Seven down. One left.
The last Cloud ninja—a special jōnin—turned to run. A voice cut through the air behind him, cold and clear.
"Running? What about their sacrifice?"
The special jōnin's eyes widened. When? He'd just seen the boy over there…
A clone. It had been a clone.
With his Kenbunshoku Haki, Qianyu had known exactly where his target was hiding. The Cloud ninja spun, sword rising in a desperate counter. Too late.
The blade punched through the back of his skull. Qianyu withdrew it, flicked the gore away, and sheathed it with a final click. Time to rejoin the main force.
His return was met with a collective sigh of relief from the Leaf ninjas who'd been following his Shadow Clone. Having their commander be a copy didn't exactly inspire confidence.
Qianyu scanned the group. Minato Namikaze and the five he'd taken hadn't returned yet. He focused his Haki, stretching his senses outward.
Minato's team had taken down four of their seven pursuers. Two Leaf ninjas were injured. The remaining three Cloud ninjas were still fighting, but Minato was struggling. Protecting the wounded was slowing him down, making the fight messy.
Qianyu dismissed the observation. He led the column forward again. The mission parameters were set. Whether Minato won or lost, this particular Cloud pursuit had already failed. What happened to that team wasn't his problem anymore.
The objective was achieved.
About an hour later, Minato returned. Only four ninjas followed him. One of the original five was gone. The two who'd been wounded earlier were still alive. The one who died had been from the uninjured trio.
Dragged down. Cost of protection.
Minato's report was quiet, delivered in a subdued tone. "The seven Cloud ninjas have been eliminated." He said nothing more, melting back into the ranks, his posture heavy.
Qianyu's lip curled slightly. He didn't bother with a response.
Protect two wounded, lose one able fighter. On paper, it might look like a net gain. In reality, it was a terrible trade. Those two wounded were now combat liabilities. Minato would have to babysit them for the rest of the retreat. He'd sacrificed an asset for two burdens.
Stupid.
"Hah. So this is the bond between comrades," Qianyu muttered, a thread of scorn in his voice. "Good thing I don't have any."
He pushed onward.
…
For veterans of the Second Great Ninja War like Orochimaru and Jiraiya, a dense forest wasn't an obstacle—it was a playground. The two Sannin, leveraging decades of brutal experience, had become a moving barrier, slowing the Cloud pursuit to a crawl.
But Cloud ninjas in the Land of Hot Water were numerous. Reinforcements from surrounding outposts were converging. They'd abandoned stealth, using wide-area ninjutsu to blast through traps and clear paths. Their advance accelerated.
Worse, they were coming from all sides now. A net was closing around Qianyu's main force.
His Haki painted the grim picture with perfect clarity. A decision had to be made.
The retreat had lasted nearly twenty-two hours. They needed at least fourteen more to link up with the Leaf reinforcements rushing from the border.
Qianyu's mind worked, cold and logical. Then, he issued the order. "All units! Disperse all Shadow Clones and regular clones! Form on me! We break through their encirclement, now!"
He relayed the situation and his decision via snake to Orochimaru. Maintaining the illusion of a large force was pointless now. Once the net tightened, the Cloud would see through it. Better to reclaim the chakra and strike before the circle was complete. Getting surrounded meant death.
The Leaf ninjas behind him jolted. Encirclement? But they obeyed without question. Their trust wasn't born of camaraderie, but of results. Their commander hadn't been wrong yet.
Qianyu led them at a full sprint.
They hadn't gone far before Cloud ninjas appeared ahead. Qianyu's Haki flared, scanning.
The Cloud was faster than he'd anticipated. A blocking force was already in position ahead. More were flanking, ready to seal the trap.
Qianyu stopped. He turned to the panting ninjas behind him. "I will clear a straight path. You follow that path. Keep up. If you fall behind, hide and escape on your own. Do not wait for help. Waiting for help gets your comrades killed."
His gaze flicked to Minato, and then to the two injured ninjas by his side.
Minato's head was down. Eyes on the ground. His posture screamed defeat. The two wounded ninjas couldn't meet Qianyu's stare, shame burning their cheeks.
Qianyu looked away. He closed his eyes, drew a long, slow breath, and exhaled a plume of white mist. His hand settled lightly on his sword's hilt.
"Thunder Breathing…"
His eyes snapped open.
Blue lightning erupted—coiling, shaping. A dragon of pure thunder.
"Seventh Form: Honoikazuchi no Kami!"
A blur. Too fast to track. He was just… gone. Where he passed, the ground turned to scorched earth. Trees shattered and fell. The Cloud ninjas at the forefront tried to stand their ground. They were dismembered, beheaded, before they could even form a hand seal.
The Leaf ninjas didn't hesitate. They charged down the smoldering, cleared lane their commander had carved, racing after the fading streak of blue lightning.
The incomplete Cloud encirclement tore open like wet paper.
…
Orochimaru received the message. "We're leaving," he told Jiraiya. "Qianyu is breaking out."
"Breaking out?" Jiraiya grunted, blocking a kunai.
"Mm. The net was closing. He had to punch through before it sealed. We move to rendezvous. Now."
The two Sannin disengaged, fading back into the trees, leaving their confused Cloud opponents behind.
Qianyu surged forward, the Thunder Dragon around him annihilating everything in its path. He could feel his chakra reserves—still decent. Maybe he could extend this cleared corridor further…
He stopped.
Ahead. His Haki screamed a warning.
Eighty chakra signatures. At least. A small army, directly in their new path.
~~~~❃❃~~~~~~~~❃❃~~~~
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