"Lightning Style: Thunder Warden!"
Boom!
A terrifying surge of chakra, ancient and overwhelming, erupted from Akira's body.
The space in front of him began to distort, forming a massive swirling black portal.
Minato's pupils tightened. "Space-time ninjutsu? Akira can open a spatial passage?"
This was actually a jutsu Akira had improved from the foundation of Flying Raijin, connecting to a separate dimension he had created himself.
Inside that space were three "Thunder Wardens," beings formed entirely from condensed chakra.
In essence, they were similar to Tailed Beasts. Akira had created them with Yin-Yang Release as energy-based lifeforms, then stored them in his pocket dimension as backup batteries.
After all, Akira's constitution was unusual. His chakra reserves grew almost endlessly.
The amount of chakra he naturally overflowed with each year was enough to condense into one Thunder Warden comparable to a Tailed Beast.
"Roar!"
A gigantic hand made of lightning suddenly grabbed the edge of the spatial vortex, and then an earth-shaking roar rang across the sky.
A hundred-meter-tall giant made entirely of violent lightning stepped out from the void.
For a moment, the entire battlefield went silent.
Minato and the others, and even Mukade on the opposite side, were all too shocked by the lightning giant to speak.
"This... is this a summon?" Minato felt his entire understanding of ninjutsu beginning to crack.
Akira shook his head. "No. It's just a jutsu."
As he spoke, a hundred-meter lightning blade condensed in the Thunder Warden's hand. A layer of purple-gold lightning armor wrapped around its body, making it look like a thunder god from legend descending into the world.
After a brief moment of stunned silence, Mukade let out a hysterical roar.
"Stop acting like some kind of god! I'll show you the true power of the ultimate puppet!"
The giant puppet charged forward with a thunderous rumble. A huge mechanical tail, shaped like a scorpion's stinger, tore through the air and stabbed viciously toward the Thunder Warden.
The Thunder Warden did not dodge.
It raised its left hand, and a shining shield of lightning appeared in the air.
Boom!
The collision of the two giants triggered a quake like the earth itself had been struck.
The shockwave swept outward, reducing every building within hundreds of meters to dust.
A bottomless crack tore through the ground, stretching all the way to the edge of sight.
This level of destruction was nothing less than a Tailed Beast-level disaster.
The moment the attack was blocked, the Thunder Warden turned into a blinding streak of lightning and appeared behind the puppet.
The blade fell.
Crack!
The supposedly indestructible ultimate puppet was split cleanly in half.
The terrifying slash continued for thousands of meters and shaved the top off a distant hill.
Though the Thunder Warden was massive, its speed was like real lightning, and its destructive power was approaching that of the complete Nine-Tails.
However, under the nourishment of the Dragon Vein, countless chakra threads surged from the wound of the bisected puppet like living tendrils. In the blink of an eye, it restored itself completely.
"Annoying insect!"
The Thunder Warden seemed to grow irritated. With a sweep of its hand, dozens of lightning chains shot out and bound the newly reformed puppet tightly.
Then another brutal slash came down.
Mukade screamed as he was cut apart again. He could not die, but the feeling of being completely crushed pushed him close to collapse.
"Try this! Super Dragon Vein Chakra Cannon!"
The dozens of arms on the ultimate puppet instantly combined into a massive cannon. A terrifying energy gathered at its mouth, enough to make the air tremble.
Boom!
A thick blue beam tore through the sky, heading straight for the Thunder Warden.
The Thunder Warden took half a step back and opened both hands, spreading a huge wall of lightning in front of itself.
The energy beam slammed into the barrier, and the blinding light forced everyone to shut their eyes.
Under the impact, the ancient city of Roran was reduced completely to ruins. The ground itself was scraped away layer by layer.
Minato and the others, who had already retreated several thousand meters, stared at the rising mushroom cloud with helpless awe.
A battle of this level had already moved beyond the realm of ordinary human ninja.
If Mukade had taken that thing into a ninja war, the consequences would have been unimaginable.
Inside the dust cloud, the Thunder Warden's lightning shield had shattered, and its body had been pushed back several hundred meters. Even so, the chakra radiating from it remained dazzling.
Akira nodded in satisfaction. "Not bad. It can take a hit."
Choza and Shibi had gone numb by this point. Looking at Akira's calm back, all they felt now was distant, mountain-like respect.
Sixteen years old...
Where had this monster even come from?
At the center of the battlefield, the Thunder Warden charged again.
The ultimate puppet unleashed every weapon it had. Thousands of smaller chakra cannons rained fire across the Thunder Warden's body, but the attacks were barely more than scratches.
The Thunder Warden pushed through the barrage, closed the distance, and swung its long blade wildly, cutting the puppet into pieces in an instant.
Just as the puppet began to rebuild itself again, the Thunder Warden leaped high into the sky. It brought both hands together, calling down thunder from above.
A terrifying lightning pillar several meters wide descended from the heavens and struck the puppet's wreckage with perfect accuracy.
Rumble!
The attack fell like divine punishment. Even the air ionized, filling the battlefield with a sharp, burned smell.
The ground vaporized on impact, leaving behind a massive crater dozens of meters deep.
At the bottom of that crater, the Dragon Vein altar was finally exposed.
A sharp light flashed in Akira's eyes, and his figure vanished.
When he reappeared, he was already standing beside the altar.
Without hesitation, he swung the blade in his hand and severed the core chakra thread connecting Mukade to the Dragon Vein.
"No!"
Mukade, who had been preparing to rebuild his body again, let out a scream of despair.
Cut off from the Dragon Vein's chakra, his life force drained away like air from a punctured balloon.
As his consciousness blurred, he stared with hatred at the back of the boy who looked like death itself.
"Damn you... bastard... my empire..."
His curse stopped there.
Mukade's body rapidly weathered away in the air until nothing remained but a pile of dust.
The arrogant ultimate puppet collapsed along with its master, falling apart into a mountain of scrap metal.
Akira waved a hand, dismissing the Thunder Warden, and everything finally grew calm.
Minato and the others hurried over.
But before they could relax, the Dragon Vein, now free of Mukade's control, suddenly began to shake violently. A furious wave of chakra erupted from it.
Like a beast that had lost its chains, the Dragon Vein went berserk.
The entire earth began to tremble, as if the end of the world had arrived.
That terrifying energy fluctuation was a sign that the Dragon Vein's chakra had completely run wild.
Akira stood quietly at the center of the violent energy and turned his head, giving Minato a steady look.
Minato understood at once and nodded solemnly.
Without wasting a word, Akira's fingers blurred through a rapid chain of hand signs.
Then he reached into his ninja pouch and drew out two special kunai, both engraved with Flying Thunder God formulas.
Watching him, Minato's eyes showed a hint of approval. "Your mastery of space-time ninjutsu has truly reached an extraordinary level."
Akira's hands moved unbelievably fast. The complex Flying Raijin space-time sealing jutsu contained more than forty signs, yet he completed them in the blink of an eye.
"Flying Raijin: Space-Time Seal!"
With a low shout, Akira vanished and reappeared in the very center of the Dragon Vein altar.
With a sharp metallic ring, the two special kunai drove deep into the dragon-eye-shaped stone sculpture at the heart of the Dragon Vein.
In the next instant, dense black sealing marks burst from the kunai handles, spreading outward like living ink.
Minato looked at the intricate sealing pattern and smiled self-deprecatingly.
"I know this jutsu too, but when it comes to sealing strength and chakra control, Akira-kun is clearly a step above me."
Standing farther away, Shibi and Choza could both clearly feel how heavy and overpowering that sealing force was.
The violent shaking of the earth stopped the moment the seal completed.
The Dragon Vein's berserk chakra, like a venomous snake caught by the throat, had no choice but to withdraw.
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