Chapter 552: Rondo
Getting closer and closer.
The sounds of battle could faintly be heard, a low, rumbling roar echoing heavily across the horizon.
The storm was coming to an end, but the sky remained gloomy. The low-hanging clouds drizzled fine rain, blurring the line of sight.
He could feel the collision of ninjutsu in the distance, somewhere even further beyond the sea horizon. Every sudden eruption of Haruno Sakura and Konan's chakra would make Rondo's heart beat violently once, like a drum being struck.
A string began to tighten in the Mist Hidden ninja's heart. As the distance closed, an invisible and heavy pressure was pulling that heartstring tighter and tighter, as if it could snap at any moment!
He tightly held a kunai in a reverse grip, beads of sweat beginning to seep from his palm, quietly soaking the anti-slip cloth strip on the handle.
In the oppressive atmosphere, Choujuurou closely followed Rondo's footsteps, walking silently amidst the waves.
Suddenly, Rondo's footsteps halted abruptly.
In the distance, a surge of chakra suddenly erupted like a flash flood, its momentum unprecedentedly astonishing. Rondo was horrified, his heartstring snapping. Almost subconsciously, he brandished the kunai to protect his chest, his body tensing, and the chakra within him ready to gush out.
In almost the blink of an eye, Rondo was ready to defend, fully demonstrating the strength of an elite Mist Ninja Jonin.
However, the awkward thing was that the object he wanted to defend against was dozens of kilometers away. Rondo was halfway through forming the hand seals for the Water Encampment Wall with his left hand before he realized he was being too sensitive and nervous, almost making a fool of himself.
"What's wrong?" Choujuurou came up with a nervous face, asking with a tense little face, his expression equally terrified and shocked.
He had also felt that astonishing chakra eruption.
Rondo calmed down and shook his head: "That's them fighting... it has nothing to do with us."
He stopped and narrowed his eyes, gazing at the horizon, silently sensing the chakra changes in the distance.
At the end of the sea and sky, the clouds were blown away, and a pillar of light poured down, extremely bright. If they advanced another twenty or thirty kilometers, they might be able to see a water wall cutting across the sky, standing on the sea horizon, grayish-white and transparent, like the edge of the world.
In the sensory ninja's field of vision, all this was as clear as if it were happening right before his eyes.
"Let's just stop here. Going any further..." Rondo said with a suppressed voice, "is too dangerous."
The distance was close enough. After Rondo and Choujuurou transmitted the first round of intelligence, they risked moving sixty or seventy kilometers in the direction where Haruno Sakura and Konan were fighting, halving their original distance.
Sakura's strong and vast chakra fluctuations could be sensed clearly enough at this distance. Rondo could "see" that the grand ninjutsu fluctuation represented a Water Release, similar to the Water Encampment Wall, only much larger and more magnificent, and its function leaned towards offense rather than defense.
This ninjutsu had been modified by Haruno Sakura.
Rondo imagined tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of tons of seawater being infiltrated by the girl's chakra, towering over the sea surface, forming a water wall reaching the clouds. The surging waves just now were merely small ripples at the foot of the thick water wall. Standing before it, the transparent seawater would occupy the entire field of vision, breathtakingly broad and magnificent. This was not a result ordinary Water Release could achieve. The Water Encampment Wall couldn't lift such a massive amount of seawater; the caster had to have an astonishing amount of chakra, as well as an even more astonishing understanding and control of Water Release.
He marveled at this Water Release ninjutsu in his heart. He also marveled at this Water Release genius.
Counting this time, Rondo had only seen Haruno Sakura twice in total. His initial impression of this Konoha ninja was stuck on a pretty but rather frail-looking young girl. Although he knew she had some strength and used ninjutsu well, the consensus of Rondo and most Mist Ninja on powerhouses was that they were ferocious, ruthless, cold-blooded, and unsmiling, just like the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the past, or at least like Mei Terumi, who would melt people at the drop of a hat.
This prejudice vanished from Rondo's mind the instant he witnessed Haruno Sakura's ninjutsu.
Chakra is the combination of physical and spiritual energy. For Rondo, who was proficient in sensing, perceiving the user's spirit and will through chakra was a breeze. Even without mentioning her tyrannical ninjutsu, Haruno Sakura's tenacious will and almost tangible killing intent could easily win Rondo's admiration—this was absolutely no greenhouse flower, but a true powerhouse.
It was said she had fought with more than half of Akatsuki's members and retreated unscathed.
Amazing! The words of praise weren't spoken aloud, but couldn't help echoing in his heart.
But the Akatsuki enemy fighting Haruno Sakura was also no pushover.
That Water Release move of Haruno Sakura's, which left him completely helpless, was cleverly and easily neutralized by her. Rondo sensed that the woman named Konan evaded this earth-shattering strike with a miraculous and bizarre secret technique. Her chakra was evenly distributed into many fragments, immunizing against the Water Release damage. Then, thousands of fragments merged back into one, and the woman reappeared on the battlefield almost completely unscathed, except for a drop in her chakra level.
Rondo frowned slightly.
Doesn't this kind of enemy stand in an invincible position? This kind of battle had exceeded the scope of Rondo's imagination!
"Senior, how is the battle situation now?" Choujuurou noticed the change in Rondo's expression and stepped forward to ask.
As he spoke, a low, chest-tightening rumble came from the distance.
That was exactly the sound of the previous Water Release move, which took several minutes to reach here.
"Evenly matched." Rondo answered, observed for a while, then changed his tune, "No, that's wrong... Haruno Sakura should have a slight edge!"
On that battlefield, after a brief pause, chakra fluctuations were stirred up again.
It was still a bombardment of ninjutsu.
Haruno Sakura's Water Dragon Bullet was exquisite and massive. The shape transformation and nature transformation of chakra were pushed to the limit, arguably perfect. On the other side was the unnamed Paper Release secret technique, probably a type of Yin-Yang Release, equally astonishing in power, condensed into a spear shape, going head-to-head with Haruno Sakura.
The confrontation of the tip of a needle against an awn of wheat stirred up an even grander momentum than the Water Release just now. Rondo's heartbeat seemed to stop for a beat. Before he could calm down, a new round of confrontation began. The combat rhythm of Kage-level ninja, even just watching from afar, Rondo found it strenuous to keep up with.
Water Release. Water Dragon Bullet, Water Severing Wave (actually Wind Blade Torrent), Exploding Water Colliding Wave, Water Encampment Wall...
Various mid-to-high-level ninjutsu were casually cast by Haruno Sakura. Her pinnacle chakra control and unique comprehension of Water Release possessed the power to turn decay into magic, making every move and stance of Haruno Sakura carry immense power.
More often than not, Haruno Sakura wasn't limited to existing ninjutsu. She just formed hand seals at will, her chakra circulating following an almost instinctive feeling. With a light step, the seawater transformed into various shapes, roaring and charging forward as lions or tigers, dragons or rocs or leviathans!
Haruno Sakura's Water Release was a feast for the eyes in Rondo's "view"; while Konan's secret technique was mysterious and powerful.
Hundreds of millions of white papers danced along with the Angel of Akatsuki. Under the effect of chakra, they condensed into spears, gathered into shields, or formed swords, spears, staffs, and clubs, taking on thousands of forms, continuously and fiercely bombarding Haruno Sakura's endlessly emerging powerful Water Release. From time to time, Konan would also turn herself into paper to conceal her figure and immunize against attacks, or launch sneak attacks from hidden places, making it impossible to defend effectively!
After several rounds of bombardment like this, although the battle was fierce, neither woman could inflict substantial damage on the other. Conventional Water Release was ineffective against Konan, but ordinary Paper Release was equally helpless against Sakura. The two were truly hard to distinguish the winner from the loser, evenly matched.
However, looking closely, Konan's chakra had already begun to slip from its peak, while Haruno Sakura's power showed no signs of decline from beginning to end. Only then did Rondo realize that the scales of victory had quietly begun to tilt!
Haruno Sakura's stamina... is simply unfathomable! Is it because of the Yin Seal? Rondo mused secretly, While on the enemy's side, both momentum and power have begun to decline...
The dawn of victory appeared.
Haruno Sakura remained unhurried. After trying conventional Water Release routines one by one, she began to use Ice Release and other secret techniques to probe Konan's weaknesses. The latter's Paper Release kept going back and forth with those few moves, changing the broth but not the medicine, and gradually became familiar and understood by Sakura.
The Angel of Paper began to show signs of defeat.