Chapter 103: Tacit Understanding
After the violent explosion, the battlefield fell silent for a moment.
Killer B arrived at his brother's side, his expression dark.
Both Kael and Minato had tacitly chosen to ignore him, which made him feel incredibly frustrated.
"Do they look down on the Eight-Tails Jinchuriki that much?"
Killer B was about to charge at Kael, but Minato moved to block his path.
At this moment, the sky began to brighten slightly.
Kael lightly tapped his right foot on the Earth Dragon's back.
Understanding his intent, the Earth Dragon raised the upper half of its body. Its brown, rock-like skin was covered in gray, segmented rings, evoking the terror of facing a mysterious prehistoric beast. As it rose, its massive body instantly towered over the battlefield.
The Earth Dragon's enormous maw slowly opened. Surging earth-nature chakra gathered in its mouth, undergoing a magical nature transformation. Then, a gray beam of light erupted once again.
The target, as before, was the Raikage's son.
Although the speed of the Petrification Beam wasn't truly the speed of light, it was at least sonic speed.
This meant that at a distance of a few hundred meters, the moment you saw the beam, you would be hit in the next blink of an eye.
But as the future Fourth Raikage—the man who would claim the title of "fastest in the ninja world" after Minato's death in the original story—he wouldn't be hit so easily!
With a flash of lightning, he flew sideways, looking down disdainfully as the gray beam swept beneath him.
He would absolutely not be hit by the same move twice!
But just then, an unprecedented sense of mortal danger seized his heart. Relying on years of experience surviving life-and-death battles, he forcibly twisted his body in mid-air, where he had no leverage.
The next moment, a visible, distorted vortex appeared in the space beside him. A bizarre pulling force tugged at him, making him feel as if he were being dragged into a spatial rift.
But this was actually an illusion.
The Void Mouse's Kamui wasn't powerful enough for that. Once the target escaped the center of the vortex, the danger was gone.
"What a pity..."
A cold look flashed across Kael's face. He hadn't expected the Raikage's son to forcibly dodge the Void Mouse's long-prepared Kamui even while airborne and without leverage.
Just then, the Thunder-Wind Eagle's attack arrived.
It chose not to use Lightning Style. Its instincts told it that its lightning jutsu would only tickle these two.
A massive, bone-white ball of wind howled toward the Raikage's son as he landed. He was in a vulnerable state, having just expended his momentum and not yet gathered new strength.
The next moment, the five-meter-diameter Bursting Spiral Sphere churned the surrounding air and arrived in front of him.
He had just steadied himself when he sensed the violent chakra fluctuation. He looked up abruptly, his eyes nearly splitting with rage.
"You're pushing it too far!"
BOOM!
A thunderous explosion rang out.
Violent ripples of wind-nature chakra spread outward, instantly flattening trees within a radius of dozens of meters.
Amidst the flying debris of earth and wood, a strong figure enveloped in azure lightning burst through the dust and sprinted toward Kael, eyes filled with murderous intent.
The Raikage's son, whose arms were as thick as an adult's thigh, now had tattered clothes and a scarred body. However, his exposed eight-pack abs and the surging lightning chakra around him gave Kael an instant sense of extreme threat.
His eyes were sharp as a hawk's, staring fixedly at Kael atop the Earth Dragon, the anger in his gaze seemingly ready to erupt at any moment.
Kael stood quietly with his arms crossed, a mocking look in his eyes.
"Worthy of the future Fourth Raikage. He took a direct hit from the Thunder-Wind Eagle's Bursting Spiral Sphere and didn't suffer much damage. I can barely imagine how strong the defense of the Third Raikage, known as the 'Strongest Shield,' must be..."
"Die!"
With a furious roar, the Raikage's son flickered across the ground. Finally, with a flash of blue light, he leaped instantly above Kael's head. He raised his right leg high and brought it crashing down toward Kael's skull.
Guillotine Drop!
Although Tabby's Repulsion Aura was on cooldown, Kael didn't panic.
Rumble!
The next moment, the Earth Dragon dove headfirst into the ground, taking Kael with it.
Boom!
The Raikage's son's pursuing right foot slammed heavily onto the ground. This furious stomp, which even created a sonic boom, shattered the earth. Debris flew everywhere, and when the dust settled, a deep pit over ten meters in diameter remained.
The Raikage's son's chest heaved violently. Though furious, he didn't follow the Earth Dragon underground.
The subterranean world was clearly the Earth Dragon's home turf; he wouldn't put himself at a disadvantage.
"Worthy of the Raikage lineage, I suppose? Quite a temper you have. Where's that arrogance from before? Where's that energy to wipe out my Hidden Hot Water Village? Today, I will cut off the Hidden Cloud's roots! I will make the name 'A' disappear from the Shinobi World forever!"
Kael's sinister voice suddenly rang out from another part of the sky. He was still standing on the Earth Dragon's back, looking coldly at the Raikage's son.
But the Raikage's son didn't dare look directly at him, clearly afraid of seeing that mind-controlling dance again.
Kael extended his hand toward the Raikage's son and pointed from a distance. As if his words were law, a green figure appeared behind the Raikage's son. Its cold scythes were poised to strike at his neck. The overwhelming sense of crisis instantly made the Raikage's son's skin crawl, goosebumps spreading over his entire body.
He jerked his right arm up.
Clang!
A loud clash.
The Void Mantis's sneak attack was once again blocked by the metal guards on his arm.
But the next moment, two incredibly thin beams of seven-colored light shot like lightning from the side, aiming for his exposed chest.
Sensing the danger, the Raikage's son instinctively flared his chakra. The blue lightning around his body surged again, concentrating intensely on his chest from all his tenketsu points. This slightly deflected the two beams, causing them to deviate from their original trajectory and graze past his sides.
Thump! Thump-thump! Thump-thump!
The Raikage's son's heart raced. Consecutive near-death experiences sent his heart rate soaring. He looked down at the two tiny holes at his feet.
Wisps of gray smoke rose from the holes, as if something had been burned.
He felt the relief of surviving a disaster.
"There was no elemental chakra signature, yet it caused an effect like high-temperature Fire Style burning, combined with the piercing power of Wind Style... That yellow dog's ability is truly bizarre..."
He didn't know that when formless, intangible light was condensed to the extreme by Goldie's eyes, it could produce such devastating power!
He turned to look at Goldie to his front-right, a glint of wariness in his eyes. If that technique hit his heart, he didn't dare imagine the consequences!