Oh? Instead of Running Away, You're Charging at Us?

While Shuofang Si was checking his injuries, he discovered a pleasant surprise: under the influence of the lightning strike's aftershocks, his Golden Bell Shield had broken through to major completion in one fell swoop.

But just then, with his ear apertures already open, he suddenly caught a faint sound.

Instinctively, he used Serpentine Movement, skimming low across the ground for several meters.

A wind blade carved a deep gouge through the spot where he had just stood, turning up the soil and leaving a cut as smooth as a mirror.

Wind Release: Wind Cutter Technique.

Shuofang Si turned around. A dense crowd of ninja was advancing on him, all wearing the forehead protectors of Otogakure. There were at least twenty of them.

Their leader was a ponytailed Sound Ninja, who was staring greedily at the two Thunder Swords in his hands.

"Hey, hand over those Thunder Swords. Those are weapons belonging to Kirigakure's Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist."

Another, shorter Sound Ninja beside the ponytailed leader had already drawn a kunai, his voice dripping with disdain.

"Why waste words on him? After taking a lightning strike like that, how much fight could he have left? Just take them off his corpse."

Shuofang Si raised his trembling hands.

A smile slowly spread across his face, concealing a surge of excitement.

These were all reward points.

Fifty points per Sound Ninja. More than twenty of them meant over a thousand points.

These Sound Ninja thought he was on his last legs, but that only applied against powerful opponents. A heavily armored fighter with high defense excelled at mowing down fodder.

Nimble fighters who relied on skill had to dance on a knife's edge. He only had to charge straight through.

Shuofang Si drove the two Thunder Swords into the ground, burying their blades in the scorched soil.

He released the hilts and looked at the dense crowd of Sound Ninja closing in.

"He's not even taking the Thunder Swords? He's charging us bare-handed?" The ponytailed Sound Ninja froze for a moment, then burst out laughing.

The short Sound Ninja beside him also flashed a cruel smile, twirling the kunai between his fingers.

"One man against more than twenty of us. What arrogance. I'm going to knock his teeth out one by one and watch him scream and beg."

He waved his hand, and a volley of kunai and shuriken came flying straight at Shuofang Si's face.

The dense whistle of metal cutting through the air merged into a piercing shriek in the night. Dozens of kunai and shuriken sealed off his escape routes from every angle.

Shuofang Si did not retreat an inch. Crossing his arms to shield his face, he leaned forward slightly and charged.

"Oh? Instead of running away, you're charging at us?"

But before the Sound Ninja's mocking smiles could fade, Shuofang Si crashed head-on into the rain of kunai like a charging bull.

A pale golden glow flashed across his skin. The protective force of his major-completion Golden Bell Shield erupted in a string of crisp metallic clangs the instant the thrown weapons struck.

Clang, clang, clang, clang, clang! The kunai and shuriken struck him as though they were hitting a steel plate, scattering sparks before bouncing harmlessly to the ground.

His sleeves were shredded, but only faint white marks remained on his skin. They had not even scratched him.

"What?" The short Sound Ninja's smile froze on his face.

By then, Shuofang Si had already closed the distance. With Serpentine Movement, he skimmed along the ground, evading a Fire Release Ninjutsu attack coming from the side.

He slammed into the crowd of Sound Ninja like a cannonball.

Spreading his arms, he unleashed Nine Yin White Bone Claw and flashed past them. The three nearest Sound Ninja tried to meet him head-on, only for his fingers to clamp onto their skulls. With muffled wet pops, five finger holes appeared in the top of each head, and they crumpled limply to the ground.

The remaining Sound Ninja hurried to put distance between them, but Shuofang Si gave them no chance.

He tore through the crowd like a tiger. Serpentine Movement always brought him to angles where the other ninja could not catch him in a ninjutsu crossfire. Every attack brought another Sound Ninja down.

The penetrating force of Heart-Destroying Palm passed through armor and shattered internal organs. The finger strikes of Nine Yin White Bone Claw pierced vital points. With his major-completion Golden Bell Shield, the Sound Ninja's counterattacks felt like little more than scratches.

This was not a fight. It was a one-sided slaughter. A combat tank charging into a pack of genin from a second-rate ninja village was like a tiger entering a flock of sheep.

Occasional ninjutsu attacks flew at him from farther away, but with both his eye and ear apertures fully open, he always detected their activation in advance, sidestepped them, and resumed tearing through his prey.

On the other battlefield, Neji's Byakugan darted rapidly, the veins around his temples bulging.

His gaze was fixed on the masks floating behind Kakuzu, but just then, his Byakugan picked up a detail everyone else had overlooked.

The left hand Sasuke had severed from Kakuzu earlier lay motionless among the rubble at the edge of the battlefield, yet it still gave off a chakra signature.

Just as he noticed it, countless black threads suddenly shot out of the severed hand, aimed straight at Tenten, who was unrolling a scroll to provide support with ninja tools from a distance.

"Watch out! Something's wrong with that severed hand!" Neji lunged toward Tenten and shoved her aside.

Black threads burst from the severed palm like a bundle of black javelins, piercing straight through Neji's left shoulder.

Blood sprayed through the air. Neji grunted and dropped to one knee, his left arm hanging limply at his side.

A flicker of regret crossed Kakuzu's eyes. What a shame. That severed hand could have taken one of them out first and thrown the others into disarray.

These Konoha Ninja were a particularly bad matchup for him. His trump card, Earth Release: Earth Spear, could render ordinary ninja attacks completely incapable of penetrating his defenses.

But Kakashi's Lightning Blade and Sasuke's Chidori Stream were both Lightning Release, the perfect counter to his Earth Release defenses.

That Uchiha brat had destroyed his Wind Release heart in the first sneak attack, preventing him from using his combined wind-and-fire ninjutsu. With his large-area attack power diminished, clearing out Naruto's shadow clones had become considerably more troublesome.

"Neji!" Sakura immediately rushed to his side. Green medical chakra lit up her hands as she pressed them against the wound in his shoulder.

Neji gritted his teeth, never deactivating his Byakugan. His gaze swept over the floating masks behind Kakuzu, and he suddenly spoke.

"His chakra is mainly concentrated in those masks. Those masks are his weak points!"

Kakuzu's brow furrowed slightly, and the two eerie green lights above his face covering flickered.

The Hyuga Clan. What a troublesome bloodline limit.

Kakashi's pupils abruptly contracted when he heard Neji's words.

So that was what Sasuke had meant by "hearts" earlier.

He formed hand seals, and an earth wall carved with dog heads rose from the ground, blocking several blasts of Water Gun.

Then he grabbed Naruto, who was about to charge in again, and quickly gave him a few instructions in a low voice. Naruto nodded firmly and formed the seals for the Shadow Clone Technique.

Soon afterward, while launching a surprise Lightning Blade attack on Kakuzu's main body, Kakashi deliberately left an opening along his flank.

Kakuzu's mask seized that opening and fired several Water Gun blasts at him, but the attack left Kakuzu unable to watch over one of the masks above him.

"Now! Take this-Spiraling Bullet Barrage!" With help from several shadow clones, Naruto leaped high into the air. The Rasengan in his hand gave off a piercing whine as he slammed it toward one of the floating masks.

But Kakashi noticed a cold smirk tugging at the corner of Kakuzu's mouth, and cold sweat instantly broke out over him.

"Naruto, stop!"