Kapitel 25: Chapter Twenty-Five
A/N- Hey guys. Here's the chappy. Expect the following update on Wednesday next week, and know you can skip the wait and read the following three chapters and continuous updates on Pa-treon right now. Since I now qualify as an unemployed member of society, all subscribers on my pa-treon are much appreciated. If you enjoy my writing, please don't hesitate to support it. For Pa Treon, you can remove the hyphen between Pa and Treon and Google it, then search for my username—Oghenevwogaga. Or you could copy the link in my bio and remove the spaces before pasting it in your address bar. Note: Please subscribe to my pa-treon using the website directly instead of the IOS app. It's cheaper on the website.
Important Announcement: Changes made to my pa-treon structure mean it's now cheaper to read the very next chapter with a lower-tier subscription. I'll be placing a discount on yearly memberships for a week or so to support this
He swam to the surface in a second while feeling at his chakra and converting it to the spiritual energy that allowed him to knit the tears across his muscles and the tiny fractures along his ribcage. If he hadn't prepared in time, that hit would have caved in his chest, but instead now he just had to make sure he hadn't left Kagami in too much of a fucked situation. One foot after the other, he pulled himself up to the water's surface and took stock of what was going on. Water walking was harder than usual with the content disturbances that came from the battle between Granduncle and the eight tails.
Against what should have been common sense, it was clear that Granduncle was winning. He was even doing it quite handily, it seemed. Almost like he was taking the time to remind the world that while he was not necessarily Hashirama's equal in every respect, he was still a legend among shinobi for a reason. One of the eight tails' (or should it be seven tails now?) tentacles floated in the water from where it had been cleanly cut through. Probably the same jutsu that would go on to cut through the roots of the God tree in a can on that would never be. The rest of the Octopus Squid was lashing out against my Granduncle's control over the water. One water dragon was wrapped around a few tentacles, and even the beast's neck, while another water dragon was intersected with the first, coiled around the dragon's lower body.
On top of the water, stood Tobirama with both hands clasped as if he was in the middle of a prayer. I didn't need to be a sensor to know he was expending ungodly amounts of chakra. I could practically see it in the very air around us. As for the Raikage, he was in a tense taijutsu bout with Kagami. I could see that he was just a tad bit slower than usual, but Kagami had already taken quite a hit. His left hand hung limp by his side, while his red eyes darted from side to side.
I flared my chakra for a second in warning, and then I body flickered right in the middle of the both of them. Of course, my approach was sensed. I ducked underneath the kick from the Raikage, and allowed Kagami to reach around me with a stab aimed at the man's knee. He snatched it back, but we kept on him. I lashed out with my fingers, aimed at his chakra points. He dove into the attack, pressing his speed advantage in close quarters.
I leaned backwards to avoid the first punch. Kagami pressed around me with a kunai aimed at our opponent's head. He was stopped dead in his tracks. His kunai rested against the lightning armour that surrounded the Raikage, making exactly zero headway. Kagami's eyes widened just as mine did in the same second. I pushed off with one arm and sent the older Uchiha flying, while his kick landed against my unprotected midsection and sent me flying away as well. I chuckled as I realised what had just happened. We'd both reacted to save the other at the cost of our own lives, almost by instinct. Fucking will of fire. Where we'd stood was practically torn apart from the impact of the Raikage's punch.
"Finally. I've been trying to figure out how you've been doing it. With the Uchiha, it's easy. He uses those cheating eyes of his to see what I'll do before I do it and uses that to remain barely ahead of me enough to make it a fight. But you, that's not it. You copied my technique. But not perfectly, no. Or rather, you use it in a different way by choice. Wind, I suspect. That's what allows your fingers to lance through my armour with such ease. Once I figured that out, I just had to figure out what made your armour different from mine. Chakra density, was my first guess. Yet if it were, then your armour would be visible to the naked eyes, just like mine. It's not. It's concentration. Somehow, you are able to concentrate your chakra control down to an almost atomic level and use that to form your armour. It's invisible to the naked eye, so I have no chance of perceiving it, but some hints do give you away. One, the ground around you is disturbed just a few inches beyond where your actual body sits. Two, your teammate can clearly see the armour, and he makes sure to skirt your form by a wider margin than would otherwise make sense." He said, standing mockingly still as he casually tore apart my jutsu with his analysis.
I looked over at Kagami, and found him looking with eyes just as wide as mine. No doujutsu. No prodigal chakra sensing. Just pure intellect. He figured me out just because he's smarter than I am and also happens to be smarter than every fucking person I know, except maybe Granduncle Tobirama and Hiruzen.
I breathed out, and brought my chakra to bear once more. The wind armour, the one I'd gone to great lengths to hide, bloomed around me in a curtain of green chakra that spun around my form. Wind Release: Armour. The new technique I'd formed from studying his lightning armour. With all the ingredients for its formation, it might as well count as a kekkei genkai technique. Firstly, I needed the byakugan to keep track of the output. To control my chakra down to the atomic level to maintain the armour. Secondly, I needed the hyuga kekkei genkai that allowed us to emit chakra from every tenketsu without training.
"I see you like my new technique then. I call it Eight Trigrams: Armour." I said, and took my stance. Since I wasn't hiding it anymore, I could move the brainpower that I'd previously spent on making the technique unnoticeable into fighting. This time, we both kicked off against the ground at the same time and met near the middle of the space between us.
Our chakra clashed before our bodies. I lashed out with a palm slap aimed for his head, but his arm moved in time to knock my wrist away and send the attack away from his target. My other palm came up but met naught but air as he moved to the left to avoid it. His knee met mine for a second and we both snarled at each other until a swarm of shurinken fell down on our position. I did not move to dodge, trusting Kagami's accuracy, even as my opponent grit his teeth and enhanced his output. The shurinken crashed against his armour but failed to make any headroom. Still, the distraction had allowed me get closer to him. My palm shot out and this time his block was a second too slow. I felt the impact against his shoulder as I knocked the bone off its previous position.
I dove into the attack at that. One hand less, it was all he could do to block and avoid my barrage of attacks. He never got the chance to attack on his own, but the fact that he was so neatly keeping me at bay with only one hand in the fight said a lot about his skill as a shinobi. That even said nothing about the fact that he had to constantly deal with Kagami's genjutsu while doing so.
I saw the Uchiha's chakra as it lashed out at the Raikage, trying to ensnare the man in its grip even as it fed him untruth after untruth. Yet, regardless of all that, he still managed to break out of every genjutsu the second he was caught. I could see it now. This was the man that Granduncle Tobirama fought for years without being able to beat. A genius of the Cloud. I silently thanked my ancestors for the byakugan as I briefly disengaged from the Raikage to cut a shinobi who tried to sneak behind me in twain. Done with the distraction, I fell upon the man again.
Somehow, the quick disposal of their comrade had not made the Cloud Jounin reconsider the thought of interfering in a fight that was clearly above their level. Somehow, it had made them even more fired up to do so. They came from all directions, screaming savage war cries as they fell upon my wind armour. With enhanced speed and strength beyond their imaginations, I dealt with them in virtually no time. Each palm thrust was a lance that shoved chakra so far into their bodies that they were dead before I even withdrew my hands. Of course, they had lost their lives, but still managed to distract me for long enough to be annoying.
The Raikage had managed to relocate the bone I'd dislocated and pressed a glowing hand to the tenketsu I'd blocked. Medical ninjutsu, of course. Just my luck. I ran at him, hoping to prevent a full recovery, but took a boot to the head for all my troubles.
I flew backwards and crashed through a few rocks before I managed to bring my movement to a stop by dragging my hands along the ground. I stared up at the raikage. His armour had intensified its presence, and now he shone like the sun to my eyes. I blinked for a second and rushed at him again. This time, I saw the attack coming and managed to dodge out of the way of the first punch, but the second moved too quickly and managed to clip me on my side. Once again, I was sent flying from the force. This time, he chased me along the ground with his speed. I closed my eyes for a second, and when I opened them again, he'd been forced to abort as Kagami sent multiple wind bullets into the space he'd been standing on. I crashed to the ground again and was up on my feet a second later. I took a breath and breathed out a storm of hurricane class winds that tore through the ground and quite a few kumo shinobi, but not their kage.
Only my byakugan allowed me to duck underneath the roundhouse kick that came from right behind my head. I remained squatted to allow Kagami's kunai free rein to locate their target, but he was already gone by the time they were close to hitting. His next target was obvious, and even if he was much faster than I was, all I had to do was take a different route and set us up for a collision. He was only a few metres away from Kagami when I dove right into him with all the force and weight I had in me. He spotted me coming and managed to jump over my sailing form, allowing me to crash into the foliage behind him. Still, I rolled to my feet a second later.
Kagami was already heavily backpedaling even as his red eyes spun without ceasing, placing genjutsu after genjutsu upon his target even as the man snapped them just as quickly as they were placed on him. I joined the fight, ducking underneath his instinctive backhand in my direction and stepping further into his guard. His body moved to the side and avoided my palm thrust into his armpit. His armour erupted in power and stopped Kagami's kunai thrust dead in its tracks. For a second, at least. Until the kunai suddenly glowed with green chakra and passed through the lightning armour like it wasn't even there.
Quick on his feet as ever, the Raikage was already moving. His arms lashed out and pushed off against both Kagami and I to send him flying in the other direction. Regardless, there was still blood in the air from Kagami's kunai, and it seemed to fall in slow motion as the Raikage rolled along the ground before snapping to his feet in an instant. Across his chest was a single red line that showed where the kunai had been able to pierce.
"You both fight well. Sadly, it will not be enough today" He said
This time, when he moved, it was all I could do to get out of the way, he was somehow even faster now. His arms lashed out in a series of punches that I just barely managed to remain ahead of. Kagami's attempts to separate us failed as they all was he against his armour to no effect. Even the wind release jutsu were avoided without a second's hesitation as he was just simply too fast for anything Kagami sent. That meant I was the only one with any hope of competing with him and while my armour did give me a modest speed boost, it was nothing compared to the lightning armour, and he seemed keen on making sure that he drove that fact home today.
I slapped aside a punch and tried to counter with a palm thrust, but his arm was already in the way, waving away my palm and ending the threat before lashing out with a gut punch that had me coughing up blood. The second and third punches that followed were straight to the head, and if I didn't have the famous Uzumaki thick skull, then I would already be out of the fight. Instead, I got the rare pleasure of trying to dodge attacks while my head rang like a bell. I snatched my feet out of the way of a stomp and distracted my that, I didn't see the other leg come up and kick my knee in.
I fell gracelessly to one knee, and it was all I could do to lift both hands up to block the raised knee that would have surely broken my nose. The punch that followed it landed with no opposition and I found myself spitting out a tooth without even realising it.
"Like I said, boy, you fought well," The final chop did not land as Kagami body flickered between us. Still with only one hand in the fight, he managed to land a spartan kick against the Raikage's broad chest. The man did not even move. Kagami used him as a platform to launch himself upwards and fired a set of shuriken that multiplied in midair into hundreds. The Raikage took a diagonal path to avoid all the shurinken but still be close enough to launch himself right at Kagami once the man landed.
They exchanged blows for a few seconds, but even the threat of Kagami's wind release kunai was not enough to keep the Raikage at bay for long, monster of sheer power the man was. I tried to force myself to my feet, but a look at my knee told me that was a terrible idea. He had shattered my kneecap. There was no chance of me healing that. None at all.
I fiddled with my armour and just about managed to unseal my spare bow and quiver. The first arrow flew just in time as it forced the Raikage to retract the hand that had just been about to smash through Kagami's guard.
It hit nothing but air, but it was enough to achieve my first goal — Keep Kagami in the fight. Another breath and two more arrows flew through the air, forcing the Raikage to dodge away from them. I took a hold of the next arrow and allowed my chakra to flow through it with a breath. When I fired, the wind release enhanced arrow cut through the air like a missile and forced the Raikage to take another path as he tried to get at Kagami. With my distraction in place, the Uchiha had taken out another kunai and seemed to be getting back into the spirit of the fight.
He lashed out like a serpent in the grass, coiling his body and uncoiling it to gain explosive force as he shoved his kunai right at the muscular man's throat. Regardless, he managed to make no headway. Ay used a single elbow to push the hand holding the kunai out of the way, and then grabbed a hold of Kagami by the throat. It happened so quickly that I only even managed to figure out what had happened after the fact. In one second, Kagami was there, being held up and in the next his body was hading towards the ground. The arrow I'd been nocking hadn't even had the time to leave my bow yet.
I stared at the body as it fell, lost to gravity's hold. It said something about the speed at which we had been fighting that it felt like Kagami's body fell for an eternity. It was still in the air when the Raikage made it to my position and was forced to snap his head backwards to dodge the arrow I threw with a flick of my wrist. I slammed my hand on the ground, instantly turning the surrounding area into mud that reached out to grab him. I myself sank into the mud a fair bit and thanked fuck for the pain relief of not having my crushed knee against hard ground.
The Raikage had two choices, retreat or commit. Ay never retreated. He rushed through the mud, moving so quickly that it struggled to get a grasp on him, and slammed a powerful fist straight through my head. Or what he thought was my head. The mud clone fell apart instantly, and it was almost impressive how he managed to dash out of the mud field without getting caught.
He miscalculated, however, stopping at the edge of the mud field to begin looking around. Staying still was a mistake. Wind release chakra around my hands, I shoved through the power of his armour and grabbed a hold of his legs. The earth around us turned into even more mud. He couldn't find any traction to push me away. This was my domain. My kingdom. I pulled him deeper into the mud even as parts of my body were forced to surface. The wind release chakra I had around my hands had been abandoned. I couldn't channel the armour and use earth release at the same time. Still, even as I felt his lightning armour burn against my skin.
"Get off me" I heard him mutter as he increased his output even further. I could smell my skin burning as I held on to him. I didn't let go. Could not let go. If I did, there was no chance of me catching him like this again. One of my legs was already out of commission. This was it for me. My one fucking chance. I dragged my body even closer to his and forced more and more mud to begin to pile upon the two of us.
I felt his hands grab a hold of my head and begin to push. The skin around my face was beginning to sizzle. I was going to die here, I realised. This new life. Everything. It was all going to end here. Against the fucking Second Raikage of all people. Basically a no-name when compared to the giants that would come after, or even those who came before. I forced more mud on top of us, trying to kill him before he killed me. I could breathe just fine. He couldn't.
"Stop. Stop it" The words left his mouth for a second and I took the chance to stuff the mouth full of mud. His fingers tightened against my head, and I felt them break skin and dig at the flesh beneath. He was trying to push my eyes out of my head, i realised. Fuck. More mud buried us, taking us deeper underground. Only my kekkei genkai allowed me to see now. We wrestled with one another. A punch to the midsection made me shudder, and then his hands were back digging into my skull again. Piercing the flesh and muscle and pushing into the bone. Fuck. So much pain. It all seemed to crescendo as I blacked out for a second. In the next second, his hands fell away limp. Had I done it? No. My byakugan could make out the person on top of the river of mud we'd both sunk beneath. He held a bow and there was an arrow sticking right out of the Raikage's left eye.
The world blurred as I struggled to force the mud to lift me to the surface. "Good to see I made it in time" Uchiha Kagami said to me with a closed left eye.
Important Announcement: Changes made to my pa-treon structure mean it's now cheaper to read the very next chapter with a lower-tier subscription. I'll be placing a discount on yearly memberships for a week or so to support this
A/N; Yes, that's how the fight ends. The Raikage should have beaten both of them. He held back in the beginning and allowed them too many chances. When he finally took things seriously, he didn't see Shori's 'earth' release coming and would have managed to snatch a draw from the jaws of victory if not for cheating Uchiha bullshit eyes.. As I said earlier, the next chapter comes up next week on Wednesday, or skip the wait and read the next three, along with daily uploads on pa-treon. For the pa-treon, you can remove the hyphen between pa and treon, google it, and then search for my username- Oghenevwogaga. You could copy the link in my bio and remove the spaces before pasting it in your address bar.
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