The shrill, piercing scream of an alarm echoed through the small stone outpost.
"Enemy attack!!"
The sentry's voice was high-pitched and hysterical, a display of panic that deeply annoyed the veteran Chunin in command.
"What is it now?" the commander roared. If a powerful shinobi were attacking, a lowly Genin sentry would have been silenced before he could draw breath. Whoever was coming couldn't be that dangerous if the kid had time to scream about it.
What the hell is he so afraid of?
"Sir! Captain, get up here! There's so many... there's too many of them!"
The terror in the Genin's voice was so raw that the Chunin felt a chill crawl down his spine.
"Damn it. If this turns out to be nothing, you're in for it."
Muttering curses, the Chunin leaped up to the high observation post in a few bounds. He followed the sentry's trembling finger and froze. The air left his lungs in a sharp hiss as he stood paralyzed on the ledge.
The charcoal-black mud that defined the Land of Rain's landscape was being swallowed by a surging, grey-green tide. This living flood was moving with the speed of a galloping horse, unfurling across the plains toward their small fort.
As the flood hit a boulder, it swelled over it like a wave. When it encountered vegetation, the plants didn't just bend—they toppled and vanished instantly. The "humps" in the tide where obstacles used to be would flatten out at a visible speed until the ground was a perfect, uniform plane of skittering carapaces.
It was insects. A literal ocean of them.
The commander, possessing sharp eyes, quickly realized the nature of the threat. He forced himself to stay calm, barking orders to his men.
"Anyone know Fire Style? No? Dammit! Get the torches!"
"Move the oil reserves out! And the poisons! Dump all the toxins over the walls! Move, move, move!"
He suddenly remembered something and grabbed the Genin sentry by the collar, hauling him down from the post. He dragged him to a corner and hissed, "Get out of here. Now. Head straight for Amegakure and report this. Tell them exactly what you saw."
The veteran Chunin had realized this was no natural phenomenon; it was a targeted strike. His gut told him they couldn't win. This tiny fort wouldn't hold.
The swarm was fast, but a ninja running at full tilt was faster. If they retreated now, they could live. But as the commander, he couldn't just flee without intel. He decided to send the youngest to safety while he stayed to see just how deep this nightmare went.
Shinobi are naturally strong and fast; the preparations were finished in thirty seconds. Toxins were splashed across the approach, oil was decanted into glass bottles with rag stoppers, and torches were lit.
"Captain, will this actually work?" one of the Ame-nin asked, his voice shaking. "Why are we fighting like commoners?"
The commander frowned, moving his precious stack of explosive tags to the most accessible pocket of his tactical vest. "We'll find out in a minute. Get your tags ready. Don't be stingy—use them all."
The swarm closed in. The rhythmic clack-clack-clack of hundreds of thousands of mandibles and legs grew into a deafening roar. Individual grey-green insects were now clearly visible to the naked eye.
There were too many. Far too many.
In the centuries since ninjas replaced samurai, warfare had evolved into small-scale skirmishes between elite groups. Modern ninjas had never contemplated a battlefield where the enemy numbered in the hundreds of thousands, filling their entire field of vision from horizon to horizon.
The swarm reached the fifty-meter mark. The commander began his seals. "Attack!!"
The Ame-nin struck in unison, unleashing their most practiced techniques.
Water Style: Rain Senbon!
Water Style: Water Colliding Wave!
Fourteen Water Style jutsus slammed into the front of the swarm. Boom! Boom! Boom! Hundreds of insects were pulverized into mush, clearing a massive patch of ground.
The Ame-nin blinked. Are they... are they that fragile?
A second volley tore through another few hundred bugs. The ninjas began to exhale, a wave of relief washing over the walls.
In truth, the defensive stats of this generation of insects had been split. Tetsumaru had "polarized" his breeding: Armor Beetles were now even more durable, capable of ignoring blades and tanking low-level jutsu. Meanwhile, the "drone" insects—which usually died to AOE anyway—had their defense stripped to the bare minimum to maximize their speed and attack power.
The result was a swarm that died in droves to a technique as simple as Rain Senbon.
But were they weak?
By the third volley, the Ame-nin's faces had turned pale again. They had killed nearly two thousand insects, but it didn't matter. The front line of the tide moved forward without a single stutter. Every gap cleared by a jutsu was filled by more insects in less than a second.
The distance closed. The fourth and fifth volleys were frantic and disorganized.
"Light the oil! Ready the tags!"
The swarm hit the twenty-meter mark—the zone drenched in toxins. The leading insects immediately began to twitch and collapse.
But the Ame-nin didn't have time to celebrate. The insects behind them simply climbed over the bodies of the dying, using the "front wave" as a literal living carpet to insulate themselves from the poison.
"Throw them! Throw the oil bottles!"
The bottles shattered, erupting into a line of fire. Insects were turned into tiny, bursting fireballs, their internal fluids sizzling.
However, a simple oil fire was nothing compared to a high-level jutsu like Toad Flame Bomb. The sheer weight of numbers eventually smothered the flames. The insects simply piled their bodies onto the fire until it was extinguished under the mass of charred chitin.
The swarm reached the ten-meter mark. The Ame-nin didn't have time for more seals. They drew their blades, bracing for the breach.
Suddenly, a massive cloud of Flight-Locusts erupted from the main tide. They took to the air, wings buzzing as they lunged for the ninjas on the ramparts. Chaos broke out.
Some ninjas jumped down to avoid the aerial assault; some used umbrellas as shields. A few Genin flailed their weapons wildly, but a short blade was useless against two or three hundred locusts diving at once. The first screams of the dying filled the air.
With the ramparts in disarray, the main swarm surged over the final ten meters. They climbed the walls like a liquid, pouring into the interior of the fort. The slaughter began.
Only the commander and two other Chunin fought with any discipline, swatting the insects away. But as the fort filled with grey-green carapaces, even they were forced to flee.
As they burst from the gates, they realized the tide had already moved past the fort. The sky was dark with flying insects. The three ninjas were immediately spotted.
They were like three small boats in the middle of a hurricane. Attacks came from every direction. Realizing they couldn't fight alone, they pulled together, standing back-to-back.
Water Style: Water Wall!
Three walls of water rose, intersecting to form a triangular safe zone. They finally caught their breath.
Hidden in the distance, Aburame Tetsumaru watched through his barrier and grew impatient. These three Chunin were surprisingly stubborn. The vanguard of his swarm was already nearing the next outpost; in a few minutes, the main body would have passed this area entirely. He decided to end it.
Tetsumaru wove the complex seals for a B-rank jutsu.
Wind Style: Wind Dragon Bullet!
A rotating dragon of compressed air slammed into the water wall in front of the veteran commander. The barrier shattered instantly. The blast sent the old ninja flying backward, slamming him into the opposite wall of water. The impact and the churning current threw him into the air, where he fell helplessly into the heart of the swarm. He vanished under the grey-green tide in an instant.
The other two Chunin reacted immediately. One used a Body Flicker, while the other used Earth Style to dive underground.
The Body Flicker only moved the ninja a limited distance. After two successive jumps, he ran out of chakra and landed directly in a pile of insects. He was gone before he could even scream.
As for the one who went underground... he had essentially burrowed into the center of a hive. The ground heaved a few times, and then fell silent.
Tetsumaru performed a cursory check of the bodies. As expected, the Ame-nin were broke; there was nothing worth looting. He picked up his pace, racing to catch up with the front of his army.
Taking this outpost had cost him seven thousand insects—three thousand more than it would have cost before he reduced their defense. But the reduction in production costs meant he had been able to hatch three times as many bugs for the same price. The trade-off was more than worth it.
Before Tetsumaru could even catch up, the vanguard made contact with an Ame patrol squad. The next battle began.
In a single day, one Ame squad after another was devoured. Outpost after outpost was drowned. A deluge of emergency reports flooded into Amegakure.
That damn Konoha bug-user is back!
The news sent a shockwave through the village. The Ame Jonin immediately organized a massive counter-hunt.
"Is the Salamander venom ready?" Jonin Fukamizu asked his subordinates.
"We have it, sir, but the quantity is limited."
"It'll have to do."
Fukamizu turned to the messengers. "Is the swarm as large as they say? Are they moving in mass? Is their attack power high?"
"Sir, there are so many of them... millions, maybe. But I don't know if they're 'strong.' They just... they just don't stop."
"Good. If there are that many bugs, the caster must be with them." Fukamizu turned to his men. "Move out! We're going to kill this monster and reclaim our land!"
Over two hundred ninjas roared in response.
As the 200-man unit set out, Jonin Gensui—newly recovered from his previous injuries—watched them go from his crutches. He called over a few of the survivors Fukamizu had ignored and questioned them in detail. The more they spoke, the more his brow furrowed.
Gensui eventually limped to find Hanzo. He reported that the scale of the insects might be far beyond what they were prepared for.
Like Fukamizu, Hanzo wasn't overly concerned. He confirmed that Fukamizu had two hundred ninjas and the new Salamander venom, and deemed it sufficient.
Only Gensui remained uneasy. He had seen the look of absolute, soul-crushing despair in the survivors' eyes. Unable to let it go, he sought out his close friend, Jonin Kigosei, and begged him to follow the unit and provide extra support.
Kigosei laughed it off, but eventually agreed just to shut his friend up. Thinking this was a low-risk mission to gang up on a single Konoha ninja, he even brought along his two disciples to "broaden their horizons."
When Kigosei and his students topped the final ridge and looked down into the valley, they were paralyzed with horror.
In the massive basin below, a sea of insects had split the 200-man unit into seven isolated pockets. They were being systematically devoured.
The trapped Ame-nin saw Kigosei appear on the ridge and let out a cheer of hope. "Reinforcements! We're saved!"
"It's Lord Kigosei! Break through! Join him!"
Kigosei took a deep breath and began his seals. The surrounding insects, sensing the chakra fluctuation, immediately pivoted and surged toward him.
The Jonin ignored the incoming bugs, leaving them to his disciples, who dispersed the swarm with their own jutsu.
As the charred insect bodies hit the ground, one of the "dead" bugs suddenly expanded into a tall Konoha ninja. The figure lashed out, throwing two kunai toward the disciples' throats.
Kigosei let out a cold snort. "I was waiting for you. Die!"
Water Style: Exploding Water Colliding Wave!
A torrent of water slammed into the Konoha ninja, sending him tumbling into the swarm. He and a few hundred bugs were pulverized by the pressure, only for the ninja to vanish in a cloud of white smoke.
"A Shadow Clone! Dammit!"
Kigosei's heart skipped a beat. He aborted his Water Dragon mid-seal and drew two kunai. Three shadows erupted from the earth beneath him. Two engaged him in a frantic melee, while the third lunged for his disciples.
Against the shadow and the surrounding swarm, the two Genin lasted only three breaths before they were pulled down, their screams lost under the clicking of mandibles.
"Bastard! You bastard!" Acknowledging no pain, a berserk Kigosei cut down the two shadows—only for them to explode into swarms of insects.
Insect Clones!
He ignored the biting bugs and drove a kunai straight through the heart of the third shadow. It, too, vanished in a cloud of white smoke.
"Another Shadow Clone?! How much chakra does this monster have?!"
By now, the swarm was closing in from both sides, aiming to encircle him. Kigosei assessed his wounds—they were deep and numerous. He realized he couldn't win. Swallowing his grief and rage, he turned and bolted for the only remaining gap in the circle.
If I can just get word back... if Lord Hanzo comes personally... you're dead, you bastard!
Dozens of Flight-Locusts rose from the swarm, diving toward him. But the distance was too great for a perfect strike; they only served to slow him down.
BOOM!
In his haste to dodge the locusts, Kigosei stepped on a Landmine Insect. His leg below the knee was vaporized. As he stumbled and fell, he triggered several more. A series of explosions reduced him to a cloud of fine red mist.
The surrounding swarm immediately surged forward to cover the remains. A few meters away, a "hump" in the sea of insects rose up, and Aburame Tetsumaru emerged.
He dispersed the surrounding bugs and stopped ten meters from the body. He flicked three Flight-Locusts from his sleeve, which buried themselves deep into the torso.
Splat. Splat. Splat.
"He's really dead."
Tetsumaru watched for another minute before approaching to loot the body. In the shinobi world, power equaled wealth; even a "poor" Ame ninja would have something valuable at the Jonin level.
Suddenly, the "ragged corpse" flipped over. A figure lunged from beneath the remains, a tanto driving straight through Tetsumaru's chest.
Kigosei, his face a mask of blood and gore, sneered. "Bastard... ever heard the name Kigosei of the Illusionary Shadow?"
"Actually, I have," the "Tetsumaru" replied with a calm smile. "Your Water Style: Illusionary Shadow is a jutsu I've been wanting for a long time. But tell me... have you heard of the Secret Technique: Domain Field Barrier? It's my own invention."
As Kigosei's eyes widened in horror, "Tetsumaru" dropped his transformation. His entire body was covered in explosive tags.
"It's an Insect Clone."
"And you lose."
BOOM!
Through his Field Barrier, Tetsumaru watched with clinical precision as the Ame Jonin was finally, truly torn apart.
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