"Stop your rambling and keep quiet."
Kaito extended a finger, and thick streams of violet lightning burst forth from his fingertip.
Jigen hurriedly conjured black rods to block, but they snapped almost instantly. Bolts of lightning pierced through his body, leaving behind countless charred, bloody holes.
"Puuh!"
Jigen spat out a mouthful of old blood. Half-kneeling on the ground, his aura rapidly diminished.
Kaito slowly raised one arm and shot a bolt of lightning into the sky.
The once-clear heavens were instantly shrouded in endless storm clouds, streaked with serpentine lightning weaving across the sky.
Thunder rumbled throughout the heavens, yet Jigen remained silently half-kneeling, as though resigned to his fate.
Kaito's eyes had already transformed into twin orbs of violet lightning. Pressing his palm down, he spoke softly,
"Do you like this grand, extravagant funeral?"
Jigen lifted his head, a flicker of gold flashing in his pupils.
"You'll regret this!"
"Oh? I'm looking forward to it. Ten-Billion Volts!"
Boom!
A thunder-born kirin descended from the heavens, swallowing the entire forest in an instant.
When the lightning dispersed, the forest had been utterly obliterated, leaving behind only a charred wasteland.
Amid the billowing smoke, a silhouette flickered faintly in and out.
Kaito narrowed his eyes and said,
"So, you've finally revealed your true form, Ōtsutsuki Isshiki."
As soon as his words fell, a powerful gust swept away the smoke covering the land, revealing Isshiki within.
The form of Jigen had completely vanished, replaced by an Ōtsutsuki with curved horns sprouting from his forehead, dressed in a white outer robe with a red interior and tails.
His demeanor had also shifted, now resembling that of an elegant nobleman.
Most striking of all were his mismatched golden and white eyes, each radiating an overwhelming sense of dominance.
Kaito folded his arms out of habit and remarked,
"Much better. This look is far easier on the eyes than before."
At this point, Isshiki grew calm instead. He lifted his gaze toward Kaito and said,
"Stop wasting time. Show me your true face, Ōtsutsuki Kaito."
Kaito chuckled a few times, then reached out and clenched the air. A black staff appeared in his hand.
Immediately, a milky-white light bloomed across his body. When it faded, Kaito had fully transformed into an Ōtsutsuki.
He opened a pair of violet Rinnegan with twelve tomoe, gazing indifferently at Isshiki as he said,
"You'd better be careful. In this state, I'm not exactly good at controlling my power."
Isshiki sneered and replied,
"Hmph, I'll return those words to you."
Both men fell silent. Isshiki expected Kaito to launch another underhanded sneak attack, but this time Kaito remained perfectly still, unmoving.
Kaito's scheming nature surfaced again. He knew Isshiki's circumstances.
No matter how calm and composed he looked on the surface, inside he was far more anxious than anyone else.
Just like in the anime, after forcibly reincarnating, Isshiki had less than three days left to live.
And just as Kaito predicted, Isshiki couldn't hold it in any longer. His right eye gleamed with golden light, and black rods materialized around him.
With a wave of his hand, the rods shot toward Kaito.
Kaito's eyes narrowed slightly as a hemispherical barrier enveloped his body. The rods shattered instantly upon touching its edge.
Isshiki flicked his hand again, conjuring several red-and-black cubes high above Kaito.
In an instant, they plummeted toward him at terrifying speed.
Kaito responded by unleashing his Susanoo's third form, directly bracing against the cubes.
It had to be said—these things were incredibly heavy. Even Susanoo strained under their weight.
Isshiki continued summoning more cubes with Daikokuten, intending to bury Kaito through sheer numbers.
Kaito's gaze hardened. From behind him, a Truth-Seeking Orb shot toward Isshiki.
Isshiki smirked dismissively. As a pure-blooded Ōtsutsuki, he had no fear of Truth-Seeking Orbs.
However, just as the orb was about to touch him, its size suddenly swelled several times over. Isshiki's expression changed as he cried out in shock,
"Nani!? This is—"
Boom!
Before he could finish, the massive Truth-Seeking Orb crushed him down, forming a perfectly smooth circular crater in the earth.
Kaito clenched his hand. The crater erupted in blinding white light, followed by a violent explosion.
When the blast finally subsided, it took a long while before Isshiki floated up from underground again.
One of his horn tips had been blasted clean off. If not for his use of Sukunahikona to hastily shrink the orb at the last second, the damage would've been far worse than just losing part of a horn.
Even so, the explosion had left him severely battered, and lingering dread clung to him.
Meanwhile, Kaito's Truth-Seeking Orbs weren't one-use items. Under Isshiki's watchful eyes, a fresh orb soon regenerated behind Kaito, filling the gap from the one he had lost.
Isshiki frowned deeply, still pondering the orb that had suddenly expanded.
The technique resembled his Sukunahikona far too closely. Could Kaito possess the same ocular power?
But within the Ōtsutsuki clan, his right eye was unique, one of his most crucial advantages as an elite.
Even against his kin, that dojutsu was an exceptionally troublesome ability.
As this thought passed, golden light once again flared in Isshiki's right eye. His body vanished from Kaito's sight.
Kaito narrowed his eyes. Suddenly, a Truth-Seeking Orb behind him transformed into a black barrier, blocking to his flank.
At that moment, Isshiki reappeared, his fist slamming against the barrier, shock flashing across his face.
He had shrunk his body to launch a sneak attack on Kaito, yet the attempt was foiled so effortlessly.
Kaito turned his head, smiling at Isshiki. In the latter's horrified gaze, the Rinnegan in Kaito's eyes glimmered with violet light.
A gray vortex enveloped Isshiki. Almost immediately, he felt the terrifying nature of the power and exerted all his strength to escape.
For someone with only three days of life left, it was practically a death sentence. With his dwindling lifespan, even a delay of a second or two could mean instant death.
Of course, Kaito deliberately slowed activation, leaving Isshiki just enough breathing room.
After all, he didn't want to overdo it and erase Isshiki outright. That would mean losing a top-quality piece of fodder.