The Battle Ends

With a sharp crack, Jing Jiu collapsed to the ground.

In an instant, Jing Jiu's expression changed dramatically. He hurled a row of shuriken, forcing Yahiko, who had been about to press the attack, to retreat, then rolled across the ground several times, dragging his broken leg behind him.

With a few simple movements, he not only dodged Chiba's follow-up Earth Flow Spear, but also the kunai thrown by Konan and Nagato.

His movements flowed seamlessly, decisive and agile.

But they were all meaningless now.

Jing Jiu stared silently at Chiba and the others, cold sweat mingling with the rain and trickling down his face.

Now that things had come to this, both sides understood that the battle was as good as over.

With his leg injured, he no longer had any chance of fighting back. No matter what tactics he tried, Chiba and the others could finish him off with ease.

Half-kneeling on the ground, Jing Jiu lowered his head in defeat. "I never thought I'd lose to a bunch of kids with no combat experience."

Looking at the man who could no longer resist, even Chiba—the one who had set the final trap—hadn't expected him to lose so quickly.

Even Chiba, who'd had a vague suspicion, hadn't thought the attack would hit him so cleanly.

That man had easily dodged so many of their C-rank ninjutsu and various thrown weapons with his nimble footwork.

Who could have guessed that a simple little technique, one that barely counted as a D-rank ninjutsu in terms of power, would bring him down?

In that instant, Chiba truly understood something.

A ninjutsu's lethality didn't depend entirely on its power. What mattered most was how you used it.

When necessary, there wasn't much difference between a D-rank ninjutsu and an S-rank one. Either could kill.

Chiba had known this in theory, but there was no doubt he understood it more deeply now.

As the others slowly approached, Jing Jiu tried to struggle at first. But kunai and other projectiles shot at him from every direction soon left more than a dozen cuts across his body.

When Chiba used another Earth Flow Spear to cripple his other leg, Jing Jiu finally gave up resisting and let the kunai slip from his hand.

For some reason, Jing Jiu suddenly chuckled. "Heh. To die like this... What a pathetic end."

He raised his head sharply and shouted,

"Come on, take my head. It should be worth a good bit of money, heh. The day I became a rogue ninja, I was already prepared for this kind of ending."

Yahiko paused briefly, then shook his head. "We're not killing you for the money your head is worth."

"Hmm?"

Jing Jiu looked at them in confusion.

They had no village Forehead Protectors, which meant they didn't belong to a ninja village. If they were only after a rogue ninja, there'd be no reason to hide their identities. So he'd assumed they were members of some small, unaffiliated bounty-hunting clan in the Ninja World.

But now it seemed that wasn't the case.

Yahiko looked at Jing Jiu with resolve. "We're killing you to bring justice to the innocent civilians you murdered."

"Hmm? Bring them justice?"

Jing Jiu stared blankly for a moment, then burst out laughing. By the end, he was laughing so hard that tears streamed from his eyes.

"Ha ha ha! What an... interesting reason."

"You bastard! Don't you feel even a little guilty about the innocent people you killed? What did they ever do wrong? How could you—"

Yahiko charged forward and punched him hard in the face.

"Pff—"

The blow sent Jing Jiu tumbling helplessly a long way across the ground.

After a moment, Jing Jiu struggled to lift himself up slightly. He looked at Yahiko with mockery written all over his face.

"Why should I feel guilty? You ask what they did wrong? I can tell you exactly: their greatest mistake was..."

"Being weak!"

Jing Jiu spat out a contemptuous mouthful of blood.

"You naive brats. This is a world ruled by the strong, where the weak should willingly offer everything to the strong. You're entitled to stand here and say all this today only because you're stronger than me. If I were strong enough, you'd be the ones dying here. As long as I'm strong enough, I can do no wrong. Even if I'm wrong, it'll still be right..."

"You bastard!"

As Jing Jiu continued to taunt and mock them without the slightest remorse, Yahiko's eyes grew angrier and angrier.

Chiba, however, found himself deeply affected by those words.

To be honest, there were plenty of people in the Ninja World who would casually prey on ordinary civilians. It was probably quite common.

Orochimaru was the most obvious example.

With all the secret bases he had scattered across the Ninja World, there was no telling how many ordinary people he'd harmed.

And there were Danzo's Root and the secret organizations of the various ninja villages. Chiba himself couldn't believe they didn't conduct similar experiments.

Yet people like them lived comfortably all the while. The reason was simple: they were powerful, and they had powerful connections.

Whenever a great war broke out, countless ninjas died. But the innocent bystanders caught in the fighting suffered even worse losses. Did anyone ever hear their cries?

Chiba didn't agree with Jing Jiu's beliefs, but a few things he'd said weren't wrong.

This was a world ruled by the strong, and weakness was the greatest sin.

A moment later, Yahiko, thoroughly enraged, drove a kunai into Jing Jiu's chest with his own hands.

Even as he died, Jing Jiu kept mocking them.

"Heh. You naive brats. One day, you'll realize that your so-called justice is worthless in this world—too weak to withstand anything. Ha ha ha..."

Yahiko looked silently at the corpse before him, his expression troubled. But that uncertainty soon gave way to a resolve unlike anything he'd felt before.

"It's because people like you exist that I have to change this world."