The battlefield held its breath. For one impossible heartbeat, everything was still.
Then someone shouted, voice cracking through the smoke, "The Young Patriarch's here! Reinforcements have arrived!"
For a moment, the words didn't sink in. The Amamiya shinobi just stood there—faces streaked with ash and blood, too tired to hope. Then, like lightning sparking dry wood, that hope roared to life.
"Our reinforcements are here! Cut down those Kaguya bastards!"
Their cries tore through the din. Chakra flared again inside near-empty bodies as the Amamiya line surged forward, weapons flashing through the haze. Even with torn armor and shaking hands, they charged, reckless and alive.
From the ridge above the western front, Amamiya Raizen stood beside Amamiya Ten, staring down at the chaos below. The ground was red—too red to tell whose blood fed it.
"Amamiya ninjas, listen up!" Raizen's voice carried across the wind, sharp as a kunai. "Follow me! We're taking back the west!"
He slammed his palms together.
"Kuchiyose no Jutsu!" (Summoning Technique!)
Smoke erupted from the field. When it cleared, a massive crimson toad crouched there, its eyes sharp and battle-hungry, a massive blade strapped across its back.
"Toad Zhan," Raizen said, landing on its head. "Fight with me."
The toad grunted, voice deep as thunder. "Got it, kid."
With one thunderous leap, the giant amphibian tore into the enemy ranks. The earth split under its weight. Its blade swung once—six Kaguya were gone, their screams ending midair.
Raizen moved next. His hands blurred through seals, chakra screaming through his veins.
"Dust Release: Primary Realm Disintegration!"
White light ignited between his palms, expanding into a glowing cube that engulfed a cluster of Kaguya. The light flashed—then vanished.
No smoke. No remains. Just silence.
"What the hell is that?!" a Kaguya soldier gasped, staggering back.
Raizen smirked coldly. "You wanted a monster? Congratulations."
The toad charged again, crushing mud and bone alike. With Raizen's arrival, the Amamiya line steadied—then counterattacked with a vengeance. The Kaguya began to break.
Two hundred had come to this front. Barely a hundred remained now, dying faster than they could retreat.
The Kaguya commander spat blood and roared, "Kaguya warriors, retreat!"
They withdrew with precision—no panic, just grim efficiency. Even dying, the Kaguya fought like predators. Within minutes, only corpses and smoke remained.
Raizen didn't pursue. His chest heaved. His gaze stayed fixed on the horizon. Another front was still burning. Until every one of them was dead, this wasn't over.
"Ten-san," he muttered, turning the toad eastward. "We move."
The Amamiya reinforcements followed—bloodstained armor, empty eyes. But before they reached the next front, a panting messenger stumbled toward them.
"The Kaguya have retreated from the east! The field is ours!"
Raizen let out a long breath. Of course they had. Word of the western slaughter must have reached them. The Kaguya weren't fools; they knew when a war was lost.
By dusk, the battlefield finally fell silent.
The survivors moved in silence—gathering the fallen, tending wounds, scrubbing blood from steel with trembling hands. The camp filled with quiet sobs and broken laughter.
Raizen walked among them. The smell of blood clung to everything. So did the faces—ones that would never leave him.
"War is always ugly," he muttered. "But damn, it never runs out of volunteers."
Amamiya Ten approached, his armor cracked, his eyes hollow. "Young Patriarch, the clan's officers are assembled."
Raizen nodded once. "Let's finish this."
Inside the command tent, every surviving Jōnin rose as he entered.
"Young Patriarch!" they greeted in unison.
Raizen took the central seat—the one he'd never wanted but had earned through blood.
"Report our losses."
Amamiya Seiji, the clan's record keeper, stepped forward, scroll in hand. "We've used over ten thousand explosive tags, eight thousand weapons, and—"
Raizen's voice cut like a blade. "I didn't ask for numbers. How many of our shinobi?"
Seiji hesitated. His knuckles whitened around the parchment. "Three hundred, Raizen-sama. More than three hundred dead."
The tent went still.
Raizen closed his eyes. His hand twitched once before he forced it still. Out of a thousand shinobi, half had fought here. Barely a hundred still breathed.
Victory, they'd call it.
But as Raizen looked around—at the men with sunken eyes and trembling hands—he knew better.
This wasn't victory.
It was survival—paid for with everything human they had left.