The Battle

Senju Seiichiro was a man who talked a lot.

All along the way, he kept striking up conversations with Qiancao and Wuming. His central idea was simple: "I want to spar with Wuming."

Senju Arashi was utterly speechless at her cousin. She turned to her two Uchiha friends and said, "Just ignore him."

But Qiancao often asked Seiichiro for advice on training, and Seiichiro taught him everything without holding anything back. Qiancao benefited greatly along the way.

After hurrying as fast as they could, they took five days to reach a port by the sea.

Senju Arashi's friends had left ahead of them and hired a medium-sized passenger boat that could carry fifteen people.

The captain was a white-haired man nearing sixty. He had a cook and three sailors working under him.

Senju Arashi's friends had offered a very generous price. When the captain saw them, his face lit up with a broad grin, and he helped them carry their luggage onto the boat.

This was Wuming's first time going out to sea by boat. As soon as they set sail, she pulled Qiancao up onto the deck.

Watching the port grow smaller and the vast sea horizon stretch into the distance, Wuming couldn't help asking, "Will we ever go back to that dark, lightless dungeon?"

Feeling the damp sea breeze, Qiancao's gloom from the past few days eased considerably. Hearing Wuming's question, he smiled and replied, "I still have to go back and settle the score with the Uchiha."

The waves at sea were rough, and the boat kept rocking slightly.

But nestled against Qiancao, Wuming felt steadier and more secure than ever before.

Unfortunately, the peace lasted only half a day. The group had just finished lunch in the cabin when excitement suddenly flared across Seiichiro's face.

"Haha! An old friend's here!" Seiichiro pulled on the windbreaker he had prepared earlier and dashed out of the cabin.

Senju Arashi's expression changed, too. She hurriedly warned Wuming and Qiancao, "The Uchiha are here!" Then she rushed out after Seiichiro.

Qiancao naturally didn't want to miss the chance to watch a fight between experts, so he pulled Wuming out of the cabin with him.

As soon as they stepped outside, they saw Arashi and Seiichiro standing side by side on the choppy sea, facing several Uchiha shinobi.

Among the three, Qiancao recognized two familiar faces: Uchiha Ryuji and Uchiha Sawa, the ones who had killed his parents.

The Uchiha shinobi leading them was Uchiha Hideki. He smiled at Seiichiro and said, "You sure took your time. We've been waiting ages."

Seeing Hideki, Seiichiro perked up at once and laughed. "You showed up at just the right time! I haven't had a proper fight in ages. I hope you can give me a good one, even after six months apart!"

With that, Seiichiro formed Hand Seals first: [Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu!] He knew that with Hideki's style, they could spend ages going back and forth without him making a move, so he decided to kick off the fight himself.

A dragon-shaped stream of water surged from beside Seiichiro's feet and shot straight toward Hideki and the others.

With the sea as their battlefield and an inexhaustible supply of water all around them, the Senju Clan had a clear geographical advantage thanks to their skill with Water Release.

"Such a pain!" Hideki said, activating his Sharingan in an instant and using the same technique. A nearly identical dragon-shaped stream of water roared up beside him and intercepted Seiichiro's Water Dragon Bullet in midair.

"Boom!" The two water dragons exploded in midair, sending up a massive wave that rushed straight toward the passenger boat. It looked as if it would capsize the whole vessel.

Meanwhile, Senju Arashi quickly formed Hand Seals: [Water Style: Water Clone Jutsu!]

Six clones leaped out of the sea. Each grabbed a crew member from the boat and hurried away, dodging the oncoming wave as they ran across the water toward the distant port.

The raging wave hit the passenger boat and flipped it over. The vessel shattered into pieces against the surface of the sea.

Far away, the captain watched as Arashi's clone carried him off and his property was torn to pieces. He couldn't help wailing, "Ah! My boat!"

Hearing the captain's wail, Senju Arashi couldn't help complaining, "Sei! Ichiro! Look what you've done! Now I have to pay for it again!"

Seiichiro had no time to reply. He formed Hand Seals, put his hands to his mouth, and spat out a jet of water under extreme pressure: [Water Style: Water Severing Wave!]

A blade-like jet of water swept toward Hideki, about to cut him in half.

"Seriously, whose idea was it to fight the Senju Clan on the sea?" Hideki grumbled inwardly as he kept forming Hand Seals: [Lightning Style: Thunder Arrow!]

Several bolts of lightning shot from Hideki's hands and instantly clung to the blade of water in Seiichiro's mouth.

Lightning traveled incredibly fast. Before the water blade could hit Hideki, several bolts were about to race along it and reach Seiichiro's mouth.

Seiichiro had no choice but to release the blade and give up control of it. It continued toward Hideki on its own momentum, but its speed dropped considerably, and Hideki easily dodged it.

Knowing that ninjutsu alone wouldn't get them anywhere, the two decided to test each other with Taijutsu, stepping across the waves on the surface of the sea.

Elsewhere, Senju Arashi faced Ryuji and Sawa alone.

Ryuji and Sawa formed Hand Seals at the same time: [Lightning Style: False Darkness!]

Two thick lances of lightning burst from their mouths, each brimming with terrifying power.

Senju Arashi didn't dare take them head-on with Water Release. In the rush, she could only form Hand Seals: [Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!]

Great Breakthrough was an extremely basic Wind Release technique. But when it was unleashed by a shinobi with chakra as deep as Senju Arashi's, it became a hurricane, blasting the two lightning lances from False Darkness straight into the sky!

Ryuji and Sawa didn't dare stay put. They ran in opposite directions. On the move, one used Water Release while the other used Lightning Release, and together they unleashed a technique: [Lightning Style: Electromagnetic Murder!]

A pillar of water wrapped in lightning shot toward Senju Arashi. A technique combining two chakra natures was extremely difficult to deal with, so Senju Arashi could only take a deep breath and forcefully exhale, defending with [Wind Style: Vacuum Great Sphere!]

A visible blast of air appeared in midair and shot toward the pillar of water, exploding on impact.

The tremendous recoil knocked Sawa, who was maintaining the water pillar, off her feet. She couldn't keep her balance and fell into the sea.

In desperation, Ryuji ignored the surroundings and immediately spat out [Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique!] to stop Senju Arashi from pursuing them.

Senju Arashi unleashed the same technique again: [Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu!] It directly intercepted Ryuji's great fireball.

But Ryuji had wanted exactly that. The water and fire combined, producing a large amount of steam. From a distance, Ryuji formed Hand Seals: [Ninja Art: Hidden Mist Technique!]

The mist in the air grew thicker and thicker until the entire battlefield was enveloped in fog. Ryuji took the chance to pull Sawa out of the water.

Just as the two began to catch their breath, Senju Arashi seemed completely unaffected by the thick mist. She controlled her Water Dragon Bullet and sent it crashing toward them!

The two could only hurry aside to dodge.

It turned out that Qiancao had activated his Sharingan and seen through the mist, continually reporting their positions to Arashi.

Meanwhile, Seiichiro's tactics were simple. Relying on his deep reserves of chakra and the water all around him, which favored Water Release, he kept using Water Clones to feint.

Though each Water Clone had only one-tenth the strength of the original, that was more than enough to give Hideki trouble.

"No one told me this battle-crazed man would be escorting these two brats!" Hideki lamented inwardly.

Seeing that Ryuji and Sawa were also struggling and couldn't help him for the moment, Hideki steeled himself. After knocking back Seiichiro's Water Clone, he closed his eyes;

When he opened them again, they were no longer ordinary Sharingan, but Mangekyo Sharingan radiating an ominous aura:

[Amaterasu!]