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Bonus Chapter
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Itachi's advance finally drew Konan and Sasori's attention to the man who had been standing silently beside Orochimaru.
Though they'd clashed briefly with him earlier, both of them had quickly been overpowered. That alone was enough to prove his strength was not to be underestimated.
Without a word, Itachi formed hand seals. Two shadow clones appeared beside him and immediately rushed toward Konan and Sasori. He remained behind, continuing to weave hand signs, preparing a jutsu.
Seeing this, Konan and Sasori couldn't help but scoff inwardly.
No matter how strong he might be, relying on just two clones to hold them off? That was pure arrogance.
Sasori immediately directed his Sand Iron Puppet forward. The sharp blade embedded in its right arm began spinning at high speed, ready to shred the incoming clone.
Meanwhile, paper peeled away from Konan's body, rapidly forming a new paper clone that charged toward the second shadow clone.
The two collided—and a deafening BOOM echoed across the battlefield.
The shadow clone self-destructed, taking Konan's paper clone down with it in a suicidal blast.
Typical of Konan. Aside from paper shuriken and spears, her preferred method of combat had always been detonate, detonate, and detonate.
She was notorious within Akatsuki for her love of explosions—so much so that she often quarreled with Kakuzu at the organization's base.
Although she could craft her own explosive tags, her chakra reserves were finite. And to make the tags durable enough for long missions, she had to consume twice the usual chakra to reinforce them.
Nagato, worried for her safety during operations, had once banned her from relying on her own crafted tags on missions. Instead, he ordered that all explosive tag expenses would be reimbursed by Akatsuki.
Of course, Pain's authority was absolute, so Kakuzu had no choice but to grumble and suffer as the group's treasury slowly drained under Konan's... artistic vision.
What detonated here wasn't just paper.
It was Kakuzu's hard-earned money.
Sasori, meanwhile, glanced toward Konan's side of the battlefield and saw that her clone had no strange regeneration techniques. Relieved, he refocused on his target and had his puppet swing its high-speed blade toward the clone in front of him.
"BANG!!!"
Another huge blast erupted.
The shockwave roared across the sand, slamming straight into Sasori's puppet. Though his body was now a puppet devoid of nerves, Sasori still felt the sting on his face from the sheer force of the wind.
The Sand Iron Puppet was blown apart into scattered components, fragments of wood, iron, and chakra-reactive core systems strewn across the battlefield. Its face split clean down the middle.
Itachi allowed himself a subtle, smug smile.
Didn't expect that, did you? He knew the purple-haired woman would rely on explosions, so he tailored his jutsu accordingly.
"It seems your Sand Iron Puppet's craftsmanship isn't up to par."
"It couldn't even withstand my clone's explosion."
Sasori was fuming inside. That puppet would take at least a week of sleepless nights to repair!
But beyond anger, he was now wary—deeply wary—of Uchiha Itachi.
The power behind that clone's explosion wasn't normal.
His Sand Iron Puppet contained immense amounts of chakra-infused iron sand, and its body had been reinforced extensively. Ordinary explosive tags barely scratched it. Only a coordinated stack of detonating tags, detonated simultaneously, could even begin to damage it.
Yet this clone had blown it to pieces in a single strike.
Itachi, of course, gave nothing away. He simply kept his expression calm and unreadable.
Thanks to observing their previous battle, Itachi had already analyzed their tactics. The woman relied on origami-based jutsu and explosives. The red-haired man with the emotionless face favored puppets—and he liked hiding underhanded tricks within them. His puppets were brimming with chakra and iron sand.
So Itachi made his choice: use his special clone explosion technique.
These shadow clones activated chakra internally, pulling chakra from the opponent's puppet through contact, and then self-detonated—forcing the opponent's construct to rupture from within.
Though they appeared as standard shadow clones, they were actually summoned crows transformed with a genjutsu overlay. Even the Byakugan and Sharingan had trouble detecting their true nature.
Not that it mattered. These two didn't even have dojutsu.
Of course, this meant sacrificing one of his remaining crows.
After Shisui's death, no one raised crows for him anymore, and now his remaining flock was dwindling. He'd have to start training them again soon.
Scorpion's still too naive, Itachi thought. He assumes that toughness, chakra saturation, and iron sand reinforcement make his puppets invincible.
But this world was filled with hidden, insidious jutsu—some that could completely bypass conventional defenses.
Just like how hardly anyone in the shinobi world knew the full horror of a taijutsu technique called "Thousand Years of Death."
After all, who would publicly admit that their... Juju... had suffered four-digit trauma?
Even if someone experienced it firsthand, they'd never talk about it.
As for clone explosions—everyone who'd seen them didn't live long enough to spread the word.
Sasori naturally wouldn't have known.
When Konan saw Sasori's most powerful puppet obliterated in seconds, her expression hardened.
It's time.
They couldn't afford to stall any longer. The next attack would decide everything.
A thousand paper cranes fluttered down, landing silently in Sasori's palm.
When Sasori saw the message written on the wings, he grit his teeth. He didn't want to retreat—but in the end, he fell back behind Konan.
Konan spread her arms wide.
A massive surge of chakra exploded from her body, and wings made of paper unfurled behind her. She ascended into the sky, glowing with power.
Sasori tied a chakra thread around Konan's leg, anchoring himself to her like a dangling puppet. The sight was almost absurd.
Orochimaru furrowed his brow, clearly puzzled by what they were trying to do.
But Itachi—his Mangekyō Sharingan spinning—broke into a cold sweat.
Under the advanced vision of the MangekyĹŤ, the desert around them had transformed.
The battlefield—a radius of over a hundred meters—had become a vast plain of hidden explosive tags.
It was too late to do anything.
Even with the MangekyĹŤ activated, Itachi hadn't sensed this trap until just now.
So that's why she was so passive earlier...
As Konan's chakra flared brighter, Orochimaru's pupils shrank in horror.
The golden sands below them… changed color.
They were no longer sand at all, but white paper—each one bearing the kanji for "explosion."
"...How much would it cost to make this many explosive tags?"
Orochimaru's mind, always attuned to practical matters, started calculating instinctively.
Hundreds of millions of ryo.
The sheer financial cost of laying this trap was enough to collapse entire small nations.
When did Akatsuki get so rich?!
Why hadn't he known about this?!
This technique... this trap... wasn't ninjutsu.
It was money-style.
Is this... the true hidden art of the shinobi world?
"Money Release?"
At that moment, Orochimaru felt like he'd gained an entirely new perspective on the very nature of ninjutsu.
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Bonus Chapter at 150 Power Stone
Second Bonus Chapter - 300 Power Stones
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