[send power stones please]
"This is getting annoying… seriously, does it ever end?"
Hikaru felt that presence drawing closer and couldn't help frowning.
He admitted it—he'd basically raided Sunagakure.
Even if the "raid" was built on information asymmetry: the Land of Wind hadn't experienced Namikaze Minato on their own soil, so they never truly understood what Flying Thunder God looked like at full speed.
On top of that, Hikaru had gained something that mattered to him more than anything—
and by sheer force of will (and results), he'd ripened every seed he'd planted, freeing his chakra at its source.
And finally, with the Wood Release he'd just obtained—plus that ridiculous "cheat" of his—he'd fused Flying Thunder God with Wood Release–condensed seeds.
That was the real reason he could "raid" alone while Sunagakure seemed completely helpless to stop him.
If he didn't have enough chakra, none of this would've worked.
If he hadn't learned Flying Thunder God, he wouldn't even dare set foot in Sunagakure alone.
But his chakra still wasn't infinite.
His recovery was fast. His body healed quickly. His stamina had improved—
yet his focus wasn't bottomless.
A person's mental energy had limits. That was reality.
And even with his unusually strong spirit, he couldn't keep sensory perception active forever, fighting like this nonstop.
"The one coming has a thick chakra signature… and they're not slow."
Hikaru drew in a breath, then simply stopped and stood his ground.
The chase was starting to irritate him.
He was basically out already, so he didn't mind venting a little—
and leaving Sunagakure with a scar they'd never forget.
He shoved the envelope he'd just taken out back into his pouch and let his chakra ripple outward.
In an instant, Wood Release seeds spread beneath his feet again.
He was curious now—who exactly had come after him?
From the chakra density alone, it wasn't some nobody.
Two names rose immediately in his mind.
"Fourth Kazekage…?"
Possible. But wasn't that man supposed to be heading to the Land of Bears to face Iwagakure?
Wasn't Pakura sent out because of that?
If it wasn't the Fourth Kazekage, then who in Sunagakure still had chakra like this?
Ebizō? No. The "flavor" didn't match.
Then…
"Chiyo?"
That seemed more likely.
The chakra he sensed carried something subtly inhuman—a thread that didn't belong to a living body.
And outside of mad puppet masters, Hikaru couldn't think of many people who had chakra like that.
Even someone like Kakuzu still felt human, at the core.
Hikaru waited quietly.
By the time the last seed had been planted, every one of them had a Flying Thunder God mark layered into it.
Inside this domain—
he would be the strongest thing moving.
"This technique has a downside," he thought. "Once I leave this range, I'll have to rely on lizards and kunai again."
He couldn't run at full speed and simultaneously keep condensing seeds and stamping marks in real time.
That wasn't a chakra issue—just a skill issue.
But it was fixable.
With enough practice—and with the system backing him—he'd eventually make it effortless.
And once he got back, he'd need to start hunting for new seeds again.
His current state was strong—strong enough to unsettle even himself—
but if he wanted to keep progressing, the best path was still the seeds.
He didn't even know whether he had talent in other chakra natures.
Even if he did, he couldn't train them to match what he was born with—not quickly.
Seeds were different.
Even if you weren't born with the gift, once those seeds grew in your chakra, they became yours.
And the fruits they formed gave you a "natural" mastery that ordinary training couldn't compete with.
The same went for Sage Mode.
Without a proper learning route, seeds were basically his only reliable way forward.
"Call it a 'full-power trial run,' I guess…"
He let out a quiet, tired sigh.
"If only I could control how hard the seeds drain my chakra—like a switch. When I need full chakra for a fight, planting mode just cuts off."
If he could do that, his combat power would jump massively.
But he'd tried.
And the result had been brutal:
the moment a seed lost chakra supply, it withered and died.
He'd wasted a rare seed that way.
After that, he'd rather have less chakra than destroy a seed outright.
Besides—his fighting style didn't always need a huge pool anyway.
It wasn't like he planned on raiding enemy villages for fun.
"…They're here."
Hikaru lifted his head.
A figure rushed in from the distance—
an old woman, fifty or sixty by the look of her, moving with frightening speed.
Chiyo.
And Hikaru didn't even have time to speak.
She attacked the instant she arrived.
"Whoosh—whoosh—WHOOSH!!!"
A storm of senbon tore through the air with shrieking sound, covering a massive area and sealing off every route.
Under the sun, the needles flashed with a sickly green sheen.
Poison.
Of course.
"Seriously?" Hikaru muttered.
He triggered Flying Thunder God immediately.
With coverage like that, dodging wasn't an option.
Luckily, after building his field he'd already stepped back a good distance—so he didn't lose half his domain before even using it.
Space warped.
Hikaru reappeared closer to Chiyo, blade already sliding free in the same motion.
No talking.
She was clearly past the point of conversation.
So he'd answer with steel.
His sword bloomed with a thin, luminous blue edge.
His speed spiked—
his Body Flicker looked like true teleportation—
and he was on Chiyo in a blink.
But Chiyo's reaction was razor-sharp.
Or rather—she'd studied him.
The moment Hikaru's sword cut forward, a puppet appeared between them as if it had always been there.
It raised a shield in one hand.
In the other, it held a blade—
and the puppet's sword thrust forward just slightly, a quiet warning.
If Hikaru took even one more step, he'd be skewered.
"—!"
Hikaru didn't hesitate.
In midair, he triggered Flying Thunder God again.
He snapped backward—vanishing and reappearing behind his own line like a phantom, as if he'd never attacked at all.
"That was close," he said, eyeing the puppet. He shook his head lightly. "Chiyo-sama… your puppetry really is on another level."
"Summoning puppets like that—so silent, so sudden. If my reaction was a fraction slower, I'd already be dead."
"You're disgusting," Chiyo spat, fury twisting her features. Even so, the caution in her eyes was unmistakable. "All you people from Konoha—are you all this fake?"
"Fake?" Hikaru tilted his head, then smiled. "Maybe it looks like hypocrisy to you."
He spoke softly, almost pleasantly.
"But isn't your village hypocritical too? Tell me, Chiyo-sama—if your shinobi hadn't attacked me first… why would I strike back?"
"You entered the Land of Wind without proof of passage!" Chiyo snapped. "What's wrong with taking you down?"
Hikaru's smile deepened.
"Chiyo-sama… I just realized something."
Chiyo's gaze narrowed. "What?"
"We're alike."
"…What are you talking about?"
Hikaru's voice stayed gentle.
"The way we justify ourselves."
He lifted a hand and, slowly, removed his mask.
Underneath was a calm face and warm eyes—
and a smile so composed it felt like mockery.
"We both have… flexible moral boundaries."
For a heartbeat, Chiyo's rage flared hotter.
She knew her words were flimsy. She knew Sunagakure had gotten greedy. She knew this had spiraled because they'd tried to seize what they couldn't control.
But she was Sunagakure's elder.
And her job wasn't to be "morally pure."
Her job was to protect her village—by any means.
Chiyo snorted.
Her hands lifted.
Three shield-bearing puppets appeared at her side.
Then smoke blossomed around them—
and dozens more puppets emerged, filling the space like a waking nightmare.
She was done talking.
"So I hit a nerve?" Hikaru sighed as though disappointed, then smiled again. "But if I were you, I'd make the same choice."
His gaze swept over the puppet army without fear.
"Because neither of us is a good person."
"Die!" Chiyo shouted, yanking her hands.
Every puppet lunged at once.
Hikaru stayed calm.
Some puppets were close-combat monsters. Others were built to suppress with ninjutsu patterns.
On paper, it was overwhelming.
The real problem was something else:
poison.
As a puppet master, Chiyo wouldn't miss the chance.
Hikaru's poison resistance wasn't great. Whenever he fought poison users, he'd always swallow an antidote in advance.
But Chiyo was a master.
He honestly doubted standard antidotes would do much.
He wasn't Hashirama Senju.
That man practically didn't recognize poison as a concept—his body simply refused to care.
Hikaru had inherited only a fragment of Asura's power.
A "defective" fragment that still felt like he'd ascended in one leap—
but compared to the monsters of decades ago, or the gods-to-be a decade later…
it was still not enough.
Poison didn't care what rank you were.
One mistake, and you still died.
"End it quickly," Hikaru told himself.
He popped an antidote into his mouth anyway.
"Probably useless," he thought, "but peace of mind counts."
"And if I get poisoned… I just have to subdue her and take the antidote from her hands."
His expression sharpened.
The puppets were already on him.
He had to move.
...
Far away, deep in the Land of Wind's desert—
Murashima Takumi glanced behind him as he ran.
"No one's chasing?"
They'd ambushed the One-Line Sky fortress garrison and killed multiple Suna shinobi, only retreating after reinforcements arrived.
But the reinforcements hadn't pursued.
Even when they deliberately slowed their pace, Sunagakure still didn't follow.
Not the garrison.
Not ANBU.
It didn't make sense.
"It doesn't look like it," Owl said, turning his masked head back for a long moment.
Then he abruptly looked up.
A messenger hawk was cutting across the sky toward them.
From its direction, it had flown from the border—and its destination was the Land of Wind.
Owl's mind shifted instantly.
He formed seals.
A gust of wind snapped upward.
The hawk's flight wobbled violently—
and a cold flash of steel cut through the air.
The hawk dropped from the sky.
Owl sprinted, tore the bamboo capsule from its leg, and returned.
"See if you can crack it," Owl said, passing it to the squad's code specialist. "If nothing else, it should contain news from the border."
"If we know what's happening ahead, we gain leverage."
"I'll try," the specialist said hesitantly. "Even if I open it, if it's cipher text… I might not be able to read it."
"I know," Owl replied. "Try anyway."
"Right now, we're blind."
"…Understood. I'll do my best."
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