Lightning Release: Lightning Blade

Ye Chen hovered in midair.

Chakra surged inside him as his consciousness spread outward.

He used it to probe the entire Hidden Jun Village for anything unusual.

The village now had two additional facilities.

Two new players who preferred PVE were lingering inside them.

Their strength was only at the mid-tier genin level.

After all, they preferred management-style gameplay.

Although they had also earned decent rewards in the previous battle, their gains in strength still lagged considerably behind those of the other players.

Everyone had their own ambitions, and their tastes differed even more.

Ye Chen was happy to see it and had no intention of interfering.

But... with so many players heading out in groups to farm mobs, the village had no defenders left. It was no different from leaving the gates wide open.

Count on those NPCs to defend the village?

They could not hold a candle to even the newest players. How were they supposed to defend anything?

Ye Chen frowned slightly. He felt it was time to assign the players some official duties.

A high degree of freedom certainly had its benefits.

But too much freedom came at a cost, too.

The Hidden Jun Village was a perfect example right now.

With its defenses stripped bare, if the enemy launched a surprise attack, wouldn't he, the Village Chief, have to step in personally?

At that thought, Ye Chen could not help grumbling inwardly:

These idiot players didn't let their guard down and run off to farm mobs just because I'm here, did they?

Thinking back to the handful of times he had acted, he really had displayed the might of a one-man army.

Yet Ye Chen took no pleasure in that. Instead, he floated in the air, complaining nonstop:

"Get this straight! I'm supposed to be the one getting carried!"

"You're all supposed to do the work, okay? Why do I still have to defend the tower myself?"

"No, I need to assign them duties as soon as possible."

"..."

Assigning duties through the system was hardly difficult.

As long as he offered enough contribution points, they would fight tooth and nail over the positions.

While Ye Chen was still complaining, something stirred in his awareness.

"Hm?"

He sensed something unusual at the eastern end of the village.

Ye Chen narrowed his eyes slightly and drifted down from the sky without drawing attention.

Then his figure flickered, vanishing without a trace.

A dense forest lay at the eastern end of the Hidden Jun Village.

Compared with the open ground where the two villages had fought earlier, this place offered far better concealment.

A squad of ninja wore grass-green uniforms, forehead protectors, and masks covering their faces.

They crouched there, peering furtively into the Hidden Jun Village through gaps in the trees.

The ninja were remarkably patient, their movements so slight that they made no sound.

Just then, one of them spoke:

"Captain, when do we attack?"

The large, heavily covered ninja at the front immediately turned and hushed him:

"Shh! Quiet!"

The man who had spoken replied somewhat sheepishly:

"But, Captain... the elder gave us clear intelligence. The Hidden Jun Village is undefended right now. This is the perfect chance for a surprise attack!"

The large ninja leading them lowered his voice and replied impatiently:

"You think you know everything? The other squads aren't moving. Why should we stick our necks out first?"

The man still tried to argue:

"But..."

The large squad leader raised his voice on the spot and snapped:

"No buts! What I say goes."

Silence returned to the forest, though a few breaths had grown heavier.

A moment after finishing his reprimand, the squad leader lowered his voice again:

"I know you're all eager to earn credit, but you should also know that credit only counts if you live to claim it."

Perhaps worried that the others were unhappy, the large squad leader patiently continued explaining in a hushed voice.

"Elder White Ape is notorious for being a sly old fox."

"If he knows the Hidden Jun Village is undefended, why send us to ambush it instead of doing it himself?"

"Because he's wary of that mysterious Village Chief, obviously."

"To put it plainly, our squads are cannon fodder."

"Don't let someone sell you out and then help them count the money."

After that explanation, the heavy breathing in the forest did indeed ease considerably.

This Grass Ninja squad leader was certainly shrewd.

But being shrewd was not necessarily enough.

"Hoot, hoot..."

An owl's call suddenly rang out in the forest.

It was the secret whistle signal the Grass Ninja used to communicate.

Hearing it, one squad member could not help asking:

"They've given the order to charge. Captain, what should we do?"

The large squad leader slowly crouched down and whispered:

"No rush. Let's watch a little longer..."

This Grass Ninja squad chose to hold its position, but rustling sounds rose from both sides of the dense forest.

One well-concealed Grass Ninja squad after another burst from hiding, brimming with murderous intent as they charged toward the undefended Hidden Jun Village.

These Grass Ninja squads were formidable.

Each was led by an elite jonin, with two jonin guarding the flanks and elite chunin following close behind.

In fact, these squads were the true main force of Kusagakure's offensive.

The Grass Ninja squads that had "fled in defeat" earlier had merely been bait.

The undefended Hidden Jun Village was like a delectable morsel, ripe for these Grass Ninja squads to devour at will.

Having sensed them, Ye Chen had already landed silently in the crown of a tree within the forest.

He could clearly sense the prying gaze coming from behind him.

That mysterious elite jonin was still holding back instead of launching a sudden attack, something Ye Chen had never expected.

But even if that elite jonin refused to act, Ye Chen could wait no longer.

If these Grass Ninja really charged into the village and reached its unarmed residents, the consequences were easy to imagine.

A cold gleam flashed in Ye Chen's eyes, and he rose from the treetop.

His fingers flew through hand seals, occasional sparks of electricity flickering between them.

He silently invoked the technique:

Lightning Release: Lightning Blade!

Above the forest outside the village, the previously clear sky abruptly filled with dark clouds.

Crack-crackle...

Thick arcs of lightning wound through the clouds like divine dragons.

The Grass Ninja squads charging toward the village all looked up in terror.

Instinct drove them to scatter and flee.

Yet Ye Chen, his entire body wrapped in lightning, descended from the sky like a massive pillar of electricity.

Crack!

The dazzling white light blinded them in an instant.

The terrifying pillar of lightning struck precisely amidst the crowd.

Even more frighteningly, arcs of electricity spread outward beneath the white glare.

One serpentine bolt after another pierced effortlessly through every ninja's body.

Lightning Release Ninjutsu possessed an inherent advantage in piercing power.

The armor worn by those well-equipped Grass Ninja squad members might as well not have existed.

The weaker ones had their organs pierced by the electrical arcs on the spot, their guts torn apart as they died gruesome deaths.

Even the stronger ones were paralyzed, their movements sluggish.

Under the effects of Lightning Blade, Ye Chen became an arc of electricity, moving as swiftly as lightning itself.

In an instant, he had swept through the crowd, and every Grass Ninja lucky enough to survive the first strike fell beneath the erratic arcs.

Everything happened in the blink of an eye. Only a single thunderclap seemed to have sounded, yet Ye Chen had already cut back and forth through them dozens of times.