My hands armed with chakra scalpels almost immediately shot into his head. But before I could rejoice in killing the jonin I immediately realised what I had stabbed into wasn't flesh or bone, it was a wooden log.
'Substitution jutsu!?'
With my location revealed due to the brightness of my chakra scalpels, the jonin immediately attacked my hands with a kunai after he left his tanto inside my water barrier.
I couldn't retreat quick enough since I had uneven footing due to the ceiling of the cave being rocky so I dove closer to the attack instead.
Perhaps the jonin was confused by my overconfident stride forward, he abandoned his plan to stab my arms with his kunai and ducked backwards while spitting out a senbon at my face.
I simply expanded the water shield and blocked the senbon but due to the low lighting but in its place, I quickly lost the jonin.
There was a soft shuffling sound that I heard and so I turned towards it to follow it.
'Did the third genin wake up?'
And then to prevent a target from being painted on my back, I stopped chakra from flowing to create my chakra scalpels. I didn't want to be the only source of light that would attract all the 'moths' in the cave.
I was a little worried about being teamed upon but with no light around me, I was simply grateful that the enemies were just as blind as me.
"You should surrender now. No matter what tricks you use to defend yourself, it will soon become bright and you won't be able to hide from me anymore." I heard the jonin say from near the cave entrance.
'He's not running away?'
'Is he worried that there might be an ambush for him outside?'
'Does he want to take me hostage and bargain with whoever is waiting outside?'
The genin soon shuffled to the area the voice came from and stopped moving once he reached the jonin.
They stayed silent for a while as I thought of what I could do to reveal their figures.
Soon a simple idea clicked in my head and I silently stepped around the ceiling until I reached the back of the cave.
Once there, I turned around and looked at the cave entrance with the beginnings of sunlight visibly pouring into it.
The mouth of the cave was lit with a dim blue light from the sky but it still wasn't enough to light up the whole cave. But that wasn't what I was aiming for.
The reason I crawled along the ceiling to reach the back of the cave was because I wanted to see which parts of the sky were restricted from my view by the silhouettes of the genin and Jonin who were standing around the cave entrance searching for me.
And it worked!
I spotted two silhouettes, one small and one as tall as me.
I could see them both sporting an active stance with kunai in their hands. But I could also see the genin trembling and barely managing to hold himself.
The sight made me feel a little guilty about killing the other genin but I firmed my mind and took a deep breath to calm myself.
The jonin spoke once again.
"Do you really think you can leave? I have set several traps around the cave, and if you don't come to me, I'll blow them up and bury you inside it along with those rabid women you've come here to save."
I didn't reply yet, I was busy fine-tuning the chakra at my feet for my next big move.
"Which village was it that sent you to us?"
"Or did you come here from the Black Mar-?"
*PUCHI*
With the speed of a jet, Tachibana vanished from his spot and flickered to the Jonin's position and stabbed the tanto he had stolen from him into his head.
Yet I found myself cursing mentally again as I was immediately forced to dodge.
The Jonin hadn't been stabbed, instead as soon as my movement using the Body Flicker jutsu made the slightest the Jonin pulled closer the genin who was beside him and was seeking protection from him to die instead.
I once again felt worse for having to kill a child, but I kept it all stuffed inside.
However, with me coming so close to the entrance of the cave, the light illuminated my figure, even if only for a moment which was enough for the Jonin to evaluate everything about me.
I tried to not give him any advantage by pulling the tanto out of the genin's head and stabbing the jonin with it. But he was faster, much faster.
Almost as soon as the blade in my hand shot towards his neck, he tilted his body backwards by pivoting on his right foot and allowed the blade to narrowly dodge him.
The jonin then grabbed onto my uniform with his bare hands and pulled me with force enough to rip me down from the ceiling despite me using chakra to stick to it.
My muscles were pulled and I felt a sharp pain travel up my legs as I was pulled from the ceiling and then from my head and back as I was slammed into the stony ground.
Having been beaten my Shizune and used to the terrible pain of glass stabbing my hand for hours on end, I managed to keep my eyes open while looking for an opportunity.
And it was my saving grace.
The moment the Jonin slammed me onto the floor he relaxed his grip and let up his guard since my hands had loosened their grip on his tanto and I was close enough to him that I couldn't weave hand seals fast enough for him to be unable to dodge.
But that was where he was wrong.
Before he could react or even really understand what was happening, I weaved my chakra out of my body and into a complicated circuit with a fraction of a second.
To actually make the bullet it would've taken me almost half a second, the way I was able to reduce the time taken to project it was because I avoided increasing its speed.
Then the entire shape condensed into a simple water bullet which shot at into the man's eyes.
I chose his eyes because the Jonin would probably think I was trying to poison him or do something similar.
And he did, since his grip on me loosened further.
And within that moment, when he closed his eyes reflexively and out of worry of being poisoned, I jabbed the tanto into his head.
The man's eyes flashed open for the last moment of his life as he looked at me in shock.
The tanto in his brain did its work and turned him into a dead body as he became limp and collapsed onto the rough cave floor.
The adrenaline started to recede as soon as I saw the limp Jonin and my body started to feel all flopsy and limp, making me collapse onto the floor too.
I was tired and didn't understand how everything happened, but within moments I was lying on the cave floor taking deep breaths as I waited patiently and analysed my situation.
'I did it!'
'I won the fight!'