, it grew extremely close to Kushina, naturally making her a perfect jinchūriki.
This granted her not only infinite chakra but also an extraordinary healing ability.
On top of that, she mastered the Lightning Release Chakra Mode and its highly refined instantaneous movement technique.
She also inherited all of her teacher's skills, plus the sealing techniques passed down from Mito, giving her enough power to completely crush the Third Raikage.
With the four of them working together in perfect sync, their fight with Madara was evenly matched.
During the battle, Madara couldn't help but remark more than once that Shin had truly raised a bunch of monsters.
If not for possessing the Rinnegan, he might actually have lost to these four youngsters.
Even with the Rinnegan, the fight was far from easy.
Because of Minato's presence, Madara was never able to deal a decisive blow to the four, and they even learned all sorts of his Rinnegan abilities, coming up with effective countermeasures.
Even his Chibaku Tensei, which he thought would succeed, was dismantled by Minato using the Flying Thunder God Technique.
In the end, Madara used Limbo: Border Jail to create shadow clones to pin down the four, and then unleashed his long-hidden Super Shinra Tensei, severely injuring Fugaku, Hizashi, and Kushina, finally ending the battle to his satisfaction.
At that point, Shin, who had been watching from afar the whole time, appeared and introduced them to one another.
From then on, Minato would frequently video call Madara, affectionately calling him "grand-uncle," and going out of his way to cheer him up.
At first, Minato's seemingly simple and honest demeanor even fooled Madara, who praised him for being very much like Hashirama.
Later, as they interacted more, he came to understand Minato's true nature, but he still liked Minato who was willing to keep him company and make him happy.