CH_57

【Earth Release: Decapitation Technique】!

Tōji's most frequently used Earth Release jutsu took effect immediately. He yanked the Iwa chūnin—already wounded by the Exploding Tag—down into the earth, not even leaving his head above ground.

He didn't follow up with another jutsu. Instead, while using the 【Decapitation Technique】, he applied his new "weapon" to his hands—poison.

The poisons Tōji had collected all came from this very battlefield, so he had no idea what most of the random concoctions actually did… He didn't have a hobby of testing them on himself.

So whenever he scavenged a new poison, he just stored it. When the time came, he'd randomly pick two kinds and use them together… The odds of them "curing each other" were basically zero. But using two random ones together would at least have some effect.

Tōji retreated immediately after landing his move, to avoid getting counter-killed. After all, these were Iwa-nin—even if they were only chūnin, the odds that they knew Earth Release were over fifty percent!

Neru, however, was far more decisive. The moment Tōji pulled an enemy underground, she had already raised a kunai and drove it hard into the enemy's skull!

"Mm!" A muffled groan came from the earth… but only for a moment—then it stopped abruptly.

"Damn it! Atun was…" The female Iwa-nin called out to her teammate, her voice seething with anger.

"You're here!" Natchi had already circled back to where Tōji had just emerged from the ground.

"You alright?" Tōji asked casually—after all, Natchi had been running for his life.

"Just some scratches. What about the other two? How do we deal with them?" Natchi pressed for a plan.

"Me and Neru will try to create an opening. You strike when the moment's right." Tōji didn't have any concrete plan—he could only roughly assign roles. It had only been a few minutes since he'd spotted Natchi being chased by three Iwa-nin and engaged them. In that time, he hadn't even figured out what type of shinobi they were facing.

"Got it!" Natchi immediately leaped away from Tōji to reposition.

Because of the light rain, the smoke bomb's effect didn't last long.

The two Iwa-nin muttered a few words to each other, and came up with some tactic. The female Iwa-nin quickly formed hand seals and slapped the ground—the soil condensed into a dark, glossy rock club. She grabbed it and wielded it like a weapon… a taijutsu specialist.

The male Iwa-nin, standing behind her, formed some seals and sank into the ground!

"Watch the ground!" Tōji jumped onto a tree, regardless of what his teammates did.

The female Iwa-nin probably thought Neru—a "frail girl"—would be an easy target, and went straight for her.

Neru followed Tōji's lead and leaped onto a tree about five or six meters away.

Natchi, naturally, did the same, forming a triangular position with Tōji and Neru.

Though the female Iwa-nin didn't look like an agility-type fighter, she pushed off the ground and shot straight toward Neru. Her movements were wide and sweeping—her rock club swung as if it weighed nothing.

Neru was forced to jump higher up the tree. But as an agility-based taijutsu user, she could handle this female fighter fairly well. What she lacked was a reliable way to finish the enemy off.

So… where was the male Iwa-nin?

Crack! The sound of wood splitting!

A section of the tree Tōji was on suddenly "tore" open, and the male Iwa-nin—who'd been underground for over ten seconds—burst out from inside!

"Coming for me, huh!" Tōji muttered as he threw shuriken and retreated quickly.

These Iwa-nin had chased Natchi before—they knew he was too agile to ambush easily. So the male Iwa-nin decided to take out Tōji first.

But he hadn't expected Tōji to…