Only the lingering, eerie aura in the air, the residual shockwaves of Karin's demonic chakra surge, and the faint, lingering dread left behind by the Divine River Crab's overwhelming pressure proved that the events of the past few minutes—events powerful enough to overturn anyone's understanding of the world—had truly occurred.
More than ten seconds passed before someone finally spoke, his voice dry as sandpaper, like a man muttering in a dream.
"I… I must've been dreaming just now, right? Heh… I saw… a giant crab…"
"No… it wasn't a dream…" another shinobi replied, trembling, his face pale as paper. "Because… I saw it too…"
"My God…" More people gradually regained their senses, their faces filled with lingering terror and disbelief. "First that man-eating Ōtsutsuki Graywhite… then that… giant crab… These are existences that never even appeared in the Heavenly Curtain!"
"Not just a giant crab—call it the Divine River Crab!"
A slightly steadier chūnin corrected them, awe clear in his voice.
"Even if Ōtsutsuki Graywhite didn't directly appear in the Heavenly Curtain, he's definitely one of the beings it implied—those who treat us shinobi as 'ingredients'!"
"…I don't even know how many of those Ōtsutsuki there are…" another shinobi collapsed onto the ground, eyes hollow. "If there are too many… then we really are just meat on the chopping block…"
Despair began spreading once again.
"W-We shouldn't be too pessimistic, right?" a younger shinobi tried to rally morale, though his own voice shook. "Isn't there still… the Divine River Crab?"
"Didn't Graywhite scream before he died? That if you mess around in other worlds, it'll come! That… sounds like it enforces some kind of rule, doesn't it?"
"That's… all we can hope for," an older shinobi said bitterly. "At least it didn't seem interested in us. And it took Wangcai away… Does that count as removing a potential world-ending threat?"
That reminded everyone.
Terrifying though the process had been, and unclear though the ending remained—
The "Natural Enemy of Chakra" that might have escaped and become unstoppable… seemed to have been removed, at least for now.
And the terrifying Ōtsutsuki who treated shinobi as food… had been casually eliminated by the Divine River Crab.
Blessing or calamity?
It was impossible to tell.
"Right!" An Anbu responsible for intelligence recording suddenly jumped up, urgency flashing in his eyes. "Did we record everything that just happened?! Video! Audio! Any kind of data?!"
"Yes! Yes!"
Several shinobi scrambled to check their equipment.
"I got it on an encrypted recording device! Some parts might be blurry, but the key events are there!" shouted a shinobi from a technologically advanced village.
"I've got automatic backups from the battlefield recorder!"
The shinobi who had survived the ordeal immediately threw themselves into gathering and organizing their "spoils."
What had happened today was brief—but the information contained within it was staggering.
The appearance and annihilation of Ōtsutsuki Graywhite.
The terrifying might and possible "enforcer" identity of the Divine River Crab.
Karin's setback and disappearance.
Wangcai being taken away without explanation.
Each point alone was enough to trigger a new wave of upheaval across the shinobi world.
When the Five Kage and their elite reinforcement units arrived at the desolate basin—rushing at full speed in anticipation of an impending world-ending crisis—
They did not find mountains of corpses, raging energy storms, Karin's arrogant laughter, or the horrifying spectacle of Wangcai breaking free.
Instead—
It was… lively.
Hundreds of stationed shinobi were not on high alert. Instead, they stood in clusters, passionately discussing something. Shock, lingering fear, confusion—and even a strange post-survival exhilaration—were written across their faces.
Some surrounded recording devices, replaying footage repeatedly.
Others sketched on the ground, attempting to reconstruct energy trajectories.
A few simply sat collapsed on the earth, eyes unfocused, as if their minds had yet to process the impact.
"Can someone tell me what the hell happened here?!"
Ōnoki floated forward, beard bristling, voice full of irritation.
At his age, he had nearly risked his life rushing here at top speed after receiving the alert—only to see his subordinates holding what looked like a discussion forum?
Outrageous!
Tsunade, A, Mei Terumī, and Rasa exchanged uneasy glances.
With their sensory abilities fully extended, they detected no ongoing battle nor large-scale casualties—only faint, deeply unsettling residual energy fluctuations lingering in the air.
Seeing their respective Kage arrive, the stationed shinobi snapped back to order and hurriedly reported what had happened, voices overlapping in a chaotic flood of shock and awe.
"Silence! Report in order! Bring me the most complete footage!" Tsunade barked, rubbing her temple.
Soon, after consolidation and selection, a relatively complete playback was projected before the Five Kage and a handful of core leaders.
The footage rolled:
From Karin manipulating the crowd—
To Graywhite's eerie appearance and consumption of a shinobi—
To the Divine River Crab descending from nowhere, crushing Graywhite instantly, swatting Karin aside, seizing Wangcai—
And finally departing as mysteriously as it had arrived.
The entire event lasted only a few minutes.
But the density of information, the shock of the spectacle, the incomprehensible level of power—
Made the expressions of the world's strongest shinobi shift rapidly.
Shock.
Horror.
Disbelief.
Sudden realization.
Lingering fear.
Relief.
And, above all—deep unease.
Silence stretched long and heavy.
"So…"
Tsunade broke it first. Her voice was cold as ice. Her emerald eyes fixed on the frozen frame of Graywhite transforming a shinobi into a chakra fruit and swallowing it whole.
"You're saying that something which treats our world… and us shinobi… as a garden to harvest and process at will… truly exists."
"Ōtsutsuki Graywhite…"
Her tone was steady—but beneath it surged restrained fury and killing intent.
She had only recently learned of the Ōtsutsuki Clan from Jiraiya.
Ōtsutsuki… the same clan as Kaguya Ōtsutsuki.
Which meant—
The same lineage as the Sage of Six Paths.
So.
The Sage of Six Paths really does have a problem.
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