Chapter 482: The Boss for a Reason

Greninja's sudden appearance behind the Froslass Queen left the entire hall stunned.

No one had blinked. One moment the black frog had been standing directly in front of Icy Wind, and the next he was simply gone, only to reappear behind the queen in less than a fraction of a second.

That was not ordinary speed.

It looked like teleportation.

Before anyone could make sense of what they had just seen, Greninja had already condensed a swirling sphere of water-blue energy in one hand and driven it toward the Froslass Queen.

"Fros!"

The queen had been on guard from the instant Greninja disappeared. Without hesitation, icy-blue energy flashed across her body and her figure split into six identical copies.

Double Team.

BOOM!

Water Pulse struck one of the figures and blasted straight through it, only for the image to dissolve harmlessly.

A fake.

The real Froslass Queen had already slipped to Greninja's side.

"Fros..."

Purple flames blossomed around her and swept over Greninja before he could disengage.

Will-O-Wisp.

Greninja frowned as the ghostly fire clung to his body. The burn immediately began sapping his strength, and the surrounding expedition members understood exactly how serious the situation had become.

A burn was one of the worst status conditions a physical attacker could suffer. Besides the constant damage, it drastically reduced physical Attack.

The soldiers' confidence collapsed almost immediately.

"Oh, shit. He got burned."

"Is Aaron actually going to lose?"

"This wouldn't have happened with Charizard. Fire-types don't care about Will-O-Wisp."

"Maybe Aaron really did underestimate her."

"Give it a rest. Everybody loses eventually. He's eighteen, for fuck's sake."

Even Grant and Ryan frowned. From what they could see, Greninja had just taken a major handicap almost immediately after the battle began.

Aaron, however, looked completely unconcerned.

"Greninja. Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu."

"Grenin."

Greninja brought his palms together.

POOF! POOF! POOF!

White smoke erupted across the frozen floor, and in the span of a heartbeat, dozens of identical Greninja filled the castle hall.

"Grenin! Grenin!"

Frog cries echoed from every direction.

Then the burn on the original Greninja vanished.

One of the shadow clones staggered instead as purple flames suddenly appeared across its body.

The hall went silent.

The ultimate Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu possessed far more than the ability to create physical copies. One of its special effects allowed Greninja to transfer a status condition from his real body to one of his clones.

Will-O-Wisp had been passed off.

The Froslass Queen noticed immediately.

Her expression changed as she searched the crowd of Greninja, only to discover something far more troublesome: every clone felt solid. Every one of them carried a physical presence strong enough to register as real.

There was no obvious original.

Against one Greninja, she could fight.

Against several dozen rushing her at once?

That was an entirely different problem.

"Frosslass!"

The queen immediately released a surge of Ice-type energy.

A violent blizzard erupted through the castle.

Blizzard.

Wind screamed through the chamber as snow and razor-cold air swallowed the battlefield. With Ice Queen already maintaining snow, the attack became even more ferocious, tearing through the shadow clones from every direction.

Aaron smiled.

"Time to finish this."

His next commands came one after another, but there was no hesitation in them.

"Shadow clones—Work Up. The rest of you, set the Flying Raijin: Water Shuriken Formation."

Then he looked directly at Greninja.

"Frog Boss—Flying Raijin Rasengan."

"Grenin!"

The clones moved at once.

Several remained behind and used Work Up, their boosts feeding back into Greninja through the special properties of Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu. Attack and Special Attack climbed rapidly until both had reached the maximum six-stage increase.

Four times their normal value.

The other clones spread through the blizzard and hurled Water Shuriken throughout the battlefield. One after another, the spinning projectiles embedded themselves across the frozen floor, walls, pillars, and open spaces surrounding the Froslass Queen.

Each carried Greninja's mark.

In seconds, the entire area had become a web of Flying Raijin anchors.

The queen was no longer standing inside an ordinary battlefield.

She was standing inside Greninja's territory.

For someone with his reflexes, even half a second was enough.

Within that window he could teleport, attack, reposition, and strike again before most opponents had even finished reacting to the first movement. The faster his mind and body could keep up with Flying Raijin, the more attacks he could chain together.

That was what made Frog Boss terrifying.

Space itself had become part of his movement.

The raging Blizzard began ripping through the shadow clones, bursting them one after another into clouds of white smoke, but it no longer mattered.

Their work was finished.

Greninja's body flared with brilliant red energy from the accumulated Work Up boosts. A blue sphere of spiraling chakra formed in his palm.

Then he disappeared.

The Froslass Queen's eyes narrowed.

She had already learned from the previous exchange.

The moment Greninja vanished, she used Double Team again, splitting herself into six identical figures scattered across the battlefield.

Aaron barely reacted.

"That won't work inside the formation."

His smile widened.

"Greninja—keep hitting them until you find the real one."

"Grenin."

Greninja appeared beside the first Froslass.

BOOM!

Rasengan tore through her.

The figure vanished.

Fake.

Greninja disappeared again before the shattered image had even finished fading and materialized beside the second.

BOOM!

Another clone broke apart.

Then the third.

Then the fourth.

From the spectators' perspective, Greninja was no longer moving through the battlefield at all. Blue flashes and explosions simply erupted around the six Froslass one after another, too quickly for their eyes to follow.

The fifth figure turned just in time to see Greninja appear directly in front of her.

The Rasengan slammed into her body.

This time, the Froslass did not disappear.

The real one.

BOOOOM!

"FROSSLASS!"

The queen cried out in pain as the spiraling force blasted her backward. Her body crossed the hall and crashed hard into an ice wall, sending cracks through the frozen surface and bringing a shower of snow and shattered ice down around her.

...