[EVERY 100 POWERSTONES= 1 EXTRA CHAPTER]
The festival on the banks of the Naka River was a grotesque parody of celebration. The forced laughter of children rang hollow, the shared food tasted of ash in nervous mouths, and the brightly colored Uzumaki seals seemed less like symbols of unity and more like wards against a coming plague. The air itself was thick with a tension so palpable it felt like a storm was about to break, and every clansman, from the lowest Rank Ninja to the clan heads, was waiting for the first crack of thunder.
It came not with a sound, but with a pressure.
It began as a subtle shift, a heaviness in the air that made the lanterns flicker. Then it grew, swelling into an oppressive, tangible force that descended upon the gathering like a physical weight. It was chakra, but unlike any they had ever felt. It was not the vibrant, life-giving energy of Hashirama, nor the fierce, burning intensity of Madara's Susanoo. This was something else entirely—a divine, all-encompassing pressure that felt like the sky itself was pressing down, demanding obeisance.
Low and mid-rank ninja from both clans gasped, their hands flying to their throats as the air was crushed from their lungs. They dropped to their knees, their faces turning purple as they fought for a breath that would not come. The festive atmosphere shattered, replaced by a scene of mass suffocation and terror. Low and Mid Level ninja's collapsed entirely, unconscious before they hit the ground.
Only the strongest could withstand it, and even they were brought to their limits. Hashirama's knees buckled, his hands slamming onto the table as he panted, sweat beading on his forehead. Madara's Eternal Mangekyo flared, the new power within him straining just to keep him upright against the onslaught. His teeth were gritted, every muscle in his body screaming in protest. The Uzumaki envoys, famed for their immense chakra reserves, stood their ground but looked as if they were facing a hurricane, their bodies leaning into the invisible force, their faces masks of strained awe.
Toka, her own chakra flaring in a desperate defense, felt the pressure like a physical blow to her heart. This was not just power; it was a message. It was a declaration that their carefully constructed play was over before the main actor had even taken the stage.
Then came the light.
A flash of incandescent gold, brighter than the sun, erupted in the center of the clearing. It did not burn, but it emitted a heat so pure it felt like standing at the heart of a star. The very air shimmered and warped. As the light receded, it left behind a vision of divine wrath.
Agni stood revealed in her full, majestic glory, sixty feet from crest to tail, her plumage a living tapestry of crimson, gold, and pearlescent white. Her eyes held the ancient, unforgiving wisdom of a creature that had witnessed the birth and death of worlds. The heat radiating from her was not merely thermal; it was the heat of life, death, and rebirth, a fundamental force given form.
And on her back stood Indra.
He looked both the same and utterly transformed. He was twenty years old, his features sharpened by his training, his milk-white hair seeming to absorb the light around it. But his eyes… his eyes were no longer the familiar Six Eyes of their memory. They were golden, like Agni's, burning with the same ancient, detached fire. Around them, the intricate, leaf-like patterns of his Sage Mode glowed with a furious, molten gold. On his shoulders, twin flames of pure, solidified chakra danced like living ornaments, casting a divine light upon a face that was carved from marble and frost. He was no longer their brother, their clansman, or even a man. He was a god, and he was looking upon mortals who had failed him.
His gaze, heavy with the weight of worlds, swept over the gathered clans. It passed over the kneeling, gasping elders, over the straining figures of Hashirama and the Uzumaki, and finally came to rest upon Madara.
The voice that emerged from him was not the warm, sometimes teasing tone of an elder brother. It was the cold, resonant echo of a judge pronouncing sentence from a celestial bench.
"Madara Uchiha."
The name hung in the air, a condemnation.
"Are you," Indra asked, each word dripping with icy precision, "the man who swore an oath to me? The man to whom I entrusted the most precious thing in my world? Tell me, before this assembled court of the broken and the guilty… did you fulfill the duty I gave you?"
Madara felt the words like a physical stab. His Eternal Mangekyo, a power that could cow tailed beasts, could not withstand the sheer, soul-piercing weight of that gaze. His pupils dilated, his breath catching. All his plans, his newfound power, his diplomatic resolve—it all crumbled to dust under the simple, devastating question. His eyes, wide with a mixture of shame and defiance, flickered from Indra's face to Toka's, a silent, desperate plea for the support they had promised.
That look, that silent admission of failure, was a thousand blades piercing Toka's heart. She saw the man she loved across lifetimes, but she saw only a stranger, a wrathful deity where her husband should be.
Indra's gaze then swept over the elders. His Six Eyes, enhanced by Sage Mode, saw everything. He saw the flickering, terrified chakra of the hardliners—Elder Hikaku of the Uchiha, Elder Temari and Kota of the Senju—who were prostrate on the ground, their faces pale as milk, sweat pouring from them in rivers of fear. And he saw the few who stood, unbowed by his pressure. In the Senju camp, Butsuma and two elders in their fifties, men known for their pragmatism over bloodlust. In the Uchiha camp, his father Tajima, Great Elder Amara, and Medical Elder Tamiko. He knew their hearts. They had never wanted this war. They were not his targets.
It was then that Toka found her voice, stepping forward into the crushing pressure. "Indra! Please! Calm down! They understand their mistake! They see the folly of their ways! Please, I beg you, forgive them!"
It was the wrong thing to say.
Indra's chakra, which had been a steady, oppressive weight, suddenly flared. A visible wave of golden energy erupted from him, a concussive blast of pure power that did not burn, but pushed. It sent the kneeling elders tumbling backward like leaves in a gale. Hashirama, Madara, and Toka herself were thrown back several feet, skidding across the ground, their defenses shattered by the mere periphery of his wrath.
"FORGIVE THEM?!" Indra's voice was no longer cold; it was the roar of a collapsing star. "I HAVE GIVEN THEM CHANCE AFTER CHANCE! THEY SPAT UPON MY MERCY! THEY INTERPRETED MY ABSENCE AS WEAKNESS! AND YOU, TOKA SENJU, SPEAK TO ME OF UNDERSTANDING? DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE PAIN OF LOSS? DO YOU?"
He took a step forward, and the very earth trembled.
"THESE WRETCHED WARMONGERS WHO CLAMOR FOR BLOOD FROM THE SAFETY OF THEIR COUNCIL HALLS—DO THEY KNOW? DO THEY KNOW HOW MANY LIVES WERE LOST BECAUSE OF THEIR PRIDE? HOW MANY CHILDREN WILL NEVER SEE THEIR FATHERS AGAIN? HOW MANY MOTHERS WEEP FOR SONS WHO WILL NEVER RETURN? HOW MANY HUSBANDS AND WIVES NOW SLEEP IN COLD, EMPTY BEDS?"
He was screaming now, his divine composure shattered, revealing the raw, human grief and rage beneath. Each question was a hammer blow, striking the conscience of every person present.
"IF THEY WANTED WAR, WHY DIDN'T THEY PICK UP A SWORD AND FIGHT IT THEMSELVES? INSTEAD, THEY PUSH THE YOUNG, THE BRAVE, THE HOPEFUL, INTO THE MEAT GRINDER TO DIE FOR THEIR ANCIENT, POINTLESS GRUDGES! CAN YOU TAKE THAT RESPONSIBILITY, TOKA? CAN ANY OF YOU?"
Toka stood frozen, his words stripping away all her prepared arguments. He was right. She knew he was right. The upper echelons, the strategists in both clans, had always been insulated from the true, gut-wrenching cost of their decisions. They saw casualty lists, not the light dying in a young man's eyes.
In the devastating silence that followed his tirade, two new figures arrived at the edge of the clearing, pushed forward by their caretakers.
On one side, Tobirama Senju, pale and gaunt, seated in a wooden wheelchair pushed by a somber Kawarama. His right leg ended in a neatly bandaged stump.
On the other, Izuna Uchiha, his eyes covered by a clean white bandage, guided gently by a Uchiha Rai Kenta Uchiha's Little Sister who grown up now. Izuna walked with a slow, hesitant step, his once-proud posture now bowed.
Indra's gaze fell upon them. The sight of his little brother, blind and broken, caused the raging inferno of his anger to subside for a single, heart-wrenching moment, replaced by a wave of protective, brotherly love. But then his eyes shifted to Tobirama, to the missing leg, and his Six Eyes saw the truth—the severed, corrupted chakra pathways, the lingering stain of Zetsu's vile energy in both of them. This was not the clean kill of a rival's blade. This was a violation. A poisoning. And his anger returned, not as a wildfire, but as a glacier—cold, immense, and inexorable.
The assembled clans, seeing the broken brothers, began to plead. "Lord Indra, have mercy!" "We are sorry!" "It was the shadow! The black shadow!"
But Indra raised a hand, and silence fell once more, heavier than before.
"Enough," he said, his voice returning to that terrifying, preternatural calm. "The pleas of the guilty are meaningless to the dead. I want to know one thing, and one thing only. I want the names. I want to know, without ambiguity or deception, who is responsible. Who, in both clans, championed this war after my departure? Who voted to send our brothers and sisters to their deaths for the sake of pride?"
He paused, letting the question hang in the air like a headsman's axe.
"And that person," he finished, his golden eyes glowing with finality, "will pay the price. With his own life."
A collective shudder ran through the crowd. This was no negotiation. This was a demand for a sacrificial lamb.
Toka looked at Indra, at the absolute, unyielding conviction in his divine visage. She saw the love for his brother warring with his fury at the injustice. She saw that he was past reason, past diplomacy. Words, pleas, logic—none of it would reach him now. He was a force of nature, and you could not argue with a hurricane.
Her mind, the mind of Vidya Joyce, the advocate who had always sought peaceful resolutions, finally accepted a terrible truth. Words will never work on him now. He is not John. Not in this moment. He is Indra, the Judge. And the only language a judge understands in the throes of righteous fury… is action.
A chilling resolution settled in her soul. She had hoped to never fight against her own Husband but this was only way left. And it would not be played with words.
She would have to fight him. Not to win—that was impossible. But to break through. To shatter the divine judge and reach the grieving brother and the righteous husband beneath. To make him see that the path of the executioner would only lead to more graves, including his own.
She took a slow, deep breath, her chakra beginning to circulate not in defense, but in preparation for an attack. The mightiest kunoichi of the Senju prepared to stand against the god of the Uchiha. Not for victory, but for his very soul.
[EVERY 100 POWERSTONES= 1 EXTRA CHAPTER]
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