The situation was not looking good. Although Yūshin had actively moved to intercept Uchiha Tajima, the current state of affairs could be said to be him being pinned down by Tajima.
The Fireflies organization had no reinforcements at all—they could only endure the enemy's offensive head-on.
Assuming Senju Tobirama received Yūshin's message in time and launched operations as he predicted, even the Senju Clan's elite squads couldn't teleport instantly to the Hagoromo Clan's village... This meant The Fireflies organization would have to hold out until at least dawn before the Senju Clan's attack could begin.
The difficulty was too high.
Organization members lacking combat strength had already withdrawn first, and the few ninja capable of engaging the enemy were no longer staying in Kikyō Castle.
The enemy naturally wouldn't simply allow organization members to leave, but they still had to retreat.
This wasn't about not resisting—the logic was simple: you cannot fight positional warfare against enemies with absolute strength advantage.
Though The Fireflies organization was more familiar with Kikyō Castle, they had no real terrain advantage. Fighting positional warfare would mean more casualties, and they fundamentally couldn't hold this position anyway.
Only by staying mobile would there be more opportunities—at least more than fighting a static battle.
Yūshin couldn't continue dragging things out with Uchiha Tajima here. If he wanted to quickly escape the current predicament, he couldn't think about conserving chakra anymore.
Hadn't he seen that Uchiha Tajima was already using Susanoo's second stage? When enemies with absolute combat superiority were acting this way, there was even less reason for Yūshin, driven to desperation, to hold back.
He took a deep breath and poured massive amounts of chakra into the ground beneath his feet.
"Earth Release: Light-Weight Boulder Technique"
Yūshin plunged both hands underground, his arms suddenly exerting force, instantly lifting up a large area of lightened earth.
Without sparing chakra, a huge bowl-shaped crater was instantly dug out in the city, with its deepest point reaching over twenty meters.
After hurling the massive earth block toward Uchiha Tajima, Yūshin immediately released the Light-Weight Boulder Technique.
Uchiha Tajima naturally disdained such an attack—earth was just earth, what killing power could large chunks of dirt have?
Massive amounts of chakra gathered in Susanoo's hand, instantly forming a huge chakra blade, then with a casual swing, it chopped the falling earth block into pieces.
At the same time, Yūshin charged toward Uchiha Tajima again.
From direction, he was charging toward Tajima; from terrain, he was charging toward the pit bottom.
Uchiha Tajima controlled Susanoo to charge downward as well. Maintaining this state consumed too much—he didn't want to waste too much time.
Seeing this situation, Yūshin lightly exhaled. Just as the literal meaning suggested, Uchiha Tajima had walked into the trap he'd set.
Yūshin hadn't torn up the ground to attack, but to change the terrain... In fact, if he could use "Earth Release: Moving Earth Core" type Earth Release techniques, he wouldn't need such trouble, but he couldn't.
Boom!
Susanoo's chakra blade slashed straight down at Yūshin, but only grazed his side, heavily striking the ground.
Under the Light-Weight Boulder Technique's effect, Yūshin's incredibly light body almost rode the air currents from Susanoo's swing to soar upward.
He rapidly climbed along that great blade's curved back, then leaped high, hanging inverted above Susanoo's head.
Simultaneously, he completed an unremarkable hand seal—seemingly a Water Release seal, but not entirely.
"Water Severing Wave: Boil Release Hybrid Version"
In open environments, Boil Release's acid mist would lose killing power due to constant dispersion. This situation was actually easy to solve—simply concentrate it, increase density, then boost killing power and corrosiveness.
So Yūshin dissolved the acid mist in water, then fired it at high speed.
Physical penetration plus chemical corrosion—probably few Susanoo had received such treatment... You should know that in enclosed environments, Boil Release's acid mist alone could corrode Susanoo, and the corrosion speed was extremely fast.
A slender water blade like white silk lashed down from directly above onto Susanoo's body... With such a large target, it would be hard to miss.
Then accompanied by the continuous sound of lard dripping on scorching iron plates, as the Water Severing Wave cut downward, hissing white smoke constantly rose from Susanoo's body.
Almost effortlessly, as Yūshin flipped and descended, he had already severed one of Susanoo's arms.
Good, it was indeed effective!
The large earth pit was terrain preparation, the special Water Severing Wave was preliminary experimentation. Now that everything was proven problem-free, Yūshin formed seals again:
"Water Release: Great Exploding Water Colliding Wave"
Like an overturned sea, water poured down from mid-air in torrents. Under the dual effects of water's gravity and impact force, even Susanoo was temporarily suppressed at the pit bottom.
As it continued pouring, the azure water suddenly began steaming and bubbling, the surface heating up while continuously making gurgling, hissing sounds.
Soon the water turned a gray-white color with flocculent floating matter.
Yūshin had prepared an acid pool for Susanoo—just the right size to bury it completely.
You should know Susanoo was hollow inside—it couldn't block air or water.
This wasn't finished yet. Next, Yūshin stood outside the acid pool, alternately using Light-Weight Boulder and Heavy-Weight Boulder techniques, again covering the acid pool with a large earth block like a pot lid... If this didn't cook it thoroughly, no one should expect to get out.
After completing all this, Yūshin's form couldn't help swaying several times, his footing seeming somewhat unsteady... He had nearly exhausted his chakra.
Just then, four Hagoromo Clan ninja attacked Yūshin from front, back, left, and right directions. In an instant, four long blades pierced Yūshin's chest.
Whether the recent commotion had drawn them over, or they'd been nearby all along and chose to act only after seeing Uchiha Tajima unable to struggle, was unclear.
"Cough, cough cough..."
Yūshin's mouth corners once again seeped fresh blood, his neck involuntarily twitching.
"I should thank you. Do you know why?"
Yūshin completely ignored his own injuries. In a flash, both hands grabbed two enemies' necks, while simultaneously using his remaining strength to quickly kick out four times, directly breaking the other two's four kneecaps.
You couldn't blame these ninja for slow reactions—who could imagine a dying person would struggle so violently?
Moreover, when approaching Yūshin, they immediately suffered the slowing effect of Heavy-Weight Boulder Technique. Their suddenly heavy bodies prevented timely evasion.
In an instant, the nearly extinguished steam on Yūshin's body boiled up again.
Feeling their chakra being rapidly drained, these enemies finally understood where Yūshin's gratitude came from.
Two plus two—after Yūshin replenished his chakra, he didn't forget to finish them off, kicking their heads to pieces like smashed watermelons.
At this point Yūshin stopped pretending. He headed straight for several positions in the city where White Zetsu were hiding.
After consecutively eliminating five White Zetsu and absorbing their chakra completely, Yūshin's chakra had recovered to about seventy-eighty percent.
Then he incinerated the White Zetsu corpses and rushed out of the city.
However, just as he left the city, a tremendous boom reached his ears from the direction where he'd set up the acid pool.
"Still not dead..."
After hesitating several seconds, Yūshin still didn't return to finish the job—he had more important matters to handle.
During the recent battle, Yūshin seemed to have glimpsed Shichimi being chased and fleeing in distress. The reason she hadn't intervened in Yūshin and Uchiha Tajima's battle was because she couldn't spare attention for herself.
After running for a while, Yūshin discovered his chest pain wouldn't stop, his breathing grew increasingly labored, like a bellows... It seemed the recent wounds couldn't heal no matter what.
Looking down, he finally discovered those four blades were still stuck in his body...
The blades hadn't even been removed—it would be strange if the wounds could heal.
In fact, with both sides in complete chaos by now, Yūshin's small blunder hardly mattered. It just wasted some of the chakra he'd just collected... Originally, treating penetrating chest wounds required consuming large amounts of chakra anyway.
Yūshin pulled out the long blades, roughly determined direction, and continued rushing into the night.
Meanwhile, Uchiha Tajima slashed open the acid pool and "pot lid" with one strike. When he surfaced, his battle-damaged Susanoo had almost only a head remaining.
Tajima struggled onto the ground, gasping violently. At this time, most of his body had lost skin, internal organs had also suffered corrosion, and the combined internal and external severe stinging pain nearly made him faint.
However, he still escaped.
As everyone knows, if Susanoo can be developed to high-level stages, after becoming a true "mecha," a pentagonal sealed space appears at the forehead position—the true "cockpit."
In life-or-death crisis, Uchiha Tajima almost instinctively urged his Sharingan's power. Though he hadn't evolved Susanoo to third stage or above, he at least achieved high-level evolution of Susanoo's self-preservation function... After all, this was fighting for life, and the Uchiha Clan excelled at power-ups during battle.
In short, he relied on the "mecha cockpit" to escape the acid pool. Though severely wounded, he ultimately didn't become a pickled cucumber as Yūshin had hoped.
But regardless, the current Uchiha Tajima was no longer suitable for continued combat, however...
Orikawa didn't know what era Shichimi had thrown him to.
The remaining three clan members had most likely all died.
And he himself was so wretched...
Uchiha Tajima still had some pride—how could a clan head return to the clan in such a sorry state?
He struggled several times, then again began pursuing Yūshin.
It must be said that the Uchiha Clan's character had this aspect—when they most needed rationality, they often chose to act emotionally.
...
Uchiha Shichimi was being pursued by six ninja led by the Hagoromo Clan head.
Frequent use of Mangekyō Sharingan had nearly dried up her mental strength, so she could only flee all the way, with almost no strength to resist.
She who could already control the duration of special dōjutsu "Umashikami" could easily escape pursuit if she could activate it again, but at this time she fundamentally couldn't open her eyes.
When fleeing to outside the city, she had already suffered multiple wounds, looking somewhat miserable.
Just as she was about to be caught by enemies, Lan killed her way out from the side, precisely intercepting the enemies.
"Shichimi, you go first. I'll hold them off."
Lan's condition was much better than Shichimi's—compared to Shichimi, her injuries at most amounted to scratches.
"Alright... Be careful yourself..."
This was very difficult to say, even against Shichimi's true feelings, but she knew staying would only be a burden, so she could only flee toward the forest depths while trying to recover eye power.
"Clan head, this is that Nameless one. At least ten clan members have died by her hand."
The Hagoromo Clan's pursuit squad temporarily stopped here, deeply wary yet extremely hateful toward Lan.
"You stay to deal with her. I'll continue pursuing." Hagoromo Shu didn't hesitate, immediately issuing orders to divide forces.
Lan indeed had considerable strength, but the ninja personally led by this enemy clan head couldn't possibly be weaklings either.
In fact, if the enemy subjectively had no intention to stay, she fundamentally couldn't stop five people.
These five stayed specifically to thoroughly eliminate her.
Lan rushed toward the departing Hagoromo Shu, trying to stop him, but this time she was blocked by the other five enemies.
Hagoromo Shu was able to continue his pursuit.
Shichimi's escape speed grew slower and slower. In the densely wooded forest, she was almost running forward with closed eyes, even occasionally tripping, appearing extremely wretched.
Thud!
A breaking air sound came from behind. Shichimi didn't even care, letting that kunai nail into her shoulder, making her body stagger.
"You can't escape."
This voice was so certain because it rang out almost at Shichimi's ear.
However, just as Hagoromo Shu, who had closed to behind her, prepared to launch a fatal strike, Shichimi suddenly opened her left eye.
The Mangekyō pattern appeared once more.
Her figure instantly vanished without trace.
Hagoromo Shu's attack consequently missed.
This clan head was stunned for a moment, then became completely furious—one second, just one second short!
He knew this Uchiha Shichimi could use some kind of space-time ninjutsu. If she hadn't been frequently saving people on the battlefield, he couldn't have noticed her either.
Originally intending to eliminate her while her eye power was exhausted, who knew things could be so coincidental.
At the final moment, her eye power recovered.
How to deal with enemies hiding in space-time? Hagoromo Shu had no methods anyway.
He could only angrily turn several circles on the spot, then turn and leave.
However, Shichimi actually only hid for ten minutes. After ten minutes, she reappeared in the same spot... because she knew that in such a complex battlefield, the enemy's highest commander couldn't possibly stay here standing punishment.
Facts proved her judgment was very accurate.
Shichimi couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief—finally escaped the deadly crisis.
Next, she planned to continue transferring toward the forest depths. At least after recovering some chakra, she could return to the battlefield again.
However, before she could walk far, intense battle sounds again reached her ears.
There was one voice she was very familiar with—she could simply determine the voice's identity.
It was Chisori.
She had led a group of ninja with almost no combat ability and was among the first to withdraw from Kikyō Castle when battle erupted.
Shichimi unconsciously walked forward several steps, then...
Stopped.
Turned around.
Rushed toward the battlefield.
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