Boom!
The ground cracked like a spiderweb as Gensou stepped forward, charging once more at the Great Toad Sage.
"Suiton: Mizutama Rentan!"
The Great Toad Sage opened its massive mouth, unleashing a barrage of water bullets the size of cannonballs, each one piercing the air with a sharp whistling sound, hurtling densely toward Gensou.
"Shinra Tensei!"
Gensou extended his hand, repelling all the incoming water bullets with a wave of force.
In the blink of an eye, he closed the gap between himself and the Great Toad Sage.
"Rinnegan..."
The Great Toad Sage's gaze fell on the distinctive purple eyes with swirling patterns. These eyes were not unfamiliar to it; they were the same Rinnegan it had once seen on Ōtsutsuki Hagoromo.
Understanding the capabilities of the Rinnegan, the Great Toad Sage had previously taken advantage of Gensou's stationary position while using a sealing technique, enduring the sea of lava to land a counterattack.
To others, the Rinnegan might seem mysterious and omnipotent, but to the Great Toad Sage, it was not an enigma.
What puzzled the Great Toad Sage was how Gensou had come to possess the Rinnegan. Furthermore, the power Gensou displayed seemed slightly inferior to that of Ōtsutsuki Hagoromo in his prime.
The Great Toad Sage, despite its wisdom, was not omniscient. The glimpses of the future it saw in its dreams were incomplete, leaving much unknown.
This was why Gensou dismissed the sage's warnings and prophecies with disdain.
Boom!
A deafening shockwave echoed.
By now, Gensou had transformed his hand into a blade, channeling a precise structure of senjutsu chakra into it, aiming a decisive strike at the Great Toad Sage.
The Great Toad Sage snapped out of its thoughts. Without moving its massive body, it raised one of its gigantic webbed hands like a mountain, intending to crush Gensou with sheer force.
It was willing to trade its own injury if it meant obliterating Gensou.
Anticipating this, Gensou halted his blade and, with a calm expression, vanished, reappearing beside the Great Toad Sage, ready to strike again.
A gust of wind kicked up sand and dust as the Great Toad Sage, bolstered by senjutsu-enhanced reflexes, leapt backward to create distance.
Gensou extended his free hand toward the airborne sage.
"Banshō Ten'in!"
A powerful gravitational force surged from his palm.
Though the Great Toad Sage wasn't pulled back, the lack of footing in mid-air caused it to momentarily freeze.
Boom!
A sonic boom rang out as Gensou seized the opportunity, rocketing into the air and appearing above the Great Toad Sage. Transforming his blade into a fist, he delivered a powerful downward punch.
The massive body of the Great Toad Sage crashed into the ground with a thunderous impact, like a meteor striking the earth.
A tangible shockwave radiated outward, sending up a thick pillar of dust and debris.
Gensou wasted no time, diving into the smoke to press his advantage, refusing to give the Great Toad Sage a moment to recover.
But just as he entered the mushroom cloud of debris, a shadow, long and fast beyond even the Rinnegan's perception, lunged straight at him with ferocious speed.
It wasn't until it was close that Gensou realized it was a massive, warty toad tongue.
The seemingly soft tongue shot forward like a giant arrow, ripping through the air with unstoppable destructive force.
Gensou's pupils narrowed slightly as he evaded, releasing another Shinra Tensei with his cooled-down interval.
This time, however, the repulsive force that could deflect most attacks merely shifted the tongue's trajectory slightly.
Rip!
It felt as though a speeding truck had grazed his shoulder.
Gensou's left arm went numb instantly.
Glancing at his arm, he saw the toad tongue had torn away a large chunk of flesh, exposing the faint white of bone.
Unfazed, Gensou looked away and raised his bleeding left hand. As he reached for the tongue, the flesh on his arm regenerated rapidly, restoring it to its original state.
With the Yin Seal unlocked and his cells fully activated, Gensou was constantly in a state of "no-seal regeneration."
No matter how severe the injury, it healed in an instant.
As his hand gripped the tongue, prepared to tear it apart, the Great Toad Sage's tongue suddenly recoiled at an unimaginable speed.
Before he could react, Gensou found himself tightly bound as the tongue coiled around him several times.
In that moment, he was reminded of slow-motion footage of a toad's tongue retracting to capture an insect.
True to form, the Great Toad Sage's ultimate attack was to immediately pull him into its mouth, intending to dissolve him within its stomach.
It all happened too fast.
Gensou was on the verge of being swallowed whole.
He had no intention of discovering what millennia of senjutsu influence had done to the Great Toad Sage's stomach, especially given its confidence in devouring him.
In an instant, Gensou's body transformed into mud, flowing out through the gaps in the tongue.
By the time the Great Toad Sage retracted its tongue fully, the mud on the ground had already reformed into Gensou's true body.
Without wasting a moment, Gensou formed a seal. The mud still clinging to the tongue exploded violently.
Boom!
Thick smoke billowed from the Great Toad Sage's mouth.
The pain caused its massive body to shudder.
Mud Release, a Kekkei Genkai Gensou had developed over the past two years through a series of fortunate encounters, was rarely used until now.
Having turned the tables, Gensou didn't let the opportunity slip. He moved swiftly, appearing in front of the Great Toad Sage in an instant.
Extending his hand, time seemed to freeze.
The wind, sand, smoke, and even the enormous Great Toad Sage itself faded into insignificance.
Before Gensou's outstretched hand, a small, jet-black sphere rapidly formed, becoming the center of all attention.
The Great Toad Sage, still reeling from the pain, sensed the sphere's overwhelming energy.
Lowering its head, it saw the black sphere emitting the aura of seven chakra natures, drifting toward it with an almost innocuous lightness.
"Truth-Seeking Ball!!!"
The Great Toad Sage's expression twisted in horror as it recognized the orb.
This was the pinnacle of ninjutsu, once seen behind the figures of Ōtsutsuki Hagoromo and Ōtsutsuki Hamura. It was the embodiment of ultimate destruction.
For the first time in a millennium, the Great Toad Sage smelled the stench of death.
(End of Chapter)
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