The moisture in the rainforest was wrapped in the smell of rotting leaves, clinging to the skin making it suffocating. Rinto pressed the hood down, pointed his toes over the moss-covered tree trunks, his steps were as light as the wind, but most of his attention was still in his mind - just now The verification of Ochiai Town is only half done. There is still a gap in the connection between the cell energy cycle in the dragon scale and its adaptive configuration. We need to find an absolutely quiet place to lock the resonance, otherwise the sample will carry unstable energy and cause trouble sooner or later.
The road he chose was a deserted path marked on the Jiraiya map. It was the furthest away from the patrol line of Takigakure. Even business travelers rarely walked on it. But just as he jumped over a fallen dead tree, the rotten leaves under his feet suddenly exploded.
It was not the roar of Explosive Tag, but a silent restraint. Dozens of water lines wrapped with seal patterns sprang out from under the fallen leaves, as thin as spider silk, but carrying a paralysis spell that could lock the meridians, and went straight to his ankles, wrists, and heart - not to kill him, but to destroy his ability to control Chakra. The target was the dragon scale in his arms from the beginning.
At the same time, poisonous Kunai stabbed out of the dense leaves of the crown of the tree above his head. Chains wrapped around Explosive Tag were thrown out from the vines on both sides. A Water Release barrier was placed in the stone crevice behind him in advance, sealing even the gap where he turned around.
The ambush was well planned. Locks were locked in all directions at the same time, and even the direction in which Chakra escaped was blocked. It was a siege and killing formation that the Takigakure hunting team had practiced for more than ten years.
Rinto's first reaction was not to hide, but to raise his hand and hold the inner pocket in his arms - the dragon scales were placed there and could not be affected by Chakra's fluctuations. His figure twisted at a very narrow angle in mid-air, and a trace of Chakra that was so light that it was almost invisible spilled out from his fingertips. Instead of cutting off the waterline, he followed the lines of the waterline and gently changed a node.
The water line that was originally so tight that it could cut through skin and flesh instantly dispersed into ordinary dew, drifted out with the wind, and landed on the rotten leaves without even leaving a wet mark. At the same time, he lightly kicked on the dead wood with his toes, and his whole body floated three meters away like a fallen leaf, just avoiding all Kunai and chains, and did not even crush the moss under his feet when he landed.
The whole process passed by in the blink of an eye. There was no roar of Chakra collision, and there was not even any unnecessary movement.
The six Takigakure ninjas who surrounded them all froze. They were a hunting team specializing in guarding the secrets of the border. They had been doing ambushes for almost ten years, and no one had ever been able to break through their advance formation so lightly, without even revealing the Chakra fluctuations.
The leader, Lian, held Ninja Blade's hand tightly, and his brows knitted into knots under his mask. He was the captain of this team, and one of the few Takigakure Jonins who had access to the core heritage of Yang Release. He followed them all the way from the ruins of Ochiai Town, in order to regain the dragon scales of the clan - which were the crystallization of inheritance condensed from the spines after the death of Yang Release ninjas of all generations. Without this thing, even if their entire team went back, their meridians would be disabled and expelled from the village.
He did not let his men rush, and raised Teuchi with a very fast gesture. The remaining five people dispersed instantly, instead of releasing Ninjutsu again, they used their fingertips Hand Seals to mobilize all the water vapor in the surrounding rainforest. Instead of attacking Rinto has placed invisible water particles in the air of the entire forest - as long as Rinto dares to release Chakra, these water particles will stick to it instantly and lock his Chakra circulation.
They knew very well that if Kakuzu could be defeated with one move, they would not get any favors by fighting Ninjutsu head-on. They could only use the soft restrictions that Rainforest is good at to chip away at his advantages bit by bit.
Rinto frowned.
What bothers him is not that he can't win, but that this battle is too noisy. Once the Chakra fluctuations become too big, it will not only attract more Takigakure people, but also interfere with the energy stability of the dragon scales in his arms. The structural gap that he has not completed in the first place will only become more difficult to contain.
He didn't intend to accept the attack, so he turned around and headed deeper into the rainforest, just wanting to escape as soon as possible.
"Don't let him run away!" Lian shouted and took the lead in chasing after him. He didn't let go of those mighty Water Release, but kept Hand Seals with his fingertips, and entangled water vines kept sprouting from the rotten leaves under his feet. Where Rinto ran, a translucent water wall would instantly rise from the ground. It was not intended to hurt him, but only to slow down his pace.
The ninjas on both sides were not idle either. The vines in the rainforest were growing wildly as if they were alive. The spikes were carrying neurotoxins unique to the rainforest, and they were entangled along Rinto's retreat route. There were also people who kept putting sensory marks on the surrounding tree trunks, locking his position tightly and not giving any chance to detour.
Rinto's brows furrowed even more.
These people are like brown sugar, which cannot be shaken off, and fighting takes time. The dragon scales in the arms have begun to heat up slightly due to the fluctuations in the surrounding Chakra, and the life energy inside is a bit unstable.
He stopped suddenly.
It's not about fighting back, it's about getting rid of these troubles at once so that you don't have to chase and argue all the way.
The water vines chasing behind him, the vines wrapped around him, the lock Chakra water particles filling the air, and the high-pressure water blade that Liangang had condensed, had reached less than half a meter behind him.
Rinto raised his right hand, and a very faint warm light lingered on his fingertips. It was not a Chakra light ball, nor a formed Ninjutsu. It was just the newly perfected Yang Release configuration, gently spread out over an area of half a meter.
The first thing to touch the light film was Lian's water blade. There was no collision or explosion. The high-pressure water blade that could cut through rocks dispersed into water mist the moment it hit it, without even being stirred up by the wind. Then came the wildly growing vines. As soon as the spikes touched the edge of the light film, the originally tight vines suddenly softened, and instead pulled out green shoots and crawled away in the direction away from him.
The water particles that filled the air quietly fell back to the ground and seeped into the soil, leaving not even a trace of Chakra.
In less than a second, all the attacks that came around were gone.
The rain forest suddenly became silent, leaving only the rustle of rain hitting the leaves and the heavy breathing of the Takigakure ninjas.
Their hands holding the ninja tool were shaking, not because they were afraid, but because they were confused. They had been dealing with Water Release and Yang Release all their lives, but they had never seen this kind of fighting method - no confrontation, no cracking, just like you poured out a basin of water, and the other party just took a sponge and gently sucked it up, without even a splash.
Lian's back was already soaked with cold sweat. He could see clearly that the other party was using Yang Release, but it was not Takigakure's secret technique passed down from generation to generation to stimulate the body's potential. It was a kind of absolute control over life energy that he could not understand at all. The dragon scale had only been in his hands for a long time, so what did he figure out from it?
Rinto didn't look at their frozen faces, didn't even look at them, turned around and left.
"Stop!" Lian gritted his teeth and shouted to him, with uncontrollable panic in his voice, "That is the inherited sacred object of our clan, not something you use for experiments! If you take it, the entire Takigakure will not let you go!"
He is not speaking harshly, but is telling the truth. If the dragon scale is lost, Takigakure will pursue it with all his strength. No matter how powerful this person is, he cannot withstand the encirclement and suppression of a village.
Rinto stopped, turned his face, and spoke in a calm tone. He was not impatient or arrogant. He was just stating one thing. "I only want the cell energy operation logic inside, and I will not destroy it or spread it to others. I will return it to you after I have verified the configuration."
He never planned to steal any sacred objects. To him, the scales were just an experimental sample for verification. Once used, they would become a piece of useless calcified tissue. If they were kept, they would still take up space.
Lian was stunned for a moment, and then the fire in his heart grew stronger. It was an inheritance that their clan had worshiped for decades, and it was a holy object condensed from the bones of their ancestors. In this person's mouth, it was just an "experimental sample"?
But no matter how angry he was, he knew that he couldn't keep anyone. At that moment, he had already seen clearly that the entire team combined could not touch the other party's clothes. He was really desperate, the other party had murderous intentions, and they would all be lost in the rain forest today.
Rinto didn't talk nonsense to him anymore. As soon as he moved his steps, his figure melted into the shadow of the tree. His speed was more than twice as fast as before, and he disappeared in the blink of an eye. Even the traces of Chakra disappeared completely.
"Captain, what should we do?" A ninja couldn't help but ask, "We can't catch up."
Lian stared at the direction in which Rinto disappeared, his knuckles clenched until they turned white. Chasing? What to chase? Let alone chasing and grabbing, even if the opponent stood still and let them grab, they might not be able to touch the dragon scales.
"Fuck you." He gritted his teeth and spat. He raised his hand and pulled off the communication talisman from his waist. Chakra formed on his fingertips and lit it. "Send a message to the village immediately and report the whole situation - the dragon scales are in the hands of an outsider. This People have more control over Yang Release than all of us, let the Presbyterian Council decide. Also, activate the global perception barrier in the border rainforest, lock him in the rainforest, and cannot let him escape, let alone let him get close to the village!"
The communication talisman burned into a plume of smoke and drifted in the direction of Takigakure. Lian knew that this matter was no longer something that their team could solve. Only the adults in the village who had mastered the core secrets could deal with people who could use Yang Release to such an extent.
On the other side, Rinto had already run nearly twenty miles, and after confirming that there were no traces of tracking behind him, he stopped in front of a cave behind a waterfall.
The cave was hidden behind a curtain of water. The entrance was tightly covered by vines. It was dry and ventilated, making it an excellent temporary experimental site. He first placed four layers of seals on the entrance of the cave, not to prevent attacks, but to isolate Chakra fluctuations and perceptions so as not to cause unnecessary trouble. Then he got into the cave and lit the windproof oil lamp.
As the dim light spread out, Rinto placed his backpack on the flat rock and immediately took out the dragon scales in his arms.
The Chakra fluctuations along the way made the temperature of the scales rise a lot. The golden luster flickered on and off, and the life energy inside was a bit chaotic. Rinto's fingertips condensed a very fine trace of Yang Release Chakra, and carefully penetrated along the lines of the scales, gradually smoothing out the chaotic energy and stabilizing it again.
After doing this, he breathed a sigh of relief, took out a charcoal pencil and a notebook, and first wrote down the optimization points that came to his mind when he was on the road.
When he just resolved the water line and Water Release, he suddenly figured out the closed gap that had been stuck for a long time - the adaptive frame of Yang Release does not need to be locked in the meridians of the body. As long as the core logic remains unchanged, it can extend along any carrier with life energy. Before, he had restricted the frame too tightly, which restricted the flexibility of the configuration.
Rinto While writing down, he drew the optimized structural diagram on the notebook. The rustling sound of the pen tip across the paper was particularly clear in the quiet cave. The irritability caused by the ambush just now had long been washed away by the new ideas, and only the lines and formulas on the paper were left in his eyes.
After taking notes, he picked up the dragon scale again, calmed down, and fused the optimized configuration bit by bit with the life energy in the scale. The cell cycle in the dragon scale was more stable and more sophisticated than he expected. The Yang Release secret technique passed down from generation to generation by Takigakure did have details that he had not touched before.
Time passed little by little, and the sky outside gradually became dark. The chirping of insects and birds in the rainforest quieted down, leaving only the sound of the flowing water of the waterfall.
The oil lamp in the cave is still burning quietly.
What Rinto didn't know was that after Takigakure received the summons, the entire Presbyterian Council exploded. The great elder in charge of Yang Release's secret transmission had personally led the village's elite to the border rainforest. At the same time, the global perception barrier covering the entire border had been quietly activated, and the rainforest he was in was turning into a huge cage little by little.
Rinto in the cave is frowning at the moment, staring at the dragon scales in his hand.
He discovered a new problem.
The Yang Release cycle in the dragon scale is formed based on the secret technique of Takigakure passed down from generation to generation. It can dismantle logic and borrow energy, but at the core, the complete path of stimulating life energy from the cellular level. There are only fragments in the scales, not a complete system.
In other words, he could not completely perfect the Yang Release configuration with just this dragon scale.
To fill the final gap, he must obtain the Yang Release secret record of Takigakure core.
Rinto put down the dragon scale and tapped his fingertips on the notebook. There was no hesitation in his eyes, only determination for the new research goal.
There's no use hiding.
The place he was going to was never a remote experimental site, it was Takigakure where the origin of Yang Release was hidden.