CH_5.15 (158)

CH_5.15 (158)

Takuma retreated towards to where he had left No#1 but found the man to be missing. This was a great problem with fighting multiple opponents; help was readily available—something he had recently taken advantage of against a difficult chunin.

He turned back to the second man and recognized him as No#3.

“I must confess, I don’t believe I am someone important enough to warrant an assassination,” said Takuma. “So, before I die, tell me who ordered this hit.”

“You don’t need to know,” No#3 rushed him.

Takuma crossed his arm to block a punch that Takuma weaved back, making it miss by the width of a finger. Takuma tried to pull away, but No#3 stuck close, targeting Takuma’s top to bottom, landing precise strikes in places that hit. Takuma didn’t fall short and managed to disarm the sword on top of getting a couple of soft augmented hits in that did more overall damage.

“Come on, can’t you give a dead man his last wish?” asked Takuma as he swung the sword at its owner. He then immediately turned and used the sword to block a sword strike from No#2. “It’s not that I'm asking too much, and this won’t jeopardize your mission... or is it that you are afraid that I’ll kill you and live to tell the tale.”

No#2 immediately became more aggressive. Takuma smiled internally and let the man think he had control of the momentum as No#3 joined the fight. A 2v1 was just the way Takuma liked it. He observed the two.

He hadn’t noticed it before, but both No#3 and No#2 had shockingly similar fighting styles; the same went for No#1. They had their quirks and adjustments unique to them, but they followed the same combat style—one Takuma hadn’t faced yet—which told him that they were trained at the same source, but more importantly, they were trained at the source.

No#2 quite easily disarmed Takuma off the sword he had stolen from No#3, who tried to reach for it, but Takuma kicked the sword away. No#2 used the opportunity to smash his knee into Takuma’s face, disorienting him for a moment, which gave No#3 the opening to lay down a lethal combo of a punch to the liver, a palm strike to the chest, which sent Takuma’s injury flare up worse than a wildfire, and he finished with a lacerating kunai strike to Takuma’s shoulder right shoulder.

Takuma barely raised his arm to block No#2’s downward strike. The sword clanged against his metal arm bracer; he didn’t cut, but the power behind his strike sent a shock up Takuma’s arm; he could already feel the bruise forming.

Takuma swept No#2’s feet, but he jumped at the last second, and while in mid-air, No#2 threw his word to No#3 as Takuma watched the blade fly over him and landed in No#3’s grip, who swung it down without missing a beat. Takuma moved but got a deep gash on his face.

Takuma’s first instinct was to open his eyes wide to check if his eyes were cut, but he could still see normally. The pain, however, ended Takuma’s information collection process. He wanted to study their moves and observe their teamwork strategies more, but it was clear that he no longer had the luxury.

He grunted and jumped No#2, who didn’t have a sword and took him to the ground. No#2 kneed him in the crouch. Takuma grunted in agony but snarled as he went for a kunai in the stomach that was deflected and ended up in a gash to the side.

His instincts screamed, and Takuma grabbed No#2 and pulled him atop, leading No#3 to slash his teammate. No#3 managed to pull back his swing at the last moment, but not before it had drawn some blood. Takuma yelled as he threw No#2 into the presumably startled No#3 before scampering off into the mist.

Takuma coughed and felt the taste of iron grow heavy. His face burned from the cut; the only silver lining was that the cut was below his eyes, which meant blood wouldn’t drip onto his eyes, hindering his vision.

No#4 was an iryo-nin. The assassination team had an iryo-nin. The danger assessment inside Takuma’s head went up two levels. A team with an iryo-nin was a threat, and this one seemed to be proficient in combat as well.

There was no way No#4 would heal him, which only meant that No#4 was trying to do the opposite. Takuma recalled a conversation with Uchiha Kano about how, with some adjustments, an iryo-nin could turn one of their healing jutsu into something that could sever muscles and fry the nerves.

Takuma couldn’t afford that.

But as he shifted his foot, a jolt of pain from his leg almost destroyed his balance. Takuma was sure it was No#4’s skillful knife work mixed with his knowledge of human anatomy.

He went for the emergency measure.

Takuma threw the kunai in his hand at No#4, buying him a second, which he used to take out his lowest-grade explosive tag, which he triggered instantly before throwing it in between them. The tag wasn’t anchored to a kunai, so it fluttered in the air with the edges burning.

It was a gambit he had used before, but this time, the stakes were higher as he had triggered the tag. He couldn’t afford No#4 missing the tag because of the fog.

No#4 froze up and leaped back as the tag exploded, while Takuma could only contract into a tight fetal position, covering his head and ears as the explosive force slammed against him. Takuma was thrown away and rag-dolled against the ground several times.

Pain.

That was all Takuma could feel.

How long had it been since he had felt this amount of pain? Even the chunin from the Police Force raid hadn’t pushed him this far. It was in his early days of Ring when he had felt so much pain—when he was forced to armor-less, and his defense wasn’t as good as it was today, which made deep stabs and gashes common after match.

He had not missed the feeling at all—but he couldn’t deny that it brought a sense of strange calm.

In the face of real danger, his mind was clear. Perhaps, the existential dread he had carried with him in his first and even some part of the second year of his life in this world had tempered his mental resiliency—the possibility of imminent death didn’t seem as terrifying as he thought.

Takuma weaved hand seals, and he felt a connection established to puddles or water around him. The liquid rose and flowed behind with a fervor, forming a large blob. He flexed his back muscles with his much pain, and eight glorious water tentacles shot out of the blob.

Takuma took out two more of Sango’s painkiller sachets and poured the awfully bitter powder into his mouth. One of the tentacles rose and dropped a mouthful of dirty water into Takuma’s mouth to help him down the medicine. He skipped double-dosing to directly triple-dosing himself. Takuma wished he had a soldier pill, but this was his only option.

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