Chapter 7: The End of the Hunt
"Kai… isn't your dad… a genin?" Ebisu stammered, his sunglasses dangling precariously from one ear as he stared slack-jawed at the smoldering crater. "How… how is he that strong?"
Shiranui Genma swallowed hard, the senbon in his mouth forgotten. "Kai, you never said! Is he hiding his power because he's afraid we'd pester him to teach us or something?"
Might Guy's own face was a mask of stunned disbelief. The father he knew, the one who shouted constantly about youth and passion, had just unleashed a power that seemed to reshape the landscape itself.
Across the battlefield, the three remaining Swordsmen—Raiga Kurosuki, Fuguki Suikazan, and Momotaro Hayato—felt a cold, primal fear grip them as they witnessed the vaporization of Jinpachi Munashi. Cold sweat slicked their skin beneath their uniforms. They had come to this war to build their legend, not to become a cautionary tale. The wall they had hit was made of Konoha's most unexpected materials.
Their minds, honed by survival, reached the same conclusion simultaneously. Without a single word exchanged, they broke. Flight was the only option.
They spun on their heels, chakra flaring at their feet, and shot off in different directions into the ravaged forest.
Uchiha Akira, however, had anticipated this. The moment he saw the shift in their postures, his hands were already moving. In an instant, a Shadow Clone poofed into existence beside him.
"Don't let them regroup or escape!" he snapped, his voice taut.
The two Akira's—original and clone—streaked after two of the fleeing figures. The real Akira targeted Momotaro Hayato, the wielder of the twin-bladed Hiramekarei. The clone, with a fraction of his power but all his skills and knowledge, angled toward the burly form of Fuguki Suikazan.
He left Raiga Kurosuki to Might Dai. The blue torrent of chakra that was Dai was already moving, a comet of azure light streaking across the scarred earth.
As he blurred past Akira, Dai's voice, strained but clear, reached his ears. "Uchiha-kun! In this state… I can only manage one more attack of that scale! The rest… is up to you!"
The speed of Fuguki and Momotaro, while respectable for jonin, was not their specialty. Uchiha Akira and his clone closed the distance with ease.
Akira had chosen his target deliberately. Compared to the monstrous chakra reserves and destructive water techniques of Fuguki wielding Samehada, Momotaro Hayato seemed the more manageable immediate threat. Water Release was a strong counter to his own primary elemental affinity, Fire. It was better to eliminate the support first, then concentrate on the more dangerous, stamina-heavy opponent.
With his Sharingan, Akira could read the flow of chakra clearly. Momotaro's reserves were substantial, but they paled next to the bottomless well that seemed to fuel Fuguki.
Without his teammates to cover his flanks, Momotaro Hayato was far less daunting. The Hiramekarei was a weapon of immense power in its released form, but not one known for agility. Pressed relentlessly by Akira's lightning-fast, close-quarters assault—a blur of kenjutsu enhanced by Lightning Release chakra—Momotaro found himself unable to create the space needed to unleash its full potential. Soon, thin, precise cuts began to appear on his arms and torso.
Meanwhile, Raiga Kurosuki, for all his speed augmented by Lightning Release, was no match for the raw velocity of the Seventh Gate. In mere breaths, the azure streak that was Might Dai intercepted him.
Realizing escape was impossible, Raiga skidded to a halt, whirling around. The twin Kiba blades in his hands snapped together, and he poured every ounce of his remaining chakra into them.
"Lightning Release: Lightning Armor!" A thick, crackling sheath of electricity enveloped his body.
"Lightning Release: Thunder Dragon Tornado!" From the crossed blades, a massive, coiling dragon of purple lightning roared into existence, its maw wide as it dove to engulf Might Dai.
Dai didn't slow. His response was a simple, world-shattering application of force.
"Morning Peacock!"
His fists became a storm. The air itself ignited from the friction, creating the familiar, beautiful, and deadly peacock-tail of fireballs. They coalesced once more into the form of a roaring dragon's head, this one of pure concussive and fiery might.
BOOOOOOM!
The collision was catastrophic but brief. The Thunder Dragon disintegrated instantly under the overwhelming barrage, swallowed by the expanding shockwave of Dai's attack. When the light and cataclysmic sound faded, another vast, smoldering scar was added to the forest. Of Raiga Kurosuki and his blades, there was no sign.
On the other two fronts, Fuguki Suikazan and Momotaro Hayato fought with increasing desperation, seeing their last comrade erased from existence.
The burly Fuguki swung the living sword Samehada in wide, furious arcs, but his frustration mounted. This Uchiha clone seemed to understand Samehada's chakra-absorbing nature perfectly. It never engaged directly, never used ninjutsu against him. Instead, it harried him with a relentless, dizzying barrage of shuriken and kunai thrown from impossible angles—the famed Uchiha shurikenjutsu.
Worse, each projectile was sheathed in a different nature transformation—wind or lightning—making them unpredictable and dangerous. He couldn't simply absorb their energy. Combined with the ever-present threat of a Sharingan genjutsu glimpsed in a moment of eye contact, Fuguki felt shackled. He had immense power, but no clear target to unleash it upon.
"Damn Uchiha! Damn Sharingan!" he roared, his bulky body rolling and weaving with surprising grace to avoid the storm of metal. His wild orange hair, hardened with chakra, lashed out like whips, deflecting some of the projectiles with sharp ping sounds.
But it wasn't enough. "This can't continue!" he snarled, his battle-honed mind cutting through the rage.
His chakra surged violently. His orange hair suddenly extended and thickened, weaving itself into a large, dome-like shield around him.
Swish! Swish! THUNK!
Several shuriken, trailing a pale yellow glow of wind chakra, sliced through his hair-shield as if it were paper, opening deep gashes on his shoulders and back. Blood welled.
Gritting his teeth against the pain, Fuguki formed a single hand seal with his free hand.
"Water Release: Hiding in Mist Technique!"
He spewed a thick, chakra-laced white mist from his mouth. It billowed out with unnatural speed, enveloping hundreds of meters of forest in a dense, sight-stealing fog. This mist was specifically designed to counter dojutsu, capable of blinding even the Rinnegan for a time, let alone the Sharingan.
Simultaneously, several kunai wreathed in sparks of lightning arced toward his heart. At the last second, the bandages around Samehada exploded outward as the sword itself seemed to swell, positioning its fleshy bulk as a shield. The kunai sank into it with a sizzle, their energy being greedily absorbed.
Seizing the opportunity, Fuguki Suikazan vanished into the depths of his own mist.
Back with the real Uchiha Akira, the thick fog washed over his battlefield as well, obscuring Momotaro Hayato from view. Akira's clone, pursuing Fuguki, was instantly blinded. He knew, with the clarity of shared intellect, that capturing or finishing the wielder of Samehada was now highly unlikely. A wounded beast with that much chakra, hidden in a mist that negated visual prowess, was not a battle to be forced. The clone would not have the chakra reserves to disperse a mist of that potency with a wind technique.
After a brief, fruitless attempt to track by sound and chakra residue alone, the Shadow Clone dissipated in a puff of smoke, its knowledge and experience returning to the original.
All of Akira's focus now converged on the remaining target, isolated and within his grasp: Momotaro Hayato.
The man was already cornered, breathing heavily. Without the support of his comrades and trapped in a close-range fight against a faster, more agile opponent who refused to give him space, the wielder of the mighty Hiramekarei was on the verge of breaking. The life-and-death crisis he sensed earlier was now a cold certainty pressing down on him.
(End of Chapter)
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