Naruto's stride halted. He looked down and saw his own shadow had already fused with Shikaku's.
"High IQ is such a pain—you even calculated where I'd land, huh?"
He flexed his body, annoyed.
That slight movement was anything but slight for Shikaku. His face went white as paper, and he shouted, voice tight:
"Everyone, restrain Naruto now! I can't hold him long—his power is beyond my control range!"
"We got it!"
The sealing squad hustled forward, lugging a massive scroll.
"Wait—back off…!" Kakashi barked, stopping the sealers. "You won't be sealing Naruto. Not after those last two seals."
The sealing-nin turned green then purple with embarrassment, but had no rebuttal—those two A-rank seals had been torn apart like paper.
Their captain gritted his teeth. "I'll use an S-rank fūin. This time, he won't escape."
"No." The one to speak was Hiruzen. Grim-faced, he stepped up. "I'll do the sealing myself."
The sealers fell silent and withdrew, unwilling but unable to object.
"Hokage-sama, hurry…" Shikaku squeezed out the words through clenched teeth, deathly pale.
It felt like restraining a primordial beast, a monster ready to snap the shadow-ropes at any moment.
"I know!" Hiruzen slapped a palm to the ground without hesitation.
"Kuchiyose no Jutsu: Enma (Summoning Jutsu: Enma)!"
A bang of white smoke, and an elderly monkey wearing a tiger-skin skirt appeared.
"Hiruzen, why have you—"
No time for talk. "Transform into the Kongō Nyoi (Adamantine Nyoi Staff)—now!"
Though baffled, Enma was an old comrade; he immediately turned into a staff.
Gripping the golden staff, Hiruzen whipped it toward Naruto and roared:
"Kongō Nyoi: Rōheki (Adamantine Prison Wall)!"
Midair, the golden staff split into a dozen bars that interlocked in a flash, forming a cage that slammed shut around Naruto.
At the same time, Shikaku's legs gave out and he slumped to the ground, murmuring,
"What a monster… Is the Nine-Tails wearing Naruto's skin? How can a human have power like this…?"
Inside the cage, Naruto flexed his shoulders and examined the golden "cell" with interest.
"So this is the strongest summoning beast, the Monkey King, huh?"
There were countless summons in the shinobi world, but the one often called the strongest was Hiruzen's Enma—capable of fighting as a beast, or turning into a staff with legendary defense.
Naruto rapped the bars with his finger.
An eye and mouth bulged from the staff's surface, Enma peering at him in puzzlement. "Minato… aren't you dead?"
"Do I look that much like him?" Naruto ruffled his hair with a laugh.
In the original story, loads of people mistook him for Minato—guess they really were lookalikes.
"My mistake…" Enma's face sank back into the metal. "But if you're an enemy of Konoha, abandon hope. With me here, you are not escaping."
His features melted away fully; the Kongō Nyoi locked down to a seamless adamantine prison.
"How arrogant." Naruto smiled faintly and leveled his index finger at the bars.
"Shigan: Kuroren (Finger Pistol: Black Lotus)!"
In an instant, Busōshoku no Haki (Armament Haki) sheathed his finger in black steel. Then it blurred, stabbing forward at a speed that left nothing but afterimages.
Clang! Clang! Clang—
Metallic music rang in rapid, endless succession.
To onlookers, there was only a haze of motion and a storm of chiming steel.
"Hokage-sama…" Unease rippled through the shinobi ranks.
If two A-rank seals couldn't hold Naruto, could a "thin" golden cage really do it?
Hiruzen stayed steady. "Relax. Enma's defense—I know it well."
He sighed, then said, "Prepare to extract the Nine-Tails. Today, we strip it out of Naruto."
Faces tightened—Jiraiya's, Kakashi's, all of them.
For a jinchūriki, losing the tailed beast meant death.
And Naruto's parents were…
"We have no choice," Jiraiya drew a breath. "For the sake of the shinobi world. They would understand."
Kakashi gave a silent nod.
They had seen Naruto's terrifying might. The fact he was even contained now was a blessing amid disaster.
In the midst of their planning, a pained, elderly voice rang out:
"Brat—what are those fingers made of?"
Hiruzen snapped his gaze to the cage. Enma's face had surfaced again—twisted in agony.
Across the Kongō Nyoi, fine cracks veined outward. In several places, deep finger dents had been punched into the "adamantine."
At this rate, in just a few more minutes, even the Kongō Nyoi would shatter.
"Enma, just a few minutes more!" Hiruzen called anxiously, then ordered briskly:
"Ready the Hakke Fūin (Eight Trigrams Sealing) and Shishō Fūin (Four Symbols Seal). We extract the Nine-Tails here."
"Kurenai, use Genjutsu (Illusion Technique) to freeze Naruto. I need to reach inside."
"Kakashi, Guy—hold the perimeter. No one approaches. If anything disrupts the extraction, it'll be catastrophic…"
Listening to Hiruzen's tight choreography, Naruto stopped moving inside the golden prison.
He stared at Hiruzen like he'd just heard the funniest joke in the world.
"Heh. Old man—did I knock your brains loose earlier?"
"I'm a bunshin. What Nine-Tails are you trying to pull out?"
The square went dead silent—then an uproar exploded.
He was… a Kage Bunshin no Jutsu (Shadow Clone Technique) all along?!
(End of Chapter)
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