A sly smile could be seen on Orochimaru's face as he said, "Not bad, not bad at all! You have surprised me, Fujin. I didn't expect you to be so good."
Fujin smirked and teasingly asked, "Is that so? Can I also be considered a hidden expert then? Maybe you should stop slaving yourself in that mercenary organization and follow me. I'll have a chat with Gramps and ask him to cut you some slack for betraying the village. I might also give you one of my old swords since I broke yours."
Having fallen for Fujin's words once, Orochimaru completely ignored any words that came out of Fujin's mouth. Besides, even though Fujin destroyed Orochimaru's best sword, Orochimaru still had plenty of good swords. At the very least, he had more than a dozen swords better than the one Fujin was using. Not to mention, Fujin was still using his cracked sword instead of switching it with a better one!
Orochimaru chuckled and said, "You are an interesting fellow. I'll admit, at least in terms of Wind jutsu, you are far better than any Ninja I have seen. However, even though specializing in a single aspect can make you stronger quickly, it also leaves a big flaw."
Without any hand seals, Orochimaru slammed his hands on the ground as he loudly added, "No matter how lethal and sharp your Wind jutsus are, there are several ways to neutralize them."
As soon as Orochimaru's hands landed on the ground, the ground for a couple of hundred meters around him became very soft.
Fujin obviously wouldn't wait for Orochimaru to be done with his set-up. Vacuum cores appeared along the edge of his blade as he swung it again towards Orochimaru.
In response, Orochimaru retreated backwards. However, he didn't retreat in a simple manner! A Mud Dragon formed on each and every spot where Orochimaru stepped on while retreating!
Fujin's Vacuum Slash cut through the Mud Dragons with relative ease initially, but as it absorbed more Mud, the Vacuum cores became unstable and the jutsu lost its form and fizzled out.
Fujin's eyes widened temporarily. The surprise soon disappeared as a smile appeared on his face. He muttered softly, "Well look at that. It seems like it was possible to use Earth Release in such a manner…"
Back when Fujin had just started to learn Earth jutsus, he used to depend on the rank E Rock Shield jutsu to defend himself. Back then, he had pondered whether he could create Rock Shields by stamping on the ground instead of slamming his hands on the ground. He felt that it would have been way more efficient and he could create more defenses while on the move.
Unfortunately, Fujin couldn't figure out how to do it. He had asked for Renjiro's help, but Renjiro couldn't do it either and asked Fujin to not waste his time on such things. Later, when Fujin learnt stronger jutsus, he stopped thinking about it and moved on.
However, Orochimaru displayed a level far beyond what Fujin had envisioned! He wasn't creating simple Rock Shields and was instead creating Mud Dragons with every step!
After the Vacuum Slash dispersed, the remaining Mud Dragons rushed towards Fujin from different directions and at different speeds so that they wouldn't fall prey to the same Vacuum Slash.
Understanding their attack pattern, Fujin raised two fingers of his left hand. Vacuum blade cores formed on top of his fingers. When the Mud Dragons reached close to him, Fujin launched Vacuum Blades at the incoming Mud Dragons. One Vacuum Blade hit a Mud Dragon, destroying it!
With one attack, Fujin had destroyed the dozens of Mud Dragons Orochimaru had created. However, he knew that it wasn't the end. If anything, Orochimaru's attack had just begun!
At the very next moment, Fujin felt the soil under him moving. He quickly flickered backwards. At the very next second, hundreds of spikes formed where he was standing previously and were launched into the air.
Fujin's new spot also came under threat, forcing him to dodge a few more times. Just like earlier, Orochimaru's attacks were to direct Fujin to a spot where he could attack more easily without allowing Fujin to counterattack.
When the barrage of mud spikes finally ended, Fujin saw Orochimaru just a couple of meters away from him. Before he could go on the offense, Orochimaru had already attacked Fujin with the Water Dragon jutsu!
In response, Fujin covered his left hand with wind chakra and waved it in front of him. A strong wind current appeared in front of him, blocking and dispelling the Water Dragon! At the same time, he began creating the Vacuum Cluster Bullets core inside his mouth while Vacuum Slash cores appeared on the edge of his sword.
However, before he could attack, he immediately stepped to his left. A strong jet of water broke through the wind current he had created earlier. Fujin's eyes widened as he observed, 'This almost feels like Tobirama's Water Release! However, it is probably lacking in power and speed compared to Tobirama...'
He kept moving as more jets of water were launched at him from a close range. After dodging twice more, Fujin shot the Vacuum Cluster Bullet jutsu at the incoming water jet.
As soon as he shot it out, the Vacuum cores inside it separated, forming their own Vacuum Bullets! One of them hit the Water jet and pierced through it, nearly reaching Orochimaru before the water filled inside the vacuum core and nullified its threat.
Of course, the water jet did nothing against the remaining Vacuum Bullets. A dozen of them pierced through Orochimaru's body. In addition, due to the sharp winds flowing between each Vacuum Bullet, Orochimaru was directly cut into pieces!
However, there was no joy on Fujin's face. He had already sensed Orochimaru switching with a Water Clone after he blocked the Water Dragon jutsu.
Fujin swung his sword in the direction of Orochimaru's real body! Unfortunately, the Mud Dragons rose into the path of the Vacuum Slash once again, filling up the Vacuum Cores long before the attack could reach Orochimaru.
A frown appeared on Fujin's face as he realized, 'Fighting him here is very restricting! Even though he can't harm me, I'm not able to do anything either as my Vacuum jutsus are getting nullified due to the high amount of mud and water.
My simple Wind jutsus won't work much either. He can easily block them with Mud and Water.
I'll need to create a distraction in order to actually land an attack. If I can't, I'll have to either retreat or use that technique!'
While Fujin's mind was rapidly forming a new plan, Orochimaru bit his thumb and slammed his hand on the ground. Fujin sensed 8 new chakras! Needless to say, all of them were large snakes. However, unlike normal summons, all of them were directly summoned underground! They moved towards Fujin through the mud grounds Orochimaru had created!
Fujin noticed their movements and wondered, 'That's strange. He should know that his summons are easy pickings for me. Does he plan to use them as a sacrifice to bait me into making a mistake? Or does he think that they can stay safe just because they are underground?'
Even though the snakes moved towards Fujin, each one of them stayed at least a couple of dozen meters under the surface. Not one of them got above that level!
Fujin pointed his index finger towards one of the snakes. A Vacuum core with several vacuum cores inside it formed on the tip of his finger. Fujin fired the Vacuum Cluster Bullet at one of the snakes while thinking, 'Well, whatever your plan is, it doesn't matter. My Vacuum jutsus can kill people hiding even a couple of hundred meters underground!'
Despite seeing Fujin's attack, a sly grin appeared on Orochimaru's face. As Fujin's attack drilled through the mud, the snakes underground felt the vibrations and moved at a rapid speed! Fujin's attack drilled through their previous location without hurting any snake at all!
Fujin was beyond shocked. He could accept someone like Orochimaru dodging his attacks with ease, but he couldn't believe that those large snakes could dodge his Vacuum jutsus!
Seeing his expression, Orochimaru laughed and said, "Those are my special hunting pets. Even though your Vacuum jutsus can pierce into the ground, they are well trained to dodge any attack drilling towards them. You can fire at them all day but you won't achieve anything.
Hehe, you're in my hunting ground now. The only way out of here is straight to hell!"
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