Yakumo shook her head and said softly, "I lost!"
Ido, who had been displaced far away by the Red Dragon, had only just arrived. Hearing Yakumo concede, she stomped her feet in midair in frustration, but there was nothing she could do.
As Karin released the Adamantine Sealing Chains, she shook her head. "I didn't win easily!"
The final exchange had come down to the two of them anticipating each other's moves.
Karin had seized the key moment and gained the upper hand.
But just as she said, she hadn't won easily. Against Yakumo, who had mastered the Red Dragon, she could only defend passively. In the end, she won only because Yakumo couldn't sustain a prolonged battle, and she anticipated when Yakumo would make her decisive move.
She had also risked taking the full force of Yakumo's Blood Clone exploding.
That kind of move was extremely dangerous in a true battle between experts, because no one could accurately judge how powerful an enemy's jutsu was.
Besides ordinary offensive jutsu, the Shinobi World had all kinds of secret techniques, Forbidden Jutsu, and even curses!
Getting tripped up by some overlooked detail was common in the Shinobi World.
So Karin had won this time largely thanks to her immense Chakra reserves and astonishing healing ability.
Of course.
There was nothing wrong with a ninja making use of her strengths.
Whoosh.
Just then, with a rush of wind, Haku appeared before them. "Keep fighting like that, and you two will fill in the whole sea!"
At Haku's teasing remark, the two finally looked around.
They had been so caught up in the fight that neither had paid any attention to the terrain. Now that their sparring was over, they realized the landscape had changed beyond recognition.
The high cliff beneath them had