Captured Alive

It was just about getting under people's skin and messing with their heads. Kawaki Aoba figured that compared to him, they were all amateurs.

As it turned out, Kawaki Aoba was still much better at making enemies.

His words had struck a nerve with the two Hyuga ninjas, as if he'd ripped open old wounds. Their anger surged another two levels.

"You damn brat, you'll pay for this."

"Brat, I promise you'll regret ever being born. Our orders were only to bring you back. They never said we had to bring you back in one piece. You've run out of Chakra, haven't you? Then get ready to welcome hell."

Kawaki Aoba used White Lightning noticeably less often, which thrilled the two Hyuga Clan ninjas. Now that they saw a chance, they sped up their attacks again.

Both of them were thinking that once they captured Kawaki Aoba, they would make sure to give the damn brat a good taste of torture.

As for Kawaki Aoba, although he could feel his Chakra running low, he wasn't worried in the slightest. Instead, he kept taunting them. "You're only threatening me. Not going to deny it? Seems even you admit you're Ninja Dogs."

"Bastard!"

"Damn you!"

The two Hyuga Clan Chunin hated Kawaki Aoba even more, but just as he'd said, even after being mocked and taunted like this, neither dared deny it.

Just then, the Body Flicker Technique beneath Kawaki Aoba's feet suddenly accelerated, widening the gap between him and the two men.

"Damn it, stop him! The brat's making a run for it!" Seeing Kawaki Aoba's move, one of the Hyuga Chunin blurted out.

But he quickly realized he was wrong. Kawaki Aoba wasn't running at all. Instead, he brazenly pulled a tube of blue liquid from his ninja pouch and gulped it down.

Apparently, the brat had used that burst of speed to put some distance between them so he could drink the mysterious liquid.

"Sorry, we've been fighting for a while, and I'm a little thirsty. I'm going to have some special juice. You don't mind, do you?" He put the empty blue test tube back into his ninja pouch—or, in reality, into his System Inventory.

Naturally, what Kawaki Aoba had just drunk wasn't juice. It was a Blue Potion that helped restore his Chakra.

That's right—it was a mana potion from a game.

Kawaki Aoba admitted he didn't have a huge Chakra pool, let alone an absurdly massive one. But with Blue Potions, he could still wear down opponents with far more Chakra than him.

For other ninjas, spending Chakra in a high-intensity battle was like draining their physical energy and mental strength. But Kawaki Aoba just had to pop a potion.

What was that saying? I could keep fighting like this all day.

After Kawaki Aoba's little interlude to refill his Chakra bar, the battle continued. The two Hyuga Chunin also began to realize something was wrong.

"How does the brat suddenly have so much Chakra again? Something's off. It must be whatever he drank earlier. Probably something like a Military Ration Pill."

"We can't let this go on. Who knows how many of those things he brought with him?"

They were only second-rate Chunin in the Hyuga Clan, but they had at least lived long enough to gain some experience in reading a battle.

They'd sensed something was off while Kawaki Aoba was recovering. And they had the Byakugan, which let them clearly see the Chakra filling his body once they activated it.

After seeing Kawaki Aoba's hidden means of recovering Chakra, the two Hyuga ninjas changed their fighting style again, becoming even more vicious and aggressive. In exchange, they began using a strategy of trading wounds for wounds to end the fight quickly.

As long as they could take out the brat and complete their mission, even if one of them ended up seriously injured, it would be worth it.

But Kawaki Aoba wasn't about to let those two have their way.

"Ready to risk your lives? Then bring it on." The two Hyuga Chunin had trump cards that let them unleash their power. How could Kawaki Aoba not have one of his own?

In an instant, Kawaki Aoba's speed surged. It was the Body Flicker Technique, but far beyond the ordinary kind.

"What?"

"How is this possible? How is the brat so fast?"

It's lightness skill. I fused part of it into the Body Flicker Technique.

Of course, that was something he only said in his head. Kawaki Aoba would never say it out loud.

Back when he'd tried to make himself faster by incorporating lightness skills into the Body Flicker Technique, he'd suffered more than a few hardships.

Even now, using this improved version of the Body Flicker Technique came at a steep cost.

Using Chakra to power the improved technique made him faster, but it also damaged his body. If he used it for too long, it would leave him with irreversible injuries.

As for why Kawaki Aoba dared to use a technique with such a serious drawback so recklessly, it was because besides Blue Potions, he also had Red Potions.

With his high-speed Body Flicker Technique and Hadō #4: White Lightning, Kawaki Aoba couldn't quite claim he was playing the two men like puppets, but he could certainly say he had the battle firmly under control.

At the very least, he could proudly declare, "This is my Kawaki Aoba's home turf!"

He darted back and forth at high speed with the Body Flicker Technique, releasing White Lightning again and again. In the end, after wasting another Blue Potion and a Red Potion, he wore the two men down in the middle of the fight.

By the time the battle ended, the two men barely looked human. After being blasted by White Lightning over and over, they were both scorched on the outside and tender within.

There was no helping it. As a low-level Kido, White Lightning's main effect was paralysis, not damage. But because of how ninja Chakra worked, White Lightning cast without an incantation barely paralyzed them at all.

So it could only be called an accident. No one was to blame.

As for why the two men hadn't tried to escape, but had kept carrying out their mission even at the cost of ending up like this?

Hah. What more was there to say about Ninja Dogs raised by the Hyuga Clan?

Looking at the two men lying unconscious, Kawaki Aoba activated his Byakugan. After confirming that their Chakra was truly exhausted, he... added another safeguard.

"Way of Binding No. 4: Crawling Rope."

Chakra turned into golden ropes and bound the two men tightly. Then Kawaki Aoba took a real rope from his ninja pouch and tied them up again before he finally felt at ease.

When you're still weak, it never hurts to be cautious.

Kawaki Aoba looked down at the two men he'd captured alive. He'd already decided what to do with them.