A few days later, a fierce battle was raging along the front line at the Land of Rivers border.
This area was still some distance from the Land of Fire itself, and it had become the primary zone of continuous warfare between the Sand Village and Konoha.
"It's the Sand Village's Blood Doctor Yuji!"
"Retreat!"
Yuji held his ninja tool and played a single musical note. Centered around him, nearby Konoha ninja fell one after another regardless of whether they were fleeing or still moving, either hypnotized or completely paralyzed.
Meanwhile, the Sand Village forces fighting alongside him quickly pressed forward, beginning to cut down their targets across the open terrain.
With him there, the Sand Village annihilated the Konoha forces completely, like a blade crushing through paper. The enemy was simply unable to resist.
"The Hyuga and Uchiha clans are not here."
He glanced around the battlefield and noted this to himself.
The moment he appeared, the Leaf Village forces had retreated almost immediately, without the slightest hesitation.
They had not even attempted to launch a counterattack against him. This indicated that the Leaf Village's current commander had issued a standing military order well in advance, designating him as a special target.
The moment he appeared on any battlefield, the Leaf Village forces were to withdraw immediately.
A cold glint appeared in his eyes.
Previously, due to Hiruzen's presence combined with the Uchiha and Hyuga clans entering the engagement, the Sand Village had been suppressed on the battlefield for an extended period.
But now the situation had reversed. The Leaf Village would finally taste the bitterness of defeat.
He and Sasori had both mobilized. The attack on the Leaf Village's border was divided into two separate fronts. Sasori was operating in another area.
Combined, the forces they were leading numbered over a thousand, making this the largest scale offensive since the opening battle against the Leaf Village.
"Blood Doctor Yuji?!"
Very quickly, news of the front line situation reached Konoha headquarters, sending a shock through everyone present.
This day had finally come. They had been speculating about when Yuji would appear on the battlefield directly.
The moment he did appear, they had not expected the enemy to move so quickly and decisively. It was important to understand that even within their own army, many subordinates had not realized the Hokage had already departed.
The plan had been to use the illusion of Hiruzen's continued presence at the front to buy as much time as possible.
But the Sand Village had reacted too quickly.
It was absolutely not an intelligence leak. The timeframe was too short, and no one on the Konoha side had been captured recently.
They had in fact been suppressing the Sand Village's forces during this period. The only explanation was that Shimizu from the Sand Village had seen through their disguise on his own.
"Go and inform Kimu and his men," the commander ordered immediately.
"Kimu and his men have already set out," the deputy reported.
"What?!"
The commander's expression changed drastically.
He did not need to think to understand what had happened. Kimu was heading directly toward Yuji's position. This was the Uchiha clan's arrogant and suicidal mindset in action.
The greatest individual threat within the Sand Village army, setting aside the overall commander Shimizu, was the Twin Stars.
Given this, many of the Uchiha clan members had convinced themselves that as long as they could deal with Yuji, or at minimum demonstrate the Uchiha clan's power and create a decisive psychological effect on the enemy, victory in this great battle would follow naturally.
"Damn it!"
The other officers were furious. This was not an ordinary opponent.
The correct response was to quickly devise a proper strategy and find a coordinated way to counter the threat, not to completely ignore orders and rush headlong into a fight they had not prepared for.
"Get Minato here immediately!"
There was no time to waste cursing the Uchiha clan's recklessness. The order went out at once.
"Yes."
On the other side, Uchiha Kimu was leading several clan members at full speed toward the battlefield where Yuji had been sighted.
Since answering the Hokage's call and arriving at the front lines, they had heard about the Sand Village's Twin Stars, and particularly about this Blood Doctor.
They knew he possessed a bloodline limit. During the Great Ninja War he had caused Konoha considerable trouble. And now he had developed abilities of astonishing effectiveness, including his deployment of medicinal resources on the battlefield, which had become renowned throughout the entire ninja world. His fame was considerable.
What made it even more surprising was his age. Fifteen years old.
However, what the Uchiha clan paid particular attention to was something else entirely. He appeared to possess a unique doujutsu. Based on the military analysis team's assessment, beyond his bloodline limit abilities, the true source of his strength most likely lay in his eyes.
The so-called Blood Release was in their judgment a doujutsu-based ability, bearing some resemblance to the Blood Dragon Eye technique associated with the Blood Pool clan, though not entirely identical.
And the Blood Dragon Eye was something the Uchiha clan was all too familiar with. The fate of the Blood Pool clan was intertwined with that of the Uchiha, as the Blood Pool clan had been escorted and imprisoned in Hell Valley at the Uchiha clan's hands.
"Doujutsu?"
Uchiha Kimu snorted as the thought passed through his mind.
Even if the ninja world had never seen a technique quite like his, in front of the Uchiha clan's Sharingan it was simply a joke. Because the Uchiha were the strongest.
In Kimu's view, if others had failed to deal with this person, it only meant their own strength had been too weak. Konoha's achievements, its scale, and its prestige in the ninja world today were largely built on the immense contributions the Uchiha clan had made across generations of battle.
It could even be said that the Konoha of today had been built on the Uchiha clan's successive victories.
And yet, in the face of their clan's contributions, the village had given them completely inappropriate rewards. One could even say it amounted to charity.
Their clan had absolutely no access to the village's core decision-making circles. Although they held real power in a military sense, they were never genuinely involved in shaping the village's direction.
They were being guarded against, and everyone knew it.
This naturally gave the Uchiha clan grounds for deep dissatisfaction and resentment. Because in their view, Konoha's current standing in the ninja world existed because of what their clan had given it.
They were owed something that had never been properly acknowledged.
Therefore Kimu wanted everyone in the Konoha army, and the village itself, to recognize one thing clearly. The Uchiha clan was irreplaceable. He wanted to demonstrate his clan's value in a way that could not be dismissed or explained away, thereby proving the village's treatment of them wrong.
He also wanted his fellow Konoha ninja to understand that the gap between themselves and the Uchiha lay precisely in moments like this, when facing a genuinely dangerous enemy.
The best way to demonstrate all of this at once was to deal with Blood Doctor Yuji. He was one of the most difficult targets to eliminate within the entire enemy army. Bringing him down would make the Uchiha clan's name resound throughout the ninja world once again.
"Hmm?"
On the battlefield, Yuji was pursuing the remaining Konoha soldiers alongside his subordinates. The Konoha forces were fleeing in a desperate and scattered state.
Then something unusual happened in the distance.
The leading Sand Village squads that had been hunting down the retreating enemy suddenly met a powerful counterattack. Several Sand Village ninja were cut down in a single encounter.
Yuji opened his eyes fully and looked into the distance.
Several figures were cutting straight through the terrain ahead, radiating an astonishing aura and filled with killing intent that was immediately apparent even at this range.
The Uchiha clan.
"What is happening? Only a few of them? They have come as reinforcements?"
He looked again, confirming what he was seeing.
He had assumed that after receiving news of this offensive, the Leaf Village would first send a proper reinforcement force. After all, this was strategically critical territory for them, and the speed of reinforcement should have been considerable. But only a few Uchiha clan members had arrived first?
That should not be right. No Leaf Village commander with even basic competence would send a handful of Uchiha to their deaths like this. Something was off about the logic.
"They are truly arrogant."
He scanned the surrounding area carefully, confirming that this was not a Leaf Village trap or concealed tactical arrangement of any kind.
Then he could not help it. The corners of his mouth curved upward.
An unexpected gift.
Today, it seemed, was going to be a good day.
...
BOnus @800 PS