Chapter 530: The Phoenix Returns (Patreon)

Unknown Fire Dimension

The crimson marking beneath Alaric's left eye finished drawing itself.

For a fraction of a second, nothing else happened.

Then the entire dimension answered.

Nature energy descended upon him from directions that had no relation to distance. It arrived through the fire, through the dimensional boundaries, and through the empty spaces between chakra itself, converging upon Alaric until the air around his body became too dense to remain still.

His eyes burned red as the Rinne-Sharingan remained within them.

Red-gold chakra rolled from his shoulders, gathering behind him until enormous phoenix wings unfolded across the endless fire. Their first movement displaced currents stretching hundreds of kilometers, while the feathers along their edges shimmered between physical flame and something older than elemental transformation.

Alaric inhaled, and the strain left his chakra network almost immediately.

Gakidō had scraped his pathways raw throughout the previous battle. Eros had healed the physical damage every time, yet the accumulated irritation had remained like hot wire threaded beneath his skin.

Phoenix Sage Mode washed through those pathways.

The pain disappeared, and his breathing settled.

Even the ache behind the Rinne-Sharingan faded beneath a flood of nature energy so vast that his earlier expenditure suddenly seemed irrelevant.

Across the dimension, the Ten-Tails stared as its enormous eye contracted, the creature remembering this chakra.

Its incomplete consciousness could not give the sensation a name, yet every fragment remaining within its body recognized the transformation that had tormented its previous jinchūriki. When Madara had carried the beast, that power had heated the dimension beyond the point where Truth-Seeking Orbs could maintain their structure.

Now the same presence had returned while the Ten-Tails stood exposed.

Alaric rolled one shoulder, the movement almost lazy. "Much better."

The Ten-Tails roared.

GRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAARRRRR!!

Its chakra exploded outward.

The fire dimension bent beneath the pressure while several malformed tails expanded behind the Gedo Mazō. A Tailed Beast Ball began forming before the roar had fully ended, and the sphere became larger than the mountain-sized hammer Alaric had created through Vulcan.

Alaric watched it grow, smiled... then the Ten-Tails fired.

VVRRROOOOOOOOOOOOM!!

Alaric vanished in a platinum-gold flash.

The Tailed Beast Ball passed through the space he had occupied and continued across the dimension until its compressed chakra disappeared into the distance.

Alaric appeared above the creature.

One phoenix wing folded behind him while the other swept downward.

It never touched the Ten-Tails... the pressure did.

KRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!!

The Gedo Mazō was driven downward so violently that the dimensional space beneath its feet shattered into concentric fractures. Its enormous body folded at the waist before the invisible force continued through it, throwing the beast deeper into the endless fire.

Alaric followed as platinum-gold light flashed repeatedly around the falling creature.

He appeared beside its jaw, his fist already driving into the cheek.

BOOOOOOOOM!!

He vanished in another flash, reappearing beneath the ribs as his heel drove upward.

DOOOOOOOOOOM!!

The Ten-Tails rose despite having been falling a moment earlier.

Alaric appeared above its head before the creature could understand the reversal, his palm pressing downward.

"Shinra Tensei."

The Deva Path had recovered.

Alaric used it.

Fully.

KRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAA—BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!

The repulsive force struck the Ten-Tails from directly above.

Its entire body disappeared.

The dimension beneath it collapsed into a vast concavity while fire fled from the impact point in every direction. Dimensional fractures opened through the void, exposing fleeting glimpses of places that did not belong to the fire realm before the surrounding space repaired itself.

The Ten-Tails reappeared thousands of kilometers below.

Its back had bent beneath the attack, and several protrusions along the Gedo Mazō's shell had broken.

Alaric hovered where he had released the technique, his coat moving gently against the residual pressure.

His expression remained calm, though the satisfaction in his eyes was harder to conceal.

This was what he had been waiting for.

During the cooldown, every attack had required a calculation. Wood Release could restrain the beast for seconds. Vulcan could alter its direction. Susanoo could physically contend with it until the Ten-Tails' superior mass overwhelmed the construct. Gakidō could consume its chakra at the cost of tearing Alaric apart from the inside.

Phoenix Sage Mode removed the need for compromise.

Alaric looked down and saw that the Ten-Tails had already begun rising.

"Good," His grin widened by a fraction.

The creature opened its mouth as three Tailed Beast Balls formed simultaneously.

Alaric raised both hands, and Wood erupted around the beast.

Entire mountain ranges of living timber manifested instantly, already fully wrapped around its body.

KRA-KRA-KRA-KRA-KRA-KRA-KRAAAACK!!

The roots tightened as the Ten-Tails tore through the first layer, then a second, and then a third.

Wooden dragons emerged from every direction, each one larger than the Gedo Mazō's torso. Their jaws closed around its limbs while their bodies spiraled together into a living prison.

The three Tailed Beast Balls fired from inside it.

Alaric's Rinne-Sharingan rotated.

"Gakidō."

Three absorption seals opened, bending the spheres away from their original paths as they collapsed into them simultaneously.

Alaric's arms trembled as the Ten-Tails' chakra flooded him, splitting the skin across both palms, but Eros repaired the wounds before blood could travel farther than his wrists.

Phoenix Sage Mode stabilized the incoming energy, reducing the earlier sensation of molten glass scraping through his chakra pathways to a fierce sting.

Alaric exhaled as the three Tailed Beast Balls disappeared.

"That's... a little easier."

The Ten-Tails erupted free from the Wood Release in a violent surge, splintering the restraints as its massive form tore back into the open fire-filled dimension.

As its largest arm swung, Alaric did not dodge.

Susanoo formed around him before the hand arrived.

A complete armored torso appeared within a heartbeat, followed by four arms that seized the Ten-Tails' wrist together.

The impact drove Susanoo backward.

Alaric's boots remained crossed casually inside the crystal at its forehead while Phoenix chakra flowed through the construct.

The Ten-Tails pushed, but Susanoo held its ground.

.

Madara woke to the sound of something enormous breaking, his consciousness returning without clarity.

Pain came first.

Every part of his body carried the emptiness left behind by the Ten-Tails. His chakra network felt hollow, while his abdomen retained the phantom sensation of roots and black receivers that no longer existed inside him.

Then his hearing returned.

KRRRRRRRAAAAAAACK!!

Madara opened his eyes.

The sight before him required several seconds to understand.

Alaric's Susanoo held the Ten-Tails by one arm.

It should have been impossible.

Madara had fought Alaric's Susanoo earlier. He had watched the incomplete Ten-Tails overpower it during the struggle after extraction. The construct had been powerful enough to stagger the beast and durable enough to survive several direct collisions, yet the difference in raw physical force had remained unmistakable.

This Susanoo was different.

Phoenix fire moved through the chakra armor.

Crimson-gold lines followed every plate and joint while nature energy reinforced the enormous body from within. Four hands held the Ten-Tails' wrist in place as the beast strained hard enough to fracture the dimension beneath both giants.

Alaric stood inside its forehead, relaxed.

The contrast bothered Madara more than the spectacle.

The Ten-Tails had once supplied Madara with enough strength to push Alaric toward the limits of his ordinary arsenal.

Now Alaric looked comfortable.

Madara's Rinnegan moved toward the glowing tattoo beneath Alaric's left eye.

That form.

He remembered the fire.

He remembered regeneration failing to outpace destruction.

He remembered the Ten-Tails evolving its body because simply surviving Alaric's heat had become impossible.

Madara had understood that Phoenix Sage Mode increased Alaric's strength, but he had underestimated the scale.

The Ten-Tails swung another arm toward Susanoo, but two additional Susanoo arms formed and caught it.

Alaric finally moved his hands, interlocking his fingers.

Susanoo pulled, throwing the Ten-Tails off balance before the giant armored warrior pivoted and hurled the Gedo Mazō over its shoulder.

WHOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!

The beast crossed the dimension sideways.

Alaric dismissed Susanoo before the throw finished.

Wood Release appeared ahead of the creature.

Vulcan appeared behind it.

An enormous metal wall formed within the same instant, layered deeply enough that its thickness rivaled mountain ranges.

The Ten-Tails struck the wood.

KRRRRAAAAAAASH!!

It broke through, then struck the metal.

GDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!

The wall buckled inward.

Before the creature could recover, Alaric appeared above it and looked toward the surrounding fire.

His Phoenix marking glowed as the dimension obeyed, every flame within perception bending to his will. Red vanished first, then blue, until white overwhelmed everything and the temperature rose.

Madara felt the change even inside the protective seals surrounding his body.

His Rinnegan widened.

Alaric had already subjected him to heat beyond the sun's surface.

This was much worse.

Alaric had stopped experimenting.

The temperature climbed toward three times the heat he had previously used as his solar comparison.

The fire ceased behaving like ordinary combustion. Matter entering it no longer burned through any familiar progression. Metal vaporized before it could glow. Wood disappeared without becoming charcoal. Loose chakra broke apart under thermal conditions severe enough to disrupt its maintained structure.

The Ten-Tails screamed.

SKRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!

Its outer shell reddened as cracks spread through the Gedo Mazō.

The creature gathered chakra around its body in a desperate defensive mantle, but the fire still penetrated it.

Several malformed tails blackened along their edges before regeneration restored them.

As the beast tried to move, Alaric pointed one finger, multiplying gravity around it until the Ten-Tails sank.

Wood Release seized its ankles.

Vulcan-created bands wrapped around the Wood Release.

Fūinjutsu spread across the metal.

Chakra receivers descended through the bindings.

A Susanoo fist materialized above the Ten-Tails and struck its skull.

DROOOOOOOOOOOM!!

Alaric was already forming another technique.

A Wood Dragon emerged from below, its jaws closing around the Ten-Tails' throat.

Lightning traveled through metal growing along the dragon's scales.

KZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ—CRAAACK!!

A second dragon struck the ribs.

A third wrapped around the Gedo Mazō's waist.

Alaric crossed two fingers, compressing the fire surrounding the beast.

A sphere of white radiance formed around it, engulfing the Ten-Tails as it disappeared inside.

Madara could only stare in silence, unable to process what he was witnessing.

He had fought Hashirama at his peak, witnessed Wood Release suppress tailed beasts, wielded Perfect Susanoo, awakened the Rinnegan, and even become the Ten-Tails jinchūriki.

None of those experiences prepared him for the sight of a man layering legendary techniques upon one another as though choosing one ability at a time would be unnecessarily slow.

Alaric was using Wood Release while maintaining gravitational pressure.

He controlled Vulcan constructs while feeding fūinjutsu through them.

He formed Susanoo limbs without manifesting the entire armor.

He manipulated the temperature of a dimension while using Gakidō to absorb anything the Ten-Tails fired through the bindings.

All of it happened together.

Madara's mouth opened slightly.

He could still remember their taijutsu battle, where Alaric had matched him.

He could remember the ninjutsu exchange, where Alaric had dismissed his elements.

He could remember nearly cutting through Alaric's neck before the strange Mangekyō technique turned the outcome back upon him.

Even then, some part of Madara had assumed Alaric possessed an enormous collection of individual advantages that could eventually be forced apart.

Watching him now destroyed that assumption.

The abilities were worse when combined.

The Ten-Tails tore one arm free.

Alaric appeared before the limb in a platinum-gold flash, his movement so fast it felt like the space itself had skipped a frame.

His palm touched it.

"Gakidō."

Chakra poured from the beast as its arm shrank.

Alaric's sleeve split as the absorption damaged his pathways, though Eros closed the wounds immediately.

The Ten-Tails swung its other arm.

Alaric caught one enormous finger.

Phoenix chakra detonated from his body.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!

The Ten-Tails' entire hand was thrown backward.

Alaric released it, rolled his wrist once, and vanished.

Madara's eyes followed the platinum-gold flash.

Alaric appeared beneath the Ten-Tails' chin, his fist rising into an uppercut.

KRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!!

The Gedo Mazō left the dimensional surface again.

Its head snapped back while its body rose through the white fire.

Alaric chased it in another flash, driving a knee into its abdomen.

BOOOOOM!!

Another flash.

His heel connected with its spine, the impact echoing through the Ten-Tails' massive body like a collapsing mountain range.

DOOOOOOM!!

FLASH.

A Shinra Tensei launched it sideways.

KRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASH!!

FLASH.

A Vulcan spear larger than a fortress appeared directly in its flight path and impaled the outer shell before the Ten-Tails ripped itself free.

FLASH.

Five Wood Dragons seized the wound and tore it wider.

FLASH.

Gakidō swallowed the chakra gathering around the damaged area before regeneration could complete.

Madara could no longer follow every transition.

The Rinnegan saw the movement, but his mind struggled to turn the information into a coherent sequence.

Alaric was smiling, not laughing.

He did not shout challenges at the beast or waste breath celebrating successful attacks. His face carried the focused enjoyment of a man finally permitted to stop rationing himself.

Every technique existed for the next opening.

Every opening became another attack.

The Ten-Tails roared and released chakra from its entire body.

VVVRRRRROOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAM!!

The blast destroyed the Wood Dragons.

The Vulcan spear shattered.

The gravitational field broke.

Even the white fire recoiled several kilometers.

Alaric emerged through the expanding wave, his coat whipping behind him.

The phoenix wings spread as he crossed his arms before his face, allowing the blast to strike.

The shockwave carried him backward.

He was driven back ten meters, then another twenty, before he finally came to a stop.

Madara watched Alaric lower his arms.

No serious injury remained, and the grin was still there.

The Ten-Tails gathered everything it could.

Its mouth opened farther than before.

Chakra compressed from across its entire body toward a single point. The nine sealing rings trembled as the remaining tailed-beast fragments responded involuntarily to the gathering energy.

Alaric immediately noticed.

His amusement disappeared.

"Well... enough playing 'round then..."

The nine rings accelerated.

Madara felt the sealing formulas react through the residue still connected to his Rinnegan.

One fragment separated.

The ring closed as a second tore free, then a third followed in quick succession.

The Ten-Tails spasmed.

GRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!

Four.

Five.

Six.

The Gedo Mazō twisted toward Madara, its eye widening.

Seven.

Eight.

The last fragment resisted.

It remained threaded through the deepest part of the shell, wrapped around the same spiritual pathway that had once connected the beast to Madara's soul.

Alaric appeared beside the ninth ring, catching it with both hands as fūinjutsu expanded across his arms.

As the Ten-Tails lunged, a full-body Susanoo appeared behind Alaric, its four hands catching the beast.

Wood Release erupted around its legs, Vulcan restraints slammed around its torso, and gravity forced it downward as the surrounding fire rose again.

Madara watched the incomplete Ten-Tails thrash beneath four simultaneous forms of restraint while Alaric calmly pulled upon the ninth sealing ring.

The spiritual connection stretched as the beast screamed.

Madara's Rinnegan burned as something deep within his chest pulled in response.

'There,' Alaric's eyes shifted towards him. 'The final link...'

The Ten-Tails was no longer simply connected to Madara through residual chakra. A hair-thin spiritual thread remained from the forced jinchūriki union, buried between the remnants of Rinne Tensei and the imprint the Gedo Mazō had left upon Madara's soul.

Alaric tightened the three-layer seal preserving Madara.

Then he severed the thread.

Madara gasped while the Ten-Tails froze.

The ninth fragment tore free as the sealing ring snapped shut around it.

For the first time since Madara had forced the beast into himself, there was nothing connecting them.

No shared chakra, no spiritual root, and no hidden residue strong enough to function as an anchor.

Alaric felt the separation become absolute, and his grin returned. "There we go...!"

The Ten-Tails turned toward him but he vanished.

Platinum-gold light flashed once across the dimension as he appeared directly before the creature's enormous eye.

The size difference should have made him insignificant.

Instead, the surrounding fire bent toward the small human figure until every current within the dimension appeared to frame him.

The Ten-Tails recoiled, but Alaric raised both hands.

Sun and moon symbols appeared across his palms as their formulas expanded.

Golden and black sealing script raced up his arms, crossed his shoulders, and spread through the phoenix aura surrounding him. The two patterns resonated with the architecture Hagoromo had surrendered to him, though Alaric's own fūinjutsu had already begun integrating refinements around the original structure.

Madara's Rinnegan widened.

Even from thousands of meters away, he felt the authority inside those marks.

The Ten-Tails did too.

Its enormous eye opened fully as the beast pulled against every restraint.

Susanoo's feet slid as wood roots snapped and metal screamed beneath Vulcan's control.

Alaric remained before its face as his palms moved toward one another.

Sun.

Moon.

The two halves of the seal began to converge upon the Ten-Tails.

Then Alaric felt it.

A tug.

It was small... yet utterly familiar.

It did not originate from the fire dimension.

The chakra touched something deeper than physical space, brushing against the edge of his consciousness from a place whose relationship with time had never matched the ordinary world.

Alaric stopped.

The Ten-Tails remained restrained in front of him.

The Sun and Moon markings continued glowing across his palms.

The tug came again.

Alaric stared ahead for a moment.

He knew that chakra.

More importantly, he understood the problem immediately.

Wherever the owner existed, time was not passing in the same manner as it did here. A conversation that lasted several minutes from one perspective might cost little or nothing inside the fire dimension.

Alaric looked between the Ten-Tails and Madara, then sighed.

"Of course."

The familiar chakra pulled once more, and Alaric allowed it.

The fire dimension vanished from his perception as his awareness simply crossed the boundary, with no movement through physical space.

The heat disappeared, and the Ten-Tails' roar vanished.

Madara, the nine sealing rings, the dimensional fire, and the half-formed Sun and Moon Seal were replaced by a vast spiritual expanse.

Alaric opened his eyes.

Someone familiar stood before him.

His expression carried the mild impatience of a man interrupted halfway through putting out a particularly stubborn fire.

"What do you need?" Alaric asked. "As you can see, I'm currently handling the Ten-Tails."