Let's Take Him Down Together!

Shinku did not answer. He merely smiled coldly and gathered another mass of Chakra in his hand. "You don't need to know where I come from. All you need to know is... you have nowhere left to run."

Before he finished speaking, his figure vanished among the petals. An instant later, a sharp Chakra blade struck from the side, aimed straight at a Sunagakure ninja's throat! The battle grew faster, and the arrival of Kawaki Aoba and Kakashi made the situation even more complicated.

The Sunagakure ninjas had the advantage in numbers, but their formation began to fall apart under the Konoha ninjas' counterattack.

Meanwhile, Shinku's genjutsu was like an invisible blade, steadily cutting away at the Sunagakure squad's will to fight.

Kawaki Aoba forced his battered body onward, swinging his Kunai as he fought a Sunagakure ninja.

He was not as quick as usual, but every strike was precise and vicious, as though he had focused all his strength into the point of his blade.

The Sunagakure ninja's words kept echoing in his mind—"Your comrades have abandoned you."

The words lodged deep in his heart like a thorn.

Abandoned me... have they?

Kawaki Aoba murmured under his breath, a complicated emotion flashing through his eyes.

He remembered the days they had fought side by side, his comrades' smiling faces, and all the times he had chosen to face danger alone.

"Aoba! Stay focused!"

Kakashi's voice snapped him back to the present. A flash of lightning swept past him and drove back an enemy who had tried to strike from behind.

"Sorry..."

Kawaki Aoba gritted his teeth and forced himself to focus. "I won't let you down again."

The battle raged on. Windblown sand tangled with lightning, while genjutsu clashed with flashing blades.

Every swing of Kawaki Aoba's blade was