"Move!"
A furious shout suddenly rang out.
The shopkeeper, who had seemed frail and old, moved with startling speed the next moment, reaching straight for Uzuki Yugao.
Yugao was stunned.
She had never imagined that the old man before her had been hiding his true abilities so well.
At such close range, there was nowhere to dodge.
Seeing this, the old man's face lit up with delight.
In his eyes, as long as he took one hostage,
dealing with two green Chunin would be no trouble at all.
"Lariat!"
Crackling arcs of lightning suddenly flared.
A lightning-wreathed fist seemed to blast the very air apart.
Thud!
The old man was sent flying hundreds of meters away.
Everything in his path, whether wooden planks or trees, snapped in two.
He slammed into a cliff face and barely managed to stop himself. Then he spat out a mouthful of blood, his head lolling to the side as he died.
Inside the post station, more than a dozen merchants who had been about to spring into action stared in stunned silence.
The intel and mission they had received were simply to deal with three Chunin from Konoha.
Among them, even the dreaded Yellow Flash, Minato Namikaze, had already left.
In their eyes, this mission was a gold mine.
"Clan leader, who is he? He doesn't seem to match the intel," one of the rogue ninja blurted out.
Their leader was none other than the middle-aged man disguised as a merchant. He looked at Qin Yu with a more sinister gaze.
"Hmph. He's only a little fast. Don't forget, our entire clan has come this time. Once we take that brat's head, the bounty will be enough to see us through the war!"
"Our clan is fighting to survive!"
"That's right! We're fighting to survive!"
More than a dozen rogue ninja echoed him at once.
The leader of the rogue ninja stared at Qin Yu and shouted, "Let's finish this quickly. We mustn't let that guy beat us to the bounty!"
At the thought of that man, who reeked of money and danger, the rogue ninja leader's spine still tingled with fear.
"Looks like we've got quite the character here," Qin Yu said with a warm smile.
"Since you're not the main course, there's no reason to keep you around for questioning."
As he spoke, the floor beneath Qin Yu's feet shattered.
The next moment, he vanished like a ghost, reappearing right in front of the rogue ninja leader.
"Rasengan!"
This was the weakest attack Qin Yu had at his disposal.
He infused it with chakra and formed the sphere in an instant.
Without any flourish, he smashed it straight into the rogue ninja.
No!
The rogue ninja leader's pupils suddenly contracted.
This was nothing like the Chunin he knew.
Boom!
The moment the Rasengan struck, the rogue ninja leader's arms, hastily raised in defense, snapped.
The tremendous force sent him flying.
He smashed through the roof beam and slammed into a tree a hundred meters away.
He fared even worse than the rogue ninja who had been disguised as an old man. He couldn't even spit up blood.
His chest caved in, and he died on the spot.
"He's dead? The clan leader is actually dead?"
"Run! We have to run, or the entire Fuma Clan will be wiped out!"
Panicked screams rang through the scene.
The rogue ninja didn't have time to think. They scattered in every direction.
"Qin Yu, hurry after them! These rogue ninja dared to attack outside Konoha. If they run into someone weaker than you, someone could get hurt," Yugao said anxiously.
After recovering from her initial shock, she quickly drew her Chakra Blade and took up a defensive position nearby.
Qin Yu's instant defeat of the rogue ninja leader didn't surprise her.
"Qin Yu, go ahead. I'll protect Yugao," Gekko Hayate said urgently.
This was a great chance to earn some credit.
But when he saw Gekko Hayate's legs trembling like noodles, his words clearly lacked conviction.
"No need. They're not getting away," Qin Yu said calmly, gazing toward the nearby forest.
Just as the rogue ninja leader had said, a troublesome character had shown up this time.
"Arrgh!"
A scream suddenly rang out.
Yugao's face changed. "Qin Yu, was that Lord Minato? Has he arrived?"
In Yugao's eyes, Minato Namikaze had the Flying Thunder God Technique.
They were still on the outskirts of Konoha, and there were bound to be Anbu or sentries patrolling nearby.
The sounds of the battle were loud enough to alert Konoha.
As soon as Minato Namikaze learned what was happening, he could cover the few miles in the blink of an eye with the Flying Thunder God Technique.
"W-what is that?" Gekko Hayate's expression changed drastically.
Before he could react, Qin Yu's right foot flashed out and sent Gekko Hayate flying.
At the same time, Qin Yu pulled Yugao into his arms and hurriedly dodged to the side.
Thud!
The spot where the three of them had been standing was pierced through in an instant.
Dirt flew everywhere as two arms, joined by black veins, grabbed at empty air.
Qin Yu landed with Yugao seven or eight meters away. Gekko Hayate, however, didn't get the same close protection.
He crashed outside the post station. Seeing the eerie hands emerge from the earth, his face went pale.
If Qin Yu hadn't acted in time, he would have been caught by those hands.
"So it really is you, money-grubbing bastard," Qin Yu said, looking toward the forest.
The two hands that had emerged from the earth suddenly tensed, tearing the soil open and revealing themselves to everyone.
A figure shrouded in a cloak, its face hidden from view, walked slowly out of the forest.
But as soon as he emerged, the black veins writhing behind him came into view. A corpse hung from each one.
They were the rogue ninja who had just tried to escape.
"Qin Yu, who is that? He's terrifying!" Yugao's face had gone a little pale.
If the rogue ninja who had appeared earlier were ordinary enemies, then this man was a monster.
He had killed seventeen or eighteen fleeing rogue ninja in an instant.
That was no feat an ordinary ninja could pull off.
"Have you heard of Takigakure?" Qin Yu asked, studying the enemy before him with an amused look.
He had never expected that, not long after arriving in the world of Naruto,
he would run into Kakuzu, a future member of the Akatsuki.
"Takigakure?" Yugao paused, then said, "I heard that two or three decades ago, a rebellion broke out in Takigakure. The powerful village's leaders were slaughtered overnight, and it fell into decline. It hid behind a waterfall to recuperate and rebuild."
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