Eventually, Minato and Kushina finished the operation.
Every last Suna operative was eliminated, their mission site cleared.
The captured bodies, especially the suspected ANBU leader, were sealed and transferred to the interrogation division, where the Yamanaka specialists stationed on this front would extract whatever intelligence they could through memory and spirit probing.
Once the formalities were done, Minato and Kushina moved to a quiet ridge overlooking the river, taking a rare moment to breathe.
The air was still heavy with the scent of water, but the sounds of battle had faded into distant echoes.
Kushina exhaled slowly, rolling her shoulders.
"That's it then. The entire reinforcement unit was wiped out. This was one of their main elite divisions, you know. If the intel's right, they were also supposed to break through and flank our supply line."
Minato nodded, his gaze calm but thoughtful. "Exactly. If they'd succeeded, Suna could've turned this whole front around. Now, they've got nothing left to push with."
She grinned, brushing a lock of red hair from her face. "So this means we basically broke the backbone of their army here, huh? Not bad for one afternoon's work."
Minato smiled faintly. "It's more than that. The command will move faster now. Once this spreads, their morale will crash. From here on, the momentum's ours. The war on this front might end sooner than anyone expected."
Kushina's grin widened. "Heh, good. The sooner this is over, the sooner we get to go home."
"Yeah," Minato said softly, the faintest relief in his tone. "But until then, we keep moving."
He sat beside her, glancing over the battlefield below. "You also handled that perfectly," he said with his usual calm tone.
"At this point, I'd say you've already stepped into Kage-level territory, and that's without even tapping into the Nine-Tails' chakra."
Kushina gave a small, amused snort. "Heh, coming from you, that actually sounds like a compliment." She leaned back on her hands, eyes on the setting sun. "Guess we're both growing faster than we thought."
Minato smiled faintly. "It's not luck. It's the result of training and teamwork."
She laughed softly. "You and your modest answers. Honestly… I never expected you'd end up being the factor in this war. The Yellow Flash of Konoha makes you sound like some unstoppable legend already."
Minato rubbed the back of his neck, clearly embarrassed. "Don't exaggerate. I just do what I have to."
Kushina smirked and looked at him sideways. "Sure, sure. Hard to believe, though, just look at you now. You've come a long way from that shy kid who couldn't even confess until after saving me like some big hero."
Minato chuckled quietly, shaking his head. "I remember. You were a lot scarier back then."
"Still am," she said, grinning.
They shared a small laugh, a rare light moment in the middle of war.
For a brief while, the tension of the battlefield faded, replaced by something quieter, understanding, pride, and the faint trace of warmth between two people who'd survived too much together to need words.
Kushina glanced at him after a pause, her smile thinning a little.
"Actually, it's not just because my technique's gotten sharper, as you said..." she said quietly. "It's also… the fox, still. But, you should know that already."
Minato didn't argue, just nodded slightly, understanding.
In truth, both of them knew the reason her strength had grown so rapidly, since the war started, wasn't only refinement or battlefield experience.
Back on the Iwa front, under the mounting pressure of the war, initially, Jiraiya said it was allowed and had helped loosen her Jinchūriki seal slightly.
The decision probably wasn't made lightly.
Because the Eight Trigrams Seal, which she had from the beginning, transcribed by the great Mito Uzumaki herself beforehand, during her last years, was an Uzumaki masterpiece, because it was designed to keep the beast in, but let the chakra flow outward safely.
It was the most stable and refined Jinchūriki seal among all the great villages, allowing its host to draw on the tailed beast's power way more efficiently but also safely than any other without risking loss of control or sanity to the same extent.
Since that day, a faint stream of the Nine-Tails' power had always been leaking into her chakra system.
It wasn't visible, not even to sensors; it simply made her natural reserves seem even more impossibly vast.
Her Adamantine Sealing Chains, especially when deployed in such advanced and large-scale combat formations like the previous one: trapping, attacking, and binding nearly a hundred enemy elites, simultaneously, consumed a staggering amount of chakra, even more than Minato's Flying Raijin activations at that time.
Without the fox's constant flow beneath her seal, it would've been impossible to maintain them on such a scale.
That wasn't to say she couldn't go further with the Nine-Tails powers in special circumstances.
During the earlier Iwa campaigns, for example, before Minato had perfected his own technique and set the record straight fully for Konoha's side, there had been moments when her emotions spiked and the seal had fractured under the strain and urgency of their operations.
She'd briefly entered the first stage of the tailed cloak, her body and chakra tails bubbling, red and feral.
In those moments, Minato and Jiraiya had been forced to restrain her and repair the seal after the dangerous battles were over.
Once, however, it had gone even beyond that, slipping toward Version Two, when her entire form began to distort more, and the Kyuubi's instincts clawed at the edges of her mind more than ever before.
It had nearly consumed her at the time, but Minato's prompt sealing mastery and their highest emotional bond had pulled her back before it was too late.
Now, after months of refinement and control, she could handle that steady tailed-beast current with ease.
It was what made her chains so powerful and unrelenting today, what allowed her to crush so many enemies without a pause.
Minato knew it too, but chose not to say it aloud.
Instead, he only smiled faintly, watching her out of the corner of his eye as she stared off toward the river, the faint light of dusk flickering over her red hair.
Meanwhile, somewhere deep beneath the calm surface, the fox's power also stirred, quiet, obedient, and waiting.
Kushina stretched her arms behind her head, the tension easing from her shoulders. "You know," she said with a teasing grin, "with achievements like this, if you don't become the next Hokage, then who would?"
Minato chuckled softly, shaking his head. "The war's not over yet," he replied in his calm, modest tone. "There'll be time for that later. Right now, we still have work to do."
But before Kushina could shoot back another remark, the air around him shifted. His chakra flared for a brief instant—then vanished.
The grass where Minato had been sitting flattened from the sudden pull of displacement.
"Minato?" Kushina blinked, looking around quickly.
Her hand instinctively reached for her pouch—her fingers brushing against one of his marked kunai.
Her heart eased slightly.
If something had gone wrong, he could always teleport back.
A few seconds passed. Nothing.
Her relief began to fade, replaced by a faint prickle of worry.
"Minato, what are you doing…?" she muttered under her breath, scanning the area with her sensory field.
His chakra was nowhere nearby.
Then it clicked.
She straightened, eyes narrowing slightly as realization dawned. "Mount Myōboku…"
Of course. He had signed the toad contract years ago, under Jiraiya's guidance.
Reverse summoning would explain everything—someone from Myōboku must've called him.
Still, she exhaled sharply through her nose, a faint scowl tugging at her lips. "Could've warned me first, idiot," she said quietly.
Then, her expression softened just as fast.
A small, knowing smile formed. "But fine. If it's the toads, it must be important."
She stood, wind brushing through her hair, looking toward the horizon where the sun was dipping lower. "Just don't take too long, or I'm coming after you myself."