บท 460: Chapter 455 : Neverending Hidden Cards!
[A/N: Saturday's Bonus Chapter.]
While Kakuzu and Fujin had engaged in a fight, two more face-offs were happening in the snowy forests of the Land of Frost.
Darui looked at the person in front of him. His expression was very serious. He muttered, "Uchiha Itachi. Why were you chasing after us?"
Darui's subordinates were tense as well. Though they were confident in Darui's strength, Itachi was someone who massacred the entire Uchiha clan. They didn't dare to underestimate him. They prepared themselves for a life-and-death battle!
Elsewhere, the Kumo team led by C and Samui encountered Konan. Though they weren't aware of who she was, C was able to sense her vast chakra reserves. As a result, they were in a tense situation as well.
Suddenly, Konan sensed something and looked in the direction where Kakuzu and Fujin were fighting. She thought, 'It looks like Kakuzu is fighting someone. My butterflies were destroyed.'
Konan took a look at the Kumo ninja once again before leaving the battlefield. C asked, "Should we chase her?"
Samui suggested, "We don't know who she is. Though she is strong, capturing Hidan is more critical right now."
C and the other ninja nodded. They continued their trail. Elsewhere, Itachi received a message from the paper butterfly. He too left and began moving towards where Fujin and Kakuzu were. Darui's team breathed a sigh of relief. They pondered for a few seconds and took the same decision as their other team.
While Kakuzu was retreating backwards, 5 Vacuum Bullets formed at Fujin's fingertips and shot at Kakuzu at blinding speed at the same time that he moved backwards. He twisted his body at weird angles to be able to dodge them.
However, the small distance meant that he couldn't dodge them entirely. Three Vacuum Bullets hit his hardened body and pierced through it. In addition, one of the two bullets he dodged destroyed the paper butterflies on his shoulders.
Despite hitting Kakuzu, there was no happiness in Fujin's expression. None of the bullets managed to hit his heart. Unfortunately for Kakuzu, it wasn't the end of the attack. Fujin could launch four waves of attack with his Vacuum Gatling jutsu by now.
Despite Kakuzu's incredible speed, Fujin chased after him and kept attacking. In the second wave, 2 more pierced through Kakuzu's body. In the 3rd wave, 4 bullets pierced through his body. And, in the last wave, though Kakuzu managed to dodge 4, the last one was heading straight towards one of his hearts.
Fujin's eyes glowed as he watched in anticipation. In terms of strength, Kakuzu was extremely strong. He was only below the likes of Hiruzen, Onoki and Ay. Even though most weren't aware of Kakuzu, according to Fujin, to be able to kill him once would be an even greater achievement than killing Juzo.
Unfortunately, it wouldn't be that easy. To Fujin's shock, Kakuzu's heart moved inside his body. The bullet passed through his body but barely missed the heart! All 5 of Kakuzu's hearts were still intact despite him being hit by 10 Vacuum Bullets at a close range.
The movement of Kakuzu's heart surprised Fujin for a moment. However, on second thought, he didn't find it odd. After all, the heart could leave Kakuzu's body and function independently.
Even though Fujin's Vacuum Bullets had the ability to suck the items that were close to its path, it wasn't very effective against Kakuzu as the only things that got sucked were the dense threads inside his body. To make matters worse, the damaged threads immediately attached to other threads, ensuring that Kakuzu didn't suffer much damage and was able to fight at his full strength.
Fujin sighed internally and thought, 'As I guessed… I can't kill a strong rank S ninja this easily.'
Seeing no new bullets forming at the tip of Fujin's fingers, Kakuzu was relieved. He looked at Fujin and thought, 'What a dangerous brat! If I had been slightly slower to react, he could have destroyed all five of my hearts with that unexpected attack!'
Since Fujin couldn't spam Vacuum Bullets, he moved faster and swung his sword at Kakuzu once again. Once again, Kakuzu hardened his arm and raised it to block Fujin's sword, confusing Fujin who wondered, 'Isn't he afraid of falling to the same attack once again?'
Of course, Kakuzu wasn't a fool. When Fujin's sword neared, several threads appeared from Kakuzu's body and tore through whatever was remaining of his cloak. He had no intention of falling to the same tactic. Instead, it was his turn to surprise Fujin. The threads moved rapidly towards Fujin's heart!
Unfortunately for Kakuzu, Fujin showed no interest in those threads. Kakuzu's eyes widened in shock and he immediately looked upwards. Instead of being stopped, Fujin's sword cut straight through Kakuzu's hardened arm! He tried moving, but the sword hit his left shoulder and began cleaving through his body!
Even though Kakuzu had hardened his entire body, it couldn't put up any resistance against Fujin's sword. It was as if Fujin was merely swinging his blade through the air. Kakuzu immediately flickered to his right. However, he was still too slow. Fujin's blade cleaved through one of Kakuzu's hearts, cutting it into two halves. Not only that, Fujin's sword had cut his body. Kakuzu's left chest, shoulder and arm were cut off from his body.
Kakuzu's remaining body had moved to the right due to him flickering before the sword had cut through his body. He fell to the ground and rolled for several dozen meters before stopping. He lay there as if he was a corpse!
Lying on the ground, Kakuzu was in shock. He had lost one of his heart! One of his arms was cut off from the forearm and the other arm was completely cleaved from his body! Though they weren't a major loss for Kakuzu, he couldn't control them as those parts didn't have a heart to allow him to control them.
He thought, 'Zetsu's information is incomplete! His Wind Vacuum Technique is far more dangerous than his Fuinjutsu. He applied a layer of vacuum to his sword. That is why I couldn't block him like before. To make matters worse, he made me feel confident in being able to defend his blade and hence forced me to make this mistake.'
With his experience, Kakuzu immediately understood what his mistake was. At the same time, he looked at Fujin in a whole new light. Though Fujin wasn't stronger than him in any way, he kept way too many cards hidden.
Juzo fell to his Fuinjutsu which no one knew of despite Fujin having such a high level of mastery. On the other hand, Kakuzu almost fell prey to a completely new style of using the Wind Vacuum Technique. If he had just one heart, he would have died. That said, if he just had one heart, he wouldn't have fought Fujin in such a reckless manner. He kept lying hoping that Fujin would lower his guard down and approach him.
Fujin naturally wouldn't believe that he was dead. He thought, 'This old geezer is good at hiding his chakra. Even though he still has 4 hearts, it feels like he is completely dead. I can't sense any chakra from him!
Still, I was only able to destroy one heart after exposing Vacuum Slash and Vacuum Gatling. And now that I have exposed them, it will be very difficult to catch him off guard with them again.'
Fujin was very careful while exposing his hidden cards. He would generally avoid exposing them even if it meant he would have to retreat if he didn't have any benefits to be gained. That is why he didn't use his new collections of Vacuum jutsus against Juzo despite knowing that he could gain a huge advantage in the battle.
However, since then, Fujin had made rapid progress in learning the Flying Thunder God jutsu. It was only a matter of time before he completely mastered it. In addition, he was also learning the Eight Inner Gates technique.
Since he would have those techniques as his hidden cards in the future, Fujin didn't mind exposing some of the Vacuum jutsus he created. Not to mention, against someone like Kakuzu, he would struggle a lot and could be at risk if he restricted himself to using the same techniques that he did against Juzo! After all, he was far away from Konoha and Kakuzu had the backup of two strong rank S ninjas! Fujin couldn't afford to get injured at that place.
Since Kakuzu was playing possum, Fujin decided to take his time. He created two Shadow Clones and immediately riled his chakra. He shot Vacuum Cannon at Kakuzu's body while his clones followed up with the Infinite Breakthrough jutsu and the Searing Migraine jutsu. The two jutsus merged seamlessly and moved towards Kakuzu who was still playing dead!
[A/N : Bonus chapter on next Sunday if the fic gets 1000 Power Stones. Bonus chapter on next week's Saturday if the fic gets 2000 Power Stones.]
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