Not a moment to mourn the previous episode's ending—the next installment of Road to Ninja: Naruto the Movie was already here!
While the audience howled in agony at having to wait another seven years, in front of Hanabi those "seven years" had already passed.
The two worlds ran on different time scales, so Hanabi got to see the new episode immediately.
The Stage knew its cliffhangers.
"How exactly did you return to the world of the living? I'm very curious. Your body right now is identical to your real one—it makes me think of those legendary forbidden ninjutsu I'd always assumed were just myths."
Orochimaru licked his lips.
"Orochimaru. What are you really after? Do you want to seize control of the Hidden Leaf?" Kushina asked in a low voice.
"Hahaha. Compared to the Leaf, what I want right now—is you!"
Orochimaru burst into laughter.
[So you're a wife-stealer too, huh!]
[The mood was being built up just fine, but forgive me—I burst out laughing]
[The script's actually pretty serious]
[Agreed with the above. Orochimaru's clearly a callback to Yamata no Orochi. Kushinadahime is sometimes also rendered Kushiinada-hime—and yeah, the surname element "Kushi" lines up]
[Yamata no Orochi wants Kushinadahime. Checks out]
In the legend, Yamata no Orochi devoured one human being a year, and the next on the menu had been Kushinadahime.
Checks out.
Except this particular Kushinadahime had a Golden-Furred White-Faced Nine-Tailed Fox stuffed inside her, and this Yamata no Orochi was packing the Sword of Kusanagi—which made the picture rather delicate.
"There's no point continuing this. You disgust me, Orochimaru!" Kushina decided to stop indulging the man.
"Hehe. Hahaha. Excellent! Then I'll just have to study you in person!"
Orochimaru released his full killing intent. This was no longer the playful sparring from earlier.
But Kushina wasn't intimidated. With the Nine-Tails' power supporting her, the Kushina in Nine-Tails Chakra Mode shrugged off the pressure entirely.
In a single instant, Kushina was on Orochimaru, driving a fist toward his face.
Orochimaru's taijutsu was no slouch—he was skilled with his bare hands. But against this version of Kushina, even he was struggling.
Kushina's strikes came down like a dragon. The Nine-Tails' chakra made every fist heavy and ferocious, and each blow drove Orochimaru into deeper pressure.
A single dash carried him out of range, where he switched to ninjutsu.
"Temporary Paralysis Technique."
Orochimaru tried to lock Kushina down, but countless chains erupted from her back. The Adamantine Sealing Chains came swarming in from every direction. Orochimaru had to abandon his seals and parry with the Sword of Kusanagi.
While Naruto had been training, Kushina had been quietly watching.
Hanabi's mastery over rope-based weapons had given Adamantine Sealing Chains a real upgrade.
What had originally been a pure sealing technique was now both offense and defense.
With Orochimaru pinned in place, Kushina formed a Rasengan in her hand and bore down on him again.
The Rasengan had originally been modeled on the Tailed Beast Ball, and pumping tailed-beast chakra into the technique made it effectively a miniature Tailed Beast Ball.
The Tailed Beast Ball itself was the closest thing the shinobi world had to a nuclear weapon.
The Tailed Beast Rasengan bloomed in her grip, casting off light terrifying enough to rival the sun.
Orochimaru darted backward, conjuring snakes to wrap around Kushina's legs.
But Kushina didn't need to move. Her chakra reshaped into Tailed Beast Chakra Arms and lunged for Orochimaru on its own.
"Summoning: Triple Rashōmon!"
Orochimaru immediately threw up his most powerful defense. Three massive gates rose between them—but the Tailed Beast Rasengan smashed straight through and slammed into him.
"Tch."
The instant the strike landed, Kushina knew. It was just a Body Replacement.
The Triple Rashōmon hadn't blocked the Rasengan, but it had bought Orochimaru just enough time for one body replacement.
Feeling Kushina's pressure mounting, Orochimaru transformed into a giant python and erupted out of the ground behind her.
A chakra tail flared from Kushina's back and slammed Orochimaru aside, smacking him clean out of the python's body.
"Summoning Technique!"
Orochimaru flooded the area with snakes.
"It won't work!"
Kushina charged in with another Rasengan, transformed into a streak of lightning, weaving through the snake horde like a thunderbolt.
The clash between them tore through the Forest of Death with ferocious shockwaves. The whole area rolled with a wave-and-thunder fury.
Hanabi didn't even need to monitor the Stage's video feed. From a distance, simply gazing across the forest and feeling the ground tremble beneath her feet, she could read the entire battle between Kushina and Orochimaru.
"But Orochimaru hasn't summoned Manda yet? Or did he decide Manda wouldn't be much help in this fight?"
Watching Kushina wield the Rasengan, Hanabi found herself thinking it through.
In the original story, Kushina hadn't really been seen using the Rasengan—although in the games she did get a Supreme Ultimate Rasengan as her ultimate. Still, it made perfect sense for Kushina to know the move. The Rasengan had been built to mimic the Tailed Beast Ball, and Minato had created the technique with Kushina in mind, specifically to help her gain control over the Tailed Beast Ball's power.
In the original story, Tsunade had even said that Naruto's personality and ninjutsu were almost identical to his mother's—and the only real techniques Naruto knew at the time were Shadow Clones and the Rasengan.
For the record, the name "Rasengan" had been Kushina's idea.
The fight stretched on.
The Stage stayed generous with the budget, dedicating an entire episode to the battle.
At first the audience was firing off danmaku like "look at this animation budget go." By the end, even they had gone numb.
The Stage layered in additional effects too, and the duel between the two became literally a streaking blaze of fire and lightning—dazzling beyond any reasonable measure.
It wasn't until someone finally typed "Damn, how am I supposed to watch any other anime after this," that the dazed audience snapped back to themselves.
—Right. With their tastes spoiled this hard, what were they supposed to watch next?
"Good response."
Hanabi never once stepped on screen, but her popularity points were ticking steadily upward. By the end of the single episode, she had pulled in five-figure popularity points.
The fight ran on. Orochimaru remained tough and unbreaking. Every time Kushina was about to land a clean hit, he slipped out of it with the Orochimaru-Style Body Replacement Technique.
By this point Kushina had practically transformed into pure radiance. It wasn't the Yellow Flash of the Leaf, but it might as well have been.
Except the color, here, belonged to the Nine-Tails Chakra Mode.
Their attacks crashed into each other again and again, sending up surging air pressure. The entire forest shook in tremors.
This wasn't even ninjutsu anymore. It was pure taijutsu.
"You weren't this strong when you were alive." Orochimaru wiped a streak of blood from the corner of his mouth.
"Something's not right." Kushina's expression had gone strange. "Orochimaru… are you really Orochimaru?"
"Oh my, oh my. We can't reveal that secret just yet."
Dropping too much exposition on the audience all at once would be a mistake.
The audience had been thoroughly entertained for an entire episode now. Hanabi figured it was about time to end this fight.