Chapter 24.4- One Thousand Hands

This was doable. I could do it. I cold beat the Raikage. I allowed myself to exhale, and felt some of the pent up tension that had built across my body to relax. I just had to follow the plan and make sure I did my bit, and this would be easy. Okay, not easy, I silently amended as I was forced to move into a body flicker to dodge away from another lightning straight. After that, I ducked underneath a kick that had come from virtually nowhere as he predicted my route of escape and moved to close down on me in the window where most would have been disoriented from he use of the body flicker. His eyes moved from side to side, assessing, judging, and silent. I knew that with every exchange, he got closer and closer to figuring me out. I just had to make sure that didn’t happen before we’d won this.

Both arrows Kagami sent at him hit nothing but air. He was upon me once again, and this time he was not letting up. I blocked a punch that made my forearms rattle in one second, and the next, I had to drop to my knees to avoid a kick that would surely had decapitated me in one swoop. The second after, I was skating backwards along the ground with my back as his other foot came up with a kick that almost smashed through my guard. I rolled to the side by instinct as he jumped upwards and smashed into the ground where I’d stood with a massive stomp. I breathed out again. I could do this.

I took my gentle fist stance, and he came again. The first blow was mine. “Eight Trigrams:…” I began, after I managed to land the first six unresponded to, but on hearing the words, he seemed to become even more locked in and exhaled an actual lightning storm in my direction. ‘False Darkness’, I recognised the jutsu as while I instantly released chakra from alll my tenketsu, and then began to spin. “Revolving Heaven” I announced once I stood still once again.

The ground around me had been worn down by the jutsu, and the Raikage himself had been forced to retreat lest the jutsu send him flying backwards, or worse, grind into him wit its rotary power. I smiled at that. A bright one. Once again, lighting straight. This time, I trusted my body to react in time. I jumped.

In mid air, his punch missed my just a whisker as I oriented my body at the very last second to allow him pass beneath me unobstructed rather than to meet his advance like I’d initially mimed. As he passed beneath me, I felt the rasengan form into being with a smile on my face and used my other hand to push off against the air with wind release and slammed the rasengan right into his back. The A-ranked jutsu sent him right into th ground, face first with the force alone, and I pressed the jutsu in deeper and deeper, trying to overcome the defence of the lighting armour. Perhaps I would have succeeded. I never ended up finding out as a massive tentacle slammed into my body full force and sent me sailing into the ocean. Even bracing for the impact by releasing chakra from the tenketsu where the blow would have come from had done nothing to hinder the massive tentacle’s force.