The next day, Uchiha Ken and the others ran into ten Chakra Samurai and immediately engaged them in battle. After six fell in quick succession, the remaining samurai turned and fled. Unwilling to let them escape, the group hurried after them.
Unexpectedly, these four Chakra Samurai proved remarkably adept at fleeing. They made full use of the terrain and their powerful physiques. Although they failed to shake off Uchiha Ken and the others, they kept the group from catching up with them.
The group had intended to give up for the time being, but whenever they stopped to rest, the Chakra Samurai returned to ambush them, denying them even a moment of peace. These samurai knew no fatigue and could push their stamina to its absolute limit. Trying to outlast them was clearly impossible, leaving only one choice—fight!
During the pursuit, however, Uchiha Ken and Fujimura Yuki keenly sensed something amiss. In principle, the Chakra Samurai were mentally sluggish. While they possessed basic combat skills, they were nowhere near as adaptable as ordinary people. Yet these samurai were clearly using much more flexible tactics. They were nothing like the Chakra Samurai the group had faced before.
The Chakra Samurai must all have taken the secret medicine Katsuya Uchiha had developed in secret, allowing them to rapidly acquire the power of chakra. The Daimyo might have believed they would remain loyal to him, but the medicine did more than stimulate the body's latent potential—it also clouded the mind. As the samurai took more of it, they gradually came to obey Katsuya Uchiha.
It was precisely because the medicine's mind-clouding effects were so powerful that the Chakra Samurai became mentally sluggish, as though trapped in a dream. Rather than people, they were more like puppets that merely wore human forms.
If mere