Earth Style: Headhunter Jutsu (Double Suicide Decapitation Technique)
It was a kind of Earth Release ninjutsu that let you burrow underground for an ambush. But after Ronin realized he could cast jutsu with simplified hand seals, he also came up with a way to hide beneath the earth.
Uvogin's speed in catching up didn't exceed Ronin's expectations by much. What truly shocked Ronin—hidden underground—was the phone call Uvogin made.
The moment Ronin heard what Uvogin said into the phone, a bad feeling surged up.
In that instant, Ronin made a decision.
The ground beneath Uvogin's feet split open. An arm shot up from below, reaching straight for Uvogin's leg—looking as if it meant to drag him down into the earth.
But before Ronin's pale, long fingers could clamp onto Uvogin's ankle, Uvogin had already lowered his gaze. A savage grin curled at his lips. His bearskin-booted foot lifted instantly, slipping out of Ronin's grasp—and giving him the perfect angle to stomp down hard.
Yet when Uvogin brought his foot down, he didn't feel flesh or bone—only a thunderous boom as his stomp hit solid ground.
The tremendous force from that stomp detonated outward, blasting the already-cracked earth into an even deeper crater.
And the Ronin that Uvogin "hit" in the first instant… burst into a puff of white smoke the moment contact was made.
Seeing that smoke, a host of questions flashed through Uvogin's mind—only to vanish in less than half a second.
Because at the same time the smoke exploded, another figure appeared abruptly at his side and launched a surprise attack at his head.
Thud!
Ronin's left leg whipped out like a steel lash—striking the side of Uvogin's head.
More precisely, it struck Uvogin's right hand—the one holding the phone.
That kick contained all of Ronin's power. It snapped Uvogin's head slightly to the side—but more importantly, the phone in Uvogin's grip was crushed to pieces by Uvogin's own strength from the impact.
Ronin had known from the start that with his current strength, it would be hard to injure Uvogin. But he hadn't expected his full-power kick to do nothing but stoke Uvogin's anger—no real damage at all.
If anything, to Uvogin, the "damage" might've been more insulting than painful.
Ronin's heart jolted, but his hands didn't slow. Even as he struck, he was already forming seals again.
The next second, Uvogin's rage-filled fist smashed into Ronin's body.
But something even more startling happened.
The Ronin that Uvogin hit turned into a chunk of dead wood in an instant!
The real Ronin had already disappeared.
At the same time, Uvogin noticed a thin layer of mist beginning to spread rapidly through the area.
And it was thickening—fast.
What the hell?
When Uvogin tossed away the shattered phone, his face had gone completely dark.
But the next second, he yanked up the eyeless head hanging at his waist. His voice was pure devil as he spoke:
"What, running away? Don't you want to look at your father's head? He was begging me to spare you right up until he died!"
At that moment, Ronin was hiding in a tree less than twenty meters away from Uvogin.
His chest heaved violently. His hands were held in front of him in the Sheep seal.
It was the final seal of Water Style: Hiding in Mist Jutsu. After all, it was one of Momochi Zabuza's techniques—and that cool move where he vanished into the fog had left a deep impression on Ronin.
Hidden Mist was also a D-rank jutsu—perfectly within the range Ronin could cast.
But while using it, he also discovered something: he had to keep spending chakra to make the mist expand—until it was dense enough to hide him completely.
Right now, Ronin felt his heart pounding like crazy.
He was just an ordinary office worker. Before today, he'd never known he could stay this calm in a fight.
But he also knew it was precisely that calm that had kept him alive up to now.
That Uvogin could follow the traces Ronin left in the forest—none of that surprised him.
In fact, ever since he'd slipped away right under Uvogin's nose, Ronin had been thinking about how Uvogin might catch him again. He didn't have much wilderness experience himself…
But the previous owner did.
Especially experience being hunted.
So as Ronin's memories fused, he gained ideas on how to erase his trail in the woods, how to hide his presence, and so on.
When he chose to use the D-rank Earth Style: Head Hunter Jutsu to hide underground, it was because he'd already prepared a disguise.
But what he never expected was that Uvogin would make a phone call—and directly ask for his location.
Hearing Uvogin's booming voice from below ground, Ronin immediately formed a hypothesis:
He'd been tagged.
And the moment that thought formed, he also had a likely culprit.
Kortopi.
In Ronin's memory, there was more than one member of the Phantom Troupe who could mark a target—but he had already used the Sharingan to examine himself.
He hadn't detected anyone else's Nen on his body. That alone was enough to rule out Machi.
Machi's ability was to turn Nen into threads and attach those threads to a target. As long as the target didn't notice the threads, she could trace them back to find the target.
Even if Machi used In to conceal the Nen threads, Ronin didn't believe he could focus Nen into his eyes with Gyo, then repeatedly confirm with the Sharingan, and still fail to detect them.
That left only one person in the Troupe who could leave a marker without being noticed—someone who left behind a copy on the target, then located it by touching the original.
Kortopi.
Kortopi's copied items lasted for twenty-four hours like real objects. But even realizing that, Ronin still wasn't sure which item on him had been copied.
So his best option was only one:
Cut off Uvogin's contact with Kortopi for the moment—then, in that brief window, find the copied item on himself… or simply abandon every possession he had.
That was why Ronin's target from the very beginning had been one thing only:
Uvogin's phone.
When he burst out of the ground, he used the Clone Technique. Using the opening created when Uvogin destroyed the clone, he followed up with a taijutsu strike.
Everything had gone smoothly. Maybe Uvogin simply never imagined a tiny ant like him would jump out and counterattack.
But now, what stood in front of Ronin wasn't just the option to run.
Because when he got close to Uvogin, he sensed something—something overwhelmingly tempting to him.
It was at Uvogin's waist: a bloodstained cloth bundle hanging beside the previous owner's father's head.
And with the empty eye sockets on the father's head… it wasn't hard to guess what was inside that bundle.
The Scarlet Eyes.