Kuja Island

The Imperial Guards stiffened when they saw Yashiro and the others' eerie red eyes. Kikyo, who stood at the front, shouted sternly:

"Who are you? Where did you come from? Drop your weapons immediately!"

Naturally, a few words were not enough to make Uchiha Yashiro and the others lay down their weapons. Several Uchiha clansmen turned to Yashiro, awaiting his orders.

Yashiro drew the kunai at his waist, with not the slightest hint of tenderness toward women in his eyes.

As an Uchiha ninja who had fought in both the Second and Third Shinobi World Wars, Yashiro would never underestimate any enemy on the battlefield.

"Capture them and take them to see the clan head!"

Sensing their hostility, Kikyo no longer hesitated and gave her subordinates an order as well.

"Attack!"

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh—!

Several arrows wrapped in faint Armament Haki tore through the air. They were incredibly fast and came from tricky angles.

Such fast arrows!

Yashiro was startled and used the Body Flicker Technique to evade the incoming arrows.

Bang!!

The arrows passed through Yashiro's fading afterimage, pierced straight through the thick branch where he had just stood, and then blasted a sizable crater into the ground without losing any force.

"How is that possible? That power...!!"

Having barely dodged the arrows, Yashiro turned back in disbelief to look at the arrows embedded in the ground.

They were clearly ordinary arrows, so why were they so incredibly powerful? Their force was nearly on par with an Explosive Tag!

He immediately gave the order, "Spread out! Counterattack! Try to capture them alive!"

The battle erupted in an instant.

The four Uchiha elites immediately used the Body Flicker Technique to evade, while kunai and shuriken poured from their hands like a rainstorm, glinting with the light of Fire Style.

However, the Imperial Guards were also Kuja Island's elite. They were exceptionally agile and had solid taijutsu foundations, allowing them to nimbly evade most of the thrown weapons.

Whenever they could not evade, they blocked with their weapons. A few could even use their bare arms to block Yashiro and the others' shuriken, producing the sound of metal striking metal.

"Don't engage them head-on at close range! Their defense is strong, and their physical abilities are exceptional too!"

One Uchiha subordinate shouted. His Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique had been narrowly evaded by one of the warriors, leaving only a scorched patch of grass.

Yashiro personally faced off against Kikyo, the leader.

Kikyo used a peculiar sword style combined with nimble footwork. In both strength and speed, she was no weaker than Yashiro.

What alarmed Yashiro even more was that her attacks contained a strange energy. Whenever they collided with his kunai, his arm frequently went numb.

"Damn it... Why are this woman's attacks so strange?"

Yashiro's expression turned grave as his Three Tomoe Sharingan spun wildly, trying to copy and analyze Kikyo's attack patterns.

But it was completely useless.

There was nothing unusual about Kikyo's attacks in Yashiro's Sharingan, yet with the enhancement of Armament Haki, their power was astonishing.

Even so, the scales of victory gradually tipped toward the Uchiha side.

Although Kuja Island's Imperial Guards had caught Yashiro and the others off guard at first with their powerful physiques and Armament Haki, as time passed, Yashiro and the others gradually adapted to Kikyo's group's attacks.

Attacks enhanced with Armament Haki were indeed incredibly powerful, but no matter how strong an attack was, it was useless if it could not hit anyone!

"This ends now!" Yashiro shouted.

He seized an opening and took a side kick from Kikyo head-on. His chest tightened painfully, but his Sharingan instantly caught a flaw in Kikyo's stance.

Fire Style: Dragon Fire Technique!

A concentrated stream of scorching flames shot forth in a straight line, forcing Kikyo to retreat and block. The heat wave made her squint involuntarily.

Now!!

Yashiro used the opportunity to Body Flicker to her side, his scarlet Three Tomoe Sharingan staring directly into Kikyo's eyes.

The genjutsu activated!

Illusion Technique: Restraining Chain!

Yashiro's low voice sounded like an incantation. His Three Tomoe Sharingan instantly unleashed powerful Eye Power, forcibly dragging Kikyo's consciousness into the illusionary world he had constructed through their locked gazes.

In Kikyo's eyes, everything around her abruptly changed.

The forest, her companions, and her enemies all vanished, replaced by a crimson, distorted space.

Countless enormous, illusory stakes appeared out of thin air. Carrying irresistible force, they viciously pierced through her limbs and torso, firmly "nailing" her in midair and leaving her unable to move.

Intense pain, as though it came from the depths of her soul, swept over her, making her let out a muffled groan.

In reality, her body stiffened as well. Her eyes instantly lost focus, and her movements came to a complete halt.

"Captain Kikyo!"

Seeing their leader suddenly freeze in place, her face twisted in pain, the other Imperial Guards cried out in alarm, and a hint of chaos appeared in their formation.

"Now! Take them down!"

Yashiro endured the dull pain in his chest from the kick and the slight dizziness caused by the depletion of his Eye Power as he gave the order sharply.

The other four Uchiha elites seized the opportunity and immediately intensified their assault.

They were all battle-hardened elites of the Uchiha Clan. Having awakened the Three Tomoe Sharingan, they were stronger than ordinary jonin.

In the instant their opponents were distracted by their leader being restrained, the Uchiha elites used the Sharingan's precise perception to cleverly knock away their weapons or restrict their movements with binding Wind Release or Earth Release techniques.

"Bang!" "Bang!"

With several successive dull impacts, the remaining four Imperial Guards, having lost their coordination and been shaken mentally, were knocked down and subdued one after another by the Uchiha ninja using a combination of taijutsu and ninjutsu.

The battle ended quickly.

In just a few short minutes of fighting, among the five Kuja Imperial Guards, one had fallen under a genjutsu, while the other four had been physically subdued.

Yashiro panted heavily as he walked over to Kikyo, whose eyes were vacant and whose body trembled slightly.

"Hmph. No enemy caught in the Uchiha's Illusion Technique: Restraining Chain has ever broken free!"

Yashiro was rather proud, deeply confident in his clan's advanced genjutsu.

"Take them back to camp."

After giving the order, Yashiro turned away first.

An Uchiha clansman stepped forward, grabbed Kikyo by the shoulder, and prepared to carry her away.

However, just as Kikyo's consciousness was about to sink completely into the illusion, her unyielding will as an elite warrior of Kuja Island, along with her powerful obsession with protecting her nation, erupted into strength on a spiritual level.

She suddenly bit down on the tip of her tongue, and intense pain jolted her nerves.

At the same time, Armament Haki instinctively began flowing through her body in response to her will, resisting the foreign mental invasion.

At the exact moment the Uchiha clansman grabbed her, Kikyo briefly broke free from the illusion's restraints through sheer force of will.

After glancing at her subdued companions, Kikyo sent the enemy beside her flying with a punch coated in Armament Haki.

Then she abruptly pulled an exquisite whistle from her robes and blew it with all her strength!

"Wheee—!!!"

The sharp, piercing whistle echoed through the forest, carrying far into the distance.