The single word tore from Yamanaka Aito's throat, raw and discordant in the silent, humming chamber.
"What?"
It was the first time he had spoken aloud in days, his voice a rusty, unfamiliar instrument. The sound was so alien that several of the meditating Yamanaka around him flinched, their concentration wavering for a critical second.
In his mind, the psychic network he maintained flickered like a faulty lamp. The message from the perimeter scouts was clear: Minato, the reinforcement, the one hope they had been clinging to, had just basically ordered the entire Third Division to stand down. He was going to face the remaining thousands of Iwa shinobi alone.
'This is insanity,'
Aito thought, the calm facade of the relay commander cracking under the strain.
'He is one man. A prodigy, but still one man. The chakra expenditure alone…'
He pictured the sea of enemy combatants, the countless jutsus, the sheer statistical impossibility of survival. The line between heroism and hubris was vanishing before his mind's eye.
With a force of will that made the blood trickle from his nose flow faster, Aito carved out a sliver of his concentration, forging a direct, private telepathic link.
He bypassed the chaotic chatter of the battlefield and aimed his thoughts like a spear at the singular, brilliant presence that was Minato Namikaze.
{Minato-san! This is Yamanaka Aito, Relay Command. You cannot be serious! The tactical risk is unacceptable! We have over eight hundred combat-capable shinobi here. Let us support you—}
The response that came back was not the arrogant rebuttal he expected. It was calm, layered with a weariness that spoke of a higher, more comprehensive understanding of the war.
{Aito-san, I appreciate your concern,}
Minato's mental voice was like a still pond, undisturbed by the hurricane of violence around his physical body.
{But consider this: your division has been under continuous siege for seventy-two hours. Your chakra reserves are depleted, your morale is hanging by a thread, and your casualties are mounting. Every moment you spend fighting here is a moment you cannot spend relaying vital intelligence to the other four divisions, who are, at this very second, also fighting for their lives.}
Even as he communicated, Aito could feel the feedback—not images, but sensations: the brief, jarring shunshin of high-speed movement, the sharp, clean impact of a kunai finding its mark, the concussive "FWOOM" of the Rasengan. It was a disorienting symphony of violence conducted at lightning speed.
{My presence,} Minato continued, {is not just about killing enemy shinobi. It is about alleviating the overwhelming stress on this division. It is about giving your Yamanaka the breathing room to re-establish clear communications across the entire front. It is about allowing your medics to tend to the wounded without fear of a stray explosion. The Hokage's orders are explicit: my priority is to break this siege completely and decisively, thereby increasing the productivity and coordination of Konoha's entire military force. The Medical Corps near the Rice Country border is pinned down. Division Two is being blinded by sand. They need the intelligence only you can provide, and you have been too besieged to provide it effectively. This is the most efficient path to victory.}
The logic was cold, irrefutable, and spoken with the absolute confidence of a master strategist. It wasn't about glory; it was about logistics. It was about treating the Third Division not as a battlefield, but as a clogged artery in Konoha's body, and Minato was the scalpel.
And all the while, the sensory feedback from Minato's end of the link was a testament to his terrifying capability. In the few seconds their mental conversation had taken place, Aito received fragmented reports from scouts that painted an unbelievable picture.
{—flash of yellow, twenty Iwa down in the canyon pass—}
{—he's on the western ridge now! The earth-style users are gone!—}
{—the Rasengan just took out their entire long-range artillery squad—}
Aito, his mind reeling, understood. In the time it had taken him to form his protest, Minato had already neutralised hundreds. The Jonin Commander wasn't predicting the enemy's movements; he was defining them. He was a force of nature, and the Iwa army was the coastline being relentlessly eroded.
But a commander's instinct ran deep. {Minato-san, I cannot, in good conscience, have a single Konoha shinobi, no matter how powerful, face such odds entirely alone.}
He then shifted his focus, broadcasting a new command on the general division frequency.
{All unit leaders, this is Relay Command. Minato-san has engaged the primary enemy force. Our orders are to hold and secure, but I am authorising all long-range support teams—anyone with projectile, lightning, or fire capabilities—to find vantage points and provide suppressing fire. Do not engage directly. I repeat, do not engage directly. But if you have a clear shot, take it. We will not let him fight completely unsupported.}
He felt the acknowledgement ripple through the network, a surge of grim determination. Shinobi who moments before had been preparing for a final, desperate stand now scrambled to new positions, not to save themselves, but to support the lone golden figure cutting a swath through the enemy.
What followed was a spectacle that would be etched into the memories of every survivor for the rest of their lives. It was not a battle; it was a systematic dismantling.
Over the next few hours, Minato became a myth in motion. He moved like a thought, appearing simultaneously in a dozen different sectors according to the frantic reports flooding Aito's mind.
The Iwa shinobi, trained for formations and combined jutsu, had no answer for an enemy who violated the very concept of space and time. Their carefully laid traps were triggered, but empty.
Their grand earth-style techniques crumbled as the user was felled by a kunai from behind before the final seal was formed. Panic, a more potent weapon than any jutsu, began to spread through their ranks. The confident war cries turned into shouts of confusion and terror.
"It's the Yellow Flash!" "He's behind us!" "He's everywhere!"
Minato's kunai, marked with the Hiraishin formula, filled the battlefield. They were lodged in rocks, trees, the bodies of fallen enemies—each one a potential arrival point. He became a whirlwind of calculated death, a golden dervish weaving through a forest of brown Iwa uniforms. The Rasengan's distinctive SHHRRRP-FWOOM! became a constant, dreadful percussion to the symphony of collapse. He didn't just break their lines; he shattered their will.
The siege of the Third Division didn't just end; it inverted. The encircling force found itself encircled by the ghost of one man. Their coordinated assault fractured into a thousand individual, doomed fights. The counter-attack Minato had promised wasn't launched by the Third Division; it was launched by him, and the Konoha forces watched, awestruck, as their prison walls were torn down by a single, relentless force.
As the sun began to crest over the mountains, its light revealing the staggering scale of the victory, the battlefield fell into an unnerving silence, broken only by the moans of the dying and the crackle of dying fires. Thousands of Iwa shinobi lay dead or scattered. The siege was over. The Third Division was saved.
In the relay chamber, the psychic cacophony had finally stilled. The constant stream of crisis reports had stopped. Aito, physically and mentally shattered, allowed himself a single, shuddering breath of relief. It was then that a new, prioritised connection pulsed in his mind. It was Senju Yuki, from the Hokage's command.
{Aito. The Hokage has a message for all division commanders. Top priority.}
Aito straightened his weary spine, the professional in him taking over. {I am ready to receive, Yuki-san. What is the message?}
There was a pause on the other end, and when Yuki's mental voice returned, it was thick with a momentous, almost fearful gravity.
{The message is this: The Third Hokage is finally joining the battle.}