After the second meteor fell I realised that I have probably been spending too much time with this and should end it.
Not that it is that urgent of a thing, I still have time after all, but I should stop just clashing against her Jutsu for fun.
Decision made, when I turn back to Hanari I enter full stealth again, immediately putting her on guard, her vortex of thorns once again surrounding her.
But I am not going easy this time, so instead of going for her, I drop into the valley and I kick the wall of the valley in the direction she is standing.
Pushing all of my chakra out once again, I manipulate vast quantities of the earth, literally pushing the wall of the valley back far enough and quick enough that she has to fall down into it.
As she is falling another wooden temple rises from the ground and out of the wall to give her something to stand on, something that is extra helpful because I then start transforming my chakra into water.
Something that I can do endlessly right now, which I make full use of to start fulling this valley with water, something that only takes a few minutes despite its size.
Because of my invisibility, or just to see where I'm going with this, Hanari doesn't do anything beyond furthering her own preparations.
But really, this whole thing is just an elaborate distraction.
This would be when I would hit her with a Railgun, but I don't know if that would kill her or not so I still have to hold back somewhat.
In a scene straight out of the bible, all of the water rises into a titanic wave headed straight for Hanari's quickly built but still ornate mini temple.
But as I said, it is only a distraction in the first place.
Before the wave is close enough that she would have to act and she is focused on the wave, I touch down right behind her and I kick her as hard as I can, in the same spot as before and send her flying away from her temple and into the wave.
I rush after her, diving into the wave and hit her again before she can orient herself.
Because she can't see me, mixed with the disorientation of being pushed around under water, she fails to react as I land hit after hit on her.
After a minute of this, as she seems sufficiently beaten up, I land one more kick on her back that send her flying up and out of the water, crashing into the valley wall opposite from where we started.
She bounces off of the wall and falls down onto the water, landing on it instead of falling through it.
"Owwwww. Shouldn't you treat your daughter more delicately? What if you hurt me?" She says as she gets back to her feet, her wounds healing rapidly.
Right.
As our daughter of course she has good staying power.
"Psshh, you look fine~. But this fight is clearly over. Just give up and go get some fodder and I can go back to holding back and taking my time while you deal with the other bad guys."
My words make her frown at me.
"What do you mean the fight is clearly over? Am I not strong enough for you?"
I pause at her words. I can practically feel the insecurity wafting off of her.
Is she worried I would be disappointed in her?
Am I?
I wouldn't say I'm disappointed, she is clearly among the strongest, but I could have killed her so many times over by now so it would be a stretch to say I'm proud.
More like, she met expectations.
"You are plenty strong, but if you can't even sense me then you are not my opponent. So no, as you are right now you are not strong enough."
No reason to lie to her after all.
But then something unexpected happens, she closes her eyes and takes another deep breath before purple markings start appearing around her eyes, spreading down like tears in purple lines that go under her crop top and out the bottom to connect to her butterfly tattoo.
Is this what I think it is?
She opens her eyes and turns to stare directly at me, which considering she didn't know where I was before kind of tells me that what just happened is exactly what I thought it was.
Her eyes are also incredibly familiar, they don't have the same pattern as mine, being that she isn't a chameleon summoner, but the purple around her pupil is an awful lot like my own Sage eyes.
"How about now? Am I enough now?" She challenges.
"Let's find out." Is all I say before launching a fully charged Railgun directly at her.
With Sage mode enhancing her she reacts fast enough that a root bursts out of the wall behind her and into my Railgun, taking the hit with a giant explosion and immediately regenerating itself to charge at me.
Right as the root is approaching me it splits into many roots, each of which grow even more roots until I am being attacked on all sides by hundreds of small and sharp roots.
But we have been through this before so I explode into fire again.
Only immediately after I am struck in the gut and sent flying into the opposite wall.
Looking forward from where I have been implanted in the wall, I see Hanari with an arm of wood, clearly showing that it was her who hit me.
Smiling slightly to myself, I go to get up, only for branches to reach out from the wall around me in an attempt to hold me in place.
The moments distraction of looking at the branches leaves me late to react to the enormous fist of wood that comes crashing down on me so fast that the atmospheric pressure alone ignites it.
Dang. Is the last thought I have before me and the hundreds, maybe even thousands of metres of area around me implodes in a gigantic explosion of force and fire.
As the dust settles and I regenerate enough to have eyes again, I observe the destruction around me with second hand pride.
This. This is impressive.
I turn to Hanari with a smile and dispel my stealth so that she can see it.
But night is about to fall, which means it's time for me to finally put my plan in motion, which means I need to end this fight now.
I enter my own Sage mode, making sure she can see my transformation before I return to invisibility.
I can tell from the way her eyes widen that my stealth is once again viable, though she would probably be able to sense me at least enough to block a simple kick.
But that is not what I am planning on doing.
You see, because it killed me, I never actually got to see how much damage my strongest attack can do.
"You might want to protect yourself." I warn her, since I still don't really want to kill her.
I see her eyes widen before rings and rings of wood surround her in an increasingly thick ball.
I wait a moment for it to grow thick enough that she shouldn't be hurt too bad.. probably.
Then I prepare another fully charged Railgun, this time enhanced to the limit by Sage mode.
Then I let it loose and immediately see black and feel nothing.
...What?
Feeling starts to return to me as my immortal body regenerates and after a moment more my sight returns to me.
What I am greeted with when I can see again shocks me enough that my mouth hangs open.
Holy shit.
The area in front of me is just gone.
A valley that puts the one we made earlier to shame is all that stands before me.
One hundred metres wide by estimate and extending literally as far as I can see, which I think is about five kilometres for someone my hight, is a gash in the world.
Like God came and cleaved at the land with a sword the size of a mountain.
My moment of pride is ruined by a spike of panic and worry.
Did I hit Hanari with that? Is she dead?
I frantically look around but find her right away.
Lying at the edge of the new valley is my daughter, leaning against what is left of her defensive ball and completely missing her legs and one of her arms.
Shit.
I rush over to her to see that she is not moving and I panic a little more before I notice a pulse.
Whew, still alive.
Ok then, everything is ok.
Yeah she is missing a few limbs, but I do that all the time, it's not as big a deal as people make it out to be.
I crouch down in front of her and poke her in the face, only after which does she open her eyes to look at me.
But she looks away right after and starts crying lightly.
"Hey, hey. I'm sorry about hurting you, but you can heal up just fine so it's not a problem. You don't have to cry, you don't have to cry. Please stop crying." I say in a voice a mix between frantic and soothing.
I reach out and put a hand on the shoulder she still has to try and add some measure of comfort.
"Please talk to me Hanari. Why are you crying?" I ask in a more calm soothing voice.
Seriously, we were fighting a moment ago and now this? What a transition.
"*Hic* I'm w-weak. I thought *hic* I thought that I'd, that I'd get to show you how strong I've become! I wanted you to be proud of me.. but I'm still so much weaker than you!" She finally cries out to me.
With tears streaming down her face she finally actually looks at me but the moment she does she freezes in shock as I pull her into a tight hug.
Holding her close with my face buried in her hair I whisper to her.
"Hanari, oh daughter of mine. You are undeniably strong. I can say with certainty that you stand among the strongest in the world. I love you, my daughter, and I am so, so proud of you. You have become an amazing woman. I could not be more proud to be your father. I love you."
I simply hug Hanari in my arms for a moment, my compulsions not forcing me to fight, which probably means the time is nigh.
"I love you Tou-san! *Hic* I missed you so much!" She literally cries at me and I just hug her tighter in response, running soothing circles on her back.
After her tears run dry I pull back and hold myself in front of her.
"I love you my dear daughter. So for now, please just wait here, I will see you again soon ok?"
As if to punctuate my words I hear a crashing sound behind me and when I turn I see that in the far distance there is exactly what I have been waiting for.
"I've got to go now. I love you." Is what I say before I go back to my Sage stealth and rush as fast as I can towards the Demonic Statue.
Finally, my plans can come to fruition, it only took years of planning and preparation as well as, you know, dying.
Though I did plan on dying quite a bit later than I did, but it all works out in the end so there's no point in complaining.
After a moment I see what I more or less expected.
Naruto Uzumaki, Might Guy, Kakashi Hatake and a transformed Killer B all fighting together against Obito Uchiha.
A smile spreads on my lips, unseen by anyone.
Finally.
The time has come.
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A/N: He~llo! Dear readers!
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