Chapter 27: Black Flash!!
The Earth-Style Wall shattered as searing flames evaporated the swamp, leaving those trapped with no time to escape.
Some managed to cast jutsu to shield themselves, but others, caught in panic, were engulfed by the blazing wave and reduced to charred remains.
Even those who survived the inferno found no solace. Their defensive earth-style jutsu was torn apart by black, spectral claws.
Whoosh—
Faced with the oncoming shadowy wolves, the Iwagakure shinobi instinctively raised their kunai to block. However...
The wolves passed straight through their bodies!
Faintly visible within the wolves' spectral forms were glimmers of pale blue light—their souls being ripped apart.
"Who are you?!" the Iwagakure leader bellowed, his voice tinged with fear and fury. "Why are you attacking us?!"
"Damn it! I can't hit these things! What kind of monster are they?!"
The lead jōnin quickly deduced the key to this bizarre technique, shouting orders to his comrades.
"Stay calm! These wolves are slow! We can dodge them—just don't engage head-on!"
But before he could finish his sentence, his voice faltered.
"Easy for you to say! How about you come save me?!"
---
Kagami smirked knowingly. He was well aware of his jutsu's weakness. This Yin Release technique had an effect similar to Kamui: bypassing physical defenses to directly target the soul.
While devastating, its primary flaw was the wolves' sluggish speed. Even a chūnin could easily evade and outlast the technique if they kept their distance.
But Kagami had anticipated this and devised a countermeasure.
Control the battlefield.
The tactic was simple yet effective: trap and burn.
Kagami deliberately left seven or eight shinobi alive, each surrounded by a few shadow wolves. Their comrades were forced to either assist or abandon them.
In the heat of battle, even the most disciplined shinobi were reluctant to leave their comrades behind. Many had grown up together, trained together, and formed deep bonds over years of missions.
The three remaining jōnin could have fled on their own, but seeing their comrades in peril, they chose to stay.
"Damn you! What kind of demonic jutsu is this?!" shouted Daishi, his anger barely masking his desperation.
Kagami stood calmly, allowing five shadow wolves to encircle him like an impenetrable barrier.
"Really? That's the best insult you can come up with? How uncreative," Kagami retorted, his tone dripping with disdain.
"And speaking of uncreative... our uniforms and eyes are quite distinctive. Are you seriously still asking who we are? Is your brain made of rocks too, Daishi?"
---
Daishi froze for a moment before finally noticing the distinctive red Sharingan in Kagami's eyes.
"No! It's the Sharingan! Don't look into those eyes—"
His warning came too late.
Whoosh—
A shadow wolf tore through Daishi's body, extracting a faint blue spirit-like essence from within.
"Nooo!!!"
A female jōnin screamed, her voice laced with desperation. Summoning all her chakra, she slammed her palm to the ground.
Earth-Style: Fissure Strike!
The earth roared as a massive crack split the ground, surging toward Kagami and his comrade Genka.
But Kagami had already prepared.
Biting his finger, he formed a series of hand seals and slammed his hand to the ground.
Poof!
A giant hawk materialized in a burst of smoke, spreading its wings to lift Kagami and Genka skyward.
The hawk ascended swiftly, soaring high into the sky beyond the reach of the jōnin's jutsu.
From a height of nearly 100 meters, Kagami gazed down, his expression calm yet calculating. Iwagakure's shinobi might dominate the earth, but they were helpless against an aerial assault—unless you were the Third Tsuchikage, of course.
---
On the hawk's back, Kagami exhaled slowly, feeling a wave of fatigue wash over him.
The combination of the swamp jutsu and the shadow wolves had consumed a significant portion of his chakra—nearly equivalent to what an adult Kakashi could muster.
The shadow wolves alone demanded immense chakra for both creation and maintenance, their energy drain magnified by the necessity of spiritual power.
Yet Kagami pressed on. This was war, and he needed to test his abilities in real combat to prepare for the battles to come.
He couldn't afford to falter—not against Hiruzen, the Nine-Tails, Nagato, or the other monstrous forces he knew awaited him in the future.
This war was his crucible, his chance to evolve and perfect his powers. Only in his most refined state could he awaken the Mangekyō Sharingan and subdue Sukuna.
---
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
The rest of Minato's team emerged from the surrounding terrain, their eyes widening at the scene before them.
"What kind of jutsu is this...?" Shibi muttered, his usually stoic demeanor faltering.
"It looks like our clan's shadow techniques... but far more potent," Suzaku added, his tone tinged with awe.
"That was Iwagakure's Daishi. I've seen him before, but to think Kagami could take him down like this..."
Fugaku, standing among the group, recalled his previous encounter with Kagami. His heart sank.
This boy's most formidable skill wasn't even these shadow wolves. It was his terrifying swordsmanship.
Fugaku had always considered himself a genius, one of the finest shinobi of his generation. But watching Kagami now, he felt a gnawing sense of inadequacy.
If Kagami awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan...
What right would he, Fugaku, have to call himself the clan leader?
---
"Who are you people?! Why is Konoha attacking us?!" shouted the remaining Iwagakure leader, his voice trembling with anger.
"This is the Land of Earth's border! Are you declaring war?!"
Kagami's gaze was as cold as his voice.
"Some things are better left unsaid. But don't pretend to be ignorant. The old man Onoki sent you to scout Fire Country's defenses, didn't he?"
"You dare speak of Lord Tsuchikage that way?!"
The jōnin's face twisted in fury. "You scum of the Uchiha clan! Your sneak attack will not go unanswered! Lord Tsuchikage will bring his wrath upon you all!"
Kagami chuckled darkly.
"Didn't your precious Tsuchikage ever tell you? Both he and his master were beaten down by my clan."
"If Madara hadn't shown mercy, that old fossil would've been long dead."
Madara... merciful?
The Konoha shinobi, familiar with Madara's infamous reputation, found this statement difficult to process.
---
"Enough! I'll kill you myself!" the Iwagakure leader roared, leaping high into the air, his rage blinding him to all else.
Like Icarus chasing the sun, he reached for an impossible goal.
Kagami smirked, his Sharingan spinning as he maneuvered the hawk to dive in a calculated arc, evading the attack with ease.
As the Iwagakure leader descended, Kagami's eyes locked onto a disturbance in the earth below—an underground escape route.
"So, trying to flee?" Kagami whispered, his tone laced with amusement.
Minato, watching from a distance, smiled faintly. He had noticed the same escape attempt but chose not to interfere, curious to see how Kagami would handle it.
---
Kagami leapt from the hawk, predicting the escape route with precision.
He exhaled sharply, clenching his fist as chakra surged through his body.
In that moment, everything became silent.
His mind focused entirely on a single point.
He found it—the infinitesimal window where physical force and chakra could converge to distort space itself.
His Sharingan spun furiously, blood threatening to seep from his eyes.
CRACK—
A deafening sound tore through the battlefield.
Kagami's punch extended impossibly, his torso twisting at an inhuman angle.
The air trembled.
Space warped.
Before the stunned eyes of his allies, a black-red flash erupted from Kagami's fist.
Black Flash!!!
---
Read up to 20 Chapters ahead on patreon.com/Fanglin
----------
[Please leave a 5 Star review and power stone for this novel]
*Thank you*
Chapter 28: Unable to Dance
Cursed energy originates from the practitioner's negative emotions such as fear, anger, and sorrow, and is a form of spiritual energy that can be manipulated in specific ways.
Chakra, on the other hand, derives from the Divine Tree, though not all chakra belongs to it. The Divine Tree is merely the seed. Chakra is a result of perfectly harmonized energies within the body, akin to "Qi." This energy enables almost anything—manifesting creation from nothingness and granting life itself, as evidenced by entities like the Tailed Beasts.
---
The Black Flash is a phenomenon of unparalleled impact, akin to a critical hit. It is not merely luck but a testament to one's profound understanding of their own energy.
In the shinobi world, there exists a similar method to enhance chakra potency: Sage Mode.
Sage Mode not only heightens sensory awareness and amplifies long-range combat capabilities but also integrates the surrounding natural energy into the practitioner's body for attacks. Techniques like Naruto's Rasenshuriken were impossible before mastering Sage Mode.
However, compared to Sage Mode's all-encompassing enhancements, Kagami's mastery of Black Flash was highly specialized.
Both techniques share one commonality—they harness the energy present in nature. Kagami concentrated all of it into a single, devastating attack.
---
As his fist fell, the black-red lightning tore through space itself.
This was destruction at the spatial level.
BOOM!!!!
---
Under the scorching sun, the eruption of black-red lightning dyed even the daylight with a sinister hue.
The power ripped through all obstructions, reducing them to nothing but debris.
BOOM!!!!
The deafening shockwave forced everyone nearby to cover their ears in pain. Even the residual blast carried the force of a large-scale Wind-Style jutsu.
---
When the smoke cleared, what remained was nothing short of apocalyptic.
A massive, bottomless crater, over ten meters in diameter, scarred the earth. It was hard to believe this devastation came from a human fist.
The edges of the crater still crackled with faint black-red lightning.
As for the Iwagakure jōnin who had been Kagami's target—there was no trace of him. Not even ashes remained.
---
Silence.
Utter silence.
For some, the scene before them was not unfamiliar.
They had witnessed something similar before: a Tailed Beast Bomb.
While the Black Flash's range was smaller, its deadly aura was on par with that catastrophic force.
---
"Cursed energy alone could never achieve such power..." Sukuna's deep voice resonated within Kagami's mind, its tone unreadable. "I must admit, chakra is a higher form of energy than cursed energy."
"Kagami Uchiha, you possess a rare talent—the insatiable hunger for power, willing to risk everything to attain it."
"In my thousand years of existence, I've seldom encountered one like you."
"If you abandon your pointless devotion to your clan, you will reach unimaginable heights."
"True freedom, like mine!"
For the first time, Sukuna addressed Kagami by name.
---
Kagami glanced at his own arm, scorched and cracked. His body reeked of burnt flesh, and his left side had gone completely numb.
His body wasn't strong enough to sustain such a technique.
"What is true freedom?" Kagami muttered, posing the question to Sukuna before answering himself.
"Someone like you—claiming to embody freedom, yet obsessed with demanding respect and indulging in meaningless slaughter in pursuit of joy."
"I'm not here to preach righteousness to you, Sukuna."
"It's just... your endless, pointless carnage bores me."
"True freedom isn't doing whatever you want—it's having the ability to choose not to do something."
"My clan isn't my weakness. It's my motivation to grow stronger."
"Uchiha is destined to be the strongest!"
---
"And you, Sukuna—you, bound in chains—what right do you have to lecture me on freedom?" Kagami's voice grew colder.
"A being that can't even dance anymore… how pitiful."
With that, Kagami sealed Sukuna back into his mental cage before the ancient entity could retort.
---
Whoosh!
As Kagami plummeted, weakened, from the sky, he expected the giant hawk to catch him. Instead, someone else reached him first.
"You're reckless, Kagami," Minato sighed as he caught him mid-air, landing safely on the ground.
Looking down at Kagami, he shook his head in a mix of disappointment and concern. "You didn't need to use that technique. You could've won without it."
"My goal wasn't just to defeat her," Kagami replied, his voice steady despite his injuries.
"This was worth it."
He had succeeded in performing Black Flash—a technique akin to a formula. Once achieved for the first time, mastering it was inevitable.
Minato sighed again, his expression softening into a small smile. "Alright, but let's get you treated first. Shibi and the others can handle the rest."
Kagami nodded but suddenly added, "Put me down. I can walk on my own."
As practical as Minato's gesture was, Kagami found the physical closeness uncomfortable.
With Minato's Flying Thunder God Technique, Kagami had no fear of being left vulnerable on the battlefield. This was the perfect opportunity to utilize Minato's abilities and gain more experience himself.
---
Minutes later, Fugaku and the others regrouped after finishing off the remaining Iwagakure shinobi.
"That's one hell of a technique…" Akimichi Chōza murmured in awe.
"I've seen many Uchiha before, but Kagami… he's something else entirely," Shibi added, his tone heavy with admiration.
"He's a monster," Fugaku muttered, more to himself than anyone else.
As the leader of the Uchiha clan, Fugaku had always prided himself on his strength. Yet, watching Kagami perform a feat on par with a Tailed Beast Bomb, he couldn't help but feel overshadowed.
---
"Do you have a name for that technique?" Minato asked as they prepared to leave.
"Black Flash," Kagami replied simply.
"That's it?" Minato quipped, a grin tugging at his lips. "I thought you'd come up with something grander!"
"Minato-sensei," Kagami deadpanned, "you don't have to act quirky just to maintain your image."
Minato chuckled, brushing off the remark. "Alright, let's get you patched up. Akimichi-san, bring the bodies for interrogation."
Minato's Flying Thunder God Technique activated.
A golden flash illuminated the battlefield.
---
Read up to 20 Chapters ahead on patreon.com/Fanglin
----------
[Please leave a 5 Star review and power stone for this novel]
*Thank you*
Paragraph comment
Paragraph comment feature is now on the Web! Move mouse over any paragraph and click the icon to add your comment.
Also, you can always turn it off/on in Settings.
GOT IT