Rapid footsteps pounded against the earth one after another.
The Konoha army led by Yagami had finally crossed the Land of Grass and entered the border of the Land of Fire.
At this moment, the sun had already begun to tilt westward.
And judging by the distance, they were not far from the frontline Sarutobi Hiruzen had mentioned before.
"Shikaku."
Yagami, running at the very front of the formation, suddenly opened his eyes and turned his head slightly.
"For now, I'm leaving the army under your full command."
Just now—
Through Kagura's Mind's Eye, he had sensed a fierce battle taking place roughly forty kilometers ahead.
And the side desperately holding the line was undoubtedly Konoha's defenders.
"Yes, Lord Yagami!"
Hearing the order, Nara Shikaku answered at once, his expression turning serious.
Back at Kikyō Castle, he had already heard from Yūhi Shinku about the range of Yagami's sensory ability.
So the moment Yagami gave that order, Shikaku immediately understood.
He must have detected the battlefield ahead.
Shikaku hated trouble more than most people.
But at a moment like this, in the middle of a war, there was no way he would hesitate over an order from his superior.
"Mm."
Yagami gave a small nod, then looked toward Kushina.
"Kushina, stay with the main force and move up from the rear together."
"Understood!"
Kushina answered without hesitation.
She had already come down from the bamboo-copter.
Now, she was running behind Yagami together with the group of Konoha jōnin.
After receiving her reply, Yagami turned forward again.
Click. Click. Click. Click.
A faint mechanical turning sound rang out.
The instant he faced forward, golden particles of light began to scatter across his body.
In that same moment, his figure became so light it almost seemed to vanish.
Since he still hadn't mastered true instantaneous movement, the fastest method available to him right now was still to move through the power of the Glint-Glint Fruit.
Boom!!
A sharp wave of air ripped outward behind him.
In the next instant, his figure turned into a streak of light that shot across the sky ahead.
He moved so fast that by the time the Konoha jōnin reacted, Yagami had already torn past the sound barrier and appeared hundreds of meters away.
"So fast...!"
The Konoha jōnin who saw it instinctively cried out in shock.
That level of speed was not something Yagami revealed often.
During the war with Sunagakure, he had only used it more than once... and more then speed he just used Manda as a mount to snipe the enemies from afar.
So naturally for some, this was the first time they had seen Yagami move like a ray of light, so fast that even their eyes couldn't keep up.
Among the entire jōnin group, only Kushina remained calm.
She had seen it before.
Boom! Boom!
Rumble—!!!
Inside a rectangular trench, hundreds of Konoha shinobi were crouched low.
Broken stone and shattered earth rained down from above like a storm.
For a time, every Konoha shinobi in the trench was forced down under the barrage, unable to even raise their heads.
"Everyone!"
"Hold the line!"
"The report was sent back to the village five days ago! Reinforcements will arrive by tomorrow at the latest!"
As the commander-in-chief, Mimura Hamaki raised his head and shouted with all his strength.
His voice spread through the trench.
The situation was already critical.
Morale among Konoha's shinobi had fallen to a dangerous low.
And because of that, as commander, the only thing he could do now was continue to raise their spirits.
"Counterattack! Counterattack!!"
The moment the rain of debris weakened, Mimura Hamaki sprang up and looked outside.
What he saw was a tide of Iwagakure shinobi surging forward like a swarm of ants.
He immediately roared at the comrades still sheltering in the trench.
At the commander's order, the Konoha shinobi looked up as well—
and once again saw the overwhelming number of Rock shinobi pressing down on them.
"Fire!!"
Countless ninjutsu, explosive tags, and shuriken were launched outward all at once.
Violent explosions shook the battlefield without pause.
But Iwagakure's total force numbered as many as eight thousand.
Even if they still didn't know why the enemy hadn't launched a full-scale assault from the start—
just the portion currently attacking was already more than the Konoha shinobi here could withstand.
So it wasn't long before Iwa's shinobi broke through and charged directly into Konoha's trench.
The battle instantly erupted at close quarters.
"I already said we should have followed my plan. What I meant was minimizing casualties."
"If you'd listened to me and allocated your forces properly, the Konoha shinobi would've been crushed long ago."
At the rear of the battlefield, a group of Iwagakure commanders stood gathered together.
Watching as their forces surged into Konoha's trench, the Four-Tails Jinchūriki, Rōshi, spoke with a smug look on his face as he glanced at Han, the Five-Tails Jinchūriki.
"Hmph. You've got a lot of nerve saying that. The one who kept causing problems this whole time was you."
Han shot back without the slightest politeness.
This time, nearly every Iwagakure shinobi at the rank of chūnin and above had been mobilized.
Originally, they should have been able to crush Konoha's line of defense quickly and push straight into the Land of Fire.
But because the Iwagakure high command had been divided from the very start, Konoha had somehow managed to hold on for two whole days.
"Tch."
Rōshi narrowed his eyes and shot Han a cold look.
The tension between the two instantly sharpened again.
In terms of pure combat power, Rōshi was stronger than Han.
But because his relationship with Ōnoki had always been poor, Ōnoki had handed overall command to Han instead.
That decision had left Rōshi deeply dissatisfied.
And ever since the battle began, the conflict between the two had only grown worse.
Because of that, Iwa's offensive had repeatedly lost momentum, allowing Konoha to survive until now.
"P-please, both of you..."
Seeing the two start clashing again, one of the Iwagakure jōnin hurriedly stepped forward and tried to calm them down, his voice trembling.
"Now isn't the time for internal arguments."
The other Iwa jōnin commanders nearby all wore helpless expressions as well.
They were already used to this.
But that didn't make it any less frustrating.
Rōshi and Han—
both possessed strength on the level of a Kage.
At the same time, they were also the two greatest combat assets in this entire Iwagakure force.
And yet, because the two of them simply could not get along, they had been clashing with each other for most of this battle.
That alone had been enough to make the Iwa jōnin commanders curse inwardly more than once.
But there was nothing they could do.
Both men were stubborn to the core.
Ordinary Iwa jōnin had no chance of changing either of their minds.
After trying several times and getting nowhere, only the mild-mannered Dōsuren still kept stepping in to calm them down.
"Report!!"
A sensory shinobi suddenly rushed over from the side.
His urgent voice immediately cut through the tension between Han and Rōshi.
"Reporting, sirs!"
"Someone is approaching from the three o'clock direction—and they're moving incredibly fast!"
"The three o'clock direction?"
"Isn't that the direction of the Land of Rain and the Land of Grass?"
"Don't tell me one of those smaller countries is planning to interfere in a war between the great nations?"
The gathered Iwa commanders frowned in confusion and instinctively turned to look to the right.
"How many?"
Han's face was hidden beneath his mask, making it impossible to read his expression, but his brows had already drawn together slightly.
"At present... only one person has been detected."
The sensory shinobi answered truthfully.
Then he added with extra emphasis:
"But his speed is unbelievably fast!"
"One person?"
"You're sure you didn't make a mistake?"
"Could it just be some idiot passing through?"
Before Han could even respond, several Iwa shinobi nearby had already begun questioning it.
After all, nearly all of Iwagakure's fighting strength had been gathered here.
Who in their right mind would charge toward this battlefield alone?
"There's no mistake."
The sensory shinobi replied firmly.
"The target is heading straight for the battlefield."
Konoha and Iwa had already been fighting here for two full days.
Everyone living within a hundred li of the area had long since fled.
At a time like this, for someone to come racing toward the battlefield at abnormal speed—
their purpose was obvious.
"Hmph. It's just one person."
Rōshi snorted, his face full of disdain.
"If it really is an enemy, what exactly do you think one man can do here?"
Compared to Han, Rōshi was far more hot-blooded and short-tempered.
Whether that was just his personality or the negative influence of the Four-Tails' Lava Release chakra, no one could say for certain.
Hearing Rōshi's words, many of the Iwa jōnin commanders nodded as well.
So what if the approaching target was abnormally fast?
Even if the man was Kage-level—
none of them believed a single shinobi could stir up trouble in the middle of eight thousand troops.
"But his speed really is too fast. He's already—"
The sensory shinobi hadn't even finished speaking—
Rumble!!!
A dazzling golden flash tore through everyone's vision.
Immediately afterward, a violent explosion erupted in the midst of the force attacking Konoha's trench.
Golden light burst outward in an instant.
Blue arcs of electricity crackled wildly through the flames.
The sheer commotion drew the attention not only of the Iwa commanders in the rear—
even the shinobi assaulting Konoha's trench involuntarily turned to look.
"Gahhhhhh!"
"T-too fast... I can't track him at all—!"
A panicked voice came from within the explosion and flames, making the surrounding Iwa shinobi even more alarmed.
Then—
"Yasakani no Magatama."
The calm voice had barely fallen when countless particles of golden light burst from within the flames.
In the next instant, streaks of condensed light shot out like a storm.
Several Iwa shinobi were pierced on the spot before they could even react.
Boom! Boom! Boom!!!
The beams of light crashed into the ground one after another, triggering a chain of violent explosions.
The battlefield was instantly thrown into chaos.
"Ahhhhhhh!!"
Only then did the pain finally reach the nerves of the shinobi who had been pierced.
Several Iwa shinobi screamed and dropped to the ground.
"Enemy attack!!"
Sumaji roared, warning everyone around him.
This time, he was the frontline commander leading the assault on Konoha's trench.
"Earth Style: Tearing Earth Palm!"
The moment he shouted his warning, Sumaji slapped both palms onto the ground after forming seals.
The earth split apart at once.
Countless chunks of shattered rock shot upward like a storm of stone bullets, blasting straight toward the center of the flames.
Boom boom boom boom!!!
The sound of stone crashing into the ground rang out continuously from within the smoke and fire.
A few seconds later, the Earth Style barrage finally ended.
The violent winds stirred up by the attack also swept away the remaining golden flames.
And only then did the figure standing inside finally reveal itself.
He wore a samurai-style outfit.
A Konoha forehead protector rested across his brow.
And he stood there completely still.
"Nani—?"
"No way..."
"Not a scratch?"
"What the hell happened just now?"
The surrounding Iwa shinobi stared as though they had seen a ghost.
Even Sumaji's face darkened with disbelief, his brows tightening.
His Earth Style had blanketed the entire area without leaving a gap.
So how had such a large-scale attack failed to touch him at all?
At the very same moment Yagami's figure became visible, a shocked voice rang out from the Iwa command position in the rear.
And the one who spoke was a jōnin with hair like a bird's nest.
"Hm? You know him?"
At once, the others turned toward him.
"That man..."
The jōnin stared fixedly at Yagami, his expression grave.
"He's an extremely dangerous swordsman."
"And Dashi... died by his hand."
The moment he said it, the memory of that scene seemed to rise back up from the depths of his mind.
The three men had been cut apart by a single slash.
That bloody, horrifying image—
it was something he would never forget for the rest of his life.
"Oh?"
"A swordsman?"
"Are you serious?"
A young man with twin ponytails pulled a shinobi blade from his back, a grin tugging at his mouth.
His eyes gleamed with eager excitement.
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