"Many Hidden Shadow Snake Hands!"
A tide of countless thin snakes rushed madly towards Jiraiya, and with a swift movement, they threatened to cover him completely.
The dense hissing sounds were enough to make one's heart tremble just by listening to them.
Jiraiya suddenly raised his eyes, and the expression in his eyes at this moment was almost pained.
His expression was not because he was afraid of Orochimaru's deadly technique.
A shinobi of his caliber had already become extremely resilient in character. No matter what kind of crisis he faced, if he became frightened before the battle, he had already lost half the fight.
"Why!?"
Until this moment, Jiraiya's heart was still reeling. He didn't understand why the companion who grew up with him and Tsunade, and the partner who fought side by side with him countless times, would now try to kill him.
Just now, due to the False Darkness technique, Jiraiya's palms were temporarily numb.
His hands were shaking as he formed seals at the fastest speed possible in his current state.
"Ninja Art: Needle Jizō!"
Just before the tide of snakes covered Jiraiya, his long white hair suddenly grew and wrapped around his entire body like a protective cocoon.
"Boom!"
The terrifying snake tide covered him and immediately caused violent vibrations throughout the dense forests of the Land of Fire.
Swish!
A dark shadow suddenly passed through the woods.
Suddenly, there were slight vibrations and sounds coming from far away.
This slight fluctuation was so faint that it would be impossible to detect with the senses of ordinary people.
But the black shadow immediately stopped moving forward, and in its scarlet eyes, three black tomoe slowly rotated and transformed into a flame pattern, capturing every detail.
"Is it there?"
This person was naturally Uchiha Yoruki, who was ordered by Minato to leave the village and retrieve Orochimaru.
After sensing the aftermath of a battle coming from far away, he immediately changed direction and rushed toward it.
"Whoosh!"
But before he could travel far, a vortex-like distortion emerged from the space in front of him.
Uchiha Yoruki became alert instantly and stopped again.
In front of him, the masked man still wearing the wide hooded black robe appeared.
"It's you again!"
When Uchiha Yoruki saw the person blocking his way, his face immediately darkened and murderous intent suddenly flared in his eyes.
The masked man seemed to ignore Uchiha Yoruki's hostile intent.
Uchiha Yoruki drew out the weapon from behind him and held the sword in one hand.
After the last fight, he already knew that the masked man in front of him possessed superior eye power.
Therefore, when facing such an opponent, one must never waste chakra on unnecessary dōjutsu techniques.
However, through the battle that day, he also had gained a good understanding of the abilities of the man in front of him.
Uchiha Yoruki could not find any information about these abilities in the clan's records.
Swish!
The next moment, Uchiha Yoruki suddenly disappeared from the spot.
There was also a slight flicker in the masked man's eyes.
"Slash!"
A blazing flame-covered blade immediately slashed towards his vital points.
However, with his ability, the masked man could simply ignore this kind of attack.
The blade passed through his body. The masked man glanced sideways slightly, then turned around, focusing his dojutsu in a certain direction.
"Buzz."
Wherever he looked, the space began to distort.
However, the moment before the distortion occurred, the black figure had already retreated.
"That's a pretty quick response."
The masked man murmured. Although his dojutsu was superior to Uchiha Yoruki's, the latter also possessed the Mangekyō Sharingan after all.
Just now, Uchiha Yoruki used the insight of the Mangekyō to predict in advance the position where his dōjutsu would be focused, and then used a high-speed body flicker technique to avoid it.
Uchiha Yoruki stopped and looked at the masked man in front of him. Although his expression was still solemn, fighting with him now was far less strenuous than before.
This was naturally because he had information about the masked man's abilities.
However, there was one most important point.
Although this person's dojutsu and abilities were quite strong, he still had great weaknesses.
That is, his combat awareness and basic qualities as a ninja were not very outstanding.
Although the top shinobi in the ninja world almost all mastered powerful jutsu and techniques,
To reach that level, one must rely on more than just powerful ninjutsu.
Just like Minato, even if he did not rely on the Flying Thunder God Technique, his speed was still unmatched in the ninja world.
Therefore, with this foundation, combined with space-time ninjutsu, Minato was able to surpass the other shinobi of the contemporary ninja world.
This is why the masked man is difficult to defeat even though he could battle against top-tier shinobi.
Because one cannot become a truly strong person simply by relying on the strength of one's abilities.
Therefore, through these observations, Uchiha Yoruki could rule out the possibility that the masked man was Uchiha Madara.
Because although he possessed eye power stronger than Uchiha Yoruki's Mangekyō, if he was really Uchiha Madara, his combat awareness and basic qualities would never be so ordinary.
The First Hokage and Uchiha Madara dominated the world in their time, and what they relied on was definitely not just powerful eye techniques and chakra.
However, even though he was aware of this, Uchiha Yoruki knew very well that his abilities were not enough to defeat the masked man.
Even Minato could only suppress him, not defeat him outright.
The key to countering the masked man's ability was to create a flaw in his technique.
But in this fight, the masked man probably just wanted to hold him back.
Uchiha Yoruki stared at the masked man intently. In this case, he could only hope that Jiraiya could stop Orochimaru.
"Boom!"
The huge tide of snakes knocked down all the giant trees within a radius of dozens of meters, and even the ground seemed to have been shaved off a layer.
Amidst the chaos, only Jiraiya, who was wrapped in the Needle Jizō technique, appeared intact.
His hair, as hard as steel, was stained with blood, and all around him were the corpses of pierced snakes.
The snake tide ended, and the long white hair slowly gathered together, revealing Jiraiya's figure.
"Huff... huff..."
Jiraiya knelt on one knee on the ground, his eyes slightly drooped, and he was breathing heavily.
Orochimaru's Many Hidden Shadow Snake Hands was not a technique that could be easily defended against.
In order to defend against this attack, Jiraiya had consumed a large amount of chakra.
With his strength, he shouldn't have been in such a dire state, but the enemy he was facing was his former best friend.
He had no way to fight with all his strength. He had been in a defensive situation since the beginning of the battle.
"Hiss."
At this moment, Orochimaru suddenly appeared in front of Jiraiya. His right hand suddenly stretched out and transformed into two large snakes, which then entangled Jiraiya and lifted him up.
The two looked at each other. Orochimaru stuck out his tongue, licked his lips, and said in a hoarse voice:
"You are still as naive as before. Do you really think I won't kill you?"
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