Chapter 185
Otsutsuki Hamura: The Second Nine-Tails?
Chapter 185 Otsutsuki Hamura: The Second Nine-Tails?
With the tip of Menma's right palm protruding out, a torrent of violent dark red Nine-Tails chakra surged fiercely into the pale golden core aura!
boom! ! !
The point where dark red and pale gold collided burst forth with an intense white light more dazzling than the core of the sun!
It instantly devoured everything inside the Hamura Shrine!
Rushing metal tracks, ancient megalithic walls, and the people inside...
All the sights were distorted and faded in the pure white light, leaving only the absolute clamor of colliding energies!
That was not an explosion.
Rather, it is a deeper, rule-based annihilation and roar!
hum-
boom! ! !
In the blinding white light, Menma's figure, enveloped in the Nine-Tails' chakra cloak, instantly froze!
Time seemed to stand still for him.
Uchiha Hikaru's heart clenched in an instant!
Ignoring the excruciating pain from the intense light, the Mangekyou Sharingan locked onto the chaotic field of light that was engulfing the numb face!
She clearly "saw" that the nine dark red torrents of chakra were being torn apart and annihilated in unimaginable ways inside the core of the giant Tenseigan!
Light and darkness, order and chaos, unfolded in the depths of this "Eye of God" in the most primal and brutal battle!
Menma's body, like a fragile bridge between two terrifying energy sources clashing fiercely, hovered on the edge of destruction!
She could feel the chakra surging wildly within her body. Her right arm rose almost uncontrollably, and her condensed red bone hand clenched into a fist, instinctively trying to drag Menma out of that hellish place!
But the next second, she abruptly stopped the movement.
The kaleidoscope pattern spun wildly, and she caught a glimpse of something even more hidden within the raging energy clash at its core: an unimaginably vast spiritual force was channeling through the Nine-Tails' chakra, locking onto Menma's consciousness in reverse!
Menma herself actively went into it!
"My lord!" Vanilla Whirlpool's exclamation was drowned out by the roar of energy.
The Vajra lock binding her servants trembled violently.
Hyuga Hizashi let out a muffled groan, and two lines of bloody tears streamed from his eyes!
His white eyes strained to pierce through the terrifying burst of light, staring directly at the point of collision at the very core of the energy!
That was not a chakra clash as ordinary people would understand it!
In his vision, the pale golden giant Tenseigan was like a huge and sophisticated living energy organ beyond comprehension, with each pulse drawing energy tides across the entire lunar space!
The invasion of the Nine-Tails' chakra was like detonating a violent energy nova deep within its core!
A chaotic storm of dark red and a network of pale gold order are frantically strangling, clashing, and annihilating each other at the microscopic level!
Each impact unleashed endless chakra turbulence and spatial ripples!
The entire temple was shaking violently, the metal tracks emitted a high-frequency mournful sound, and the huge gray-white stone walls continued to crumble and shed fragments of stone and dust!
The immense chakra surge made it difficult for everyone to breathe!
Shisui, Kimimaro, and the others couldn't help but raise their hands to shield their eyes from the dazzling light.
"Ha...hahaha...ignorant fool! The power of the giant Tenseigan is nothing..." Sakuto Otsutsuki, nailed to the metal pillar, greedily "witnessed" the devastating collision with his "mind's eye," and just let out a burst of gleeful laughter.
But his voice abruptly stopped.
The all-consuming white light did not continue to expand and explode.
Instead, after reaching a glorious peak, it suddenly collapses and converges inward!
Like a waterfall flowing backwards, the blazing white light that illuminated the entire temple and even penetrated matter to illuminate the outer void was completely devoured and absorbed by the core of the giant Tenseigan in an instant!
The temple instantly plummeted from its most magnificent splendor into absolute darkness!
Click...click...click...
In the silence, only a faint, rapid cracking sound came from inside the giant Tenseigan.
Its originally round and magnificent pale yellow halo was now flickering violently, and countless fine cracks appeared on its surface!
The light flickered, like a heart on the verge of breaking!
The core of that six-petaled flower, which was originally slowly rotating, is now being tightly entangled and eroded by nine dark red "thorns" that are deeply embedded within it!
The Nine-Tails' chakra, like a stubborn poison, has taken deep root within!
Menma himself maintained the same posture of reaching out his hand.
The dark red Nine-Tails chakra cloak resembled solidified blood-red glass, with nine enormous tails hanging down, emitting a faint yet dangerous glow in the dim light of the temple.
It was like a soulless shell.
Unable to restrain herself any longer, Uchiha Hikaru took a step forward, and a giant red chakra palm suddenly condensed beside her, ready to pull Menma back at all costs!
"Don't move!" Hyuga Hizashi's hoarse voice suddenly rang out, filled with unprecedented fear.
His white eyes were fixed on the numb body, his voice trembling slightly: "His spirit has been pulled into that eye!"
Beneath the bulging veins on his forehead, blood trickled down his pale cheeks, a shocking sight.
That was the trauma left by the overload of the White Eyes' perception of higher-dimensional energy conflicts.
……
grey.
An endless expanse of gray, like solidified chaos.
There was no sky, no earth, only endless, mist-like suspended gray.
The air carried a deathly stillness as cold and heavy as the depths of a tomb.
The light was dim and of unknown origin, barely outlining the surrounding scene.
This is a cemetery.
Countless low stone tablets, like neatly arranged soldiers, stand silently in this desolate space filled with gray mist, stretching to the gray horizon beyond sight.
Each stone tablet is simple, without inscriptions or decorations, only exuding an ancient desolation.
The moment Menma's consciousness descended into this strange space.
hum...
A faint but clear ripple spread silently from beneath his feet.
Huh-huh-huh-
The gray mist began to flow, breaking the deathly silence.
On the surface of those low stone tablets, hazy figures silently emerged.
They share common characteristics: pale skin, pure white eyes, no caged bird mark on their foreheads, and an ancient headdress.
They wore standard, oddly styled white linen robes, their faces showing either calmness, sorrow, or bewilderment.
These are the descendants of Hamura Otsutsuki, the souls of those Otsutsuki main family members who have long since perished on the moon!
Thousands, even tens of thousands of souls emerged from beside the stone tablet, like a silent legion.
Their figures were composed of pure soul matter, emitting a faint halo that made them stand out in this gray world.
Every ancient soul carries with it a faint, lingering sorrow.
Their empty eye sockets were all focused on Menma, who had suddenly barged in.
at this time.
Step...step...step...
The distinct sound of footsteps was unusually jarring in the silence.
Countless souls slowly retreated to both sides, then knelt on one knee, revealing a straight passage in the middle.
At the end of this path of the soul lies endless smog.
A hunched figure, radiating a more solid soul light than the surrounding souls, slowly stepped out from the gray mist.
The newcomer was very old, with a pair of sharp horns, his face etched with the marks of time and countless years, and he was thin and small, wearing a simple, faded gray linen robe.
Only those eyes, pure white and flawless, were filled with a deep, bone-deep weariness.
Otsutsuki Hamura!
He walked step by step, and with each step he took, the gray mist beneath his feet solidified and became more solid.
He walked very slowly.
Every step felt like walking on the river of time.
The tens of thousands of ancestors' souls knelt on the ground, and as he passed by, they all silently lowered their heads, as if worshipping their ancestors and gods.
Finally, Hamura stopped ten steps away from Menma.
Those pure white eyes, like a vortex of stars, scrutinized Menma's spiritual projection—a being enveloped in pure chakra and imbued with inhuman tyranny—with a hint of deep confusion.
Although the person in front of him was well disguised, and he didn't know what method he used to even disguise his soul, Hamura's eyes could roughly see the figure of a child.
"I noticed you the moment you stepped into this forgotten prison." Hamura's voice rang out, old and calm, devoid of any human warmth, yet it seemed to resonate from the depths of the soul.
“You have your brother’s blood in you, but the… tailed beast inside you… it… is not quite the same.” He tilted his head slightly, as if trying to identify it.
“I can sense that it is not the Nine-Tailed Fox that my brother separated from that guy back then.”
"Chaos, disorder, filled with malice that transcends life itself... yet forcibly bound by your will. Like a cosmic chaos being forcibly shaped. It's very strange..."
"A second Nine-Tails? How is that possible?"
Hamura's eyes showed even deeper confusion as he stared at Menma's mask.
Menma's spiritual projection remained motionless in the gray stillness, with only the dark red Nine-Tails chakra on his body flowing and undulating like living magma, resisting the omnipresent cold erosion of this soul space while simultaneously feeling the heavy pressure of its rules. "Strange, isn't it?" Menma removed his mask, revealing his youthful face.
His voice rang out from the gray fog.
This all-knowing, condescending gaze and mockery seemed to come from a higher dimension.
"The mess your mother, Kaguya Otsutsuki, left behind when she descended with that fruit was far stranger than this Nine-Tails." His words were like invisible thorns, piercing directly into Hamura's calm and unmoving heart.
"Of course, she probably didn't expect that after you sealed her away, the 'third child' she temporarily gave birth to would endure humiliation and lie dormant on this planet for a whole thousand years."
"What?!" For the first time, Hamura's usually calm and composed face showed a violent tremor!
The muscles on his aged, stone-carved face twitched suddenly!
His pure white eyes, which had been as calm as a frozen starry sea, suddenly contracted!
A powerful force, capable of upending the entire soul space, suddenly erupted, causing the surrounding gray mist to surge wildly, and even countless souls in the distance to tremble and ripple!
"A third child?! The mother's...other child?! Lurking on the planet...for a thousand years?!" For the first time, Hamura's voice lost its detached calmness, filled with disbelief, astonishment, and a hint of absurd anger at being deceived!
"Impossible! Before my brother and I decided to seal Mother, she only had..." His words stopped abruptly, because those pure white eyes were fixed on Mianma, trying to discern the truth from his mental fluctuations.
But Mianma's spirit is like a bottomless black ice field, cold and solid, without the slightest ripple that one would expect from a "lie".
What made him even more convinced was the secret Menma casually pointed out: the seal on Kaguya, and an ancient, unknown war.
"Then, how do you know..." Hamura forcibly suppressed the turmoil in his heart.
When he spoke again, his voice returned to its usual calmness, but carried an unprecedented heaviness and an indescribable sense of inquiry.
His pure white eyes, brimming with starlight, seemed to see right through the pockmarked spirit on his face.
"Your Excellency... who exactly are you? Such a long-standing secret, even concerning my mother..." His gaze seemed to pierce through the frenzied appearance of the Dark Nine-Tails' chakra, casting it into the vast unknown deep within Menma's consciousness.
"Me?" The mental projection of the faceless figure slightly raised its head in the endless gray.
An indescribable aura is quietly being released.
This aura was completely different from any power that Hamura had ever sensed; it seemed deeper and more primal.
“You can understand me as the offspring I conceived for the ‘will’ of this planet. To cleanse the scourge left by your clan, and even more so to defend against the predators of the Otsutsuki clan who will eventually come.” His voice carried an indifferent tone, as if stating a given fact.
The name 'Otsutsuki clan' instantly tightened Hamura's aged face.
He knew that the other party was not referring to the few remaining members of the Otsutsuki clan on the moon.
"Planetary will..." Hamura murmured, chewing on this word that was almost beyond his comprehension. For the first time, complex human emotions surfaced in his pure white eyes: surprise, shock, and a faint hope of relief.
"So, you know all that has happened in the past? Including... the true mission of this moon?" His voice was probing.
"The seal here is quite strong. A thousand years have passed, and Kaguya has shown no signs of breaking free." Menma's response seemed to confirm Hamura's guess.
However, Menma's words did not stop: "Oh right, that Otsutsuki who was severely injured by your mother but managed to escape has been licking his wounds in the shadows for the past thousand years."
Another secret caused Hamura to sway imperceptibly.
Menma paused slightly, his gaze falling on the aged soul of Hamura.
"So, put away your self-righteous idea of a peaceful and tranquil paradise."
"I will unite all the forces of the ninja world, whether they are in the present or confined to the underworld. You and Hagoromo, just continue to sleep and do not cause any more trouble. Clean up the house and defend against external enemies—" He calmly proclaimed the vision for the future.
"That is my mission."
Hamura remained silent for a long time.
Two mysterious enemies lurk in the ninja world, enemies that even he and his brother failed to detect...
If that's the case, then the many suspicions he and his brother had had, and the millennia-long conflict in the ninja world, can be explained.
The gray mist rose and fell like tides behind Hamura, highlighting his hunched figure.
The vast amount of information contained in Mianma's words struck his soul time and time again.
It also makes the person in front of you even more mysterious.
"The Otsutsuki clan, severely injured by my mother... the Otsutsuki clan that is about to be unified... the ninja world..." he murmured, each word seemingly weighing a ton.
He raised his head and stared at Mianma, the doubt in his pure white eyes not completely dissipating: "Why should I believe you can do it? It's a long-cherished wish that my brother and I have been unable to fulfill for thousands of years."
His intuition told him that the other party was not lying, but this war spanning thousands of years allowed no room for luck.
What he wants to see is a substantial force capable of shaking up the landscape.
"Heh." Menma's voice seemed to carry a hint of mockery.
He slowly withdrew his outstretched right hand, palm facing upward, loosely clenched.
hum-
Space seemed to silently crack open with a tiny fissure.
An item emitting a faint red glow appeared out of thin air!
It was a scroll of bamboo slips.
It was enveloped in a hazy, pale red glow.
The surface of the bamboo strip is very smooth, without any densely packed, intricate, and mysterious runes, resembling a wordless book.
The moment it appeared, an irresistible sense of time and space freezing suddenly enveloped the entire gray space!
It was as if an invisible force field suddenly spread out from it!
Buzz…!
A silent shockwave swept across!
A strange thing happened!
The silent, dim, pearl-like aura of the main family's souls surrounding Hamura and Menma froze as if by an invisible cold current the moment the bamboo slip appeared!
Their souls instantly became extremely dim and blurry, their movements froze, and even their ethereal aura of sorrow was completely solidified!
It was as if the entire world consisted only of the bamboo scroll emitting a faint light, and the two figures enveloped by that light.
Zhu Yue's Book!
Hamura's pure white pupils contracted sharply once again!
His aged face was etched with utter shock!
He tried to use his consciousness to touch and analyze the bamboo scroll.
It's not the chakra from this planet!
It was not any ninja tool that his brother had ever used, nor was it any of the kind he knew!
It's more like a sealed-off cosmic law, an absolutely alien... spacetime anomaly!
"This..." Hamura's throat felt like it was being choked by an invisible hand, and he could only squeeze out a dry syllable.
His gaze was fixed on the Book of Vermilion Moon, trying to imprint it into the depths of his soul, but each attempt was like sinking into cold stardust and quicksand.
Unprecedented!
Beyond cognition!
From the unknown!
These three thoughts flashed through his mind like lightning.
It was a forbidden creation that seemed to come from outside the world, capable of even distorting and sealing time itself!
With this item, Menma's words and his ambition to unify the ninja world instantly gained terrifying persuasive power, heavier than a mountain!
In this absolute silence where everything is still and the soul is silenced.
Menma's gaze passed over the speechless Hamura and landed on the countless array of main family stone tablets in the distance, which seemed to be sleeping in a gray curtain.
"Time is up."
There was no farewell, no explanation.
Mianma's figure began to blur and become transparent.
The dark red Nine-Tails chakra cloak and the Crimson Moon Book, which emitted a faint red halo and an aura of another dimension, both faded and dissipated rapidly along with his very existence.
It was as if they had never appeared in this desolate graveyard of souls.
All that remained was endless, desolate grayness, cold stone tablets, and tens of thousands of souls whose chants had been forcibly suppressed and returned to silence.
Hamura stood alone in place, observing the ninja world for a thousand years, and for the first time, his heart was filled with so many emotions.
Menma's final glance into the depths of the tombstone firmly imprinted an unspeakable worry on Hamura's heart.
(End of this chapter)