After awakening the Two-Tomoe Sharingan, Sasuke felt the pressure from the ice senbon suddenly lighten.
The senbon that he could only narrowly dodge before could now be accurately blocked by him, and he even had enough leeway to help Sakura.
Seeing Sasuke deflect the attacks aimed at her, Sakura quickly reacted. She pulled out the last few kunai from her ninja tool pouch and hurled them at the ice mirrors.
'Since the enemy was using these mirrors to launch their attacks, then perhaps breaking the mirrors would...'
Snap.
A hand reached out from behind one of the ice mirrors, catching the flying kunai.
Then, Haku slowly emerged from the mirror.
Landing lightly on the ground, he let out a soft breath, as if maintaining such a high-density attack had drained a considerable amount of his stamina.
At this point, the key players on both sides were restrained, and the remaining combatants had reached a stalemate.
Haku's masked face turned toward Zabuza's direction, and as if resolving himself, he prepared to merge back into the ice mirrors.
But then, an unexpected turn of events occurred.
An arm connected with black threads suddenly shot out from the side and directly grabbed Haku's throat.
At the same time, a figure wearing a black robe with red clouds leaped out from the shadows and instantly subdued the exhausted Sasuke and Sakura.
"See, Kakuzu? I told you waiting it out was the right move."
The man pinning down Sasuke and Sakura turned his head to speak to his companion.
The guy called Kakuzu, who is the owner of the flying hand, slowly emerged from the forest at this time.
"Tch, waste of time."
Kakuzu glanced at the situation on the battlefield and began muttering under his breath.
"[Demon] Momochi Zabuza, 40 million Ryo, Hatake Kakashi, 41 million Ryo, and you..."
Kakuzu simply ignored Shiro, Sasuke and the others, then walked closer to Zabuza, who was standing still, and then glanced back and forth at the three people in front of him.
"Uzumaki Naruto… I don't know what you've done, but someone's offering 90 million Ryo for your head. You're the most valuable one here."
Looking at this guy who suddenly appeared and Haku who was gripped in his hand, Zabuza's heart sank to the bottom.
Right now, he really wanted to release the two people trapped in the water spheres in exchange for his freedom of movement, but he hesitated.
"Oh? Care to tell me who's being so generous?"
At that moment, something happened that shocked Zabuza and everyone else present.
Naruto, who had been pretending to struggle in the water prison, suddenly opened his eyes and even spoke through the water sphere.
'This guy… he was faking it the whole time?!'
"Sorry, but as a professional, I can't reveal my employer's identity."
When Kakuzu heard the question from the boy in front of him, he felt that the other party was overestimating his own abilities.
"Is that so? Well, no worries. Maybe you'll change your mind later."
Zabuza was shocked and had a bad premonition in his heart, so he wanted to cut off his Chakra and escape immediately.
But Naruto was even faster than him.
"Fish-Man Jujutsu: Ebb Tide Lifter!"
The water suddenly seemed thickened, as if turning viscous, before Naruto 'gripped' it with both hands and hurled it forward like a raging dragon.
Faced with the high-pressure water blast, the experienced Kakuzu immediately discarded his contemptuous thoughts.
[Earth Release: Earth Spear!]
Chakra surged into Kakuzu's other arm, hardening it to an extreme degree.
He then launched that arm as well, colliding with the oncoming water blast mid-air.
After a few seconds of stalemate, the water overpowered the arm and continued surging forward.
Seeing this, Kakuzu quickly retracted his arms and leaped into the air, barely dodging the attack.
The water blast tore through several trees behind him before finally dissipating.
"Damn it!"
Zabuza knew he had likely fallen into a trap. Without hesitation, he severed the Chakra maintaining the Water Prison Technique and instantly flickered toward the nearby lake.
"Kakashi-sensei, can I leave this guy to you first?"
As he said this, Naruto pointed at Zabuza, who had already escaped, and spoke to Kakashi who was still wet.
Kakashi looked at Naruto deeply but said nothing more. He then turned and chased after Zabuza.
Having already expended a significant amount of Chakra and stamina, Zabuza was quickly overtaken by Kakashi.
The two stood facing each other on the lake's surface, tension thick in the air.
Kakashi also knew that the situation no longer allowed him to continue slacking off and 'training' his students, so he simply adjusted the forehead protector that had been worn crookedly, revealing the other eye beneath.
Like Sasuke's, it was a Sharingan from the Uchiha bloodline.
The only difference is, instead of two tomoe, it had three.
Zabuza glanced at the captured Haku, then back at Kakashi, gritting his teeth.
He began forming hand seals at high speed.
Tiger, Ox, Monkey, Rabbit…
To his shock, Kakashi mirrored his movements perfectly, performing the exact same sequence in perfect sync.
The lake's surface began to ripple violently.
Both men's hands blurred as they weaved hand seals with terrifying speed.
"Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique!"
Zabuza and Kakashi's voices rang out simultaneously.
Two massive water dragons erupted from the lake, crashing toward each other with furious momentum.
Perhaps due to both combatants' depleted Chakra, the clash of dragons ended in a stalemate, neither able to overpower the other.
On the other side, Kakuzu's partner dragged Sasuke and Sakura over to him. Haku, who had been restrained earlier, seized the chance to slip away, vanishing into the forest.
"This brat… seems like trouble."
"Shut up."
Kakuzu found his partner's commentary unnecessary, 'Was there any need for him to state such an obvious fact? Maybe I should just kill him one of these days.'
Meanwhile, Naruto had somehow appeared right in front of them, gazing at the captured Sasuke and Sakura with a faint smile.
"Don't worry. Just take a nap."
Then, without warning, he uttered something cryptic, "Unnecessary participants should exit the stage now."
The moment those words left his mouth, an overwhelming, suffocating pressure erupted from his body.
To those standing before him, it felt as though they were staring up at an insurmountable mountain… a crushing, unstoppable force that sapped their will to fight.
For a brief moment, dark lightning seemed to crackle around Naruto, sending shockwaves that blasted away the surrounding foliage.
The momentum quickly enveloped them.
The first to faint was Sakura, followed swiftly by Kakuzu's partner.
Perhaps because of his Sharingan, Sasuke was able to hold on a little longer than the other two.
He finally remembered that this was the same sensation he had felt from Naruto on the day of their team assignments.
'No… that wasn't an illusion.'
'This feeling...'
Before he could finish the thought, his consciousness became completely blurred.
No matter what, Kakuzu is an old man who had lived for nearly ninety years, so his mental fortitude far surpassed that of most.
Therefore, even under the assault of Naruto's Conqueror's Haki, he managed to cling to consciousness.
But the Conqueror's Haki still affects him.
His limbs trembled, and the five hearts in his chest seemed to stutter.
Cold sweat slowly flowed down his forehead.
In that moment, facing this boy, Kakuzu felt the same overwhelming dread he had once experienced before the man hailed as the [God of Ninja].
'How... is it possible?'
Kakuzu refused to believe it.