By the faint moonlight overhead, Amamiya Ayane finally saw her opponent clearly.
A gray robe dragged along the ground.
Two water-buffalo-like horns protruded from its head.
Its skin was dark and metallic, crisscrossed with mechanical seams.
In short—
It barely looked human at all.
"It's a Sunagakure mechanical puppet!" The woodpecker recognized it instantly.
Without hesitation, he hurled a kunai.
Damn it. A Sand shinobi? And from the puppet corps? What is he doing here?!
A faint buzzing filled the air.
No one answered his internal question.
The puppet's mouth opened—
Not to speak—
But as its entire head detached from its neck and shot upward, clamping the incoming kunai between its teeth midair.
Simultaneously, its hands split open—
From its palms, countless fine poisoned needles sprayed toward them.
Whoosh—!
"Fall back!" Woodpecker shouted while evading.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the rookie's reaction.
Fast.
The moment the puppet moved, Ayane had already flipped backward in a spinning somersault, forming hand seals midair without pause.
Fluid. Seamless.
Before her feet even touched ground—
She was upside down, head lowered, cheeks puffed.
"Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!"
A violent gust exploded outward.
The airborne needles were blown off course, clattering uselessly to the ground.
Nicely done.
Woodpecker praised inwardly—but this wasn't the time for encouragement.
He seized the opening and dashed past the puppet.
To deal with a puppet master, you didn't waste time on the puppet—
You located the chakra threads and hunted the real body.
Strike the king to capture the board.
When the puppet's head had separated earlier, he'd glimpsed it—
A faint chakra string.
There was no time to explain.
He could only hope Black Swan understood and would hold the puppet down.
"Where do you think you're going?"
The puppet's palms shifted again—
This time, twin blades snapped out from within, gleaming coldly.
The woodpecker said nothing.
He wasn't a ninjutsu artillery-type shinobi.
Against poison needles, he'd instinctively retreated.
But close combat?
This was his domain.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Sparks flew as kunai met steel. Dozens of exchanges in seconds.
"I told you," the puppet's body twisted beneath its robe, "you're going nowhere."
From beneath the gray cloak—
A steel tail lashed out.
Its bladed tip gleamed ominously.
Poisoned.
"Die!"
The tail thrust viciously—
But nothing struck me.
Poof!
White smoke burst.
A wooden log dropped.
Substitution Technique.
Woodpecker vanished from the melee, ricocheting into darkness.
"Ah… ANBU. Your partner seems to have abandoned you."
The puppet didn't pursue. Its severed head still floated, tethered by a thin cable.
A chilling sight.
Yet the provocation was laughably crude.
Ayane had watched plenty of Naruto clips in her previous life—especially Chiyo and Sakura versus Sasori.
One of Haruno Sakura's rare high points.
She understood instantly.
"Heh. Shouldn't you be the one running?" she replied coolly. "After all, a puppet master's strength is mostly in the puppet."
"Oh? Underestimated by a child?"
Though its tone remained mechanical, the hostility sharpened.
"Then I suppose I'll kill you first… before returning to protect my body."
The puppet kept talking—
But its head was already retracting, cable whirring as it reattached.
Ayane didn't hesitate.
Drawing her blade, she bent low and accelerated—
A streak of lightning toward the floating head.
Click—click—
Mechanisms shifted again.
The puppet's mouth opened wide—
And spewed thick purple smoke.
Poison gas.
Ayane halted briefly.
In the shinobi world, there were two great poison masters.
Hanzō of the Salamander—
And Chiyo of the Sand.
Arguably, Chiyo surpassed him.
Hanzō's toxin required him alone—and even forced him to wear a mask.
Chiyo's poisons could be shared, refined, and perfected.
But—
If the puppet master thought smoke would hinder her—
He was mistaken.
Ayane's hand dipped into her pouch.
Three explosive tags tied to kunai.
The smoke was dense, obscuring vision.
Her eyes narrowed.
[Precision Ninja Tool Throwing] activated.
In that instant, she felt it—
The puppet head's movement within the haze.
There.
Her thought and throw were simultaneous.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Three explosive-tagged kunai flew in an inverted triangle formation—
Straight into the smoke.
Boom!
Fire erupted within a purple haze.
Behind a ruined wall—
A red-haired puppet master trembled.
He hastily severed his chakra threads.
Impossible.
Just before his puppet's vision cut out—
He'd been about to mock the ANBU's childish attempt.
A few explosive tags?
This wasn't Academy playtime.
Yet—
The explosion had struck with surgical precision.
Both eyes.
The mouth.
Weak points.
As if—
She had tracking vision.
Some kind of sensory ninjutsu?
Don't tell me she stole Byakugan from Konoha…
"Found you."
A cold voice whispered behind him.
His body froze.
The woodpecker stood there, kunai pressed to his back.
"Drop your weapons. Or die."
"Don't kill me—"
The puppet master raised both hands instantly.
Surrender.
The woodpecker didn't relax.
"Cut your chakra threads. Don't try tricks."
Silence.
"You know puppet masters well," the red-haired shinobi muttered.
Woodpecker said nothing—
Only pressed the blade deeper. Blood welled.
"…Fine. I surrender."
His body slackened.
"Please. I don't want to die in this sunless hellhole."
"Then answer my questions honestly—"
Woodpecker reached to remove the ninja pouch from his waist.
Suddenly—
Blinding light burst from the puppet master's body.
Woodpecker's pupils constricted.
Not good.