Suspended in midair, Lee's gaze pierced through the swirling sand and dust, locking with Guy's eyes up in the stands.
The moment he received his teacher's permission, a dazzling light flared in his eyes.
He reached down and began unwrapping the thick bandages wound around his legs, loop after loop. Beneath the bandages were two plain-looking metal weights.
In the stands, everyone watched this scene in confusion.
"What's he doing? Taking his gear off?"
"At a time like this, isn't he supposed to use ninjutsu? Oh, right, he can't use ninjutsu."
"What a weirdo."
Gaara, still controlling the sand, didn't attack immediately. A hint of curiosity flickered in those green eyes. He wanted to see what trick this insect, who kept challenging his defense, was trying to pull.
Lee finished unwinding the bandages and held the metal weights in his hands, one in each palm.
Then he let go.
The two weights fell freely.
No sound.
For a heartbeat, everyone thought they really were just ordinary protective gear.
Boom!!!
A deafening crash exploded from the arena floor. The entire tower shook violently.
All eyes snapped downward in shock. On either side of where Lee had been standing, two half-meter-deep craters had appeared in the hard stone floor.
Dust billowed skyward.
The arena fell into dead silence.
Every mouth hung open in a perfect O. No one could believe what they were seeing.
T-Those two little guards… just how heavy were they?! And this kid named Rock Lee had been fighting all this time while wearing them?!
"OHHHHHH!"
Guy shot to his feet, pumping his fist wildly. "That's it, Lee! Go! Show them that hard work can surpass genius! Burn your youth with everything you've got!"
In the VIP seats—
On Shinju's system panel, Lee's data streams suddenly went berserk.
The values representing his physical condition were jumping wildly, the color shifting from stable green to warning yellow, then finally settling on a dangerous red.
[Warning: Target's physiological indicators abnormal.]
[Warning: Target is undergoing life-force conversion.]
[Muscle fiber activity increased by 512%.]
[Neuronal reaction speed increased by 480%.]
[Chakra circulation efficiency increased by 630%.]
[Overall Evaluation: High-load, self-destructive secret technique.]
"Hachimon (Eight Gates)," Shinju confirmed his judgment. "Burning life itself in exchange for power… this really is the strongest taijutsu humans have ever created."
Down in the arena—
After landing, Lee felt his body become incredibly light without the weights. A new kind of power surged through every fiber of his being, unlike anything he'd felt before.
His skin flushed red, veins bulging along his forehead and arms. Green chakra began to steam off his body.
"Dai Ichi no Mon—Kaimon (Gate of Opening), open!"
A shockwave burst out from him, rippling across the arena.
"Dai Ni no Mon—Kyūmon (Gate of Rest), open!"
His breathing grew ragged. The sound of his heartbeat was loud enough for everyone in the arena to hear.
"Dai San no Mon—Seimon (Gate of Life), open!"
The power inside Lee continued to climb. The red in his skin deepened.
Across from him, Gaara's expressionless face changed for the first time.
For the first time, he felt a lethal sense of danger coming from his opponent.
He stopped waiting and immediately moved the sand under his feet.
The ground sand gathered, twisted, and hardened into several sharp spikes that shot toward Lee.
The instant the sand spikes left the ground, Lee vanished.
This wasn't just high-speed movement—it was true disappearance from visual perception.
The sand in front of Gaara's body reacted on pure instinct, condensing into a thick shield, but it blocked nothing.
The spikes stabbed only into the empty spot where Lee had stood, punching deep holes in the stone.
A split second later, a massive force exploded upward from Gaara's jaw.
Bang!
Lee's figure appeared directly beneath Gaara, his kick slamming up in a ferocious uppercut that connected cleanly with Gaara's chin.
Gaara's body was blasted off the ground and hurled into the air, completely out of control.
For the first time, his sand defense had been utterly shattered.
The stands erupted in uproar. No one had clearly seen what had happened; they had only seen the result.
In the air, Gaara's body refused to respond. He couldn't move at all.
The sand in his gourd went wild, pouring out in a frenzy, chasing after him. In midair, the sand stretched and twisted, trying desperately to catch him before he hit the ground and shield his body.
But it was too slow.
Lee's speed had completely exceeded the limits of the sand's automatic defense.
He kicked off the ground with both legs. The stone floor splintered beneath his feet, and his body turned into a streak of green lightning, racing after Gaara even faster than Gaara was falling.
He flashed to Gaara's back in an instant, tore loose the bandages from his arms, and wrapped the helpless Gaara up at a dizzying speed.
"It's not over yet!"
Lee's shout cracked like thunder through the sky.
He hugged the bound Gaara, flipped in midair so that both of them were upside down.
Then he began to spin.
The two of them became a single green drill. The bound sacrifice and the spinning executioner fused into a single falling meteor, crashing down toward the ground below with overwhelming force.
"Omote Renge (Front Lotus)!"
In the stands—
Kakashi stared at the scene, shock filling his exposed eye. He whipped his head toward Guy and growled, "Guy! You actually… taught him that?! That's a forbidden technique!"
Guy's eyes burned with unwavering trust. "Because I believe in him! I believe in Lee's ninja way!"
Sakura, Ino, and the other kunoichi watched the figure burning his life for the sake of his conviction, deeply shaken and moved to their core.
Boom!!!
Words couldn't describe the magnitude of the impact. The sound shook the heavens.
The entire arena trembled violently. At the center of the collision, the hard stone floor collapsed into a massive crater more than ten meters across.
The violent shockwave whipped up a storm of dust, completely obscuring everyone's vision.
Everyone thought the match was decided.
Under such a terrifying assault, no one could possibly survive.
Watching the scene, Shinju mused that if nothing unexpected happened, things would likely play out similarly to the other timeline—Gaara probably wouldn't be in too much danger.
As the dust settled, the scene at the bottom of the crater came into view.
Lee knelt on one knee, his entire body trembling uncontrollably under the strain of the Hachimon.
In front of him, there was no mangled body as many had imagined.
There was only a sphere of sand, its surface completely laced with cracks.
The sand sphere began to split.
Crack… crack…
Fissures spread across the entire surface.
With a sharp boom, the sand sphere burst open.
The sand scattered, revealing the person inside.
Gaara.
The sand fell away, exposing Gaara.
He was uninjured.
But the sand armor covering his body had completely shattered.
Gaara raised his head and touched his cheek.
His fingertips came away damp.
Blood had seeped from a cut on his face.
He was hurt.
This was the first time in his life that anyone had ever managed to injure him.
He stared blankly at the red on his fingers, unmoving.
When he finally looked up again, his eyes were utterly different.
The earlier indifference was gone without a trace.
All that remained was pure, unfiltered killing intent.
(End of Chapter)
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