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Chapter 89: The Jashin Cult (5)
The silver glow of the Wood Dome illuminated the rocky clearing. The mercenaries held their heavy weapons tight, waiting for a command. The immortal cultists watched the blond boy with narrow, calculating eyes.
Naruto stood perfectly still. He lowered his hand from the hilt of his Kanto blade. He took a slow, deep breath.
He reached deep into the seal on his stomach. He grasped a fraction of the Nine-Tails' raw, burning malice and pulled it to the surface. He did not take the actual chakra. He only took the pure, unadulterated hatred of an ancient demon and perfectly blended it with his own refined Sakki.
He projected that heavy, suffocating Sakki outward in a massive, invisible wave.
The temperature in the clearing plummeted instantly. The air grew thick and incredibly heavy, pressing down on the lungs of every single person present. The sheer weight of the murderous intent was a physical force. It tasted like old copper and felt like freezing water rushing over bare skin.
Koji gasped loudly. The veteran mercenary leader felt his knees buckle. His hands began to tremble violently. He dropped his heavy battleaxe. The iron weapon hit the dirt with a dull thud. He looked at the small blond boy and saw a towering, monstrous shadow looming right behind him.
The High Priest of Jashin choked on his own breath. The fanatical smile vanished from his face. He took a wide, clumsy step backward, his silver pendant clinking loudly against his chest. Even the immortal zealots, men and women who embraced pain and death daily, felt absolute, primal terror grip their hearts. The young man with the rusted arm-blades started to shiver uncontrollably. His metal weapons rattled against each other.
Itachi stood a few yards away. His Sharingan spun rapidly as he analyzed the terrifying pressure. His chest tightened. He had felt the killing intent of elite Anbu captains and seasoned Uchiha warriors. He had never felt a murderous pressure this immense, this ancient, and this completely devoid of mercy. It was not something a human child could project.
Koji grabbed the hilt of his battleaxe and forced himself to stand straight. He realized his men were on the verge of dropping their weapons and fleeing into the dark forest. Panic was highly contagious.
"Kill him!" Koji screamed at the top of his lungs, his voice cracking with absolute desperation. "Attack him now!"
The spell of terror broke slightly. Ten heavily armored mercenaries standing in the front row roared in unison to mask their fear. They gripped their broadswords and spiked maces. They channeled raw, bluish chakra directly into their weapons, making the iron glow brightly in the dark. They charged blindly at Naruto, their faces twisted in violent rage.
Naruto moved.
He did not run. He simply vanished from his spot. He reappeared directly in the center of the ten charging mercenaries. The speed was completely terrifying. He drew his Kanto blade in a smooth, upward motion.
He infused his highly compressed wind chakra directly into the cold steel. The wind did not just sharpen the blade. It extended the cutting edge outward by a full three feet, creating a lethal, invisible extension of the sword.
Naruto spun on his heel and delivered a single, horizontal slash.
The invisible wind blade sheared through the heavy iron breastplates, the thick chainmail, and the flesh beneath without a single ounce of resistance. The ten charging men stopped dead in their tracks.
A second of total silence passed.
Then, all ten heads slid off their shoulders simultaneously. Ten geysers of dark blood erupted into the night air, raining down on the rocky earth. The headless bodies collapsed in a perfectly synchronized circle around Naruto.
Naruto did not pause to watch them fall. He gripped his Kanto blade tightly and sprinted directly into the thickest part of the enemy line.
Absolute slaughter commenced...
Naruto moved like a violent phantom through the ranks of terrified mercenaries. Every single swing of his wind-infused blade brought instant death. He ducked under a heavy axe swing and sliced the attacker cleanly in half from the waist down. He side-stepped a thrusting spear and decapitated three men standing behind the attacker with a flick of his wrist. Arms, legs, and heads flew through the air. Blood soaked the ground, turning the dry dirt into a slick, red mud.
The mercenaries quickly realized that engaging the boy in close combat was a guaranteed death sentence. Their armor was completely useless against the wind blade. They began to scramble backward in pure panic, dropping their heavy weapons to weave hand seals rapidly.
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Watching from the center of the clearing, Itachi felt completely awestruck. He watched the blond boy dismantle an entire private army with clinical, terrifying precision. Itachi briefly thought of his younger brother, Sasuke. Sasuke was the exact same age as Naruto. Sasuke was currently struggling to hit a stationary target with a standard shuriken. This boy was casually slicing grown men in half. The gap in power was completely incomprehensible.
Itachi shook off his shock. He could not just stand there and watch. He rapidly wove hand seals.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique," Itachi declared. He exhaled a massive sphere of roaring orange flames directly into a cluster of mercenaries attempting to flank Naruto. The men screamed as the fire consumed them entirely.
The young man with the arm-blades and the girl with the solid blood whip noticed the Uchiha attacking. They were completely terrified of approaching the blond monster tearing through their meat shields. They decided to target the boy with the red eyes instead.
"Kill the Uchiha!" the young man yelled. He charged at Itachi, swinging his rusted arm-blades in a furious, cross-cutting pattern.
The girl followed closely behind. She snapped her solid blood whip through the air, aiming the jagged tip directly at Itachi's throat.
Itachi drew his short sword and engaged them simultaneously. His Sharingan tracked every twitch of their muscles. He parried the heavy arm-blades with absolute precision, deflecting the rusted metal away from his vital organs. He ducked under the cracking blood whip, feeling the wind from the strike ruffle his dark hair. The cultists were aggressive and utterly fearless in close combat, knowing their wounds would heal. Itachi danced around their strikes smoothly, looking for a way to incapacitate them without drawing their cursed blood.
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On the southern edge of the battlefield, the High Priest stood perfectly still. He completely ignored the screams of the dying mercenaries. He ignored the smell of burning flesh and the heavy spray of blood.
His wide, unblinking eyes were fixed entirely on Naruto.
The High Priest watched the blond boy move through the chaos. He watched the effortless decapitations. He watched the absolute lack of emotion on the boy's face.
A violent shiver ran through the Priest's thin body. He remembered the vision he had received during the bloody ritual in the ruined shrine. He had seen a blond boy standing in the center of total destruction, bringing death to everything around him. The Priest had assumed the boy was the ultimate sacrifice Jashin desired.
He realized his mistake. He had severely misinterpreted the divine revelation.
"He is not the sacrifice," the High Priest whispered. Religious ecstasy flooded his veins, making his hands shake with joy. "Look at him. Death follows his every single footstep. The pain he inflicts is perfect. He is the incarnation. Lord Jashin walks among us in the flesh."
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Across the clearing, Koji rallied a small group of his surviving men. Five veteran mercenaries stood shoulder to shoulder. They realized physical weapons were useless. They formed the exact same sequence of hand seals in perfect unison.
"Earth Release: Earth Dragon Bullet!" the five men shouted together.
The ground beneath their feet rumbled violently. Five large heads made of solid rock erupted from the dirt. The stone dragons opened their heavy jaws and fired a massive, continuous barrage of dense mud projectiles directly at Naruto. The combined jutsu covered a massive area, completely cutting off his escape routes.
Naruto stopped moving. He sheathed his Kanto blade smoothly. He raised his right hand.
Wind chakra exploded from his palm. The sheer density of the energy created a loud, high-pitched screeching sound that physically hurt the ears of everyone in the clearing. The chakra spun wildly, rapidly forming a dense blue sphere. Four massive, razor-sharp blades of pure wind erupted from the center of the sphere, spinning like a giant shuriken.
"Wind Release: Rasenshuriken," Naruto stated coldly.
He threw the violently spinning mass of chakra forward. The Rasenshuriken tore through the air, completely obliterating the incoming barrage of earth bullets. The wind blades shredded the solid mud into fine dust instantly.
The Rasenshuriken slammed directly into the chest of the mercenary standing in the center of the five-man group.
The sphere expanded rapidly, forming a massive dome of microscopic wind blades. The five mercenaries were trapped inside the glowing dome. The noise was deafening, sounding like a thousand screeching birds. The men did not even have time to scream. The countless tiny wind blades cut through their armor, their skin, and their internal organs at a cellular level.
The wind dome collapsed, leaving absolutely nothing behind but a fine, red mist and shredded pieces of metal floating in the air.
The remaining mercenaries stopped fighting. They dropped their weapons entirely. They stared at the red mist settling on the ground. Complete and utter despair broke their spirits. They were fighting a literal god of war.
Naruto looked around the clearing. He was not finished.
He channeled a precise amount of wind chakra directly to the soles of his dark shinobi sandals. He stepped firmly onto the empty air. The wind chakra created a solid, invisible platform beneath his foot. He took another step upward. Then another.
He walked perfectly into the night sky, climbing an invisible staircase until he stood thirty feet above the bloody battlefield.
He looked down at the terrified survivors. His face was devoid of all mercy.
Naruto extended his right hand. He formed a sphere of heavily compressed chakra in his palm. The sphere spun rapidly, but this time, he did not add the cutting edge of wind. He poured his intense Fire affinity directly into the rotating core.
The sphere ignited instantly.
The dark night vanished completely. A blinding, intense light flooded the entire canyon. The sphere in Naruto's hand expanded rapidly, turning a deep, violent orange and yellow. The heat radiating from the jutsu was so intense that the rocks directly beneath him began to crack and pop. The air distorted and shimmered wildly.
He stood high above the world, looking exactly like a deity holding a miniature sun in his right hand.
"Katon: Rasen Ryūsei," (Fire Release: Spiraling Meteor) Naruto announced. The name of the technique echoed clearly over the crackling flames.
Koji fell to his knees. The harsh orange light illuminated the absolute horror on his scarred face. He looked up at the blond boy floating in the sky, holding the power of a dying star.
The mercenary leader lowered his head and murmured the only word that made sense.
"Monster."
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