The two men, each leading a group of subordinates, stepped onto the scorched land.
Their names, Senju Gouki and Sarutobi Kyosuke.
Nashi blankly turned towards the approaching interloopers, looking at them as if they were but mere lambs to the slaughter.
Gouki and Kyosuke, rather than being unsettled, found themselves more relieved.
'Thankfully, this evil spirit underestimates us.' The Senju leader thought.
'With that abominable genjutsu of hers, extracting the sealing approach from the heads of the previous guys would be simple but, just as expected, this monster never even bothered to look.' The Sarutobi leader mused.
He was correct.
If Nanashi had been so inclined, extracting information using the Tsukyomi to allow for days of interrogation time would be extremely easy but a weapon, a mere tool like it, did not even consider such human matters like plans and motivations.
It was simply not its place to do so as per its masters' instructions.
In line with this logic, the way Nanashi employed Tsukuyomi ran completely opposite to the way it was used by Uchiha Itachi in the future.
Itachi dilated time within the Tsukuyomi world, making an instant stretch out for days in the anime and even years in one of his novels. He used this time to spiritually attack and torture his opponents.
Nanashi did the exact opposite.
It manipulated the sensation of time within her Tsukuyomi so her victims did not notice its passing at all.
In other words, Itachi made an instant feel like days while Nanashi made days feel like an instant.
With their perception slowed to a crawl, the Uchiha's living weapon could just casually walk up to and kill them without resistance.
Sure, this type of use meant Tsukyomi could not directly take out opponents, could not be used for interrogation and made it vulnerable to standard genjutsu breaking tactics like allied help.
But regarding the first point, Nanashi had far more efficient ways to kill.
Regarding the second, interrogation was not the concern of a weapon.
And regarding the third and last point, Engraved Tsukuyomi, unlike the regular version, could easily and efficiently entrap entire swathes of enemies so there would be no allies to free someone trapped in genjutsu because they would be trapped alongside them.
All this to say, Nanashi's way of doing things was optimized for efficient killing, not discovering enemy plots, making her theoretically vulnerable to the kind of dastardly plot the Senju and Sarutobi were planning . . .
This however, was on the condition that they could survive the colossal gap in power until their plan could be implemented.
. . .
No words were exchanged.
Nanshi was not interested while her enemies already knew there was no point to it.
Besides Gouki and Kyosuke, they each brought six clan shinobi to support them.
Four of the Senju hung back with four of the Sarutobi to cover them while the leaders each took their two strongest subordinates as support and charged.
'Fire Release: Fire Dragon Flame Bullet'
Sarutobi Kyosuke immediately unleashed one of his clan's signature jutsu, spitting out three fiery dragons to assault Nanashi from tricky angles.
It was a jutsu famous for the high difficulty of dodging it.
The only viable option was to take or counter the jutsu with ninjutsu of your own, thus forcing most opponents to stop moving.
Emphasis on "most".
Dashing forward into the flame, a crimson skeletal giant formed around Nanashi, allowing the living weapon to barrel through the blaze without a single singed strand of hair.
From the immediate use of Susanno, it was clear that the Uchiha was taking this new wave of opponents far more seriously than the previous one.
'Kagutsuchi: Yasaka Beads'
The signature ranged attack of the Susanno, the Yasaka Beads but enveloped by the inextinguishable black flames of Amaterasu.
Nine of them were launched in pinpoint, Sharingan guided attacks.
Three at Gouki as his supports, three at Kyousuke and his supports and three at the backline that stayed out of the battle but not out of Nanashi's mind.
Everyone was elite though and as such, despite some of them cutting very sorry figures with awkward dive rolls, all of Senju and Sarutobi shinobi survived the attack.
Gouki and Kyousuke shared a look and their thoughts aligned.
'We'll need to bet our lives in pressuring this monster if we want her to ignore the backline squad, long enough for us to put the plan into motion.'
This time, Gouki took the lead.
'Earth Release: Earth Spear'
Both he and his two supporting subordinates used the same jutsu, darkening their skin to near pitch black with concentrated earth chakra in order to increase their physical toughness and ninjutsu resistance.
Although pushing Earth Spear to such a degree heavily taxed even Senju shinobi, it also means that they were practically invulnerable to everything other than Lightning Release until their chakra ran out.
But that was in a regular battlefield against regular, even skilled shinobi.
And Nanashi was many things but regular was not one of them.
A red chakra blade manifested in the skeletal Susanno's hand and muscle fibers threaded themselves across its bones.
Despite their increased protection Gouki and his cohort felt the threat of death chilling their very soul.
With a big sweeping flash of the giant blade, they were immediately forced to abandon their charge and jump away.
But they were now mid air, in full view of Nanashi's deadly Mangekyo . . .
'Fire Release: Blazing Meteors'
From three different directions, Kyosuke and his two subordinates spat out a hail of fireballs at the Uchiha.
Useless against the Susanno . . . But enough to harass and block Nanashi's sightline.
Exchanges like this repeated over and over again.
The living weapon of the Uchiha constantly generated opportunities to take out one group but the other always came in time to save them.
But against an untiring Nanashi, how long could they hold out?
'Fire Release: Susanno - Dragon Flame Song'
Using her crimson construct as a ninjutsu amplifier, Nanashi made it spit out a barrage of dragon shaped fireballs that twisted and turned erratically through the air.
The regular Dragon Flame Song was already notorious for its power and difficulty of dodging it but with its scale massively increased by the Susanno, it alone was enough to force Kyosuke and his two cohorts to pour all of their efforts into preserving their own lives.
This left the Uchiha with a short window of time to deal with the Senju trio.
Nanashi did not bother with any pretense.
'Engraved Tsukuyomi'
With a massive burst of ocular power, all three were immediately paralyzed by a red flashing light of genjutsu projected from the weapon's left eye, their thoughts slowing to a crawl.
And then its right eye began dripping blood.
'Amaterasu'
Black flames lit the bodies of the three Senju as the genjutsu holding them broke.
Without wasting a beat, Nanashi turned towards the Sarutobi trio who had only now managed to fend off her Susanno - Dragon Flame Song greeting them with an unflinching barrage of Yasaka Beads.
It was a mind shattering sequence of high level ninjutsu and with it, Nanashi eliminated the foes attacking her in one fell swoop . . .
But they had not been the only ones to arrive at the battlefield . . . had they?
+++++
Hey, Author here!
To promote the novel I will be releasing BONUS CHAPTERS on SUNDAYS based on the previous week's power stone count.
100 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter
500 Power Stones = 2 Bonus Chapters
1000 Power Stones = 3 Bonus Chapters
Every earned BONUS CHAPTER on Webnovel will also be posted on Scribble.
Just a reminder that you can read up to a FULL MONTH ahead of this site on pa-treon.
I'm trying to become a full time Author now and I'm not going to be starting any new novels just so I can make sure this one is properly completed.
Find those sweet advanced chapters on pa-treon.com/lusoba without the -