As soon as the puppet army, made up of thousands of pure puppets and human puppets, appeared—
They clearly targeted only the Cloud Ninjas wearing vests.
Some puppets transformed their arms into sharp blades.
Others raised their arms and shot golden light bullets with a whooshing sound.
The ninjas' execution power was truly astonishing.
Even though they were violently shaken by sound waves, the barrier and medical teams gritted their teeth and endured the pain, still helping and commanding the villagers to evacuate.
Besides, the puppet army showed no interest in them.
So the evacuation of the villagers was very smooth. The remaining ninjas began fighting the puppet army.
"Cloud Style · Soaring Dragon!"
A fierce blonde woman, though not as strong as Tsunade, swung a short blade with her backhand.
With a bright electric light in the night, she smashed a puppet with one strike.
Seeing how the puppet corpses only used weapons and light bullets, Samui looked at the human puppets fighting other ninjas—those could use the Five Nature Transformations easily, with only one or two hand signs.
She slightly furrowed her brows and loudly reminded everyone:
"Watch out for those puppets using ninjutsu. They're made from corpses, so they may retain their abilities from life—or even their bloodline limits!"
"Look, these people are all wearing Konoha forehead protectors."
"There are some from the Sand Village too."
"And some from the Sound Village. All of them have slashed forehead protectors—they're rebels."
"I remember that months ago, Konoha was attacked by Orochimaru, the Sand Village, and the Akatsuki. That was the Konoha Crush plan. The Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, and Elder Danzo Shimura, along with the Root members under them, all died."
"The corpses from those three villages were taken away by the Akatsuki's Sasori of the Red Sand. Now they've been turned into puppets."
"Damn Konoha and the Sand Village. Are they still causing trouble even after their people died?!"
"..."
The other Cloud Ninjas also noticed something wrong with the puppet army and shouted information to each other.
Each Cloud team quickly figured out enemy traits and began using specific tactics to fight them.
But they didn't know—
These forehead protectors were only a trick.
Their real purpose was to make the enemy draw the wrong conclusions.
Before the chakra in the chakra cores was exhausted, each human puppet could only use Five Nature Transformations, plus secret techniques and forbidden jutsu.
If the original body had bloodline limits or special jutsu, they could even use abilities that Izayoi didn't have himself.
When the enemy identified a puppet's bloodline or jutsu and used counters against it—
The puppet would suddenly use techniques the original didn't know, or ones not even from their village.
This created a massive intelligence advantage, often ending with the enemy getting one-shotted.
The fact was—Izayoi's strategy worked brilliantly.
Aburame Togen released a swarm of poisonous insects.
They only flew past two vest-wearing Cloud Ninjas—
And those two fell to the ground, screaming in pain.
Other Cloud Ninjas saw this and quickly shouted:
"That's a member of Konoha's Aburame Clan! A poisonous insect user! Don't let his bugs touch you!"
After yelling, one Cloud Ninja pulled out his sword, his body surrounded by lightning chakra, and charged at Aburame Togen.
But the next moment, he froze.
Aburame Togen suddenly formed hand seals and spat out a giant fire wave.
Fire Style · Great Fire Annihilation!
The Cloud Ninja was engulfed instantly, screaming inside the flames.
Other human puppets used this same trick.
They either seriously injured or outright killed several Cloud Ninjas.
The rest of the pure puppets, who couldn't beat Cloud Ninjas one-on-one, began supporting the human puppets.
Some shot light bullets to harass from a distance—
Others took the opportunity to steal corpses of fallen Cloud Ninjas,
Looted the buried bodies of ninjas from the ruins,
Then retreated under the stealth effect of Ranmaru's red eyes.
As the number of dead Cloud Ninjas increased,
Beams of light—visible only to Izayoi—flew out from the corpses and shot into the distance.
However, the advantage of the human puppets didn't last long.
Under the orders of special jonin and experienced elite ninjas,
The Cloud Ninjas began to adjust.
Those skilled in close combat focused on pure puppets.
The others—those good at long-range ninjutsu—bombarded the human puppets from afar.
This forced the puppets to respond with jutsu and gave Cloud Ninjas a chance to observe, collect intel, and find weak points.
Very soon, a sensory ninja gathered key intel and shouted:
"These puppets have limited chakra!
They can't extract chakra during battle, and soldier pills don't restore their stamina!"
Hearing this, many Cloud Ninjas' eyes lit up.
Some special jonin even raised their hands to make signal gestures—
Use delaying tactics!
The human puppet army instantly lost their intelligence edge.
"Storm Style · Binding Lock!"
Unlike the army-wide tactics of the puppet corps and the Cloud forces,
Darui—Kumo's ace—singled out Aburame Togen.
He fired several powerful lasers to wipe out the insects and pinned the dangerous opponent.
Xi, another trump card of Cloud Village, targeted Yamanaka Fuu—
Who could control puppets using the Heart-Turning Puppet Curse Seal Technique—and kept him pinned as well.
The Two-Tails jinchuriki was away.
The Eight-Tails jinchuriki hadn't shown up.
Even the Fourth Raikage hadn't moved yet.
The puppet army was being pushed into a corner.
One wooden clone protecting Ranmaru couldn't help but sigh:
"Amazing... Thinking we could take down the strongest ninja village now with just a few hundred puppets was unrealistic..."
Right after finishing the sentence,
The wooden clone's face changed.
He immediately had Ranmaru cast a red eye illusion to hide himself and all the other clones.
Because his Rinnegan had just spotted a third force—
It was White Zetsu's clones.
They had already snuck into Hidden Cloud Village,
Replaced some villagers with the Transformation Technique,
And were now using Mayfly Technique to track down the mastermind behind the puppet army.
Several White Zetsu clones emerged from the ruins,
Hiding their chakra signatures, watching the battle in silence.
If nothing unexpected happened, the real White Zetsu was aware of this too.
Maybe even Uchiha Obito already knew, and was on his way.
"We must end this quickly. Come out... my trump card!"
Izayoi issued the command to the wooden clone managing the puppet army.
Whoosh—
Not long after—
A kunai, concealed in the darkness, appeared above the Cloud Ninja Army that was in a long-range battle.
Right after that, blurry shadows appeared around it—
Then instantly turned into solid kunai raining down like a storm.
Shuriken Shadow Clone Technique!
"Watch the skies, scatter!"
A sensing ninja detected chakra above and urgently warned the others.
"Wind Style · Great Breakthrough!"
An all-round jonin quickly formed seals and blew a gust of wind into the air.
Bang bang bang...
Sounds like balloons bursting echoed. Thick white fog covered the sky.
Still, a few kunai fell into the Cloud Army,
But they were dodged thanks to their speed and movement skills.
Yet in the next second—
A black flash, barely visible in the night, flickered across the battlefield.
A cold glint sliced through Cloud Ninjas near the kunai.
Puff puff puff—
The sound of flesh tearing echoed, almost as one.
"So... fast..."
One all-round jonin died without even seeing who attacked.
Swish—
After killing the nearby ninjas instantly, the black flash paused—
It was Danzo.
Wearing the Akatsuki cloak, holding a ninja blade,
Expressionless. Cold.
His right eye's three-tomoe Sharingan spun into a Mangekyo.
In the dark, it glowed red.
The next moment, a Cloud Ninja accidentally made eye contact and froze.
Danzo appeared in front of him instantly,
Used Flying Thunder God to teleport—
Then slapped the ninja flying with one palm.
The surrounding ninjas didn't know what had happened.
Seeing their comrade fly, two Cloud Ninjas instinctively reached out to catch him—
But then they saw it.
A black flash. A slash of cold light.
It carried a chakra flow—either Wind or Lightning release—
And it swept across their necks and chests.
Their vests tore with a rip,
Before the blood even sprayed out, Danzo had already vanished.
They couldn't even say a final word.
Puff...
The sounds of slicing and tearing continued to echo.
Danzo's right eye kept spinning.
At the same time, he used the nature transformations of both Lightning and Wind, pushing his own speed to the limit.
He moved freely through the Cloud Ninja army as if no one was there—
Like walking in an empty field.
In front of the extreme speed,
And under the insight of the Mangekyō Sharingan,
Those Cloud Ninjas, even the ones skilled in ninjutsu and high-speed movement,
Looked like wooden dummies in Shimura Danzo's eyes—completely still.
The ninja swords in his hands either had Wind-style chakra to increase sharpness,
Or Lightning-style chakra to increase piercing power.
With each slash, like cutting leeks,
He either took a life or seriously injured a Cloud Ninja.
When facing Cloud Ninjas who could react—
He used the Mangekyō Sharingan's genjutsu to freeze them in place,
Then struck them down with his blade,
Leaving behind a Flying Thunder God mark as he knocked them away.
That black flash—
In less than thirty seconds,
Harvested hundreds of lives.
At this point, the Cloud Ninjas finally recognized him.
"That's Shimura Danzo, the Elder of Konoha!"
"Hurry! Spread out immediately—that's the Flying Thunder God Technique!"
"Don't pick up your comrades' bodies!
Don't go near those kunai!
That's the Flying Thunder God Technique from the Second and Fourth Hokage!"
"—!"
The shouts echoed with panic, as if their lungs were being torn apart.
The entire army quickly scattered.
Even though they had more than 2,000 ninjas—
(Not including those escorting villagers, those on missions, those guarding the border, or the Genin without vests)
All it took was one person—
And the group was scared into fleeing in panic.
The earlier advantage of grouping together and using combined firepower was instantly gone.
This was the terrifying pressure of the Flying Thunder God Technique!
Before Shippuden had started,
Before Impure World Reincarnation and the Eight Inner Gates were treated as god-tier skills—
The Flying Thunder God Technique was already the top-tier forbidden technique.
After all—
This was a time-space jutsu that let two Hokage earn the title of "God Speed" in the ninja world!
Seeing the Cloud Ninja troops scatter,
The Human Puppet Corps immediately seized the opening.
They used large-scale or single-target powerful Five Element-style jutsu
To harvest the lives of Cloud Ninjas who no longer had their attention on them.
For a while—
Countless beams of light rose into the sky again.
The pure puppets, and the human puppets who were almost out of chakra in their cores,
No longer exploded for entry points—
They only targeted already-dead Cloud Ninjas,
Picked up the corpses,
Then used the invisibility ability granted by Ranmaru's red eyes to quickly leave the battlefield.
However—
This advantage did not last long.
"Lightning Release: Furious Thunder Axe!"
Just as Shimura Danzo was slicing through Cloud Ninjas like vegetables,
The Fourth Raikage—who had been observing from the rear—couldn't sit still any longer.
A figure covered in blue lightning appeared suddenly above Shimura Danzo.
He raised his right leg above his head—
Then slammed it down like a battle axe with a loud shout.
But Shimura Danzo didn't even look up.
His figure turned into a black flash—vanishing instantly.
BOOM—!!
Right after he disappeared,
A deafening explosion shook the ground.
The earth cracked apart,
A huge crater was blasted open,
And violent shockwaves surged out in all directions.
"It's Lord Raikage!"
Seeing the Fourth Raikage appear,
The Cloud Ninja troops—who had been terrified by the Flying Thunder God Technique—
Immediately found their backbone.
"Everyone, spread out!" the Fourth Raikage shouted.
"Preserve your lives! Ignore the puppets!
Even if the village is destroyed, we can rebuild it—
But your lives are the most important!"
"Yes, Lord Raikage!"
The Cloud Ninjas shouted together,
Their morale instantly reignited.
Under the command of the jonin in vests,
The scattered Cloud Ninjas quickly regrouped into tactical squads.
They no longer focused on attacking the puppet army,
Instead staying alert and protecting each other.
From a distance, they cast long-range ninjutsu
To hold back the puppet corps and give Lord Raikage room to fight.
"The winner has been decided."
"Cloud Village really lives up to its name.
So few traitors... they're truly united."
Hidden underground, a White Zetsu clone—
Merged with the land and plants through Mayfly Technique—spoke.
Another White Zetsu clone said with expectation,
"Is that mysterious man finally going to appear?"
Seeing that their advantage was gone,
And the chakra in their cores was almost used up,
The human puppet army gave up the idea of blowing up more entries.
They didn't keep attacking the Cloud Ninja troops—
Who, although scattered, were now more united.
The human puppets on the outer edge suddenly formed hand seals.
They used up a large amount of remaining chakra,
Then breathed out a wide and roaring wave of fire,
Burning straight toward the Cloud Ninja army.
After the fire wave passed—
Hundreds of human puppets disappeared without a trace.
Without a detection barrier,
Even skilled sensory ninja couldn't locate their position.
After all, this so-called "invisibility" wasn't just physical—
It was an illusion cast by Ranmaru's red eyes.
It could hide both form and chakra signal,
Interfere with enemy perception,
And even the Byakugan couldn't see through it.
With the puppet army now gone,
A large section of the battlefield was suddenly emptied.
And on that battlefield—
Only one person remained.
He still held a blood-dripping ninja blade,
And he was—
The MVP of the whole game:
Danzo.