A Sage's Pursuit of Power

No one could truly understand just how much Obito hated Aoba Kamikawa.

He had suffered so much. He had sacrificed so much. He had obtained the power of Kamui, yet he had been repeatedly countered by Aoba, and in the end, he lost both of his Kamui Mangekyō Sharingan.

He had nearly lost his life as well.

Afterward, he obtained the Rinnegan, thinking it was finally his time to rise to power. But mastering the Rinnegan wasn't easy. Once again, Aoba and his allies cornered him, and he almost died yet again.

This time, he had fixed his body and mastered the Rinnegan's abilities.

So why the hell couldn't he still kill Aoba?!

If Aoba didn't die, then Obito would never be able to collect all the Tailed Beasts.

Without all the Tailed Beasts, he couldn't execute the Infinite Tsukuyomi and create a world where Rin was still alive.

Aoba had to die.

But the problem was, Obito couldn't kill him.

He had thought teaming up with Orochimaru and capturing that strange shinobi named Shin would allow them to extract some of Aoba's secrets or weaknesses.

But now, look at Orochimaru!

The snake bastard was clearly holding back and getting ready to escape. After all, the Konoha shinobi fighting him was incredibly strong.

That shinobi didn't use any particularly secret techniques, but their mastery over the Five Elemental Ninjutsu had reached an extreme level.

This meant that they had no conventional weaknesses.

Orochimaru had no intention of fighting to the death, which was why he was getting overwhelmed.

At this moment, Orochimaru was incredibly frustrated.

He had no desire to be Aoba's enemy, at least not yet.

Orochimaru understood that Aoba was hiding a massive secret, making him far more dangerous than Obito.

That was why Orochimaru had agreed to work with Obito in the first place.

But that didn't mean he wanted to go to war with Konoha right now.

Sure, Konoha had only sent a handful of shinobi here, but if this dragged on any longer, reinforcements would soon arrive.

At that point, Konoha's ANBU pursuit squads, along with sensory and sealing teams, would completely surround them.

Maybe Obito could escape, but Orochimaru doubted he could.

Additionally, Orochimaru had discovered something alarming some time ago.

Although he still had DNA samples of several dead Hokage, he could no longer use Edo Tensei to summon them.

Konoha had done something to sever his ability to revive the dead Hokage.

He could still summon other deceased shinobi, but they wouldn't be of much use.

Especially when Aoba was an expert in sealing techniques, regular Edo Tensei summons would be useless.

Orochimaru still had other trump cards, including DNA samples from various deceased Kage from different villages.

In theory, he could summon multiple past Kage to aid him.

But doing so would be crossing a major line...

If he resurrected the ancestors of every major village, he would be declaring war on the entire shinobi world.

No village would tolerate their former leaders being turned into tools of war.

Even if they weren't strong enough to stop him, they would have to kill him for the sake of their reputation.

Orochimaru was already in a precarious situation. If he angered the entire shinobi world, even he wouldn't survive long.

Orochimaru wanted to retreat.

Obito wanted to fight.

Their partnership was on the verge of collapse.

Aoba noticed something, Obito's techniques weren't as overwhelming as expected.

Even though Obito had mastered the Rinnegan, he hadn't attained the true power of the Six Paths, like Madara had in the original timeline.

Instead, his body was in ruins, like a doll barely stitched together.

It was unclear whether his body was weakening his eyes or his eyes were burdening his body, but either way, his condition was suboptimal.

He felt like someone wielding a powerful weapon but running out of ammo.

Aoba's Sharingan also had limits, but its chakra consumption was much lower than expected.

The reason? His Sharingan wasn't providing him with vision.

Due to nerve damage, his implanted Sharingan couldn't be placed in his eye sockets, meaning he couldn't see with them.

However, this actually reduced the chakra drain significantly.

Moreover, his Sharingan were implanted in his chakra cloak and enhanced by Hashirama's cells, making their stamina far superior to Obito's.

Meanwhile, even though Obito had repaired his body, it still wasn't at the level required to sustain the Rinnegan's full power.

If he kept using its abilities continuously, the strain was overwhelming.

Within five minutes of their standoff, Obito was already feeling the strain.

But he couldn't afford to lower his guard, and escaping was not an option.

Between Aoba's Flying Thunder God and Kakashi's Kamui, even if Obito could fly, escaping wasn't easy.

In reality, if Obito had fled the moment Aoba arrived, he probably could've gotten away.

Aoba wouldn't have chased him down if the battle hadn't reached a stalemate.

But now it was too late.

With the standoff continuing, Obito had to keep using Limbo: Border Jail to maintain a constant threat.

If he let up for even a second, Kakashi's Kamui could end him instantly.

At the same time, he had to watch Aoba closely.

Obito even noticed that Aoba was using Wind Release to send multiple Flying Thunder God kunai into the air.

This meant that even the skies were now a trap.

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Currently on Chapter 326 - The Final Confrontation Begins