Chapter 152: Ambush and Rescue
Sasuke moved through the melee like water finding cracks — fast, economical, leaving bodies behind him. Four Kumogakure ninja down in the span of moments.
Before he could breathe, another came at his back. Old momentum gone, new not yet built. He was preparing to take a hit in order to land a kill when the attacker simply stopped moving.
Shikamaru, not far away, exhaled.
"Shadow Imitation — successful."
Sasuke took the opening and finished it.
In the same instant, a silent figure lunged at Shikamaru from an angle no one had covered.
"Fang over Fang!"
The spinning drill of Kiba's technique erupted from nowhere and sent the attacker airborne.
"Not bad at all." Shikamaru wiped nonexistent sweat from his temple.
"Heh!" Kiba rubbed his nose with evident satisfaction. "I'm going to be Hokage someday. Of course I'm not bad."
He was still smirking when a kunai came screaming at the back of his skull from somewhere unidentifiable.
Buzz.
A dense mass of black insects surged up and intercepted it in midair.
Kiba stared at the kunai on the ground below the swarm, heart catching up to what had just happened.
"In battle, don't relax." Shino adjusted his glasses. "The insects sensed it."
A cluster of Kumogakure ninja immediately converged on Shino.
He didn't move. Just slightly tilted his head, expression unchanged behind the sunglasses.
"Meat Tank!"
Choji's battle cry preceded the impact — a massive spinning sphere tearing through the group and scattering them.
"Ha! Shino would've been in trouble without Choji, right?" Kiba grinned.
"No." Shino's voice was flat. "I knew Choji would respond. That's why I left that angle open."
Choji scratched his head and smiled.
Chidori.
Lightning detonated at close range. Sasuke drove his hand through the Kumogakure ninja who'd been lining up behind Choji, withdrew it in a shower of sparks, and looked at the group.
"This is a battlefield." His voice was level. "Don't get distracted."
The red Sharingan eyes swept them briefly.
Something different in them today. Still cold. But not quite so empty.
In the Konoha command trench, surrounded by guards and fortifications, Kushina and Ino kept the Spiral Mountain Formation active. Every development in the battle fed back through it to Jiraiya in real time.
"Right wing is being pushed — Fifth Company from central command, fill the gap immediately!"
"Left wing and vanguard have broken through — Third Company, press the advantage with them, now!"
"Vanguard taking heavy pressure — First, Fourth, and Sixth Companies from center, support the vanguard!"
Jiraiya called it all while holding Orochimaru at bay simultaneously — managing his half of the fight while the Formation gave him eyes across the entire engagement.
"You seem distracted, Jiraiya." Orochimaru pressed his advantage with the Kusanagi, not letting Jiraiya create distance. "That's not like you."
Jiraiya didn't dignify it with a response. He ducked back from a Hidden Shadow Snake Hand and formed seals immediately.
"Fire Release — Great Fireball!"
The fireball drove at Orochimaru, who watched it come without concern.
"You haven't changed at all. No adaptability."
"Fire Release is strong. It counters my snake techniques. Theoretically it counters Wind Release too."
"But that's only theoretical."
His hands blurred through seals.
"Wind Release — Breakthrough!"
Orochimaru's wind met Jiraiya's fire head-on.
The fireball didn't die — it expanded, fed, became a wall of flame twice its original size.
Aimed directly back at Jiraiya.
"—Move—"
Jiraiya scrambled clear, still catching embers, slapping them out with irritated efficiency.
"Tsk." He straightened, soot-marked.
"Keep letting yourself get distracted like that," Orochimaru said pleasantly, Kusanagi already driving forward again, "and I'll stop holding back."
Jiraiya threw himself back into it, no choice.
Konoha rear lines.
A powerfully built man stood at the edge of the tree line, looking at the Konoha formation arranged before him. He'd pulled a small notebook from his pocket and was writing in it.
Zetsu drifted over, curious.
—okay, Bee-sama, stab Konoha in the rear, a single strike, leave them scrambling between two fires—
"What's that?"
"Rap lyrics." Killer Bee capped his pen. "Want to learn? I'll teach you."
"Really?!" Zetsu's face lit up.
"Of course. People who appreciate rap are rare and precious."
"If you teach me, that makes you my teacher!"
"Exactly!" Bee straightened with sudden authority. "Starting today, Killer Bee is your sensei!"
"Yes, Killer Bee-sensei!" Zetsu dropped to one knee, overcome with emotion. "I want to learn rap!"
Bee smiled the smile of a master who has found a worthy student and ruffled the green-and-white hair with genuine affection.
"Then once all this is settled, I'll teach you properly." He stepped back. "Right now — I've got business."
Zetsu's spore technique had allowed him to reach Konoha's rear without being sensed. The plan had two objectives: hit Konoha from behind to create a pincer situation, and eliminate the extraordinary sensor who'd been dismantling Kumogakure's guerrilla campaign.
Can't have that in the world.
"Stay here." Bee patted Zetsu's shoulder. "Don't get yourself killed."
Before Zetsu could respond, Bee was already moving — a single leap, crashing into the snow with a sound like a small explosion.
"WHO'S THERE?!"
The nearby Konoha security detail was on alert in an instant.
"Hey~"
Bee showed his teeth.
He moved through the security detail in the time it took them to process the fact that he was there.
Then he was running, heading directly for the coordinates Zetsu had marked.
The moment Bee and Zetsu separated, far back in the fortified Konoha command area—
Kushina's eyes snapped open.
Red eyes. Full of shock.
Enormous.
Something completely outside the scale of anything she'd sensed before. Not human-sized. A chakra that dwarfed everything.
Not Orochimaru. Not Tsunade. Not Jiraiya. Not the Raikage currently fighting Sakura.
Larger than all of them.
And it was coming directly at her.
She clenched her teeth and forced the panic down. She kept the technique running. She relayed the information to Jiraiya.
Jiraiya's expression shifted.
In all of Kumogakure, there was exactly one person capable of this. One person who could walk into an opposing army alone and treat it as an obstacle course.
The Eight-Tails jinchūriki.
"Damn it—"
He needed to break away from Orochimaru. Get back to the command position. This wasn't just Kushina — this was the entire battle. If the perfect jinchūriki reached the rear command and the Spiral Mountain Formation went down, the battle collapsed.
Orochimaru saw him try to disengage and pressed harder, Kusanagi moving like a striking serpent.
"Orochimaru." Jiraiya's eyes went cold.
"Isn't this more interesting?" Orochimaru licked his lips. "Stay and play."
Two people who had trained together since childhood, who knew every technique the other had. There was no ending this in thirty seconds. Not without an opening neither of them had shown yet.
Entering sage mode required the toads, which required a window. Orochimaru wasn't giving him one. The five minutes of petrifaction would be fatal in this engagement.
Trapped.
Seven blades. Moving like part of his body.
Killer Bee cut through Konoha's rear lines without slowing, leaving wreckage behind each step. Groups trying to form combination jutsu were down before the seals were half-complete.
"Bee-sama, like wind, like rain, like thunder, like a mountain falling—"
"Konoha ninja, bottles filled with nothing—"
Improvised rap aside, he was already inside Konoha's lines. He could see the red hair.
Kushina pressed her teeth together and held the technique. Bee was under a hundred meters now. For someone at his level — seconds.
"Found you, little mouse."
Something sharp entered his eyes. He accelerated.
The ninja between them threw themselves at him without hesitation. They knew they weren't enough. They went anyway.
Kushina felt chakra signatures blinking out around her, one by one, and held.
She wanted to drop the technique. She couldn't. Jiraiya's standing order: the Formation did not break. If it broke, every ninja in the field would know something had gone catastrophically wrong in the rear. The disruption could cascade into disaster.
So she held it.
Bee closed the last of the distance—
A figure appeared.
Hands moving faster than a person's hands should be able to move, seals completing in a blur:
"Water Release — Water Formation Pillar."
A column of water erupted from the frozen ground and drove Bee back.
She kept moving. Seals again before the echo of the first technique had died:
"Water Release — Water Dragon Bullet."
The pillar transformed — became a serpentine form dozens of meters long that threw itself at Killer Bee with full force.
Two techniques. A handful of seconds. The situation reversed entirely.
Green eyes swept the area. Kushina. Ino. The guards.
"Keep the technique running. All of you, move. Now."
Kushina stared for half a second and obeyed, moving with Ino while maintaining the Formation without breaking stride.
The guards looked at the woman who'd just appeared and then looked at each other.
When had this water-type specialist appeared in their ranks?
Water Release was terrain-dependent. Snow didn't count as water — it needed work to become water. This woman had pulled a Formation Pillar from a frozen battlefield, then immediately converted it into a Dragon Bullet, maintaining both in sequence.
The chakra reserves required for that. The technique mastery required for that.
Jiraiya's voice came through the Formation.
"Listen to her."
The Konoha guards cleared back.
Mei Terumī looked at the field they'd left her and let out a slow breath.
Did she want their help taking this man down?
Yes. But she couldn't use it.
Two kekkei genkai. Both of them area-denial. Both of them indiscriminate.
If allies were nearby, her Boil Release and Lava Release would dissolve them just as thoroughly as the enemy.
She worked alone.
"Hmm." Killer Bee's eyes moved over her with professional assessment. "Can't say I've seen you around Konoha before."
Mei laughed lightly.
"Oh my. A man who leads with staring — that's not very gentlemanly."
"How about melting in my fiery kiss instead~?"
"Boil Release — Skilled Mist Technique!"
(Chapter End)
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