Chapter 146: The Transaction
...
Tsunade was speechless.
Not out of awe or because she had been convinced.
It was simply that the overwhelming power pressing down on her body left her unable to move or think of anything else.
The Hundred Healings Technique worked furiously, patching her together over and over within the sea of flames. Her armor and clothing had long since evaporated to ash. Only flesh remained, charring, sloughing away, and regenerating again in a constant cycle.
She had no idea how many times she had died and regrown in that instant.
All she knew was that the Yin Seal on her forehead was draining at an alarming rate.
The towering, intertwined flames tore the Four Purple Flames Formation apart almost instantly. The focused torrent of fire nearly liquefied the stone plaza in front of the Hokage Building into a glowing, molten field.
Pale blue flames, almost sentient, writhed on the ground, letting out eerie, wailing sounds as they clung to surfaces and twisted the air with their heat. Light and shadow danced across the scorched square, reflecting the terrified faces of the Konoha shinobi who were still conscious.
In a single exchange, several shinobi had been gravely injured, while dozens more had suffered burns or impact injuries.
And Aizen Sousuke had not even tried to kill them.
He had only shattered the Four Purple Flames Formation's backlash as it crashed against his Kido.
That alone had stained Konoha's sky an unnatural color and reduced Tsunade to her current state just for stepping in front of the aftershock.
From within the warped, shimmering blaze, a silhouette slowly emerged.
Under countless fearful gazes, Aizen stepped forward, calmly brushing soot from his collar. He gathered his hair back with one hand, tucking the length neatly behind his head.
He sighed, sounding almost content. One hand slid into his trench coat pocket as he surveyed the shinobi in front of him, the firelight painting his face in shifting gold and blue.
"I said before that I do not want to be your enemy."
His voice carried cleanly over the crackling flames.
Aizen's gaze rested on the Konoha shinobi one by one, then settled on Tsunade, whose body was repeatedly burnt and restored by the Hundred Healings Technique while the cursed seal markings flowed endlessly across her skin.
"Konoha does not hold any particular research value for me right now," he said quietly. "This place is simply where I once lived. I happen to have a small bond with it. I truly do not wish to see misunderstandings ruin that connection."
"Fire Style, Great Fireball Technique."
"It is useless," Aizen replied without turning his head. "And interrupting someone while they are speaking is rather rude, do you not think?"
A crimson fireball raced across the air and burst apart in front of him. The flames rolled outward, splitting neatly around his body. Waves of heat and burning wind rushed past his coat, making his white clothes whip and snap in the storm of fire.
His light brown eyes slid toward the shinobi who had launched the attack.
It was barely a glance, casual and mild, but the invisible weight that followed it was crushing.
There was a dull thud. Then the sharp crack of bones giving way.
The jonin in the green vest screamed and dropped to his knees, body forced to the ground as if struck by a giant hand. The earth beneath him had been heated nearly to boiling by the earlier flames. Two long, bloody grooves dug into the scorched plaza as his body slid forward, flesh searing against the superheated stone. The smell of burning blood and cooked meat quickly filled the air.
The scent was nauseating, thick with the stench of one sided slaughter.
Kakashi had expected something like this.
Even so, seeing his fellow shinobi rendered helpless so easily made his hands curl into fists.
All he could do now was pray that Aizen did not truly lose his temper.
Because Kakashi knew very clearly that what Aizen had shown so far was only a fraction of his actual power.
This was, as the man himself had said, merely the introduction to a conversation.
Some shinobi froze when faced with such an overwhelming enemy, minds blank with fear.
But there were always those whose blood burned hotter instead, whose pulse pounded louder, simply because they were forced to confront their own limits.
"Eight Gates Formation, Gate of View, open."
The chakra roar came from the entrance of the Hokage Building.
Kakashi's head snapped around.
It had been the Gate of View from the very start.
"Guy, stop." Kakashi's voice cracked. "You cannot defeat Aizen. Do not throw your life away here. And he might not even be an enemy."
"I have never once stopped to consider whether someone is an enemy first or not."
Green chakra erupted around Might Guy's body, forming a blazing aura that made the air vibrate.
"Maybe there is some misunderstanding," Guy went on, his expression deadly serious. "Maybe you know something I do not, Kakashi. But since when do shinobi stand still while the Hokage is suffering right in front of them? Rushing out to fight at times like this, that is what youth is."
He threw a quick glance over his shoulder at Kakashi and growled his words in a low, firm tone.
Then Guy turned back to face Aizen Sousuke, who stood smiling calmly amid the shattered barrier and pale blue flames.
The next moment, Guy vanished.
A violent gust tore across the plaza in his wake.
"Front Lotus."
The strikes came faster than sound.
Punches and kicks slammed in from every angle, wrapped in shrieking wind and raw force. The barrage swallowed Aizen completely, turning the space around him into a whirl of shadows and shockwaves.
The Reverse Lotus like assault spun around Aizen at supersonic speed, body augmented and driven by the opened Gate. The sharp, repeated sound of air ripping apart blended with heavy impact blows, creating a chaotic rhythm like cloth being torn continuously in midair.
For a heartbeat, it sounded like the opening fanfare of a sure victory.
But Tsunade, kneeling in the azure flames and healing herself again and again, felt something was wrong.
Her skin was marked everywhere by black lines, the Hundred Healings Technique frantically repairing the damage even as it continued to mount.
She grabbed at her own scorched throat, forcing sound through torn vocal cords.
"Stop, Jonin Might Guy, you must stop."
"What?"
Guy's body halted abruptly. He reappeared in front of Aizen, staring in disbelief.
Aizen looked exactly the same as before.
No bruises. No blood. Not even a wrinkle in his coat had shifted.
It was as if nothing had happened at all.
Aizen nodded slightly, meeting Guy's gaze. His tone was almost kindly as he gave his verdict.
"Excellent taijutsu," he said, "but completely meaningless against me."
Guy's skin reddened further as blood flow and chakra surged, his eyes whitening under the force of the technique. Even so, Aizen's expression remained unruffled, a mixture of calm analysis and faint compassion.
"Right now," Aizen continued, "without Sage art in play, all ordinary chakra ninjutsu are ineffective against me. Taijutsu, as you just demonstrated, struggles to pierce my Blut Vene armor. The only way you might injure me is by opening the Death Gate of the Eight Gates Formation. Even then, your chances would be slim."
"If I am not mistaken," he went on, "the final gate, the Gate of Death, is opened by tapping directly into life force through the tenketsu. The blood red steam it produces can twist space itself. It is a sound strategy, using the most basic form of attack to break an enemy that ninjutsu cannot touch. Your judgment is not wrong. It is simply insufficient."
"The problem is that the technology I possess is beyond your current imagination. Even your attacks can be converted back into energy and recycled into my body. If you wish to harm me, you will need something several magnitudes stronger."
As he spoke, a faint blue symbol appeared on his forehead.
The regular, geometric markings drank in the chakra that Guy had released, stripping it from the air. Residual flame, heat shimmer, trailing blue smoke, all of it broke down into particles and flowed back into Aizen's body.
Tsunade felt a ripple of horror.
Even without consciously directing her chakra, she could sense it being pulled toward him, shifting inside her like a tide.
It was as if something inside that man was calling chakra home, as if he represented its final destination.
Kakashi watched the symbol forming on Aizen's forehead and felt a chill run down his spine.
He had seen something like this before.
In the other world, when Madara had contacted him through chakra threads, the Core Formation technique had shocked him. That level of control, the ability to compress and seal chakra into a single focus, had been beyond anything the shinobi world knew.
Now, that same principle flickered plainly on Aizen's skin.
Aizen Sousuke had taken that art, refined it to the limit, and worn it openly as a casual accessory.
Even his own students in that other world had never fully understood his abilities.
To display it so easily here could only mean one of two things.
Either it was so trivial to him that it barely counted as a secret.
Or there was something far worse hidden still.
"At present," Aizen said, "your taijutsu cannot harm me. Your ninjutsu has no effect at all. In other words, I think it is fair to say I have complete control over this conversation."
"..."
Guy did not answer.
Even with his chakra being siphoned away, he stubbornly remained on his feet and glared at Aizen with pure white eyes.
He was a shinobi of Konoha, a man who celebrated youth with his entire being.
This situation had arrived without warning.
This stranger named Aizen Sousuke had humiliated Konoha's fighting strength in front of its Hokage and openly trampled the village's pride.
Perhaps it was not a deliberate insult.
Perhaps it was, as Aizen claimed, a necessary demonstration to make negotiation possible.
But Might Guy could not accept that.
His whole life had been spent pushing back against ridicule, doubt, and mockery. He had never bent his head to anyone who treated him as useless. He had run, trained, and bled to earn the trust and recognition of his comrades.
Now, his village faced an unknown crisis.
The Hokage, Tsunade, could barely stand. The Hundred Healings Technique was being overwhelmed, her chakra drawn away.
How was he supposed to face a man like that? A man who stood among them like a god?
For Guy, the answer had never changed.
He slowly drew in a breath, expression settling into a look of unwavering resolve. His thumb began to lift toward his heart.
Aizen watched him and shook his head.
"So your answer," Aizen said softly, "is to prove your existence with your life simply because your home and your precious people are in danger. That may be noble, but it is not something I would encourage."
"Your death may not lead to any meaningful outcome. It may simply satisfy your own sense of resolve. But then, is there anyone in this world who does not ultimately live to fulfill their own desires?"
"...Yes."
Guy's voice was steady.
"If this is the moment for my youth to burn out, then let me burn it to the end."
"Guy, do not be reckless. Stand down."
Kakashi shouted, his composure finally cracking.
The light around Guy was thickening, taking on a darker shade. A strange aura wrapped around his body, carrying the scent of blood and ozone.
"Aizen Sousuke will not take true action against us," Kakashi shouted at him. "In essence, he is not from this world at all. He is an observer, from another Konoha, another ninja world. There is no need for you to fight him."
"I know that," Guy said.
"But sometimes it is not reason that moves us, Kakashi. That is what youth is. I know he may not intend harm, but his actions are hurting Konoha. So I have to act. If the time is now, then I will do it now."
"You..."
Kakashi's hand twitched toward his eye. For a moment he seriously considered using Kamui to drag Guy into another space before he could open the final gate.
Before he could act, Aizen let out a faint sigh.
"Personally, I do not enjoy watching fights erupt from misunderstandings," he said. "And all I truly wanted was to demonstrate the gap between us. I have already done that."
He looked over the courtyard.
"In that case, there should be no issue with a slightly rougher method of ending this, yes?"
"The Eight Gates Formation, Gate of Death..."
"One of the aspects of binding," Aizen said, cutting across Guy's words, "is the obstruction of flow."
He snapped his fingers.
Almost instantly, every Konoha shinobi in the area, Kakashi included, felt as though an enormous unseen hand had slammed them face first into the ground.
Their arms jerked behind their backs, elbows locked.
Wrist and shoulder joints froze in place as if clamped by iron shackles.
Dozens of shinobi, some in flak vests, some previously hidden in the shadows, were forcibly exposed. One after another they crashed to their knees, hands pinned behind them. The superheated stone burned through their clothes, sending sharp pain racing up their limbs.
Without their hands, no ninjutsu came. No hand signs, no seals, nothing.
It became painfully obvious in that moment that from start to finish, everything that had happened was nothing more than a game to Aizen.
A demonstration.
A lesson.
Nothing more.
"For brute force or chakra alone, it is impossible to break this Kido," Aizen said calmly. "It is one of the simplest techniques we use to distinguish between those who have taken in natural energy and those who have not."
He looked down at them, watching their struggles fade into exhausted trembling.
"As long as the technique user possesses natural energy, even a child can break this binding through their own power," he said. "There is no other danger in it. But if someone has never touched natural energy, never felt the power of the Six Paths, then no amount of chakra will help them escape."
"Many Kido techniques here share the names of the ones I know, but their nature has changed completely. This binding, for example, shapes a fragment of the original signal that comes from the mixing of the seven elemental chakras. It is locked in place by will and layered over the body."
"Essentially, it seals the flow of chakra between the limbs. Once a shinobi's chakra flow is halted, they cannot resist."
He watched as they strained helplessly against the invisible force.
"In my world," he added, "this sort of binding is only used on children these days. It cannot even slow someone protected by basic Blut Vene. But for people who know nothing of natural energy or the Six Paths, the outcome is what you see now."
"..."
He let his gaze drift over them, then smiled gently.
"You are telling me I can use the techniques of the Sage of Six Paths," he said. "But you misunderstand something important."
His eyes were soft, almost kind, as he looked at them kneeling in the burned plaza.
It was the look of someone watching children who had strayed from the path, or rash youths charging forward without knowing what lay ahead.
"Techniques of the Six Paths can be reproduced," he said. "As long as the proper theory, environment, and constituent elements are in place, any so called miracle can be recreated."
"If something exists once, it will be recreated again. That process is inevitable."
The last traces of azure flame flickered and went out.
Tsunade stood in the ruin of the plaza, skin raw and newly restored, clothes hanging in tatters from her frame.
Her eyes were dull, stunned into numbness by the pain and the sheer helplessness she had just experienced.
Aizen walked toward her slowly.
"Now," he said, "I believe we can talk, Fifth Hokage, Lady Tsunade."
He paused, then added with a faint smile,
"Or, in the terms I am familiar with, captain of the Fourth Division of the Gotei Thirteen in Konoha, Tsunade Senju."
"Perhaps if I address you that way, you will better understand why I seek a conversation instead of relying purely on force."
He looked at her without a hint of embarrassment or impropriety, even though she was nearly naked under the remains of her clothing.
In his eyes, she was no different from any of the other shinobi around her.
For Aizen Sousuke, there was no distinction to be made.
They were all the same.
Just people who did not yet understand.
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