Genryu moved first.
The kodachi came down in a short line, wind and lightning wrapped so tight around the edge that the air near it looked wrong. Roen stepped in to meet it and got there late anyway. His kunai rose with the lightning still packed along the edge, caught the cut, and the force shoved his arm wide before he could hold the line. Dirt tore under his heel as he gave ground. Itachi entered from the side at the same time, one step off-center, hand and kunai cutting toward Genryu's ribs.
Genryu's free hand met him first.
He caught Itachi's wrist and turned it off line, pulling his shoulder just enough to break the angle. The opening closed before anything could follow.
Genryu didn't chase. He stepped once, blade low, and that single step forced both of them to give ground wider than they wanted.
Roen went again.
He drove straight into the center, lightning-coated kunai tight to his forearm, shoulder behind it, trying to close the distance before Genryu could swing.
He didn't make it.
The kodachi was already there.
Not wide. Not fast.
Just in the way.
Roen shifted left, cut high missed then dropped low. Steel met steel for a split second before the angle slipped and the strike slid off.
Itachi moved on the second beat, Sharingan open, stepping into the lane Roen had forced.
Genryu turned once.
That was enough.
A shift of the hips, a single step
Both of them were sent flying.
It kept happening.
Roen closed Genryu was already there.
Itachi moved to the blind side Genryu's shoulder cut it off.
Roen changed angles nothing held.
Roen's hand snapped into a seal.
"Wind Release"
He cut forward.
A blade of air tore low across the ground.
Genryu stepped over it before it touched.
Itachi's kunai came through the space the wind should have opened.
Genryu's blade met it once.
The kunai spun off into a tree.
Roen stepped in again
Too slow.
He saw it now.
Every time.
Genryu's foot set first.
Then the shoulder.
Then the blade.
Roen kept reading the blade.
And he kept paying for it.
Genryu moved.
The cut came clean
Roen twisted out late, the edge singing past his sleeve.
He landed off.
Too close. Breath rough.
Itachi moved to cover him, Sharingan fixed, already stepping in
Genryu took that too.
His hand caught Itachi's forearm.
The kodachi snapped back short.
Itachi had to pull out.
Roen reached for the next line
Nothing.
Just the pressure of the blade forcing him back another step.
Roen's breath caught once.
Still too slow.
Genryu's foot moved.
Observation Haki.
Roen's chest rose once, then settled. The noise around the clearing pulled back. Thinner. The leaves above stopped blurring together. The dirt under his foot pressed firm, the edge of a root just behind his heel. Itachi's next entry sat left, a step off Genryu's shoulder. Genryu's front foot moved first. Then the shoulder turned. Then the blade followed.
Roen moved before the blade finished coming down.
His foot left the dirt clean, body already outside the line, kunai snapping up not to catch the full force this time but to touch the side of it and turn it past him. The cut missed his body by a hand's width. Roen stepped straight through the space behind it, shoulder driving in, and Genryu had to bring the free hand across properly instead of just letting the pressure do the work.
What just happened
Itachi saw it.
His sharingan tracked Roen's timing, and the next beat came cleaner than before. Roen forced the center. Itachi entered from the off-line at the exact moment Genryu's guard shifted to meet the first pressure. Roen's kunai flashed low, lightning packed dense along the edge. Itachi's kunai came high. Genryu stopped both, but not with one motion now. Two.
Roen stayed on him.
Wind Release: Vacuum Blade came from low on the right, not thrown to win, thrown to cut the ground Genryu wanted next. Genryu lifted over it. Itachi was already there with a fireball building in his chest. He spat it the instant Genryu left the ground. Roen stepped under the rising heat and drove a narrow Fire Release: Stream through the lane the fireball boxed closed.
Genryu had to answer.
He planted hard for the first time and took the fire line with movement that was no longer casual. His kodachi cut through the stream just enough to break its center. The great fireball passed close enough to light the bark of the tree behind him. Roen's kunai struck again, this time at the wrist. Itachi's next throw followed under it. The bells at Genryu's waist moved once from the force of his turn.
Roen saw Itachi's next step before it happened and moved with it. Itachi saw Roen's shoulder line and trusted it. Their pressure overlapped cleanly for three straight moves. Roen cut high with the lightning kunai. Itachi filled the low line. Roen's knee came through the center as Genryu's blade rose to answer the first two. The spacing held. The attack didn't collapse.
For a breath, they had him working.
Then Genryu shortened everything.
No bigger movement. Less. The next cut came from closer in, tighter through the shoulder, with almost no travel on it. Roen saw the foot and the shoulder and still answered a fraction wrong because the blade arrived sooner than he could follow. His kunai met it late. The shock ran up his arm. Itachi's next entry came on the angle that had been right a moment earlier and found empty air because Genryu's step was shorter now.
Roen tried to keep forcing it. Observation Haki stayed open. The foot. The shoulder. The wrist. It was all still there.
It just wasn't enough anymore.
Genryu's lines got smaller. Harder. Roen read the start and the end came faster than the read. Itachi's sharingan tracked, but the answer demanded from his body came too clean and too late for the change in rhythm. Roen cut in left. Genryu's blade turned half a fraction and stole the line. Itachi filled right. Genryu's shoulder checked him before the strike became real.
Roen threw himself back into it with brute insistence.
He forced the lightning kunai in close, hand and shoulder working together, and tried to let the Observation Haki carry the next beat. It showed him Genryu's foot. It showed him the blade hand tightening. It showed him the free shoulder dipping.
He misread one thing.
The free hand came first.
Genryu struck Roen's wrist with the back of his knuckles, just enough to shock the fingers open, and the kunai spun out of his grip into the dirt. Roen's stance broke with it. Itachi stepped in to save the line and Genryu cut across both of them at once, not hitting clean, just forcing the spacing apart so hard that the whole pressure collapsed in a single movement.
Roen's bare hand came up on instinct. Itachi had already given two steps back. Genryu stopped there.
The kodachi stayed low in his hand. Ion Blade still wrapped tight along the edge. Wind compressed. Lightning held. The bells at his waist hung untouched.
No one moved.
Roen bent once and picked the kunai up from the dirt. Lightning didn't return to it this time. Itachi eased out of his stance a moment later, sharingan still active, eyes narrowed but steady. Genryu stood where he was, breath even, blade unchanged, posture settled as if the fight had only reached the point he'd allowed.
The bells moved once
and settled.