Crack crack crack!
"If I hadn't switched to my Hydrification Technique in time, that really would have been the end of me. But that lightning still left me with some serious injuries."
Mangetsu Hōzuki's body dissolved into a puddle of water that spread across the ground.
"Then let me send you on your way!"
Hiss!
Powerful Lightning Release chakra gathered in Obito's right hand, letting out a sharp shriek.
It was Hatake Kakashi's signature technique, Lightning Release: Chidori!
He thrust forward toward Mangetsu Hōzuki.
At that moment, Ringo Yu Yuri came flying in from the side, her twin blades crackling with lightning as she brought them slashing down. Beneath his mask, a cunning light rose in Obito's eyes.
Swoosh! Swoosh!
Both blades passed straight through Obito once again, the same trick as before. The difference was that this time he made it far more convincing.
"What!?" By the time Ringo Yu Yuri sensed something was wrong, it was already too late. Both Thunderswords drove straight into Mangetsu Hōzuki.
"Ahhh!!" He let out a cry of agony.
And right before Obito's eyes was Ringo Yu Yuri's completely unguarded back.
He found himself acknowledging one undeniable truth: Kamui, played well, could really kill a person.
Crack!!
Obito's lightning-shrouded right hand punched out through Ringo Yu Yuri's chest from behind.
"Wah!!" She vomited a gush of blood, her eyes wide open. There was no saving her.
Obito pulled his arm free, and Ringo Yu Yuri collapsed to the ground, dead.
His peripheral gaze swept toward Fuguki Suikazan, whose expression had gone pale with panic in the distance.
So, next up.
Swoosh! He used Kamui on his right eye to absorb himself in and reappeared like a ghost behind Fuguki Suikazan, reaching a hand toward his shoulder.
"It's over. Hm?"
Suddenly, a sword stabbed in from the side. It was Kisame Hoshigaki!!
Obito immediately switched to Transparency Mode.
Kisame's sword passed through him, and at the same moment, the pupils beneath Obito's mask met Kisame's eyes.
Genjutsu: Sharingan!
Kisame's pupils shrank instantly.
Fuguki Suikazan sensed something wrong at his back and swept Samehada around in a wide arc. Obito deflected it with the war fan.
With a resounding clang, Obito used the impact to push himself back.
"Kisame, well done. If it weren't for you, that really would have been dangerous just now." Fuguki Suikazan said, his heart still racing.
Crack!!
Without any warning, Kisame Hoshigaki's sword had already drawn across Fuguki Suikazan's throat.
"Kisame, you!!"
Thud! Fuguki Suikazan dropped to both knees, clutching his bleeding throat, his bloodshot eyes locked hard on Kisame.
But Kisame's eyes were vacant and unfocused.
"So it was a Sharingan genjutsu. Serves me right. To die, again and again, Konoha." In boundless resentment, Fuguki Suikazan breathed his last.
Fate had a funny way about it. In the original story, Fuguki Suikazan had indeed died at the hands of his own most capable subordinate, Kisame Hoshigaki, and here under Obito, he received exactly the same treatment.
Ringo Yu Yuri and Fuguki Suikazan had fallen one after the other. The only survivor, Mangetsu Hōzuki, was pinned to the ground by the Thunderswords, the lightning they continuously discharged paralyzing his half-liquefied body completely and leaving him unable to move.
"Kisame, finish off Mangetsu Hōzuki." Obito issued the command to Kisame through the genjutsu.
Kisame trudged forward with hollow steps, came to stand before Mangetsu Hōzuki, raised his sword high, and thrust it downward.
Crack!!
Blood sprayed into the air!
Obito's eyes narrowed.
Kisame Hoshigaki had driven the sword into his own thigh. Cold sweat drenched him from head to toe as he gasped in sharp, ragged breaths.
He had used the intense pain to break free of Obito's genjutsu control.
Even Obito could not help but give a heartfelt word of praise at this: "Kisame Hoshigaki. As expected of you."
Kisame exhaled weakly: "Even I would never accept being controlled by a genjutsu twice. But the fact that I killed my own superior is undeniable, and after something like that, I have no face left to stand before the Fourth Mizukage."
As he spoke, he pulled the Thunderswords that had pinned Mangetsu Hōzuki's movements free from the ground.
Mangetsu rose and said gravely: "We probably won't be seeing the Fourth Mizukage anyway. Because this man's power is even more terrifying than Lord Yagura's."
Obito neither confirmed nor denied it. He walked forward, flicked Samehada up from the ground with his foot, took it in hand, used Kamui through his right eye to absorb it into the dimension, and then kicked Fuguki Suikazan's corpse aside.
Roar!!
A blazing blue chakra flame ignited. Susanoo released, activating its second form.
Clad in Susanoo, Obito advanced on Kisame Hoshigaki and Mangetsu Hōzuki with overwhelming force and declared: "I can spare your lives. All you have to do is break through this Susanoo."
"What a delightful offer, getting a chance to live. But somehow I can't bring myself to smile." Kisame said sincerely, facing the Susanoo that inspired dread in all who beheld it.
Mangetsu Hōzuki felt the same. He spread open his scroll.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Summoned: Longsword Nuibari!
Summoned: Bluntsword Kabutowari!
Summoned: Blastsword Hiramekarei!
"Kisame, pick whichever one of these suits you best!" Mangetsu Hōzuki said.
"I won't hold back then!" Kisame said, his gaze moving between the three swords.
Nuibari was shaped like a massive sewing needle with a tough steel wire trailing from its end, possessing the strongest piercing power of all seven swords, capable of stitching a skewered enemy to whatever lay behind them.
Kisame picked it up and weighed it in his hand, then set it aside, because the blade was too light and felt insubstantial when swung.
Kabutowari had a rope connecting a blade on one end to a hammer on the other, and its method of attack was to first hack with the blade, then drive the hammer into the blade's spine to multiply the force, a weapon said to be capable of smashing through any defense.
Kisame weighed it in his hand and found the balance just right, but he still set it down, because this blacksmith-like style of attacking was not to his liking. He wanted to end battles in the most direct and straightforward way possible.
So he chose Hiramekarei, the blade perfectly married to explosion, which at the instant of striking an enemy would detonate its explosive scroll with tremendous force, the power of the blast scaling with the ferocity of the swing, giving it the most lethal destructive potential of all seven swords.
"To break through that, it will take all three, Hiramekarei, Kabutowari, and the Twin Swords, the three most destructive swords. Not one can be left out." Mangetsu Hōzuki said, forming seals with both hands.
Boom! In a cloud of white smoke, a shadow clone appeared beside him.
"Is that wise given how much chakra you have left?" Kisame asked.
"There's no time to worry about that. This concerns the last stand of us, the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of Kirigakure." Mangetsu Hōzuki said.
"Very well. Show me the true destructive power of the Swords of the Mist." Obito said in a low voice.
Mangetsu Hōzuki's main body took the Twin Swords in hand and circled around to the rear of the Susanoo, transforming both arms into the Great Water Arms and pouring chakra in without reservation, causing the blades to grow to extraordinary size.
Mangetsu Hōzuki's clone gripped Kabutowari and charged straight at the front of the Susanoo, likewise activating the Great Water Arms, holding the blade in one hand and the hammer in the other. Boom!! The blade came sweeping down with full force and struck the Susanoo. Boom!! The hammer simultaneously crashed down onto the blade's spine.
Crack! A fissure appeared on the surface of the Susanoo's exterior.
"Twin Swords: Release!!"
Almost simultaneously, Mangetsu Hōzuki's fully unleashed Twin Swords came crashing hard into the Susanoo's back.
Crack! Crack! Struck from front and rear at once, the fissure on the front of the Susanoo widened further.
Boom!! Mangetsu Hōzuki's shadow clone dispersed.
His main body, drenched in sweat, called out: "Kisame, now!!"
"Ha!!" Kisame Hoshigaki leapt high into the air and brought Hiramekarei slashing down with all his strength onto the fissure at the front of the Susanoo.
Boom boom boom boom boom boom!!
The violent explosion released from the blade's explosive scroll swallowed the entire Susanoo whole.
"Ahhh!!" Kisame and Mangetsu Hōzuki were both sent flying a great distance by the blast.
"!" In the distance, Uzuki Yūki's pupils shrank sharply and her hands clenched involuntarily.
"Not bad at all. Kisame Hoshigaki, Mangetsu Hōzuki. I, Uchiha Raito, acknowledge your strength. I am pleased to call you the Twin Demons of Kirigakure. Today I will let you go free, and if you ever find you have no place left for you in Kirigakure, consider joining Akatsuki. No, come report to my ninja village instead."
From within the flames of the explosion, Obito walked out without a scratch, speaking to the Twin Demons of Kirigakure who lay battered and exhausted in the distance, unable to so much as move a finger.