Chapter 523: The Times Have Changed
Ryo withheld absolute zero combat output, cleanly flattening every single adversary stationed across the Land of Water within a mere ten continuous minutes.
The Ancestral Relative Battalion was systematically sealed down to the final unit, yet Gengetsu Hozuki—who was securely locked inside Ryo's specialized water pyramid—remained intensely talkative, continuously spouting prose: "Exactly how on earth is it logically possible for Ryo Uzumaki to still be immortal and alive under heaven? Sifting through my historical memories, he outpaces my age parameters by a solid forty-odd years. Wielding a baseline that spans to the current timeline... my vessel would have scaled past the ninety-year milestone! That ancient monster... completely, thoroughly impossible!"
Ryo projected a warm, gentle smile straight toward Mei Terumi: "The Second Mizukage native to your Hidden Mist Village has officially devolved into a certified mental invalid."
Mei Terumi wove an exceptionally elegant maneuver to gently brush the vibrant green hair strands framing her face: "Adhering strictly to the chronicles archived by our sovereign predecessors, the independent character governing the Second Mizukage was monumentally unreliable. Back across the first grand shinobi war, our forces explicitly commanded a massive, crushing strategic advantage, yet driven entirely by his reckless, high-risk maneuvers, he coupled his life force to crash into a total double-demise alongside the Second Tsuchikage, forcing the village to..."
"Hey, hey, little girl! Your prose is an execution my presence flatly declines to process silently!" Gengetsu Hozuki's small mustache violently flared straight up into the air with deep irritation: "Exactly why on earth are the contemporary youth of the modern era this monumentally ungrateful? Had it not been for my personal presence choosing to covertly water down my combat parameters just a brief moment ago, my explosive volleys would have cleanly blasted your vessel into absolute fragments!"
Ryo rolled his dual eyes straight toward the canopy. As if your physical frame possessed the absolute clearance to override the Reanimation control parameters to govern your own movements.
Mei Terumi similarly refrained from launching an active verbal pushback; when all was said and done, the entity anchored within the water matrix constituted their sovereign historical Mizukage, making it highly unoptimized to aggressively argue his metrics.
Yet, Gengetsu Hozuki remained entirely unsatisfied.
"Regarding that specific first grand shinobi war of the ancient era, my presence commands a non-negligible volume of unvarnished commentary to articulate! My execution was fundamentally far from being a reckless, blind charge; rather, the Second Tsuchikage—Mu—that absolute bastard had completely lost his rational sanity, aggressively mobilizing every single scrap of his lifeforce single-mindedly desiring to force a total double-demise against my vessel. Heaven strictly withholds the data regarding what exact psychological demon had hijacked his matrix." Reaching this milestone of his breakdown, Gengetsu Hozuki actually manifested a minor trace of distinct internal grievance. Exactly what catastrophic blood feud or ancient grudge prompted an execution of that extreme caliber?
Ryo, however, burst into a relaxed, gentle laugh: "He was single-mindedly terrified that your tracking grid would razor-sharply expose his profound physical vulnerability. Back across Konoha Year 13, he deployed his specialized Fission Jutsu to successfully salvage a single drop of his life force beneath the descending storm of my Particle Style, yet the secondary fission proxy vessel was cleanly pulverized by my hands. The absolute fraction of a second your forces collided against the Hidden Stone Village down the chain, he had highly probable completely failed to restore his peak combat output."
Gengetsu Hozuki instantly fell into a state of absolute, dazed astonishment, murmuring under his breath: "I explicitly stated... so the logistical layout mapped out down that exact track! Negative, could your absolute presence genuinely constitute Ryo Uzumaki?!"
Ryo smoothly wove a helpless shake of his head. Looping the narrative back down that track, does it structurally imply this absolute melon had flatly declined to place his belief in my identity down to this exact fraction of a second?
Right at that exact fraction of a second, the oceanic surface beneath their boots violently generated a series of minor, rhythmic wave ripples. A short distance away, Mangetsu and Suigetsu wove a secondary shift to re-assume their massive water-monster configurations, aggressively hauling a towering twenty-meter-tall water pyramid to charge straight toward their coordinates.
Mei Terumi cast a thoroughly confused glance to audit the towering twenty-meter pyramid blanketing the horizon, shifting her focus back to scrutinize the highly compact, two-meter-tall water tower securely encasing Gengetsu Hozuki, before turning her wide-eyed gaze straight toward Ryo.
"Ahem, the First Mizukage's raw strength metrics sit at an monumentally high-tier vertex; crafting a minor water tower triggered a layer of internal anxiety that my seal might fail to securely anchor his matrix."
"Absolute nonsensical garbage! Exactly how on earth can the First Mizukage's prowess vertically eclipse my independent strength tier? Auditing this structural setup, could it possibly be that the dual of ancestral juniors representing my biological Hozuki lineage wove a flawed maneuver that aggressively offended your presence? As expected, your independent reputation matches the global rumors flawlessly—monumentally petty and narrow-mi... glub, glub, glub..."
Gengetsu Hozuki's prose was cleanly cut off right mid-sentence, as the internal matrix of the compact water tower encasing his frame was violently and completely flooded with high-density sea currents...
Ryo raised his eyebrows to a subtle degree, weaving his hand to seamlessly clear the fluid layer away: "Ah, my deepest, most absolute apologies. My personal presence single-mindedly desired to practically test whether an ancient predecessor representing the glorious Hozuki clan wove a flawless mastery over the Hydrification Technique. To think your matrix is completely devoid of the capability; your execution fails to match even those two small brats!"
Gengetsu Hozuki wove a sudden standstill, completely clamping his jaw shut into absolute silence.
A brief moment later, the Water Monster Brothers successfully hauled the colossal water pyramid straight to hit their coordinates, their physical stats thoroughly drained past normal recognition by the intense friction. Flanking their advance, the sole remaining member of the Hidden Mist's Ninja Swordsmen roster—Chojuro—walked across the water surface to touch down point-blank.
"Lord Mizukage, the ancient predecessors who were successfully sealed under the Senior's hands... emmm..." Chojuro stood completely, utterly dazed.
Mei Terumi wove a gentle laugh: "The data has been thoroughly parsed. Advance straight ahead to execute a casual rest block, Chojuro."
"Understood! Lord Mizukage!"
The Hozuki brothers simultaneously dispelled their water-monster configurations to re-assume their human frameworks, letting out a massive, sweeping sigh of relief. Catching sight of the highly compact water tower permanently anchoring Gengetsu Hozuki, their countenances experienced a violent shift. Suigetsu let out a soft murmur: "The global rumors detailing his monumentally unreliable character... are completely, flawlessly accurate."
Gengetsu Hozuki wove a sharp flare of his small mustache, his internal cognitive parameters dropping a silent, soaring validation: Spectacularly articulated, what a magnificent ancestral junior representing my biological Hozuki lineage!
Ryo wove a playful smile to glance across Suigetsu's coordinates, prompting the youth to frantically contract his neck parameters in pure, instinctual panic.
"Byakuren, have your memory tracks successfully dredged up the data to grasp exactly who anchors your flanks?"
"Ryo Uzumaki... the supreme Grand Elder governing the Uzumaki clan historically affiliated straight under Konoha's wing. To think your vessel commands this tier of absolute longevity, compounding the detail that your external physical aesthetics remain completely insulated from logging a single shred of weathered decay..."
"Patriarch First Kage, your strategic intelligence archives are completely, thoroughly bankrupt and outmoded. The Uzumaki clan has long since cleanly decoupled from Konoha's mantle to independently engineer our very own sovereign nation," Gengetsu Hozuki shook his head to cut him off.
"Lord Dual Mizukage, the contemporary shinobi world has officially transitioned into a structural framework where six independent major nations stand perfectly level alongside one another," Mei Terumi added a smooth explanation.
"As expected..."
Ryo raised his eyebrows: "Anchored straight under my sovereign leadership, the Land of Whirlpools will inevitably scale to an exponentially more affluent, formidable vertex. Mei Terumi, the catastrophic crisis besieging the Land of Water has been completely and cleanly leveled to absolute dust; down the subsequent timeline, your cognitive planning should flawlessly grasp the mandatory operational steps. The Old Ancestor charts a maximum-velocity transit block to navigate back to the Land of Whirlpools!"
Mei Terumi gave a firm nod: "Safe travels, Senior, my deepest gratitude for your high-powered flanking assist. Concluding a brief tactical rest window, I shall systematically coordinate our ninja forces to sprint across the waters to reinforce the Land of Earth!"
"...Exactly what prose did your vocal parameters articulate?!" Gengetsu Hozuki and Byakuren blurted out the exact same objection in perfect, overlapping unison.
A brilliant, radiant smile blanked across Ryo's features: "Precisely for this underlying reason, the Great Ancestor deployed a highly specific formulation to immutably seal your matrices, single-mindedly desiring to ensure your conscious awareness remains fully online to comprehensively map out the contemporary shinobi world."
"The times have completely changed, Byakuren. The supreme, absolute peace Hashirama Senju intensely yearned for back during the inaugural Five Kage Summit... will inevitably secure its absolute, terminal fulfillment under heaven!"
"The absolute peace Hashirama Senju yearned for... is it?"
A mere five continuous minutes later, Ryo successfully touched down straight back onto the northern frontier boundaries of the Land of Whirlpools.
This entire round-trip journey block coupled along the high-powered combat executions had expensed a scattered array of slightly past half an hour. Aside from the explicit reality that the designated reinforcement battalions deployed to back up the Hidden Cloud had cleanly executed their departure tracks, the northern frontier perimeters logged absolute zero fresh developments. Kushina and Naruto had turned monumentally bored, slumping their frames flat against the dirt in absolute, vacant stagnation...
Concurrently, Nagato had levitated his physical frame to hit these exact coordinates, having temporarily outsourced the administrative command governing the western frontier units straight to the Ninja Swordsmen roster.
"Well, Teacher, sifting through Kushina's informational brief, your mind single-mindedly dictates managing a maximum-scale relocation campaign to permanently transport the shinobi forces and civilian commoners native to the Hidden Hot Springs Village straight inside our Land of Whirlpools?"
Ryo gave a firm nod: "Mmm, accelerate your administrative planning to compile an airtight residential sector to comfortably settle their lines... Across this brief window of my absence, have your global tracking arrays intercepted a single drop of fresh strategic intelligence?"
A trace of distinct hesitation smoothly painted Nagato's face, yet prior to his vocal apparatus delivering a formal response, Kushina and Naruto wove a maximum-velocity sprint to touch down right beside their flanks.
"Great-Great-Grandpa, your velocity parameters managed a monumentally rapid return block! The adversaries completely declined to materialize, and... where on earth is Tsukika?"
"Tsukika?" Ryo murmured softly to himself, his facial muscles momentarily locking into a rigid, frozen knot. Waving his arm forward, he smoothly dissolved his spatial barrier to liberate Tsukika straight out from his pocket space... To think my cognitive planning had completely, thoroughly forgotten her presence inside the vault...
"Old Ancestor, that expended a monumentally immense duration of time, you know! Exactly what catastrophic anomaly struck the coordinates?" Tsukika's little mouth wove an monumentally high-tier, exaggerated pout.
"...The high-powered clash just a moment ago scaled to an exceptionally turbulent vertex; my internal safeguards prioritized insulating your vessel from sustaining structural trauma. Kushina, Naruto! Coordinate your movements immediately to escort Tsukika straight back inside the ramen shop sanctuary. The impending combat operations will inevitably scale to an exponentially more violent tier; it maps out as absolute optimal if Tsukika refrains from tracking along my flanks down the chain."
"...Very well, Old Ancestor."
Watching the trio smoothly execute their departure trajectory, Ryo wove an exceptionally grave, solemn rotation to face Nagato: "Exactly what transpired? That specific, un-articulable expression blanketing your features just a moment ago... does it cloak an active connection targeting their metrics?"
Nagato wove a highly peculiar, anomalous facial expression: "Well, negative. Senior, trouble your personal focus to independently audit these parameters."
Lifting his arm forward, he systematically handed over a massive, dense stack of paper slips—every single one constituting an active intelligence dispatch transmitted straight through the Land of Rain's communication relay.
Ryo knit his brows into a narrow slit to filter the first handful of rows, subsequent to which his brow smoothly unraveled into absolute clarity. Every single line packed inside the paper slips explicitly detailed a magnificent node of spectacular intelligence. For instance—the Land of Iron had proactively mobilized their samurai battalions to sprint straight to reinforce the Land of Lightning; the Hidden Waterfall Village had independently spearheaded an offensive blitz to reinforce the Land of Earth; the Hidden Grass Village had proactively deployed their units to supply a high-powered flanking shield to protect the Land of Wind...
"Wielding a repository of data formatting this caliber, what on earth prompted your execution to harbor that trace of internal hesitation? Articulate the metrics transparently!" Ryo shot a sharp, sidelong glare to check Nagato.
"Well, Teacher, my cognitive processing simply parses out that for these minor ninja villages to proactively step forward to supply high-powered military reinforcements to protect the major nations... maps out as an exceptionally bizarre, unique anomaly."
Ryo stood briefly startled. Precisely. Exactly when on earth had his own internal cognitive loops silently commenced processing a paradigm—where global nations historically choked by centuries of profound blood feuds and visceral hatred seamlessly coupled their military forces to aggressively safeguard one another—to operate as a perfectly normal, default baseline parameter under heaven?
Could it possibly be driven by the absolute, crushing existential dread manufactured by the Dark Akatsuki's presence? Or was it a testament to the slow, relentless, generational paradigm shift anchored by the Akatsuki organization's historical operations?
"Yahiko's burning, high-minded efforts to forge absolute peace have ultimately successfully delivered a spectacular layer of contribution, haven't they. The times... have genuinely, thoroughly changed!"
☆☆☆
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