"Explosive tags!"
"Fall back!"
Boom!
The first explosion tore through the night like a bolt of thunder.
Then came the second, the third, the fourth.
The entire granary seemed to be punched from the inside by an invisible giant hand. Firelight spread into one continuous blaze in the blink of an eye. Wooden beams snapped, tarps were blown away, and the stacked mountains of grain sacks and wagons burst apart in every direction.
The middle section of the main warehouse was the first to collapse.
Countless burning fragments of wood, burlap, and shredded grain sacks came crashing down like a storm. The people who had just gathered below didn't even have time to finish screaming before they were swallowed by a towering wave of fire.
Kakashi landed on a half-collapsed wooden frame, looked at the warehouse district that had been almost instantly devoured by flames, and let out a low whistle.
"That's pretty spectacular."
Chizumi stood higher up, his expression still calm.
"The west warehouse."
"Got it."
Kakashi's figure flickered, and in the next instant, he was already rushing toward the western ninja-tool warehouse that had not yet fully collapsed.
The west warehouse had been more heavily guarded than the main grain store to begin with. The moment the explosions started, several ninja immediately rushed over, trying to drag out the ninja tools and medicines before the fire surrounded it.
But just as they approached the warehouse doors, a blue-white streak of lightning cut across from the darkness.
"Raikiri!"
With a piercing blast, the entire warehouse door and half the wooden wall were forcibly ripped open.
The explosive tags planted inside lit up at the same time, as though triggered by an unseen pull.
With a thunderous boom, the entire west warehouse blew apart.
Crates of kunai, explosive canisters, ninja-tool scrolls, and supplies were blasted into the air by the wave of fire, then came raining down into the crowd trailing crimson flames, setting off even more screams and chaos.
"Where's the enemy?!"
"Did anyone see them?"
"Put out the fire first! Clear the area around the main warehouse first!"
"What fire?! Find the caster first!"
"Signal flare! Fire the signal flare!"
A jōnin wearing a forehead protector had just raised a signal tube when his wrist suddenly tightened.
The next instant, his whole body was yanked backward by some unseen force. His legs lost balance, and he fell straight into the nearby shadows.
Shikamaru crouched on the wooden fence at the valley entrance, fingers forming a hand sign. His shadow stretched like a black thread, tightly binding the jōnin.
"Don't be in such a hurry to call for help, mister."
The jōnin's face twisted as he struggled desperately, but his limbs and body were pinned in place as though nailed to the ground. He couldn't move at all.
Almost at the same time, Kiba and Akamaru lunged out from the side.
"Fang Passing Fang!"
The spinning double fangs tore forward like a savage black drill, slamming into several mobile ninja who were trying to rush out of the valley entrance and sending them flying in all directions.
"Damn it! There are enemies at the valley entrance too!"
"It isn't one team—it's a multi-point raid!"
"Call reinforcements! Call reinforcements!"
But the fire in the center of the warehouse district had already grown completely uncontrollable.
The main grain warehouse had been packed most tightly. Once the explosion started, the thick tarps and huge number of dry grain sacks instantly became the perfect fuel. Sparks blown out by the blast kept falling onto nearby wagons and oilcloth, and even the ox carts temporarily parked there for grain transport were overturned and set ablaze.
The wind swept through, and the whole valley seemed to catch fire.
The flames painted half the hillside red.
Kakashi leapt backward out of the wave of fire, casually flicking out a handful of kunai on the way and pinning down two ninja who had tried to take a shortcut to the rear warehouse to put out the flames.
"That should do it."
Chizumi glanced at the fire rising above the valley, then at the night sky farther away.
"Reinforcements will arrive quickly."
Kakashi shook out his wrist. "Then we leave?"
Chizumi's gaze settled on the darkness beyond the valley.
"Wait ten seconds."
"Hm?"
"Let them fire the signal."
Kakashi looked at him, then immediately understood, his smile deepening slightly.
"You're afraid they won't know the grain warehouse was blown up."
"They should know."
Before ten seconds had passed, a crimson signal flare finally shot out of the chaos and rose into the night sky.
It burst open in midair like a bloody firework, dyeing the clouds above the valley red.
"Now we can leave," Chizumi said.
"Everyone withdraw."
The order went out, and the Konoha ninja who had been waiting at various points immediately pulled back like a receding tide.
Shikamaru released his Shadow Possession Jutsu. As he jumped backward, he still couldn't help glancing once more at the granary that had become a roaring sea of fire, the corner of his mouth twitching.
"Those guys are probably going to lose their minds over this."
Kiba swept in from the other side, barely suppressing the excitement on his face.
"That felt great! Damn, that felt great!"
"Don't get too happy yet," Shikamaru said, glancing at him. "Once the reinforcements arrive, we'll have to start running."
"Then we run. Let them catch up first!"
"You'd better pray they really can't."
The group quickly split off toward the planned retreat routes, absolutely refusing to stay clustered together.
That was one of the rules Chizumi had set before the mission.
They could infiltrate separately during the raid, and when retreating, they had to spread out even more. Otherwise, once large-scale pursuers got on their tail, a single clustered group would be easiest to surround.
On the rear slope of the valley, Tenzō brought his hands together.
"Wood Release: Wood Forest Wall."
Dozens of thick wooden pillars burst out of the ground, rising like a wooden wall that unfolded in an instant in front of the dozen or so ninja chasing up the rear slope, directly blocking the fastest shortcut.
"Damn it! It's Wood Release!"
"Go around from the side!"
"Don't let them get away!"
Kakashi caught sight of that wooden wall from above and said lazily, "Tenzō's been improving fast lately."
Chizumi didn't answer. He simply raised his hand, flinging a kunai precisely toward the upper rear diagonal.
Clang!
The kunai collided in midair with a Wind Release shuriken flying toward him, and sparks burst out.
A furious-looking Suna jōnin charged out from behind the treetops, hands forming seals at high speed.
"Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!"
A violent gust swept forward, carrying embers from the fire. He was clearly trying to use the remaining heat of the granary blaze to set the entire forest here alight.
Chizumi didn't even dodge.
He simply lifted his eyes and glanced at the man. In the next instant, with almost no visible hand signs, an even fiercer blaze roared straight out to meet it.
"Fire Release: Great Fire Annihilation."
It was not an ordinary fireball.
It was an entire scorching tide of flame sweeping outward.
The Suna jōnin's expression changed sharply. The Wind Release he had just unleashed not only failed to suppress it, but instead seemed to feed the other side's flames. The moment the two powers met, his entire field of vision turned into a wall of fire smashing toward him.
"Retreat!"
He only had time to shout that one word before the wave of fire hurled him away. He crashed through several branches and slammed heavily into the ground.
The few ninja who had just caught up behind him were all forced to scatter to both sides.
By the time they looked up again, the figures ahead had already widened the distance.
"Chase them!"
"We absolutely cannot let them escape!"
"Notify the western camp! Notify the main army station! The grain warehouse was blown up—Konoha's people are here!"
Roars, hand signs, and the sound of signal flares tearing through the air rang out one after another.
This night had originally been a rare peaceful night for the Allied Army's rear lines.
But in less than half an hour, the entire relay zone had been stomped on hard.
First, flames from the grain warehouse shot into the sky. Then one red signal after another rose into the air, startling every nearby stationed camp awake.
Ninja who had been woken from sleep cursed as they rushed out of their tents. When they heard the main grain warehouse had been attacked, every face turned uglier than the last.
The official responsible for escorting the grain and supplies hadn't even finished dressing. With half one arm still bare, he stumbled outside, shouting as he ran, "Put out the fire! Save the grain first!"
But when he finally reached the area under guard escort, his entire body froze.
That was no longer "a fire."
It was a collapsed ruin that had been swallowed by a sea of flames.
The grain sacks, wagons, medicine crates, and ninja-tool boxes that had once been piled into mountains were now almost all charred fragments. Broken wooden racks and beams thrown apart by the blast lay everywhere, while flames kept burrowing deeper, crackling and popping. The heat wave was so intense that even from far away, it stung people's eyes until they could barely keep them open.
The middle-ranking commander in charge of the warehouse guard knelt on the ground, his face blackened by smoke, his lips trembling.
"Where are they?!"
The Earth Country official grabbed him by the collar, his voice changing pitch.
"Where are the attackers?!"
The commander rasped, "They're… they're being pursued…"
"Then why aren't you chasing them!"
"People are already chasing them! But—they split up while retreating, and they're too fast. The warehouse district blew up all at once, so we couldn't—"
Slap!
A vicious slap struck his face.
"Useless! All of you are useless!"
The official's face turned purple with rage. He turned to the guards beside him and roared, "What are you standing there for?! Mobilize every nearby camp! I want them alive! I want to know who did this!"
One ninja beside him went pale and said in a low voice, "My lord, it's very likely… Konoha."
"Konoha? How could Konoha's people have slipped all the way here?!"
"But judging by their methods and the scale of that Fire Release… it doesn't look like anyone else."
"Then we have even more reason to catch them!"
The official kicked aside a burning piece of wood near his foot, his eyes bloodshot.
"If the warehouse is gone, what happens to the advance plan next month? What about the food? What will the rear eat? What will the front use to move!"
No one dared answer.
Because everyone knew he wasn't just shouting nonsense.
This was not some small expendable storehouse.
It was one of the large forward relay granaries prepared for the Three-Nation Allied Army's next advance.
If this place was destroyed, then several supply routes would have to be reorganized.
Worse still, this place didn't only store grain.
The soldier pills, injury medicine, and a portion of the ninja-tool supplies for the accompanying ninja units had also been stored here.
Losing it wasn't a matter of eating a little less.
It meant the entire Allied Army's advance would be disrupted.
"Send the order!"
The Earth Country official took several ragged breaths, his voice cracking.
"Seal off the surrounding forest lines! Send out every tracking squad! They don't have many people. They can't have gone far!"
But as he said that, the Konoha team that had carried out the raid had already scattered deeper into the night.
The chase through the forest continued.
Figures sped through the treetops, while Allied ninja kept pursuing from behind. Some were skilled at sensing, some used Wind Release to accelerate, and some simply relied on summoned beasts on the ground to follow the traces.
But the farther they chased, the more the targets ahead scattered.
Sometimes, they clearly saw two figures sweep past ahead, only for one to vanish the next instant. Then, in another moment, even the remaining one seemed to be swallowed by the forest.
"Right side! There's another chakra reaction on the right!"
"Fake! It's a substitute!"
"Above!"
A Kumo jōnin suddenly looked up and saw Kakashi flash past a high branch.
"Catch him!"
Three pursuers lunged at him together.
Kakashi glanced back, the corner of his eye curving.
"Pretty persistent, aren't you?"
He tapped his foot, and his whole body abruptly changed direction, slipping diagonally through a narrow gap between two large trees. The three behind him had just followed in when the ground ahead gave a faint click.
"Cra—"
Boom!
Explosive tags buried beneath the fallen leaves detonated instantly, and fire and earth erupted upward, blasting all three away.
Kakashi didn't even look back. He only lazily raised a hand and waved.
"Good night."
Elsewhere, Shikamaru was running through the forest while cursing under his breath.
"This is such a pain…"
A dozen meters behind him, three pursuers doggedly kept after him.
"The one ahead!"
"Nara clan shadow techniques! Be careful not to step in front of him!"
"Don't let him form hand signs!"
Shikamaru clicked his tongue and suddenly stopped.
The pursuing ninja were delighted and instantly closed the distance.
"Got—"
Before the man could finish, the shadow beneath Shikamaru's feet suddenly spread wide.
"Shadow Possession Jutsu."
The black shadow spilled like ink, using the moonlight and the flickering remnants of firelight to surge up their ankles.
The three pursuers' faces changed at the same time, and all their movements froze.
Shikamaru lifted his eyes and looked toward a tree ahead.
"Kiba."
The next second, Kiba and Akamaru, who had been lying in ambush, lunged out from the left and right. Without a single wasted word, they knocked all three pursuers down.
"That technique of yours really is useful."
Kiba shook the blood off his hand and grinned.
Shikamaru snapped, "It would've been even more useful if you were any slower."
"Tch, timing was perfect."
"Stop wasting time. We're leaving."
"Got it."
They quickly vanished into the forest again.
But the most terrifying route was still the one Chizumi had taken.
Because the team chasing him was the first and largest.
At first, those people had thought the leader of the raid was probably up ahead, and if they just stuck to this direction, they might be able to take down a big target.
But the more they chased, the more they started regretting it.
The figure in front of them did not just flee.
Sometimes, he suddenly stopped.
Sometimes, he suddenly doubled back.
And every time he turned back, someone died.
Behind a thick tree in the forest, three Allied jōnin had just tried to split left and right to flank him when a figure like firelight charged straight toward them from the front.
"Surround—"
The frontmost man had only just raised his blade when Chizumi was already in front of him.
There was no unnecessary movement.
Just one punch.
The man's chest caved in violently, and his whole body flew backward as if struck head-on by a siege hammer. He smashed through the tree trunk behind him and didn't get up again.
Of the other two, one formed seals, while the other swept his blade horizontally.
Chizumi turned sideways to avoid the blade, then raised a hand and caught the man's wrist. With a twist, there was a crisp, tooth-aching crack of bone.
Before the blade even fell to the ground, Chizumi had already caught it with his other hand and swept it backward.
Blood sprayed a hot line through the night.
The last one had only gotten halfway through his hand signs when his face turned pale, and he instinctively backed away.
But however fast he retreated, he wasn't faster than the kunai shooting toward him.
The kunai pierced his throat.
He fell, clutching his neck with both hands, a gurgling sound bubbling in his throat. His eyes were filled with terror.
The people catching up from behind saw the scene and unconsciously slowed by half a step.
Someone gritted his teeth and shouted, "Attack together! Don't let him pick us off one by one!"
They shouted that, but not one of them truly dared to be the first to rush forward.
Chizumi stood amid scattered branches, leaves, and the smell of blood, slowly lifting his eyes to scan them.
His gaze did not release killing intent, nor did he make any threatening gesture.
But that calmness made them feel colder than rage ever could.
~~~
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