Bone Release

As the last word fell, his arm suddenly tensed. Amid the grating sound of shattering rock, the bone spear swept downward, and an arm dropped heavily to the ground.

It rolled several times before landing in front of Qifeng. He raised his foot and crushed it beneath his heel as if stomping on an ant!

With the arm no longer blocking it, the bone spear pierced straight through Tsuchi's chest and into the wall behind him, skewering them together.

To be honest, even Qifeng had not expected to display such strength after fully unleashing the Shikotsumyaku.

He had been living like a salted fish all this time, so he did not have a clear understanding of his own strength.

Of course, the greater reason was that he had caught Tsuchi completely off guard. Tsuchi probably had not expected the Konoha brat who could not withstand a single punch from him to suddenly transform into a spiky hedgehog.

At the same time, Qifeng failed to notice the system notification that popped up after he fully activated the Shikotsumyaku.

Kekkei Genkai Shikotsumyaku: +10 Constitution!

This was the true effect of a Kekkei Genkai in the system's evaluation.

His original 45 points in taijutsu, plus another 10, instantly reached 55 points, nearing the level of a Jonin.

The severed arm and pierced chest finally made Tsuchi react.

Gritting his teeth, he pressed his remaining left hand hard against the wall to stabilize his center of gravity and find a point of leverage, then whipped a kick at Qifeng's forehead.

Bang!

Qifeng raised his left arm to block.

But the veins and blood vessels in his left arm instantly burst under the tremendous impact, blood spraying wildly from every pore in his arm.

At the same time, he staggered. The bone spear pressing against Tsuchi loosened, allowing him to escape.

Losing an arm, coupled with the penetrating injury in his chest, was undoubtedly a devastating blow to Tsuchi.

Blood poured from his mouth in mouthful after mouthful as though it cost nothing.

But a Jonin was still a Jonin, especially one known for his physical prowess. Taking a deep breath, he clenched his left hand and charged at Qifeng.

The Sharingan locked on, and the Shikotsumyaku defended.

The battle once again turned into one-sided punishment.

The difference was that Qifeng had revealed all his cards, while blood continued to seep from Tsuchi's wounds. The gap between them was steadily narrowing.

I still haven't mastered the Shikotsumyaku. Otherwise, one Dance of the Emerging Fern would turn him into a human skewer. Qifeng stared through the gaps in the white bones at Tsuchi's storm-like assault, his thoughts racing to distract himself from the pain of pulling bones free.

There was no helping it. The extracted bones could heal instantly, but the pain did not disappear.

He had originally thought that the Shikotsumyaku he received through the system was complete, that he could instantly unleash all of its power.

The facts proved that he had been overthinking things.

No matter how powerful the Shikotsumyaku was as a Kekkei Genkai, he had only acquired it recently and had merely grasped the basics. He could not display its proper power at all.

Otherwise, Qifeng in this state would not merely be approaching Jonin strength. He would definitely be above a Jonin.

Bang!

Tsuchi threw another punch, knocking Qifeng back several steps.

But he could no longer pursue relentlessly as before, attacking without pause.

Instead, he braced himself on his knees, his chest heaving violently.

Yet the harder he tried to breathe, the more blood sprayed from his chest cavity.

His face had already turned somewhat pale.

He probably had never expected their fight to develop into this sort of situation.

All because he had stepped on a corpse.

If he had known it would turn out like this, he should have gone all out from the start.

Now that the breath he had been holding dispersed, his limbs grew weaker and weaker, and his eyelids began to droop uncontrollably.

Was death coming?

He suddenly felt lost.

Qifeng also quietly breathed a sigh of relief. To be honest, he was not feeling good either. Every one of the other man's punches had felt like a sledgehammer strike.

His left arm had also burst apart under the heavy blows.

Fortunately, his bones were hard, and with the Shikotsumyaku's recovery ability, he had barely regained the ability to move.

He glanced at the shield constructed from bone, its surface covered in fine cracks.

These were Shikotsumyaku bones!

"Cough, cough."

Tsuchi coughed violently.

Qifeng's expression remained cold, without the slightest trace of sympathy.

Dragging the bone spear behind him, he carefully approached step by step. He did not let down his guard just because the other man was badly injured.

Tsuchi struggled to raise his head. His exhausted voice rang out. "What is your name?"

Qifeng stopped one step away from him, the bone spear aimed at his heart.

The moment the words left his mouth, Tsuchi, who had appeared to be on the verge of death, suddenly sprang into action.

But while Tsuchi was fast, Qifeng, whose Sharingan had locked onto him, was faster. He had long prepared for the possibility that Tsuchi would not surrender so easily.

His right hand exerted force, and the bone spear stabbed into Tsuchi's heart.

In that instant, Tsuchi's raised hand froze.

Squelch! Squelch! Squelch!

Pale bones pierced out from Tsuchi's body one after another. It was as though a mass of bones had exploded inside him, turning his entire body into a hedgehog.

"Bone Release! Bone Stab Technique!"

This was a usage of the Shikotsumyaku that Qifeng had improvised on the spot.

The Kaguya Clan had taijutsu techniques suited to the Shikotsumyaku, such as Willow Dance, Camellia Dance, and so on.

But he had only obtained the Shikotsumyaku, not those taijutsu techniques.

In that instant, he suddenly thought that since the Shikotsumyaku was so similar to Wood Release and the Sage Body, perhaps he could try learning Senju Hashirama's Wood Release ninjutsu and combine it with his own bones to perform similar techniques.

The inspiration for this move came from Wood Release: Cutting Technique.

He stabbed bones into the opponent's body, then detonated them, destroying the opponent from the inside out and extinguishing their life signs.

A taijutsu ninja as physically powerful as Tsuchi had a strong body, especially after combining it with Earth Release, which made his exterior even tougher. But if Qifeng chose to destroy him from within, it became much easier.

This experiment had succeeded, laying the foundation for Qifeng's future development of Bone Release.

Pressing down on Tsuchi's head, Qifeng watched in his disbelieving eyes as his body crashed heavily to the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.

Only after finishing all this did Qifeng finally relax. He dropped onto the ground, feeling sore all over.

This battle had been won by the skin of his teeth.

He had only succeeded because he caught Tsuchi off guard. Otherwise, he would never have had a chance of winning.

After all, even with one arm severed and his chest pierced through, Tsuchi had still been able to pin him down and pound him mercilessly.

If not for the surprise of the Shikotsumyaku, then no matter how furious Qifeng had been over Tsuchi's destruction of the corpse, he could only have chosen to flee.

Principles were principles, but one needed to be alive to have principles.

"Hiss—"

It really hurt.

The Shikotsumyaku was powerful, but it truly hurt as well.

Looking at the bones protruding from his body, he thought for a moment before activating his Chakra again. One bone after another, still connected with flesh and blood, squeezed out of his body and fell to the ground.

He had no intention of pulling them back in.

Though he did not know whether Kimimaro's blood disease came from reusing those bones after exhausting them, as long as there was even a possibility, Qifeng would avoid it.

It only deepened the pain.

But pain was just pain. The longer it hurt, the more one got used to it.

Once all the bones had fallen away and the wounds on his body healed themselves, Qifeng lay on the ground, drenched in sweat.

His face was pale.

He stopped supplying Chakra to his eyes, and the Sharingan returned to normal.

After resting for a short while.

He forced himself to stand.

He still could not rest. Before Orochimaru and the others returned, he needed to clean up the scene.

For now, he could not let others know about his abilities, especially Orochimaru.

Even this small-scale test had been so dangerous. Who knew how terrifying it would become once the war truly began?

The outside world was too dangerous. He wanted to return to Konoha.