Gunshigu very naturally took another step forward and continued in a steady tone. "Mu understands the Davy Clan better than you do. They are not people worth trusting. They carry an obsessive conviction toward a certain 'mission,' hiding in a corner of the world and clinging to life. If you trust them too much, your ending will not be good."
Ron smiled and once again took a step back, always maintaining a distance that was neither near nor far from her. Only then did he slowly speak. "Thank you for the warning. But... ever since I realized that you shouldn't understand a person only through someone else's mouth, I stopped caring about what other people say."
Gunshigu's gaze darkened slightly. Something seemed to drift through those eyes for a brief instant. She did not answer immediately. After a moment of silence, she slowly said, "Ron, are you truly determined to interfere in the affairs of this world? Can you not simply remain an observer?"
"Depends on my mood," Ron said lightly.
Gunshigu: "..."
"If there's nothing else, that's that. Bye. Don't come looking for me next time." Ron waved at her. After saying that, he naturally turned and stepped forward.
Gunshigu seemed to want to say something else and subconsciously took another step forward.
Boom!
Ron's figure erupted with golden light in an instant. He transformed into the golden Nine-Tailed Fox and sprinted away violently.
Gunshigu stood where she was and watched that fleeing figure in silence for a while.
Then the corner of her mouth suddenly curved faintly. In the eyes exposed above the cloth band, a very pale smile surfaced, as if she had finally confirmed something. "Are you afraid of Mu, Ron?"
"In other words, you fear being killed by Mu."
As her voice fell, a pair of pitch-black wings burst out from behind her. Their wide span unfurled in the narrow space of the alley and shattered the surrounding walls.
The next second, she soared into the air and grasped at empty space. A completely black trident condensed in her hand.
"In that case, Mu naturally cannot let you go..."
Inside the golden Nine-Tailed Fox, Ron turned his head slightly while sprinting. His peripheral vision caught the black figure chasing after him, and his brows unconsciously furrowed. He cursed under his breath, "So annoying. This thing really won't go away."
As his voice fell, the golden Nine-Tailed Fox's body abruptly dispersed in midair. Golden chakra receded like a tide, and Ron's figure returned to the ground, landing steadily on a small path paved with broken stones.
Gunshigu stopped sharply in the air. Her wings slowly folded in a little, and she hovered there without rushing to land.
She did not attack immediately. It was as if she was waiting for something, or weighing something.
She was wary of Ron's dirty tricks, and she was also afraid that her judgment just now had been wrong.
Ron stood on the ground and looked up at the figure hovering motionless in the air. He likewise did not act rashly. He was also wary of Imu's dirty tricks.
After all... his understanding of Imu was still too limited. He knew almost nothing about the other side's trump cards and methods.
That unfathomable feeling made him instinctively keep his distance.
The two sides fell into a strange stalemate.
"Does your world have a custom of seeing guests all the way home?" Ron asked.
Gunshigu looked down at him. Her gaze lingered for a moment on that seemingly casual face.
Ron's expression was complicated. It seemed cautious, curious, and perhaps mixed with an unwillingness to get entangled.
"Hehehe..." Gunshigu suddenly laughed. "Ron... why are you afraid? What are you afraid of?"
Ron's heart tightened. As expected of an old schemer who had lived for eight hundred years. She had actually noticed.
But... the only thing Ron was truly afraid of was Imu's Domi Reversi. After all, in the original story, that sinister move had even controlled Rocks.
Ron did not let that tension surface on his face. Meeting her gaze, he calmly asked in return, "What about you? What are you afraid of?"
She had been talking nonstop without attacking. He also felt that Imu was worried about something.
Gunshigu's eyes flickered slightly. Then she suddenly smiled. In the next instant, her body dove down violently. The edge of the trident tore through the air and stabbed straight at Ron's face.
"Damn it, you baited me!" Ron cursed.
In that instant, his pupils changed abruptly. Orange eyeshadow patterns appeared around his eyes, and his entire aura became heavy and long, as if even the air had been drawn into his body.
Clearly, this was his newly obtained mode: Sage Mode.
Sage Mode was a state formed by absorbing natural energy and combining it with one's own chakra to create senjutsu chakra.
After entering Sage Mode, the power of ninjutsu, taijutsu, and genjutsu would be greatly enhanced.
Immediately after, golden chakra once again covered his body, blending with that natural energy to form an entirely new fused state: Sage Fox Mode.
Whoosh!
Gunshigu's Haki-covered trident stabbed down fiercely, carrying a sharp whistle as it split the air.
Ron vanished from where he stood at the instant before the attack fell, as if scattered by the wind.
The trident missed, but the huge shockwave along its shaft roared toward the ground.
Boom!
With a loud blast, smoke surged into the sky, and a huge crater was blown into the ground.
Gunshigu's attack missed. Her gaze swept rapidly in every direction. At the same time, a light shout came from not far away.
"Seventh Gate: Gate of Wonder, open!"
The instant the voice fell, beneath Ron's glittering golden exterior, a faint layer of blue steam intertwined with the golden chakra cloak.
Then, a terrifying aftershock of airflow spread outward with him at the center.
Gunshigu's pupils shrank abruptly. That aura was not merely the signal that a person had "become stronger." It was an unquantifiable presence that made her feel, for the first time in many years, that something was "uncontrollable."
"Has Mu... misjudged?"
Before Gunshigu's thought could fall, Ron's figure had already appeared before her. His body twisted slightly backward, as if winding all of his power into an arc, then his fist blasted out.
Bang!
A dull impact exploded in the air.
A visible ring of ripples burst outward, and Gunshigu's upper body was directly blasted into an afterimage.
The lower half of her body flew backward at extreme speed under the fierce shockwave.