Chapter 117: The Shura's True Power
The four Cloud Jonin roared in unison, their combined chakra fueling the cataclysm. The wall of lightning enclosing Kagenori detonated inward, a sun-bright sphere of pure annihilation. The air itself screamed as incalculable volts of electricity and searing heat scoured the epicenter, a force designed to vaporize everything within its radius, leaving not even ash behind.
The flash was so intense the other Cloud-nin had to shield their eyes. For three full minutes, the lightning raged, a sustained bombardment meant to leave no doubt. When it finally subsided, a thick, acrid smoke choked the air.
Confident in their kill, the four Jonin and the five Chunin maintaining the barrier dropped their jutsu, regrouping with the squad. They waited, eyes fixed on the clearing smoke, ready to confirm the Shura's demise.
As the haze dissipated, a collective, stunned gasp rippled through the twenty shinobi.
The ground was a blackened, glassy crater. But at its center, Kagenori stood. Unscathed. His clothes were untouched. The only sign of strain was a single, vivid trail of blood tracing a path from his left eye, stark against his pale skin.
"So this is the power of the Mangekyō," Kagenori murmured, a note of clinical fascination in his voice. "Extraordinary."
The Cloud-nin's shock lasted only a second before training took over. A volley of ninjutsu—fireballs, lightning spears, pressurized water—erupted from the group, flying towards the unmoving target.
"Banbutsu Sōzō: Kyozetsu." (Ten Thousand Phenomena Creation: Rejection)
Kagenori's voice was calm. His left Mangekyō swirled. The incoming ninjutsu seemed to strike him, but they simply… vanished on contact. No explosion, no impact, not even a ripple in his clothes. It was as if the very reality around him rejected their existence.
This was the ability housed in his left eye. Kyozetsu. Upon activation, his body automatically rejected any foreign chakra-based technique, rendering the opponent's ninjutsu, genjutsu, and likely even certain kinjutsu, utterly null against his person.
Seeing their attacks prove completely futile, a sliver of primal fear entered the Cloud-nin's hearts. Kagenori didn't give them time to process it. With a cold sneer, he became a blur of motion, charging directly into their midst.
Freed from the need to defend against ninjutsu, he could now wield Thunder Breathing with impunity.
He closed the distance in an instant, his breath exhaling in a sharp hiss.
"Thunder Breathing, Second Form: Rice Spirit."
Five lightning-fast, zig-zagging slashes erupted from his blade. The Cloud-nin, unprepared for his sudden, close-quarters assault, could not react. Three heads flew from their shoulders before they could even raise a guard.
Chaos erupted. The remaining shinobi scrambled to counter-attack with taijutsu and close-range ninjutsu. But Kagenori's Mangekyō Sharingan spun wildly, its predictive and analytical capabilities pushed to their zenith. To his enhanced perception, their movements were sluggish, telegraphed, and painfully easy to read. He weaved through their strikes with an almost contemptuous ease, his ninjato a silver flash that severed limbs and opened throats. Blood sprayed, painting his cheeks and clothes crimson.
"Hell Stab: Lariat!" a Jonin roared from behind, five fingers crackling with concentrated lightning as he thrust at Kagenori's back.
In a motion too fluid to track, Kagenori pivoted, his free hand snapping out to catch the Jonin's wrist. The moment his fingers made contact, the Kyozetsu ability activated. The brilliant lightning coating the man's hand winked out of existence, rejected by Kagenori's very being.
Without a pause, Kagenori's sword swept up, severing the arm at the elbow. A follow-through slash cleanly beheaded the stunned Jonin. Kagenori tossed the disembodied arm aside like garbage and continued his relentless advance.
It was no longer a battle; it was a slaughter. The Cloud-nin were lambs before a wolf. Within ten minutes, more than half of the twenty-strong squad lay dead on the scorched earth. The survivors' fighting spirit broke, replaced by a cold, creeping terror.
"Re-form the Lightning Lure!" the commander screamed, desperation in his voice.
A few tried to comply, hands fumbling for seals.
"Thunder Breathing, Fourth Form: Distant Thunder."
Lightning erupted around Kagenori as he became a bolt himself, closing the distance and cutting down the seal-weavers before they could complete their first hand sign.
Seeing the last hope of containment extinguished, the commander made the only call left. "RETREAT!"
The remaining Cloud-nin scattered, fleeing in every direction. But against a shinobi whose primary attribute was speed, turning their backs was a death sentence.
"Thunder Breathing, First Form: Thunderclap and Flash. Eightfold."
The sound was not of a single clap, but a rapid, staccato peal of thunder tearing the air apart. Kagenori became a flicker of lethal light, impossible to follow with the naked eye. He flashed past one fleeing ninja, then another, his blade a mere afterimage. With each flash, a life was extinguished.
After several such bursts of impossible speed, only one Cloud-nin remained—a trembling Chunin who had tripped and fallen to the ground. He looked up at Kagenori, his eyes wide with abject horror. He couldn't comprehend it. How could anyone survive that hellish lightning sphere? What kind of power was this?
Kagenori walked over and crouched before him, a stark contrast of a calm demeanor and a blood-splattered face. The Chunin flinched, waiting for the final blow.
Instead, Kagenori smiled.
To the Chunin, that smile, framed by the blood of his comrades, was the most terrifying sight he had ever witnessed—the grin of a true demon.
"You're lucky," Kagenori said, his voice conversational. "I'm letting you live. You're the sole survivor."
The Chunin, though petrified, managed to stammer out a single word. "Why?"
"Because I need a messenger." Kagenori calmly wiped his bloody blade clean on the Chunin's flak jacket, sheathing it with a soft click. He stood up, looking down at the cowering man. "Go back. Tell them everything you saw here. In detail. Make your survival worth something."
He turned and walked away, leaving the Chunin alone amidst the carnage. The young man's gaze swept over the grotesque landscape of his fallen comrades—the scattered bodies, a severed head staring blankly back at him from a few feet away. The shock and horror finally overwhelmed him. He doubled over, vomiting violently, his body wracked with sobs of utter despair.
The report that reached the Cloud command was met with stunned disbelief. A twenty-strong elite squad, including eight Jonin, had been sent to kill one man. Not only had they failed, but they had been systematically slaughtered. The sole survivor's account painted a picture not of a battle, but of a one-sided massacre, a demonstration of power against which they had no defense.
The Cloud leaders were forced to a grim conclusion: Kagenori was no longer merely a Jonin. He had ascended to the rank of an Elite Jonin, a tier of power where the difference was not incremental, but exponential.
Dealing with him now would require committing a significant portion of their forces or pitting another elite of similar caliber against him. But with the serpentine Orochimaru watching their every move from the shadows, diverting such resources to a single hunter was a strategic folly. It would leave other fronts critically vulnerable.
Kagenori, the Blood-Eyed Shura, was no longer just a nuisance. He had become a tactical paradox—a problem they could not ignore, yet could not afford to solve.
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