Light rain was still falling from the sky. Panting heavily, Naruto and Sasuke confronted each other on the lake surface. The ripples on the lake made their reflections appear very distorted.
"Damn it!"
Sasuke muttered.
He didn't expect that even after possessing the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan and having First Hokage cells implanted, he still couldn't take down Naruto, his former defeated opponent.
"Did Shinji know early on that I'm not Naruto's opponent? No, that's impossible. How can I lose to an idiot like Naruto? If Hikari and the others find out, how can I face them and continue staying in the organization!"
The more Sasuke thought, the more annoyed he became.
His vision had long been raised by powerhouses like Shinji, Toneri Otsutsuki, Shion, Karin, and Hikari. In his eyes, Naruto was simply incompetent. Therefore, he absolutely couldn't tolerate himself being unable to defeat even Naruto.
Naruto panted: "We agreed, if I win, you come back to the village with me!"
Sasuke's expression became ferocious: "Arrogant guy, you don't really think you've won, do you?"
Just then, Menma jumped directly out of Naruto's body, staring coldly at Sasuke: "I'm different from Naruto, not in the mood to persuade you to turn back. If you come back with us obediently, I'll let you off. Otherwise, I'll break your limbs and drag you back!"
"Is that so..." Sasuke sneered, then beckoned to Menma: "Then come and try!"
Menma wasted no more words, directly starting hand seals: "Summoning Technique: Nine Masked Beasts!"
Instantly, a light array appeared behind him. Nine Masked Beasts came out from the light array one by one, landing around Menma.
Distance.
Guy asked: "They still want to continue!? Lady Hokage, do we need to stop them?"
Tsunade hesitated.
Initially, she thought some other organization was targeting Naruto, so she rushed over in a hurry. Seeing only Sasuke at this time, and from the conversation between Naruto and Sasuke, it seemed Naruto was persuading Sasuke to return to the village, so she breathed a sigh of relief.
Kakashi said at this time: "Both of them are already exhausted now. If they continue fighting, the consequences are hard to predict!"
"Wait and see!"
Tsunade couldn't make up her mind.
Sasuke defected to Shinji. If they intervened now, how to treat Sasuke would become a big problem.
Turning a blind eye was definitely not okay. After all, Sasuke was nominally still a Konoha missing-nin. As the Hokage, she couldn't ignore him. But if she took action against Sasuke, it would break the tacit understanding between her and Shinji, destroying their private cooperation.
Inside the Valley of the End.
Seeing Menma summoned the 'Nine Masked Beasts', putting on a posture of having a big fight, Naruto hurriedly shouted: "Go easy on him!"
"Don't worry, I'll leave him a breath!"
Menma waved his hand, then issued an attack order to the Nine Masked Beasts.
Instantly, the Nine Masked Beasts dispersed and attacked Sasuke from all directions.
"Courting death!"
Sasuke's face darkened. Using his remaining pupil power to activate 'Amaterasu', in just one encounter, he hit the White Tiger and Azure Dragon attacking him frontally.
Swish...
At this time, the Reaper swung its scythe slashing from one side.
Sasuke had to bend over to yield, dangerously dodging the scythe swung by the Reaper!
"!?"
Just then, Sasuke's gaze condensed.
Because he noticed that the scythe blade he just dodged actually took away a large amount of chakra from his body.
Obviously, even without being hit by the scythe, the Reaper's scythe could cut away part of his chakra.
Subsequently, not allowing him to think carefully, the Southern Dipper Sage and Northern Dipper Sage came together.
Experiencing the weirdness of these Nine Masked Beasts, Sasuke dared not be careless in the slightest, hurriedly preparing to activate 'Amaterasu' again, using dojutsu to solve these two incoming Nine Masked Beasts from a distance.
But just as he prepared to activate dojutsu, a sense of trance hit, followed by a burst of stinging pain from his eyes.
This was a sign of pupil power exhaustion!
"Damn it, at this kind of time!"
The bombardment with Naruto just now really consumed too much of his pupil power. Even if he now possessed a pair of Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan, the recovery of pupil power also needed some time.
Therefore, he could only retreat backwards while observing the situation.
Excluding the Azure Dragon and White Tiger defeated by his 'Amaterasu' and turned into white smoke disappearing, the remaining seven Nine Masked Beasts were scattered in all directions around him, all waiting for an opportunity to move.
Especially the attacking Southern Dipper Sage and Northern Dipper Sage, the staffs in their hands were already glowing with dark purple light, making his intuition constantly warn him!
"You forced me!" Sasuke hesitated no more, shouting: "Wood Release: Deep Forest Emergence!"
He originally prepared to defeat Naruto using only the power of the Sharingan, but the current situation was critical, even risking defeat, so he could only use the power of 'Wood Release'.
Rumble...
In an instant, countless vines rose from the ground, quickly turning into thick tree trunks and vines, firmly entangling all seven Nine Masked Beasts surrounding Sasuke.
Landing on one of the tree trunks, Sasuke made a fist clenching gesture towards Menma in the distance.
As he clenched his fist, the vines strangling those seven Nine Masked Beasts tightened rapidly. Although the seven Nine Masked Beasts struggled hard, facing 'Wood Release', such struggles were all futile. Finally, they had to disappear into white smoke amidst muffled sounds.
"Wood Release... how is it possible?!"
Naruto was shocked.
Standing on the towering tree, Sasuke looked down at Naruto and Menma below: "This farce should also end!"
Distance.
Seeing Sasuke cast 'Wood Release', the Jonin were dumbfounded one by one.
Tsunade, however, was unexpectedly calm, only her furrowed brows showed the unrest in her heart.
After knowing Shinji was 'A', she vaguely guessed Shinji had solved the rejection problem of First Hokage cells. Otherwise, 'B' wouldn't possess 'Wood Release'.
Precisely because of this, she wasn't surprised Sasuke could master 'Wood Release', just thinking of Uchihas obtaining the First Hokage's 'Wood Release' made her mood extremely complicated.
Shizune was somewhat worried: "Lady Tsunade, should we intervene?"
Tsunade looked at Jiraiya.
Jiraiya said in a deep voice: "This can be considered a test for Naruto! The enemies he will face in the future may be more powerful than Sasuke. We don't have the ability to protect him forever!"
"Hmm!"
Tsunade nodded gently.
Inside the Valley of the End.
Different from Naruto, seeing Sasuke cast 'Wood Release', Menma's face didn't have too many ripples, only saying lightly: "Naruto, I'm afraid I can't hold back for the next attack!"
Naruto exclaimed: "You can't be..."
Menma floated into the air, sneering: "If we can't bring back a live one, then bringing back his corpse is the same!"
Before his voice fell, a mass of dark vortex appeared in his palm. This was exactly his self-created ultimate move 'Great Spiraling Ring' (Dai Rasenringu)...