Chương 495: CH_13.14 (495)

Orochimaru stood up, his face contorted. The genjutsu battle seemed to affect him more than Itachi. He exhaled, and wisps of raw chakra escaped with his breath. He slammed his hands together, and his chakra flared so violently that it created a localised gale that sent dry clay and dust flying around. He weaved a long set of hand seals, his hands showing an atypical fury. He slammed his palms into the clay, and the world began to weep.

It started with a sudden, unnatural dryness—the mist in the air vanished, sucked into a central vacuum. The dew on the grass retreated, and the vibrant leaves of the surrounding trees shrivelled to brown husks as every drop of moisture was violently leached from their cells. The water-natured chakra spilled out of Orochimaru like a flood and began converting into water.

Water Release: Great Grinding Basin The earth buckled as a hundred-foot-wide subterranean tidal wave erupted from the soil, and a colossal pillar of water surged upward with the pressure of a cannon. The stream turned into a rotating millstone of violence, filled with the debris of the forest, designed to crush bone, stone, and metal alike. Centripetal forces turned the water into a grinding edge, uprooting massive oaks and reducing granite boulders to silt.

The forest floor was gouged into a fifty-foot-deep trench, the topsoil stripped away to reveal the naked, shattered bedrock, actively turning the vibrant woodland into a barren, muddy canyon as the jutsu surged forward. On the other side, the heat distorted the air around Itachi as he weaved hand seals while sucking in air, his lungs expanding and his diaphragm opening. As he pressed together the last hand seals, the heat vanished for a moment, and then he exhaled a sea.

A rolling curtain of orange-white plasma so vast the tall forest trees seemed to shrink before it hammered forward with a speed that outpaced the wind. It was like a white star was summoned to the ground with a roar so loud that it became silence. Fire Release: Great Fire Destruction The trees in its path detonated before they even had the chance to burn.

The sap inside the trunks didn't have the time to sizzle as they instantly reached critical temperature, turning to steam that burst through the bark in showers of flaming shrapnel only to be instantly vaporised. Massive oaks were pulverised into charcoal dust before they could hit the ground, their carbonised remains sucked into the updraft of the fire's own artificial weather bubble.

The topsoil flash-fused into jagged, black sheets of glass as the temperatures reached a visceral high, while the inferno greedily gulped oxygen in an attempt to reach even higher heights. The liquid heat haze seemed to warp reality as the rippling lens of the black stone glass looked like it was crying while it melted into a slurry on the forest floor. And then the two ninjutsu clashed. ———. Due to their varying circumstances, everyone present in the group had seen the use of A-rank ninjutsu first-hand.

The assault squad had been given yearly demonstrations of A-rank ninjutsu by their captain, in this case, Fox. Anko was shown the sheer destruction by her former master, Orochimaru, who, coincidentally, was casting another one. Takuma had seen the clash of A-rank ninjutsu in the Gojiro Mines during the Steam-Frost War, and even though he was at a distance, he had almost lost his life from the periphery of the aftermath.

So they knew how close they were to almost certain death and thus ran to their fullest strength away from the clearing. Takuma looked over his shoulder and saw the heat-distorted view of Itachi as he weaved hand seals for a split moment before he disappeared between the trees. The assault squad was a few metres to his side; Yazo was running as well, his hand glowing in the reddish-green glow of an iryōjutsu—a temporary fixture to keep his hand stable as they ran away.

Anko, who was the fastest on the ground, was running ahead of him. He purposefully shifted so he was directly behind her, so if something came, it would hit him before it reached her. They simultaneously knew when it started. Takuma felt the moisture being sucked from the surface of his eyeballs and his skin going dry.

Then, the tips of the green leaves on the trees around him turned rusty brown, and the grass beneath his feet began to crumble, but that was nothing compared to the whiteout when an oppressive heat hit them from behind. However, there was no time to comprehend it when a physical weight descended on them. A blinding, white-hot wall of super-heated steam expanded outward from the point of clash at subsonic speed. In an instant, they lost all sight of each other, regardless of how close they were.

"Get low to the ground!" Anko screamed, but her voice was swallowed by the hiss of the phase change. Instead of a breeze, the steam felt like a falling avalanche as the pressure caught up to them. Their eardrums popped, nearly to the point of shattering. Two of the assault squad members were tossed forward thirty feet into the undergrowth, and everyone except for Anko lost their footing—Anko herself was airborne for a second before landing on her feet.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. Takuma tried to breathe, but instead of air, he felt a toxic cloud of ash and scalding vapour rush into his lungs. He momentarily faltered as the air became too hot and unbearable to breathe. As the group scrambled to find footing, the trees around them exploded, peppering them with flaming wooden shrapnel that hissed through the steam like senbon.

They ignored the splinters in their bodies and continued to rush forth away from the unravelling destruction. Just when they thought they had gained enough distance, they were all lifted off their feet and pulled back. The fire's massive thermal updraft created a vacuum; it felt like an invisible hand trying to drag them back to hell. Below them on the ground, boiling water met scorched earth and created a sizzling, ceramic-like mud.

Some were lucky and managed to land on ground that was still solid; others were not so lucky and got burned. Takuma landed on the sludge and sank up to his knees until he managed to pull himself out and stand atop it. He felt a sudden chakra drain and looked down at his body to see it covered in the onyx of Earth Release: Earth Spear. Somewhere along the way, he had pulled up the jutsu on instinct. He immediately started to run. His heart was hammering in his chest with terror. Everything he knew was wrong.

Someone like him didn't have a place in a fight between those two monsters. The Frost jōnin? Kinoto? He was lucky that he was alive after running into a jōnin, but no amount of luck would get him past this unharmed." … Oi." It was better to abandon the foolish plans and let the jōnin handle it among themselves." Hey…" He would get himself and others killed." Oi!" Grey's voice echoing in his head snapped him out of it.

A jolt of pain in the base of his head distracted him from the overwhelming fear for a moment to listen to the voice in his head." You have a plan. You need to see it through," Grey said." Stop running!" Takuma couldn't believe what he was hearing. If there was anything the entity in his head cared about, it was Takuma's life. He thought Grey would encourage running away from the obvious danger to keep the body alive." Stop running, you scared fuck!

"Grey yelled." After slaving away when you could've been living your life, you're going to run away now? Why did you waste away all of that time training!? What was that all for if not for right now!?"

"Those monsters—"" One of those monsters is on your own side! Anko and the assault squad members are on your side! The Akimichi clan head is on your side! Even the fucking mindwalker is on your side! You promised them a plan, and now you're abandoning them? What do you think Anko is going to do?" Even if the plan was abandoned, she would go right after Orochimaru regardless of the danger.

The other people would also be in disarray and might head straight towards the two jōnin, only to be caught off guard when their previous instructions were no longer valid." I don't like how you live; it's not how I would, but the truth is that you're already more of a shinobi than I would've ever been—but if you're going to run away now, what was the point of it all?

"Grey appeared in front of him, looking displeased, like he always did when Takuma did anything he disliked." You can do it. I know it better than anyone else that you can. I was there when you puked during training, studying when you wanted to sleep, making clones when you didn't want to. After all of that, you don't get to doubt yourself…" Grey seemed to have said everything he wanted because he disappeared without waiting for a response. Takuma stopped running and slowly came to a halt.

He stood above the boiling sludge for a moment before turning around and running back into the steam, heading towards where the two monsters fought." Jōnin Kawamochi, may I disturb you to guide everyone through the steam? We need to hurry if we want the plan to work. Is Lord Choza on time? May I also ask you to relay a few more thoughts of mine to others; I have some refinements." The point of it all was to survive.

However, he also had pride in the work he had done and wanted it to go well so that all the effort he had put in would not go to waste. Grey told the truth. Why had he put in all the effort into his training if he was just going to run away? He wanted to be a jōnin in the future; would he be able to become someone special if he were to run away now? It was undoubtedly dangerous, but he wasn't going against Orochimaru alone. He had many competent people working alongside him." Is everyone alive?" he asked next."

Fortunately, no one has died," Kawamochi replied, her voice severe. Regardless of where everyone was, there was no doubt that everyone had seen what had just happened." Good," Takuma sighed while following Kawamochi's instructions through the steam until he ran into Anko.

"Is everyone okay?" she asked.

"Everyone's alive," Takuma replied and missed the look of surprise on her face when she heard his voice. They waded through the steam together until they were reunited with the assault squad, who were in various states of injury from the destruction caused by the clash of A-rank ninjutsu, but nothing that would put them out of combat. He immediately asked them, "Koyal, are you going to participate?" Koyal was the assault squad's iryō-nin and was working on Yazo.

The assault squad's part in the plan worked best with four people, but if he wasn't going to participate, they would have only three. The risk of anything working sank against someone like Orochimaru if they weren't perfect.

"I need to work on his hand, or he's at a high risk of losing it."

"It can wait," Yazo said.

"No, the risk—""This is more important," Yazo said to Koyal.

"Also, I trust your skill, Koyal. Complete this job and fix my hand afterwards."

"It doesn't work like that." Koyal tried to persuade him, but Yazo cut him off and turned to Hopper.

"Give the command, sir. We can't take any chances here. If I lose my hand, then it would be the result of my choice. I'll take responsibility for it and not blame anyone." Hopper's moment of silence seemed to stretch for an eternity.

"How sure are you about this?" he asked Takuma.

"This is going to work," Takuma replied, deciding to put trust in Grey's words and the work he had put in.

"… The four of us will go in. Koyal will then rush back," Hopper said, making his decision. Though Koyal seemed to want to protest, he clenched his fists and accepted the decision. As an iryō-nin, his primary job was to keep his teammates safe, but at the same time, he was also part of the assault squad like others and had his duties towards their mission. Takuma nodded and then looked to Anko.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

"I am," she replied immediately without a hint of hesitation, and that worried him as her friend, but it was good for ANBU operative Ratel.

"Then, let's go take down a snake," Takuma said.