While Kuro was sprinting toward Konoha, Uchiha Natsu had already buried Senju Tatsuhiko in a secluded place and paid respect to his grave.
The three magatama in his glowing crimson Sharingan spun as he looked at the sky.
Suddenly, another flood of memories from one of his dispersed shadow clones entered his mind. He spent a full second organizing his memories.
"I ran for nearly fifty kilometers carrying my Senpai's corpse to this place, but those traitorous scums still found me."
"Hmm? They should be less than two kilometers away."
"It won't take long for them to locate me."
"Even if I run, they will still be on my tail. Without a forest terrain, it would be almost impossible to hide from their trackers and sensor ninjas."
"Running any more would be unwise. It would only deplete my stamina. And unlike my enemies, I don't have any more potions or pills to heal or replenish my chakra or stamina."
As he kept muttering, Natsu's eyes flashed with an eerie red light. Hatred boiled inside him as his face twisted in a ferocious snarl.
However, at the next moment, all fluctuations of emotions vanished from his face.
He looked utterly calm.
Uchiha Natsu looked around him for a while, and then he started checking his ninja tools and his remaining combat supplies, including explosive tags.
"Since fighting is inevitable, I will choose the hunting ground."
"They want to kill me, huh? Very well. Let them come."
"I may not be able to survive, but they won't be unscathed either."
With that, Uchiha Natsu chose an advantageous location and began setting up hidden traps.
He wasn't delusional.
He knew that if he tried to confront the group of nearly seventeen ninjas head-on, he would die even before he could take down two people.
So, he would set traps. He would hide. He would use hit-and-run tactics as efficiently as possible to kill as many as he could manage.
Today, he would show his enemies how a true Uchiha Shinobi fought.
Today, he would make them dance to his rhythm and make them feel despair—the very same despair he felt when he was forced to watch his comrades die in front of his eyes.
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About ten minutes later, seventeen ninjas, including the five full-fledged Jonin and the other twelve Chunin-level sensor and hunter ninjas, arrived at the place where Uchiha Natsu had stood a few minutes ago.
The hunter ninjas asked the group to stop and began inspecting the surroundings with patience.
However, the Jonin leader, Shin, didn't have such patience.
He asked with an impatient voice, "Why are we dawdling here? Did you find them?"
The subordinate Chunin-level ninjas immediately broke out in a cold sweat and replied, "We have found traces of blood. The Konoha ninjas probably thought that the rain would erase all the traces. But fortunately, the traces still lingered."
Another sensor ninja commented, "No wonder. They were gravely injured, after all. Even if they managed to bandage their wounds, running in such conditions would still aggravate their wounds."
Shin nodded. "Sensors, extend your chakra field. I want to see them within two hours."
The poor sensor ninjas exchange glances with each other before nodding their heads.
What could they even do?
They could only follow orders if they wanted to avoid punishments.
After sniffing around for the clues for a few more minutes, they found another set of clues.
Seven hunter ninjas gathered together and inspected the clues. Their face showed a hint of confusion.
"Strange. Why did the traces disappear all of a sudden?"
The hunter ninjas stood together in the location from where the traces suddenly vanished.
"How are we supposed to find them now?"
One of the hunter ninjas grumbled.
Another one replied, "Let's look around this place carefully. There is no way the traces would vanish suddenly."
The other hunter ninjas nodded.
However, before they could take another step, they suddenly felt a large amount of volatile chakra fluctuate around them, instantly putting them on alert.
Suddenly, they heard one of the sensor ninja screaming at them, "Get out of there, now!!"
The shout from the sensor ninja put the seven hunter ninjas to the edge, making them try to get away from where they were standing almost instinctively.
Unfortunately, it was too late.
The ground beneath their feet began to glow, and heat surged upwards along with faint sparks.
One of the seven hunter ninjas, who had already activated the Body Flicker Technique, shouted, "No, it's explosive tags. Get out!"
As soon as his words fell, the countless explosive tags hidden on the ground exploded simultaneously.
BOOOOOOOOOOM!!!
Crimson fire surged outwards as a result of the explosion, carrying blistering heat that instantly engulfed two hunter ninjas who were slowest to move.
But before they could feel the pain, a powerful shockwave generated by the explosion instantly blew them into smithereens, and their corpse turned into ashes by the crimson fire that engulfed them.
The shockwave carrying the crimson fire and its heat also hit another retreating hunter ninja, tearing his limbs apart and destroying his internal organs, all while burning him.
In the end, he also died, leaving behind a mangled and charred body.
The other four hunter ninjas, who acted fast, were relatively safe.
Three of them had suffered from blunt damage from the shockwave, only breaking a rib or two. They had suffered from several third-degree burns.
Although they were severely weakened, they still retained some degree of combat power. They weren't in any mortal danger.
The only one who was completely safe was the hunter ninja who had activated the Body Flicker Jutsu the earliest.
Suddenly, one of the three injured hunter ninjas felt two hands grabbing his ankles.
And before he could react, his entire body was dragged underground, leaving only his head above the surface.
"What?"
He was shocked and tried to channel his own Earth Release chakra to free himself.
"You want to leave? No chance."
As he tried to free his body from the earth's grip, a chilling voice suddenly echoed in the air.
And at the next moment, his pupils shrank in terror as he suddenly felt the chakra fluctuations of several explosive tags that seemed to be attached to his clothes.
Explosive tags? When? He screamed inwardly.
Already weakened because of the injuries, the hunter ninja's reaction speed and strength had dropped by several degrees.
In the end, he could only watch the explosive tags trigger and explode.
Boooooom!!
The impact and the scorching heat of the explosion obliterated the hunter ninja's body underground before the shockwave and fire caused the ground around him to explode and burn fiercely.
From the initial explosive trap's activation to the death of the fourth hunter ninja because of the explosive tags Natsu had sneakily attached to him while dragging his body underground, all those incidents occurred within a period of less than five seconds.
It left all the involved ninjas too stunned to react.
Only after the death of the fourth hunter ninja did the entire group, along with the sensor ninjas, finally snap back to reality.
As for the other five full-fledged Jonin, including their leader Shin, they were standing too far away from the group to intervene when the incident occurred.
But now, they were alert and quickly moved toward the group of hunter and sensor ninjas.
Meanwhile, Uchiha Natsu, who had orchestrated everything, was hiding in the dark and contemplating his next actions.
Tch! Only four died.
But that's fine. Two of them are already injured.
Dealing with sensor ninjas is a trouble, too.
Now that they are fully alert, they would use their chakra field to locate me.
But they would only find the chakra signature of my shadow clones and mud clones.
I should stay hidden underground as much as possible.
After awakening the three-tomoe Sharingan, I still have half of my total chakra reserves even after pumping the shadow clones and mud clones with tons of chakra.
Let's focus on killing as many of the injured hunter ninjas and the sensor ninjas as possible first, before those five Jonin-level ninjas show up.
He had thirty seconds at most before the five Jonin arrived here. After all, the commotion he created by triggering explosive tags was quite loud.
After making up his mind, he signaled his clones to take action immediately.
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