"Kill, kill, kill!!"
"Slaughter these Akatsuki shinobi!!"
The battlefield was chaos, sparks flaring wherever jutsu clashed.
The howling, butcher's din roared across the field.
Akatsuki's flank main force was under assault by the elite squad led by the First Raikage.
At the center, the First Raikage wove through like a dragon, his whole body blazing with blinding lightning.
His body, trained to the utmost and sheathed in Lightning Release Armor, made the explosive-tag barrages worthless; not even a scratch could get through.
That's the Cloud lineage's secret art.
In a ninja world famous for high offense and low defense—glass cannons everywhere—they stood alone.
Naruto Uzumaki's Rasenshuriken couldn't pierce the Third Raikage, and Sasuke Uchiha's Chidori couldn't crack the Fourth Raikage. Every Raikage's bodily defense was terrifying.
"Take my elbow!"
"Double Elbow!"
"Triple Elbow!"
"Consecutive Elbows!"
The First Raikage alone smashed Akatsuki's formation to pieces.
Then—
He turned into a burst of lightning so swift the Akatsuki present couldn't even track him.
Plain, honest blows were the strongest of all; that's the charm of numbers. You can't see him, you can't match his speed, you can't withstand his strikes. Each muttered call and elbow sent an Akatsuki flying and took a life.
Such is the awe when heaven-and-earth force settles into a single body. A top-of-the-world powerhouse like the First Raikage radiated sheer dread just by standing there—never mind the surge to his side's morale.
His elite squad shouted in triumph. The Cloud ninja, emboldened by his solo charge, all fought beyond themselves, unleashing more power than usual.
Following where he broke through, they kept clearing out the weaker Akatsuki.
After several Akatsuki jōnin captains were felled in succession by the Raikage—
The battle grew even more chaotic.
But—
Akatsuki's will to fight wasn't crushed by one blow. More and more reinforcements stepped up, blocking the Cloud's advance.
"For Lord Light Shadow!!"
"Banzai!!"
"In a narrow pass, the brave win!!!"
Even rank-and-file genin, the kind the First Raikage could snuff out with a flick, didn't retreat. They dared to bare their blades against overwhelming odds.
Because they ate Lord Light Shadow's kindness.
Now was the time to repay that kindness. Dozens of genin rotated in, each wrapped with a hundred-plus explosive tags, and charged the dragon-like Raikage in the fray.
"Charge!!!!"
A more savage chain of detonations erupted.
Mushroom clouds sprouted across the field.
They couldn't harm the First Raikage much, but blasts on that scale the Cloud around him could not endure. Even though each was an elite jōnin—some few strong enough to be called "Kage" in some future era (like a Sixth Mizukage)—under this magnitude of explosions they started to suffer casualties.
"They're insane!"
"They're mad!!"
"That bastard Uchiha Makoto is a lunatic, and his ninja are all lunatics!!"
A Cloud ninja who survived the blasts stared in terror. Under pressure like this, Akatsuki could still countercharge and momentarily force them back. Unbelievable.
Akatsuki really did have mountains of tags.
And their shinobi truly weren't afraid to die.
Their will to fight was frightening.
After a bitter back-and-forth—
The First Raikage had taken little damage, but the Cloud with him bore wounds large and small, bleeding hard.
They were slowing, their jutsu rhythm flagging. Human stamina has limits; so does chakra. Even a monster like Senju Hashirama ends up fist-fighting Uchiha Madara when the chakra runs dry.
"What do we do?"
"They've tied us down!"
A badly wounded Cloud fell back to the Raikage's side. If they kept being swarmed like this, even the Raikage risked falling.
He wanted to pull out.
Just then—
Akatsuki suddenly pulled back.
"Lord Raikage, they're falling back!"
"We beat them back!!"
A Cloud who had felt his limbs growing heavy lit up with joy. All around, Akatsuki were rapidly withdrawing. For a second there, he'd thought none of them feared death.
"They're retreating this easily?"
The First Raikage's face showed no joy.
Not far behind him, the Cloud main force lay in ambush.
He had risked himself—risked being bogged down by Akatsuki's flank force or even surrounded by their main—to draw Uchiha Makoto's gaze. Best case: lure Makoto into his carefully prepared kill box and take his head, then ride the momentum of slaying a Kage-level foe to smash Akatsuki's main body and win outright.
And if Makoto didn't bite, the Cloud main force, right behind, could force a strategic decision here anyway.
Cloud couldn't play attrition.
They couldn't wait.
If they crushed Akatsuki, they could face mighty Konoha after… everything would be negotiable.
He knew Cloud's end—play the "defeat CG."
But small loss, medium loss, big loss—those are different. If Cloud beat Akatsuki, he could answer both up and down the chain.
As for Konoha's expeditionary force… then talk. There's no shame in losing to Konoha.
Most crucial—
He had scented something.
Akatsuki and Konoha weren't as cozy as they seemed.
Otherwise Konoha wouldn't have dragged its feet so long before deploying—downright sluggish for a shinobi village.
Konoha likely didn't like this ally. Secret intel said the deployment stirred a domestic opinion crisis, and this move might be forced by internal pressure.
Which village goes crazy enough to wage a war this huge for a single chūnin… besides Akatsuki?
A shinobi war isn't something you "just start."
It drains a village dry. Money and logistics, the dead, the pensions afterward—these bleed a village's marrow.
Even the Han dynasty needed two generations of Wen and Jing to bankroll Emperor Wu's "big spender" wars; after beating the Xiongnu, the state was ragged, the coffers so empty rats fled, and even a political colossus like Wu had to issue a self-reproach edict. Konoha had no reason to go all-out against Cloud for a partner already beaten by Akatsuki.
A beaten Akatsuki has no say.
Sign a truce, and be done.
The First Raikage's math looked good. The Hokage should be rational, not a madman like Uchiha Makoto.
Even if they must face Konoha later—
Beating Akatsuki first would ease the later fight.
But now the battle's flow—
Gave him a sudden dread.
"With this much noise here, there's no way Uchiha Makoto hasn't noticed…"
"This isn't normal. Akatsuki shouldn't fall back so easily… unless…"
"The third defensive line!!"
He snapped his gaze rearward, a terrible guess forming.
With this ruckus, Makoto could not have missed what was happening here… unless Akatsuki's flank main force was only stalling them, clouding their eyes, while the bulk of Akatsuki had already massed to strike the truly thin third line.
If so—
It was over.
The Cloud main force was nearly all here.
The third line was hollow.
Earlier, with logistics failing, Cloud could still choke down ration pills and water, grind on with the Will of Lightning and hatred for Akatsuki. But if the third line fell now, the result was obvious—their logistics would be cut for good.
Then they wouldn't even have ration pills and water.
The supply line is the war's lifeline.
Even if you kill the Raikage, you can't conjure food from nothing.
Ninja are drilled to obey.
Drilled to endure.
But they're still human. Humans must eat.
Expecting Cloud to fight high-intensity while starving… how is that different from suicide?
They might as well surrender.
The First Raikage's scalp went numb.
Sweat streamed down.
This was the village's future on the line.
"Move—move! Go! Run back and alert the main force! Emergency redeploy to the third defensive line!"
He bellowed to the nearby Cloud.
"Going somewhere? Where to?"
"Your third line isn't holding this time!"
"First Raikage, you tried to fish for me without even wearing a helmet… this round you're dead meat. Local shinobi really have no manners—no courtesy at all. You don't put me in your eyes!"
"I hear you Cloud drink muscle boosters for your gains. Did you pin yourself too? Ever heard of the Power of Nine Dragons?"
"Follow the Nine Dragons program and you'll gain the Nine Dragons' strength. You'll need: Mibolong for warm-up, two caps per set; Kangfulong one set, four caps per set; Qunbolong one set, one injection per set; Yangxionglong one set, four caps per set; Kanglilong one set, one cap per set; Qutuolong one set, one injection per set; Xisilong one set, two injections per set; for weak points add-on dosing; Meitinolong one set, two caps per set; Kui-suan Nuolong one set, two injections per set; Benbing-suan Nuolong super-set, two injections in one set; focus on peak contraction, 30-second set rests; finish with one Little Sunflower liver pill!"
"At this rate your head's going pointy sooner or later!"
Uchiha Makoto's figure arrived with his voice, spouting lines only he himself understood, and he confirmed the Raikage's fear.
The moment Makoto learned the First Raikage had led an elite strike on Akatsuki's flank main force, he'd guessed the plan: kill Makoto, force a decisive pitched battle.
But—
The advantage was his.
How could he let Cloud write the script?
Yes—
Makoto had committed his main force.
He had a good chance to keep the First Raikage here; that death would shatter the Cloud's morale.
But this was the First Generation era.
Kage-tier combatants popped up like bamboo after rain. "Ordinary Kage" barely counted. It was a vibrant age—everything surging upward. Konoha was at its strongest, with a handful of Hokage reserves, each able to prop up the village.
And Cloud surely had a backup Raikage candidate.
The future Second Raikage, who would appear at the First Five Kage Summit, was likely at his peak right now.
So even if he slew the First Raikage, if Cloud's main force made an emergency retreat and died on their third line, Cloud would keep fighting.
Makoto would still have to pay dearly to crack that position. He wanted no part of that. So he chose to smack the First Raikage's rear, and while that third line sat thin, take it in one stroke.
Seize Cloud's third line, and Akatsuki would lock the win. The Cloud main force would be stranded, their supply cut off.
Fight on an empty stomach—even one day—and the Cloud would break. Iron is the man, rice is the steel; skip one meal and you're faint.
Surrender would be their only choice.
"Your main force is moving to attack our Cloud's third defensive line?"
The First Raikage's voice shook. He couldn't parse Makoto's rambling, but he caught the key: Akatsuki really meant to strike the third line now.
He'd been too eager to end the war. Eagerness makes fools; fools make mistakes. He'd missed the key step.
"Do I need to say it?"
Makoto raised his voice on purpose, further rattling the Raikage's mind. Today would decide the war's course. He would not only take Cloud's third line—he would also slay the First Raikage here.
Two birds with one stone.
Let a village's Kage fall, then break their third line and sever supply—more than enough to crack the main body's will.
End it before that "born-evil" Senju old ghost arrives.
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