Akahane Sora's strength was indeed formidable; Xuan had to admit this. Just from the two Taijutsu moves he had displayed, he was already above Uchiha Shinji.
Faced with this situation, Xuan chose the simplest method: paying homage to Comrade Uchiha Obito from the original work.
Just look at classmate Obito in the original story. Relying on a single move of defensive intangibility, he played the role of a mysterious god and a peerless expert, flourishing everywhere he went. His actual baseline strength wasn't even as good as Kakashi's, yet he stubbornly managed to become a successful generation's Boss. He was the absolute paragon of hoisting a fake banner to play the tiger.
Ahem... the topic has strayed a bit far. Back to the main point: in the original story, Uchiha Obito rarely made a move, but looking at his later combat records, his most commonly used technique was using his intangibility's suction power to drag people into Kamui's attached dimension, thereby achieving the effect of killing the enemy.
It had to be said, it was simple, crude, and effective. It could even ignore the gap in ranks, perfectly allowing one to challenge higher-level opponents. Actually, when reading the original work, Xuan always had a tiny doubt: how exactly did Obito kill people after sucking them into the dimension? According to the original work, Kamui's attached dimension didn't possess the inherent ability to kill, and his intangibility wasn't like Kamui's offensive variant, which could specify the size of a spatial rift or increase spatial mass to crush things.
It wasn't until Xuan redeemed this move himself and passed through that dimension countless times that he suddenly saw the light. He realized how much he had been overthinking it in the past. Why did he need to actively kill them? In that completely barren Kamui dimension, there was absolutely nothing. If you just threw someone in there, they would literally starve to death.
Shinobi are still human, aren't they? As long as they are human, they need food and water. Without these two things, even shinobi cannot survive. This was especially true for water. Once dehydrated, a person could last at most seven days before inevitably kicking the bucket.
Therefore, as long as someone was sucked into Kamui's dimension, even if left completely alone, it was a one-way trip to death. As for exactly how many days they could last, that depended purely on their individual physical fortitude.
Xuan had already made up his mind. After sucking this old man into the dimension, he wouldn't use intangibility again for ten days, just in case the old geezer stabbed him the moment he phased part of his body in.
Xuan's strike was incredibly fast. Like lightning, he grabbed the opponent's wrist and chuckled softly, "Caught you."
The three tomoe in his right eye spun rapidly. Spatial turbulence appeared, forming an inverted spatial vortex from which a powerful suction force erupted.
"It is I who have caught you," Akahane Sora sneered coldly. Holding his longsword, he twisted his arm at an almost impossible angle, slashing right through the right hand Xuan was using to grip him. Unfortunately, the blade passed through without any resistance.
Akahane Sora narrowed his eyes. Taking advantage of the brief moment Xuan phased his right hand to avoid the attack, he instantly yanked his left arm free. Activating the Body Flicker Jutsu, he materialized over twenty meters away in the blink of an eye.
Xuan raised his right hand to his eyes, squeezed it a few times, and muttered dryly, "How unreliable." It was unclear if he was calling the technique unreliable, or himself.
A drop of cold sweat trailed down Akahane Sora's brow. That was close! He didn't know what that spatial vortex Ninjutsu was, but his intuition screamed that it was lethal. If he had been sucked inside, he feared there would be absolutely no chance of escape.
Physical attacks are completely ineffective, but he's not an illusion either. The sensation of his hand grabbing my wrist was definitely physical and solid. Is it a Ninjutsu that instantaneously turns his body intangible? How bizarre. But I don't know if it only grants immunity to physical attacks, or if it makes him immune to Ninjutsu as well. Akahane Sora analyzed frantically, not daring to be the slightest bit careless. From what he could sense, the opponent's chakra density wasn't exceptionally high—it hadn't even reached the level of an Elite Jōnin. Yet, this unfathomable Ninjutsu gave him an unprecedented sense of lethal crisis. He hadn't felt this kind of pressure in who knew how many years.
"If you aren't going to attack, I won't hold back," Xuan's voice drifted from beneath the black cloak. Pushing off the ground, he surged toward the old man in an instant. With a flick of his wrists, six kunai, each tagged with explosive notes, were hurled forward.
With a sweep of his longsword, Akahane Sora knocked the six kunai away. However, mid-air, the deflected kunai shockingly collided with one another, using the kinetic force of the impacts to redirect three of them straight back at him!
This kind of shuriken throwing technique... did he even calculate the trajectory of my sword swing?! Akahane Sora's pupils shrank slightly. It was already too late to block them with his sword again.
"Detonate," Xuan commanded softly.
The three explosive tags detonated on cue. A deafening explosion ripped through the hall, kicking up a massive cloud of smoke and dust.
"Flame Wall!" Akahane Sora shouted lightly. A massive wall of fire instantly erupted in front of him, perfectly blocking the blast radius of the explosive tags.
Cloaked in black, Xuan charged straight into the center of the explosion. In the palm of his left hand, a highly compressed, rapidly spinning sphere of chakra had already formed. He dashed directly through the wall of fire and slammed the sphere down toward the old man's head. "Rasengan!"
After careful consideration, Xuan decided that sucking the old man into the Kamui dimension was a bit too unreliable. He opted to finish him off with a different method. After all, he wasn't as utterly pitiful as Uchiha Obito; he had a massive arsenal of high-level Ninjutsu at his disposal.
He passed right through the fire? So Ninjutsu is ineffective as well?
Even as this thought crossed his mind, the old man's hands were not slow. He thrust his sword straight forward to meet the attack. Unsurprisingly, the blade's light phased right through the opponent's arm once again, while the rapidly spinning sphere of chakra surged directly toward his heart.
Shifting his footwork slightly, Akahane Sora took a tiny step backward. This micro-movement masterfully evaded the chakra sphere by a hair's breadth. He whipped his sword around. "Ghost Slash!"
"Hmm?" Xuan hummed in slight surprise. Naturally, the sword slash still failed to hit him physically, but he distinctly felt a unique strain of chakra attached to the blade. It snaked its way into the Rasengan. The delicate internal balance of the high-speed spinning Rasengan was instantly shattered, causing it to dissipate into a burst of harmless chakra light.
Xuan swept his arm horizontally, fully relying on his intangibility to engage the old man in close-quarters Taijutsu. In an instant, the two exchanged countless blows. By Xuan's own estimation, the opponent had slashed through his intangible body at least several dozen times.
Intense currents of chakra erupted constantly. The premium wooden floorboards were completely pulverized, and the entire ancestral hall was reduced to a chaotic mess.
This is so troublesome. I need to find an opening to one-shot him with Kamui or the Rasenshuriken. As they exchanged blows, Xuan's mind raced, constantly searching for a fatal opening.
All attacks are completely ineffective. I used several Ninjutsu just now, and they were equally useless. Yet, he hasn't been able to land a direct hit on me either. If he truly could ignore everything, I would have died a long time ago. Is it that... in the exact moment he strikes someone, he must materialize? If that's the case, there might be a razor-thin chance!
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