The boy popped, leaving only a cloud of smoke and an enraged Dogan behind.
Before the elite jonin could even formulate a response, a massive explosion blew apart the barrier, the Kumo shinobi and even incinerated most of Shinka's insects, violently blowing her and Mei back though at their range, they suffered no real injury.
From the scorched earth, an unharmed Shiki emerged, he had gone deep underground with the Hidding in Surface jutsu to protect himself.
The massive blast? A product of a few well placed Scroll Bombs of his.
'Two jonin, one elite and ten chunin all elite. Not bad for my first real battle.' Shiki thought to himself.
"Screw you white haired brat!"
Quickly side stepping, he evaded and enraged Mei who did not appreciate his "explosive tactics" very much.
But despite the initial attack, she had a big smile and blush on her face.
They had not only survived.
They had won!
But before they could even figure out their next move, a big shadow was upon them.
Bleeding profusely and severely burned, Dogan had managed to survive the massive explosion by using Earth Spear, to harden his entire body, making him look like a black stone goliath.
Swiftly reacting, Shiki was already moving to dodge but he stopped.
'If I dodge he'll take the girls.' The boy thought.
Shinka was part of the plan to screw with him but Mei was not.
'He's already half dead, slower, weaker and running out of chakra. I can take him.' Shiki judged.
In his deepened Kukyo state, his thoughts sped up to the point he could have an entire internal monologue in less than an instant.
With a flare of chakra, he swiftly formed a Rasengan but with so little time, it was underpowered.
Still, the boy grit his teeth, weaved Dogan's hardened right fist with his extreme reflexes and put the Rasengan in his gut.
The harsh sound of grinding emitted from the point of impact as Shiki's hastily formed Rasengan struggled to do real damage.
Shrugging off the pain, Dogan launched his left fist at the back of the boy's head, right from above and without delay.
In their current position, Shiki was too close to dodge and too committed in his strike to put up a sable block.
But right now, Shiki was already fully immersed in his emerging innate nature, this feeling in his core grew more and more with each life he took.
He was not gaining any impressive new powers, not yet at least, but his understanding of his jutsu and their combat applications increased as his instincts revealed the most efficient way to fight and kill relying on his current abilities.
This time was no different.
By suddenly cutting off the containment of his Rasengan, it spiralled out of control and created an omnidirectional blast of force.
Too weak to even scratch Dogan but strong enough to instantly send him and his two teammates flying back and out of the jonin's close combat range.
Mid air, Shiki activated his Assault Storage Seal, summoning four kunai to each hand, buffing them with his Chakra Cutter and loosed them at Dogan with Shuriken Shadow Clone, Assault Storage eliminating the need for hand seals.
From Dogan's perspective, he only felt the weak blast and saw the kids being sent flying before a wall made up of thousands of chakra enhanced kunai filled up his vision.
'Blocking chakra enhanced weapons with my hardened body while I'm already weakened is a bad idea.'
'Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall'
A stone wall rose from the ground protecting the jonin.
Like a hailstorm of steel, the chakra enhanced kunai wore down the earthen wall until it had less than half its original thickness but were ultimately stopped.
'Glad I did not charge through while relying on Earth Spear to harden my body . . .'
Dogan thought with a chill.
But his movements did not stop.
As soon as the kunai barrage stopped, the jonin weaved a few hand seals.
'Earth Release: Stone Scattershot'
Punching the stone wall he raised with both fists, a storm of deadly stone projectiles was unleashed.
Enhancing all those kunai had taken quite a bit out of Shiki's chakra, his initial Hiding in Mist also did not rely on the tags so it cost a ton of chakra to make it as large as it was with his poor chakra affinity and lack of much water release training.
And this sudden flare of fatigue delayed him enough for Dogan's wide area attack to hit.
'I won't be able to fully block this or dodge in time.' Shiki quickly judged.
He kicked Shinka, propelling himself towards Mei and pushing her with his back while pulling out six paper tags.
The boy threw out three and smacked the other three into the ground.
And with that, three full power Wind Release: Breakthroughs burst out to try and deflect the stones and three Earth Release: Practice Bricks, the weakest type of earth barrier rose to try defending him.
But even with three instances of each, against a jutsu cast by a jonin using their most proficient elemental release, such low level jutsu would never be enough.
With barely any delay, the stones cut through the wind and blast through the weak earthen barriers.
Shiki could only raise his arms and harden his body with chakra as a violent impact hit him.
Without delay, he was sent flying, tumbling through the ground with badly torn harms, three holes in his abdomen and several open wounds on his torso, rolling to a stop only when he hit a tree and shattered its bark with his flying body.
Leaving Dogan shellshocked, the boy got up almost immediately after, despite coughing up blood as he did.
Shinka and Mei were frozen on the ground, still processing what happened.
"What are you two idiots doing!? Run!" Shiki shouted.
Snapping out of it, Mei and Shinka cast worried gazes at him but this was a fight way out of their league.
They would only be liabilities and so, each body flickered away, rushing towards the town to try and get help since Konoha shinobi did sometimes visit it off duty.
Dogan who would normally stop them did not even react.
'How!?' He questioned with shock.
With the level of defense the boy had put up, Dogan was sure he'd get torn to pieces, there would barely be enough left to identify.
'So how is he getting up!?'
Despite Shiki being at his worst, the elite jonin's battle instinct told him things were getting more and more dangerous.
'I don't know what is happening with that kid but I must finish this fight fast.'
The Kumo shinobi seemed to be more aware of the boy's state than Shiki himself was.
Activating a paper tag with Medical Jutsu: First Aid to help with his injuries, as slight as that help might be not even noticing how his wounds were barely bleeding already despite being in areas that would have warranted it.
Shiki was not healing, but the boy's body was most certainly shifting to minimize the impact of his wound on his combat effectiveness.
'Speaking of medical help. Where the hell is Tsunade-sama!?' He wondered with anger.
But for some reason, escaping or dragging the battle out was a thought that did not even occur to him.
The boy's very blood beckoned him to end his enemy's life or offer up his own.
Still . . . Where had the Senju princess gone?
+++++
Hey, Author here!
Just a reminder that you can read up to a FULL MONTH ahead of this site on pa-treon.
I'm trying to become a full time Author now and I'm not going to be starting any new novels just so I can make sure this one is properly completed.
Find those sweet advanced chapters on pa-treon.com/lusoba without the -