Chiba finally stopped holding back.
For most of the battle, his presence had been like a pressure buried beneath mist..constant, cold, and patient, as if he were merely allowing the enemy to exist for as long as it amused him. But the moment he released his true power, the temperature of the battlefield didn't just drop..it collapsed. Frost surged outward in a roaring tide, the air turning brittle, the ground glazing over in an instant, and even chakra itself feeling sluggish beneath the sudden weight of absolute cold.
Hyōton: Hyōga Jidai ("Ice Age") erupted.
The technique didn't "clash" with their combined assault so much as it smothered it..an overwhelming freeze that swallowed the pressure of Orochimaru, Jiraiya, and the two Mount Myōboku toad sages, Fukasaku and Shima, all at once. Four top-tier forces moving in concert..four veteran monsters of the shinobi world..yet for a heartbeat, they looked like they'd been caught stepping into a nightmare they hadn't prepared for.
Their expressions changed at the same time.
Orochimaru's brows tightened, the corner of his mouth twitching as calculation replaced instinct. "He's more terrifying than we imagined…"
Jiraiya didn't respond immediately. The shock sat heavy in his chest, not because he couldn't accept a stronger opponent..but because, in that moment, he understood what kind of wall stood before them. Even Fukasaku and Shima, whose long lives had seen countless techniques, couldn't hide their disbelief.
"What an incredible Ice Release ninjutsu…"
"This range… this scale… this raw force.."
"It's comparable to the God of Shinobi, the Shodaime Hokage's Wood Release… and I mean Senju Hashirama at his peak!"
The outer battlefield around Kirigakure ignited into a harsher, brighter kind of chaos..one where every breath stung, and every step threatened to slip into death. On one side: the Edo Tensei army, the Mount Myōboku toad forces, Jiraiya, Orochimaru. On the other: Ryūchi Cave's snakes, and Chiba's senjutsu-infused Ice Release..an entire host of frostborn dragon riders surging like a blizzard given shape and command.
And then, at last, Kirigakure's reinforcements began to arrive in waves.
The first to reach the front lines were the ANBU under Hoshigaki Kisame. Intelligence runners by nature, they moved like a sharpened knife..quiet, fast, and lethal. Kisame's gaze swept over the invading forces, taking in the unnatural cadence of bodies that moved without fear of death.
"So this is Edo Tensei…"
He let out a low, humorless breath, eyes narrowing. "Summoning this many… Orochimaru really is beyond depraved."
With a single order, Kirigakure's ANBU elite slammed into the enemy's flank. They didn't waste time trying to "kill" what couldn't die. They fought with the cold professionalism of people trained to end problems, not argue with them..crippling, restraining, shattering momentum, creating windows.
Because most of Kirigakure's shinobi had learned sealing techniques under Chiba's guidance.
Not everyone had mastered them, of course. But in ANBU..where specialization meant survival..a dedicated sealing squad existed by necessity. The pattern became brutal and efficient: a first wave charged in to overwhelm, bind, and disable; then the sealing squad followed immediately, locking the Edo Tensei bodies down before they could recover.
In short order, the weaker portion of the Edo Tensei army was erased from the flow of battle..not destroyed, but neutralized, silenced, removed.
Edo Tensei looked like a shameless, near-unsolvable technique… but it had weaknesses.
Sealing could handle the "immortality." And even more crucially, forcing the resurrected to fight at their true peak was nearly impossible. Even with guidance from Senju Tobirama..the technique's creator..Orochimaru's summons could only bring out a fraction of what those shinobi had been in life. Two or three tenths, at best.
And there was another issue, one that ate at the technique from the inside: Edo Tensei summoned souls.
Souls meant identity. Memory. Ego.
If they were loyal to Konoha, they'd fight willingly. But most of the resurrected on this battlefield weren't Konoha's faithful. Many were Uchiha and Hyūga..people who had severed their ties, whose remains could be "used" without the political backlash that would come from disturbing the graves of families still deeply rooted in the village.
Even Hiruzen Sarutobi couldn't have allowed Orochimaru to desecrate the cemeteries of Konoha's great clans without risking his own position. But that convenience came with a cost: how do you force the unwilling dead to fight?
There were only two methods.
One was to erase their consciousness entirely..turn them into hollow puppets that moved on command. But the price was steep: mobility dulled, finesse vanished, overall strength dropped even further.
The other method was direct control by the caster..manipulating the resurrected like extensions of one's own will, drawing out the greatest possible power they could still produce. But Orochimaru was only one man, and he was on the battlefield himself. He couldn't simultaneously micromanage an entire army of dead.
So most of his forces were reduced to mindless, zombie-like combat dolls..convenient, obedient… and barely able to display a tenth of their original strength.
Kabuto Yakushi had once controlled Edo Tensei elites from the shadows, safely hidden away while pulling strings from afar. Orochimaru wasn't in that position. And more than that..Kabuto's mastery of the technique, at that time, far surpassed Orochimaru's current level.
As the battle churned, Mei Terumī's division arrived.
They were the most vibrant and promising force Kirigakure could field..young, sharp, and hungry, the kind of shinobi who hadn't yet learned to accept "impossible." The moment they entered the battlefield, the tide tilted even further toward the Mist.
Then came the Uchiha and the Hyūga.
They had been the last major outside forces to join Kirigakure, stationed slightly farther from the village's central region. But that distance meant little once they moved..their response was swift, their pace relentless, urgency burning hotter than any strategy.
And when they reached the front, they saw it.
Their dead. Their relatives. Their ancestors.
Bodies that should have been at rest..now driven forward by Edo Tensei, twisted into weapons, launched against their own living kin.
The reaction was instant and violent.
Uchiha and Hyūga alike erupted with a fury so raw it seemed to carve through the cold air itself. Because the resurrected clan members weren't loyal to Konoha, they had been stripped of will..emptied out, reduced to instinct and programmed violence. They couldn't speak. They couldn't recognize faces. They couldn't stop.
The living understood that. They understood it too well.
And still… there was hesitation at first. The hand trembled. The breath caught. Even on a battlefield, even with logic screaming the truth, the heart refused to accept what the eyes were seeing.
But war doesn't offer mercy to hesitation.
They forced themselves awake to reality: those were not their loved ones anymore. They were corpses..tools in an enemy's hands. And sealing them wasn't cruelty.
It was release.
Once that truth settled, the two clans surged forward like a storm finally given direction, their efficiency turning terrifying. They fought harder, faster, sharper..grief burning into focus, rage becoming discipline.
More reinforcements poured in: Hōzuki Mangetsu and the Mist's great clans..Kaguya, Tsuchigumo, Hōzuki, Karyū… force after force unleashing their distinct bloodline talents and combat styles, the battlefield flashing with technique and steel as Kirigakure's entire foundation roared to life.
Then the rest of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist arrived..Ringo Ameyuri, Momochi Zabuza..along with Yakura, Mei Terumī's core fighters, Utakata, Ao, and other pillars of the village's strength. The sealing units dedicated specifically to countering Edo Tensei had already taken position, operating with frightening precision.
Tsunade and Shizune arrived as well.
But when Tsunade faced Konoha shinobi..people who had once been comrades, friends, allies..her body didn't move immediately. The moment caught in her chest like a splinter: old bonds colliding with the brutal clarity of the present.
Even so, under Chiba's command, Kirigakure had already seized an overwhelming advantage.
What shook Orochimaru the most was simple..and unforgivable.
So many of Kirigakure's shinobi… knew sealing techniques. Not just the sealing squad..ordinary ninja. Enough to disrupt his entire strategy, enough to make his Edo Tensei army feel like a blunt weapon being dismantled piece by piece.
One after another, the resurrected were bound, suppressed, and sealed, losing mobility, losing relevance, losing the ability to influence the battle at all.
Meanwhile, Mount Myōboku's toad army began to falter beneath Ryūchi Cave's snakes. The legendary three-way deadlock..toads, snakes, slugs..was more than folklore. Snakes could swallow toads. And against the forces of Ryūchi Cave, the toads were facing a natural enemy that didn't hesitate.
Orochimaru and Jiraiya exchanged a look mid-battle..an unspoken recognition, sharp and ugly.
The situation had turned.
If this continued, the plan to invade Kirigakure and ignite internal chaos would collapse completely. Worse..they would collapse with it.
They began to withdraw.
Orochimaru ordered what remained of his Edo Tensei army to cover their retreat, then slipped away, quick and opportunistic as ever. Jiraiya couldn't leave so cleanly; he stayed with the toads, still fighting, still trying to keep the line from snapping entirely.
But Chiba didn't chase Jiraiya first.
He chose Orochimaru.
Chiba shot forward in a blur of motion, closing the distance with predatory certainty. The air screamed as frigid killing intent surged behind him, and that extreme cold..so dense it felt like it had weight..blasted out once more, swallowing Orochimaru's retreat path.
Orochimaru's face went pale. He forced chakra through his body and snapped into his strongest defensive secret art.
Kuchiyose no Jutsu: Sanjū Rashōmon ("Summoning Technique: Triple Rashōmon")!!!
The earth thundered.
Three massive Rashōmon gates tore up from the ground in succession, towering walls of grotesque protection interlocking to shield him..
And then they froze.
The impact of Chiba's cold didn't merely "coat" them; it invaded them. Ice raced across the gates like a living thing, sealing them shut, turning them into monuments of dead stillness.
Chiba clenched his fist.
Crack..CRACK..
The gates shattered.
Not dented. Not splintered.
They broke apart entirely, collapsing into ruined slabs and glittering fragments of frozen debris.
Orochimaru's eyes widened as he fled, panic flashing beneath his usual composure. He moved fast..desperate fast.
Chiba's Mangekyō Sharingan flared.
Amaterasu: Kagutsuchi no Ya ("Amaterasu: Arrow of Kagutsuchi")!!!
A jet-black chakra arrow, wreathed in inextinguishable black flame, tore out from Chiba's line of sight with terrifying speed and accuracy.
It punched cleanly through Orochimaru's body.
The scream that followed was sharp enough to scrape the nerves. Black fire devoured flesh, skin, bone..biting deeper as if it wanted to burn the very idea of him away.
But Orochimaru was the shinobi hardest to kill.
In the next instant, he split his jaw open at an impossible angle, his mouth stretching like a nightmare. From within, an arm reached out..then the rest of a body surged free in a violent burst.
Orochimaru-style substitution..an almost perfect escape from lethal damage, paid for with immense chakra and strain.
He landed in the form of a white-scaled serpent and immediately began to slither and dart, twisting his movement erratically across the battlefield, trying to break line of sight.
Chiba didn't let him.
More black flames dropped ahead of Orochimaru's path, sealing routes, cornering angles, weaving a net of darkness. The fire became a cage..one that offered no clean exit.
Orochimaru turned, staring up at Chiba, who hovered above like judgment given a human shape.
In that dead-end moment, Orochimaru actually smiled.
"Mizukage-sama… so you truly intend to wipe me out."
Chiba's answer was a quiet smile in return..calm, almost intimate in its certainty.
"Orochimaru, I know you won't die easily. Your forbidden 'immortality' has reached completion."
He tilted his head slightly, as if considering the most efficient method.
"But making you wish for death..and denying it to you..that is something I can do."
Orochimaru's eyes narrowed, cold amusement flashing. "Is that so?"
"Then let me see you try."
He detonated what remained of his chakra..his last reserve, his last gamble.
His body swelled grotesquely, flesh expanding and multiplying, countless pale serpent forms erupting outward until the mass became something monstrous..something that resembled a calamity given scales and hunger.
His ultimate secret art..
Yamata no Jutsu ("Eight Branches Technique")!!!
Orochimaru became the legendary Yamata no Orochi, throwing everything into a final, desperate struggle.
But Chiba knew the story.
Orochimaru could resist physical attacks and endure countless ninjutsu. Yet he had two ancient weaknesses carved into his existence: genjutsu..and sealing.
Genjutsu needed no explanation. Whether it was Uchiha Itachi's instant suppression, or the mental world where Uchiha Sasuke turned the tables during possession, Orochimaru's spirit had always shown cracks under illusion's blade. Perhaps constant body modification had damaged his soul over time, making him increasingly vulnerable despite whatever the databooks claimed.
And sealing was worse.
Sealing was final.
Sealing was fear.
The moment Chiba saw the Yamata no Orochi emerge, an image surfaced in his mind..sharp, unmistakable..followed by a slow, knowing smile.
Everything Uchiha Itachi had once wielded… was now part of Chiba.
Against Orochimaru and this technique, victory wasn't difficult.
The eight-headed serpent surged through the black flames of Amaterasu. It burned immediately..then shed its skin, escaping the worst of the damage, and lunged forward, jaws tearing open as it snapped toward Chiba.
Chiba didn't dodge.
He didn't flinch.
His Mangekyō power surged..vast, crushing..unleashing a Susanoo far beyond what Uchiha Itachi had shown, rising into a fourth-stage manifestation that felt like a war god stepping onto the battlefield.
Susanoo ("Armored Warrior") manifested in a storm of chakra.
And with it..
Yata no Kagami ("Yata Mirror").
The colossal mirror flared like an absolute shield. The Yamata no Orochi collided..
BANG!
The impact rebounded.
The serpent mass was thrown back, and Orochimaru's senses lurched, the sudden reversal leaving him disoriented, his own momentum turned against him.
Chiba moved without hesitation.
The Susanoo shifted, drawing forth another sacred weapon..
Totsuka no Tsurugi ("Totsuka Blade").
One clean thrust.
The blade pierced through the Yamata no Orochi.
Orochimaru laughed, arrogant even in desperation. "That level of attack is meaningless to me, Mizukage-sama!"
Then..
His expression snapped.
"Wha..?!"
The confidence fractured into panic, then into naked dread. "No… that can't be…"
"Is that… one of the legendary Kusanagi… the Totsuka Blade, the sealing sword?!"
Chiba's smile didn't change. "You guessed correctly."
His tone softened, almost merciful.
"But it's too late."
In an instant, Orochimaru..and the entire Yamata no Jutsu..were swallowed and suppressed, dragged into the sealing world contained within the Totsuka Blade. A genjutsu realm known as Drunken Dream, where escape did not exist, where time itself could become a prison.
Once sealed inside, there was no breaking free.
Orochimaru's soul was locked away within Susanoo's chakra gourd, his presence snuffed out as if the battlefield had finally exhaled.
In the end..
Orochimaru had died on this battlefield.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Additionally, more chapters exclusive content are available on Patreon: https://patreon.com/ImmortalEmperor?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink
- CHRONICLES OF THE ICE SOVEREIGN
-PLAYING ANIME LEGENDS
-THE OTHER WORLD'S ANIMATOR
Join now and help shape the future of the story while enjoying special rewards!