Once upon a time—
No, that wording isn't accurate.
It should be in the future.
In the future, there would be a chūnibyō youth who constantly shouted "Art is an explosion!", riding a clay bird created through a special Earth Release jutsu, casually infiltrating Sunagakure at low altitude.
He would then rain down all manner of clay explosives from the sky, yelling "Katsu! Katsu!" as he bombarded the village.
If not for the fact that the Fifth Kazekage had already experienced a miracle-level genjutsu rivaling Kotoamatsukami, had fallen victim to a certain master of Talk no Jutsu, and been placed under a long-term, SSS-rank buff called "Protect Sunagakure"—
If not for him stepping forward during that catastrophic air raid and safeguarding the village at the cost of being captured—
One could easily imagine Sunagakure being bombed into utter ruin.
Of course, that chūnibyō youth's real objective had been the jinchūriki and the tailed beast, not the destruction of Sunagakure itself.
But now—
Someone else was preparing to infiltrate Sunagakure using almost the exact same method.
Only this time, the goal was pure destruction.
That future experience alone was enough to prove that Sunagakure's air-defense shortcomings were very real.
And it wasn't just Sunagakure.
All the great ninja villages shared the same weakness.
Aerial attacks were notoriously difficult to defend against.
Yatagarasu's bombing method wasn't nearly as varied, nor were its individual explosions as exaggerated as mass-detonated explosive clay.
But it had one overwhelming advantage:
Quantity.
If one blast didn't destroy you, no problem—
There were plenty more where that came from.
After flying for a while longer, the sounds of the battlefield completely vanished.
High in the sky, Hagoromo could let Yatagarasu fly at full speed without restraint.
There were no effective countermeasures.
At that altitude, there weren't even reliable detection methods.
This was a state of—
"I pass through the sky, yet leave no trace in it."
Yes.
This was what people called asymmetric warfare.
From a conventional moral standpoint, attacking enemy civilians should be condemned without reservation.
But in reality, strategic strongholds were precisely where civilians tended to concentrate—because they were relatively safer.
Collateral damage was unavoidable.
Now that Hagoromo was heading to bomb Sunagakure, he had no intention of distinguishing between shinobi and civilians.
In the eyes of Konoha shinobi, people of the Land of Wind were enemies.
This was the brutal reality of the Shinobi World War.
No one expected shinobi to practice humanitarianism.
Back in the day, when Orochimaru and the others encountered the three war orphans in the Rain Country, he'd said:
"How pitiful. They won't survive the war anyway—might as well kill them."
Cruel as it sounded, that was ninja logic.
That was ninja mercy.
So Hagoromo felt no psychological burden whatsoever.
His actions followed the accepted rules of the shinobi world.
Yes—Hagoromo had a gentle-looking face.
That didn't stop him from possessing an S-class sadistic soul.
Based on his judgment, Sunagakure was currently in a severely weakened state.
Between their heavy losses in the previous battle and the forces they had committed to this one, the Sand had pushed their combat power to its absolute limit.
Both sides were treating this as the final collision.
The outcome would be simple:
Either you surrender—
Or you are destroyed.
The Hokage had personally led Konoha's remaining elite forces into the Land of Wind.
Faced with such an aggressive invasion, whether the Kazekage wanted to or not, he had no choice but to respond with full force.
Which meant—
Sunagakure Village itself was inevitably under-defended.
Objectively speaking, now was the perfect moment to infiltrate the village.
And an equally perfect opportunity to inflict massive damage.
Concern for national image?
Sorry—there was no such concept in the shinobi world.
That was civilian thinking.
Take Kumogakure, for example.
One of the strongest military powers among the Five Great Nations—
And yet they routinely sneaked into Konoha to kidnap women and children.
If Hagoromo's bombing succeeded, would it accelerate the end of the war?
If the results were good enough—
Absolutely.
Was that the reason he launched this air raid?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
But regardless of his subjective motivation, the objective value of his actions was undeniable.
After flying at full speed for four to five hours, Hagoromo finally ordered Yatagarasu to begin descending.
Sunagakure was close.
In the midst of barren desert, a target as large as Sunagakure was impossible to miss—
As long as you didn't fly too high.
At extreme altitude, all you saw was sand and dust.
Hagoromo's judgment was precise.
When he lowered altitude to about five hundred meters, Sunagakure finally came into view.
The village had been built with defensive terrain in mind.
From the ground, it was extremely difficult to assault.
From the air—
That was a different story.
The sky was undefended.
Even so, Hagoromo remained cautious.
No matter what, he refused to descend below three hundred meters.
He didn't know whether Sunagakure had any offensive aerial barriers.
In truth, he was being overly careful.
At most, Sunagakure would have a warning barrier—one that triggered alarms upon aerial intrusion.
As for powerful, floating, offensive barriers?
Technologically speaking, those weren't really feasible yet.
And at Hagoromo's altitude, nothing would be triggered anyway.
As Yatagarasu circled above Sunagakure, Hagoromo muttered to himself:
"Let's start with the biggest one…"
Unable to identify the most valuable target, he could only judge by size.
And honestly—
That wasn't a bad choice.
The highest-ranking individual usually occupied the largest building.
From the side, the building Hagoromo selected bore a massive "Wind" character on its wall.
It was unmistakably the Kazekage's office building.
With the target selected, the rest was simple:
Aim.
Load.
Lay eggs.
A complete service package.
No one knew whether anyone had noticed the bird.
But before the Sand shinobi could react—
A rain of white objects slammed into the Kazekage's office building.
Only then did the explosions begin.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
The first wave was impressive, but the building wasn't immediately destroyed.
A defensive barrier surrounded it.
However, no barrier was infinite.
Under bombardment, it flickered violently—like a screen about to fail.
With each explosion, the light grew dimmer.
After the third wave, the barrier finally shattered.
And once the barrier was gone—
The Kazekage's office was nothing more than bricks and dirt.
It took only a few more blasts to reduce it to rubble.
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