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Chapter 148: Yellow Flash!
🕑 Added 2025-08-23 12:47:59 +0000 UTCChapter 148: The Yellow Flash!
"The Iwagakure line was blown up?"
The roar of the explosion shot into the sky, the brilliant light nearly staining the heavens. Nara Keisuke and Ōnoki, locked in a fierce battle high above, naturally noticed the drastic change on the battlefield below.
Ōnoki, the architect of the Tailed Beast Bomb plan, saw the super-sized bomb detonate not within Konoha's defenses, but deep inside his own. For a moment, his focus completely shattered. Keisuke, however, had anticipated this and showed no surprise. He raised his hands and fired a series of Spiraling Shadow Piercing Bullets at the momentarily stunned Tsuchikage.
But Ōnoki's combat experience was immense. Relying on instincts honed over years of war, he and his clone narrowly dodged the attack, taking care to avoid the bullets' trajectory. Even so, the turn of events below was too sudden. After successfully evading the attack, Ōnoki still tried to analyze the cause. He racked his brain but couldn't fathom why Han would bombard their own defensive line.
Why? Could Han have betrayed Iwagakure?
Just then, an image flashed through Ōnoki's mind: Nara Keisuke, riding his Shadow Creature, had made a sudden, baffling charge toward the Iwa lines before immediately retreating.
"It was you?!" Ōnoki stared at Keisuke, a mixture of shock and fury in his eyes, though his conclusion was far from the truth. "You're the one who made Han's Five-Tails lose control?"
Keisuke had no intention of answering his enemy's question. With the Iwa front lines now in ruins according to his plan, their invasion could be declared a total failure. The most important task now was to keep Ōnoki from escaping.
Spiraling Shadow Imitation Bullet!
Keisuke raised his hands, and two black pellets shot out in a crisscrossing pattern, both aimed at Ōnoki. The Tsuchikage had to swallow the words on the tip of his tongue and use his Super Light-Weight Rock Technique to alter his position. He expertly dodged the two projectiles, but before he could even breathe a sigh of relief, he caught sight of the bullets transforming behind him.
Poof! Poof!
Two Shadow Doppelgangers burst from the black pellets and, at extremely close range, lunged at him. Several more black bullets closed in from behind, weaving a deadly net with the Spiraling Shadow Piercing Bullets being fired by Keisuke's main body, trapping Ōnoki in the center.
In that critical moment, Ōnoki's clone decisively deactivated the Super Light-Weight Rock Technique. Its body immediately returned to its normal weight and plummeted downwards like a stone, narrowly evading the storm of shadow projectiles.
Ōnoki was now seething with rage. He knew his battle plan was in shambles. This devastating blow in the Land of Grass could potentially alter the entire course of the war between Iwa and Konoha. But for him, the priority wasn't to seek revenge on Keisuke; it was to retreat and save as many of his forces as possible.
He could not allow every Iwagakure ninja to die here! At the very least... Ōnoki and Han, the Tsuchikage and the Five-Tails Jinchuriki, absolutely had to survive.
Ōnoki fell like a meteor. But how could Keisuke let him get his way so easily? The Shadow Creature beat its wings and dove down in hot pursuit. Keisuke poured his Yin Release chakra into it, and its smooth, dark surface began to peel away, forming a flock of smaller Shadow Creatures that swarmed towards Ōnoki.
But this seemed to be the very opportunity Ōnoki was waiting for. His main body flew through hand seals, preparing to unleash his Dust Release just as the smaller creatures were about to hit.
But at that moment...
Spiraling Shadow Imitation Bullet!
A black pellet, moving faster than sound, shot past him, interrupting his hand seals and forcing him to suppress the nascent Dust Release technique. The bullet landed below and, with a soft poof, transformed into another Shadow Doppelganger, joining the flock of small creatures in a pincer attack on the two Ōnokis.
Left with no choice, Ōnoki's clone had to form seals for the Super Light-Weight Rock Technique once again, altering its trajectory to fly off to the side.
"Damn you Konoha ninja!" Ōnoki knew his plan to land and support his troops was now impossible. His opponent had seen through his intentions and would never give him the chance to touch the ground.
And he was right. Keisuke wasn't trying to inflict serious damage on Ōnoki; he was simply doing his job of controlling the field, ensuring the Tsuchikage couldn't interfere with his allies below.
While the two were locked in their high-stakes chase in the sky, the ground below was a scene of utter devastation.
A massive, gaping crater had been carved out of the Iwagakure defensive line, littered with the bodies of their shinobi. The surprise Tailed Beast Bomb had wiped out more than ninety-nine percent of them. Of the thousand Iwa ninja who had invaded the Land of Grass, fewer than ten were still alive.
At the very center of the crater, Han, the Five-Tails Jinchuriki, was still enveloped in a dark red Tailed Beast Cloak. But the once-perfect cloak was now riddled with massive holes, and the crimson armor beneath it was heavily damaged. He was clearly gravely injured. Even a Tailed Beast would be in bad shape after taking a Tailed Beast Bomb at point-blank range, let alone a Jinchuriki merely borrowing its power. Han had only survived the blast thanks to the cloak's immense defensive power.
As for Kitsuchi, who had tried to block the Tailed Beast Bomb... he was now nowhere to be seen.
The Konoha shinobi couldn't make out the details within the Iwa lines, but after the earth-shattering explosion that had just occurred, even the lowest-ranking Genin knew the enemy had suffered a catastrophic blow.
'Why did the Tailed Beast Bomb lose control? Did the Iwa Jinchuriki betray them? Or was there another reason?' Just like Ōnoki, Orochimaru's mind flashed back to Keisuke's strange dive-bombing maneuver earlier. 'Could that kid, Nara Keisuke, be the cause of this explosion?'
'Come to think of it, he made Iwagakure's Four-Tails Jinchuriki lose control last time... and the time before that, he made the Five-Tails lose control.'
'Could that guy... actually be some kind of Tailed Beast Killer?'
Countless thoughts raced through Orochimaru's mind, but he knew what needed to be done.
"All units—"
Flash!
Before Orochimaru could finish his command, a flash of yellow light appeared within the Konoha lines.
"Sorry, I'm late!"
Namikaze Minato's forehead was beaded with sweat, his expression grim. "I sensed an extremely intense chakra fluctuation in this area... Huh? It looks like everyone's okay?"
As he took in the state of the battlefield, the grave look on Minato's face vanished. When he received the mission from the village, he had expected a difficult battle. He never thought... the situation here was nowhere near as dangerous as the Third Hokage had made it sound.
"Minato, you're late," Orochimaru said, a faint smile appearing on his pale, cold face at the sight of a familiar colleague. "The battle here is almost over. As for what's left for us to do—well, your timing is perfect. We can't determine the exact situation inside the enemy's lines right now. Your mastery of the Body Flicker Technique is perfect for scouting and... reaping the lives of any surviving Iwa ninja."
Minato's gaze shifted to the massive crater on the other side. He gave a slight nod, and his figure instantly vanished.
The Yellow Flash moved across the battlefield. Using his exceptionally sharp senses, he located the few remaining Iwa survivors and finished them off with cold efficiency.
'What chaotic chakra... What kind of massive explosion happened here?'
Minato looked towards the figure at the center of the crater. He would never mistake that conspicuous Tailed Beast Cloak.
'Don't tell me the Five-Tails Jinchuriki blew up his own defensive line?'
His nerves on high alert, Minato pulled several of his special kunai from his pouch and threw them, planting them in the ground around the Five-Tails Jinchuriki. With his experience fighting Jinchuriki, Minato was second to none. He cautiously approached, intending to assess the Jinchuriki's condition. If he could kill him or capture him for the village...
Just then, Han sensed Minato's approach. Every ninja in Iwagakure knew the name of the Yellow Flash. There was even an unwritten rule in their village: "Encountering the Yellow Flash and retreating does not count as mission failure."
"Ōnoki, your plan failed after all..." The battered Han looked up at the sky, where the Tsuchikage was still fighting Konoha's Shadow of Darkness. "The Shadow of Darkness, the Yellow Flash... Iwagakure... it seems we have little hope of winning this war."
Muttering to himself, Han withdrew his consciousness. The sealing power he used to suppress the Tailed Beast faded along with it, and the Five-Tails' power began to surge out from within him, unchecked.
"What?!" Minato clearly sensed the amount of chakra erupting from the man's body expanding exponentially.
In the next moment, the Five-Tails broke its seal and descended upon the battlefield!
