vstars Chapter 523 The villain is truly vicious; Konoha is filled with sorrow and despair.
Chapter 523 The villain is truly vicious; Konoha is filled with sorrow and despair.
The number of survivors is decreasing rapidly.
From nearly 10,000 at the start of the war, to 5,000, to 3,000, and now to less than 1,000.
Exhaustion and despair were etched on the faces of all the ninjas, but no one stopped.
Gritting their teeth, they dragged their wounded comrades and retreated step by step towards the Land of Fire.
The ninjas from Takigakure Village pursued them relentlessly, and they couldn't shake them off no matter what they did.
Beyond that lies the border of the Land of Fire.
The Konoha ninjas saw the boundary marker, which bore the symbol of the Land of Fire—a simple flame emblem that now seemed particularly glaring.
This is their land, and they have retreated to their doorstep.
"Lady Tsunade, are we really going to die here?" Kurenai Yuhi leaned against Asuma Sarutobi, now completely exhausted and unable to even stand.
Tsunade remained silent, for she had nothing to say. The slugs had been summoned back and redistributed among the Konoha ninja to heal their minor injuries. But while the physical wounds healed easily, the mental and physical exhaustion was much harder to recover from.
Just then, their proud First Hokage was defeated, his massive Wood Release body torn apart. His Impure World Body was also ambushed, shattered, and reformed repeatedly.
Kakuzu's lie that he was once evenly matched with the First Hokage has finally been exposed.
On the other side, Lady Mito Uzumaki stood in front of Shirai Uzumaki. Although the two were evenly matched in strength and skill, their methods were also comparable.
However, the Nine-Tails' chakra within her body was visibly depleted, and her body was restrained by the Adamantine Chains, which she could only intercept by constantly self-harming, breaking down, and reassembling.
But how long can it really hold on? Nobody knows.
Hiruzen Sarutobi and Jiraiya's side were holding off the main force, led by Naoto, whose strength was neither too great nor too weak, and supported by Fuuka's Angry Waves. As for the Sarutobi clan ninjas around them, they were blown to pieces by Deidara's unrestrained attacks.
They're all about to die!
Their situation wasn't much better. Two swordsmen, surrounding a man who looked like a merchant, led hundreds of swordsmen and blocked their last path.
They might really be going to die!
This was Tsunade's truest thought at that moment.
"Everyone, stop!" Tsunade shouted. "We have nowhere left to retreat. Behind us lies our homeland. The people we protect, our loved ones, live there."
"All you Konoha ninjas with guts, stand up! We'll fight to the very end, even if we shed our last drop of blood, we'll tear off a piece of flesh from the enemy!"
In an instant, more than 300 ninjas simultaneously formed hand seals, their chakra burning within them, transforming into an insurmountable human wall that blocked the path of the Takigakure pursuers.
"Yes, Lord Godai!" someone cried out.
"We won't leave, we'll fight alongside you!"
"We haven't lost yet! The First Lord is still holding on!"
"Behind us are our family, our friends, and the villagers living in the Land of Fire. We cannot abandon them!"
The Konoha ninjas, their eyes red and their bodies aching, still picked up their last weapons. But in reality, it wasn't like that at all; there was no way out!
Just then, a calm and unhurried voice came from the Takigakure village group.
"Haha, villagers? Family? Friends?"
Surrounded by his son's guards, Ryuji Ida slowly walked forward, a cruel smile on his face. "Well, they're probably all dead by now."
He took out a projection bug from his pocket and gently tapped it. A beam of light shot out from the projection bug, unfolding into a huge image in the sky.
The scene depicts Konoha (the Leaf Village).
To be precise, it was the ruins of Konoha.
In the sky, a huge steel fortress hovered, its cannons still emitting blue smoke.
On the ground, a giant Buddha clad in silver armor was battling a steel fortress. The Buddha's thousand arms swung, each strike leaving deep dents in the fortress's outer shell.
The scene looks very exciting and thrilling.
However, upon closer inspection, it can be seen that the battle took place above Konoha, and Konoha itself is almost unrecognizable from its original state.
The Hokage Rock was cut in half, and only half of the faces of the four Hokage remained.
The streets disappeared, replaced by bottomless ravines and countless bomb craters of all sizes.
The building was reduced to ruins, overgrown with vines and trees—remnants of Wood Release.
Metal slag and shell fragments were scattered all over the ground, reflecting a ghastly white light in the firelight.
Occasionally, shadowy figures can be seen in the footage—not living people, but corpses.
There were civilians, ninjas, the elderly, and children.
Their bodies lay scattered among the ruins, some burned to a crisp, others blown to pieces.
Underneath many collapsed houses, only a pale hand, a thigh, or half a mangled head could be seen.
There might still be some living people, but almost none of them survive.
The battlefield fell into a deathly silence.
All the Konoha ninjas stared intently at the light screen, at the land in the image where they had grown up, now turned into a living hell.
Some people knelt on the ground, covering their faces, tears streaming through their fingers. Someone let out a wild howl, a sound that seemed inhuman, the pain like that of a bird of prey whose spine and limbs had been shattered.
His hand gripping the weapon trembled violently, and blood dripped from his bitten lips onto the ground.
Some people couldn't help but bend over and gag.
Why have they endured so much until now?
Isn't it because they have loved ones to care about, because they want to protect their families and friends, and protect the people of Konoha from being trampled by the demons of the Land of Waterfall?
But now everything is destroyed!
Their lifelong emotional bonds and the precious things they wanted to protect were directly destroyed by this group of inhuman and heartless demons!
Vicious! You demons are truly wicked!
"You broke your promise! You agreed on the ninja matter, and now you've dragged innocent civilians into it. What wrong did they do? What wrong did my family do? There are elderly people and children left! How could you do this?!"
A middle-aged ninja jumped out, his voice hoarse with rage, and at that moment, his throat was almost broken from shouting.
He was filled with rage but had no way to vent it, and he only regretted that he was too weak.
What? Why is fate always so cruel to them? Why must kindness be defeated by evil?
If evil can achieve final victory, then what about our previous bonds, our previous faith and beliefs?
A sense of despondency and fear of battle spread through the crowd in an instant, and countless people dropped their weapons and collapsed to the ground.