Pre-Chapter A/N:Welcome to September, guys! Let's smash whatever goals we've set ourselves this year. More chapters on my patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)— same username as here and link in bio. Experimenting with two chapters a week, we'll see how long I can keep this up for.
The explosion of the Fire Release: Rasengan bloomed in the distance, expanding in a field of red that had the hair on my arms standing on end.
"Do you think that was enough?" Uzume asked. I scoffed. There was no chance it was.
"No chance," I answered.
"I did put a lot into that," she said, defending herself. I nodded, but I knew the truth. If he fought a tailed beast and came out unscathed, then there was going to be very little we could do to deal with him. Still, I spun my chakra around my arms, forming the jutsu in a matter of seconds. It wasn't as powerful as it could have been, and I had Onoki to thank for giving me the clues I needed to get to this point at least, but still.
I called them the Spears of Heaven. They were chock-full of Earth Release chakra, bound and given shape with the neutral shape release of the rasengan, but bent to form the shape of a straight spear rather than the balls of chakra one would have expected when they thought about the rasengan.
I sharpened my gaze, catching a storm of power heading towards us. I bent my knees, sprung forward one step, and with all my strength, hurled one of the spears at him. From this distance, he looked none the worse for wear and did not even bother dodging the spear. Mistake. It drove him backwards on his feet. I squeezed my right hand, the hand I had used to toss it, and the jutsu did its work. It expanded before contracting, leaving behind its intended payload. All the stones around the Raikage rose from the ground, rising and smashing into him.
They piled on and on as I executed my own version of the Chibaku Tensei, except it was with the Raikage at the center. Onoki had been the one to put the idea in my mind that gravity was within the purview of Earth Release, and if that was the case, then it meant jutsu like that one could be created. And maybe even with time, I could use the lightweight boulder jutsu as well. I wasn't going to hold my breath for it, but I was relatively confident that it was only a matter of time.
The stones piled up more and more. Within, I could see the Raikage trying to force his way out. But no dice as far as I was concerned. I tightened my fist. The earth piled on more and more until the effect of that jutsu ended. Then I tossed the second spear straight at the mass of rock and the Kage buried within it. It expanded to establish its range, and then more and more rocks piled on. The Raikage was pushing through, slowly and steadily, but the sphere was moving as he did.
"Have anything that can blow that sky-high?" I asked Uzume.
"Fire Release: Rasengan is the most damaging one I've got. You know I'm not one for indiscriminate damage. Scalpel, not hammer..."
"What a shame. None of my damage discriminates," I told her with a smile before I allowed Kurama's chakra to seep into my coils. 'You owe me one, you grump. Give it,' I said in my mind.
'Knock yourself out,' he grunted.
Four tails formed behind me as I felt my body fill with power that was not mine. This was the minimum I had to reach in tailed beast chakra to use the absolute unit that was the tailed beast bomb.
With preternatural chakra control, it was almost child's play getting the balance of positive to negative energy perfect. 2:8, and the orb formed in front of my mouth. More and more stones were still forcing their way into the sphere as the Raikage got closer and closer to ripping himself out of it. The entire back half of the sphere was following him, adding to his mass, even as the front half pressed against his body and should have made it impossible to move. It was the perfect prison, but he hadn't gotten the memo.
I bent downwards, on all fours, and perfectly focused. At this distance, it was best if I fired a second or so before he would break out, and that was now! I shot the tailed beast bomb, leaving the tailed beast mode almost instantly. I watched, gaze cold as he ripped his way through the sphere and came face to face with the tailed beast bomb. I wish I could have said that I thought it was enough. But I got to see his chakra output nearly double before the bomb hit. I stepped in front of Uzume as the explosion triggered, sending a shockwave that spread through at least half the village. And then there was the damage. Debris flew in every direction. More than a few rocks clattered against my skin to no effect.
Winds battered my body, sending my hair flying in all directions. At some point, I'd lost my hair tie. I couldn't even remember when that had been, if I was being completely honest. Probably at some point when I was wrestling with the Raikage. My byakugan was nearly useless in this case, blocked by all the dust the tailed beast bomb had caused.
"Fūton," I heard Uzume whisper, and then the dust was gone.
"Thank you." At least I could be polite these days. The buildings around had been leveled to the ground, leaving a massive field. Every skyscraper in the city—of which there were, impressively enough, more than a few—had been toppled. The collateral damage from the jutsu was clearly more than what the explosion itself had caused. In a crater, resting on one knee, lay our quarry.
Around him was the armour of black lightning Uzume had spoken about. So this was his ultimate mode. Good. I was beginning to tire of all the back and forth. Now I just needed him to whip out that hell stab. He moved. Was movement even a good word for it? One second he was somewhere, and the next he was somewhere else. I felt Uzume's kick against my ribs toss me to the side while he barreled into her. Of course, with stasis, she would be fine no matter how strong he had gotten. I watched him wrestle her through three buildings in a row, sending kunai into the air and aiming for everything I could. The more advantages I had on the battlefield, the better.
Uzume managed to dig her feet in for a second, not fully stopping the Raikage, but slowing him down enough that I could clearly see where he started and where she ended. I teleported next to them, rasengan grinding against the man's midsection. He didn't even feel it, hand lashing out in a backhand I barely managed to teleport away from. Interesting. He picked Uzume up, ripping her off the ground despite her attempt to stick to it with chakra adhesion. He made to slam her into the ground, and I was in their midst again.
My left foot snapped at the back of his knee in a kick that would have folded any other man. It got his attention somewhat as I spun into another kick. Except this one he managed to catch as he dropped Uzume unceremoniously to the ground. Of course, that was a mistake. With no hesitation, she unsealed her gunbai and aimed it straight for his neck.
Even with the Wind Release rushing through it, it did nothing but grind against his armour. And then the Raikage smirked. I twisted my foot, kicking at his hand as I moved, managing to give myself enough leverage to transition to a handstand while ripping my foot from his grip. And then I was off. It was a good thing I was. The area around him exploded in black lightning. It coursed through Uzume's body, doing nothing to her. That would have fucked me up if I managed to get hit by it. Stasis was such a cheat ability sometimes.
She moved again, gunbai lashing out with perfect form. But even perfect form could do only so much against an opponent you could scarcely hurt. In a flicker of space, I was in their midst again, using the hiraishin marker I'd placed on Uzume to great effect. My foot slammed straight against the Raikage's forehead. He was pushed backwards. I backflipped with the force, landing on the ground on all fours.
The ground to his left and right turned to mud that I forced to surround him. Uzume blew a storm of hurricane-force winds that slashed at his armour. Neither worked much, just forcing him back a smidge. And then he was back again. Was this what fighting Thanos on Titan had felt like for the Avengers? No. This was worse. At least then they could make him bleed. This motherfucker had taken a tailed beast bomb to the face and said, "Bet."
He stretched his hand out. I saw it with my byakugan clearly this time. The path that was created for his jutsu—positive and negative charges blooming for a second before the world became black lightning. It happened so quickly, I was still barely able to teleport myself out of the way of the storm of lightning. Uzume took the hit head-on, taking the fight to him. I checked my internal clock. It had been a minute and thirteen or so odd seconds since Uzume stepped in. Stasis was a broken ability, but it was chakra-intensive as fuck. If she had ever used it with just a regular mangekyou, it might have put her in a coma for using it this long.
With the EMS being a more stable doujutsu, there were undoubtedly efficiency gains, and her chakra had swelled even since the fusion with Izuku. Still, the last time we had checked, five minutes was her hard limit. She would have to stop at four if she still wanted to be able to fight afterwards. That meant I could only rely on her as a complete shield and tank for less than three more minutes. I teleported next to her again. She aimed a kick at his neck, and I lashed out with my fingers aimed at his chest.
"Plan B," I called out, uncaring that he heard me just as surely as she did, or that Uzume did not reply at all. I had the fullest trust in her ability to execute. I just needed to make her an opening.
Just like before, my gentle fist broke against his lightning armour. No matter how long I made the lances, it seemed the armour just could not be penetrated reliably. Uzume ventured another kick that the Raikage blocked with his left arm. I moved to the side and stomped down on the back of his knee with all my strength. He only moved a smidge. But that was movement. She twisted, tossing five shuriken filled with wind release at his form at the same time I was moving a wind release rasengan straight at his back. It was up to him to decide which one was the bigger threat, and like anyone with common sense would have, he turned his back on Uzume and caught my wrist. A mistake.
I channeled enough of Kurama's chakra that I knew my eyes would have turned a bloody red. I smiled at him, a sharp, bloody thing, while I strained against him. He wouldn't budge. But he didn't need to. He just needed to stay fucking still, and I was achieving that. Through him, I could see Uzume unseal my bow from her armour. Next came an arrow. This was another of my failsafes for dealing with the Raikage. She took a breath and let loose, looking like a perfect mirror of me as she did so. The arrow whistled through the air. I was practically holding my breath as we wrestled for dominance. It was taking all my strength and then some just to maintain this equilibrium. But if it worked, then it meant we had something we could use.
The arrow hit, and I felt my breath escape my lips in a sigh as, just like everything else, it broke against his armour, not managing to make it through. Irritated, I expanded and exploded the rasengan right between us, teleporting behind him. His arm was there to block my raised kick, but that left his midsection open for Uzume to slam a rasengan into. It ground against his shield to no effect. I inhaled, exhaling a storm of flames that covered him but did little to stop him from coming at me. With Kurama's chakra burning through me, I could meet him strength for strength. He was faster, but with my byakugan and the advantage of Natural Energy sensing, I could tell what he was going to do even if I couldn't necessarily keep up with his movements visually.
I leaned out of the way of a knife-hand that threatened to pluck out one of my eyes before I stabbed a punch into his nose. The armour took it, and he buried a punch of his own into my gut. More chakra from Kurama manifested in three tails that shot from my tailbone, wrapping around his fist and holding him still. Another Fire Release: Rasengan to the face expanded around the two of us. I used hiraishin to escape from the explosion while he just tanked it, armour none the worse for wear. Two minutes and sixteen seconds now.
That rasengan must have taken a lot out of Uzume, I observed, watching the way she breathed, each breath seeming to struggle out of her lungs. I amended my initial estimate. Even after only four minutes, she'd probably still struggle to keep up with the fight. I had chakra aplenty but no way to pierce his shield. Where the fuck was the hell stab? Was he just waiting to see what we had up our sleeves before bursting out his premiere move?
The smoke cleared, and he was just standing there.
"This was a good fight, Shorirama Senju. You were a worthy opponent."
"I don't think you can call this fight over yet," I scoffed. He didn't even seem like he had heard me, stretching out his right hand before turning it on its side, aiming the knife-hand straight at me. Finally. The Hell Stab.
"I call this the Hell Stab. The more fingers I use, the less powerful the stab. No one has ever survived three fingers," he said.
"Is that like a weird sex thing?" I asked Uzume with a stage whisper.
"It sounds like a weird sex thing. Is he going to use a weird sex thing on us? Please don't penetrate me with your big scary fingers, Raikage-san," I said with as much fake horror as I could without laughing out loud.
If I succeeded in getting under his skin with that one, it was difficult to tell from his face. But then I did notice the number of outstretched fingers drop from four to three, and then I was leaning backwards, barely avoiding losing my head with that one. Uzume was on the counter almost instantly. Several fireballs peppered his form, and he turned instead, aiming for her next. She stood her ground. He hadn't figured out stasis yet, clearly. There was nothing to be gained from fighting Uzume head-on when she had it active. You could blow up the entire planet around her and she would not feel a thing. He shot after her and she prepared herself to counter, only for him to switch tacks.
Instead of trying to run her through, his hand opened fully as he spun around her, grabbing her waist as he did so. In a flicker of space and time, she was buried into the ground headfirst. That had been a textbook suplex, I thought. Guess he had managed to figure something out. But the fact that he had remained frozen in the suplex position gave me a perfect opening. I marched forward and I stomped him in the nuts. At least I tried to. The armour was in the way.
Said armour brightened once more. The shadow that stretched from his position off into one of the buildings retreated, and while I silently thanked her for the interference, I made sure to note to warn her about interfering in fights she had no business partaking in. The Raikage would tear her apart in a matter of seconds if he managed to get in close enough range. He lifted his body from the ground, and I met him face to face.
He lashed out, Hell Stab coming straight for me. I had been waiting for it, though. For the opportunity. I twisted, using every ounce of speed and foresight I had to avoid the attack, and just as the attack missed, I grabbed his wrist and maintained his momentum, turning his hand around and trying to stab it into his chest.
He managed to change the angle at the last moment, turning a strike at his heart to one that buried itself in his chest but missed everything vital. With sage mode, I was still a few inches shorter than he was, so he was looking down at me as his blood hit the floor for the first time in this battle. For the first time all through the war, I was sure.
"So that was your plan," he said, his voice grinding out.
"More or less," I said. I was smug. Why wouldn't I be smug? That wasn't a heart blow. Not an immediately fatal one, as I could tell I'd missed everything vital, but that was still blood. And if he was bleeding, then that meant I just had to let him keep bleeding until it was over.
"All that for a drop of blood?" he scoffed, stepping back. He ripped his hand from his chest, and I felt my hopes dash as said hand began to glow green.
A/N: Yeah, had to steal that line. Next five up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)(same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.