Minato's eyes hardened with seriousness, his breath grew deep, and his senses sharpened from unease.
The cause of this effect?
Well, it was simple.
Right then and there, the fourth hokage was face to face with a very angry beast, and that beast was now channeling a planetary mass of destruction incarnate.
A biju bomb that was increasingly growing at a rate, that would dwarf its earlier attacks by over twice the size.
"This is a great sight to see from all the way up here." Obito mocked, his tone laced in derision and elation.
Obito's eye then gleamed scarlet under the haunting levels of bloodlust that filled the air.
"I have a front row seat— to the Yellow Flash's final struggle."
At that moment, having his hearing assaulted by demoralizing snarls.
Watching his friend slip closer to death's door, and looking upon the fiendish planet that hovered above him.
Minato couldn't help but slip back into almost a decade ago. Back to when he had faced this very same beast, with a hole right in his chest.
He had barely grasped victory in that altercation back then.
However, unlike then, Kushina's adamantine chains weren't binding the beast's chakra.
But there was one thing that that decade long battle and his dreadful present shared in common.
It was do or die!
As though the flames of his hope had been fanned to a raging fulmination, Minato's eyes sparked with a radiant blue blaze.
"Masked man." The Fourth Hokage's voice darkened under a cold tone. "Remember what I said earlier?"
Suddenly, embers of blue chakra started to slowly seep out of Minato's body, creeping around him, before bursting forth into a seemingly uncontrollable storm.
"I said I would kill you."
Obito was taken aback for a brief moment, and for almost a second, the Uchiha's mind crumbled with worry, as he beheld something that he would have never guessed would happen in his wildest dreams.
Minato's killer intent!
Bright surges of chakra erupted around Minato, before they began to swirl about, first around him, and then into his outstretched palm.
"Sage art!" The Yellow flash exclaimed, feeling the waves of Chakra violently rotate in his hold.
"Giant Rasengan!"
Ethereal blue light emanated from the mountain sized sphere of aura that hovered above the Fourth Hokage's arm.
It looked celestial, almost bearing the nature of a divine punishment if one might add.
And it drove heavy winds across the battlefield in its expansion, until it was just as large and as threatening as the Ninetails' dark sphere.
"Do not underestimate the Leaf— Intruder." Minato warned, before blitzing forward and crashing his rasengan right in the middle of Kurama's biju bomb.
The battlefield thundered under their titanic clash, sending disastrous earthquakes accompanied by tsunami like winds to rage across the War zone.
Kurama pushed his head forward, driving the Tailed beast bomb into Minato's rasengan, but Minato didn't falter in the slightest.
'I'll bet it all on this!'
Standing his ground up above the air, Minato poured as much chakra as he possibly could into his rasengan.
He used as much of his vigour as he could muster, until beads of sweat started to form on his head.
And he employed as much of his chakra as expendable, until the yellow markings on his eye lids fizzled away.
"He's unbelievable." Obito confessed, watching Minato and Kurama almost lock each other into a stalemate. 'But he's still human.'
Suddenly, Kurama's eyes burned in malice, his hatred spiraling into a fuel that pushed his attack to even greater magnitudes.
'Darn it! I'm about to run out of chakra already!' Minato cursed, watching red streaks of energy adorn Kurama's attack.
But before his rasengan could be pushed to defeat. He heard a reassuring voice muffled in between mouthfuls of blood.
"Minato! Here's some of my chakra!"
Gamabunta managed to break his arms loose, sending gusts of blue energy into Minato's rasengan.
And that was just the miracle Minato needed.
"Chief! Thanks a lot!"
Mixing Gamabunta's energy into his blue sphere, Minato spun the rasengan into a gargantuan spiral of destruction.
One that was even larger than the Ninetails' attack.
"Impossible." Obito watched in bewilderment as the sharp arms of Minato's rasengan scraped away at Kurama's Biju bomb.
"He's a monster."
The rasengan consumed more and more of its dark counterpart, eating and blending into it until the once dreadful attack had disintegrated into nothingness.
And with Kurama's attack out of the way, Minato drove his planetary attack right into Kurama's face.
He released the blue sphere, sending the Fox crashing into the ground, to release the captured Amphibian.
"Now Bunta!"
Minato's words were followed by the Warchief's swift motion, who rammed himself into the Ninetails like a battering ram.
The Orange Fox that originally tried to get back to its feet was now being grappled by a Gamabunta that had no intention of letting go.
And no matter how hard Kurama rammed his fists into the Toad's ribs, Gamabunta's grip only grew tighter.
"Minato, you're up!"
The moment Gamabunta uttered those words, the fourth hokage propelled himself into the air, projecting himself over to the Ninetails' head.
The plan was trending smoothly, and once he had made it to the Ninetails, he would cancel the contract seal between It and Obito.
But before his fingers could even graze the beast, Obito appeared in his vision, causing a spark to flash in the night from the blades of both warriors.
"Did you forget about me?…" Obito tossed his Kunai into the air, letting it fall back into his grasp.
"…The one you so desperately want to kill?"
Minato gritted his teeth in frustration. As upon seeing the Masked Uchiha, one thing was made painfully clear to him.
He would have to defeat his problematic foe, in order to break his contract seal. Be it through him or the Nine tailed fox!
Gamabunta would only be able to hold Kurama for a few seconds, meaning he had only one shot.
And he would have to end it all with a single strike.
Adopting a battle stance, Minato held his Kunai tightly in his hand.
And then the fourth Hokage observed his opponent, who was clamping his hands with a curious chain-like weapon.
And when his final clamp snapped shut, both warriors blurred, speeding towards each other with a frenzied march.
Minato pointed his Kunai forward, but the moment it barely pierced Obito's mirage, his blade slipped through his mask, leaving Minato to phase past the ghostly figure.
'I've got you.' Obito hardened his body as his chains ascended, wrapping themselves around Minato.
But before the wrung steel could properly latch onto him. The Hokage tossed his Kunai behind him with lightning fast speed.
'What?'
FLASH!
Minato warped in front of a speeding Obito, conjuring a rasengan in a split second, before ramming it right into Obito's midsection.
Mission successful.
His plan to get past the Masked Man's indomitable time/space ninjutsu had worked.
Or so he thought.
His rasengan sunk into Obito's belly, only scraping the hems of his cloak before heading right through him like a sword through fire.
'He's gotten much faster at using that jutsu!' Minato panicked internally as he phased through the vengeful Uchiha.
But there was nothing he could do, but hear the heart wrenching voice of Obito, while he stretched under the agonizing gravitational pull of the Kamui.
Obito grinned, his accent clad in a paradox of both glee and coldness, as he placed his arm on Minato, causing a mass of warping chakra to swirl him into his vision.
"Goodbye, Minat—"
"RASENGAN!"
A storm of blue energy crashed into Obito's side, sending him spinning violently with a forceful collision onto the hard earth.
What Minato heard next, had him in a state of both confusion, and a strange sense of relief.
"Your hero has arrived— In the coolest of fashions!"