Chapter 57: The Price of a Dream
The world narrowed to the space between Kagenori and the aging leader of Yugakure. The man's face was a mask of bitter resolve, etched with the lines of a leader who had gambled his village's safety on a powerful ally, only to see it burn around him. He was, without a doubt, the strongest shinobi present—a fact that made the desperation in his eyes all the more potent.
Yugakure itself was not a major military power. Its forces were a mix of its own ninja and a contingent from Kumogakure, but the Cloud Ninja's true elite were deployed elsewhere. They had considered this rear-line stronghold safe, a miscalculation that Konoha was now exploiting with brutal efficiency. The ranks were filled with genin and chunin, with only a handful of jonin. There were no elite jonin here. No one who could stand against the Sannin for long. This man, the Village Head, was the linchpin.
With a snarl, the leader's hands flew through a sequence of seals. "Suiton: Suiryūdan no Jutsu!" A powerful torrent of water bullets shot from his palms, slamming into the ground where Kagenori had been standing a moment before, leaving deep, water-filled craters.
Kagenori was already moving, his body a blur. He answered with a volley of kunai, each tagged with an exploding seal. The tags detonated in a chain reaction, kicking up a thick cloud of dust and debris to obscure the Village Head's vision.
"Doton: Doryūsō!" Kagenori formed his own seals, and pillars of earth erupted from the ground within the dust cloud, attempting to form a rocky prison.
But the Village Head was already in the air. "Suiton: Suihō no Jutsu!" He spat a trumpet-shaped blast of water down onto the emerging pillars, shattering the earth and sending a powerful wave rushing toward Kagenori.
"Doton: Doryūheki!" An earth wall rose before Kagenori, taking the brunt of the water charge. Without a moment's pause, he leveled his ninjato at the Village Head, who was still airborne. "Thunder Breathing, Fifth Form: Heat Lightning!" A blistering, lightning-fast slash of superheated energy screamed through the air.
The Village Head's eyes widened, but he was prepared. He'd been watching this boy. He knew the speed of that technique. As the heat lightning was about to connect, his hands completed another, faster set of seals. "Fūton: Reppūshō!" He clapped his hands together, and the wind itself sharpened into an invisible blade, slicing the heat lightning apart with a sharp crackle.
So, he uses Wind Release, Kagenori thought, his Sharingan spinning wildly, analyzing every minute chakra fluctuation. And his hand seals for it are faster than for Water Release. It's his primary affinity.
"Katon: Ryūka no Jutsu!" A straight line of fire erupted from Kagenori's lips, spearing toward his opponent with deadly intent. The flames connected, but with a puff of smoke, the Village Head was gone, replaced by a charred log sizzling on the ground. A substitution jutsu.
Where?
His Sharingan scanned the chaotic battlefield, filtering through the clashing chakra signatures. A flicker of movement. A single kunai shot toward him from the shadow of a collapsed building.
"Fūton: Daitoppa!" the Village Head's voice called out from the darkness. A violent gale erupted, accelerating the kunai to a terrifying speed.
Kagenori flickered away, the kunai embedding itself deep into the ground where his heart had been. As he landed, he didn't hesitate. "Thunder Breathing, Fourth Form: Distant Thunder!" Lightning wreathed his body as he became a bolt himself, closing the distance in an instant. His Sharingan locked onto the Village Head, now standing on a fractured wall. He swung his blade in a high-velocity slash.
But his sword passed through his target, which dissolved into a splash of water. A water clone.
The real Village Head appeared behind the dissipating clone, hands already sealed. "Suiton: Suirō no Jutsu!" The water from the clone surged upward, forming a spherical water prison that engulfed Kagenori, trapping him within its suffocating grasp.
The Village Head approached, a kunai in his hand, his expression a mix of hatred and grim satisfaction. "It's over," he whispered, thrusting the blade toward the immobilized boy.
But Kagenori's arms, trapped within the water prison, were not idle. His ninjato was already in a guarding position. "Thunder Breathing, Second Form: Rice Spirit!" He didn't need seals. Lightning exploded outward from his body in every direction, a storm of razor-sharp arcs that shredded the water prison to mist. He landed lightly a dozen feet away, putting distance between them once more.
The Village Head frowned, his kunai held ready. "Seal-less lightning-nature chakra transformation... truly troublesome." If the boy had needed hand signs, he would have been dead. But without that tell, his techniques were too sudden, too unpredictable.
He looked at Kagenori, really looked at him—the intense, spinning Sharingan, the calm, controlled breathing, the sheer power radiating from a boy who couldn't be more than thirteen. A profound, bitter envy twisted in his gut.
"To be a jonin-level shinobi at your age... Konoha is truly drowning in geniuses," he muttered, the words tasting like ash. He'd seen four of them today alone. Orochimaru and Jiraiya, legends in their own time. The yellow-haired boy with the startling speed. And this one—this Kagenori—a prodigy who wielded Fire, Earth, Water, and his innate Lightning nature with the coveted Sharingan. If only Yugakure could have nurtured one such talent. If they had their own Hanzo, they wouldn't be a pawn in a war between giants, watching their home be torn apart.
Kagenori's Sharingan never wavered. He understood the trap now. The kunai, the wind jutsu—it was all misdirection. A deliberate ploy to make him attack a water clone, leaving him open for the real one to ensnare him. It was a clever, veteran's trick. He wouldn't fall for it again.
He went on the offensive. "Suiton: Suiryūdan no Jutsu!" He molded the water from the destroyed prison, shaping it into a coiling dragon that roared toward the Village Head.
Not to be outdone, the older ninja formed his own seals. "Suiton: Suiryūdan no Jutsu!" An identical water dragon rose to meet Kagenori's.
A faint, almost imperceptible smirk touched Kagenori's lips. He pointed his ninjato. "Thunder Breathing, Fifth Form: Heat Lightning!"
But he didn't aim at his opponent. The blistering bolt of lightning struck his own water dragon. The effect was instantaneous. The watery form became a crackling, supercharged serpent of pure energy. When the two dragons collided, they didn't just cancel each other out—they exploded.
A massive shower of electrified rain fell upon the battlefield, a downpour of shocking, stinging droplets with nowhere to hide.
The Village Head's eyes shot wide with shock and pain as the charged water struck his skin. He was trapped in his own element, and Kagenori had turned it against him.