Technology, ripples, rotation, and the invasion of the Otsutsuki.
They let many people witness the power of a new era, to the point that quite a few people even forgot the most glorious and powerful age of ninjas.
Now…
People remembered again.
Uchiha Madara.
Senju Hashirama.
With the addition of these two, the one-sided battlefield instantly underwent earth-shaking changes.
Wood Release: Wood Golem Technique.
Susanoo.
Two giants hundreds of meters tall forcibly cut apart and tore to pieces the artillery blockade coming from the sky. Below them, the Edo Tensei ninjas advanced forward under the cover of the two big shots, a scene that could be called the ninja world's version of infantry–armor coordinated combat.
Uchiha Madara folded his arms and stood within Susanoo, his eyes filled with uncontrollable rage.
He only wanted to question Obito, what exactly had that brat done?
Was he dead?
Uchiha Madara was, after all, a hero of his era. He had thought everything was arranged perfectly and had gone to his death willingly, never expecting that in the end he would become a puppet in someone else's hands.
Dense artillery fire fell. Susanoo drew two gigantic swords from its waist and cut down all the fire raining from the sky.
He narrowed his eyes and looked into the distance.
He still couldn't see the enemy, but…
Susanoo planted the two swords into the ground, and rings of rotating magatama appeared in its hands.
"Yasaka Magatama."
Dozens of magatama turned into streaks of afterimages and flew into the distance. A few seconds later, tiny sparks of fire appeared on the far horizon.
But they were only sparks.
Nothing fell, and there was no midair explosion.
Uchiha Madara frowned slightly.
"How long have I been dead, exactly?"
"There's actually this kind of powerful ninja tool flying in the sky now."
It wasn't just the sky battleships. Under the coverage of defensive barriers, the research institute, like a city of the future, also looked utterly out of place and mysterious in Uchiha Madara's eyes.
This feeling of waking up to a world that had completely changed, of being cast aside by the times, was truly awful.
BOOM!
As he thought this, Susanoo slashed its sword against the defensive barrier, creating a tiny crack.
In the blink of an eye, it healed and disappeared.
"An auto-repairing defensive barrier."
The White Snake Sage had already studied and broken through the research institute before, and it immediately switched tactics. "Stop wasting time."
It called over Namikaze Minato.
Susanoo slashed down again, the crack reappeared, and Minato activated the Flying Thunder God Technique, bringing the White Snake Sage, Itachi, and several core powerhouses into the interior of the research institute.
They had just entered, their feet not even touching the ground yet, when they heard the walls clatter as gun barrels popped out one after another, Rat-a-tat-a-tat!
Dense barrages of bullets rained down.
Countless trees surged up, blocking every single gun barrel.
Senju Hashirama withdrew his hand, looked around at the neat and clean environment inside the research institute, and his eyes were filled with admiration, respect, and deep emotion.
"The young people of this era… are truly amazing."
"You still have the mood to sigh right now?!"
Uchiha Madara shouted in a low voice. "We're being controlled like puppets, resurrected in this unfamiliar era…"
"Can someone tell me what the situation is now?"
"I'll explain," Namikaze Minato said.
He had awakened relatively early, and combined with the special nature of the Flying Thunder God Technique, Minato was able, without violating the orders of the Edo Tensei, to move around a bit and gather some information.
He roughly understood what was happening outside. While running, he briefly explained it to the few who had just awakened, and for a moment, everyone fell into a state of mental shutdown.
'The ninja world had achieved complete unification, and the one in power was an Uchiha?'
Senju Tobirama's face turned iron-blue.
'Obito chose to become the Ten-Tails' jinchuriki?'
The corner of Uchiha Madara's eye twitched.
'Three Otsutsuki invaded the ninja world and were about to destroy it?'
Senju Hashirama's expression turned solemn.
Only the Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, remained calm after listening. He sighed and said, "It really is a complicated situation. But if it's Ryosuke… there shouldn't be any problem."
Hearing the familiar name, Namikaze Minato recalled his experiences fighting side by side with Ryosuke in the Land of Roran, and he also smiled. "Yes, Ryosuke really is an incredible person."
Uchiha Madara more or less understood.
The situation was even more complicated than he had imagined. The plan had completely derailed and was heading in an entirely unknown direction. But before he readjusted the plan,
"We need to first remove the restraints of Edo Tensei, or just kill the caster outright," Uchiha Madara said.
Although they had different stances in life, everyone nodded slightly in agreement at these words.
White Snake Sage, "Hey! I'm still here."
No one paid it any attention. The people following behind, especially Senju Tobirama and Uchiha Madara, had already started exchanging information about Edo Tensei.
It wasn't just Uchiha Madara who had this idea. The order Namikaze Minato received was to bring some strong fighters and the White Snake Sage together into the research institute.
Because time was tight, aside from Senju Hashirama and Uchiha Madara, the White Snake Sage didn't place restrictions on the others.
As a result, everyone who came in was from Konoha. With a bit of thought, the White Snake Sage knew that this was to give them the chance to tacitly join forces and kill it if they had the opportunity.
"However, it doesn't matter. You won't have that chance."
The improved Edo Tensei was controlled by a dual core, Kabuto Yakushi and the White Snake Sage, and the degree of control over the Edo Tensei targets was twice that of the original.
The White Snake Sage stopped paying attention to this and continued forward.
The research institute was filled with artillery fire, chakra was extremely chaotic, and sensing had been weakened to the extreme. Fortunately, Uchiha Itachi was still by their side, enough to serve as a locator.
There was no time to look for Hidan and Orochimaru's disc. Two "present" afterimages hovered before the White Snake Sage's eyes, and it decided to first look for Amenominakanushi.
"Something's not right."
Uchiha Itachi reminded them, "All the researchers have been evacuated, and they even prepared sky battleships and defensive barriers in advance. If that's the case, why didn't they take Amenominakanushi with them?"
This was a question that couldn't be avoided.
Everyone present was a ninja, and naturally understood the implication behind this question.
A baited trap.
And it was done far too obviously.
But precisely because it was so obvious, it felt unsolvable.
The White Snake Sage knew it was a trap.
The research institute side also knew that the White Snake Sage could tell it was a trap.
Yet one side still did it.
And the other side still came.
"When both sides have their cards on the table, it's no longer a trap. It becomes a contest of methods."
"Whether they can kill me with the trap, or I dismantle the trap and take the 'bait', it all depends on ability."
The White Snake Sage said.
As it spoke, they passed a corner.
Ahead was the central machine room.
BOOM!
The door was smashed open and crashed heavily to the ground with a loud noise.
The White Snake Sage looked at the Sharingan soaking in nutrient solution.
At the same time, Amenominakanushi slowly rotated and looked toward the White Snake Sage.
In the instant their gazes met, perhaps it was the resonance between the present path that comprehends the world and Amenominakanushi that extrapolates all things, or perhaps it was the effect of two "presents" overlapping, anyway…
The White Snake Sage saw two completely different timelines.
The timelines of "despair" and "hope."
"Ryosuke, in extreme despair… erased the timeline and chose to start over… What kind of ability is this, exactly?!"
The White Snake Sage seemed to be standing in a dark universe. Looking to the left, it saw strips of parallel worlds; looking to the right, the same.
Endless parallel worlds, each with a different history of the ninja world. Ninjas and heroes lived similar or dissimilar lives, with only one common point, in the parallel worlds, Ryosuke did not exist.
Only in the world before it, in this very moment, did Ryosuke exist.
The White Snake Sage looked beneath its feet. If the countless parallel worlds were separated branches, then the world beneath its feet, the one where Ryosuke existed, was the trunk, it was… the baseline world.
At this moment, the White Snake Sage understood the whole truth. Gritting its teeth, it murmured in a low voice, "Ryosuke… is someone from another world, who invaded our baseline world…"
"A ghost."