Instead, his massive Susanoo was struck as if by a falling star. Its entire body lurched backward, and the arm he had swung so casually let out a groan of overstrained, splintering cracks!
The massive energy construct was knocked off the ground uncontrollably, sent flying back hundreds of meters by the terrifying force contained within that single punch!
"What?!" Inside the Susanoo, Sasuke was caught off guard. The immense inertia made it nearly impossible for him to steady himself, his Sharingan wide with incredulous horror.
How is this possible?
His Susanoo, though not in its strongest form, had actually been punched away?
What alarmed him even more was that Sakura didn't stop after the successful hit.
Her speed surpassed the limits of visual perception, chasing after the flying Susanoo almost instantly.
"Here, the Village won't be affected," Sakura's voice came calmly, yet it carried an indisputable power.
Without him even noticing, she had already caught up and was positioned above the Susanoo.
Under the stunned gaze of Sasuke's Sharingan, Sakura once again raised her seemingly delicate fist.
Then, she hammered it down toward the massive purple armor below!
BOOM—!!!
This punch seemed to contain the power to shatter the stars!
The massive Susanoo was struck as if by an invisible sledgehammer, slammed irresistibly from mid-air toward the open wasteland far from the Village!
Accompanied by a world-shaking roar and a plume of dust that shot into the sky, the very earth wailed and split open, as a massive crater a hundred meters in diameter was smashed into existence!
The Susanoo, which had once awed the Ninja World, was now embedded deep in the bottom of the pit like a broken doll. The Chakra armor on its surface was riddled with cracks, its light flickering violently as if it might collapse at any moment.
The power of a single punch had actually reached such a level!
The entire Ninja World fell silent at this moment.
Everyone was shocked into speechlessness by Sakura Haruno's absolute, cognition-defying power.
Dead silence.
Not just around the ruins of Konoha, but the entire Ninja World—everyone watching the earth-shaking scene through the heavenly screen—fell into a state of near-speechless shock.
What did they just see?
That pink-haired girl, Sakura Haruno, she... she punched the Susanoo away?
It wasn't a mere push or a stalemate; it was a pure, unadorned, crushing display of power that blew it away!
And the second punch had directly hammered that god-like armor into the ground!
"Mon... Monstrous Strength?" someone murmured instinctively, but immediately shook their head in denial.
Tsunade's Monstrous Strength was powerful, but when had it ever possessed such mountain-cleaving, sea-splitting majesty that seemed to shatter the very rules of the world?
"Just what kind of power is this?"
Hiruzen Sarutobi watched Sakura Haruno land steadily, his eyes flickering intensely as his heart churned with turmoil.
"This is definitely not an ordinary application of Taijutsu or Chakra..."
For the first time, he felt so directly that this young girl, whom he once thought was merely excellent in her theoretical studies, had stepped onto a path he could not comprehend at all.
"Cough, cough..."
At the edge of the deep pit, rubble rolled.
Uchiha Sasuke stood up from the ruins in a somewhat disheveled state. The Susanoo surrounding him had temporarily dissipated due to the massive impact and the violent oscillation of his Chakra.
Although his physical body hadn't suffered substantial heavy injury thanks to the Susanoo's protection, the shock to his heart was thousands of times stronger than the impact on his body.
He looked up at the pink-haired girl walking slowly toward him, his Sharingan filled with unprecedented shock and disbelief: "Sakura... you actually..."
You actually possess such power?
You can actually be strong to this extent?
Naruto also walked over while clutching his chest, standing beside Sakura. Looking at Sasuke's shocked expression, he explained with a complex tone: "Sasuke, this is the Shinjutsu Sakura has mastered... a power truly like that of a god."
Sakura looked directly at Sasuke, her gaze sincere and firm: "Come back, Sasuke. If there are truly grievances and hatred, we'll face them together. I will definitely help you!"
However, the shock in Sasuke's eyes slowly receded, replaced by an even deeper coldness and obsession.
He used the back of his hand to wipe away a trace of blood that had leaked from the corner of his mouth due to the Chakra backlash, letting out a low, mocking sneer:
"Help me? You can't help me, Sakura."
"My goal has been only one thing from the very beginning—revenge!"
"I will personally kill the Konoha Leadership who planned and allowed the Uchiha Clan Massacre, and announce their crimes before everyone! And then..."
His voice suddenly rose, carrying a resolve to destroy everything:
"I will completely destroy Konoha, this source of darkness stained with the blood of my clan!"
"Only then can the countless souls of the Uchiha Clan, weeping in the darkness, truly find peace!"
His hatred had not diminished in the slightest because of the absolute power Sakura displayed; instead, it became sharper and more extreme because of the obstacle this power presented.
"Sasuke, you're being too extreme!" Naruto roared in heartache, seeing his best friend completely consumed by hatred.
Sasuke stopped in his tracks but didn't look back, only letting out a cold sneer: "Extreme? Uzumaki Naruto, if you had experienced everything I have, witnessed your entire clan being slaughtered with your own eyes, and lived until today carrying such a blood feud, you would be even more extreme than me! You'd probably want to destroy the entire world!"
"Naruto wouldn't be like that!" Sakura immediately countered. She refused to believe that the sun-like youth would ever turn toward destruction.
Naruto also nodded firmly, trying to use his beliefs to convince the other: "That's right! Is there anything that can't be talked out? And Sasuke, even if you truly have an enormous grievance, why attack the Village? Those ordinary villagers know nothing; they are innocent!"
"Innocent?" Sasuke acted as if he had heard the most ridiculous thing, but he had completely lost the desire to argue.
He glanced at the Konoha Ninjas gathering in the distance, who dared not step forward due to the previous battle, and knew that nothing more could be done today.
He turned around, no longer looking at Naruto and Sakura, leaving behind only a bone-chilling sentence that sounded like a final ultimatum:
"If you're going to act, do it now and keep me here. Otherwise, next time, when I'm ready, I will still come—to destroy Konoha."
As the words fell, his figure moved, turning into a black shadow. In a few leaps, he disappeared into the intersection of the ruins and the forest.
Facing Sasuke's departure, Sakura and Naruto stood where they were, ultimately not moving to stop him.
Naruto gazed in the direction where Sasuke had disappeared, his face filled with loss and sorrow as he whispered: "Sakura... I wanted him to stay. I really did."