After the wind swept past, a shocking gash appeared in the ground.
The cross-section of the trench was smooth, as if it had been forcibly ground through by some enormous blunt weapon. Soil beneath the surface and shattered tree roots had been turned up along its edges.
"Hehehe... interesting."
At that moment, a hoarse female voice with a drawn-out tone slowly drifted over from the direction the trench extended.
Then, a tall, gaunt male ninja wearing a Kusagakure forehead protector slowly emerged from the shadows.
His pupils were vertical black slits, and the muscles around his mouth curled upward slightly in a way that did not conform to normal facial structure.
He slowly walked to the edge of the blasted trench, lowered his head to glance at Naruto and the other two, then slowly pulled a black scroll from his robes.
Earth Scroll
He raised the scroll before his face, tilted his head back, opened his mouth, and, before all three of them, swallowed the entire black scroll down his throat.
The scroll stretched the skin of his throat as it traveled down his esophagus, finally disappearing into his abdomen.
After doing all that, he closed his mouth. A long tongue extended from the corner of his lips and licked around them once.
"Then, let the battle for the scroll begin!"
The instant he finished speaking, an undisguised killing intent poured from his body.
In an instant, Sasuke and Sakura felt as though they had seen their own deaths beneath that killing intent.
Sakura collapsed onto the ground.
The oppressive force was completely beyond what she could bear. Sakura's legs went weak, her whole body trembled, and her back pressed against the cold ground. Every nerve screamed at her to run, but her body had completely stopped obeying her.
Sasuke