His whole body finally relaxed.
"The top ten placements will be discussed and announced later. For now, the Chūnin Exams are suspended." Kaede floated in midair and spoke calmly to everyone.
Then he waved his hand.
Not only did the ground Neji had restored return to normal—every part of the arena that had been destroyed was brought back to its original state.
Kaede had only recently unlocked Sennin Modo (Sage Mode). Of course, this Sennin Modo was different from the ninja world's version. His came from the civilization of Huaxia, a path tied to the "Hundred and Eight Desolations." Abilities like turning scattered beans into soldiers and turning stone into gold were things he would comprehend later on this path.
For now, the system had only opened the most rudimentary stage of Sennin Modo for him—he could fly and perform small feats of restoring matter.
In the original cultivation system, things would be split into two broad routes: cultivation of the Dao and cultivation of the human self. Kaede's system, however, directly opened the most basic Sennin Modo: he could move objects, create something from nothing, and restore broken things to their former state; he could fly. Once his proficiency rose high enough, he would step into the next stage, the realm of the "Five Eyes and Six Powers"—Gogan (Fleshly Eye), Tengan (Heavenly Eye), Egen (Wisdom Eye), Hōgen (Dharma Eye), Butsugen (Buddha Eye); and the six powers: Tengan-tsu (Divine Eye), Tenji-tsu (Divine Ear), Tajin-tsu (Reading Others' Minds), Shukumei-tsu (Seeing Past Lives), Jinzoku-tsu (Supernatural Movement), and Rojin-tsu (Exhaustion of Outflows).
At the final, full stage of Sennin Modo, Kaede would reach ten distinct realms—adept at knowing what others think, able to perceive the life and death and the good and ill fortunes of beings in all directions… In short, he would possess the abilities attributed to the gods.
Yet what he had shown just now was only the smallest hint of those powers, and it already left spectators from other countries speechless. After the battles with Konoha, the Land of Water, and several other nations, Kaede's name had already spread far and wide; those brilliant fights had been carved deep into people's hearts. Just as the Three Sannin had left their mark during the Third Ninja War, people now spoke of Kaede as someone approaching the First Hokage.
The First Hokage, Hashirama, was a man who revered peace. He once thought of unifying the Five Great Nations, but in the end chose to exchange tailed beasts with money, distributing them evenly among the five nations. Because of Hashirama's overwhelming strength, the world did indeed welcome an era of unprecedented peace.
That alone showed how incredibly powerful Hashirama had been. If he were in Kaede's place today, perhaps he would walk the very path Kaede had chosen.
To establish something new, the old must first be broken. To move toward true peace, one must tear down the fragile, surface-level balance the Five Great Nations were clinging to. This was why Kaede intended to found the Land of the Gods and create a new nation.
For many in the stands, this was the first time they had seen Kaede in person.
His entrance was too extraordinary: clad in white, he descended slowly from the sky, and as he fell, everything in the arena that had been ruined became whole again. Throughout it all, he looked as if he had done nothing—yet it was as if everything had already been done.
In the ninja world, opening Sennin Modo always brought visible changes to one's body—Sasuke's body would show the scales of the serpent, Naruto's eyes would gain dark markings that looked painted on, and Tsunade's face would carry black patterns. Everyone displayed some outward transformation.
Kaede's Sennin Modo, however, carried the air of a true immortal—after all, his was the purest form of Sennin Modo. In this moment he was already a half-immortal body on the verge of soaring—a "transformed soaring immortal." His eyes, too, had changed.
(End of Chapter)
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