Boom!
"What?!"
Everyone around was stunned.
Faced with a mountainous behemoth crashing down from above, Kirito actually blocked it, holding his blade up with just one hand!
As the Zanpakutō in Kirito's grip was enveloped in a radiant, snow‑white glow, the surrounding air dropped in temperature at an alarming rate.
Grrr...
Having drawn too deeply from the Tailed Beast's chakra, Gaara's remaining reason was eroding fast. He was now all primal instinct, a beast driven solely by its urge to fight. Seeing the tiny figure beneath him resist his full weight with one raised blade, Gaara inhaled sharply, and his massive body swelled further, growing as large as a small mountain.
But even so, Kirito's blade didn't waver.
It didn't budge an inch.
"So it's time at last... to release its true name," Kirito whispered.
His vision was flooded with a blinding white light. At that moment, the blade in his hand no longer felt like a separate weapon, but like an extension of his soul. Boundless energy surged from the Zanpakutō, coursing through every inch of his body.
Kirito slowly shifted his gaze upward, locking eyes with the monstrous Gaara looming above him, who still sought to crush him through brute force.
Kirito shook his head gently.
"That strength of yours... can no longer suppress me."
BOOM!
With barely a motion, Kirito lifted his blade upward.
A terrifying surge of power erupted from beneath.
Gaara's monstrous form, pressing down with all the force of a collapsing mountain, was blasted back by the overwhelming force of the Zanpakutō's awakening.
The shockwave hurled Gaara skyward.
The dazzling white glow condensed.
As the light receded, the Zanpakutō's true form emerged.
Snow white.
From the blade to the hilt, to the tsuba and the long flowing ribbon at the pommel, every part of it was flawlessly pure. The entire sword shimmered with a faint halo of white light, beautiful and ethereal like something born of nature itself.
Its name was,
"Sode no Shirayuki."
BOOM!
Gaara, blasted away, crashed violently into the ground. But even that wasn't enough to defeat a Jinchūriki.
His massive yellow beast-eyes locked onto Kirito, now cloaked in snow and light.
Then came a terrifying transformation.
Gaara's mouth opened wide, not just the one on his face, but dozens of grotesque, fanged mouths burst open across his rocky body. They all inhaled at once, his chakra swelling to its peak as his body ballooned even larger.
From afar, Kankurō and Temari turned pale.
"No! That monster's going to use that move! We've got to run!"
"Run? How? That's an S-rank Wind Release..."
Temari froze. She had seen it once before, how that technique had razed an entire forest into flat land.
Farther off, Karin trembled.
Her keen sensory powers let her feel the sheer terror of the chakra Gaara was unleashing... and the monstrous presence deep within his core. Her legs shook violently, too frightened to flee.
She stared blankly at the one man still standing before the beast.
"H-He's not scared...? At all?" she murmured.
"…So this is the true power of a shinobi?"
Asuna clenched her teeth. The sight before her left an indelible shock in her heart.
She stared at Kirito's back, and whispered,
"You're not even a shinobi... so how are you going to fight something this terrifying?"
"Kirito-kun!" Hinata called out.
"Don't worry," he said, his back to her, raising one hand to wave casually.
Even in the face of such a horrifying build-up, he still had the presence of mind to respond. It was surreal.
But Kirito wasn't showing off.
It wasn't strategy.
It wasn't pride.
He simply… believed.
That he could take this head-on.
The white tip of his blade scratched against the ground, carving small channels from which cold mist poured forth like a flood of winter.
The blade pointed forward.
He gathered every bit of the encroaching frost,
and concentrated it all at the blade's tip.
And then, Gaara released his ultimate attack.
"Wind Release: Infinite Sand Dust Breakthrough!!"
An S-rank jutsu, combining raw destructive force and the condensed chakra of a Tailed Beast. Everything in its path would be erased.
"Second Dance: White Ripple." [Tsugi no mai: Hakuren]
The concentrated frost exploded forward from Kirito's blade.
Where the cold passed, even the air itself froze solid.
Devouring wind and devouring frost collided head-on.
Where they met, the battlefield split into two realms: one of blinding snow and the other of transparent, howling wind. At the center where the elements clashed, sharp shrieks of slicing gales and the crackling of shattering ice echoed in terrifying harmony.
It felt like standing in the heart of a world where a blizzard and a hurricane raged as one.
On Gaara's side, the Tailed Beast's chakra flowed endlessly, feeding his storm. The destructive gusts didn't weaken, they grew fiercer.
But in terms of sheer power, Kirito had the upper hand.
His ice carved deeper and faster, the frostline pushing forward,
but slowly… gradually… the speed of that advance began to wane.
At this rate, when the snowstorm's momentum finally faltered,
the hurricane would consume everything in return.
Kirito narrowed his eyes.
If he wanted to win,
he needed to end this with overwhelming force.
Slowly, he raised his blade.
The snow-white tip brushed lightly across his finger.
"…Negative eighteen degrees."
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200 P.S = 1 Extra Chapters