Shadow One unconsciously shifted his steps slightly, avoiding the moonlight, hiding his entire body within the shadows.
There was a trace of admiration in his tone.
"This is what a true genius of the Hidden Mist Village should be. To be able to land a hit on me, your future is limitless."
"It's just a pity… you had to follow Master Genji down a road of no return. You should know, he's just an old man already at death's door, while you… are still a young girl who hasn't even entered the bloom of her youth."
Terumi Mei pressed her hand tighter over the wound on her waist, but even so, she couldn't stop the blood from endlessly flowing out.
In truth, removing the chakra that Shadow One had attached to the wound, chakra that kept tearing it open, wasn't that difficult. It only required focus.
But the problem was, against a ninja like Shadow One, who likely mastered space-time ninjutsu, a single lapse in attention could mean getting dragged away to one's death.
A faint look of regret appeared on Terumi Mei's small face, "Captain Shadow One, you're right. I didn't think my wedding day would never come… and my life would end here."
"But isn't that exactly the situation in the Hidden Mist right now? Kids younger than me are being forced to kill each other, fighting to become the last one standing."
"So, I want to use my life… to trade for the lives of all of them."
Shadow One's tone remained cold, "Your life is worth far more than theirs. The Mizukage's Bloody Mist Policy is nothing more than a way to filter out the most gifted children. Isn't that how this world works? Only those who survive can continue to grow stronger."
Terumi Mei panted as she spoke, "Yeah… only those who survive can keep developing. But if you change the way you live, without constantly being in fear, maybe… development could be even better, don't you think?"
Shadow One shook his head, "That's nothing but your wishful thinking. Peace and stability make people weak. In the end, they'll end up just like the Land of Whirlpools, destroyed."
At this point, Shadow One noticed that as Terumi Mei's blood kept flowing, her body was getting weaker and weaker.
Almost time… to make his move.
He didn't waste another word. With a sudden thrust, he lunged toward Terumi Mei.
Seeing this, Terumi Mei didn't hesitate. Her hands quickly formed seals.
But having suffered from her once already, Shadow One wasn't about to fall for the same trick twice. She couldn't predict when he would vanish, or from which direction he'd strike next.
She could only gamble—
"Water Style: Water Dragon Bullet Technique!"
Beneath Terumi Mei's feet, another water dragon surged upward into the sky. After she'd awakened her dual bloodline limits, people had always defined her value by her bloodline techniques. But it was Water Style that she had refined through countless battles, and it remained the art she controlled with the greatest mastery.
This time, the water dragon didn't aim by prediction. It lunged straight toward Shadow One.
A faint smirk flickered at Shadow One's lips. Was this just the futile struggle of someone in their dying moments?
The next instant, his figure merged with the darkness, and vanished from sight.
A heartbeat later, he reappeared beside Terumi Mei, kunai thrusting toward her.
Terumi Mei didn't show the slightest hint of surprise. Her hands still maintained the sealing posture, and the water dragon she controlled suddenly changed direction, reversing midair, its head turning sharply toward Shadow One.
However, Shadow One was far too close to her. There was no doubt, his kunai would reach her throat first.
But as he felt the water dragon abruptly shift direction, a flash of horror crossed Shadow One's face.
The Water Dragon Bullet Technique was an area-wide jutsu; normally, its direction could only be controlled before it was launched. After release, almost no one could force it to change course mid-flight.
Yet Terumi Mei had just done exactly that.
And at such a young age, she was… monstrous.
What's more, she couldn't possibly be unaware of whose attack would hit first. She was simply gambling that even as her throat was cut, the water dragon would drown Shadow One immediately after.
A mutual destruction tactic.
But Shadow One didn't pull back. If it was about risking everything, as captain of the Hidden Mist's Anbu and commander of the Shadow Guard, he was more than familiar with dancing on the knife's edge.
Playing with fire on the tip of a blade, who was afraid of whom?
So, he didn't alter his attack trajectory at all.
In a flash, his kunai sliced toward Terumi Mei's throat. Just a bit closer, and the young girl's life would be over.
But at that moment—
Not far away, the dark forest suddenly lit up with flashes of electricity.
Amid the silence came a sound, unbroken and sharp, like the cries of thousands of birds singing all at once.
At first, the sound came from a distance. But in an instant, that distance vanished.
Shadow One instinctively turned his head, and saw a figure sprinting toward him at incredible speed, even faster than his own, leaving phantom traces in the air.
As an elite among elites, his body reacted before his mind could even process it, turning and crossing both arms before his chest to block.
The next moment, the figure was right in front of him. Amid the flicker of lightning, a voice rang out—
"Chidori!"
In the blink of an eye, the spot Shadow One used to defend himself was pierced by the lightning in that man's hand.
His entire body was blasted backward like a cannonball, smashing into the ground and carving out a long trail in the dirt.
Kakashi released the lightning from his hand, turning his head just in time to see Terumi Mei's wide eyes, full of disbelief.
Tears welled up in her eyes almost instantly.
She asked softly, "Kakashi… why are you here?"
Kakashi turned his head away a little awkwardly, maintaining his usual cool expression, "I just heard some noise over here. Acting on the intuition of a top-class intelligence operative, I came to take a look."
Terumi Mei couldn't help but laugh, "Kakashi, your rescue timing was really cool. As expected of the Mr. handsome I've got my eye on."
Kakashi froze for a second, his face beneath the mask turning faintly red. But when he noticed the wound Terumi Mei was pressing, he immediately said, "Hurry and treat your injury. That guy took my full-power Chidori, if he's not dead, he's seriously hurt. He won't be a threat to us for a while."
Terumi Mei obediently nodded and focused her attention, carefully cleansing the wound of Shadow One's parasitic chakra that clung like maggots to bone.
Though she wasn't a trained medical-nin, any ninja had at least some knowledge of emergency treatment and blood-staunching.
Kakashi didn't focus all his attention on her; his gaze shifted to where Shadow One had been blasted away.
That Chidori just now, executed under his Three Gates state, had been his strongest single-target lightning-style strike to date.
Yet even in that situation, Shadow One had managed to react and defend himself to some extent, preventing the Chidori from blowing a hole straight through him.
This ninja… was no ordinary opponent.
Even Kakashi couldn't help but take him seriously.