Chapter 197: The Cost of Rescue

 

The sudden disappearance of Kisame's inland sea drew the watchers out of hiding.

Those with long-range techniques had already seen three figures amid the water. The rest crept closer through the damaged forest, hoping to learn who could create a lake and erase it moments later.

Tonbo ignored them and looked at Kisame.

"That was close. Your name is Kisame, correct? An S-rank missing-nin of Kirigakure. Your methods are excellent, but I prepared one step earlier."

He loosened the Hundred-Puppet Soul Binding around Kisame's head. The rest of the man's body remained under his control.

Kisame turned toward Itachi. His expression was surprisingly calm.

"Go, Itachi. He has to control my body. He cannot divide his attention between that and stopping you. As for me, I am a remnant of an age that should disappear. Death in battle is an ordinary end for a shinobi."

Itachi's pupils trembled.

Kisame noticed. "What is that look? Did I move you? I knew your feelings were different from mine, but I never expected the man who killed the Uchiha clan to show them for me."

The mockery gave Tonbo the opening he needed. He made the old covert signal Itachi would remember from Konoha and met his eyes.

For an instant, they stood above the Hokage Rock.

The village spread below them in afternoon light. People crossed the market with groceries, Academy students hurried home, and three familiar genin argued as they completed a mission. Sasuke walked among them, alive and unharmed.

"This is Konoha as it stands now," Tonbo said. "The village is peaceful. Your brother is safe."

Itachi recovered his composure. He understood why Tonbo had used Kisame's words and his own concern to create a single lapse in his defense.

"I did not expect the Third to tell you."

"He sent me for information about Akatsuki. What else he intends, I cannot say. If there is something you need to know, ask now."

Itachi watched Sasuke below them. A gentleness absent from his public face returned for one breath.

"There is no need. Only do not tell Sasuke the truth, senior."

"Very well. I can grant that request."

Tonbo had no desire to destroy the hatred driving Sasuke's growth before the boy possessed the strength to survive what lay ahead. His knowledge of the possible future remained incomplete, but Sarada Uchiha and the enemies who would descend from the Ōtsutsuki clan made Sasuke's development too important to disrupt casually. If events changed enough to require the truth, Tonbo could reconsider then. For now, silence preserved the stronger path.

The mental scene ended.

Kisame saw only Itachi staring at Tonbo instead of fleeing.

"You were not truly moved by me, were you?"

Itachi's Mangekyō spun. Red chakra surged outward and formed a colossal rib cage around him. Bone became armor; an immense Susanoo rose above the ruined ground.

Tonbo's eyes lit with interest.

"Then I will answer with one of Kisame's techniques."

He forced Kisame's hands through the seals for Exploding Water Colliding Wave. A tsunami rushed toward Susanoo. Itachi swung the spirit's sword once and split the water down the middle, then sent the blade toward Tonbo and his captive.

Kisame stared at the armored giant. Itachi had revealed a trump card to save him.

Tonbo made Kisame form another sequence. A geyser hurled them both into the air before the sword landed.

"Water Release: Great Shark Bullet Technique."

Chakra sharks filled the sky and plunged toward Itachi. Susanoo raised its shield. Each shark broke against it without reaching the man inside.

Kisame could feel every seal Tonbo forced through his fingers and every portion of chakra taken from his reserves. The binding had not dulled his awareness. It made him a spectator within his own body, able to recognize the techniques while Tonbo turned them against the partner trying to save him. That helpless clarity was what made the technique terrifying.

"Your puppet lacks offensive power," Tonbo said.

He released Kisame long enough to Body Flicker behind Susanoo. Chakra and strength aligned through his right arm until the skin of his fist turned black.

"Iron Fist."

The blow struck the spectral ribs. Cracks spread through the red chakra with a sound like breaking glass.

Itachi's eyes narrowed. Branching nerves had appeared where Tonbo's fist touched Susanoo, then slipped into the fracture and vanished. The contact lasted only an instant, but it was another technique he could not identify.

Itachi let the force carry Susanoo backward. Its sword passed between Tonbo and Kisame and severed the chakra threads controlling the missing-nin's soul.

The two Akatsuki members formed seals. Crows burst from their bodies and scattered through the trees.

When the last wingbeat faded, Tonbo stood alone amid the waterlogged ground.

"A spy must also learn how to act," he murmured.

He remembered his own years inside Amegakure. Itachi had performed concern for Kisame well enough to justify Susanoo, while Tonbo had performed an enemy determined to capture them. Neither role made the private exchange less real.

Fine nerves swayed from Tonbo's hand. The fight had given him Kisame's physical information, Samehada's structure, and a fragmentary reading of Susanoo. The chakra construct differed greatly from Cat God Possession. Its organization and density belonged to a far higher order.

The data taken from Kisame included the changes produced when his body merged with Samehada. Tonbo had watched the sword become tissue, chakra pathways join, and the combined reserve exceed a simple sum of its parts. Susanoo supplied a different answer to the same broad question: how a technique could create a structure larger and stronger than the body sustaining it.

The contact had been brief, yet it supplied another piece of the third stage of Contact Evolution. By combining the behavior of Samehada, Kisame's fusion, and Susanoo's energy frame, Tonbo could begin designing the defense he had imagined: a form able to withstand attacks on the scale of Water Release and Tailed Beast Balls without exhausting him at once.

Research would take time. The necessary pieces now existed.

Tonbo formed seals and used Earth Release to bury his discarded nerves and the most revealing traces of his techniques. Then he scanned the approaching observers and left before they reached the battlefield.

The witnesses emerged to find a ravaged forest and one another.

They argued over the direction in which the combatants had vanished and the identities of the red giant and the sharklike man. No one had seen the entire exchange. That did not prevent any of them from preparing a complete version for the intelligence markets.

"Who were they?"

"I do not know."

"Then why did you drag us here?"

Some had recognized Konoha's pursuit captain. News that Tonbo had fought unknown enemies in the Land of Hot Water would sell well. So would the claim that the ruined ground had been a valuable forest farm before the battle. Clever informants were already composing both stories.

Far away, crows gathered inside an Akatsuki hideout.

Itachi appeared first, blood running from his eyes. He leaned against the cave wall as Kisame materialized beside him with Samehada across his back.

"I never thought you would use that technique for me," Kisame said. His surprise carried sincere respect. A man who had slaughtered his clan had risked himself to retrieve a partner.

Itachi closed his eyes and said nothing. Sasuke's image remained clear behind them.