"Magnet Release: Sand Barrier!"
At the very last moment, Karura suddenly raised her hand, and a massive surge of flowing sand shot upward, rushing toward the descending blade winds.
"Don't just stand there!!"
Karura shouted at Rasa.
Rasa froze for a split second. With the speed of his gold dust, he couldn't possibly intercept Kokushibo's attack in time—but Karura's sand could.
Even though the sand was inferior in quality compared to gold dust and might not be able to fully block the attack, what Rasa needed… was just a tiny bit of time!
"Boom!!!"
Karura's sand formed a yellow, eggshell-like barrier above them. But the blade winds from Akashō crashed down almost immediately, and the barrier shattered after only a few seconds.
"Gold Dust!!!"
Rasa's gold dust surged in just a beat slower than Karura's sand, instantly filling the hole left by the shattered barrier and colliding head-on with the blade winds.
Amid a spine-chilling grinding sound, the blade winds aimed at the two gradually dissipated. The remaining blade winds, which had been meant to seal off their movements, fell to the ground without Rasa's interception, crashing down with several thunderous booms and kicking up endless dust and rubble.
"Heh."
Rasa pulled out a smug grin and looked toward Akashō, who had already landed in the distance.
"Kokushibo, you've already lost your only chance. From here on, you won't get another opportunity!"
Akashō raised his head, looked at Rasa's self-satisfied expression—and couldn't help but laugh.
He lifted a finger and pointed beneath Rasa.
Rasa subconsciously looked down—and his eyes instantly widened.
Beneath him lay corpses of Sand Village ninja scattered across the ground. Nearby, hundreds more had been caught in the aftermath, lying there, their fates unknown.
As the dust slowly settled, some Sand ninja who had only suffered minor injuries—or had barely avoided the blade winds—struggled to their feet, staring blankly at the bodies around them.
After those few waves of blade winds, nearly half of the thousand-plus ninja Rasa had brought were injured to varying degrees. And the number of dead… clearly exceeded a hundred.
"What kind of monster is that…"
"Damn it, Rasa! He only cared about himself! We couldn't even escape because of his gold dust, and yet he completely ignored whether we lived or died!?"
"My leg—my leg is gone!!"
As the aftermath faded, the previously relaxed Sand ninja erupted into chaos—shouts of shock, screams of pain, furious curses. Fear and anger spread like wildfire.
Floating in midair, Rasa felt his mind go blank.
Right… he had called nearly the entire Sand Village camp to watch this battle. But in that critical moment, he had completely forgotten the ninja beneath him, focusing only on blocking the blade winds aimed at himself and Karura.
"Kokushibo!!!"
In just a few breaths, the smugness on Rasa's face vanished, replaced by burning rage. His gaze toward Akashō looked ready to spit fire.
"I'll kill you!!"
"Wait, Rasa!"
Karura suddenly grabbed him.
"Don't let anger cloud your judgment!"
A trace of regret flashed through Akashō's eyes as he watched Rasa being stopped.
If those two had really lost control and rushed at him, he was eighty percent sure he could have taken their heads in a single strike.
"All Sand ninja—take the dead and wounded back to camp. Rasa and I will handle the enemy!"
Seeing that Rasa was restraining his anger but clearly unable to think calmly, Karura issued orders in his place.
"Yes!"
Amid scattered responses, the Sand ninja quickly turned and retreated. Meanwhile, Karura and Rasa kept their eyes locked on Akashō, preventing him from continuing the slaughter.
"Kokushibo… what exactly is the grudge between you and our Sand Village? Why are you targeting us like this?!"
Rasa asked hoarsely.
Only now, with no other Sand ninja around, did he dare to ask—because hidden in that question was a trace of fear.
"And you still dare ask that, when you have no idea what your own village has done?"
Akashō let out a cold laugh, his icy tone instantly crushing any thought Rasa had of negotiating.
Of course, Rasa had no way of knowing that his subordinates had mistakenly killed Akashō's adoptive parents. And even if he did… would knowing mean they didn't have to die?
"A life for a life—that's only natural."
Akashō swept his gaze coldly across the Blade of Living Flesh.
"Today, I'm going to have your entire Sand Village buried with them."
A life for a life. Buried together.
From those words alone, Rasa immediately understood—someone important to Kokushibo had been killed by Sand Village ninja.
A grudge like that… there was no chance of reconciliation.
"Then today, one of us is going to die."
Rasa exhaled slowly. The gold dust floating around him began to move once more, while Karura silently raised her hand as well.
Just as the two prepared to resume the battle, Akashō suddenly looked up at the distant sky. Then, without warning, he turned and fled—vanishing from their sight in just a few breaths.
"W-what just happened…?"
Rasa and Karura stared at each other, completely baffled.
"No matter what… for now, we're… safe…"
Rasa let out a long breath and lowered them to the ground on a cushion of sand.
"Using gold dust on this scale consumes far too much chakra."
"And that Kokushibo's body is like a demon—it regenerates instantly. If this kept going, we might really have died here…"
Feeling that nearly half his chakra was already gone, Rasa spoke with lingering relief.
What Rasa didn't know… was that Akashō had been thinking the exact same thing.
It was already around three in the morning. Both of their Magnet Release techniques were massive in scale. While they would be easy prey for him once he got close, that was only if he could actually close the distance.
After their earlier experience, their vigilance had clearly increased. If the fight continued, the result would only be him taking repeated damage and regenerating—until the first rays of dawn erased him completely.
Akashō sped toward the cave he had found earlier.
Tomorrow night… he would return and wipe out the entire Sand Village camp.
As he traveled, he pulled up Kokushibo's Villain Template and glanced at the reputation value at the bottom.
And that one glance nearly made him lose it.
"Holy shit—how is it almost 500,000 already?!"
"I'm about to get rich!"
Akashō's breathing quickened. Was the Sand Village really this generous? There had only been about a thousand ninja present—by average calculations, it should've been around one or two hundred thousand at most.
Was it because the Magnet Release duo was so strong…?
Just as Akashō was wondering why he had gained so much reputation, several kilometers behind him, the Sand Village camp suddenly erupted in a blinding burst of firelight.
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