[A few minutes ago]
Renjiro stood at the edge of a mixture between a forest and a large rock outcrop, cloaked by the shadows of towering pines. His eyes were sharp, gleaming with the unmistakable crimson hue of the Sharingan.
The Suna outpost loomed below, nestled in a bowl-like valley where the terrain narrowed and visibility decreased—a clever tactical placement. Around it, subtle chakra signatures pulsed through the earth like heartbeat rhythms but the signatures were not of human origin. Chakra seals—trip wires, detection fields, suppression zones—all humming silently beneath the surface.
Renjiro narrowed his eyes, scanning with precision. He could sense a wide-field chakra detection barrier encompassing the base like a dome—cleverly woven and silent, it would have been undetectable to most. But not to him.
He moved forward a step, then halted abruptly.
"Right there," he muttered to himself. "That's the limit. Any closer and they'll sense me." He crouched and touched the earth, feeling the vibrations. The barrier hummed just a few feet ahead. "I can work with this."
With a sharp hand motion, five puffs of smoke exploded around him. When the smoke cleared, five identical Renjiros stood poised, expressionless and waiting.
Without a word, they flickered away, scattering to the cardinal points around the base. Each clone landed with the silence of seasoned shinobi, their sandals barely disturbing the leaves beneath them.
Each clone quickly moved into position, one to the north, one to the south, one to the east, one to the west, and the fifth above—perched high in a tree to monitor from above.
They moved in near-perfect synchronicity, all kneeling and biting their thumbs. Crimson blood mixed with the chakra as they slammed their palms to the ground.
"Four Pillar Violet Cage: Binding Crucible Formation!" they shouted in unison.
A chorus of violent chakra surged outwards. Black sealing formula exploded from their palms and raced outward in spidery, concentric circles across the forest floor, sizzling into the earth like wildfire.
As the ink turned a vivid, throbbing red, four massive violet beams erupted into the sky with a BOOM, streaking upward and then arcing inward to form a titanic dome over the base.
The sky above shimmered violently as the energy converged, sealing the entire area in a translucent violet barrier that crackled with power. Trees bent slightly under the pressure wave that followed, leaves spiralling upward in the sudden gust.
Inside the base, alarms went off instantly. Bells clanged against each other with metallic shrillness. Shinobi began pouring out from their makeshift tents, their headbands glinting with the Sunagakure insignia, some still fastening gear as they grabbed their weapons.
Renjiro's final clone, perched up high, flickered into view in a rush of wind and chakra. "Move now!" he barked with authority. "There are four entry points. Split into quadrants. Squads 1, and 3 East. 2 and 6 West. 4 and 9 South. 5 and 7 North. 8 and 10 remain behind as reinforcements. Go!"
Despite the surprise, Arata and the other squad leaders responded with trained obedience.
With coordinated bursts of movement—Pop!Flick!Whsh!—they vanished in waves toward the glowing edges of the barrier.
The violet dome shimmered like a giant gemstone in the landscape, and under its glow, the shinobi slipped through the four open gaps made by Renjiro's clones. It felt like walking into a pressure cooker. The air inside vibrated with contained energy. They had barely formed ranks when the Sunagakure defenders surged out with coordinated aggression—earth-style walls exploded from the ground, sand shuriken hissed through the air, and kunai clattered against steel as the two forces collided.
Renjiro's real body stood at the apex of the great violet dome, high above the chaos that had erupted below. The battlefield beneath him thrashed with motion—clashes of steel, the hiss of sand slicing through the air, and the guttural cries of shinobi locked in mortal struggle. From his vantage point, Renjiro was a spectre of war his Sharingan eyes glowing with predatory clarity.
He raised a single hand and closed his eyes.
A low, almost imperceptible hum rolled off his skin as his chakra surged outward in a pulse so forceful the very barrier beneath him trembled. WHUMMM. The dome responded instantly, its translucent violet surface glowing brighter, reacting as if it were alive. Tendrils of Renjiro's chakra seeped into the barrier's weave-like veins branching through a living body. He connected with it fully—not just as its creator, but as its core making an improved version of a chakra field. Every step inside, every flicker of movement, every enemy heartbeat—it all fed back to him.
Then, with eyes still shut, he inhaled deeply and opened them wide. His voice rang out across the dome like a cannon blast.
"REMEMBER!" he thundered, his voice bolstered by chakra, reverberating like thunder across the battlefield. "YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO DIE IN THIS CAGE!"
The declaration wasn't just for his comrades—it was a command to fate itself.
As the last echo of his voice faded, he moved.
"Boom!"
The air around him detonated in a shockwave of compressed chakra. Leaves whipped up into the air. Dust spiralled into violent funnels. One moment he was a figure against the dome's sky, and the next—a blur.
Down below, Suna shinobi barely had time to register his descent.
At the western edge of the dome, a chunin turned to bark an order but was cut short. A crack of thunder split the air as Renjiro landed in the middle of the unit with meteoric force. One shinobi was sent flying backwards, limbs flailing like a ragdoll before slamming into a tree. CRACK!
"Stop him!!" a jōnin-level Suna shinobi screamed, thrusting both hands forward.
A dozen hardened sand spikes launched toward Renjiro with deadly velocity—"Thup!" "Thup!" "Thup!"
But he was already gone.
Only a puff of sand and a burn mark on the grass marked where he had stood. A moment later, another Sunagakure shinobi's head snapped backwards, eyes rolling up as he collapsed unconscious. A precise strike had shattered the man's consciousness in a single, efficient blow.
This was no berserker's charge. Renjiro was methodical—surgical. With each flicker of movement, he reaped another target. His chakra control, battle instinct, and sheer speed turned the battlefield into his personal web. His enemies were flies, struggling in futility as Renjiro neared his destination.
Above the din of battle, a streak of violet lightning marked his path as he blurred again, now descending on another squad attempting to regroup. One shinobi barely raised a defensive mud wall before Renjiro crashed through it like it was paper. His knee drove into the man's gut with a WHUMP, and before the jōnin could scream, Renjiro twisted mid-air and hurled him across the field like a sack of grain.
Back in the eastern quadrant, Arata was locked in his own exchange. A Suna shinobi with twin chakra-forged sabres came at him with relentless precision. Sparks flared as their weapons clashed. Steel met chakra with a high-pitched SHRREEE.
Arata ducked a swipe aimed for his throat, slid under the man's guard, and launched a powerful wind-style palm thrust directly into the Suna shinobi's chest.
"Whoof!"
The man staggered back, wheezing, and collapsed.
Arata stepped over the body, panting, his forehead damp with sweat. He cast a quick glance skyward and caught a flicker of black and red as Renjiro zipped through the air again like a phantom. His lips curled slightly into a grimace.
"Is he just going to stand there and watch us?" he muttered, annoyed, as he wiped blood from the side of his mouth.
But then Renjiro shouted something else—inaudible from a distance—and vanished again in a flash of motion, streaking toward another quadrant. Arata hesitated for only a moment before refocusing. The fight demanded his full attention.
He parried another attack, this one from a sand user weaving a combination of Earth and Wind release techniques. Arata adjusted, dodged, struck with his kunai, and then spun away to avoid a flurry of shuriken.
But as his blade dug into another enemy and the shinobi dropped to the dirt, something strange happened.
The earth beneath Arata's feet trembled. Not from battle. This was... different.
A hum. Subtle. Menacing.
Then came the glow. Similar to before but vastly different
A deep crimson seal crept across the cracked ground, its tendrils writhing and slithering like living script. The seal pulsed—once, twice—and then ignited. Arata turned just in time to see the energy explode upward. A scarlet pillar of chakra blasted toward the sky. Others joined it, forming points of a circle inside the dome.
"Another barrier?" Arata said aloud, confusion blooming into alarm.
The ground vibrated more violently now, and the inner dome began to rise. Its energy was darker than the violet one—blood-red, almost black around the edges. It was thicker, heavier. Like gravity itself had changed inside its radius. The chakra in the air grew oppressive, crawling over skin like ice. Breathing became harder. Even sound seemed to mute slightly inside the second barrier's birth.
Arata's instincts screamed. Every nerve in his body pulled taut. This wasn't a normal jutsu. It wasn't just a cage—it was a seal.
A killing field.
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