Chaotic Battle

Hyuga Ao killed a Rain Ninja with a single palm strike, using the Byakugan's all-around vision to quickly survey the battlefield and be ready to intervene at any moment.

By now, the Rain Ninja and Konoha had devolved into a chaotic melee, tangled together in a messy free-for-all.

This was where the average quality and teamwork of Konoha's ninja shone. Three-man cells worked tightly together, each member supporting the others, and those cells coordinated with each other to form dense combat clusters. They quickly gained a foothold and began effectively taking down Rain Ninja.

But the Rain Ninja weren't pushovers either. As mercenaries, their coordination wasn't as seamless as Konoha's, but they had their own tactics for chaotic battles.

The Rain Ninja used speed-specialist Elite Jonin as spearheads, forming elite squads that cut through the battlefield, disrupting Konoha's cell coordination and making the chaos worse. Their goal was to drag Konoha into a messy one-on-one brawl, then rely on their years of battlefield experience to crush them.

Konoha wasn't helpless either. Once the chaos set in, familiar Jonin gravitated toward each other, forming clusters centered around themselves to provide mutual support.

Seeing this, the Rain Ninja squads didn't force their way in. If they encountered a formation they couldn't break, they quickly abandoned it and moved on to disrupt others. After all, if the entire battlefield fell into chaos, the remaining groups would inevitably be dragged in too.

Konoha had no real counter for this. They could only hold the line and see whether the Rain Ninja would break their formations first and use their experience to win, or whether Konoha's superior system and teamwork would grind them down.

At this point, both Konoha and the Rain Ninja lacked a decisive high-level combatant who could turn the tide, and no one could organize the troops. They could only rely on their cells to coordinate on their own.

It was a fifty-fifty situation.

It all came down to who broke first.

"Eight Trigrams Vacuum Palm!"

A blast of air shot out, sending a Rain Ninja lurking underground behind Nawaki flying.

Hyuga Ao teleported in to finish the job, easing the pressure on Nawaki. "What's wrong with you? Why do you keep falling into the Rain Ninja's rhythm?"

"Water Style: Water Wall!" A wall of water rose up, blocking a rain of senbon needles. Nawaki looked confused. "I don't know why, but lately, I've been terrified of Explosive Tags. Can those things actually kill someone?"

Ao was speechless. That's like the First Hokage holding the Nine-Tails and saying, 'You're too strong, I need to seal you.'

But you're the one who died!

She patted Nawaki on the back, signaling him to take care of himself, when a chakra signature noticeably stronger than the others appeared in her Byakugan's vision.

As the strongest ninja in this area, Ao had no choice but to face it herself.

Ao was currently on the edge of the battlefield.

At the start of the assault, Konoha had unleashed some large-scale jutsu, but once they closed in, the high-level combatants found their own opponents. The Quasi-Kage tied each other down, while the Jonin led the troops forward.

The Jonin squad had charged into the Rain Ninja formation in an arrowhead pattern. After being caught in a pincer, the Rain Ninja deliberately opened their lines, letting Konoha in for a chaotic brawl.

Konoha had racked up some kills while sticking together during the breakthrough, but the Rain Ninja quickly dragged them into the mud, making those early gains seem insignificant.

Ao's position was a scattered pocket of troops from the advance, a battlefield of mid and low-ranked ninja.

They had originally grouped up, but they'd been scattered. Now, thanks to Ao's strength, they were slowly regrouping.

Elsewhere on the battlefield, things weren't as good. Konoha and the Rain Ninja were half in chaos, half clustered together.

But once the chaos set in, casualties would mount quickly. Like a whirlpool, it would keep pulling in intact groups from the edges. Just as entropy always increases, this battlefield between the Rain Ninja and Konoha would inevitably descend into total chaos, giving the Rain Ninja a major advantage.

In terms of strategy, the Rain Ninja had the upper hand.

Ao fixed her gaze on the Rain Ninja in front of her.

He looked to be in his thirties, with scars covering his exposed hands and neck, and half his face marred by fire burns. By all logic, he should have looked ugly and vicious, but the man before Ao gave off the feeling of a kindly old neighbor—warm and weathered.

Especially his eyes.

Ao had seen that look before. In her past life, the old veterans in her village would get that look when they had a few drinks and reminisced about their glory days.

It was the look of someone with conviction and ideals.

Ao knew that if someone like this was your enemy, going all out was the only way to show respect.

The Rain Ninja stopped ten meters in front of Ao. He looked at her youthful face, his gaze distant, and couldn't help but think of his daughter, who had died in the war.

If my daughter hadn't died, she'd be about this girl's age now, he thought.

The thought passed in an instant. He tightened his grip on his kunai. There was no time for that. Right now, he had to fight for a future where thousands of families in the Land of Rain wouldn't lose their loved ones to war.

"Konoha sends children as young as this to the battlefield? A little girl from the Hyuga clan."

Ao didn't bother answering. She was observing him while staying alert to her surroundings, knowing he was just talking to himself.

"The great nations, sitting on fertile lands, still need children to protect their interests?" As he spoke, his face twisted with anger. "Lord Hanzō is right! The suffering of small nations like ours is caused by the great nations! To end the endless rain over the Land of Rain, we must raise our blades against them!"

As if reaffirming his conviction, the Rain Ninja tossed the umbrella strapped to his back into the air and charged at Ao under the cover of Ninjutsu: Thousand Senbon Rain.

At the same time, he formed hand seals. "Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu."

Small-nation ninja usually only knew one or two offensive jutsu, but years of combat had given them a unique understanding and refinement of those techniques. People like this had a name—specialists.

The terror of a specialist went without saying.

A dense barrage of water blades flew out like scattered petals, blocking every angle Ao could dodge, while the senbon rain fell from above.

It was a combo that most people couldn't handle.

One look at the water blades told Ao she couldn't take them head-on. From their shape and the chakra imbued in them, she could tell this Rain Ninja had instinctively learned some form and nature transformation.

Ao rooted her strength in the ground, spinning her entire body as chakra burst from her tenketsu.

"Rotation!"

A spinning semicircular barrier slammed down, deflecting the incoming senbon and grinding the water blades into droplets that splattered across the ground before being absorbed by the soil.

Hyuga Main Family? That Rain Ninja was taken aback.

His combo was his signature move for maintaining his standing—senbon in the sky, a Water Blade in front, and his own charge, with the rain of senbon and the jutsu erupting almost simultaneously. Few had ever managed to block it before.

But long battle experience made him shift tactics quickly. He pulled out a stack of Kunai wrapped with Explosive Tags, tossed them around the Rotation, and timed the detonation to go off the moment it ended.

Inside the Rotation, Hyuga Ao naturally saw the Rain Ninja's move, but she didn't keep the Rotation going. Instead, she ended it after blocking the Water Blade and senbon.

As the Rotation stopped, violent explosions surged toward Hyuga Ao from all sides. She stood her ground, her whole body trembling, like a character in the King of Fighters game unleashing a burst of energy. A shockwave erupted from her body, pushing the surrounding air outward to cancel out the blasts.

The Rain Ninja outside didn't just stand around waiting for the result. He formed hand seals again and launched another wave of Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu.

Hyuga Ao burst out of the explosion smoke unscathed. Having used Rotation to block the Water Blade before, she knew exactly how powerful it was.

This time, she didn't dodge. She charged straight toward the Water Blade.

Under the Byakugan's penetrating vision, the Water Blade's trajectory was crystal clear. Hyuga Ao weaved through it with her unmatched body control, and whenever she couldn't avoid a strike, she shattered it with a palm. In an instant, she closed in on the Rain Ninja.

The Rain Ninja had never imagined anyone could break through the Water Blade and get right in his face.

But with no other choice, he could only grab a Kunai and fight back.

Using her momentum, Hyuga Ao slapped and lifted her palm, knocking aside the Rain Ninja's arms and exposing his armored chest. That armor meant nothing to her.

She channeled force into her palm and struck with Heartbreak Palm. The Rain Ninja's heart meridian shattered instantly—one hit, one kill!

The Rain Ninja collapsed, muttering something about Hanzō with his last breath.

Hyuga Ao's heart grew heavy, and she couldn't help a bitter smile. "What's the point of saying all that? I'm just a passerby."

She sighed. "You had the wrong direction. No matter how hard you tried, it was useless."

Hyuga Ao realized she had underestimated the Rain Ninja—or rather, the Rain Ninja under Hanzō's leadership.

She noticed that these Rain Ninja had conviction. Even if it was a misguided one, it still massively boosted their combat power.

She opened her Byakugan to its fullest, scanning the battlefield. Sure enough, the Rain Ninja were gradually gaining the upper hand.

Konoha definitely won in the end, but where was the turning point now? she wondered.

Hyuga Ao sighed. Whatever it is, hurry up and come. If this drags on, I won't be able to stay hidden.