The Nine-Tails

Aburame Torune's Phosphorus Corrosive Insects were different from the ordinary bugs of the Aburame clan. They were Nanobugs—tiny, intensely poisonous insects that killed on contact.

But the Nanobugs were also very difficult to control. They couldn't distinguish friend from foe.

So in battle, Aburame Torune usually covered his body with the Nanobugs, charged at his enemies, and fought them at close range.

If you didn't know what you were dealing with and rushed into a fight with him, even one careless punch would get you swarmed by the Nanobugs and killed on the spot.

The best way to fight him was to attack from a distance with Ninjutsu and secret techniques. You absolutely couldn't let him get close.

But Uchiha An was the perfect counter to the Aburame clan. Once he activated Susanoo, its Chakra energy became the perfect barrier.

"Hahaha..." He laughed uproariously, swinging the Scepter in his hand and bringing it down on Aburame Torune in a relentless barrage.

"Don't you love fighting at close range?"

"Come on!"

"Come take my attacks!"

Aburame Torune kept moving, hopping back and forth as he struggled to dodge. But when the enormous Scepter slammed into the ground, the sand and stones it sent flying scattered like a hail of buckshot. They were as fast and powerful as Kunai, and there were so many of them that there was nowhere to hide.

In no time, the grit had scored bloody lines across his body. Blood seeped from the wounds, only to be devoured at once by the Nanobugs.

Aburame Torune's face was stony. After circling Susanoo several times without finding an opening, he gave a hand signal.

The Root shinobi in the distance immediately abandoned their earlier wariness and rushed over.

As soon as one of them got close, he began forming Hand Seals at high speed.

"Earth Style: Earth Flow Spear!"

Uchiha An caught sight of his Hand Seals and immediately leaped backward, taking Susanoo away from where he had been standing.

The ground trembled faintly. Several sharp stone spears burst up like spring bamboo shoots, stabbing diagonally into the air and covering the spot where he had just stood.

"A Ninjutsu of that caliber can't hurt me!"

Uchiha An formed Hand Seals just as quickly. Susanoo opened its mouth, and a sea of flames surged toward the ordinary Root shinobi.

"Fire Style: Great Dragon Fire Technique!"

Flames blazed sky-high, scorching the air until it warped.

Suddenly, from a blind spot, a pitch-black shadow darted out of the darkness like a venomous snake. Cleverly using the shadows cast by the flames as cover, it rushed toward Uchiha An without a sound.

"Secret Technique: Shadow Binding Technique!"

The Ino-Shika-Cho had reached the area and were making a covert move against him.

But Uchiha An had been on his guard against them from the start. With the dynamic vision of the Mangekyō Sharingan, a sneak attack of this level had almost no chance of success.

"Tch. You really are all cut from the same cloth. So you've joined forces after all!"

He turned his head slightly and shifted the direction of the flames. The scorching blaze swept over the flimsy shadow and blew it away without a trace.

But the ground beneath his feet gave way, and a whirlpool of mud and sand suddenly appeared. Like quicksand, it dragged Susanoo's body down relentlessly.

"Earth Style: Antlion Hell!"

The Earth Style shinobi from earlier was at it again.

"Susanoo really is inconvenient without legs!"

Uchiha An grumbled to himself, raised the Scepter, and swung it in a broad arc at the shinobi's head.

Every Ninjutsu required the caster's control. If the caster dodged, the technique's effects would naturally disappear.

But against this deadly attack, the Root shinobi didn't move an inch. His eyes shone with the light of one ready to die. He completely abandoned his defense and held his Hand Seals without wavering, pouring out Chakra like mad to push Antlion Hell to its limit.

The Scepter came down with a thud, easily smashing the Root shinobi into a bloody pulp that splattered across the ground.

But in the time Uchiha An had spent on him, even more Ninjutsu struck Susanoo.

"Earth Style: Earth Flow Split!"

"Earth Style: Earth Prison Dome!"

"Earth Style: Double Suicide Decapitation Technique!"

Perhaps because their intelligence had been leaked, the people of Konoha already knew Susanoo's weakness was its lack of a lower body. Half the Root shinobi who had come this time were Earth Style users.

The Quicksand Trap that had ensnared Susanoo had only just begun to harden when the ground suddenly split apart, opening into a massive fissure several meters wide and seemingly bottomless.

Another tactic specifically designed to target him!

Uchiha An's feet left the ground, and he and Susanoo fell into the fissure together.

At the same time, the ground around the fissure suddenly rose. Loose stones climbed upward on their own and quickly converged overhead, sealing the opening and forming a huge earthen prison around him and Susanoo. It began draining his Chakra.

The ground beneath him suddenly rippled like water. A shinobi leaped out from underground, Explosive Tags flashing beneath his clothes as he charged at Uchiha An with his head down.

A human bomb!

Dead or alive, the huge number of Explosive Tags on his body was bound to detonate in the cramped space.

"Cheap tricks, and you dare show them off!"

Suspended in midair, Uchiha An roared. The Mangekyō in his eyes spun wildly, and Susanoo's energy body suddenly surged upward. Two sturdy legs grew beneath it and planted themselves firmly on the ground, protecting his whole body. Susanoo swung its arms like a golfer, batting the charging Root suicide attacker away.

But at the moment of impact, all the Explosive Tags detonated at once.

The blast's tremendous shockwave expanded outward and slammed into the surrounding earth and stone. It rebounded repeatedly around the cramped space in an instant, greatly increasing the damage at the center of the explosion.

Those outside saw the earthen prison bulge outward the moment it formed. After several Earth Style shinobi managed to hold it together for a brief moment, it exploded with a deafening roar.

Flames surged skyward from within, forming a pillar of smoke that spiraled through the opening in the stone prison and reached the heavens.

The fragments of rock and sand that shot in every direction were even more dangerous than Kunai. Even the Root shinobi had to retreat and dodge.

Had they succeeded?

Aburame Torune stared intently into the pillar of smoke, ready to rush in and finish him off at any moment.

In Root, the mission came first. Their lives were secondary.

They didn't even care about their own lives, let alone anyone else's.

The only person Aburame Torune considered a friend was Yamanaka Fu. The other Root shinobi were just tools, and he had sent them to their deaths without hesitation to create an opening.

The traps, fissure, stone prison, and human bomb had followed one after another, forming a net-like assault with no escape.

With the Phosphorus Corrosive Insects ineffective, this was the most effective attack he could manage.

As the flames died down, a towering shadow appeared once more through the billowing smoke.

It was Susanoo!

Uchiha An hovered around the center of Susanoo's chest, breathing slightly hard. His left eye was half-closed, and a streak of Blood Tears slowly ran down his cheek.

He stuck out his tongue and gently licked the Blood Tears into his mouth.

Tasting his own blood again made his already feverish heart grow even more frenzied.

"Hahaha..."

"You're really something. You're all really something!"

He threw his head back and laughed wildly, quickly forming a Hand Seal. Then the people of Konoha watched in horror as flashes from Explosive Tags lit up beneath the clothes of the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki in their hands.

The fighting had been too intense. Although they had rescued the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, they hadn't had time to examine him. They had no idea that Uchiha An had already planted an Explosive Tag trap in a concealed spot on Naruto.

Now Uchiha An set it off from where he stood, and the Explosive Tags detonated at once.

The next moment, amid a tremendous explosion, an enormous, fiery red fox appeared out of thin air in the middle of Konoha's ranks.