Chapter 14: A Small Stir Caused by Tsukasa Kaede
The zombie's rotting flesh suddenly exploded, and the splashing pus, carrying a dark green substance, wrapped around the enemy's arm like a living thing. The Hidden Sand ninja watched in horror as his skin visibly festered.
"Poison doesn't work on dead people."
Tsukasa Kaede's fingertips still retained the chakra used to detonate the zombie.
The zombie, whose head had been pierced, demonstrated its last bit of value on the battlefield, transforming into a human bomb that entirely blasted its attacker at point-blank range.
The Hidden Sand ninja immediately tried to retreat and escape the moment he heard the sizzling sound, but his hand was gripped tightly. When he suddenly exerted force, the surface skin and flesh were torn open. Unfortunately, he still couldn't escape and could only watch as the exploding firelight engulfed him. One side of his body became like charcoal, resembling a withered branch scorched by flames.
Morino Idate's kunai delivered the final blow, killing the enemy.
He stood beside Tsukasa Kaede, wary of enemies from other directions. With a sidelong glance at the Hidden Sand ninja's curled, charred corpse, he turned to the sealing scroll at Tsukasa Kaede's waist: "You injected poison into these corpses?"
"I just stored the venom extracted from Feizhu Qingting in the corpses' gallbladders. I don't believe every ordinary ninja from the Hidden Sand Village carries an antidote for this poison. If they can use this poison against us, then it's perfectly reasonable for me to extract some and use it on them."
Tsukasa Kaede whispered, then summoned another zombie to stand in front of him. On a battlefield like this, besides launching attacks in specific directions according to the commands of commanders and strategists, one also had to deal with various chaotic situations. Perhaps a corpse on the ground was just a cunning foe playing dead, specifically waiting for someone to approach.
Trying to hide one's abilities without sufficient strength was practically courting death. Tsukasa Kaede could only summon new zombies to prioritize his own safety—when enemies saw two figures, they would naturally divide their attack intensity, thereby indirectly increasing Tsukasa Kaede's safety.
Genin were the group least able to guarantee their own survival, but if they possessed a unique skill, they could usually last a bit longer, unless they were extremely unlucky.
Bang bang bang! When the Hidden Sand's poison smoke bombs exploded for the third round in the sky above the battlefield, Tsukasa Kaede's personal tactics were constantly overturning the understanding of many Konoha ninja.
New zombies appeared, forming a humanoid, self-propelled barrier. Pus, blood, and poison mist circulated among the horde of corpses, like a walking biochemical fortress. Anyone who approached would suffer misfortune; the best outcome was to suffer a self-detonation and be forced to flee far away in fright.
Such a startled reaction, which then forced them to make an evasive movement, inherently meant revealing a weakness. Other approaching Konoha ninja would seize this valuable gap to launch a fierce attack, often achieving unexpected gains and securing kills.
During a war that lasted less than an hour, with Tsukasa Kaede, when similar situations occurred three times in a row, the Konoha ninja naturally began to notice this—on a battlefield fraught with difficulties everywhere, it seemed that being near this medical team always led to unexpected surprises? With a loud bang, a zombie forcefully kicked an enemy, sending them flying. The force was so immense that the leg used for the kick immediately burst apart! That single kick already caused the enemy's chest to cave in, and the blood they spat out was mixed with fragments of internal organs. The expression on their face was forever frozen in a moment of terror.
"This zombie is basically useless now too. It's a shame I didn't stick an explosive tag on it..." Tsukasa Kaede kept one hand in the hand signs position, ready to summon a new zombie at any moment. Occasionally, he would also change hand signs to be ready to detonate a zombie at any time. He said this with a touch of regret.
This was because he hadn't fully unleashed the zombie's true power yet—the truly astonishing aspect of zombies lay in their troublesome infectiousness.
If Tsukasa Kaede were to truly let loose and disregard all consequences, each time a zombie was detonated, the splattered flesh and blood could trigger a small-scale zombie crisis, which would then allow the infected enemies to return to their camps, transform into zombies, and continue infecting healthy enemies...
Like a snowball, it would expand wildly, creating an incredible amount of damage before the enemy's higher-ups could react and establish a containment system.
But Tsukasa Kaede wouldn't do that. He was just a Genin, and due to his physical condition, his upper limit was locked. Until he acquired a body he was satisfied with, Tsukasa Kaede wouldn't go all out. The true terror of Corpse Release should not be brazenly displayed in the light of day.
The Second Great Ninja War was the stage for Konoha's White Fang, the Sannin, and Minato Namikaze, certainly not for Tsukasa Kaede.
His true moment to shine was definitely not now; if all went well, it should be during the Third Great Ninja War a few years later.
Tsukasa Kaede needed to ensure he stayed alive and well, survived until the war ended, and then demonstrate his talents in specific fields.
"You call this thing the Soul Death Technique? Can the Soul Death Technique even be used like this?"
The more the accompanying medical ninja understood, the more dumbfounded they became.
A medical ninja, moving with other Konoha ninja, was positioned towards the rear. Having just healed a rapidly retreating injured comrade with the Mystical Palm Technique and watched them charge again, he turned his head just in time to see Tsukasa Kaede, one hand forming hand signs and the other pointing. A chunin zombie sprinted at high speed, pushing itself until its legs showed signs of shattering. After getting close to the enemy, it traded blows, furiously stabbing with a kunai, and then decisively self-detonated after its combat power was completely exhausted.
This usage was practically like a suicide-style tactic for Shadow Clone Jutsu, but a sane ninja would never be so extravagant as to casually send Shadow Clones to self-detonate. This painful method of death would be fully fed back to the main body, placing a heavy burden on the brain, nor did their chakra reserves allow them to play such dangerous games.
When people started spreading rumors that this was the Soul Death Technique, all the medical ninja who knew the jutsu were dumbfounded. Other ninja who learned from the medical ninja what the jutsu was originally supposed to be like were also dumbfounded.
Morino Idate, taking advantage of a moment when one of his subordinates was killed, used a chakra scalpel to sever the throat of an attacking Hidden Sand ninja. He seized the opportunity to retreat behind his other comrades to catch his breath. "This kid playing with corpses like this is simply unheard of. Even the ninja who created the Soul Death Technique probably never imagined it could be used this way."
Medical ninja were the most deeply affected. They found that this jutsu didn't seem as useless as they had imagined. Giving medical ninja more unpredictability meant a higher survival rate—battles between ninja were inherently intelligence warfare, and any practical, unexpected technique was useful.
Hmm, it seemed Naruto also thought the same way when he used the Harem Jutsu on Kaguya Otsutsuki.
But ultimately, everyone merely considered it in their minds. The Soul Death Technique was not a proper ninjutsu. The mere act of manipulating corpses made many shy away from it, rendering it unsuitable for widespread adoption as a universal ninjutsu among too many Konoha ninja.
(end of chapter)