vncnus Chapter 225 Whoever runs away is a coward
Chapter 225 Whoever runs away is a coward
Chapter 225 Whoever runs away is a coward
Inside the giant water sphere, Shukaku leaped and bounded joyfully, its massive size causing the entire body of water to surge and churn. It raised its hand holding Taiichi high, while its other hand slapped wildly across the water's surface, the beast frolicking freely in the water.
But gradually it also realized something was wrong: why wasn't the vast body of water dissipating even though the insect was dead?
Shukaku, somewhat incredulous, pulled its raised claws back to its eyes and carefully opened each claw one by one. But when all the claws were open, there was nothing on its claws. Undeterred, it repeatedly searched its claws to see if it had squeezed too hard and accidentally crushed someone into its hands.
Finally, after checking with his left and right paws, he was certain that he had not caught the little bug.
"Hey, where are you? You damn bug, where did you hide?"
Shukaku angrily waved its arms, causing the entire body of water to surge and crash.
Meanwhile, Taiichi was on a large tree at the edge of the water, which was the location of the Flying Thunder God Kunai that Minato had set up beforehand.
Just now, he took advantage of the turbulent waves to create a shadow clone in front of himself, while his main body used the Flying Thunder God Technique to get away from the scene.
Originally, it was just to be on the safe side, but I didn't expect that Shukaku, who is arrogant and conceited, also had the heart of fishing. If his real body had really gone there just now, facing such crushing damage, even if I had the Cremation Technique as a life-saving secret technique, I would probably not have been able to escape death.
Through his chakra perception, Taiichi clearly saw Shukaku there, raging in a helpless frenzy. Above his head, the kunai that he had used with the Flying Thunder God technique was stuck diagonally, not attracting its attention at all. After all, that small kunai was too insignificant to it.
Just as Shukaku finished venting his anger and began to gather the Tailed Beast Ball again, Taichi knew that this time the opportunity had truly arrived.
On his right hand, a Rasengan began to form, and under Taiichi's superb control, a large amount of chakra continuously poured in, but its size remained unchanged, only its brightness continued to increase.
With his chakra senses locked onto Shukaku's Tailed Beast Ball, Taichi's figure instantly appeared above its head a split second before it was fully formed. He pressed down with his right Rasengan and then teleported away again.
The moment Taichi left, the Rasengan that Taichi had tampered with began to explode. A normal Rasengan can blast a crater two or three meters deep into the ground, but this one was different.
For once, a look of fear appeared on Shukaku's yellowish-brown tanuki face. The upper half of its head first began to twist, and then, as if a bomb had exploded inside its brain, it instantly turned into a cloud of yellow sand that scattered in all directions.
That wasn't the worst of it. After the upper half of his brain disappeared, the tailed beast ball that was about to take shape in Shukaku's mouth became unstable due to the violent impact of the explosion. The spherical surface twisted violently, but it only froze for a second before an even bigger explosion occurred.
This time, it wasn't just half a head that was gone; even half of Shukaku's body disappeared in the explosion.
In Taiyi's perception, Shukaku's originally violent chakra fluctuations disappeared immediately after a pause, and in his soul vision, the ball of soul light that belonged only to Shukaku also quickly dissipated at this moment.
Unlike ordinary people whose souls are extinguished like candlelight, Shukaku's soul merges into the world. This may be the reason why the nine tailed beasts are immortal. After they die, their souls will reunite somewhere in the world and be resurrected and returned as time goes by.
As Shukaku's soul dissipated, the remaining half of its body quickly turned gray, making it clear that it had lost all life. Then, its massive body collapsed rapidly under the influence of gravity, turning back into yellow sand that filled the entire body of water.
The death of Shukaku was truly unexpected by everyone. No one expected that such a monstrous beast would die at the hands of Taiichi.
You have to understand that Shukaku isn't a mindless beast. Although it's a bit impulsive and easily angered, its intelligence is in no way inferior to that of humans. If you really can't beat it, running away is always an option.
But the truth is, it didn't even have a chance to run away; it was taken down in one fell swoop by Taiyi's combined attack and defense.
This scene wasn't only witnessed by Jiraiya and Rasa, who were nearby; that 50-meter height was clearly visible even to the Sand and Konoha ninjas fighting three or four kilometers away.
Although Shukaku had previously unleashed a number of Sky-Piercing Bullets at the Sand Village under Taiichi's guidance, and this was a major reason why they were now at a disadvantage, all the Sand Village ninja knew that the Tailed Beast was on their side. As long as they could free their hands, dealing with Konoha would be a piece of cake. So they persevered, relying on this last bit of faith to fight against the people of Konoha.
But at that moment, as that 50-meter-tall behemoth collapsed, the pillar of the Sand Village's unwavering spirit also crumbled.
"He's dead! The Jinchuriki is dead! Konoha's 'White Reaper' has arrived!"
It's unclear who shouted this, but many Sand Village ninjas who witnessed Taiichi's battle with Shukaku followed suit, adding to the fact that their own village had previously advertised that encountering Taiichi meant abandoning the mission without punishment!
Under multiple stimuli, a large number of junior and junior ninjas broke down emotionally, and this trend spread like dominoes, one after another, faster and faster. In just a few minutes, Sunagakure was in a state of collapse on the entire main battlefield.
Many Konoha ninjas were still wondering why Sunagakure had lost so suddenly, but a defeat is a defeat. The morale of Konoha ninjas immediately took a triple leap, rising once, then rising again, then rising a third time, until their morale was unstoppable and a large number of Konoha ninjas began to chase and cut down Sunagakure ninjas.
The situation changed too quickly; not only the ordinary ninjas, but even the high-ranking officials on both sides were caught off guard. But now there's no more time for them to think.
Chiyo and Ebizo of Sunagakure immediately organized their forces. With their prestige, they quickly gathered a group of ninja around them. Using this as a base, they fought and retreated, constantly gathering the scattered Sunagakure ninja. This preserved a lot of Sunagakure's strength, but most of them were like headless flies, fleeing in all directions.
On the Konoha side, led by Minato, Shikaku, and other skilled fighters, they swept across the area, striving to eliminate as many of Sunagakure's remaining forces as possible.
On Taiyi's side, when he confirmed Shukaku's death, he was somewhat disappointed. It wasn't that he was disappointed that Shukaku was eliminated so quickly, but rather that he was disappointed that he couldn't extract any of Shukaku's chakra, so that he wouldn't have any materials to use for researching Shukaku in the future.
Composing himself, Taiichi turned his gaze to Jiraiya and Rasa, who were engaged in a fierce battle not far from the water.
Half of the ground there was covered in gold dust, while the other half was a muddy swamp. Taiyi recognized it at a glance as the effect of Jiraiya's Earth Release: Swamp of the Underworld. It seems that Jiraiya intended to use Swamp of the Underworld to suppress Rasa and produce more gold dust, but judging from the current effect, it can only be described as half and half.
The gold deposits in Luosha have reached a considerable scale; it is unclear whether they were created temporarily or prepared in advance.
Watching the clash between the gold dust and fire-style ninjutsu, with shadow clones occasionally unleashing toad oil fireballs, Jiraiya was suppressing the Fourth Kazekage in the overall battle.
Taiyi saw this and knew there was no reason not to kick a man when he was down. He quickly maneuvered the water to get closer to the battlefield.
Without the need to restrain the tailed beast, he relinquished control of the waters. The massive volume of water instantly transformed into a flood, rushing towards Rasa. Wherever it passed, gold and silver sand were all submerged in the water.
Before they even got close, Taiyi's mocking voice rang out: "Lord Kazekage, weren't you so formidable last time, chasing us around? Don't try to run away this time!"
Meanwhile, Jiraiya kept firing his Fire Dragon Bullets, not even trying to harm Rasa, just to keep him occupied. At the same time, he didn't forget to cooperate with Taichi, saying, "Rasa, you're such a grown man, why are you bullying a child? If you have the guts, fight me to the death today! Whoever runs away is a coward!"
Rasa was furious. Those bastard Konoha ninjas not only ganged up on him, but also made sarcastic remarks. Especially Jiraiya, that brat Matsushita Taichi, is he even a child? What kid can kill Shukaku single-handedly?
Moreover, his current situation is also very bad. It was already difficult to deal with Jiraiya alone, and now there is Matsushita Taichi. In addition, the entire battlefield is now flooded, making it even more difficult for him to control his gold dust.
Heaven knows where Matsushita Taichi got so much chakra. How could he not be killed by the backlash of such a secret technique?
Cursing in his heart, Rasa still had to carefully deal with Jiraiya's attacks. He knew that the battle on the front lines was beyond saving at this point. The death of the tailed beasts had dealt a huge blow to morale. Not to mention the ordinary ninjas, even he himself almost lost his composure.
Seeing that Matsushita Taichi was about to arrive, if he delayed any longer and the two of them got entangled with him, he might not be able to escape either. So Rasa didn't delay any longer and instantly condensed most of the remaining gold dust into a large-scale gold dust rain, which he then attacked towards the charging Jiraiya.
While Jiraiya was using his needle-shaped Jizo statue to defend against the gold dust attack, Rasa had already gathered the remaining gold dust into a pile, leaped up, and once again transformed into an aerial acrobat, soaring into the sky.
"You little brat, are you trying to run away already?" Jiraiya cursed from below. He couldn't actually hit the man, but he could still get a verbal advantage.
Taiyi, who had rushed close, watched Rasa take off into the air once again, and he was furious. How many times had this happened? Just because she can fly doesn't mean she's so great.
He quickly formed hand seals and slammed his hands into the water as if venting his frustration.
Water Escape: Water-Severing Waves.
Water cannons fired one after another from the surrounding water, attacking Luo Sha, which had just taken off. The "whoosh whoosh whoosh" sound of water piercing through the air could be heard incessantly, forcing Luo Sha in the sky to sway and dodge constantly.
A recent water gun shot pierced right through his gold dust, cutting off a small portion of the ground he was standing on. Unfortunately, the angle was wrong, allowing him to escape a section; otherwise, at least one foot would have been left intact.
Seeing that Luo Sha was flying higher and higher, Taiyi had no choice but to stop continuing his spell and stand up straight again.
However, he was greeted by Jiraiya's large hand and hearty laughter: "Good lad, I never expected your strength to have reached this level. Even I was surprised."
Taiichi chuckled awkwardly, feeling the warm, large hand rubbing his head. He unconsciously backed away.
Jiraiya took the opportunity to withdraw his hand. He only wanted to experience the feel of the hand; anything more would be inappropriate, since this kid was now a top-tier fighter.
"It's not as exaggerated as you think, teacher. I'm only maintaining this level of power because of my chakra reserves and the prior preparation of the Yin Seal. It's not my own strength. Moreover, this time, the chakra stored in the Yin Seal has been completely depleted. I won't have this kind of strength again later."
In fact, only half of the chakra in the Yin Seal was used up; this was just to reassure some people, though not much. After this battle, even without a sufficient amount of chakra, Taiichi's strength was enough to place him among the top ninjas.
After speaking, Taiyi immediately formed hand seals. After a series of complex hand seals, the incantation patterns all over his body began to converge towards his forehead, finally shrinking back into the diamond-shaped mark. If his headband were removed, one could see that the mark still shone brightly, without dimming or disappearing.
Jiraiya kept his eyes on Taichi's every move, his gaze following the curse mark to Taichi's forehead. He smiled, neither believing nor disbelieving Taichi's nonsense. A ninja should always keep some trump cards up their sleeve; he wouldn't pry into his apprentice's secrets.
"Alright, things are settled here. My shadow clone just sent word that we also won a great victory on the main battlefield. You're fast, so get to the rear immediately and bring back the logistics and medical ninjas to prepare to treat the wounded."
Jiraiya immediately switched to commander mode and began issuing orders to Taichi.
"yes!"
Taiichi was pleased to hear of the great victory on the main battlefield, but his face immediately darkened when he thought of Yangping, Kakashi and the others whom he had abandoned.
Looking back on my actions, I feel ashamed. I wonder how Yangping and the others feel, but I'm sure it won't be good for them.
"What's wrong, Taiichi? Did you overexert yourself? Why does your complexion look so bad all of a sudden?" Jiraiya carefully examined Taiichi and asked with concern. The change was so drastic that he couldn't help but have some doubts.
"No—it's nothing, it's just—I was thinking about some unhappy things!" Taiichi tried to explain, but the more he spoke, the less confident he became, so he simply said, "I'm leaving now!" and flew away with Thunder God Technique.
Jiraiya was left standing there bewildered, but he didn't care. He shook his head, jumped onto a big tree, and checked the movements in the distance. After confirming the location, he set off to get there.
Although the great battle has ended, small-scale battles have not decreased at all. He can still help out in the past, boost the morale of his side, and reduce casualties.
Taiyi didn't go very far with his Flying Thunder God technique. After calming down briefly, he used it again and finally returned to a temporary camp near the border of Konoha.
Taiichi appeared beside Chief Fujita. This was a Flying Thunder God kunai given to the chief before the battle, for the purpose of rapid communication now.
"Taiichi, how's the situation?" Director Fujita asked the question that everyone present wanted to ask as soon as he noticed Taiichi's arrival.
Taiyi looked at everyone present, all of whom were high-ranking officials in logistics and medical fields. They were all staring at him, eagerly awaiting his answer.
"Victory! A resounding victory!"