This was the same method Madara had used at the Valley of the End-cladding the Nine-Tails in Susanoo and bombarding Hashirama's True Several Thousand Hands with Tailed Beast Bombs.
These densely packed Tailed Beast Bombs—each individual shot—had enough power to destroy one arm of the True Several Thousand Hands.
At first glance, that might not sound particularly terrifying.
But those "arms" weren't ordinary limbs.
Each palm alone stretched over two hundred meters wide, and the Nine-Tails—standing half-upright—reached more than sixty meters in height. In other words, a single arm was already on the scale of a kaiju.
Each one of these attacks was, without exaggeration, the equivalent of a nuclear strike, on the same level as Madara's Susanoo-fused Tailed Beast Bombs.
Facing this ultimate barrage, Arata did not hold back either.
The hand he had raised toward the sky earlier came down.
In an instant, the thunder dragon in the clouds absorbed every naturally formed lightning bolt within dozens of kilometers.
Then—
It condensed into a single, heaven-shattering bolt and slammed directly into Arata's Lightning Armor!
This was an attack that even Madara's Susanoo might not be able to block.
Yet Arata took it head-on.
There was no explosion.
No shockwave.
The terrifying lightning fused seamlessly into him—as though it had simply returned to its source, becoming part of his body.
This was Arata's true trump card: naturally generated lightning from the world itself.
After awakening his Devil Fruit ability, his internal power had already become immense. But against opponents of a higher tier, natural lightning was still necessary.
And once he gained full control over lightning, even the power of the heavens could be absorbed and refined into his own strength.
That was the foundation of the move he was about to unleash.
His strongest technique to date.
Until today, it had existed only as a concept in his mind.
This was its first true use.
"Lightning Armor: Third Gear!"
"The Thunder God Descends!"
With Arata's roar, the Lightning Armor—already over a hundred meters tall—began to expand violently.
Two hundred meters…
Two hundred fifty…
Three hundred…
Five hundred…
Six hundred meters!
At last, Arata's Lightning Armor form reached a staggering height of six hundred meters.
And this was only his first attempt.
With mastery, he could gather even more natural lightning.
If he were to cultivate Sage Mode in the future, the power of this jutsu would rise yet again.
After all, Hashirama had relied on Sage Mode to manifest the colossal True Several Thousand Hands.
In truth, Hashirama's base strength was still only Super-Kage peak—but Sage Mode elevated his combat power to an entirely different level.
Seeing how the Monkey Sage had circulated natural energy through his body earlier, Arata had already begun to place great importance on mastering it himself.
He had decided:
After this battle, Sage Mode would be his next priority.
This third-stage Lightning Armor form was not just six times larger in size.
The energy contained within, as well as the power of every strike, had risen by several tiers.
And the transformation didn't stop there.
Originally, the Lightning Armor body had three pairs of arms.
Now—
It possessed nearly a hundred arms.
Those countless arms spread outward, dense and imposing. From afar, the figure resembled a divine Buddha, inspiring instinctive awe.
It couldn't compare to the sheer absurdity of the True Several Thousand Hands' thousand limbs—
But Arata's Lightning Armor body was made of pure lightning, whose offensive power far surpassed Wood Style.
Fewer arms were only natural.
All of this took far longer to describe than to happen.
In reality, it was completed in a blink of an eye.
Lightning was, after all, the embodiment of speed.
Madara had only just begun his attack—
And Arata had already transformed into a six-hundred-meter Third-Gear Lightning Armor.
Seeing this, Uchiha Madara's eyes widened once more.
It had been many years since anyone had made him feel this way.
For the second time in his life, he sensed the threat of death.
The last person to give him that feeling had been the God of Shinobi—Hashirama Senju.
White Zetsu surfaced from the ground again, utterly speechless.
Only now did he truly understand what kind of monster Arata was.
This Lightning Armor: Third Gear completely suppressed Madara's Armored Susanoo.
Perhaps only Hashirama's True Several Thousand Hands could barely rival it.
Realizing how dangerous the situation had become, White Zetsu didn't hesitate—he dove underground once more.
At this level of combat, he thought bitterly,
even being a spectator is a death sentence…
Madara, on the other hand, burst into exhilarated laughter.
"Come on! Keep going! Let me see how far you can dance!!"
Arata's expression was ice-cold.
Since he had already unleashed his strongest move, he had no intention of letting Madara leave alive.
"Thunder Burial: Flash Banquet!"
With Arata's command, every arm behind the six-hundred-meter Lightning Armor manifested a samurai sword.
Under his control, they slashed down in unison, all aimed at Uchiha Madara!
With the massive increase in scale, every single slash far surpassed the power of Second-Gear Lightning Armor
A casual swing alone produced a sword wave with a diameter exceeding dozens of meters.
Under such attacks, even the tallest mountain in the Land of Fire looked insignificant.
In the next instant, the world lost all color—
Consumed entirely by blazing blue lightning.
Sword waves of lightning tore through the sky, one after another, forming a true banquet of thunder.
Madara did not falter.
He accelerated the formation of Tailed Beast Bombs and Susanoo strikes yet again.
The real victim here was the Nine-Tails.
Not only was it being treated like a puppet, every last shred of its chakra was being mercilessly drained by Madara.
If not for its near-limitless chakra regeneration, it would have collapsed long ago.
Even so, chakra generation had its limits.
Once those limits were exceeded, it could no longer produce Tailed Beast Bombs.
After firing dozens in succession, the Nine-Tails was finally pushed to its brink—its output slowing dramatically.
And at that very moment—
The ultimate attacks of Madara and Arata collided.
The first Lightning Armor: Third Gear slash struck Madara's fully empowered Armored Tailed Beast Bomb in midair.
This time—
Arata's slash gained the upper hand.
Yet after piercing the bomb, the resulting explosion halted its advance.
The same scene repeated.
Second clash.
Third.
Tenth.
By the time the Nine-Tails' output began to fall, more than fifty explosions had already occurred.
And yet—
Arata's slashes had not stopped.
Only then did Madara realize something was wrong.
He immediately reduced the size of each Tailed Beast Bomb—
And only then was he barely able to keep up with the exchange.
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