"Roar!"
The Gedo Mazo's true form!
As the Divine Tree was summoned, its shape began to shift violently. In the blink of an eye, the towering celestial tree transformed into a monstrous, skeletal entity. Ten tails uncoiled from its back, thrashing wildly through the air and whipping the atmosphere into a frenzy.
"Holy crap, the Ten-Tails?" members of the Shinobi Guild cried out in shock.
The Divine Tree had always been the physical vessel of the Ten-Tails, but this version was different. Having been modified and reconstructed, it appeared far more menacing and robust than the original.
The Demon Mother Tree's branches trembled, emitting a piercing, dissonant screech. "What... what is this thing?"
It sensed an utterly repulsive aura emanating from the Divine Tree—a primal enmity that made it want to tear the newcomer apart instantly. Without hesitation, it acted.
The Demon Mother Tree unleashed a tide of vines, each one imbued with various Devil Fruit powers. The sheer force of the onslaught was meant to shred the Divine Tree into splinters.
Uchiha Madara's lips curled into a smirk. His fingers blurred as he wove a series of rapid hand signs.
"Gedo Chains!"
Spectral chakra chains erupted from the Divine Tree, lashing out to meet the encroaching vines.
Boom!
The vines were violently repelled. Before the Mother Tree could recoil, more chakra chains shot forth, binding its massive trunk and dragging it forward with irresistible force.
Watching the live broadcast, the ninjas of the Guild were frozen in disbelief. Was Madara treating the Demon Mother Tree like a Tailed Beast? Was he actually planning to seal it away?
Rumble!
The Demon Mother Tree was decisive. Its trunk suddenly shattered into countless fragments, slipping through the gaps of the chains before reforming into its gargantuan shape a safe distance away.
Madara didn't seem bothered by the failure. "Phantom Dragons Nine Seal!"
The Gedo Mazo unhinged its jaw, exhaling several spectral chakra dragons that lunged toward the Mother Tree, teeth bared. The Demon Mother Tree countered by erupting with a barrage of high-intensity Devil Fruit abilities, obliterating the spectral dragons mid-air.
"A clash between the primordial origins of two different worlds, eh?" Lin Xuan remarked, rubbing his chin with a faint smile. "Though it looks like the current Divine Tree still can't quite suppress the Mother Tree's abilities."
Under normal circumstances, the modified Divine Tree could nullify Devil Fruit powers. When CP9 had raided the Sabaody Archipelago, they had been rendered powerless simply by being within the reach of its roots. However, that suppression seemed ineffective against the Mother Tree itself.
Lin Xuan surmised it was a matter of authority. Users "borrowed" power from the demons within the fruits, which ultimately traced back to the Mother Tree. You couldn't easily use a derivative power to suppress the source.
Boom!
The sky shook as the two titans traded blows. The sheer pressure tore through the fabric of space, sending chaotic currents surging through the cracks. Suddenly, a Tailed Beast Bomb began condensing in the Mazo's maw. It fired—a sphere of pure destruction that struck like a world-ending thunderclap.
The blast shattered the Mother Tree's defenses, carving a massive hole through its trunk. In retaliation, the Mother Tree's counterattack gouged deep furrows into the Divine Tree's bark.
Madara let out a cold, sharp laugh. He hadn't summoned the Divine Tree just to trade blows. He had been observing. He noticed that the damage dealt by the Divine Tree wasn't regenerating instantly like the damage from his previous attacks.
Since that was the case...
Madara's hands flew into another sequence of signs. Watching the screen, Uchiha Itachi and the others turned pale.
"That's... the Six Paths Ten-Tails Coffin Seal!"
"What the hell is Madara thinking?" the members of the Akatsuki shouted.
The Six Paths Ten-Tails Coffin Seal was the ultimate technique to absorb the Ten-Tails into one's own body, turning the user into its Jinchuriki. But there was a glaring problem: Madara was currently a Reanimated Corpse. A soul tied to a fake body shouldn't be able to merge with the Divine Tree.
In the original history, Madara had to be fully resurrected before he could become the Jinchuriki.
Ignoring the laws of the past, Madara finished the sequence and landed atop the Divine Tree.
"Six Paths Ten-Tails Coffin Seal!"
A deafening roar filled the air as the Divine Tree began to shrink rapidly, spiraling into Madara's back and merging into his form.
The Shinobi Guild was stunned. How was a Reanimated body absorbing the Divine Tree's power?
Namikaze Minato immediately sent a message to the Trans-Dimensional Chat Group, asking Lin Xuan for an explanation.
Lin Xuan smiled and typed back: "In the past, it would have been impossible. But now? It's different."
He didn't keep them in suspense. "This is a result of Orochimaru's research. He extracted unique substances from Devil Fruits and integrated them into the Divine Tree during its modification. This gave it some of the characteristics of the Demon Mother Tree."
"This Divine Tree is no longer the one from the Shinobi World. It possesses a trait that allows it to bridge the gap between life and death. That's why it can suppress Fruit users."
"To put it simply, the tree itself has 'eaten' a colossal, synthetic Devil Fruit. It has gained special properties without being possessed by an actual demon. It is a bridge between two systems of reality."
----------
T/N:
You'll also get 5 extra chapters just for being a free member!
Access 40 chapters in advance on my Patreon: [email protected]//allbluestories