Chapter 124: After Completing a Bunch of Side Quests, Entering the Main Story
Finally, watching Mizuki's face—teeth clenched so hard his jaw muscles twitched from extreme anger and humiliation, his entire face turning the color of pig liver, looking like he really had a ridiculous red ball on his nose and could go straight to the circus as a clown or be printed on playing cards as a joker—Naruto could no longer contain the laughter he'd been holding back.
"Pfft... HAHAHAHAHA!!!"
He laughed unreservedly at Mizuki's face, which was twisted beyond recognition.
Sure enough, when people are doing bad things and pretending to be someone else, they become particularly patient... but once that disguise is torn away and their true nature is exposed, they become particularly ridiculous.
However, this mockery-filled laughter completely triggered Mizuki's fragile nerves.
"Bastard!!!"
Mizuki let out a roar of extreme shame and fury, violently throwing the fake scroll covered in "IDIOT" to the ground.
He swiftly grabbed that heavy giant shuriken again, and this time without any hesitation or wasted words, hurled it fiercely at Naruto!
"DIE!!!"
The giant shuriken tore through the air with a piercing whistle, spinning as it aimed straight for Naruto's face!
However—
"CLANG!!"
A crisp, loud metallic clash suddenly rang out!
Naruto, who had been doubled over with laughter just a second before, instantly calmed his gaze. His right hand was already gripping a kunai in reverse, sweeping upward with tremendous force.
A perfectly precise block. That heavy, powerful giant shuriken was actually deflected by this single strike, changing trajectory with a wail as it flew off at an angle, embedding itself deep into a nearby tree trunk with a "thunk."
"What...?!" Mizuki's vicious grin instantly froze on his face, his brain unable to process this incredible scene!
And in that split second of his stupefaction—
Whoosh!
The next moment, Mizuki felt a gust of wind hit his face! Naruto had appeared right in front of him as if teleporting, using his momentum to complete a fluid spin in midair!
"Leaf Whirlwind!"
A powerful spinning kick swept hard across Mizuki's chest and abdomen!
Mizuki instinctively tried to form hand seals for a substitution jutsu, but his seal formation speed was laughably slow compared to Naruto's sudden fierce attack—like watching slow-motion replay.
BOOM!
An incredibly heavy thudding sound exploded!
Naruto's kick landed solidly on Mizuki's chest. The massive impact force instantly erupted, and Mizuki couldn't even let out a complete scream before his entire body flew backward uncontrollably like a sandbag hit at full speed.
His body traced an ugly parabolic arc through the air before slamming hard, back-first, into the trunk of a tree so thick it would take two people to wrap their arms around it.
CRACK—! The teeth-grinding sound of breaking bones was clearly audible.
Dust and leaves from the impact rustled down.
When the dust settled slightly, Mizuki could be seen collapsed at the base of the tree in a twisted position, head lolling to one side, eyes rolled back, blood trickling from his nose and mouth, completely unconscious.
Naruto landed lightly back on the ground, looked at that pile of mush in the distance, and gave an extremely concise assessment.
"...So weak."
After completely dealing with the troublesome Mizuki, Naruto didn't just wait around for the Third Hokage and Iruka to arrive and clean up the mess.
He walked slowly toward Mizuki, who was slumped unconsciously at the base of the tree.
He vaguely remembered that in the original story, this guy seemed to have been marked with a curse seal by Orochimaru. Just to be safe, and to prevent this morally corrupt guy from causing trouble in prison later, Naruto decided it would be more prudent to add an extra "insurance policy" beforehand.
Although directly eliminating this scum would be more convenient...
Naruto glanced at the unconscious Mizuki, but doing that would probably be hard for Iruka-sensei and the old Third to accept. They'd probably look at me strangely...
He walked up to Mizuki and quickly formed a series of hand seals in front of his body. As his chakra gathered, mysterious sealing runes formed in his palms.
"Eight Trigrams Seal!"
Naruto called out in a low voice, pressing his palm covered with sealing runes precisely onto Mizuki's abdomen.
The next moment, those runes spread rapidly from Naruto's palm like living creatures, flowing swiftly throughout Mizuki's entire body along his chakra pathway system!
These sealing techniques targeted the complete blockade of all chakra points and meridian systems within the target's body! They precisely severed and sealed every pathway that could generate and circulate chakra.
Simultaneously, the sealing power quickly captured and wrapped around the curse seal energy belonging to Orochimaru that was hidden in Mizuki's arm, suppressing, encasing, and ultimately completely isolating it!
The entire process lasted about ten seconds. When the runes completely disappeared into Mizuki's body, the technique was complete.
At this moment, Mizuki's entire chakra system had been completely locked down. He could no longer refine even the slightest bit of chakra—his meridians were like completely dried-up, abandoned riverbeds where chakra could not flow at all.
He had completely become an ordinary person unable to sense, refine, or use any chakra whatsoever.
Naruto's Eight Trigrams Seal wasn't something that could be easily broken with special medicinal materials. Without Naruto personally releasing it or someone with sealing technique expertise far surpassing Naruto's, this guy would remain an ordinary person for life.
Having completed all this, Naruto walked over to sit on a clean large rock nearby, calmly taking out another small scroll from his ninja tool pouch.
He released the storage seal on the scroll, and with a light puff of smoke—the real Scroll of Sealing containing countless forbidden technique secrets appeared in his hands.
He unrolled the massive scroll and, by the bright moonlight and faint forest light, began reading through the various powerful ninja techniques recorded within with great interest. While learning and studying, he quietly waited for the Third Hokage and Iruka-sensei to arrive so he could "return" the mission objective.