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Anko swiftly withdrew her kunai from within the Hidden Frost shinobi. Her eyes then shifted to the three-storey U-shaped manor owned by one of the Yu's wealthy blown up by Takuma's clone blast. A lush perimeter of trees surrounded the building, encircling a meticulously maintained shrub hedge maze.
However, as they advanced towards the building, all cover disappeared, heightening the risk of detection. Anko's gaze swept across the windows, a task she had been diligently performing for the past few hours. Her eyes halted abruptly on a window near the far left, where, in a heartbeat, she caught the fleeting glimpse of a man just as he disappeared behind the wall.
They had been seen. The enemy knew they were coming.
"We've been caught," she told Daiki.
"Crap," he muttered nervously.
The two groups converged at the manor's heavy double doors.
Anko informed Team B of the news, to which they responded with heavy nods.
"We're going to take it slow. Stick close, don't disappear from sight, and keep cover."
She maintained a steadfast front as the leader but was nervous about this undertaking. Having left Iori behind, their headcount was reduced to five. According to Aranai, the ROOT team had seven people, and given that one of them had died, their headcount was six, which put her team at a numerical disadvantage.
Moreover, she clearly remembered a bastard of a sensei telling her that ROOT agents were dangerous—not because they were talented, but because of the training the agents were put through. She wasn't concerned about herself. From what Takuma had told her—regardless of how limited his information was—she was confident that she could take out the leader.
However, if their goal were to exterminate the ROOT team, her confidence ended there. Even if she killed the leader, Team-9 would still be outnumbered and for all she knew, the other ROOT agents could far surpass her subordinates in strength.
They were going in with the little information Takuma had brought back from his fight with the leader and his agents. Thankfully, they were only there to take an agent or two away—which was still very dangerous, but she thought her team had a better chance to succeed without casualties.
Though there was no such thing as a guarantee on an active field mission. Things could go south in an instant.
She signalled to Takuma and pointed at the doors. The team quickly fell back, creating a safe distance. Takuma launched a second form augmented punch; the burst of chakra hit the panes, broke the latch on the other side, and forced the doors open. He immediately jumped back, prepared for potential booby-trapped explosives, but the doors remained still and the entryway looked clear.
They swiftly entered the building with full heads of caution and slowly spread out in the expansive three-storey foyer, where the open corridors on the upper floors could be seen from the lower levels.
A doorway in the front led deeper into the house, and a staircase led up in the corner. Anko motioned the team to stay on the ground floor before moving up. Just as they were about to proceed deeper, a kunai with an explosive tag fluttering on its tail descended from the first floor.
Kameko was the first one to notice and yelled,
"Explosion—clear!"
Everyone jumped towards the walls to clear out of the way. The explosive tag burst near the floor, scorching the gleaming marble and ruining the lush carpet, but the warning saved anyone from getting injured.
Anko jumped to the first-floor corridor railings and saw a man making a break towards a corner. She threw a volley of shuriken, but they were deflected, and the ROOT agent disappeared behind the corner.
She didn't rush after them and called the team up. Around the corner was a small corridor with an open room at the end. Halfway through, a ROOT agent emerged before the open door and released a powerful gust of wind from his mouth,
Wind Release: Breakthrough jutsu.
The gust of wind slammed full force into Anko. She flew through the air and crashed out of a window. As she fell to the manor grounds, Anko saw a duo of ROOT agents standing on the walls of the manor above the window she shattered. They hurled volleys of shuriken and kunai at her while she was in mid-air, unable to change directions, and did her best to deflect the rain of metal coming for her.
Two kunai got her in the leg—one only grazed her, but the other one made a significant gash below her knee—a third sliced through her side.
She landed on the injured leg, sending a jolt of pain as she stumbled. The two ROOT agents jumped towards the ground and then rushed towards her as she landed on the ground off-balance—but the moment they moved forward, Daiki jumped out from the shattered window and launched an explosive tag tied to a kunai towards them. The ROOT duo were late to hear the flutter of the tag and tried to jump away, but the tag exploded when the kunai struck the ground and caught the duo at the edge of the blast radius, throwing them to the side.
Anko used the time to find her balance and weaved hand seals for theFire Release: Dragon Fire Jutsu. She spewed an invisible stream of chakra that struck one agent and jumped to the other, and with a final tiger seal, flames sparked at her lips, igniting the streams.
The flames coalesced into a roaring dragon in front of her and the flames washed over her, surging ahead. One of the agents swept a chakra-coated hand through the stream, saving himself from a fiery death but the other wasn't so lucky. Daiki spat an oil globule at the escaping ROOT agent. It hit his gloved hand and ignited into fumes with the freshly chakra-infused oil.
The fire burned up his hand severely through the glove and his ally had managed to douse the flames in a nearby fountain but now was heavily damaged in the places that weren't heavily covered by gear.
Anko put some weight on her injured foot and hid a wince. The injury by no means put her out of the fight, but it was sure to slow her down, which could make all the difference in a fight. Fortunately, the two adversaries were injured as well, which levelled the playfield to some degree.
She glanced up at the shattered window; the team was now split, and she wasn't close enough to provide immediate help. It worried her, but she quickly returned her attention to the enemies before her. There were two of them, which was perfect in the sense that she could put them down quickly and have Daiki carry them off the property.
Then, she could support the rest of the team and get them away from the ROOT agents.
The combat came to a pause as the four shinobi looked at each other, ready to react in case anyone made a move. Anko looked between the two agents and suddenly rushed towards the more injured one—but the moment she moved, both agents moved towards Daiki.
'Shit!'
Her plans immediately changed. She shot towards the less-burned one and weaved a modified version of the Summoning Jutsu. It simplified the hand seals in exchange for limiting the scope of the summoning.
Hidden Shadow Snake Jutsu.
Half a dozen dark, long snakes, as thick as her arm, emerged from the oversized sleeves of her overcoat and flew towards her target; they bit into him and constricted his legs and body, tripping and temporarily stopping his pursuit of Daiki.
Despite her injury, she was still faster and stronger than the ROOT agent, and crashed into him. They wrestled on the ground, and Anko managed to mount him. She swung the kunai at his heart but an earthen spear struck her hand, knocking the kunai out of her hand Seizing the advantage, he struck her wounded side and kicked her away. A third ROOT agent stood on the manor house's roof with two earthen spears hovering over his shoulders. He sent down another spear with a swipe of his hand; Anko avoided it by rolling to the side.
"Rooftop!" Anko didn't forget to warn Daiki.
The second spear flew toward Daiki, who was moving already in the middle of an attack. He had to haphazardly twist his body at an awkward angle after Anko's callout. The front half of the earthen spear missed him, but the back half grazed his upper shoulder.
Anko jumped and placed herself in between Daiki and the three ROOT agents.
"We should—" Diaki tried to say something, but Anko silenced him.
"I know… just let me think," said Anko, taking in the enemies before her.
There were three ROOT agents to deal with—and only one was injured enough for it to make a real difference. It was clear that they were used to fighting together; the third hidden agent aiming for an opening was clearly a planned action. They were around the level of combat-forward chunin—if any of them got their hands on Daiki, he would be dead, which meant she had to protect him while she fought them.
Moreover, neither was the leader, Kon, which meant that the strongest of them was in the building.
The third agent dropped from the roof, and joined the most injured one. Together, they backed away until they were closer to the building, putting the most injured one on the back.
"Daiki, stay behind me and support me. Don't try to deal with them directly," she said.
The one with the burned hand was their vanguard, supported by the new arrival, who followed after him with his sword drawn. The agent in the back, seemingly not in pain at all, fitted several shuriken between scorched fingers and stood at the ready.
A large commotion induced by an explosion from inside the building reached them, stopping the exchange before it could begin. The ROOT agents shifted into a more defensive position and fell back to see what was happening inside the building.
Anko rushed toward the most injured one, ignoring the throbbing in her left. They didn't turn their eyes towards the building, but the sudden break in their plans was opportunity enough. The ROOT agents tried to put some distance between them, but she was faster. She pushed hard, even on the injured leg, and instantly closed in. She cracked him in the calf with a powerful kick and, in one fluid motion, pulled out three shurikens and threw them at the other two agents to keep them away. Returning to the heavily burned agent, Anko nailed him with two consecutive kicks to the head before pulling him close and spinning around. Using him as cover, she peered at the furthermost agent in the distance who was trying to strike her with an explosive tagged kunai.
The hesitation in his stance was enough for her to throw her human shield at the closer agent. He had a sword in his hands so he couldn't sidestep or catch his ally. The best he could do was make sure he didn't impale him in the collision but they still made full contact and fell.
Anko, now open, kept an eye on the only agent standing, who threw his explosive tag kunai toward her. She was about to jump away to dodge, which would put more distance between the two agents she had just disrupted—but another kunai flew from behind her and prevented it from reaching her.
She smiled as she sprinted toward the two agents, weaving the hand seals for a Fire-Release jutsu. Her left hand ignited with screaming fire. As the two agents rolled to their feet from the fall, she grabbed the scorched one and slammed her left hand into his throat, squeezing as the fire grew white-hot and ate through his neck, shoulders, and head.
His agonised screams died the instant the flames melted his voice box. Leaving his burning corpse to fall behind her, she sprinted towards the second agent, who still managed to maintain his grip over his sword.
"Now, this," Anko looked at the two remaining agents, "this is much more manageable."
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