MM Racing Chapter 38 Intelligence Leak
Chapter 38 Intelligence Leak
Hyuga Kanan followed behind Orochimaru, constantly pointing out directions at an extremely fast pace. He should be able to catch up with the Iwa ninja within 10 minutes.
Upon hearing this, Orochimaru sped up even more. After all, he needed to catch up with this Iwa ninja as quickly as possible, kill him swiftly, and then take Hyuga Kanan back to scout out the other Iwa ninja, so he was in a great hurry.
Hyuga Kanan was also trying her best to keep up with Orochimaru, but her heavy breathing proved that she had reached her speed limit; any faster and she wouldn't be able to keep up with Orochimaru.
Orochimaru glanced at Hyuga Kanan and stopped speeding up. He still needed Hyuga Kanan to quickly pinpoint the location of the Iwa ninja and end the battle as soon as possible.
In less than ten minutes, Hyuga Kanan and Orochimaru were less than 200 meters away from the Iwa ninja. The Iwa ninja seemed to have already noticed that they were being pursued, so they went back underground to prevent the Konoha ninjas from discovering and attacking them immediately.
Hyuga Kanan activated his Byakugan, quickly locking onto the Iwa ninja underground. He immediately began panting heavily and shouted at Orochimaru:
"Lord Orochimaru, the Iwa ninja are lurking underground less than 200 meters to your right, at a depth of about 5 meters, and they are still moving at a rapid pace." He then slowed down, as he had already exhausted a lot of his stamina and could no longer maintain this high speed. He also needed to conserve some stamina for when he turned back to pursue them.
Orochimaru was delighted to hear that the pursuit had reached less than 200 meters. It seemed that this Iwa ninja would be dealt with soon. He turned to Hyuga Kanan and said:
"You stay put and rest to recover your strength. At the same time, keep track of the enemy's location to ensure they can't escape to another location. I'll go take care of them."
After saying that, he accelerated and quickly moved to the location indicated by Hyuga Kanan. He arrived on the ground and quickly formed hand seals, preparing to use ninjutsu to force the Iwa ninja out from underground.
"Earth Release - Earth Release Wave!"
As Orochimaru completed his hand seals and placed his hands on the ground, the ground began to ripple, shaking like an earthquake, in an attempt to prevent the Iwa ninja from maintaining their underground stealth technique.
Meanwhile, Hyuga Kanan stood on a tree trunk not far away, watching Orochimaru use ninjutsu to drive away the Iwa ninja, secretly envious. Being a ninja is indeed a good profession in the early stages; aside from being someone else's laborer with no future, you can get involved with some elemental rules so early. Thinking about how he himself had to wait until at least the Innate Realm to access the power of the laws of heaven and earth, without several years of training, he would be weaker than the explosive power of a ninja.
The ground rippled continuously, and soon the Iwa ninja could no longer hide. They had no choice but to leap from the ground, heading towards Hyuga Kanan. Clearly, the Iwa ninja realized that to escape the pursuit, they needed to eliminate the ninja who could detect their location first. Of the two Konoha ninjas, one was obviously a child, and the fact that he was being chased by them meant there must be something special about him. The most likely explanation was that the other was a sensory ninja who could detect their movements at any time. Therefore, they needed to quickly eliminate the sensory ninja, giving them the option to either flee or fight.
When the Iwa ninja quickly approached Hyuga Kanan to within 30 meters, upon seeing Kanan's white eyes, they immediately understood why they had been unable to shake off the pursuit. When they turned back and saw the Konoha ninja attacking them at lightning speed, they felt a chill in their hearts. The Konoha ninja behind them must be Orochimaru, one of the three legendary Konoha ninjas!
The Iwa ninja now understood that their chances of escape were slim. With Orochimaru, the strongest of the legendary Sannin, present, escape was impossible. Their current task was to eliminate the Hyuga clan ninjas pursuing them, thus removing a threat to their retreating comrade. Simultaneously, they needed to delay Orochimaru as much as possible, making their comrade's retreat easier.
The Iwa ninja accelerated and charged towards Hyuga Kanan. Orochimaru and Hyuga Kanan both vaguely understood what the other side was thinking: were they going to deal with the sensory ninja first and then look for an opportunity to escape?
Orochimaru used the Body Flicker Technique to quickly appear in front of Hyuga Kanan. He didn't want to let the Iwa ninja harm Hyuga Kanan, a sensory ninja, in front of him, as he still needed to chase down another Iwa ninja later!
After seeing that Orochimaru had returned to the Hyuga clan brat, the Iwa ninja realized that killing him easily would no longer be so simple. They could only stall Orochimaru for now and find an opportunity to finish him off with a single, decisive blow, without giving him any time to react.
The Iwa ninja immediately halted their charge, confronting Orochimaru at a distance of 20 meters. Their plans were completely different; Orochimaru was focused on quickly killing his opponent, while the Iwa ninja were contemplating how to ambush the Hyuga clan brats behind them while Orochimaru was attacking.
After exchanging only a glance, the two immediately took action.
The Iwa ninja made the first move, charging forward while rapidly forming hand seals. Once the seals were complete, they unleashed their power directly at Orochimaru.
"Earth Release: Rock Pillar Spear Technique!"
Huge stone pillar spikes rose from the ground where Orochimaru stood, preparing to force Orochimaru to leave Hyuga Kanan's front and create an opportunity for a sneak attack later.
Orochimaru used a mere Body Flicker Technique to dodge the earth spikes that kept rising from the ground, and his figure appeared directly in front of the Iwa ninja, raising one arm towards him.
"Ninja Technique - Snake Hidden Stalker!"
Several bluish-brown pythons darted out from Orochimaru's sleeves, their gaping maws revealing chilling fangs as they attacked the Iwa ninja.
Just as the Iwa ninja hadn't reacted to Orochimaru's sudden attack, the blue-brown python bit their necks hard, causing them to scream in agony.
But Orochimaru, with a disdainful expression, spoke mockingly in his hoarse, magnetic voice:
"Stop putting on such an obvious show. This level of ninjutsu isn't enough to take down a Jonin. Are you still not giving up on escaping? But you should know you have no chance of escaping!"
The Iwa ninja who was bitten by the python instantly turned into mud, becoming nothing more than an earth clone.
The Iwa ninja slowly reappeared from the ground without saying much. That was just a test to see if Orochimaru had become arrogant and let his guard down, allowing them to sneak underground and ambush the Hyuga clan brat.
However, it's clear that such petty tricks are utterly ridiculous to Orochimaru, a man of rational thought. Orochimaru is a very rational person; he won't let his guard down unless he's certain the other person is truly dead.
Soon, the two sides stopped probing each other and began a life-or-death struggle. Their figures flashed and clashed constantly, and their kunai collided, sparks flying everywhere.
But soon, the Iwa ninja had many wounds on their bodies, gushing blood. Orochimaru still had that cold expression, and his clothes were perfectly wrinkle-free, just as before.
The difference in strength is quite significant; this is the difference between a Jonin and someone who has reached the Kage level.
Orochimaru also seemed eager to end the battle quickly, as he had no time to waste. The Iwa ninja, knowing they were no match for Orochimaru, focused on stalling for time, constantly using ninjutsu to slow his advance.
Orochimaru finally couldn't hold back any longer. He had originally planned to save a little more chakra to finish off his opponent, but the fact that he was stalling for time and allowing another Iwa ninja to escape was the real problem. He immediately began to rapidly form hand seals.
"Wind Release: Thousand Blades of Wind!"
Orochimaru raised his right arm and swung it fiercely at the Iwa ninja. Chakra emanating from his fingertips was like a sharp knife, and gusts of wind, small yet incredibly sharp, like razor-sharp blades, attacked the Iwa ninja.
It's incredibly fast, there's absolutely no way to dodge it!
Surrounded by wind blades from all sides, there was nowhere to hide. The Iwa ninja was quickly struck by several wind blades, resulting in huge, gaping wounds. Most seriously, his left arm was severed by a wind blade, gushing out a large amount of blood.
His body was also blasted away by the wind blades, crashing heavily to the ground, less than 10 meters away from Hyuga Kanan.
But the Iwa ninja wasn't dead yet. He had just realized he couldn't withstand an attack of that magnitude. He sacrificed an arm to change the direction he was being knocked away, to get as close as possible to the Hyuga brat, and to launch a sneak attack with his last strength.
The moment he fell, the Iwa ninja scrambled to his feet, covered in blood, his face contorted in a ferocious expression, charging towards Hyuga Kanan like a demon, shouting at the same time:
"You brat from the Hyuga clan, die with me, taking your Byakugan with you, for the sake of Iwagakure!"
Hyuga Kanan simply watched the Iwa ninja charging towards him, a helpless smile playing on his lips. They really thought he was a pushover, that anyone could bully him, even someone about to die thought they had him cornered.
He assumed a Gentle Fist stance, and in an instant, his figure flashed, appearing behind the Iwa ninja. He then used the Eight Trigrams Palm - Finishing Strike to strike the center of the opponent's back, instantly piercing through the heart.
The Iwa ninja's body suddenly flew forward and crashed heavily to the ground, lifeless.
Orochimaru glanced at the corpse on the ground, then nodded directly to Hyuga Kanan and said:
"Let's go. We need to help the other side. Time is running out. We need to catch up with the other Iwa ninja as soon as possible."
After saying that, he quickly returned to the tree trunk, and Hyuga Kanan quickly followed, heading in another direction.
It took nearly half an hour to reach the location where the Konoha team was pursuing them, but Hyuga Kanan had already scanned the surrounding area with his soul power and found no trace of the Iwa ninja. He could only continue his pursuit towards the Iwa ninja camp.
After a 10-minute chase, Hyuga Kanan's soul power detected the opponent's trail, which was approximately more than 10 kilometers away. He could only address his team:
"We've detected traces of their movement, but they're probably beyond the range of my Byakugan. We need to speed things up in this direction."
Upon hearing what Hyuga Kanan said, the squad immediately sped off in that direction, but everyone knew that the chances of catching up were getting smaller and smaller.
Soon, Hyuga Kanan used his Byakugan to observe the opposite position, but it was too late, because his soul power had already detected a large force of Iwa ninja rushing towards that Iwa ninja in the distance, obviously going to meet the opponent.
Less than ten minutes later, Hyuga Kanan stopped. Panting, he addressed Orochimaru and the others:
"There's no hope. I can see the main force of Iwa ninja is about to meet up with that Iwa ninja. If we go there now, we'll just run straight into the main force of Iwa ninja!"
Orochimaru's expression darkened upon hearing Hyuga Kanan's words, realizing there was little hope left; the information leak seemed inevitable. Now, he needed to consider his next move.