The Third Great Ninja War had ended only five years ago. As a former member of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist, Raiga Kurosuki was a name that carried the weight of an elite Jounin throughout Kirigakure.
During his clashes with Konoha, the Uchiha and Hyuga clans had left the deepest scars on his memory.
The Hyuga were a nightmare because their Byakugan could see right through the Hidden Mist Technique, completely neutralizing the Mist's tactical bread and butter. The Uchiha, while susceptible to the mist's visual interference, possessed kinetic vision and reaction speeds far beyond ordinary shinobi.
Most lethally, a single glance into their eyes meant falling under a genjutsu. Even if one broke free in a heartbeat, that split-second opening was a death sentence on the battlefield. Countless Mist shinobi had met their ends that way.
"Dammit! Are these Konoha ninja?"
As the thick fog rose, Raiga vanished within it. He furrowed his brows, wondering if his men had recently offed some high-profile merchant from the Land of Fire to bring such hunters to his doorstep.
It was common knowledge that Konoha loved taking missions from anyone with coin—merchants and nobles from neighboring lands often bypassed their own villages to hire Konoha's elite. Ever since the Land of Wind's Daimyo slashed Suna's budget after the war, even Suna's own nobles had started outsourcing to Konoha, pushing Suna into a financial crisis.
So, Raiga wasn't surprised to encounter Konoha ninja; he was just surprised they had sent an Uchiha.
"Wait..." Raiga grew alert.
He realized that he hadn't seen a Konoha forehead protector on the girl, nor was she wearing the standard flak jacket. Furthermore, the people he had been cornering were clearly Hoshigakure shinobi.
Raiga, who had been holed up in the Katabami Gold Mine for months, was woefully out of the loop regarding the geopolitical shifts in the Land of Stars.
On the other side, seeing the mist thicken, Hikari gave a calm order to Natsuhi. "Go support Hotarubi and the others. Deal with the rest of the Kurosuki family. I'll handle Raiga myself."
"Yes! My Lady!" Natsuhi, desperate to get to her husband, felt a wave of relief and vanished in a Body Flicker.
Once Natsuhi was gone, Hikari stood with her arms crossed, her Sharingan glowing with a predatory red light through the haze. She spoke with cold mockery.
"Raiga Kurosuki, one of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen... Is hiding all you're good at?"
"Brat, so you aren't a Konoha ninja?" Raiga's voice echoed from all directions, distorted by the mist and the terrain to mask his true location.
"And what if I'm not? I'm just here to beat the Kurosuki family into submission." Hikari's eyes spun, scanning the environment.
"Hahaha!" Raiga's manic laughter rang out. "An Uchiha rogue? Interesting! If I weren't about to hold your funeral, I'd love to sit down and hear the story of how you deserted."
Raiga's favorite pastime was holding funerals—listening to the life stories of others, especially those he personally sent to the grave.
"No worries. After I've thrashed you, we'll have plenty of time to talk." Hikari mused on how to flush him out.
Suddenly, several lightning snakes erupted from the ground, lashing out like silver whips toward her.
Lightning Burial: Banquet of Lightning!
It was another specialty of the Kiba blades. Hikari didn't retreat; instead, she leaped directly toward the source of the attack, weaving signs mid-air.
"Fire Release: Phoenix Sage Flower Nail Crimson!"
Hikari exhaled a burst of flames followed by a dozen shuriken. The shuriken caught the fire, dispersing the flames so that each blade was cloaked in searing chakra. The result was a rain of burning steel that tore through the mist.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Several crisp metallic impacts echoed in the fog. While Raiga successfully parried the shuriken, he inadvertently revealed his position. Abandoning stealth, he raised the Kiba blades high, crossing them to draw power from the heavens.
BOOM! BOOM!
Two massive lightning bolts slammed down into the tips of his swords, infusing them with raw electrical fury.
"Ninja Art: Lightning Armor!"
Bolts of electricity flowed from the blades across his body, forming an integrated suit of lightning. Wrapped in crackling, jagged sparks, Raiga looked like a god of thunder.
"Oh? A little interesting," Hikari muttered as she landed.
She had to admit, he was an elite Jounin for a reason. Upon realizing he faced an Uchiha, he immediately prioritized distance, used mist to disrupt her vision, and relied on long-range lightning. It was a seasoned, professional tactical set—the kind of wisdom bought with blood during the Great War.
Against a standard three-tomoe Uchiha Jounin, this would be a difficult fight.
But Hikari was no ordinary Uchiha.
Gurgle~
An untimely growl from her stomach made Hikari's ears turn slightly red.
"Let's see how far you can keep running!"
Hikari's hands blurred into seals, her gaze turning heavy and solemn.
"Fire Release: Great Fire Annihilation!"
A colossal volume of fire chakra surged from her lungs, manifesting as a literal tidal wave of flame that roared toward Raiga. The wall of fire was so vast that it instantly evaporated the mist in its path, tearing a glowing orange tunnel through the gray battlefield.
Raiga was horrified. He had seen Uchiha use this jutsu before, but never on this scale. The wall of fire was meters high, resembling a sea of lava more than a simple ninjutsu.
As expected, anyone who can go rogue from a clan like that is a monster.
Raiga hoisted his blades once more. Lightning coalesced, spinning and dancing in the air until it formed a massive, red-eyed dragon of electricity.
"Lightning Release: Lightning Dragon Tornado!" Raiga roared.
He swung the blades down, and the snarling dragon collided head-on with the wave of fire!
BOOM!
The resulting explosion leveled the ruins of the nearby village and flattened the surrounding forest. Through the smoke and flickering embers, Raiga allowed himself a smirk of triumph. "Uchiha... is that all—"
Before he could finish, a dark crimson skeletal claw tore through the smoke and fire of the explosion, slamming down with the weight of a falling mountain!
"What?!" Raiga's eyes bulged.
Never having seen such a technique, he desperately pushed his lightning armor to its maximum output and raised the Kiba blades to intercept.
The red skeletal hand crashed down on him. The blades and lightning armor provided no resistance; Raiga was smashed bodily into the earth.
Cough—!
Raiga spat out a mouthful of blood, looking up in disbelief at the Uchiha girl walking toward him through the dissipating fog.
She was encased in a massive, translucent, dark crimson ribcage—the perfect defense. The skeletal arm of her right side had extended over twenty meters, closing the distance instantly to swat him like a fly.
Worse yet, the skeletal claw was wreathed in a layer of dark red flames that were currently eating through his lightning armor.