Thud! Thud! Thud! Crack-snap, snap, snap...
After slamming into several outcroppings along the steep cliff, Xue Ge finally caught hold of a branch jutting out from the rock. The slender branch was far from sturdy and looked ready to snap at any moment, but fortunately, Xue Ge himself was fairly light.
"...Pfft..." Xue Ge coughed up a mouthful of dark red blood, and the pressure in his chest finally eased.
The blood pooling inside him from his severe injuries had finally found an outlet, but his injuries had only grown worse. His hand was trembling now, and waves of weakness washed through his arm.
Xue Ge could feel his consciousness slipping away as his vision began to darken.
"Cough, cough..."
He shook his head hard, then crawled along the branch toward the cliff face. Finding a shallow recess, he leaned into it and caught his breath.
At the top of the cliff, Kakuzu lay at the edge and peered down. A rock happened to block his view of Xue Ge. He searched for quite a while without spotting him.
"Don't tell me that brat fell straight to his death..." Kakuzu's face twitched.
Had the twenty million already within his grasp just flown away? He couldn't accept that. Alive, he needed to see the boy. Dead, he needed to see the body.
Just as Kakuzu was about to slide down the cliff to search, the entire mountain suddenly shook violently. His foot nearly slipped, almost giving him a firsthand taste of Xue Ge's way of descending a mountain.
Once he steadied himself, Kakuzu immediately looked toward the source of the tremors. Behind him, a blaze surged up from below to the mountaintop, then came crashing toward him like a vast tidal wave.
Baffled by the sight, Kakuzu formed hand seals and unleashed Water Release: Water Curtain, holding the oncoming flames at bay for the moment.
Whose Fire Release was this? How could it be so powerful?
Knowing nothing of what had happened at the foot of the mountain, Kakuzu felt a sinking sense of alarm. Don't tell me someone had come to steal my business?
Wind Release: Vacuum Sphere, Rasengan, Wind Release: Vacuum Great Sphere, Shuriken Shadow Clone Technique...
Madara was thoroughly irritated by the ninjutsu hurtling at him from every direction. As he nimbly evaded the attacks, he kept sweeping aside the kunai flying through the air, only to feel as though their numbers grew with every strike.
For this strategy, Minato had packed the scrolls he carried with kunai inscribed with his technique's formula. He wasn't about to run out anytime soon.
Unless an opponent's speed exceeded the user's reaction time, a Flying Thunder God user was almost impossible to hit as long as a mark remained unaccounted for.
Facing a Flying Thunder God user, Madara wasn't certain he could prevent him from escaping. As a result, he didn't dare use many of his powerful techniques that could easily reveal his identity, such as Susanoo.
"All you can do is run..."
Forced to hold back, with nearly all his attacks missing, Madara was growing sick of this fight.
Of course, while Madara found it sickening, Minato found it daunting and alarming.
He had already used almost every means at his disposal, pushing Flying Thunder God, Rasengan, and Wind Release practically to their limits. Yet his opponent showed no sign of strain, evading his attacks with taijutsu alone. Minato hadn't even managed to tear his cloak!
Even now, Minato had yet to see his opponent's face.
This couldn't go on. The gap in their strength was too great for tactics to bridge. His opponent couldn't catch him for now, but he couldn't hurt his opponent either.
Fighting this way consumed too much chakra. He couldn't keep it up for long. His opponent clearly wasn't taking this seriously, so winning a battle of attrition was impossible... Hmm?
Just as Minato was considering what to do, a huge cloud of mist suddenly rose from the summit, so large that he could see it even from the foot of the mountain.
Why was there so much mist... Wait.
Minato remembered that Madara's earlier Fire Release had not only blasted apart a good portion of the mountainside, but also sent considerable flames surging up to the summit. That meant someone up there had used Water Release to counter the Fire Release. The mist was actually steam from the clash of fire and water... Someone was on the mountain?
At that thought, Minato suddenly realized: Right, I only came here to find Xue Ge.
Minato was faster than his opponent. Since Xue Ge wasn't here, he could simply head up and search the mountain. As long as he avoided being caught, there was no need to fight this mysterious man to the death at its foot.
Having sorted out his thoughts, Minato immediately threw a kunai up the mountain.
Meanwhile, Madara also noticed what was happening above and promptly frowned. His thoughts followed much the same course as Minato's, but Xue Ge clearly couldn't use Water Release... Was someone else up there?
Seeing Minato abandon him and head up the mountain, Madara sprang forward and raced up a sheer cliff no ordinary person could traverse. His speed was actually no slower than Minato's successive Flying Thunder God jumps.
Madara couldn't match Minato's maneuverability, but when it came to simply covering ground, the kunai Minato threw weren't really much faster than Madara.
Boom!
Xue Ge had been trying hard to rest and recover when the sudden explosion caught him off guard, making his feet slip. Terrified, he caught the rock face at the last instant and wrapped chakra threads around the branch, barely saving himself from falling.
Madara had nearly gotten Xue Ge killed again.
Dangling in midair, Xue Ge was completely out of options. There was no way to rest in this position, and with his current injuries, he had no idea how long he could hold on.
Below him lay a cliff that would certainly kill him if he fell. He couldn't fly, and he no longer had the strength to climb back up.
Come to think of it, all I'd done was use the Summoning Technique once. How had I gotten so unlucky? Why had even staying alive become so difficult...?
Maybe I should just let go? Or try another Summoning Technique without a designated target?
Even though Xue Ge had already grown numb to it all, the dreadful situation still made him laugh despite himself. A few darkly humorous thoughts inevitably crept into his mind.
A rush of wind sounded, and Xue Ge raised his head as a dark shape landed on the branch.
Crack!
The branch split halfway through and looked ready to break. The situation had just gotten worse, yet Xue Ge's spirits lifted.
"Hawk..."
Kakuzu had been too busy searching for him to deal with Hawk, and now the hawk had landed right in front of him.
The hawk seemed to be looking at Xue Ge. Clearly, today's events had exceeded anything it could comprehend in its short life as a hawk. That green-eyed monster above radiated murderous intent and was frighteningly strong. A single Wind Release: Pressure Damage had left it wounded all over.
For safety's sake, it had landed beside Xue Ge, a little creature stronger than itself, but friendly.
"Did you come to save me? Never mind, let's leave that for later..." Xue Ge used his teeth to pull out the contract he had temporarily tucked against his chest and hung it on the branch. The contract was already stained with his blood, saving him some trouble.
"Make a contract with me, Hawk," Xue Ge said earnestly,
"I'll be a good contract partner."
Even at the brink of death, Xue Ge hadn't forgotten what he needed to do. With difficulty, he found places to hook his feet, then awkwardly extended chakra threads from his broken arm and joined them to the threads tied around the branch.
With his freed hand, Xue Ge grasped the hawk's wounded, bleeding wing.
The hawk didn't struggle. Perhaps it could also sense that Xue Ge meant it no harm. Seeing no resistance, Xue Ge pulled its wing over the contract and dabbed a few drops of blood onto it.
"That should be right..." Xue Ge murmured. "Why don't I feel anything?"
Once the contract was completed, a special connection should form between the ninja beast and the ninja. At the very least, the ninja's chakra should be able to flow into the ninja beast...
Oh, right. I'd forgotten one more step.
"I still need to give you a name..." Xue Ge studied the hawk intently.
Pitch-black feathers, sharp eyes with a rather dopey look in them, and an enormous body...
Snap!
The branch broke. Xue Ge lost his balance and plummeted down the mountain, while the hawk spread its wings and took flight.
He clamped the contract between his feet, bit open his index finger, and used his blood to write the name he had chosen for the hawk on the scroll-
[Black Pine].