Chapter 524: The Distance Between Them (Patreon)

Land of Frost — Northern Wilderness

Madara did not attack.

Snow drifted between them, each flake entering the pressure surrounding Alaric before dissolving into beads of steam. The frozen valley stretched beneath the moon in pale silence, enclosed by mountains whose slopes had remained untouched for centuries.

Alaric stood several meters away.

The Rinne-Sharingan watched from within red irises while the phoenix-shaped markings around his left eye cast a faint glow across his cheek. Red-gold chakra moved close to his body, its edges occasionally spreading into the suggestion of feathers before folding back beneath his coat.

Madara stared at the hand hanging beside Alaric's hip.

That hand had touched his forehead.

He had seen Alaric disappear from across the ruined dimension. His Rinnegan had followed the shift in chakra. The incomplete Ten-Tails had heightened every nerve, accelerated his thoughts, and reinforced a body already capable of movements beyond ordinary perception.

None of it had mattered.

By the time Madara recognized the displacement, Alaric's palm had already rested against his skin.

The teleportation had followed afterward.

That sequence irritated him more than being transported against his will.

Had Alaric opened a portal beneath him, Madara could have attributed the success to an unfamiliar space-time technique. Had the Rinne-Sharingan dragged the entire battlefield into another dimension, the speed of his physical response would have been irrelevant.

Alaric had crossed the distance first.

He had reached him.

Madara had been too slow to stop it.

The Ten-Tails shifted inside him, reacting to the pressure spreading from Alaric. Its fragmented wills pushed against one another beneath the seal, some retreating from the unknown energy while others answered it with instinctive hostility.

Madara tightened his control.

The movement silenced the beast without quieting his thoughts.

He remembered Hashirama catching him during their childhood spars. Tobirama had once appeared behind him with the Flying Thunder God during the clan wars, though Madara's Sharingan had recognized the marked weapon quickly enough to prevent the follow-up strike.

Those moments had explanations.

Alaric offered none.

Madara raised one hand and touched his forehead where the palm had rested. The skin felt ordinary beneath his fingers. No mark remained. His Rinnegan found no foreign chakra, hidden seal, or residue of a technique.

Alaric watched him with quiet amusement.

"Still thinking about it?"

Madara lowered his hand. "You reached me before I perceived your movement."

"I noticed."

"The Ten-Tails enhanced this body beyond what I possessed at the Valley of the End."

"And I still touched your forehead."

The casual confirmation sharpened the irritation behind Madara's eyes.

Alaric's smile widened a little.

"You should have seen your face."

The snow beneath Madara's feet fractured.

A circular break traveled across the valley floor, passing beneath drifts and frozen streams before reaching the mountain slopes. The pressure came from his chakra rather than a deliberate technique, and the incomplete Ten-Tails answered his emotion with a pulse that darkened the markings across his chest.

Alaric glanced toward the spreading crack.

"Sensitive."

Madara's lips curved, though the expression carried little warmth. "I had forgotten how unpleasant it was to discover a distance I could not immediately cross."

"That almost sounds healthy."

"It will cease to exist."

Alaric tilted his head. "The distance?"

"Between your strength and mine."

Wind descended from the northern ridge, carrying a sheet of powder snow through the valley. It struck Madara's chakra robes and divided around him, leaving his pale figure untouched.

His gaze remained on Alaric.

The Eye of the Moon Plan had once represented the final shape of Madara's will. Every war, betrayal, and loss had become evidence that the world could not be corrected while human choice remained free to reproduce suffering. The Infinite Tsukuyomi would have ended that cycle by replacing reality with a dream no one could resist.

Black Zetsu had poisoned the foundation of that purpose.

The Stone Tablet had lied.

The supposed salvation of humanity had been a mechanism for Kaguya's return, while Madara himself had been cultivated into a vessel arrogant enough to mistake manipulation for revelation.

The plan remained in his memory, though it no longer occupied the center of his future.

Alaric did.

The thought should have offended him.

Instead, it settled into place with the certainty of an old instinct returning home.

Madara had pursued Hashirama because Hashirama represented a summit worth reaching. Their rivalry had forced both boys beyond the limits inherited from their clans, then continued shaping them long after those childhood meetings beside the river.

Now another summit stood before him.

Alaric possessed eyes Madara could not explain, regeneration no known bloodline should provide, control over fire that ignored the Ten-Tails, a body capable of mirroring Madara's own taijutsu, and speed sufficient to bypass the reactions of a Ten-Tails jinchūriki.

Surpassing him offered something the Eye of the Moon Plan no longer could.

A purpose Madara knew had come from himself.

"I will surpass you," Madara said.

Alaric's expression flattened.

The lack of enthusiasm disturbed Madara more than mockery would have.

Alaric rubbed one thumb across the edge of his glove.

"Then you'll want to fight me all the time."

Madara raised a brow. "Naturally."

"I don't have the energy for that."

"You claimed this was your first opportunity to fight without restraint."

"It is." Alaric looked toward the moonlit mountains, then back at him. "That doesn't mean I want you appearing at my home every week because you discovered another way to squeeze power out of the Ten-Tails."

Madara's smile returned. "You believe I would wait a week?"

Alaric sighed.

"There it is."

Madara's chakra stirred harder, anticipation pushing through his irritation.

Alaric's gaze sharpened.

"Besides, I don't have much patience for people who are easily manipulated."

The smile on Madara's face stopped moving as Alaric continued before he could answer.

"You spent decades convincing yourself the Eye of the Moon Plan was the conclusion of your own genius. Zetsu changed a tablet, fed your grief, pointed you toward the exact steps needed to revive Kaguya, and you followed them while calling everyone else blind."

The frozen wind passed between them.

Madara's fingers curled slowly.

Alaric lifted one shoulder.

"So if surpassing me means you start following me around like a starving dog, prove you've learned how to recognize a leash first."

The mountain behind Madara split.

It happened without a gesture.

A vertical fracture opened from its peak to its buried foundations as Ten-Tails chakra surged from Madara's body. Snow collapsed from both sides in vast white curtains, exposing dark stone beneath.

Madara remained motionless at the center of the valley.

His Rinnegan had hardened.

"You speak boldly for a man who deliberately permitted that plan to advance."

"I permitted you to become stronger."

"You manipulated the outcome."

"Yes."

Madara's eyes narrowed.

Alaric's admission came without hesitation.

"You object?"

Madara considered the question.

Alaric had withheld intervention, revealed Black Zetsu's deception at the moment most useful to his own intentions, and allowed Madara to claim the incomplete Ten-Tails so that their rematch might become worthwhile.

The difference between that manipulation and Zetsu's should have mattered.

Alaric had not rewritten history around him.

He had not planted false knowledge and waited decades for Madara to mistake it for truth.

He had opened a path, then watched Madara choose whether to walk through it.

That distinction did not remove the insult, but it did make the situation clearer as Madara's fingers relaxed.

"I object to remaining the weaker man."

Alaric laughed beneath his breath. "Better answer."

A distortion appeared behind Madara.

The air folded inward, forming ten dark points across the moonlit valley. Each point widened without producing visible portals, and the natural world recoiled as figures stepped from the neighboring plane.

The Limbo clones returned.

Their arrival carried no color and no ordinary presence. Snow passed through their bodies without disturbance, while the ground beneath them sank beneath pressure that living senses could not perceive. Each clone possessed Madara's face, stance, and power, existing within an adjacent world whose boundary now pressed dangerously close to the Elemental Nations.

Alaric's Rinne-Sharingan followed every one.

Madara felt the eye settle upon them.

"You can see them."

"I saw them before."

"Then there will be no excuse when they tear you apart."

Alaric spread his hands. "There's the confidence I was waiting for."

Madara released the incomplete Ten-Tails, and chakra erupted from his body, darkening the valley beneath its shadow.

A pale column climbed toward the sky, swallowing moonlight and forcing the clouds outward in an expanding ring. The unfinished beast roared inside Madara as he drew from every current at once, compelling the separate tailed-beast chakras to move beneath a single command.

The black markings across his body widened as his incomplete horn extended.

Truth-Seeking Orbs multiplied behind him as the existing spheres divided, each surface swallowing the light around it. Lightning traveled through the chakra robes without sound. The frozen ground beneath Madara ceased breaking and disappeared into an expanding crater.

The ten Limbo clones moved into formation.

Some rose into the air.

Others spread along the mountain slopes.

Three approached Alaric directly while the remaining seven positioned themselves across different angles in the adjacent plane, creating an enclosure no physical movement could escape.

Alaric watched the formation close as Phoenix chakra surged in response.

Red-gold light poured from his body and flooded the valley floor, transforming snow into vapor before the heat could become flame. The glowing markings around his left eye brightened. His Rinne-Sharingan rotated once, and the space surrounding him acquired layers Madara had not noticed until Alaric's perception touched them.

Wind stopped within several miles.

Every frozen tree along the distant ridges bent toward the valley.

Alaric raised his right hand as a black sphere formed above his palm, lightning wrapping around it.

Fire followed, though the flames contained colors Madara had never seen in ordinary nature transformation. Wind compressed around the growing construct while traces of water and earth chakra folded into the center. Wood Release emerged as a living lattice inside the sphere, restraining the incompatible energies without allowing them to cancel one another.

Space curved around the technique.

Fūinjutsu characters appeared across its surface.

Madara's Rinnegan widened slightly.

Alaric had combined elemental transformation, Wood Release, senjutsu, space-time chakra, and sealing formulas inside a construct held above one hand.

Then Phoenix power entered it.

The sphere became silent.

Madara brought his hands together as his Limbo clones attacked.

Seven invisible fists descended through the neighboring world as three clones crossed toward Alaric's body. Madara released a wave of Ten-Tails chakra at the same instant, creating a vast blade that stretched from one mountain to the next.

Alaric closed his fingers around the sphere.

The Land of Frost vanished.

Light filled the valley without traveling through it.

The elemental construct expanded outward while the Ten-Tails blade descended, and the meeting point swallowed sound, color, and distance. Mountains bent toward the collision before their peaks disintegrated. Snow fields rose from the ground as intact sheets, hovered for one breath, then broke into vapor.

The ten Limbo clones struck Alaric's position.

Phoenix chakra erupted into wings.

Each wing extended for miles, passing through the boundary between the physical plane and Limbo. The first sweep scattered three clones across the adjacent world. The second collided with four others and dragged their invisible bodies partly into reality, where red-gold feathers burned across their pale forms.

Madara entered through the center as a Truth-Seeking staff formed in his right hand.

Alaric met him with a black blade drawn from the sphere, its surface still folding space as it solidified into a single edge of compressed reality. Madara's Truth-Seeking staff met it head-on, neither yielding as chakra and void-aligned matter locked at the point of impact.

The instant they collided, the valley imploded under the pressure of opposing forces, erasing terrain, sound, and distance alike as the world between them buckled and vanished.

KRRRRRRRRAAAAAAA... BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!

The ground dropped thousands of feet.

Mountain ranges surrounding the wilderness shattered from their foundations, their remains lifted by pressure before being thrown across the horizon. The clouds above opened into a circular void wide enough to reveal the stars, while aurora-like bands of chakra spread across the northern sky.

Madara drove forward.

The Truth-Seeking staff erased the outer layers of Alaric's blade, though new matter replaced them as quickly as they vanished. Alaric twisted his wrist, redirecting the staff beside his shoulder, and drove one knee into Madara's abdomen.

The incomplete Ten-Tails reinforced the point of impact, yet Madara barely moved.

His left hand caught Alaric's knee.

A Limbo clone struck Alaric's ribs from the adjacent plane.

The blow folded his body around it.

Another clone caught his shoulder.

A third seized his wrist.

Madara's staff swept toward his neck.

Alaric's Rinne-Sharingan flashed, and space rotated.

The Truth-Seeking staff passed through a Kamui distortion, disappearing beside Alaric's throat before emerging from another spiral behind Madara. Madara released the weapon before it could strike him, turned within Alaric's grip, and drove his elbow across Alaric's jaw.

Alaric flew through the remains of a mountain.

Madara followed.

The ten Limbo clones converged from every direction, attacking through stone, chakra, and dimensional boundaries. Alaric emerged from the debris with Phoenix wings spread behind him. Each feather separated into a blade, crossing into Limbo and forcing the clones to defend.

Madara appeared beneath him.

His palm struck Alaric's abdomen.

"Shinra Tensei."

Repulsive force erupted at contact range.

Alaric became a streak of red-gold light across the night, passing through three distant peaks before Madara pulled him back with the opposite force.

"Banshō Ten'in."

Alaric reversed direction.

Madara formed a Truth-Seeking blade along his forearm and advanced to meet him.

Their eyes remained locked as the distance closed.

Alaric raised one hand.

"Shinra Tensei."

The opposing forces met.

The atmosphere compressed between them until the air ignited. Madara's attraction collapsed against Alaric's repulsion, producing a gravitational sphere that dragged shattered mountains, frozen rivers, and millions of tons of stone into orbit around them.

Madara shifted the angle of his hand, and the balance broke.

Alaric's repulsive field slid aside.

A Limbo clone caught his ankle while another struck beneath his shoulder.

Madara entered through the opening and drove the Truth-Seeking blade across Alaric's neck.

Alaric leaned back as the black edge passed beneath his chin.

Madara changed its shape midway.

The blade curved upward, touching skin.

Blood opened across Alaric's throat.

Madara stepped closer, reinforcing his arm with the full physical power of the incomplete Ten-Tails. The Truth-Seeking edge continued through muscle, arteries, and vertebrae.

For one perfect instant, Madara felt the resistance of Alaric's neck give way.

The blade passed through.

Alaric's head separated from his body.

His Phoenix chakra flickered.

Madara's Rinnegan watched the severed head begin to turn through the air.

Victory entered his living heartbeat.

Then Alaric's Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan shone.

Madara saw it despite the head already leaving the shoulders.

The pattern rotated once, and the world missed a moment... no darkness, no sensation of time reversing, and no displacement similar to Kamui or Limbo.

Madara remained standing with his arm extended.

The Truth-Seeking blade had completed its path.

Yet Alaric was gone.

No head fell through the air.

No body remained before him.

The blood across the blade disappeared.

Madara's heartbeat struck once.

Pain arrived from everywhere.

Wet lines opened across his chest.

One cut passed from his right shoulder to his left hip, deep enough to expose ribs and the organs beneath them. Another carved through his abdomen and opened the Ten-Tails seal along its outer layer. Two more crossed his thighs, severing muscle to the bone.

His right forearm split lengthwise.

Blood erupted from his back as wounds appeared across places no weapon had touched.

The injuries were deeper than ordinary sword cuts. Their edges looked excavated, as though the flesh had been removed through repeated strikes layered inside the same instant. Pieces of Madara's pale robes slid away from his body, followed by strips of skin and muscle that struck the broken ground with heavy, wet sounds.

Madara's eyes widened.

The incomplete Ten-Tails screamed inside him.

Regeneration began, then faltered as the separate chakra currents attempted to repair every wound simultaneously. His knees bent beneath the sudden loss of muscle. Blood poured across the exposed stone, steaming where Phoenix residue remained in the earth.

Madara forced himself upright.

His Limbo clones turned.

Alaric stood behind them, his head still attached, and the cut across his neck no longer existed.

His Vanguard coat moved in the wind while the Eternal Mangekyō pattern rotated within eyes otherwise shaped by the Rinne-Sharingan and Phoenix Sage Mode.

He looked down at Madara's injuries.

"It's been a while since I used that."

Madara's Rinnegan moved over him, searching for evidence of substitution, teleportation, illusion, or dimensional exchange.

Nothing matched what he remembered.

He had cut through Alaric's neck.

His body retained the tactile memory.

The Truth-Seeking blade had encountered skin, muscle, bone, and empty air after completing the decapitation.

That event had happened.

The result no longer belonged to Alaric.

Madara looked at the wounds across his own body.

Some followed angles Alaric had never attacked from. Others were too deep to have been produced within the time that had passed. His Rinnegan perceived faint distortions along their edges, thin residues of temporal chakra that vanished as soon as he attempted to isolate them.

His widened eyes slowly narrowed.

Blood ran from the corner of his mouth.

Then Madara laughed.

The sound began low, broken by the damage to his lungs, before growing louder as the incomplete Ten-Tails repaired them.

Alaric raised a brow.

"You nearly removed my head," he said. "Why are you laughing?"

Madara pressed one hand against the open wound across his chest. Regenerating ribs moved beneath his palm, sliding through blood as flesh rebuilt itself around them.

"Because the distance is greater than I thought."

Alaric's expression became unreadable.

Madara's grin widened despite the blood covering his teeth.

"That only makes crossing it worthwhile."

Behind him, the ten Limbo clones straightened.

The valley was gone.

A basin several miles deep occupied the northern wilderness, its edges glowing where stone had melted beneath their opening clash. Broken mountains continued falling in the distance, while bands of red, violet, and black chakra stretched through the sky far beyond the Land of Frost.

Madara drew more deeply upon the incomplete Ten-Tails.

The regeneration accelerated.

His body began closing wounds that should have killed him several times over, while his Rinnegan remained fixed upon Alaric's Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan.

The Eye of the Moon Plan had promised him a world without uncertainty.

Alaric offered the opposite.

An opponent he could not yet understand, a power capable of stealing the result of victory from his hand, a summit whose true height remained hidden even after Madara reached what should have been the realm of gods.

His heartbeat thundered beneath the healing flesh, and Madara welcomed every strike.