"stay put" mayumi says to me before rushing into the raging battle, i watch the fight wishing i could do something, anything. theres 4 shadow shinobi vs 5 of us, mayumi, fuya, jeiku, mikku, and jin. kazuya is knocked out, ibuki is squared up against butcher and im here unable to function without my power. im a failure.
i focus on jin because hes the most interesting fighter here, no powers just raw skill, he can throw 15 consecutive punches so fast you can barely tell what happened and as i see a blur and one of the shadows look winded i know thats what happened. jin brings a sweeping roundhouse kick to the shadows face, uses the momentum from the kick to spin around faster and then place a carefully aimed punch directly into the shadows throat, crushing his windpipe and killing him.
i focus next on mikku and jeiku, theyre tag teaming one of the shadows, over these 3 years their teamwork has become flawless, when the shadow is preoccupied blocking jeiku, mikku strikes from the opposite side, they do this back and forth effortlessly
"shadow clone jutsu!" 3 mikkus appear and attack the shadow, jeiku strikes from behind, stabbing directly through the shadow. mikku finishes him off with a buster cannon to the head, the shadows head is knocked off.
i see fuya fighting a shadow, she makes quick work of it by disintegrating it with her fire style jutsu but then as if it was a flick of a switch, all of the defeated shadows stand up as if they've been reanimated.
"you ninja are a lot stronger than i thought" in an instant the fighting stops and everyone stares at the man that walks out from behind a nearby tree, he looks dangerous he claps slowly as he walks towards the battlefield, "bravo shadow you did so good with your reanimation jutsu and butcher youre doing fantastic" he smiles widely, a large toothy grin that would seem warm and genuine if it were on anyone else but this mans aura is pure evil. "shadow you can come out of hiding now we're almost to the main event"
"yes sensei king" a man rises out of a shadow and raises his hand, the shadow shinobi scream in agony before imploding and sending guts and blood everywhere. shadow sighs, "getting rid of them is such a pain" the man shadow referred to as sensei king walks briskly to the battlefield.
"if you all promise that you'll sit still and watch patiently as your friend over there" gestures to ibuki "fights butcher to the death then i wont kill you"
"in your dreams!" jeiku yells as he creates and throws a chakra knife at king, jeikus knife throwing skills are incredible, ive never seen him miss and he puts chakra into the throw to make it faster, but king catches it between two fingers without so much as flinching.
"well well well one of you had to ruin it for everyone else" king snaps his fingers and the fighters go stiff, including me. "shadow could you arrange them in a neat circle around where butcher is? i would do it myself but i dont want to"
"yes sensei" shadow moves us to sit in a circle around butcher and ibuki, i cant move a muscle and it looks like the rest cant either. king yawns loudly. hes sitting cross legged and perked up like an eager child on Christmas morning.
"young man what's your name?" he asks ibuki
"ibuki naga of the hidden leaf village"
"well mr. naga this is butcher, im guessing he's killed one of your friends for you to have such a hostile look in your eyes whenever you look at him" i dont know what the hell king is but he's dangerous, really dangerous, i dont think i could beat him even with my powers "ill make you a deal mr. naga, if you best butcher in combat i will allow you and your friends to live, if you die then they all die, and butcher is known for being ruthless" he giggles
"and what if i surrender"
"thats simple really, ill use one of my jutsus to drain you of your jutsu completely, its a non reversible effect im afraid"
"and what about them"
"ill kill one of them at random" kings eyes gleam with malice "so what do you say mr. naga"
"im in"