Naruto: Kage of Kages

Still . . . Where had the Senju princess gone?

But as he questioned in his mind, Shiki could not know that Tsunade’s course of action and resulting delay, was entirely his fault.

Originally, the Senju princess had been poised to ambush Dogan’s forces in order to allow Shiki’s escape but, seeing his barrier and how helpless the Kumo shinobi were trying to find him, her thoughts shifted.

‘There’s no way they’ll be catching the brat anytime soon.’ She thought.

‘I’ll go and help their bitch of a sensei first. With me holding the front, she will be able to unleash her full suit of abilities so we can defeat the enemy and double back to help the brats. We can end this with no casualties.’

Never did Tsunade consider that Shiki, despite becoming more and more sensitive to danger, would opt to hunt the Kumo shinobi in the mist barrier rather than just try to waste time.

And so, by the time the boy’s battle truly began, the Senju princess was already about to reach the high level battlefield on the valley’s other end.

That is what led to the current situation where a tired and injured Shiki was standing off alone against an Elite Jonin, once that had been pushed to his limits and was already heavily injured and exhausted thanks to the boy’s “explosive genius”.

*

Back to the battle.

Dogan quickly took out three pills and downed them without hesitation.

A blood increasing pill to cover for his blood loss and a military rations pill for energy to sustain the use of the last pill, a stim cocktail pill.

Rather dangerous and rare, it was a pill that boosted the consumer’s physical and spiritual energies while pushing back exhaustion.

However, after the effects wore off, deep exhaustion would set in and, depending on the strain endured, even death is a possibility though most users only end up needing a relatively long period of rest and recovery.

But with his instincts flaring in alarm at Shiki’s ongoing transformation, Dogan decided that using the pill to temporarily get his peak combat strength back and finish the fight immediately was his best option.

Sensing the shift in his opponent, Shiki consumed a military radiation pill to sustain his fading stamina and chakra.

Curiously, he noticed his stamina, his physical energy, was draining faster than usual.

But there was no time to ponder on it.

‘Earth Release: Serial Stone Bullets’

From Dogan’s mouth, small stones were fired at blinding speed, turning into flying boulders as they flew through the air.

Surrendering to his instinct, Shiki flicker flashed his way through the barrage, leaving trails of blue chakra behind him.

‘Tch, he’s not getting faster or stronger, it’s like fighting a much better shinobi with equal strength but a lot more skill.’ Dogan grit his teeth.

Shiki meanwhile, was only getting more relaxed.

‘I don’t have anything that can pierce his defenses from range. I need to close the distance.’

Dogan was a close combat specialist himself and preferred to fight up close but for Shiki it was his only choice.

But the Kumo jonin knew this.

‘He can’t pierce my defenses from a distance but I can do the opposite. No reason not to take advantage.’

‘Fire Release: Flame Bullet’

Switching to his secondary elemental release, Dogan unleashed a series of fireballs but Shiki kept weaving through them with little difficulty, his moves getting more and more fluid.

‘Fire Release: Flame Bullet’

Dogan re-cast his jutsu, opting to fire it in a wide area stream of flame instead.

But Shiki had been waiting for it.

‘If your projectiles can’t hit me then it’s obvious you’d try a wide area attack but now you can’t see me.’

With a large flare of chakra, the boy pushed Flicker Flash to the maximum he could handle.

But that was not all, using a strange footwork that just popped into his mind, he accelerated even further, his ninjutsu and this purely physical footwork technique melding perfectly.

Before Dogan could even react, Shiki was already upon him.

‘Rasengan’

‘That jutsu from before, I can take this and counter.’ The Kumo jonin thought, swinging at the boy with the ‘Earth Release: Stone Fist’.

He would regret it.

Because this time, Shiki had the opportunity and time to form the Rasengan properly.

The spiralling orb of chakra ruthlessly ground against Dogan’s core.

Alas, the boy had underestimated the strength of a jonin’s defensive jutsu like Earth Spear, just as said jonin underestimate the power of the rasengan.

Just before that orb of chakra sent him flying, Dogan’s stone encrusted fist smashed down upon his back.

Shiki was pancaked into the earth, cracking it beneath his body while the Kumo jonin spun through the air, bouncing violently off the ground and smashing through a large tree before coming to a stop.

However, much to each other’s chagrin, they both rose from the ground, ready for more smoke.

There was no need for words.

No more tricks were necessary.

Reaching this point haphazard plans would only prevent them from fully unleashing their abilities.

From this point on, it was a pure battle of ability.

Dogan had to take Shiki down before his stimulant’s effect ran out and Shiki merely had to remain in fighting shape until then.

The boy had the advantage, but his opponent was stronger, he would not be able to shrug off so many of his attacks otherwise.

‘Earth Release: Mobile Core’

Sinking a large square of land into the ground, Dogan created an enclosed battlefield.

Shiki was weaker but faster than him, even if not by much, which considering speed was Dogan’s weak point and the boy’s strong point, showed just how big the difference between the two was.

If not for the scroll bombs creating an advantage, Shiki would have already lost. Badly.

The Kumo jonin jumped back into the vertical wall of the enclosure he made.

‘Fire Release: Burning Wave’

With a less intensive but very wide area fire jutsu, he covered the entirety of the space in fire.

But he did not relax.

Intensely eyeing the ground as the flames dissipated, only to not see any sign of Shiki.

With a powerful body flicker, he smashed into the center of the enclosure.

‘Earth Release: Ground Tearing Earth Palm’

Shattering the earth, Shiki who had hid underground with his Hiding in Surface jutsu was revealed.

With a thunderous bellow, Dogan, fortified by the Earth Spear jutsu, dashed towards the boy with a devastating kick.

The ground was smashed open further but a timely Flicker Flash saved Shiki from the same fate.

With his great combat experience however, Dogan predicted where the boy would move and preemptively threw a punch.

Caught the moment he slowed down, Shiki could not escape the blow but with Flicker Flash flaring strategically across his chakra points, he accelerated his body to get his feet off the ground and crossed his arms while releasing a burst of chakra to cushion the blow.

It was only his accelerated thoughts that allowed such a complex reaction.

The result?

The boy was sent flying with minimal damage.

But he was in an enclosed space and so crashed at high speed into the wall, leaving him disoriented and coughing up more blood.

Dogan knew his strike had not been effective but the wall crash stunned his opponent.

Body flickering without delay, he rushed the stunned Shiki, ready to deliver the final blow.

+++++

Hey, Author here!

Just a reminder that you can read up to a FULL MONTH ahead of this site on pa-treon.

I’m trying to become a full time Author now and I’m not going to be starting any new novels just so I can make sure this one is properly completed.

Find those sweet advanced chapters on pa-treon.com/lusoba without the -