Chapter 222: Nadare Rōga
After quite a bit of effort, Ino finally located Nadare Rōga, the man who constantly boasted he was Kakashi Hatake's equal.
Comparing yourself to that guy... Kakuzu was a hundred times more cunning than you are.
"A ninja from the Leaf Village? You actually managed to find this place, which means that stupid woman, Fubuki Kakuyoku, was defeated by you?" Nadare Rōga, the strongest ninja in Snow Village, stood tall, with purple hair and green eyes. He had been waiting for a signal from his comrades but instead saw a woman he didn't recognize walking towards him from the other side of the snowy landscape. Her forehead protector clearly indicated her affiliation. His voice carried a fierce, ruthless killing intent as he spoke.
"Well, you don't look like much, either. I heard you've fought Kakashi-sensei?" Meeting him was different from just hearing about him. Nadare Rōga's aura was heavy with malice, but his actual capability seemed rather ordinary.
Nadare Rōga sneered. "Kakashi? Just a defeated opponent. You ignorant young brat, this snowfield will be your grave today!"
Clenching his back teeth, he began forming hand signs. But Ino was faster.
"Water Style: Heavenly Weeping!"
Pfft, pfft, pfft...
Heavenly Weeping required no hand signs. In the blink of an eye, fine needles of water-nature chakra, as fast as lightning, pierced Nadare Rōga's chest, abdomen, and neck. Crimson blood instantly stained half of his body red.
The Chakra Armor used by these Snow ninja wasn't like traditional full or half-body armor. To make a forced analogy, it was more like numerous wires and electrical stimulators connected together and worn on the body, somewhat resembling a posture brace from her previous life. It was a technological device that stimulated the body's acupoints with electric current. Nadare Rōga's torso area had no direct physical protection. Ino could feel that her Heavenly Weeping had only pierced his skin and muscle; the layer of defense provided by the Chakra Armor, located just outside his nerves and chakra pathways, had neutralized the majority of the damage on an energy level, rather than physically blocking it.
That Fubuki Kakuyoku wasn't boasting when she claimed the Chakra Armor offered considerable defense against ninjutsu; it was actually true.
"What the hell?!" Nadare Rōga, who was still diligently forming hand signs, didn't know what had attacked him. Enduring the pain, he rapidly retreated, his hands meticulously continuing their sequence of seals.
Ino concentrated her attention, observing. She could tell that unlike the female ninja who stimulated the Gate of Closing using the device, Nadare Rōga's chakra stimulation device was on his limbs. He was using it to stimulate the Gate of Astonishment and the Gate of Life, bursting forth with potential to enhance his combat ability.
His movements were faster than expected, and his tolerance for pain was also higher than an ordinary ninja's. While retreating rapidly, he performed over a dozen hand signs and finally released the ninjutsu he was preparing.
"Ice Style: Tearing Dragon Fierce Tiger!"
An ice tiger, formed from snow and ice and carrying a biting cold wind, roared out on all fours.
Ino's expression became serious; this ninjutsu had some substance to it. Facing the ice tiger, she counterattacked.
"Earth Style: Mud Flow!" This was a B-rank Earth Style jutsu Ino had learned from Tsunade-shishou, passed down from the Third Hokage. Jiraiya had modified this technique into the A-rank Earth Style: Swamp of the Underworld.
Ino's hand seals were extremely fast. Mud Flow instantly cracked open the frozen ground, turning it into a mud swamp. Nadare Rōga, along with his ice tiger, sank into it and were then swept far away by the river-like mud. The sudden appearance of the mud disrupted Nadare Rōga's fighting rhythm. He had never seen such a strange ninjutsu before.
Flustered, he tried to grab onto something to cling to. But his feet found no purchase, and his body kept falling downwards. Soon, the mud submerged him past his waist.
Ino's half-smiling expression infuriated this self-proclaimed strongest Snow ninja, who told everyone he was evenly matched with Kakashi.
Unable to bear it any longer, he gritted his teeth and formed hand signs: "Ice Style: Unicorn Ice Whale!"
An ice block shaped like a whale burst out of the ice layer. Nadare Rōga grabbed the giant whale's horn, flipped, and jumped onto the whale's back. Using the momentum of the jutsu, he managed to escape the mud swamp. Covered in mud, his previous composure and demeanor were nowhere to be seen.
Ino smiled. Another ninja who just honestly forms hand signs. She loved fighting this type of ninja the most.
She didn't use ninjutsu again. Without waiting for the giant whale to land, her body, incredibly light, moved through the many ice blocks thrown up by the whale, using them to leap. Closing in within five steps, she jumped onto the whale's head, drew a kunai, and used Water Style: Water Blade, coating the kunai with water-nature chakra that had piercing and sharpness properties. Like a short sword, she rapidly stabbed towards Nadare Rōga's heart.
Nadare Rōga's taijutsu was exceptionally poor. Faced with the incoming water blade, he only knew to activate his armor to stimulate his chakra acupoints and then use high-speed side-stepping to dodge.
Cursing him as an idiot, Ino changed her movement from a stab to a slash. The water blade sliced off a large piece of flesh from Nadare Rōga's arm.
Without waiting for him to cry out in pain, Ino kicked him directly in the abdomen. This was the spot where Heavenly Weeping had previously made two bloody holes. Now struck head-on by her Painful Sky Leg, the wounds instantly burst open as he was sent flying backwards. Standing on the back of the white whale, Ino reached out an arm, acting first, and pulled the Snow ninja, who was still in mid-air, back towards her. Clenching her left hand into a fist, she smashed a punch into his chest. Before the blood in his chest could even spurt out, she grabbed the Snow ninja's head, held him upside down with his back towards her, and then delivered a side kick towards his spine again!
With a crisp crack, Nadare Rōga flew out over ten meters like a kite with a broken string.
"I'll kill you! Die, die...!" Nadare Rōga lay in the snow. After taking one punch and two kicks from Ino, he seemed to want to stand up, but the intense pain in his chest prevented him from succeeding after two tries. Even worse, he had no feeling in his lower body.
"Master Wolf," Ino's voice echoed to his left, "if this mud underneath were a blade, you'd already be dead. You're not supposed to fight like this."
"Earth Style: Earth Spikes!"
Is there still a chance for me to live? Before Nadare Rōga could even beg for mercy, he felt several thick, sharp spikes suddenly shoot up from beneath him. They crisscrossed in various directions, piercing his body from multiple angles.
Didn't you say there was no blade underneath? Why are you still using earth spears...?
Unable to comprehend Ino's thoughts, Nadare Rōga breathed his last, his mind filled with confusion.
"Idiot. Your taijutsu is so bad, and you didn't even try to train it? Just relying on that piece of crappy armor? It's no damned use."
Ino used her chakra to examine Nadare Rōga's corpse, which was now riddled with seven or eight holes. The chakra pathways in his hands and feet showed a tendency towards atrophy due to the frequent electric stimulation. It seemed trying to take a shortcut to opening the Eight Gates without a body tempered by a thousand refinements just wouldn't work out in the end.
She stripped off the Chakra Armor. Taking the body back to report to Sandayū would allow her to claim a reward.
Fifteen minutes later, Shikamaru and the others returned as well. There wasn't much to say. The three of them teamed up, including Hinata, whose eye power had greatly advanced. They easily defeated the Snow ninja Mizore Fuyukuma.
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