The coffin burst open with a low, cracking sound.
Dust scattered through the broken tower as Madara Uchiha stepped out, his chakra instantly flooding the air like a storm front.
His body was in its prime, not the aged shell from the war, but the perfected, youthful form Black Zetsu had engineered for him.
Obito froze, staring in disbelief. "You… you resurrected him?"
Black Zetsu had already separated from his white counterpart, his inky form slithering to Madara's side.
"There was no other choice," he said flatly, his voice calm despite the chaos.
Madara's eyes opened slowly, Sharingan spinning, then shifting into the Rinnegan as his chakra stabilized.
His gaze swept the ruined landscape, the collapsed tower, the fractured earth below.
"I see," he murmured, "you've managed to make quite a mess without me."
But his words were cut short by a sudden flash of cyan light.
Akira appeared mid-strike, his Tenseigan Chakra Mode blazing, pressure bending the air around him as he charged straight at the resurrected Uchiha.
Madara's instincts took over.
He raised his arm, chakra surging outward as a gigantic dark-blue skeleton wrapped around him in an instant.
His Susanoo roared to life, intercepting the blow, but the moment Akira's chakra clashed against it, cracks spread across the ethereal armor.
Madara's expression hardened. "What… is this power?"
The pressure intensified, forcing him back dozens of meters in an instant.
He clenched his fists, pouring more chakra into the construct.
The skeletal form expanded rapidly, flesh and armor layering over it until the Perfect Susanoo towered above the ruins, its blade cutting through the dark clouds of Amegakure.
Even so, the cyan light didn't yield.
The shockwave from Akira's falling pressure aura split the rain itself, sending ripples through the flooded streets below.
Due to the combined damage, the remains of the Rain Tower finally gave way, collapsing entirely.
However, Madara immediately formed several shadow clones, each manifesting their own smaller Susanoo around.
The towering avatars moved in unison, surrounding the Gedo Mazō as the ground began to collapse.
Their chakra armor interlocked like a barrier, shielding the statue from the falling debris.
Obito stood among the now outside wreckage, and breathing hard, previously using his intangibility to pass through everything safely, his perfect Sharingan now darting between Madara's colossal Susanoo and the shining figure of the attacker floating above the ruins.
White Zetsu appeared beside him, staring up at the chaos, thanks to his durability recovering from the wreckage damage.
Meanwhile, Black Zetsu had already attached himself to Madara's leg, inside of his Susanoo.
He then quickly explained the situation, his tone urgent and steady.
He summarized to Madara that he had used Edo Tensei to bring him back because they were under attack by this unaccounted-for being of overwhelming power of an unknown origin.
Nagato, Obito, and even he himself had been seconds away from death.
It had been the only option left. For their plan to live.
Madara's eyes narrowed slightly.
The explanation didn't sit right with him.
How could Zetsu, his own creation, of all beings, know Tobirama's obscure Edo Tensei?
Suspicion flickered in his mind immediately.
It had also seemingly only been around a year since his death, judging from Obito's chakra signature, far too soon, far too convenient.
It was not yet time for him to appear, nowhere near the timeline they planned.
So, even he was now very confused about the strange situation he found himself in.
Sensing his doubt, Black Zetsu spoke quickly, as if anticipating the thought. "I learned the technique later, stealing it from one of Root's cells outside Konoha, when they did the experiments regarding it, thanks to my parasitic techniques... I thought it might become useful, judging by how quickly the world was changing once you left..." he said smoothly.
"For example, that technique has also become much more of a 'common knowledge' nowadays. Danzo used it himself, he perfected the process, and even later summoned Tobirama and Hashirama, and now they rule Konoha again. The world's in utter chaos."
Madara's expression hardened. "Tobirama… and Hashirama… revived?" For a brief moment, even he was stunned.
But the time for reflection ended as the earth shook violently beneath them.
Out of the ruins of Amegakure's central tower, most of which had been reduced to rubble by his own Perfect Susanoo, rose a new form.
The shattered steel and stone twisted under invisible force, merging into a colossal metallic golem only slightly smaller than his Susanoo.
Standing atop its shoulder was the same luminous figure from before, the mysterious being whose cyan aura lit the rain.
Madara felt the chakra building again, a vast, alien energy gathering in that man's hands.
Black Zetsu turned toward him urgently. "Take this, quickly," he said, his dark mass shifting as something glimmered within it. From the inky surface, a familiar pair of eyes emerged, the Rinnegan, still pulsing faintly with chakra.
Madara's expression darkened as he recognized them.
"My eyes," he said quietly, narrowing his gaze.
Seeing the suspicion flash across his face, Black Zetsu spoke fast, his tone firm but measured. "Listen, when I revived you, Nagato would have realized immediately that Obito was lying to him the entire time; that he was an impostor."
"And he probably would've turned on us the moment he understood the truth. I couldn't risk it. Not now. So, before performing Edo Tensei, in the last second, I sneakily struck first and took them from him."
Madara's stare didn't soften, but Zetsu continued before he could speak. "Besides, this enemy… even your Edo Tensei body might not withstand him for long... So, you might need your Rinnegan right now, not later. With it, you can fight on more equal ground."
Madara looked at the eyes for a long moment, then exhaled quietly. "Hmph. You're bold, Black Zetsu. You act without my approval, yet your logic still serves our purpose."
Meanwhile, deep inside, Madara still harbored traces of suspicion toward Black Zetsu.
However, he didn't voice them now; timing was everything, and for the moment, Zetsu's reasoning held together well enough to follow.
Thanks to the Hashirama cells fused within his body, Madara's senses were razor-sharp.
Even through the blinding rain and chaos, he could feel it, the immense, alien chakra radiating from his opponent.
Whoever this was, he stood above him in raw output.
Additionally, Madara's current Rinnegan, restored through Edo Tensei, lacked the depth of his original; it was a mere imitation, a paper vessel of what it once was, and that limitation weighed on him immediately.
His entire body also didn't truly feel like what it was during his true peak.
However, before he could dwell further, his opponent raised both hands.
He seemingly finally finished loading up whatever allowed Black Zetsu and Madara to conserve for a few moments just now.
Chakra condensed around him, first forming a vortex of white wind, then a blinding golden edge that split the dark clouds above.
Madara's eyes widened. The sky itself seemed to buckle under the force.
Madara's eyes narrowed. "What is he creating…?"
Two spiraling waves of golden and silver light twisted together, descending from the sky like the hands of a god.
The sheer radiance tore through the clouds, swallowing everything in its path.
Madara reacted in an instant.
He seized the Rinnegan from Black Zetsu's grip and pressed it into his own socket, chakra flaring violently as the eye synchronized with him. "Rinne Rebirth!"
The world trembled as his Edo body dissolved, life flooding back into him, warm, real, pulsing.
Fully revived, he extended both hands, shaping the air around him with gravitational force. "Chibaku Tensei!"
The ground split beneath him, chunks of earth and steel rising as the core of his jutsu pulled upward, meeting the oncoming radiance.
At the same moment, he unleashed a massive Shinra Tensei, the blast colliding with the falling beams of gold and silver.
The sky turned white, and for a moment, there was no sound, only the sight of two divine forces meeting and erasing all that lay between them.
The impact was catastrophic.
The resulting shockwave swallowed the entire city.
Towers shattered, streets vaporized, and every structure within Amegakure was erased in a blinding storm of light and gravity to nothingness.
When the dust settled, nothing of the Rain Village even remained, only a giant crater and the faint echo of two divine forces still pressing against each other in the silence that followed.