The trail opened into a wide clearing. The ground flattened, dirt worn from use instead of passage.
Figures were already there.
Some sat near a fire pit burned down to ash. Others stood a few steps apart, weapons close but not drawn.
Roen's step slowed as he came out of the trees, eyes moving over the clearing.
No one was scrambling. Nothing looked out of place.
Itachi's gaze didn't drop to the ground. It moved across the clearing who stood where, how far apart.
One man shifted slightly to the left. Another didn't move at all.
They had already seen them.
One of the seated figures lifted his head first. No surprise. Just acknowledgment. The others followed without a word, hands moving closer to weapons, posture tightening as they stood or adjusted their stance.
Three sat further back in the clearing. Four were closer.
The four moved first hands shifting, stances tightening.
The three didn't follow.
One of them stayed completely still even after the others had already adjusted.
Genryu's gaze passed over them once and didn't linger, but it settled just long enough on the three at the back to decide it, and that was all it took. His hand moved and steel followed it clean, the kodachi already in place and the dadao coming free a breath later, the weight of it pulling his stance down without a step, shoulders lowering, center tightening, the line of him shifting forward in a way Roen hadn't seen before. There was no warning in it, no build, just a change that sat wrong the moment it happened.
Lightning didn't spread from the blade it locked to it, drawn tight along the edge like it had been forced there, and the wind came down over it the next instant, pressing it further, compressing it until the blade itself started to look different, the steel taking on something deeper as red began to run through it, not a glow, not a reflection, something inside it that shouldn't exist. The air around the edge didn't sit right. Roen felt it before he could put a shape to it. This wasn't what Genryu had shown them before.
Across the clearing, the three moved at once.
Hands slammed into the ground. Chakra surged.
Earth Release: Earth-Style Wall
The first wall tore out of the earth in front of them, thick and angled, a second rising behind it before the first had fully settled, a third locking over both to layer it into something meant to stop a real strike.
Genryu was already moving. His foot hit and the ground cracked under it, dirt splitting as he crossed the distance in a single step that didn't give the eye time to follow, the blade cut once, straight across. For a fraction, the walls held. Then all three split along the same line, the top halves sliding off together. The upper halves shifted first, sliding off the lower as the structure failed, chunks of earth breaking apart as they hit the ground.
The three on the other side had already moved, not to counter but to get out of the line, feet shifting hard as they broke away from each other, guards snapping up as they cleared the path of the cut.
Genryu didn't slow.
"Take care of the chūnins."
Roen was already moving, stepping through the space where the wall had fallen and closing on the nearest of the four before they could settle. The man met him with his blade up, trying to hold long enough for the others to come back into position, but Roen cut straight through it, kunai catching near the wrist and turning the strike off line as he stepped in hard, shoulder driving the distance closed.
Itachi moved at the same time. He cut across and met the second chūnin before he could make a move, steel catching early and stopping him there. The other two tried to close, but Roen was already on them, breaking off the first attacker and stepping straight into the next, keeping it tight so they didn't get a chance to make formation. Behind them, Genryu was already putting pressure, the ground splitting where he moved. Roen felt it without turning. The chūnin in front of him set his foot wrong. Roen stepped in and drove the kunai straight into his throat, cutting it clean as the man dropped under him. He didn't slow.