Jūbei, who was currently advancing alone, had become the vanguard of Uchiha Kei’s forces.
Unfortunately, he had yet to receive the good news that a full-scale war had been mobilized.
He still didn’t know that his role had changed.
He still thought of himself as an abandoned detachment sent out alone.
With the cold wind howling and the waters of the Yi River freezing, Jūbei advanced toward the "battlefield" where Yakushi Inari and the Sarutobi were fighting, carrying the resolve of a man prepared to die.
He had heard that the fighting there was intense, with the two sides locked in fierce confrontation and both suffering casualties.
He couldn’t afford to arrive late.
"Those who charge into the enemy ranks have no thought of returning alive!"
"Brothers, charge!"
Jūbei led the way, flying straight toward the boundary between Konoha and Nanga.
The distance wasn’t short, but for shinobi, it wasn’t particularly far either.
As soon as he arrived, Jūbei saw a group of Sarutobi shinobi surrounding two children from Nanga.
He knew those two children.
They were the prodigies from Yakushi Nonō’s orphanage.
And Nonō was someone Jūbei deeply respected.
She was a woman who had supported an entire world for orphans who had nowhere else to turn.
Regardless of how she had managed to accomplish it, her actions were worthy of respect.
The fault did not lie with her.
It lay with the world itself.
In Jūbei’s heart, as someone who had also grown up an orphan, Nonō was practically the reincarnation of the goddess Myōken.
She protected the orphaned and helpless, warded off calamity and enemies, and brought blessings and longevity to those under her protection.
Although some of the people she had once protected had betrayed her, the children who still possessed a conscience continued to follow her.
Just as Jūbei himself followed Lord Kei.
Such loyalty was something worthy of praise.
Jūbei would never allow anyone to harm the last remaining people under the protection of the goddess Myōken.
"How dare you!"
"You’ve gone completely lawless!"
Upon seeing this scene, Jūbei, who had already come prepared to die, had no intention of holding back.
He only hoped that while he was still alive, he could kill as many Konoha shinobi as possible to repay Uchiha Kei for recognizing his worth.
He also hoped that the children of the goddess Myōken could continue living peacefully in Nanga without suffering any harm.
Besides, Jūbei was facing five Sarutobi clan jōnin.
There was even less reason for him to hold back.
Jūbei summoned the power of fear.
His chakra transformed into the shape of a demonic head.
"Masakado’s Flying Skull!"
A hideous head shot forward.
At that moment, the five Sarutobi jōnin were already being forced into a miserable defensive position by Yakushi Tsukushi and Yakushi Inari.
They were so preoccupied with their immediate opponents that they didn’t notice another combatant had entered the battlefield.
Was ambushing people an inherited tradition at Nanga Shrine?
Why did everyone who came here attack without saying a word?
They didn’t have even the slightest bit of dignity expected from a great clan.
"Ah!"
The demonic head struck Sarutobi Tsukiji Hongan.
It wrapped around his body.
In an instant, only a skeleton remained.
The only relatively clever member of the five-man Sarutobi team had "fallen" on the spot.
Jūbei hadn’t held back with that attack.
But when he saw the result, even he froze.
"I prepared myself for a hard-fought battle, and you’re this fragile?"
"Don’t make the battle so boring by turning it into an instant stomp!"
Jūbei stared suspiciously at the surviving Sarutobi shinobi.
They were jōnin, weren’t they?
They were members of the Sarutobi Clan, weren’t they?
He hadn’t even gotten serious yet, and one of them had already collapsed.
"How did someone at this level even become a jōnin?"
Jūbei’s fighting spirit suddenly deflated a little.
"You’re this weak, yet you actually had the nerve to come to Nanga looking for trouble?"
This wasn’t an accusation.
It was a genuine question.
The sheer incompetence of these jōnin had shaken Jūbei’s confidence in himself.
Wait.
Could it be that I’m not the lone unit after all?
Could these guys be the ones who were sent out alone?
"Or maybe I’m not the spark that started this full-scale war."
"Maybe these idiots are."
Is Konoha really preparing to move against us?
Did they come here deliberately to create an incident?
"Heh."
"Looks like that’s exactly what happened."
"Otherwise, why would they send such useless trash to provoke us?"
"They’re practically here to die."
Just like Uchiha Gen had forced a cripple like him to step forward and risk his life.
Jūbei felt that he had finally figured out the truth.
Damn that Uchiha Gen.
She misjudged the situation.
That foolish old woman thought she had accounted for every possible move, but she didn’t realize that the person she was facing was Hiruzen Sarutobi, a man who had spent his entire life scheming.
Thank goodness I reacted quickly.
Otherwise, Sarutobi would probably have already sent a massive army to our doorstep.
Someone as loyal and capable as himself should have been constantly serving at Lord Kei’s side.
Unfortunately, petty schemers had interfered, forcing a loyal warrior like him to march alone onto the battlefield.
Alas... the times are against me.
Jūbei sighed inwardly.
I was wondering why things had felt so strange lately.
Why had Sarutobi, who had spent his entire life working himself to the bone, suddenly started jumping around so energetically?
This isn’t dancing.
This is wartime mobilization!
"The Sarutobi Clan’s desire to destroy the Uchiha has never died!"
"Damn them!"
Then, today, he would give his life for Lord Kei.
"You damn Sarutobi! Face me and answer!"
The reinforcements behind Jūbei soon arrived.
Nearly two hundred red-eyed warriors surrounded the remaining four Sarutobi.
The Sarutobi who had been surrounding their opponents just moments ago were now the ones being surrounded.
The Nanga shinobi formed their encirclement with remarkable discipline, leaving not even the slightest gap.
Two of the red-eyed warriors even had the leisure to help the two Yakushi children who had been fighting the Sarutobi earlier to their feet.
The surrounded Sarutobi quickly moved toward the remains of Sarutobi Tsukiji Hongan.
The four of them stared at the skeleton in horror.
They didn’t even dare touch their companion’s remains.
All they could do was adopt defensive stances and summon the last of their courage to confront Jūbei.
"Uchiha, do you know who we are?"
This strange man had arrived with such a large group of shinobi.
He had to be an Uchiha.
Those eyes couldn’t lie.
Sarutobi Aoyama became even more certain of his earlier judgment.
They had hooked a big fish.
Those children were definitely not ordinary.
Unfortunately, they hadn’t managed to capture the children immediately.
Now that the situation had turned against them, their only hope was to reveal their identities and make the enemy hesitate.
The instant he finished speaking, a Kōga shinobi shot forward.
He used his elbow as a weapon and struck Sarutobi Aoyama directly in the back of the head.
The blow landed squarely.
Before Aoyama could react, the Uchiha vanished with the Body Flicker Technique.
"You Sarutobi trash! Answer Lord Jūbei’s question properly!"
The blow to the back of his head nearly knocked Sarutobi Aoyama unconscious.
The attacker had held back.
But the message was clear.
They already knew exactly who the Sarutobi were.
The Sarutobi name carried no weight here today.
"Isn’t there some kind of misunderstanding?"
Sarutobi Yasukuni was terrified.
Watching his companion get beaten while surrounded by so many Uchiha was completely different from the situation they had enjoyed moments earlier while attacking the Yakushi children.
Being the one doing the beating and being the one getting beaten were two entirely different experiences.
Even when they had been attacking their opponents, the two sides had exchanged blows.
But now they had to face the terror of being mobbed by an overwhelming number of enemies.
The moment Sarutobi Yasukuni finished speaking, two more figures shot forward.
One drove a knee into his abdomen.
The other slammed an elbow into his back.
Both strikes landed solidly.
"You trash! Answer Lord Jūbei’s question!"
And so it continued.
The Kōga shinobi and the red-eyed warriors treated the surrounded Sarutobi like cats playing with mice.
One after another, they leaped forward and beat the Sarutobi with their fists and feet.
Every strike came with the same sentence:
"You trash! Answer Lord Jūbei’s question!"
The playful atmosphere actually helped dispel the bleak mood among the Nanga forces.
They continued beating the Sarutobi for nearly twenty minutes.
Eventually, the taciturn Sarutobi Tanaka couldn’t take it anymore.
"Earth Release: Earth Dome Prison of Magnificent Nothingness!"
Sarutobi Tanaka unleashed a technique without forming a single hand seal.
It was his trump card for survival.
Walls of earth rose up around the Sarutobi and formed a dome-like prison, trapping all of them inside.
The chakra-absorbing earthen walls temporarily blocked the Uchiha and Nanga forces from continuing their beating.
This technique was originally intended to trap enemies.
Now it had become a means of survival.
Fortunately, it proved useful.
The Nanga shinobi finally stopped their game.
A muffled voice came from inside the earthen prison.
"Uchiha! Enough already!"
"If you want to know something, then ask!"
"You haven’t asked a single question and you’ve just started beating us!"
"Are you deliberately humiliating the Sarutobi Clan?!"
Jūbei had been watching his subordinates’ antics with amusement.
He froze.
Then he carefully thought about it.
They really hadn’t asked anything.
An awkward Jūbei suddenly found himself missing his lost arms.
If he still had arms, at least he would have something with which to cover his embarrassed face.
What should have been a proper confrontation had somehow turned into a farce.
He had truly brought shame upon Lord Kei.
"Ahem!"
"Sarutobi, explain your purpose."
"Speak."
"Did you come here to wage a decisive battle against us?"
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