Taking a page from a certain "cautious" senior's playbook—referring, of course, to the legendary detection barrier of a certain steady immortal—Aburame Tetsumaru (a fellow "steady" soul) designed his Land of Wind exploration plan as a truly gargantuan engineering project. The core of the plan involved using Burrowing Worms to carve out a subterranean network spanning the entire Land of Wind, allowing him to explore the nation from beneath the surface.
The initial phase called for the construction of thirteen underground Broodmothers dedicated to breeding a "Mining Zerg" workforce. Their ultimate goal: to excavate a massive underground network consisting of 200,000 kilometers of primary tunnels and an uncalculable number of secondary branches.
This network wouldn't cover every square inch of the Land of Wind, nor would it be a perfect grid like a man-made border. A square, orderly grid might look neat and theoretically guarantee finding the giant insects, but the sheer volume of construction and the logistical difficulty would skyrocket unnecessarily.
No matter how powerful an insect might be, it still requires food and water. The larger the organism, the more it consumes daily. Therefore, they were guaranteed to live in an environment with an ample food supply.
In a desert, there is no shortage of light, heat, land, or air—only water.
Water is the catalyst for plant life, and plants provide food. Even if these giant insects possessed chlorophyll and could survive on photosynthesis alone, they would still require massive amounts of water to function.
Thus, it was enough for the underground network to follow the path of the subterranean water veins. Whether it was the giant ants or the four-tailed scorpion, they were bound to be hidden at a node where these water veins converged.
Subterranean exploration was also more suited for finding insects. Giant insects would naturally be active underground, or at the very least, hidden in caves during the day. Otherwise, the scorching desert sun would turn them into desiccated specimens in hours.
The water veins of the Land of Wind were essentially underground rivers. Their paths mirrored surface rivers, though most were completely buried beneath the dunes.
Tetsumaru had studied maps of the Land of Wind carefully. Shinobi generally didn't care about geological trends, let alone those hidden beneath the sand, so the maps were useless for estimating water flow. However, the maps clearly marked every oasis—and every site where an oasis had once stood. He decided to use these as his starting points.
Phase One: Direct the worms to dig toward the oases closest to the Land of Rivers.
Phase Two: Once the worms reached a water source, they would dig in both directions along the vein, gradually expanding the reach of the tunnels.
Phase Three: Dig along veins that didn't lead directly to known oases, ensuring no giant insect habitats were missed.
Tetsumaru estimated that he would find something by Phase Two. According to his calculations, the project would take about a year to locate the giant insects he desired.
Even after finding them, the network wouldn't go to waste. Since it followed the water veins, it would effectively blanket all towns and settlements in the Land of Wind, allowing for total monitoring of the nation.
A long, rhythmic whistle echoed—the alert from an Alarm Cricket. This specific cadence signaled the approach of enemies.
Uchiha Hiro, Inuzuka O, and Nara Yoshito stopped their work, smiles spreading across their faces.
"Finally," Hiro muttered. "I thought we'd be building this bridge forever."
Hiro dropped his hammer, tossed his remaining nails into a crate on the bridge deck, and strolled toward the western bank. He rolled his wrists, loosening up for the fight.
O, who had been bracing a pier beneath the bridge, was even faster. He dropped his tools and bolted toward the right flank under the cover of the riverbank, quickly vanishing into the woods.
On the eastern bank, Yoshito methodically organized his tools before leaping to the center of the bridge, keeping pace with Hiro.
As Hiro reached level ground, he began weaving signs. Yoshito mirrored him, maintaining his stride.
Earth Style: Multi-Layer Barrier!Ninja Art: Multi-Layer Web!
Three walls rose in front of Hiro and on his flanks. From each wall, nine stone pillars extended forward, and three spiderwebs were perfectly draped across them.
Four kunai and a dozen shuriken flew from the forest, only to be caught in the webs before they could even touch the stone.
The explosive tags attached to the kunai detonated, destroying the webs and the pillars, but the blast occurred too far from the walls to do more than scorch the stone.
Several figures leaped from the forest. A ninja bringing up the rear, wearing a Suna headband, went pale when he saw who they were facing.
"Team Aburame Tetsumaru," he hissed through gritted teeth. "Damn that intel."
The barrier collapsed as the chakra dissipated, revealing the two Konoha shinobi. The Suna ninja noticed that the two had swapped positions and finished their seals. He paled further.
"Danger! Evasive maneuvers!"
The ninja at the rear shouted as he lunged for cover behind a large tree. However, his teammates didn't share his caution. They were confused; their own jutsu were already primed.
"What is he doing?" "Tch. Heijiamaru survived one squad wipe and turned into a coward."
Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!Wind Style: Thousand Shearing Winds!Wind Style: Dust Storm!
Hiro watched the two C-rank and one B-rank Wind techniques flying toward them. He waited calmly for Yoshito to finish.
Wind Style: Internal Swirling Wind!
Yoshito's jutsu constructed a horizontal tornado beside them. Then, Hiro swelled his chest and spat fire into the intake of the vortex.
Fire Style: Great Fire Eruption!
The tornado transformed into a crimson firestorm. Within the vortex, the flames were compressed, their color shifting. By the time they reached the output, the fire had turned a brilliant, piercing blue, emitting pale blue Mach diamonds like the exhaust of a rocket engine.
The twenty-meter-long plume of fire possessed terrifying power. Though it was a combination of two C-rank jutsus, it instantly obliterated the enemy's B-rank Wind Style. The wind blades from the C-rank jutsus were swept aside like dust.
Yoshito manipulated the fire-pipe, sweeping it across the battlefield. Two puppets lunged forward, only to be caught in the plume. They ignited instantly and were disintegrated by the kinetic force, smoking parts scattering across the ground.
However, a ninja's agility surpassed that of a puppet. Yoshito struggled to sweep the twenty-meter flame accurately, and he failed to hit a single Suna ninja.
The Sand ninjas scattered, flanking the two Konoha Genin with senbon, shuriken, and kunai. Faced with attacks from all directions, Yoshito and Hiro were forced to abandon the combo and dodge.
As three more intact puppets joined the fray, the density of the senbon fire skyrocketed. Hiro was forced to raise another barrier, while Yoshito used his Dust Storm for cover.
Sheltered by the stone and smoke, the two retaliated with shuriken and ninjutsu. The four Suna ninjas and their puppets held the upper hand, and the ninja at the rear, Heijiamaru, took the chance to brief his team.
"That's the Aburame squad! They specialize in combo jutsus!"
"What?" the Suna captain shouted. "Heijiamaru, which Aburame?"
"It's the 'Giant Insect Messenger,' Aburame Tetsumaru!"
"Damn it!"
There were currently seven Aburame Jonin leading squads in the Land of Rivers theater. The Aburame were always a polarizing clan: at the Genin and Chunin levels, they were average, but every Aburame who made Jonin was lethally dangerous.
Two, in particular, were notorious. Their squads were considered second only to the White Fang and the Sannin. One was the "Perfect Shinobi," Aburame Shige, and the other was the "Giant Insect Messenger," Aburame Tetsumaru. In encounters with their teams, Suna's mission records were a string of total failures.
The Suna captain was a newly promoted Jonin leading a standard puppeteer squad—hardly a match for a top-tier team.
As the captain began to consider a retreat, Inuzuka O burst from the trees behind them. With Wind-Style wings attached to his waist, he charged into their formation like a bolt of lightning.
Inuzuka Secret Art: Fang Over Fang!
O and his ninja dog transformed into twin rotating tornadoes, slamming into the rear Suna ninja. The puppeteer tried to defend with his puppet, but he was too late.
The two tornadoes performed a cross-over, hugging the ground as they struck the ninja and his puppet simultaneously, launching them into the air. Blood and puppet fragments showered the area.
O didn't even look back at the airborne ninja; he kept his momentum, charging straight for the Suna captain.
With a flick of his wrists, a pair of Attached Insect Limbs appeared on his forearms, locking tightly over the backs of his hands. Five sharp talons extended past his fingertips.
Clashing with the Suna captain, O used his Wings of the Wind to spin around him at high speeds, his claws a blur. The Jonin was forced into a frantic defense, unable to give orders.
Hiro took the opportunity to drop the barrier and join the melee.
He was wearing even more bio-prosthetics. He had a limb on each shoulder and six more extending from his waist—all of them independent, spider-like Attached Insect Limbs.
His eyes were now blood-red, a single black tomoe spinning in his pupils. Only with the Sharingan active could he manage the simultaneous control of four pairs of independent prosthetic limbs.
With the Sharingan active, Hiro was a whirlwind. Holding a kunai in each hand and backed by eight mechanical legs, he attacked with a ferocity that surpassed a "three-headed, six-armed" demon. He single-handedly suppressed two Suna ninjas and their remaining puppets.
Relying on Hiro's overwhelming pressure, Yoshito used his Multi-Layer Web to capture the two Suna ninjas and their puppets, binding them like cocoons. Then, the three Genin turned to surround the Suna captain.
But they couldn't finish him.
The gap between a Jonin and a Chunin is immense, and the primary difference is that a Jonin has no glaring weaknesses.
O's speed advantage allowed him to tangle with a Jonin for a short time, and the trio's teamwork made their advantage look overwhelming on the surface, but they lacked the decisive blow to end it.
As the minute mark passed, the tide began to turn. The Suna Jonin had adapted to their bizarre combat styles and regained control of the rhythm. As his full strength came to bear, the three Genin were repeatedly forced into life-threatening situations.
The faces of all four combatants were grim. The Konoha Genin knew they were losing, while the Suna Jonin felt like he was already dead.
The battle had lasted four minutes. That was far too long.
Tetsumaru was known as the "Nanny Captain." Intel specifically noted that he never allowed his subordinates to fight alone. The only explanation was that the dangerous Konoha Jonin was hidden nearby, observing. He was testing these Genin, and he would intervene the second they were in real danger.
That means I'm a dead man walking.If I'm going down, I'm taking these three with me!
In a fit of desperation, the Suna Jonin stopped dodging. He took a heavy kick from Yoshito to summon a half-body puppet. The grotesque puppet blocked Hiro's advance, and O seized the opening to drive his claws deep into the Suna ninja's lower abdomen.
The Jonin turned to stare O in the eye, his abdominal muscles tightening to lock the claws in place. His hands blurred through signs.
The Suna ninja's resolve for a mutual kill terrified O. He went rigid, watching his enemy's hands move in a daze.
Wind Style: Wind Cutter!
The Jonin's hands coated in chakra, forming sharp blades of wind. His left hand swiped, parrying a shuriken Hiro had thrown, while his right hand lunged for O's throat.
The three Genin watched with wide eyes. In that lethal moment, a towering figure appeared in front of O.
The newcomer was massive. The Suna ninja's hand, aimed at O's throat, struck the man's stomach instead. It shredded his clothes but failed to penetrate the insect armor beneath.
At the same time, a fist the size of a mortar slammed into the Suna ninja's jaw, sending him spinning through the air like a top.
The Suna Jonin was dead before he hit the ground.
The three Genin were drenched in sweat. O collapsed to the ground, gasping for air.
"Not bad," Tetsumaru said, dragging the two cocoons back toward them. He evaluated their performance with a smile. "You held out against a Suna Jonin for four minutes and fifteen seconds."
The three subordinates caught their breath, their eyes fixed on their captain's fist. The proportions are wrong.
Tetsumaru was now sixteen, and his height had surpassed two meters. He was built like a mountain, so his hands were naturally large, but this fist had been the size of a human head.
Noticing their stares, Tetsumaru spread his fingers. Each finger split open, the cracks extending to his elbow. The "fist" unfolded like flower petals and fell away.
It had been a specialized gauntlet made of Attached Insect Limbs. The three Genin pouted; over the last six months, they had seen so many variations of bio-prosthetics that they were no longer impressed. Most were gimmicks, though a few were undeniably effective.
Team 121 had grown rapidly over the half-year. They had mastered numerous jutsus, but the boys were still only eleven. Their bodies were just beginning to develop, and they lacked the massive chakra reserves of a Senju or Uzumaki. They could only use a few jutsus before running dry.
On the battlefield, if you can't rely on Ninjutsu, you must rely on Taijutsu. That was a high-risk game. In war, the number one cause of death for Genin was being killed in melee, followed by traps. Ninjutsu was actually only the third leading cause of casualties.
Furthermore, most Genin killed by traps were commoners. Shinobi from established clans were trained better; unless they were careless or greedy, they rarely fell for them.
Accordingly, Tetsumaru had designed a set tactical doctrine for the squad:
Opening: Raise a barrier to block projectiles and obscure vision.
Suppression: Use combo ninjutsu to pin the enemy down.
Assault: Cover the scouts as they flank for a raid, followed by a frontal charge.
Cleanup: Use support jutsu for area control to secure the win.
Today's battle had perfectly executed this doctrine, quickly dismantling the Suna squad. As for failing to kill the Jonin—that wasn't a tactical failure; it was simply a gap in raw power that no amount of strategy could bridge.
In the shinobi world, the line between Genin and Chunin is blurry; a Genin squad can often overwhelm a Chunin, and a Genin solo-killing a Chunin isn't unheard of.
But a Jonin is a different animal. They either have a perfect balance of Ninja, Body, and Illusion arts, or they are so peerless in one field that their weaknesses don't matter. Any Jonin is capable of wiping out a squad of Chunin and Genin—unless, of course, they run into a squad of Konoha Genin.