While Sasori was analyzing Akira's weaknesses, Akira himself noticed something subtle but important—blood trickling from the corner of Sasori's lips. The strike from the Illusionary Body had landed. That small, visceral sign told him everything he needed to know.
Sasori hadn't fully transformed himself into a human puppet yet—or at least, not entirely. If he were fully converted, he wouldn't be bleeding. That meant one thing: Sasori still had a vulnerable human core. And if Akira could destroy that, then the threat would end decisively. There would be no last-minute transfer of his Rebirth Core, no sleight of hand to escape death.
Wasting no time, Akira directed Susanoo to lunge forward. The obsidian titan surged with speed uncharacteristic for its size, one enormous hand shooting out like a vengeful god's palm. Though Sasori's attention was divided among ten puppets, his reflexes were sharp. He tried to command them all to scatter, but two of the front-line puppets weren't quick enough.
The black skeletal hand crushed them effortlessly. Wood, iron, and chakra-reactive alloys splintered with a terrible crunch. Fragments of metal and gear-strewn limbs rained to the ground like discarded toys.
Sasori's expression didn't flicker—not even a wince. He silently unfurled another scroll, summoning two replacement puppets with a puff of smoke. He was methodical, almost clinical. But Akira knew it wasn't because he didn't care. Each puppet was hand-crafted. Each one represented hours, days, maybe weeks of labor. And now he was losing them. Fast.
Meanwhile, the battle between the Illusionary Body and Sasori's puppets continued. Akira had deployed only two clones, aware that their presence alone would confuse Sasori. They moved independently and unpredictably, darting between enemy limbs and launching swift hit-and-run strikes. Unlike Sasori's puppets, the Illusionary Bodies could self-repair by absorbing chakra, making them ideal for prolonged combat.
Sasori's six puppets lashed out with hidden blades, poisoned needles, and puffs of paralyzing gas, attempting to corner Akira or force a mistake. But Susanoo's defenses remained untouched. Even surrounded, even assaulted from multiple directions, its hardened black chakra armor remained impenetrable. Shurikens shattered. Needles bounced off. Gas dispersed before reaching Akira.
He stayed silent, calculating, confident—but not arrogant. This was still Sasori of the Red Sand.
And Sasori, increasingly frustrated, came to the same conclusion Akira had anticipated.
"Enough of this," he muttered.
He reached for a scroll that was noticeably different from the others—gold-trimmed, aged with protective seals etched into the surface. Even from a distance, Akira could see the bold kanji etched across its center:
"Three."
Akira's eyes narrowed. "So you're finally taking out the Third Kazekage puppet."
He took a breath. This was no ordinary puppet—it was Sasori's masterpiece. The body of a Kage turned into a weapon, infused with the Magnet Release kekkei genkai, and able to manipulate iron sand. This would be the true fight.
As Sasori summoned the puppet with a deep thump and burst of smoke, the battlefield grew still. When the haze cleared, a new figure hovered beside him—a pale, monstrous rendition of the former Kazekage. His skin was bluish-black, his eyes hollow gold orbs, and his body was grotesquely altered. The hands, once used to weave noble jutsu, now ended in mechanical tools. The jaw was segmented, like some monstrous insect.
Sasori's voice rang out, pride sharpening his tone like a knife. "This is the puppet I forged from the body of the Third Kazekage. My greatest work. It retains all his abilities—even his Magnet Release. Until now, no one who has seen it has lived to tell the tale."
Akira scoffed, the ghost of a smile tugging at his lips. "If he was really the strongest Kazekage, how did he let himself be caught and turned into that? Sounds to me like he wasn't much to begin with."
That stung. Sasori's eye twitched, and he snapped his fingers. The Kazekage puppet opened its mouth, releasing a stream of shimmering black particles—iron sand.
"Iron Sand Shower!"
Shurikens formed mid-air and rained down like a metallic storm. Akira raised Eclipse, the massive broadsword of Susanoo, and deflected the projectiles in broad, sweeping arcs. As they struck the blade, the iron sand dissolved upon contact, their chakra drained and repelled by the weapon's unique properties.
But Sasori wasn't finished.
"Iron Sand: Three-Pronged Cone!"
A triangular spike formed, glistening with condensed chakra. It shot toward Akira at blinding speed, its trajectory impossible to predict. But Akira didn't flinch. He read the movement perfectly, stepped forward with Susanoo, and cleaved the cone in half. The fragments dissolved, returning to useless sand.
"Still nothing," Akira murmured.
But then, Sasori unveiled his real tactic.
"Iron Sand: Giant Needle."
Multiple spears formed and launched in unison, attacking from every angle. Akira's broadsword couldn't block all of them—he was one man, with one blade.
But he had something new.
Drawing from the insights he'd gained while practicing Rasengan—a technique of spiraling motion and controlled release—Akira made Susanoo spin.
He raised Eclipse above his head and began to rotate. The massive blade spun like a divine turbine, forming a whirl of dark chakra.
"Secret Technique: Spiral Shield."
The spears shattered upon impact, torn apart by the centrifugal force. A shield of black wind and chakra surrounded Akira, protecting him from all directions.
Sasori's eyes widened slightly. He hadn't expected such fluid, adaptive movement from Susanoo.
But he wasn't finished.
The iron sand that had fallen to the ground—discarded, neutralized—wasn't gone. Sasori still had chakra flowing through it, a detail Akira had missed.
As Susanoo spun, shifting its position ever so slightly, a trap was sprung. The iron sand underfoot surged up, forming sharpened spikes aiming directly at Susanoo's unguarded lower half—the one part of the colossal avatar Akira hadn't fully reinforced.
Akira's eyes flicked downward.
"Damn it!"
He knew. In his pursuit of overwhelming offense and dramatic defense, he'd given Sasori a moment. And Sasori—true to his name as the Red Sand's most cunning puppet master—had not wasted it.
The battle was far from over.
After re-establishing his connection with the iron sand beneath Akira's feet, Scorpion let a confident smile curl across his lips.
As expected. Even the iron sand supposedly shielded by Susanoo was still within his control.
That was enough. With it, he could directly attack Akira—strike the source.
"Magnet Release: Iron Sand Binding Coffin."
In an instant, the iron sand rose with deadly purpose from the earth beneath Akira.
"What!" Akira's surprised shout rang through the air. He hadn't anticipated that the iron sand—drained of chakra by Moon Eclipse—could still be manipulated.
Caught off guard, he was ensnared in the iron coffin, its fine grains wrapping around him like the grasp of death.
His Susanoo crumbled. Without Akira's chakra fueling it, the mighty spectral guardian vanished like smoke.
Scorpion's heart pounded with excitement. Akira—the wielder of a Mangekyō Sharingan—had finally been restrained.
To control a puppet born from such power… One capable of suppressing even Tailed Beasts…
Scorpion could already imagine it—his masterpiece. His immortality. He nearly laughed aloud.
Until a voice, laced with amusement, disrupted his fantasy.
"You didn't think that was all, did you, Scorpion? This was just warm-up. I haven't even started fighting seriously yet."
Scorpion spun around. Akira stood to his right, unbound, wearing a calm, mocking expression.
"Impossible… I saw you bound in the iron sand..."
Could it have been a Shadow Clone all along?
But no… the chakra output, the Susanoo—it all felt genuine.
Unless… that absurdly fast Body Flicker Technique of his…
Scorpion paled. He recalled Akira's odd movements when he first arrived. That moment when Akira had said, quietly, "how dangerous" just before the sand engulfed him...
Flying Thunder God.
Yes. In that heartbeat between capture and binding, Akira had teleported away, leaving a clone to be caught in his place.
Scorpion clenched his fists. Fighting a Jinchūriki like Shukaku had been simple in hindsight. Despite its immense chakra reserves, the beast fought with brute force, lacking subtlety or tactics.
But Akira? Akira was lethal in a completely different way.
He was cunning. Efficient. A tactician who disguised his strength until the perfect moment.
Scorpion's strategy—exposing Susanoo's weakness beneath its feet—had nearly worked. But "nearly" wasn't enough.
Now, Akira stood, his Sharingan spinning as his chakra surged. He had adapted.
White Lightning coursed through him—an ability that accelerated his cognition. With it, he had already begun to integrate Flying Thunder God into live combat. Though he couldn't yet use it as fluidly as the Fourth Hokage, even a single-use teleport was lethal when wielded with precision.
Scorpion's anxiety spiked. His long-prepared killing move had failed.
Worse—Akira wouldn't give him another chance.
They weren't far from Konoha, and the noise of their battle would draw attention. Anbu would soon be on their way.
Akira had to finish this now.
His Mangekyō rotated slowly. Shadows coalesced. A towering figure rose behind him, taller and darker than before.
This time, Susanoo had legs—no longer vulnerable from below.
Scorpion's breath hitched. He had to retreat. Regroup. Study. He hadn't expected Akira's power to escalate this quickly.
Still, he couldn't bring himself to abandon the thought of acquiring that power. The Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan—it was too great a prize.
But Akira had already seen through him.
And he had no intention of letting Scorpion go.
Akira had noticed something. Scorpion hadn't converted himself entirely into a puppet yet. That meant he could be consumed.
Akira's Infinite Rebirth.
Unlike before, when he had devoured Uchiha Kawa in a moment of deception, Scorpion was battle-ready. If Akira wanted to absorb him, he'd have to break him first.
But the reward was great.
Scorpion held scientific knowledge beyond most ninja—how to mechanize the human body while retaining chakra flow, how to preserve bloodline techniques within artificial frames. Akira, a scientist in his previous life, recognized the potential.
If he could consume that knowledge, he could revolutionize his power.
To do that, he needed to get close. And to get close, he needed to crush Scorpion's resistance.
His eyes narrowed.
Akira drew Moon Eclipse and poured chakra into it. The edge turned black, almost humming with contained hunger.
Then—
A massive, obsidian slash arced through the air, shrieking toward Scorpion like a demon's scythe.
Scorpion's expression darkened.
"Magnet Release: Iron Sand Wall!"
Iron sand surged into a dense, obsidian wall between him and the slash.
A loud, grinding impact echoed as the wave met the barrier.
But the Iron Sand Wall, a technique modeled after Shukaku's own defenses, crumbled. Moon Eclipse devoured chakra, and the moment it touched the wall, it stripped it bare.
The defense dissolved.
The slash hurtled onward.
Scorpion cursed, leaping onto the Third Kazekage puppet. In a blur, he summoned the Iron Sand Wings and rocketed upward, narrowly avoiding the slash.
The wave of dark chakra tore through the trees, carving a massive trench into the earth, its destructive power echoing into the distance.
Akira tracked him with narrowed eyes.
Scorpion was fleeing. He had prepared this retreat in advance, banking on the Iron Sand Wings for a quick escape.
But Akira was faster.
He threw a kunai, marked with the Flying Thunder God seal, with the full might of Susanoo.
It didn't aim for Scorpion directly—but the Iron Sand Wings.
The impact sent a shockwave through the puppet's frame. Scorpion stumbled, nearly thrown from his perch.
And in that fraction of a second, Akira vanished.
A flash.
He reappeared beside Scorpion in midair, his fist drawn back.
"Monstrous Strength Fist."
The punch landed.
A shockwave ripped the air. Wood shattered below. The sky itself seemed to split from the force.
Scorpion screamed.
Akira's expression was cold. Calculating.
There would be no escape.
He would harvest every secret Scorpion had.