Shinji Uchiha displayed astonishing individual skill.
His Two-Tomoe Sharingan spun rapidly. His extraordinary motion vision and predictive ability let him find the few narrow openings for survival amid the relentless attacks.
He moved like a phantom, every shift carrying him just clear of a lethal strike. His long sword, Blazing Inferno, danced into a crimson curtain of light, precisely deflecting the poisoned senbon and shuriken he could not dodge.
The blade struck the ninja tools in an unbroken chorus of sharp clangs, scattering sparks.
Before the dust from the first ambush had settled, eight figures radiating icy killing intent slowly rose from the blasted-open underground pits and caves in the rock walls. Like emissaries from hell, they formed a perfect encirclement, sealing every escape route.
The two at their head had a commanding presence that set them apart from the surrounding Sand ninja.
The man looked about twenty-seven or twenty-eight. His handsome face carried a lingering air of gloom and cold severity. He wore the uniform of a Sunagakure elite jonin beneath a light-colored coat marking him as a candidate for elder.
His hands hung naturally at his sides. Threads almost invisible to the naked eye extended from his ten fingers, glimmering faintly with chakra.
Three sinister-looking puppets floated behind him, radiating an ominous aura: one wielded an enormous axe like a door panel, with heavy armor covering its joints; another was slender, its limbs fitted with sharp blade spikes like an assassin; the last had a broad chest cavity, with an intricate network of pipes faintly visible inside, and gave off a thin purple mist.
He was Chiyo's son, the future hope of Sunagakure's Puppet Technique-Wenshu (I don't know his name, so I just made one up).
The woman was about his age, with delicate features, but her eyes