A Swift Victory

Chapter update is here.

Find a quiet spot, turn the page, and let’s see what this story has been hiding 🌙

✦

After both sides separated, the scene suddenly fell quiet.

Guy's expression was grave. At this moment, more than ten cuts marked his body. The wounds were shallow, and some had barely broken the skin, but no matter how minor they were, he was still injured.

Zabuza held his blade horizontally and panted with a ferocious expression.

He had taken a heavy kick from Guy squarely in the ribs. Several of them seemed to be broken, and for the moment, he could barely straighten his back. Even breathing caused a faint pain.

Standing in the tree, Naoki saw an opportunity and immediately spoke. "Guy, step back."

Guy did not argue. He silently retreated to the side.

Although the earlier exchange had been brief, it had allowed Guy to measure Zabuza's strength. He knew that if he did not use his forbidden technique, defeating the opponent would likely be difficult.

Naoki lightly dropped from the branch to the ground. In front of both friend and foe, he walked toward Zabuza and said, "I'm different from Guy. Against Hidden Mist trash like you, I don't need to take things too seriously."

His tone was flat and his expression contemptuous, as if the person in front of him were nothing more than an animal not worth his attention.

When had Zabuza ever suffered such contempt? He flew into a rage at once. "You dare call me tra-"

Whoosh.

Naoki's figure flashed forward.

This was the moment he had been waiting for.

Although Zabuza was furious, he was not a rookie. Knowing he had fallen for a trap, he immediately shut his mouth, swept the long blade in his hands horizontally, and cut toward Naoki as he rushed in.

The blade carried a sharp hiss of wind.

Naoki showed no fear. No one noticed that beneath his goggles, the Tenseigan was shining with gorgeous light.

Through the Tenseigan's unmatched insight, he had already noticed chakra surging through Zabuza's body toward both hands. At the same time, no chakra gathered in Zabuza's legs, and there were no signs of sudden contraction in his leg muscles.

All of that exposed Zabuza's tactical intent.

This horizontal slash was clearly meant only to force Naoki back. The lack of contraction in the leg muscles meant Zabuza was not preparing to exert force with his lower body. That also meant there would be no follow-up slash after the horizontal cut.

At the same time, the chakra gathered in both arms showed that after forcing Naoki back, Zabuza intended to abandon the blade, form hand signs, and use ninjutsu.

In only that brief instant, Naoki predicted Zabuza's entire next tactical sequence through the flow of chakra and the tiny changes in the muscle groups of his limbs.

So he stopped.

Then he leaned back.

Naoki's entire movement was almost seamless. While easily avoiding Zabuza's horizontal slash, he did not widen the distance between them by even a little.

'Impossible.'

Seeing Naoki avoid his horizontal slash by exactly the necessary margin, neither more nor less, while seeming completely unworried about a follow-up attack, Zabuza's heart tightened.

At that moment, Zabuza realized Naoki had seen through his tactics. But it was already too late to change moves.

Taking advantage of the instant after Zabuza swung and before he could recover or alter his technique, Naoki lowered his body and slipped in front of him. Both arms moved, striking out with a series of Gentle Fist blows.

Staring at Naoki's chakra-coated palms, Zabuza's heart sank.

Whether he tried to swing his blade again or abandon it and form hand signs, it was already too late.

Thud, thud, thud.

A series of muffled palm strikes landed on his body, clearly reaching everyone nearby.

Amid those impacts, Zabuza's entire body trembled. Finally, like a punctured bag, he collapsed weakly to the ground.

Hiss.

The three Hidden Mist assassination unit members and the two Konoha ANBU all drew in a quiet breath.

For no other reason than that Naoki had ended it too cleanly, too easily.

A skilled fighter like Zabuza was not someone even Kakashi, famous as a genius, or the ANBU jonin beside him could guarantee defeating with absolute certainty.

Yet Naoki had ended Zabuza in one simple exchange. The whole process looked relaxed and effortless, as if his opponent were a genin fresh out of the Academy.

Naoki stood in the middle of the field, still calm and without surprise or joy.

He glanced at the three Hidden Mist shinobi not far away, then hooked Zabuza's unconscious body off the ground with his foot. Turning, he kicked Zabuza toward the three of them.

"Take him and get out."

Two Hidden Mist shinobi caught Zabuza. The other said, "We are here under orders to pursue missing-nin."

Naoki lifted his chin slightly and looked at the Hidden Mist shinobi with contempt. His voice was cold. "Those missing-nin are my mission targets. If you dare interfere, I don't mind eliminating you as well."

Looking at the unconscious Zabuza, then at the two Konoha ANBU watching from nearby, the Hidden Mist group exchanged a look. Then they carried Zabuza and hurriedly withdrew.

After the Hidden Mist shinobi left, Naoki did not greet the two ANBU. He simply called Guy, who had already bandaged his wounds, and continued tracking the wandering shinobi.

The two ANBU looked at each other.

The older ANBU muttered, "Hey, that move the kid used just now was Gentle Fist, right? He's from the Hyuga clan?"

Kakashi, wearing the fox mask, nodded. "Yes. I know both of them. They were in my class. One is Might Guy. The other is Naoki Hyuga."

The older ANBU was surprised. "I remember that in your class, aside from you, there didn't seem to be anyone especially strong. So how..."

In Kakashi's class, eight or nine out of ten of their classmates had already died in the war. The survivors were usually only at the chunin level. Only Kakashi had stepped ahead and reached jonin level at a young age. So in this ANBU's eyes, Kakashi was the best shinobi from that class, without question.

At this moment, Kakashi himself was also confused.

He did not have a deep impression of Naoki. He had always felt the boy was ordinary and had nothing especially worth noticing. But Naoki's performance today had shocked him. In particular, the confidence Naoki showed while treating the well-known Hidden Mist assassination unit as if they were nothing reminded Kakashi, without his realizing it, of his teacher, the Fourth Hokage.

The older ANBU sighed. "Record it. Report this to Lord Hokage when we return. Talent like that should be recruited into ANBU as a priority."

On Naoki's side, Guy, who was traveling at high speed, asked, "Naoki, why didn't we ask those two ANBU for information on the wandering shinobi?"

Naoki smiled. "There was no need. The appearance of the Hidden Mist assassination unit proves that the wandering shinobi truly are Hidden Mist missing-nin. As for the ANBU, they were probably only monitoring the Hidden Mist unit after it entered the country. Otherwise, they would have acted already."

Without needing to think too deeply, Naoki had roughly guessed what was going on.

The Hidden Mist had sent an assassination unit to clean up its own defectors and take the corpses back. That also meant there might be a Hidden Mist kekkei genkai shinobi among the missing-nin.

Kakashi and the other ANBU had clearly been sent to monitor the Hidden Mist assassination unit after it entered the Land of Fire. That could be seen from the fact that the two sides had only faced off without fighting.

Guy heard this and felt it made sense.

If those two ANBU were only responsible for monitoring the Hidden Mist assassination unit, then they probably did not have much intelligence on the wandering shinobi anyway. Besides, Naoki and Guy had already locked onto the traces left by the group. There truly was no need to waste more time.

Guy then said, "Naoki, what you did back there was amazing. That guy felt pretty strong, but he couldn't even block one move from you."

The corner of Naoki's mouth lifted slightly, and he smiled with restrained pride.

✦
✦
✦

Ready for more?

The next chapters are already waiting on my Patreon, along with early access, previews, and extra story updates 🗝️

https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheBacklotFanfiction