Before the God of Death could extract Hiruzen's entire soul, a blade of wind appeared out of thin air and sliced through Hiruzen's soul! For the very first time, the smile on the face of the God of Death disappeared! His eyes widened as around 20% of Hiruzen's soul returned to his body.

He immediately extended his arm towards Hiruzen's body, but before he could reach his body, the God of Death began disappearing! The Reaper Death Seal jutsu had ended. Hiruzen fell to the ground with a smile on his face!

Shock appeared on Jiraiya's face as he wondered, 'What in the world was that? Could only a part of the soul be used as a sacrifice for this jutsu? Regardless, this is good news. The only question is, can Sensei live with so little of his soul remaining?'

However, there was one person even more shocked than Jiraiya. And, that person was none other than Fujin. He looked at Hiruzen with a stunned expression and exclaimed internally, 'What the hell??? That's my fucking Wind Domain!!! When did this old fox copy it?'

The Wind blade that sliced Hiruzen's soul wasn't from Fujin or any other ninja. It was used by none other than Hiruzen!

After Minato's death, Hiruzen had studied the Reaper Death Seal in great detail! He reached such a stage that no other ninja in history, including the Uzumaki ninja who created this seal, knew as much about it as Hiruzen did. It was during this study, Hiruzen realized that once the enemy's soul had been sealed, there was a chance that the caster could continue living by cutting his own soul and deactivating the jutsu.

However, there were several issues. The very first was that the God of Death's blade couldn't be used for that purpose. And, normal attacks couldn't cut through the soul perfectly and could end up destroying the soul entirely.

Hence, Hiruzen worked on creating a jutsu that could cut through the soul perfectly. It wasn't very difficult to do due to his expertise in manipulating Yin chakra. He created a jutsu that looked very similar to the Blade of Wind but had very little Wind chakra and far more Yin chakra which was the most effective against souls.

That led him to the second issue, which was to time the jutsu to cut through his soul at the perfect time. In order for this to work, he would need to wait until the God of Death sealed the soul of his enemy and only then cut his soul.

However, the God of Death took both souls at almost the same time. There was an extremely small window of opportunity to cut his soul and still live after using the Reaper Death Seal. If he created the jutsu early and waited, the God of Death could become suspicious and take his soul before the enemy's soul. On the other hand, if he waited until the God of Death sealed the enemy's soul, it would be too late. Trying to make a move hastily would only result in the caster's death.

For over a decade, Hiruzen couldn't solve this issue. He had pretty much given up on it. Fortunately, he gained the solution to his problem when he saw Fujin using the Wind Domain! It perfectly resolved the timing problem.

Hence, it could be said that Hiruzen's survival was an impact of Fujin transmigrating to the Naruto world. Without Fujin, Hiruzen would have never seen the Wind Domain and wouldn't have any chance of survival after using the Reaper Death Seal. Even though Fujin was shocked to see Hiruzen copying his technique, he was relieved to see the future possibly changing.

When Hiruzen was debating whether to seal Orochimaru or not, he had two choices. The first was to wait for Fujin and Jiraiya and have them injure Orochimaru and consume his chakra. That way, he could seal his soul entirely. However, Hiruzen had very little chakra left. Even if Orochimaru ran out of chakra, his willpower alone would require every bit of Hiruzen's chakra to seal him.

That meant that he wouldn't have any chakra left to save himself. He would have still done it had Orochimaru's death been absolute. However, knowing that he could still be revived, Hiruzen decided to ensure his own safety. If he lived, he could once again counter the Edo Tensei jutsu in the future and the next Hokage wouldn't need to sacrifice his or her life to stop Orochimaru again.

Hence, Hiruzen released most of his chakra into the air, which transformed into Winds consisting of a high amount of Yin Chakra. The God of Death didn't pay any attention to it since it mixed with the air while Orochimaru's attention was more on the God of Death.

Hiruzen waited until the right moment and made a move right after the fragment of Orochimaru's soul had been sealed and ended the jutsu right after. Of course, even if he was alive for the moment, the damage to his soul was truly devastating. He fell unconscious as soon as his soul was sliced!

In a secret base in the Land of Grass, Jugo exclaimed in panic, "Kimimaro! What happened to you? Did your illness flare up again?"

Juzo was talking to Kimimaro when Kimimaro suddenly collapsed to his knees. Even though he didn't scream, the pain was visible on his face. He placed his hand on his curse seal and thought, 'This pain… Orochimaru-sama…'

"Old man! Give me my arms!" Orochimaru screamed in rage. However, Hiruzen had already lost consciousness.

"Orochimaru-sama!" Tayuya, Kidomaru and Sakon shouted as they flickered towards him. Orochimaru glanced at them and noticed Fujin and Jiraiya right behind them. He shouted, "Kill Hiruzen!"

Tayuya, Kidomaru and Sakon were surprised by the order. But, they didn't dare to disobey his command. Despite his injuries, Enma got up and said resolutely, "You'll have to go through me!"

However, his feeble appearance wasn't enough to intimidate them. What worried them more was the ones chasing after them. Due to having used most of their chakra to sustain the barrier, all of them were on their last leg. And, they were well aware that even if they were at their full strength, it wouldn't make much of a difference.

Sakon muttered, "This will be our last attack!"

Ukon chuckled and said, "Taking the life of the Third Hokage and his powerful summon, that's not a bad way to go!"

'Multi-leg Hurricane jutsu'

Tayuya thought, 'To think that I'll die in this shitty place! Who'd have thought that this old geezer still held such fearsome power!'

'Demon Flute: Trio Requiem'

Kidomaru thought, 'I never imagined that Orochimaru-sama could lose… Konoha, we completely underestimated them. Even if Kimimaro and the Fourth Kazekage had participated, I don't think the result would have been any different. Directly attacking Konoha was a grave error!'

'Spider Bow: Fierce Rip jutsu'

'Wild Lion's Mane jutsu'

'Wind Release: Vacuum Cluster Bullets jutsu'

Seeing the remaining members of the Sound Four launching attacks at Enma and Hiruzen, Fujin and Jiraiya immediately acted. Despite having a lead over Fujin and Jiraiya, their attacks paled in terms of speed.

Fujin's Vacuum Bullets pierced through the arrows shot by Kidomaru, destroying and diverting all of them. Moments later, they rampaged through the Doki summoned by Tayuya, killing every single one of them.

Finally, the Vacuum Bullets entered the hurricane surrounding Sakon and Ukon. Normal Air Bullets and even Vacuum Bullets would have been diverted due to the winds of the hurricane. However, that didn't happen with Fujin's attack. Before either of them could realize it, several holes opened up in their weird body! Another member of the Sound Four fell in Konoha!

While Fujin directly countered their attacks, Jiraiya's hair extended towards Hiruzen and Enma, protecting both of them. With Jiraiya defending Hiruzen, Fujin focused entirely on the offense. Winds appeared from his Wind Cloak and several Wind Blades moved towards Tayuya and Kidomaru.

With nothing to hide behind, Tayuya was defenseless. She immediately tried to summon another Doki to hide behind but failed to do so. She cursed, "Shit! I don't have any chak…"

Wind blades cut straight through her throat, beheading her on the spot. Dozens of Wind Blades also hit Kidomaru, but he protected himself by secreting sticky spider gold from his pores. Unfortunately, even that didn't buy him much time as a Vacuum Bullet pierced straight through the third eye on his forehead. Fujin didn't even glance at him and instead used his Vacuum Gatling jutsu on Orochimaru!

Orochimaru's expression was grim. He had already been on the receiving end of that jutsu once. In his current state, he had no chance of dodging the jutsu. Jiraiya noticed it as well and wondered, 'Is this it for Orochimaru?'