At this moment, the light gathering above the Giant Tenseigan had already reached its peak.
In an instant, an unimaginably huge and dazzling beam of light shot out like lightning, racing straight toward the ninja world.
Wherever it passed, space itself seemed to twist and warp.
At the same time, in the Mountain's Graveyard—
When that powerful force swept down from the moon, the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path, which had been sitting quietly on the platform, suddenly lit up all over with enormous rune marks.
However, because Black Zetsu had already carefully set things up here beforehand, those rune marks only flashed for a brief moment before quickly vanishing without a trace.
As time went on, the scanning in the sky grew more and more intense.
All of a sudden, a thick beam of light fell from the sky without any warning, shining straight onto the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path.
The Demonic Statue of the Outer Path slowly began to tremble.
Then, BOOM!
With a huge burst of smoke, the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path was gone.
White Zetsu, who had been lying in wait nearby, saw this and immediately dove into the ground. He had to go report this situation to Black Zetsu.
———
Inside the moon, everything was dead silent.
Suddenly, a thunderous bang rang out.
BOOM!
Right after that, a massive cloud of smoke shot up, filling the entire space.
Looking closely, one could see that the terrifying Demonic Statue of the Outer Path had already been summoned outside the altar.
When Second Elder Seito heard the sound, he snapped his head around. After only giving the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path a quick glance, he immediately focused all his attention on the Great Elder.
Because just after summoning back the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path, the Great Elder's once surging chakra reaction had instantly dropped like a cliff, as if it had been drained dry.
"Cough!"
Along with a burst of violent coughing, a large mouthful of blood suddenly sprayed out of the Great Elder's mouth.
The crimson liquid drew an arc through the air before splattering all over the ground.
Then the Great Elder's body fell straight backward like a puppet that had lost its strings, lying flat on the ground.
"Great Elder!"
Seeing this, Second Elder Seito rushed over in panic.
The Great Elder's face was as pale as paper, his eyes shut tight, his breathing barely there.
Using his last bit of strength, he tightly gripped the Second Elder's hand, his lips trembling as he spoke.
"Seal… seal the Demonic… Statue… ugh!"
Before he could finish, the Great Elder swallowed his final breath and went completely still.
"Great Elder! Great Elder!"
Second Elder Seito was overwhelmed with grief, tears flowing uncontrollably from his eyes.
But now was not the time to mourn. The Demonic Statue of the Outer Path that the Great Elder had brought back at the cost of his own precious life absolutely could not fall into the enemy's hands again.
Thinking this, the Second Elder forced himself to endure the pain in his heart and carefully laid the Great Elder's body gently on the ground.
There was a trace of sadness in his expression, but the first thing he had to do was to dig out the Great Elder's Byakugan.
The Second Elder reached out, precisely stuck his hand into the Great Elder's eye socket, and gouged out that Byakugan that was still giving off warmth.
Then, holding the freshly removed Byakugan high, the Second Elder walked toward the Giant Tenseigan.
As he got closer to the Giant Tenseigan, he could see that the Great Elder's Byakugan began to give off a hazy white glow, like a soft halo covering it.
Next, as if drawn by some powerful force, the Byakugan floated up on its own and quickly fused into the Giant Tenseigan.
The reason the Giant Tenseigan was sinful was because it had been formed by piling up the eyes of countless members of their own clan.
This was also one of the reasons why only a few descendants of Hamura were left on the moon.
After successfully completing this "offering" of the Byakugan, the Second Elder did not even have time to catch his breath.
He immediately hurried out to the huge Demonic Statue of the Outer Path standing in the plaza outside.
He kept changing his hands through all kinds of complex hand seals, sending one mysterious seal after another flying out from his hands.
Like shooting stars, they rushed toward the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path and were stamped onto its surface one by one.
The Demonic Statue of the Outer Path's body was far too massive, making the Second Elder standing on it look extremely tiny.
But even so, he kept moving tirelessly over the statue's body.
Not letting a single corner go, he slapped those densely packed seals into it one after another.
Time passed second by second. Finally, when the entire body of the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path was covered with sealing marks, the Second Elder let out a long breath.
Although the Second Elder was more than ten years younger than the Great Elder, the marks of time had still mercilessly climbed over his face and body.
At this moment, he was already an unmistakable old man.
Even so, though he was utterly exhausted, being able to completely seal the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path meant that all this effort had not been in vain.
Looking at the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path now fully sealed, the heavy weight in the Second Elder's heart finally fell.
In this state, the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path would no longer be summoned away.
He held onto the statue's toes and looked up at it.
It was because this thing had been lost that the Great Elder had been unable to eat or sleep for all these years, his body growing extremely weak.
Now that the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path had been recovered, the Great Elder was gone.
After quite a while, once some of his chakra and strength had returned, he walked back into the altar.
At this time, the Great Elder was still lying in front of the Giant Tenseigan.
His face looked the same as before, but his body was already completely cold.
"Great Elder, you are gone, now there is only me and Toneri left here."
The Second Elder murmured to himself. He and the Great Elder had known each other for nearly a hundred years, friends from childhood.
Back then, however, there had been many clansmen living together on the moon, and they were divided into a main branch and a branch family.
The main branch and the branch family went to war because of differences in how they understood Hamura. The branch family sacrificed huge numbers of people to merge together the Giant Tenseigan, and only then did they win the war.
But after that, there were not enough people left in the branch family to reproduce.
Under the pressure of the Great Elder, who had always insisted on the pure blood theory, the remaining clansmen married among close relatives. The children born were all deformed, and most died young.
Now there were only two people left on the moon. One was him, and the other was Otsutsuki Toneri.
"Do not worry, Great Elder. I will definitely raise Toneri well and complete the mission that our ancestors entrusted to us."
Then the Second Elder, his expression dark, began to prepare the body. But he did not notice.
When he had been sealing the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path just now, a small black dot had already stuck to his skin.
And it silently seeped in.
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