Insect Sage Mode

Those five minutes would be a bit of a challenge for Shibi.

For one thing, Kizashi Moku was one of the village's rarer Earth Release Nintaijutsu users. He specialized in combining the Hardening Technique and Partial Hardening Technique with Konoha-Style Strong Fist, and in recent years, the Shinobi World had even given him the title of Konoha Iron Fist.

As a clan of insect users, the Aburame Clan feared Taijutsu specialists most of all, especially ones with terrifying defensive abilities like him.

Although Touma had given Shibi some pre-match training to help him counter Taijutsu, there was no way he could completely overcome this weakness.

On top of that, before he became a Chunin, Kizashi Moku had mostly relied on simple Earth Release techniques combined with traps. As a result, he was highly experienced at setting traps and spotting and countering them.

That meant Shibi's strategy of using Kikaichū to lay traps would be unlikely to work on Kizashi Moku, either. Unless the "Iron Fist" deliberately went easy on him, Shibi would have a hard time lasting the full five minutes!

Still, Shibi wasn't completely without a chance of success. He'd just have to use the trump card Touma had prepared for him.

Calling it a trump card was a bit much. It was really just a desperate, all-or-nothing move.

After all, the Aburame Clan's strength was directly proportional to their chakra reserves and the number of Kikaichū they bred inside their bodies. It was difficult for them to make any dramatic leaps in power.

So if they wanted to temporarily boost the strength of an Aburame, they had to find a way to enhance the Kikaichū living in their body's insect nest.

Touma had previously asked Shibi for a number of samples of the clan's specially bred mutant insects, then taken them to Orochimaru's lab for analysis.

After testing more than a hundred naturally mutated insect samples, they found one species that could clearly sense Natural Energy and withstand its corrosive effects after absorbing a small amount.

Using these insects, which they had tentatively named "Sage Destruction Bugs," Shibi could enter a relatively stable Sage Mode.

In this "Insect Sage" state, not only was the power of Shibi's ninjutsu fundamentally enhanced, but his basic physical abilities also rose significantly, letting him fight with greater Taijutsu prowess!

Of course, the Sage Destruction Bugs' ability to withstand Natural Energy had its limits. They could maintain it for about three minutes.

Once those three minutes were up, the Sage Destruction Bugs began to wither. Shibi had to expel them from his insect nest before they were completely petrified by the Natural Energy.

The Sage Destruction Bugs also couldn't reproduce quickly. Before the match, Shibi had gone to considerable trouble to gather just one jar of them. It was enough to activate Insect Sage Mode once and a half—that is, for less than five minutes!

That was why Shibi hadn't put the Sage Destruction Bugs inside himself at the start of the match. Instead, he'd used three kinds of insects at once—the Kikaichū, Digestion Bugs, and Fluorescent Destruction Bugs—combining them into a variety of tactics!

This was also why Shibi was regarded as a genius within the clan. His insect nest had a natural affinity for every kind of insect, which meant he could bond with almost every species of ninja insect in the clan.

The Kikaichū could absorb chakra, the Digestion Bugs could emit infrasound, and the Fluorescent Destruction Bugs could release intense light and secrete a chemical that spontaneously combusted when exposed to air.

Together, the three species formed a fighting style unlike that of ordinary Aburame shinobi, leaving Kizashi Moku at a loss for a while.

The Kikaichū could break through the Hardening Technique covering his body. Then the Digestion Bugs would pass through his skin and muscles and use infrasound to attack his internal organs, before the Fluorescent Destruction Bugs sprayed him with a flammable substance.

But Kizashi Moku was one of the more experienced Chunins in Konoha. Once he'd adapted to Shibi's fighting rhythm, he quickly found a weakness in Shibi's defense, closed in, and unleashed a swift Taijutsu assault that pinned down Shibi's next move.

Shibi's physical abilities in his normal state were indeed a glaring weakness. It wasn't his fault. From the moment the Aburame became insect users, they were destined to achieve little in the way of physical training.

After all, the Aburame Clan raised insects in nests inside their bodies. That alone was enough to be considered a Kekkei Genkai.

And to host enough insects, they couldn't build up too much muscle or bone density.

The Aburame Clan had once tried building a space-time barrier inside their bodies to hold more Kikaichū.

Unfortunately, despite the massive investment of several generations, they had made no progress. If Kikaichū were separated from their host's chakra for too long, they suddenly became wild and had to be tamed all over again.

After that, the Aburame Clan focused on their role in intelligence and sensory work, and paid little attention to developing their combat abilities.

But after Touma used cross-selection to help Shibi breed a jar of Sage Destruction Bugs, the Aburame Clan had a new hope of taking another step forward.

Shibi didn't hide the fact that he could use the Sage Destruction Bugs to enter Insect Sage Mode from the Aburame Clan. Nor did he keep it from the Third.

However, Touma didn't notify the Third directly. Instead, the information reached him indirectly through a one-way intelligence channel on Orochimaru's side.

After all, the Aburame Clan had suddenly acquired a more broadly applicable way to boost their combat power. Even if it lasted only three minutes, that was enough to affect the balance among the village's shinobi clans. It was impossible to keep it from the Hokage.

And the reason Shibi had been randomly matched against Kizashi Moku, who was about to be promoted to Jonin, was that the Third and the Aburame Clan had privately decided on it after learning the details.

They'd decided to test how much stronger Shibi was in Insect Sage Mode compared to usual.

Normally, this kind of test would be conducted in private. Unfortunately, the clan still hadn't fully figured out how to breed Sage Destruction Bugs. For now, the only jar they had was the one Touma had helped Shibi produce.

After realizing he was completely outmatched, Shibi glanced at the timer beneath the stands. It had just reached 2:01.

He suddenly leaped backward, tore the insect jar from his waist, and buried his face in it, inhaling deeply!

The Sage Destruction Bugs weren't very large. They weren't quite as tiny as the nanoscopic Rinkaichū, but they were still invisible to the naked eye. So the fastest way to get them into his body was to breathe them in.

As Shibi lifted his head from the jar, his skin gradually paled from its original wheat-brown tone. Dark green Sage markings quickly spread around his eyes, between his brows, and across his forehead.

Once the markings were complete, a solid-looking cloak of emerald-green chakra suddenly rose around his body. His hair floated upward, lifted by the Chakra Cloak.

With his sunglasses off and his pair of cold, handsome eyes exposed, Shibi really did seem to possess the air of a sage looking down on all things below!

Seeing the transformation, Kizashi Moku was already a thousand percent on guard. Even so, he failed to catch any trace of Shibi's instantaneous approach.

Shibi's high-speed movement just now hadn't been the Body Flicker Technique. He simply hadn't been able to control his surging strength right after entering Insect Sage Mode, and the speed had come purely from his enhanced physical abilities.

Shibi's bean-sized fists rained down on Kizashi Moku. No matter how intently Kizashi Moku focused, all he could see were blurry afterimages of Shibi darting at high speed.

Each punch packed a heavy blow. Even with the Hardening Technique at full strength, Kizashi Moku felt pain unlike anything he'd experienced before. The force of the blows had actually pierced through the Hardening Technique and struck his internal organs!