Chapter 159: See Small Gain and Forget Principle; Cherish Life and Lose the Moment
By the time Obito understood his mistake, it was already too late.
His plan had been straightforward: the moment the chains caught her, use Kamui immediately and pull her into the dimensional space. The Fourth Hokage had escaped the same trap with Flying Thunder God. This girl had no such technique.
What he had failed to account for — the critical, obvious thing he had missed — was whether he could actually move this particular girl once the chains connected.
"Idiot."
The word arrived from behind him. Sakura's voice, entirely matter-of-fact.
He tried to phase. Too late.
The force that hit his wrists was not something he had a frame of reference for. He didn't resist so much as cease to be relevant to the outcome — like a person trying to anchor a stampede with their palms. In one motion he was flat on the ground, carving a groove through the earth as she dragged him.
He tried to release the chains. Sakura grabbed the chain directly and swung him into the ground.
BOOM.
Then swung him the other way.
BOOM.
Seven times. Eight. She found a rhythm like someone doing something she'd done many times before. Each impact left a new crater.
When she finally let go, Obito lay there feeling like a person who had been assembled incorrectly and was now reconsidering the original design.
She turned the chains in her hand — they were spinning now, a black disc in the air, the metal producing a strained keening.
"Big claims," Sakura said pleasantly. "Phasing ability is the whole show, isn't it."
Obito's face showed exactly how he felt about this summary.
"Don't get too comfortable, little girl."
She spun the chains faster.
"Can't stand looking at me? Then come fight me." The smile didn't reach anything approaching warmth. "Stand right here and try to hit me. You probably won't manage it even if I let you."
He had Mangekyo Sharingan — Kamui, near-unbreakable. Wood Release cells giving him limitless ocular stamina. One regular three-tomoe eye capable of Izanagi, able to reverse any fatal outcome. Black rods of chakra-suppression. An effectively bottomless toolkit.
And a girl who healed faster than he could hurt her and hit harder than anything he'd planned around was explaining that he was inadequate.
"There's actually something I'm curious about," Sakura said, the chain spinning going a bit louder.
"Hm. A last request?" He hadn't moved from his position of studied superiority. "Surrender first."
"If I asked the old man to use Impure World Reincarnation and bring back Rin—"
His expression changed.
"—and she found out what you've been doing — do you think she'd want to kill you?"
"Because Rin died specifically to protect Konoha, you know~"
A black blur crossed through him. He had started phasing before the sentence landed — the word Rin had set him on alert — and the chain passed through clean.
"Don't—"
"She's not yours to—"
Sakura was already running. The chain had been a feint; she'd been two steps ahead of him before she threw it.
He turned. She'd passed through him entirely, back to front, and was at the far end of the movement.
He grabbed for her shoulder — the moment of separation, the instant when she was solid—
Contact.
He had her shoulder.
Now.
She was accelerating.
He found himself moving with her, involuntarily, stumbling, almost going down.
She didn't notice him. Or she noticed and it registered below the threshold of things worth responding to.
He stood there watching her run, hand extended, the most useless grab in the history of the ninja world.
Zetsu, at distance, watched this transpire.
"Ah." A sigh. "What a shame."
Obito had Kamui. He had Wood Release. He had every theoretical advantage a ninja could carry.
But his method had never changed across any opponent he'd ever faced. The same approach, executed with perfect confidence, because perfect confidence had always been sufficient before.
Against this particular girl — she'd spotted the first trap from the reaction of her own foot mid-kick, immediately identified the pattern, instantly calculated her own physical superiority, and deliberately walked into the rod to break his mask and expose him. She'd taken a wound as a tactical decision.
He should have updated. He'd seen the strength with the chains.
He hadn't updated.
No surprise there.
Zetsu found itself thinking about Nagato.
Jiraiya had been in sage mode too long. The frog characteristics were visible — not stone yet, but pushing the margin. Fukasaku and Shima were still with him, but the sustained combat against both Orochimaru and the Raikage while managing the entire battle was taking its toll.
Sakura looked at the situation: Kakashi and Mei with the Eight-Tails, holding but not progressing; Jiraiya fading; the Raikage bleeding, chakra nearly gone; Orochimaru pacing himself as always.
She ran toward Jiraiya's fight.
The Raikage could die, but Orochimaru — the Reanimation Jutsu existed. Even the Outer Path's ability to call souls might not permanently end Orochimaru. This wasn't the moment. He'd recover, he'd escape, and eventually there would be an accounting. Not today.
The Raikage, though—
Obito saw her vector change and moved. He also wanted the Raikage — alive, for now. A dead Raikage created complications he didn't need.
He started toward the engagement and slowed.
What if she turns around and hits me?
She was busy. She wouldn't. Probably.
He thought about the last time he'd been within reach of a full-force strike from her.
His feet made their own decision.
Zetsu watched, and felt something like resignation.
See small gain, forget principle. Cherish oneself when the great moment demands sacrifice.
He's become useless.
Perhaps it's time to think seriously about Nagato.
The Raikage had just staggered a step back from Jiraiya's last exchange, breathing hard, when the sharp sound of displaced air reached him.
He looked.
A black disc. Fast. And behind it, the pink hair.
No.
Everything depleted. Injuries stacking. She's been fighting as long as I have and she's—
He moved to evade, but the initiative was already gone. Full strength against a fresh Sakura was something he could contest. Against her now, in this state—
Where was Obito?
He couldn't see him. He couldn't rely on him.
Orochimaru had noticed, was moving to intercept, but Jiraiya moved first — placed himself between Orochimaru and the fight, and Shima formed seals on his shoulder:
"Sage Art — Wind Release — Dust and Sand!"
A storm of turbid wind filled the space between Orochimaru and everything else. Orochimaru watched it arrive.
Does it matter? The Raikage's survival was not Orochimaru's problem. He'd been present. He'd participated. The promised technology would be delivered regardless.
He stopped moving.
The chains Sakura was carrying — she threw them.
"Adamantine Prison Wall!"
The chains wrapped the Raikage. Enma didn't need to be asked — several staff forms drove into the ground and built a frame around him in an instant.
Obito moved toward the Raikage, fast — he needed to phase him out, move him to safety before this concluded—
And then slowed again.
To phase the Raikage out, he needed to be in physical form. If he committed to physical form and she turned around—
He thought about that fist.
He weighed it.
His steps continued slowing.
Zetsu watched and had nothing left to say.
The Eight-Tails saw his brother immobilized and abandoned the fight with Kakashi and Mei entirely, driving toward the Raikage with all eight arms.
"Water Release — Water Dragon Bite-Crash!"
The technique was from Tobirama's scroll. S-rank. The water that gathered in response to the call was not the same thing as a standard water dragon — it was shaped differently, carried differently, moved with the weight of something that had consumed everything available to form itself.
The Eight-Tails launched tailed beast bombs toward it — no time for a proper Tailed Beast Ball, just the smaller, faster version.
"Water Release — Water Formation Pillar!"
"Earth Release — Earth-Style Wall!"
Two of the bombs hit Sakura's defenses and detonated. One broke through.
Sakura's earth wall — sculpted with a dog's face, because Kakashi had used that seal during their exercises once and it had stuck — took the impact and held.
The water dragon connected with the Raikage.
The force was what being hit by a truck felt like. He felt his internal organs shift. The chakra that had been sustaining consciousness was gone.
Sakura was through the smoke before it cleared.
Everything she had, in the palm of her hand, burning, shaped.
She hit him in the chest.
The shockwave swept the field.
The Raikage looked at the small white fist in his chest and didn't understand.
He'd only wanted his people to eat. He'd only wanted the ones in his care to live without hunger.
Was that wrong?
Why was he dying for that?
The cold came fast. His thoughts couldn't follow the cold.
In the last available moment, he heard something — a voice cracking through grief, through fury, through everything—
"BIG BROTHER!"
(Chapter End)
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