"Life is very precious, Sensei. Don't throw it away so easily. After all, the Hatake Clan's bloodline is down to just you!"
Sakura hoisted Kakashi onto her shoulder and threw him behind her to Guy, who came sprinting over.
Both of them were in a very bad state. To stop the damage caused by the Cutting Technique released by Obito manipulating the Ten-Tails from causing too many casualties to the allied forces, the two had exhausted every means at their disposal.
"Sakura, Naruto and Sasuke..." Kakashi, being carried like a bundle by Guy, barely raised his head.
"Leave them to me. As long as I'm here, not a single person will die. I guarantee it to you in my name!"
Crimson thunder surged in Sakura's emerald pupils. The will of the dominant sovereign circulated over the earth, trembling. Her unyielding spirit indiscriminately assaulted everything around her, turning the heavens and the earth into her territory.
Something had changed. This thought clearly appeared in the eyes of everyone who looked directly at Sakura.
The girl before them had transformed from her previous hazy state into this more clear, more willful, and rebellious form.
After shedding the long, balanced and peaceful aura brought by Sage Mode, breaking free from the retention of Natural Energy and the Naruto World, her own will revealed itself externally, governing all things, manipulating all phenomena!
"Haruno Sakura, what have you done?"
Obito had no way of knowing what had happened to the girl.
But judging from the spirit rising from her, the Ten-Tails within him seemed to be... fearing her.
"Hehehe, you'll find out soon enough!" Sakura raised her hand. White mist rose from her body.
The next moment, her figure suddenly appeared behind Obito. Her hand, burning with pale flames, reached straight for his heart.
'I can't react!!!'
His pupils contracted. Cold sweat ran down his face. For the first time since becoming the Ten-Tails' Jinchuriki, Obito felt such an intense crisis.
Fortunately, the Truth-Seeking Balls on his body automatically protected his body, spreading a layer of black membrane before Sakura's hand.
Ssssrip!
The piercing sound of friction came from between Sakura's fingers as she tore at the Truth-Seeking Ball. The girl, relying solely on her physical body, destroyed the high-density Chakra formed by the combination of seven natures.
The impact of this scene was no less than if a certain Anbu's top-secret file contained words about Danzo giving oral exercises to Hiruzen.
"Impossible! Haruno Sakura, what are you..."
Obito's words were cut off. A fist filled with Senjutsu Chakra struck him in the face, sending him flying and embedding him in the earth.
"Whew~, this feeling is truly awful, but also freaking awesome!" The girl, taking a skip-step in mid-air, withdrew her smoking fist and gently shook it.
On her shoulder, a slug that had turned emerald crawled out, narrowed its eyes, and sighed softly. "But this way, you can never return to being human!"
"Hahahaha, who cares!" Grinning, Sakura's beautiful face hung an arrogant smile. "After all, I don't want all this messy stuff to interfere with my clash with the strong!"
Having completely completed her Sage Transformation, she indeed could no longer be defined by human standards.
But this also brought her a benefit: the complete completion of the technique that had only existed in her designs, the fourth stage of the Senjutsu Evolution technique… Transformation!
The great sages of the Holy Lands, as life forms evolved by the planet to resist invasive foreign organisms like the Ten-Tails, inherently possessed the ability to devour the Ten-Tails in reverse.
And Sakura, since joining Shikkotsu Forest, had developed the second stage, Decay, and the third stage, Adaptation, based on the first stage of the Senjutsu Evolution technique, Return.
And now, with Katsuyu's help, she had perfected her Senjutsu to the fourth stage… Transformation!
In this mode, she could continuously convert all Chakra, Spiritual Energy, willpower, and even vitality into Natural Energy, thereby obtaining a vast amount of Natural Energy to counter the Ten-Tails without exploiting the planet.
This was the most pure and direct defiance of an individual with a backward life form against the evolution and development to a higher-level existence!
"Wait, aren't you afraid that life depletion will kill you first!!!"
In the pit littered with gravel, Obito, having used the Ten-Tails' instinct for Natural Energy extraction to ascertain Sakura's ability, wiped the blood from his face and reattached his broken jaw.
He suddenly flew out of the pit. All the Truth-Seeking Balls on his body activated simultaneously, forming various ninja tools to strike at Sakura.
"Why should I be afraid? Shouldn't overcoming one's flaws and fighting to one's heart's content bring sincere joy?" Sakura cupped her own crimson cheeks. Her emerald pupils were filled with intoxication.
She let the Truth-Seeking Ball Ninja tools attack her body. The technique capable of annihilating all matter stalled upon touching the high-density Natural Energy bursting around Sakura's body, unable to advance further.
"Madman!"
Obito gritted his teeth, raised his hand, and clenched his fist toward Sakura in the air. The surrounding Truth-Seeking Balls again spread out to form a canvas covered with spikes, wrapping toward the girl at the center.
The violent explosion seemed to sing loudly.
Thus, witnessed by the entire Allied Force, flames and impact spread across the sky, as if trying to drag the entire world into blood.
…
On the other side, following Sakura's instructions, Leviathan and Sato Sakura, carrying Naruto and Sasuke to evacuate the battlefield, ran quickly on the ground.
Using Sato Sakura's Observation Haki and earth sensing, they followed Orochimaru's Chakra and moved toward the southern side of the Land of Water.
"Is it really okay not to treat these two? I feel like they're going to die!" Leviathan used her darkness ability to wrap around the two, forcibly plugging the hourglass-like leakage of their lives.
But because of this, she had fallen into an immobile state, so she could only let Sato Sakura carry them and run across the earth.
"Mother's order is to take them to find Orochimaru, and then help him deal with Yakushi Kabuto. Their lives are not within the scope of Mother's command!" The emotionless girl didn't care about others at all. What she cared about was only completing the task assigned by Sakura, cold and efficient.
"Tsk, tsk, so cruel, Sato Sakura~." Leviathan shook her head, focusing all her attention back on maintaining Naruto and Sasuke's lives.
And through Leviathan's ability, passing through that thick darkness,
Within Naruto and Sasuke's respective Inner Worlds, the two simultaneously entered a dark space filled with shallow ripples of water.
Although they could not see each other's Inner Worlds, as the embodiments of Yin and Yang, an old man with exactly the same appearance and clothing appeared before the two.
"It seems you two are quite troubled. Then let me first state my name!"
"I am the embodiment of peace and order, the founder of Ninshu. My name is Hagoromo! There is something I wish to ask of you."