"Anko, don't say that."
Kakashi didn't agree with Anko's explanation.
He thought that if they talked to Sakura like this, she would only become even more hostile toward Naruto.
Sakura hadn't liked Naruto to begin with.
As expected, Sakura fell silent.
She looked at Naruto in the distance, her hands clenched tight.
"Anko, is this why the adults hate Naruto?"
Sakura had always thought the adults in the village shunned Naruto because he was always causing trouble, had terrible grades, and ranked last in their class.
But after hearing Anko say so much, she began to understand some of the truth.
However, she had guessed wrong.
Only a few Jonin in the village knew that Naruto was a Jinchuriki.
Anko had learned that Naruto was the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki from Hiruzen.
Although Anko was only a Special Jonin, she was special because she was Orochimaru's student.
Strictly speaking, she was Hiruzen's grandstudent. Judging from the conversation between Orochimaru and Anko after Orochimaru attacked the village, Hiruzen had indeed treated Anko like a confidante and discussed many sensitive matters with her.
Secrets that ordinary ninja could hardly know.
The others only guessed that Naruto was the Nine-Tails incarnate. Even Naruto's other teacher, Mizuki, thought so.
Iruka knew Naruto's identity because Hiruzen hoped he would accept Naruto and teach him well, so he told him the truth.
Anko glanced at Sakura.
She noticed that learning Naruto's true identity didn't seem to make Sakura hate or fear him.
If anything, she seemed worried about him.
Hating someone was one thing; worrying about them was another.
They weren't enemies, after all.
Given Sakura's personality, she naturally wouldn't hate or fear him.
Instead, she was worried because he was her teammate.
Anko looked at Sakura, then turned to Kakashi. "Your student seems pretty good."
Kakashi was a little surprised, too.
He knew just how much Sakura disliked Naruto.
He hadn't expected her to show neither fear nor hatred after learning Naruto's identity.
But when he thought about how the three of them had gotten along over the past month or so, it didn't seem all that surprising.
They had all passed the bell test.
He should have realized then that all three were worthy students.
Kakashi smiled.
"They passed my test, after all."
Anko thought of Orochimaru. "Was I a student of his who failed the test?"
Although she hated Orochimaru, she had never been able to let go of her feelings for him.
She had always wanted to earn her teacher's approval.
Unfortunately, Orochimaru left without ever giving it to her.
That had always been one of Anko's regrets.
"I wonder how Yeyu is doing." Kakashi sounded worried.
Anko looked in the other direction.
"He should be all right, shouldn't he?"
Anko didn't think anything would happen to Yeyu.
Ever since he'd made his move, she had felt that he was far stronger than she was.
After roaring at the sky, Naruto turned toward where Yeyu was.
That punch hadn't hurt him.
But it had enraged him.
He expanded his sensory range and found Yeyu.
Naruto opened his mouth and rapidly formed a Tailed Beast Bomb nearly a meter across before him.
Although it was smaller than the previous Tailed Beast Bomb, he was in his Four-Tails state now, so it contained far more chakra.
It had also been compressed, making it several times more powerful than the previous one.
Even the surrounding air was riddled with cracks.
It seemed on the verge of buckling under the Tailed Beast Bomb's power.
Anko looked worried. "Another Tailed Beast Bomb. I don't feel safe here anymore."
Kakashi activated his Sharingan. When he saw how much chakra the Tailed Beast Bomb contained, he was stunned. "That's an enormous amount of chakra. This Tailed Beast Bomb could destroy everything around us."
Anko was about to carry Kakashi and Sakura away again.
But before she could move, Yeyu appeared on top of a bridge pier.
Standing atop the pier, Yeyu looked at Naruto in the distance.
"Another Tailed Beast Bomb. This one's pretty powerful."
The Tailed Beast Bomb was undoubtedly a Tailed Beast's strongest attack.
Yeyu frowned slightly. I wonder what would happen if I sent this Tailed Beast Bomb into Naruto's body.
Never mind. If I blew Naruto up, that would be a disaster.
With his abilities, Yeyu could use the Flying Thunder God Technique to send the Tailed Beast Bomb Naruto had unleashed into Naruto's body.
But Naruto would most likely die on the spot.
Yeyu wasn't close to Naruto, but he still couldn't bring himself to do something that would kill him.
Naruto had already spotted Yeyu.
"Roar!"
After a roar, Naruto seemed to have learned how strong Yeyu was from their earlier fight.
Worried that Yeyu might escape if he waited too long, he immediately fired the Tailed Beast Bomb, brimming with terrifying amounts of chakra.
Boom!
The Tailed Beast Bomb became a streak of red light and shot across nearly a thousand meters of sea.
The storm it kicked up carved a trench a thousand meters long and more than ten meters deep into the sea.
Waves surged all around them.
It looked as if a huge club had slammed down on the sea.
The waves, dozens of meters tall, made it seem like the end of the world.
Carrying Kakashi and Sakura, Anko leaped onto one of the bridge piers.
The waves stirred up by the Tailed Beast Bomb alone could have swallowed the shore where they had just been.
That showed just how powerful the Tailed Beast Bomb was.
And now it was flying straight toward Yeyu.
Anko frowned. "Is Yeyu planning to take it head-on?"
She was worried.
Kakashi gritted his teeth and stared fixedly in Yeyu's direction.
Sakura barely knew Yeyu, but she was worried about him, too.
The hem of Yeyu's clothes whipped violently in the shock wave as he stood on the bridge pier.
In the blink of an eye, the Tailed Beast Bomb was right in front of him.
Yeyu's gaze sharpened.
"Armament Haki: Entanglement!"
Powerful Armament Haki gathered around Yeyu's fist in an instant. It was actually flowing.
It wrapped around his entire fist.
In that moment, smoke suddenly rose from the flowing Haki.
It looked like magma.
And there really was magma inside it.
"Great Eruption!"
Yeyu's fist instantly grew scorching hot, brimming with terrifying power.
Boom!
Yeyu punched with all his might.
His terrifying power collided with the Tailed Beast Bomb.
Bang!
A violent explosion rang out.
The sea within several thousand meters of Yeyu instantly sank.
Thousands of meters of ocean suddenly dropped.
A crater formed, dozens of meters deep and thousands of meters wide.
The bridge pier beneath Yeyu shattered into pieces the moment they collided.
The Tailed Beast Bomb turned into a streak of light and shot tens of thousands of meters into the sky.
Rumble!
It burst open in the sky like fireworks.
The instant it exploded overhead, it shone like the sun.
The shock wave soon reached the sea.
Rumble!
The seawater that hadn't yet flowed back after the earlier shock wave was forced to the edges again by this new one.
Thousands of meters of forest along the surrounding shore were instantly shattered.
The trees turned to dust, the earth split apart, and countless chunks of soil weighing hundreds of tons flew a hundred meters into the air.
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