Demonic Illusion: True Tree Binding Kill

The moment Asuma's body sprang from his seat, Wind Release chakra had already filled every blade groove of the Flying Swallow Knuckle Blades.

A metallic hum tore through the training hall in a straight line. The two knuckle blades crossed as they slashed toward Chiba's face, their airflow sweeping the wood chips off the arena floor into a spiral.

He was fast, and the angle was tricky. His left hand feinted while his right struck for real, the Wind Release blades of the knuckle weapons drawing two translucent arcs through the air and precisely sealing off Chiba's paths of escape to either side.

It was close-combat tactical skill at the jonin level—seasoned techniques backed by ample experience.

Chiba did not move.

Both feet remained nailed to the wooden platform, his hands still in his pockets, his center of gravity not shifting even half an inch.

When Asuma's Flying Swallow Knuckle Blades were less than half a meter from Chiba's nose, Chiba's eyes narrowed slightly.

Not the kind of squint one used to look at someone, but as though something deep within his pupils had flashed for an instant.

"Demonic Illusion: True Tree Binding Kill."

His voice was quiet, even somewhat casual, but the instant those words left Chiba's lips, the air above the arena changed.

It was not the oppressive feeling caused by chakra suppression. Rather, the very texture of space had warped. Temperature, light, even the feel of the wooden boards beneath their feet—all of it was replaced within a single breath.

Asuma's Flying Swallow Knuckle Blades slashed to within thirty centimeters of Chiba's face. Their metallic edges struck something invisible, and the airflow of Wind Release chakra burst across the point of contact, while the ripples on the blades were forcibly flattened.

A tremendous resistance traveled up his wrists. It was not a physical block, but interference on a mental level. In the same second, his brain received two utterly contradictory sets of signals.

His eyes told him that Chiba was standing right in front of him, unmoving and undefended.

But his body told him that the arena beneath his feet had vanished.

Asuma lowered his head for a look.

The shock-absorbing boards of the arena were gone, replaced by a thick layer of humus. Tangled roots lay buried in the soil, their surfaces covered in damp moss. The air was filled with the earthy smell of a forest after rain and the bitter fragrance of resin.

Something had wrapped around his ankle.

A tree root thicker than an arm burst from the earth. Its bark was rough and covered in knobby growths. The root climbed up his calf, each tightening coil exerting solid physical pressure, wrinkling the fabric of his shin guards.

Asuma's pupils abruptly contracted.

"What the hell is this?!"

He swung the Flying Swallow Knuckle Blades down at the root around his leg. The Wind Release chakra edge cut into the bark, sending wood chips flying. The sensation was real. The feedback from the cut was real. The sound of fibers tearing as the root snapped was real.

Yet within half a second, the severed root regrew. It was thicker than before, and there were more of them. The number of roots bursting from the soil doubled, winding up his thighs and all the way around his waist.

"Impossible! This is just genjutsu—it can't have a physical form!"

Asuma began flooding his body with chakra, trying to break the technique by force. Wind Release currents surged from every pore of his body, scattering the fallen leaves and loose soil around him, but the roots did not budge in the slightest.

Because he was trying to dispel it the wrong way.

Chiba's Tree Binding Kill was fundamentally different from the version Yuhi Kurenai had demonstrated.

Yuhi Kurenai's Tree Binding Kill was pure genjutsu, using spiritual chakra to create a false scene of vegetation and deceive the target's five senses to restrain them. It looked convincing, but it was fundamentally fake. A burst of chakra was enough to break it.

Chiba's version was real.

The arena's wooden floor still contained plant fibers from the timber. Chiba's Wood Release chakra seeped into it through the soles of his feet, activating those dead cells and making them divide and grow again, creating an entire living network of roots within the arena floor.

Yin Release spiritual power created the outer shell of the genjutsu, making everyone present see a forest.

Wood Release chakra provided physical substance within the illusion, turning the roots' coils and restraints into real force.

There was substance within illusion and illusion within substance. It was impossible to distinguish what was false from what was real. Dispelling the genjutsu was useless because the roots binding you were real. Brute force was useless because your senses were disrupted by the illusion, leaving you unable to even tell which direction the roots were coming from.

It was the perfect fusion of genjutsu and Wood Release.

More than seventy jonin throughout the hall stopped moving at the same instant.

The sight on the arena left them dumbfounded.

Half a breath earlier, it had been a flat wooden platform. The moment Chiba spoke the technique's name, vast swathes of emerald light erupted across its surface. The wooden flooring cracked from the center outward, dense roots and vines squeezing out from the fissures. Enormous trees burst through the boards one after another, their trunks wider than an adult's arm span, their canopies spreading within three seconds to cover half the arena.

Three trees, then five, then seven.

Beneath the towering canopies, the training hall ceiling seemed to have dropped lower. What filtered through the leaves was not sunlight, but the dark-green glow of Chiba's Wood Release chakra, casting the dim gloom of a deep forest across every face.

In the front stands, Yuhi Kurenai's hand had lifted from her knee and hung in midair. Her lips parted slightly, and the incredible forest upon the arena was reflected in her crimson eyes.

As a jonin specializing in genjutsu, she understood better than anyone present what had just happened.

Chiba's technique contained both the mental interference of Yin Release and the tangible chakra output of Wood Release. Two completely different chakra natures were operating in perfect synchronization within the same technique framework, without the slightest rejection or conflict.

Theoretically, that was impossible.

In Konoha's ninjutsu academic system, the combined use of Yin Release and Yang Release had a special term.

Six Paths level.

Tsunade's hand trembled as she held her teacup. Not from fear, but excitement. The bloodline of the Senju Clan was responding to the surging life force of Wood Release on the arena, and more than half the tea sloshed from her cup.

Anko's mouth hung open, unable to close. The skewer of her tricolor dango slipped from between her fingers and fell to the ground, but she did not even notice.

In the shadows at the highest point of the stands, Hiruzen Sarutobi's pipe drooped from his mouth. The ember in its bowl went out. Veins bulged across the old man's hand as his five fingers dug fiercely into the wooden armrest.

On the arena, Asuma had already been surrounded and trapped at the center by five thick tree trunks. Vines extended from the trunks, binding his arms, legs, and waist completely. The Flying Swallow Knuckle Blades were clamped by tree roots. Wind Release chakra hissed across their surfaces, but could not cut through a single vine. His body was lifted roughly half a meter off the ground, struggling in midair like an insect caught in a spiderweb.

Chiba stood in the center of the forest beside the roots of an enormous tree, his hands tucked back into his pockets.

Morning light filtered through the illusion-created canopy and fell across his shoulders. Emerald Wood Release chakra circulated around him, while the roots beneath his feet slowly writhed at his will.

He looked up at Asuma hanging in the air. His expression barely changed, as though he were looking at a product he did not find very satisfactory but could not be bothered to return.

"Jonin Sarutobi, shall we end the spar here?"

Asuma's face had turned bright red. The cigarette in his mouth had flown off during his struggles. Gritting his teeth, he poured chakra outward, the veins in his neck bulging like earthworms, but every time he forced the vines around him to loosen by one degree, they tightened by two the next second.

His ribs began to compress, and his breaths became short and rapid.

Not a single person in the hall spoke.