Before the Masked Man could say anything,
another black figure suddenly dropped from the sky, landing right in front of Orochimaru.
The moment Orochimaru saw the familiar Red Cloud Black Robe, his eyes flashed.
Someone from the Akatsuki?
But before he could react, something even more astonishing happened.
The Chen Xiaoxi who had just landed wasn't standing on a branch. He was... standing in midair.
A levitation technique?
Orochimaru scrutinized the figure.
He wore a loose Red Cloud Black Robe and held an unsheathed short sword in one hand.
He had short brown hair, a sharply defined face, fair skin, and... golden eyes that seemed to burn.
He wore no Forehead Protector.
Orochimaru suddenly grinned, revealing a sinister smile.
"Heh."
"A member of the Akatsuki, are you?"
"Using a trick like that the moment we meet—isn't that a little rude?"
"Shouldn't you introduce yourself first, golden-eyed boy?"
As the words left his mouth,
before Chen Xiaoxi could answer, Orochimaru abruptly opened his mouth in a bizarre expression.
Then an even stranger sight appeared.
A hand suddenly emerged from his mouth!
Then another hand, followed by a head, and finally his entire body!
At last, an Orochimaru covered in slime crawled out of the mouth and leaped onto a nearby tree trunk.
The figure that had been trapped in Six Rods Light Prison was now nothing but an empty shell.
This was Orochimaru-Style Perfect Substitution!
Without making a single Hand Seal, he could escape any predicament by shedding his body like a snake.
Even with his original body trapped by Six Rods Light Prison, he could still escape!
Watching the scene,
the Masked Man Tobi let out a shriek. "Yuck, that's disgusting!"
But
Chen Xiaoxi remained calm, as if he'd expected it.
Of course he knew Orochimaru had this trick. He'd never expected to defeat him so easily with a single Bakudō.
So he simply looked at Orochimaru and smiled.
"Why would I need to introduce myself to you?"
"Weren't you the one who deliberately leaked information this time to lure us here?"
"...Huh?"
Orochimaru wasn't the only one stunned by those words. The Masked Man Tobi was, too.
Then he immediately began theatrically clutching his head.
"What?
"Is that true, senpai?"
"Damn it! Does that mean our Feiyu duo are the ones who've been ambushed this time?
"Waaah!"
"Shut up."
Chen Xiaoxi glanced at the Masked Man Tobi, then looked at Orochimaru and said coolly,
"Did your movements just now look like you were traveling somewhere?
"They seemed much more like you were waiting for us to attack."
"Your acting is terrible."
"..."
After Chen Xiaoxi finished speaking,
Orochimaru froze for a moment.
Then he slowly grinned, his expression turning sinister as he stared at Chen Xiaoxi and laughed hoarsely.
"Heh. Is that so?"
"Yet even with my terrible acting, I seem to have fooled you, golden-eyed boy."
"Haven't you noticed... something different behind you?"
As he spoke,
the smile on Orochimaru's face grew more and more unsettling.
Hearing that,
the Masked Man Tobi immediately looked behind Chen Xiaoxi. The moment he did, he froze.
Several small purple snakes had appeared on the tree behind Chen Xiaoxi. They bared silver fangs.
The instant he noticed them,
the snakes shot toward Chen Xiaoxi's back, moving at incredible speed!
Before Chen Xiaoxi could react, they had wrapped around all four of his limbs, leaving him unable to move at all!
In an instant, the situation had completely turned around!
Chen Xiaoxi was trapped!
Seeing his scheme succeed, Orochimaru grinned, narrowed his eyes at Chen Xiaoxi, and chuckled darkly.
"So, how does it feel now?"
"..."
A deathly silence fell over the scene.
The Masked Man Tobi seemed to finally catch on. He put on an extremely worried expression and shouted at Chen Xiaoxi,
"Waaah! Senpai Chen Xiaoxi?
"Are you all right?
"Do you need my help?"
"You're so noisy."
Chen Xiaoxi's calm voice suddenly rang out, cutting off the Masked Man Tobi's chatter.
But what astonished everyone was that
his voice hadn't come from beside them.
It had come from... above!
"?"
Realizing this, Orochimaru and the Masked Man Obito felt their hearts lurch at the same time. They looked sharply up into the sky!
But before they could find where the voice had come from, they heard another calm voice.
"Scatter, Senbonzakura."
Before the words had even faded, cherry blossoms scattered across the sky.
The sharp sword tips seemed to slice through the air!
In an instant, the blade fell from above and shot toward Orochimaru's chest!
Splurt!
In the blink of an eye, Orochimaru's entire body was pierced by the cherry blossoms, which smashed through the tree trunk behind him as well!
Then he was pinned firmly to the ground!
Blood gushed out, staining the earth red.
Orochimaru's pupils shrank to pinpricks. He stared at the cherry blossoms in the sky in disbelief, his face completely frozen.
Meanwhile, nearby,
the Masked Man, Obito Uchiha, who had thought he had everything under control, froze like he'd seen a ghost when he saw what happened.
Only then did he quickly raise his head and look toward the sky. He could just make out Chen Xiaoxi holding a sword.
No... it couldn't be.
What... had just happened?
Had Chen Xiaoxi never come down in the first place?
Obito was completely dumbfounded.
"..."
The vast forest in the valley was terrifyingly quiet.
Only the rustling of the breeze through the leaves remained, as if all were peaceful.
But
neither Orochimaru nor the Masked Man felt any peace. Their backs were prickling with dread!
Disbelief filled both their eyes.
When?
How had he done it?
Still reeling from the shock, they suddenly looked in the same direction—
toward Chen Xiaoxi, who had been trapped by the purple snakes.
But what they saw next made their scalps go numb.
The trapped Chen Xiaoxi smiled faintly at them,
then slowly turned transparent and... vanished completely!
He had turned into thin air!
Orochimaru and the Masked Man both jolted and stared wide-eyed at the sight.
There had been no explosion, and he hadn't switched places with anything?
What was going on...?
Had that Chen Xiaoxi not been a Shadow Clone or a Substitution Technique at all?
Hiss...
No way...
Could what he'd used have been... a genjutsu?
Although the two were in different places, they arrived at the same conclusion.
After all, in their understanding, any Clone Technique or Substitution Technique would have some telltale sign.
But the Chen Xiaoxi down there had simply vanished...
It was safe to say that it had to be a genjutsu!
But...
If that had been a genjutsu, when had this guy put us under?
He hadn't even come down, and he'd still managed to do that?
That was ridiculous, wasn't it?
Before you continue