The Baku Summoning Beast Was Just There for Laughs

"Captain, come take a look! There's a barrier over here!"

The Konoha Ninja patrolling the village's outskirts soon spotted a gray barrier shrouding the woods and immediately reported it to their leader, Anko.

Anko was startled. She stopped chatting with the kids in the Chat Group and hurried with her team to the barrier.

After examining it, Anko came to a conclusion. "This is a concealing barrier. Its purpose is to keep people from noticing what's happening inside. Something shady must be going on in there."

"Gather everyone. Find a way to break this barrier!"

Anko had a bad feeling about this. Though it could be a diversion, she immediately ordered someone to send out a gathering signal.

At the signal, all the nearby patrol ninjas gathered.

"The Byakugan can't see through the barrier. This is a Four-Sided Barrier Formation, with a formation point in each of the four directions. Remove them all at the same time, and the barrier will collapse," a Hyuga clan member reported after investigating.

Anko made a quick decision. "Send someone back to the village to report this to Lord Hokage. The rest of you, put on your wireless communicators and search for the formation points. Wait for my signal before acting."

"Yes!" The named ninjas hurried off.

Before long, reports came through the wireless communicators.

"Captain, we found a formation point, but it's trapped. It'll take at least half an hour to disable it!"

"Same here."

"Same!"

All four teams reported the same result.

Anko frowned. "Send more people. Can they speed up the process?"

"No. Only one person can disable it. More people won't help."

"Same on my end!"

"Here too."

Anko sighed and rubbed her temples. "Start disabling them at once. Do your best. Everyone else, stay on guard and watch your surroundings."

"Yes!"

Frowning, Anko muttered, "From what Tenten and Karin told me, Mo Chen was just returning to Konoha from the direction of Sakura City. Is he inside that barrier? Someone's ambushed him!"

"People from Kusagakure? No, they wouldn't be that bold, and they wouldn't have had time to set this up. So it must be someone who left the village. Spies from another country? I hope it's not what I'm thinking!"

Anko had already learned what kind of person Mo Chen was from the Chat Group, and she was curious about him. She'd planned to seek him out after her mission, but she hadn't expected to run into him here.

Even setting aside Mo Chen's special connection to the Chat Group, he was a Konoha Ninja. They had a duty to protect him.

Inside the barrier.

Danzo fled from the Wood Dragon in a sorry state. In the blink of an eye, he was back on the ground, and all his previous efforts had come to nothing.

Once everyone landed, the Wood Dragon was withdrawn. Mo Chen wasn't in the least bit eager to attack them.

"Damn it! This is taking too long!" Danzo's face darkened.

Being toyed with by a youngster was humiliating.

The eight Root members who had ambushed Mo Chen were standing behind him. Even though they wore masks, Danzo could tell they were struggling to hold back their laughter.

"If you insist on making this difficult, don't blame me for showing you no mercy!"

Danzo wanted to take Mo Chen down as quickly as possible. He glanced at the two guards who had regained their footing, then formed Hand Seals and barked, "Summoning Technique!"

With a bang and a cloud of smoke, a beast appeared, with an elephant's trunk, an ox's tail, a lion's body, and tiger's paws.

"Baku, suck hard!"

At Danzo's command, the Dream-Tapir opened its mouth toward the Wood Golem and inhaled deeply.

A tremendous suction force sprang up, pulling in all the trees and dirt in front of the Dream-Tapir.

At the same time, white smoke poured from its trunk.

It was expelling the air it had sucked into its belly through its nostrils, so it wouldn't burst.

By breathing in and out like this, it could keep going until it ran out of Chakra.

The suction from the Dream-Tapir's mouth was immense. Even the Wood Golem, which stood over a hundred meters tall, was sucked off balance.

Though Mo Chen was far away in the sky, the force tugged him off balance too. He lost his footing and fell, pulled straight toward the Dream-Tapir's mouth.

Once Mo Chen was no longer on the Wood Golem, his Chakra output stopped, and both the Wood Golem and Wood Dragon collapsed to the ground.

Seeing this, the Dream-Tapir aimed at Mo Chen and increased its suction.

"That suction is terrifying. No wonder even Sasuke's Susanoo couldn't withstand it!" Though startled, Mo Chen stayed calm and quickly assessed the situation.

He had allowed himself to be pulled in, to some extent, but there was no denying that the Dream-Tapir's suction was powerful.

Now he was weightless, and controlling his Chakra was difficult, let alone keeping his balance.

But even Sasuke could use ninjutsu in these conditions. Mo Chen didn't think he was any weaker than EMS Sasuke.

Danzo was fully focused on assisting the Dream-Tapir and couldn't spare a hand. That was one reason the beast's technique was so powerful.

The two guards had already stepped forward, waiting for Mo Chen to be sucked within reach so they could subdue him.

It all happened in the blink of an eye. In just two or three seconds, Mo Chen had crossed over a hundred meters.

By then, though, he had managed to steady himself. He spread his right hand and aimed his palm at the Dream-Tapir.

"Wood Release: Cutting Sprigs!"

A mass of wooden spikes burst from Mo Chen's palm, raining down like spears.

Aside from being slightly weaker, the attack was almost as powerful as the one Obito had unleashed with the Ten-Tails' power during the Fourth Shinobi World War.

Mo Chen had Chakra to spare, so he didn't hold back.

If Chakra could solve a problem, it wasn't a problem.

As the barrage of spikes came down, Danzo and the others' expressions changed.

No matter how powerful the Dream-Tapir's suction was, its mouth was only so big. There was no way it could suck in every wooden spear.

They hadn't expected Mo Chen to still be able to use a technique under these conditions, so they were caught unprepared. If they didn't want to get hurt, they had no choice but to dodge.

With no other option, all three immediately retreated, and Danzo abandoned the Dream-Tapir.

He had thought the Dream-Tapir would be injured at most. But after he pulled away, its suction weakened drastically, and the falling spears easily pierced its body.

Worst of all, the wooden spears inside the Dream-Tapir exploded. Branches burst through its flesh and stabbed out from within.

The Dream-Tapir managed only a single howl before it was turned into a pincushion.

Blood sprayed everywhere. It was dead in moments.

"What a joke of a Summoning Beast!" Mo Chen scoffed as he landed steadily on the ground.

The suction was powerful, sure, but one ninjutsu was all it took to blow the beast apart. You didn't even need to aim. The Dream-Tapir was only useful against the weak.

But if you were facing the weak, did you really need to summon a beast?

Come to think of it, should he get a Summoning Beast of his own? Preferably one that could fly!

"Secret Technique: Insect Ball!"

"Sword Technique: Gale Slash!"

Danzo's two guards had long since had enough of Mo Chen's arrogance. As soon as the barrage of spikes ended, they seized the moment while he was still unsteady and launched their attacks.

They had already seen how troublesome Mo Chen was, so they gave it everything they had.