Orochimaru realised that faster than others, as he released the physical expression of chakra and forgot all about getting the barrier jutsu off him. Instead, he bit both of his thumbs to draw blood and weaved an unfairly short series of hand seals before slamming his palms on the cracked earth with a look of utter focus.
Summoning Jutsu: Triple Rashōmon
The ground itself buckled in protest. With a sound like the grinding of tectonic plates, three colossal, iron-clad gates erupted from the base of the artificial pond, one after another. Each gate was a masterpiece of intimidating defence, adorned with monstrous, horned faces and thick sealing chains.
Fire Release: Solar Nucleus Needle
Itachi simply pointed.
The blue-white spark elongated into a needle-thin beam of pure plasma and ford a line of white light across the battlefield as it travelled nearly instantly. The beam of plasma didn’t cause an explosion; it simply lted a perfectly circular hole straight through the monstrous first gate as though it offered no resistance. However, the Rashōmon gates were still the First Hokage’s legendary defence. The needle beam pierced the second gate, but it turned from blue to orange as the gate reduced the jutsu’s power. The third gate couldn’t stop the beam either and was forced open, though not without resistance.
The beam—the thickness of a needle—was suddenly dispersed into a pillar of intense fiery energy the size of a tree. The jutsu’s power ca from injecting an A-rank ninjutsu’s worth of chakra directly into a singular target and burning them from the inside while they were helpless in the face of the foreign, hostile chakra. Death was a foretold outco once it entered the body. However, even if the energy was dispersed, it remained a dreadful A-rank ninjutsu that drowned the target in extrely intense and potent fire-natured chakra.
The pillar-like beam vaporised everything that fell inside its diater, carving a tunnel into the ground for several tres. However, the man who should have been a burnt corpse was still standing.
A wet, rattling sound erged from behind the third gate. Orochimaru beca visible in the shadow of the iron, his entire body charred, but his right shoulder a hollow ruin where the needle beam had caused the most damage. The wound was horrifying—a cauterised crater that had been nearly vaporised to the bone. Any other shinobi, perhaps even a Kage, would have been in a state of dical shock, their nervous systems shutting down from the trauma. But Orochimaru didn’t fall. Instead, his body began to shudder with sickening undulations.
“Kuku… kuku-ha-ha-ha-ha!” The laughter tore his throat, punctuated by a spray of black bile. He was gravely injured.
Beneath the scorched skin, sothing was moving. Hundreds of tiny, pale white vipers began to writhe within the cavity of his ribs, their bodies weaving together like living stitches. They filled the hole, acting as a makeshift circulatory system, pumping a dark ichor through his veins. The charred edges of wounds across his body began to bubble and peel away, revealing raw, pink tissue that was already hardening into scales.
In their locations, Hopper and his squad stood frozen, their sandals sinking into the cooling mud. Koyai’s hands trembled as he held the chain. As an iryō-nin, he knew much about the human body. Even if the Solar Needle had to punch through three Rashōmon, and even if its power was reduced and dispersed, no one was supposed to survive what did get through. He couldn’t wrap his head around what he was seeing.
“It didn’t work,” he whispered, the words tasting like ash.
Across the crater, Itachi leaned against the wall, heaving for air with a rasp in his throat. Using two A-rank ninjutsu so close to each other was tough on anyone’s body. On top of that, he had used the Susanoo the day before. The strain of it was catching up to his young and immature body. Continuing to fight at the required level itself might cause his body to break down. Itachi stood up straight regardless. He didn’t care about any of that and was going to fight until he died.
Orochimaru looked through the gates at Itachi, his yellow, snake-like eyes wide with a terrifying, drug-like euphoria. “Is this your best? A needle prick?”
Despite the thoughts swirling in his head, Takuma looked above Orochimaru.
The plan wasn’t over.
As Orochimaru was cackling, a black snake hamred out of the ground near his feet and sank its fangs—the size of chef's knives—into Orochimaru’s good shoulder and then wrapped its long body around him, restricting him tightly. At the sa mont, Anko descended right in front of him with a look of pure hatred burning in her eyes. She finished her last hand seals the mont her feet touched the ground and then stabbed a point below his chest.
“Dear Anko, you have grown so much,” Orochimaru said with an almost sweet tone. He raised his good hand and softly brushed her cheek; she didn’t stop him, but when his finger lingered down towards her shoulder, she slapped it away. He chuckled and continued, “You have grown strong as well. Your chakra has got stronger. You’re almost there, aren’t you, my dear student? Just one more step and you’ll be on this side. You were always so talented… Yes, you were.”
Though his gaze seed nostalgic, there was an unsettling feel to it that made Anko grit her teeth.
“But I must say I’m disappointed. Venom? On ?” He looked at the snake’s maw covering his shoulder and felt pangs of pain as the fangs dug into his flesh. “You should know better than anyone else that poisons and venoms don’t work on —or on you. I made sure of that before I left. That’s how much I cared about you.”
Anko knew he was trying to get a rise out of her and kept her temper down. Instead, she chuckled. “That arrogance and pride of yours have always been your faults. It’s going to be your death. I found this one specially for you.”
Orochimaru narrowed his eyes and was about to say sothing when he heard a rattle, and his eyes widened in a sudden realisation. He looked at the snake—its black colour, the shape of its scales, and the distinct rattle on its tail—and recalled a rare variety of serpent that lived in the Ryūchi Cave. For the longest ti, he didn’t know that the breed existed, and when he did beco aware, it just existed in the back of his head. He didn’t even know that it was a venomous kind because the snake’s venom did no harm, on its own, that is.
But when the venom was introduced to the fire-natured chakra, it turned into one of the most corrosive substances known to the world. It caused damage everywhere, carried by the blood through every corner of the body.
A malicious grin broke out on Anko’s face. She saw the look of realisation on his face that he had allowed the venom to spread throughout his body as he talked to Anko, and that there was a senbon stuck in his chest.
“Fuck you!” she snarled.
Orochimaru roared as an imnse amount of chakra was pumped directly into his body, and the snake restricted his body. However, he was faster than Anko and weaved single-handed hand seals.
Anko scread as her shoulder exploded in pain and the curse mark began to expand. However, rather than collapsing or taking a step back, she yelled louder and pushed more chakra into his body with more ferocity. Orochimaru’s eyes widened when he felt the curse mark he had left on her bump against a seal, and instead of pushing forward, it recoiled in fear and even shrank back.
He instantly recognised who had put that seal there by the chakra coming from it. It was the powerful chakra of the Third Hokage, his forr master.
“Curse you, damned old man!” Orochimaru yelled as the inert venom turned corrosive. Every organ from the lungs to the kidneys burned. His internal organs, which were already in a precarious condition from the repeated mouldings and getting hit by multiple A-rank ninjutsu, began to fail altogether. Black smoke began to rise from his body as the corrosive substance began to open holes in his body.
Takuma, standing at a distance, heard the scream, saw the black smoke, and knew that the plan was working. Anko was arguably doing as much damage as the A-rank ninjutsu had done to him.
And just at the right ti, he heard Kawamochi’s voice in his head.
“He’s there. Everyone, clear out!”
Others heard her voice as well because the assault squad imdiately dropped their barrier ninjutsu and sprinted away from the crater in different directions. Itachi vanished from his spot with a Body Flicker. Takuma was also going to run, but he stopped when he heard Anko.
“Just die, you monster!” Anko yelled, releasing all of her pent-up feelings that had built up over the years. She wasn’t moving away from Orochimaru as planned.
Takuma clicked his tongue and turned around to flash to her with a Body Flicker. He picked her up on his shoulder without any communication and got her elbow smashed into the side of his head—which kind of helped with the fear of being so close to Orochimaru—before flashing away again and running as hard as possible to clear out of the blast zone.
Orochimaru, through his pain, suddenly felt a foreign chakra in his body. It wasn’t Anko’s violent chakra. This chakra was trying to hide and doing everything in its power not to get caught in the chaos, wreaking havoc in his body. It only wanted to complete its job.
It was the chakra of that boy who had just whisked Anko away.
The boy with the augntation. However, unlike that crude thing, this was smart.
He was under a genjutsu.
———
.
As Itachi ran away, he looked up at the darkened sky and the shadow that it cast over everything. He looked over his shoulder as the clearing disappeared from his vision and recalled the conversation he had with Takuma as he was explaining the plan.
“—We are going to cast two genjutsu on Orochimaru. I’ll go first, and then you’ll cast a second on top of that. We’d need to coordinate it well because it doesn’t work if we slip up with our timing—” Takuma said.
“—Are you sure this is going to work? He has the Sharingan—” Itachi said, feeling a complex jumble of negative feelings. “—Even without his eyes, he’s skilled enough to see through genjutsu, and when you add the Sharingan, it’ll be hard—”
“—Not if we don’t give him a chance to figure it out—”
The plan’s crux was not to give Orochimaru any space or ti. They had to keep him busy enough that he didn’t notice the ninjutsu. It was to start with Takuma’s Water Dragon Missile Jutsu that would allow the two genjutsu to be set up. Orochimaru would be on the lookout for Itachi’s genjutsu, but less so from soone else. And to ensure he didn’t notice, they had to keep up the pressure.
Itachi’s genjutsu would allow Takuma’s clone to get close to get in a hit, which would then allow the assault squad to lay down their barrier ninjutsu that would give ti for Itachi to prepare his ninjutsu, which was to do enough damage to allow Anko to get in close for her own attack. All of that was to ensure that Takuma’s genjutsu wasn’t found out until the very end for the final surprise attack.
As for what was hiding behind that genjutsu?
———
.
Even though his five senses weren’t giving him anything out of the ordinary, Orochimaru’s chakra sense was telling him that he was in danger. It was a sunny day with a soft sprinkle of clouds, a perfect day to be outside. He thought back to the weather before the fight and recalled the breeze that was cool to the touch. And yet, when he blinked, that scene disappeared, blocked by the gigantic figure that cast a shadow that blanketed everything around him. The light had gone from the bright afternoon to the late evening, and it would have been complete darkness.
Orochimaru looked up, his reconstructed snake-flesh quivering, and high above, breaking through the veil of steam and ash, was a god-like giant. Akimichi Choza had transitioned from a man to a mountain. His clan’s Super Multi-Size Jutsu had pushed his physical form to its absolute limit, his armour plates now the size of city gates, his red hair whipping like a forest fire in the high-altitude winds.
Because of their huge size, any physical attack they made was extrely powerful and covered a wide area. The drastic increase in size put a great strain on the user’s body, but in return, it granted trendous power. Akimichi Choza had made a na for himself outside the Ino-Shika-Cho by using that jutsu in the Third Shinobi World War to dominate and win every battle he was ever a part of.
He was truly the Hidden Leaf’s Undefeated Giant.
And yet, the strongest Akimichi was coming right down at him with an A-rank ninjutsu.
The air around his massive form began to hum with a resonant, golden frequency. This was the pinnacle of Yang Release—the art of breathing life into form.
Yang Release: Hand of the Benevolent God
A shimring, celestial light erupted from Choza’s down-turned palm. It wasn’t a fla or a beam; it was a solidified construct of pure, golden chakra that mirrored the shape of his hand, cast in golden sun, growing until it spanned beyond the width of the entire clearing by the raw vitality of the Akimichi clan.
The sheer mass of the jutsu began to compress the atmosphere. The air was hamred downwards. Below, everything began to crack and pulverise before the palm even made contact. There was no escape; you couldn’t outrun the sky when it decided to fall.
There was no way to avoid this without getting hit. Escaping was going to be an utter pain; the recovery itself felt like an incoming chore, but perhaps this was the ti to make so adjustnts to the body.
“I never liked you,” Orochimaru muttered, with resignation. This was going to hurt.
The golden palm struck.
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