Kakashi, having changed his approach, finally caught sight of a chance to win.
But that was only the beginning. To truly surpass Sakumo was still an immensely difficult task.
At the very least, from the moment he changed, the battle was no longer one-sided.
Lightning was Kakashi's stronger element, and after finding the proper balance through instinct, the power of wind and lightning on his short blade shifted, lightning now dominated.
As a result, his strikes became slightly faster, though his invisible wind slashes were weaker than Sakumo's. Every wind-imbued attack he unleashed was suppressed by his father and left shallow cuts on his own body.
Kakashi didn't care. From the moment he glimpsed a path to victory, he devoted himself wholly to the fight.
One cut. Two cuts. Three…
Ten. Twenty. Thirty…
As the wounds multiplied, blood quickly dyed his clothes red.
To an onlooker, it still seemed that Kakashi was at a disadvantage. But in truth, he had turned the battle around from a hopeless defense to a contest of equals, even showing faint signs of surpassing his father.
He ignored the pain, focused only on how to defeat Sakumo.
The flashing blades tangled together. The faint tearing of skin was drowned by the clashing steel. When Kakashi had accumulated more than fifty cuts, for the first time since the duel began, he gained the upper hand.
His eyes suddenly gleamed. His gaze seemed sharp enough to pierce through his father's short sword.
Finally… he had found his chance to strike back.
His arm tensed like a drawn spring and released in a blur. The shining blade swept toward Sakumo's right arm, the hand that gripped his sword, and with a flash of lightning, sliced through it effortlessly.
The severed arm spun through the air. On Sakumo's rigid Edo Tensei face, a faint smile appeared.
"Well done, Kakashi."
His calm tone was filled with fatherly pride.
The moment his sword arm was severed, Sakumo had lost.
Hearing his father's rare words of praise, Kakashi fell silent and clenched his teeth. He knew that merely cutting off his father's arm wasn't enough. To allow the sealing team to complete their work smoothly, he had to push his father's body to the brink of collapse.
The black mask covered most of his face, hiding his expression, but Sakumo knew, Kakashi must be in great pain.
"On the road ahead, don't fall so easily again."
As their final moment approached, Sakumo maintained his stiff smile.
"…Yeah."
Kakashi's eyes moistened slightly. He nodded heavily then his blade, shining with white light, cut across Sakumo's chest.
As they passed one another, countless small paper-like fragments scattered from Sakumo's body and drifted into the air.
With his back to his father, Kakashi tilted his head upward slightly.
The sealing team, who had been monitoring the battlefield closely, immediately performed their duty. Sakumo Hatake became the first Edo Tensei to be successfully sealed since the battle began.
The Allied Shinobi Forces had managed to suppress the cloned army, but once the Edo Tensei appeared, everything changed. The fight had become a stalemate, but the Allied casualties were mounting, while only one Edo Tensei had been sealed so far.
The results were bleak.
The sealing teams and medical squads, serving as support units, avoided direct combat whenever possible. Their duties were to seal the Edo Tensei and heal the wounded, not to attack.
Kakashi had paid dearly for his victory, dozens of shallow wounds, but he had defeated Sakumo and allowed the sealing squad to finish their work. Soon after, the medical team arrived to treat him.
Fortunately, this battlefield was some distance from the main front; otherwise, even treatment would have been impossible amid the chaos. Of course, medical-nin were trained to first relocate their patients to safer ground before beginning treatment.
Kakashi's body was covered with injuries. Though most of the hidden slashes had lost much of their force, leaving only shallow cuts, there were simply too many. After fighting for several minutes while bleeding, he had lost a considerable amount of blood.
Even after the medics healed his wounds, Kakashi still felt exhausted. He glanced once at his sealed father, then turned his gaze toward the Allied troops still battling the Edo Tensei and clone army. Clenching his jaw, he headed toward the area where Kimimaro was fighting.
He was worried about Guy, he didn't know how his friend was faring.
When he arrived, the ground was covered in a layer of pale white, ash-like dust piled more than two meters high, mixed with countless broken bones. It looked like a graveyard of corpses.
Their battle site was far from the main battlefield, so they hadn't drawn attention from the clone army or Edo Tensei. But it was only a matter of time before they were discovered.
"Guy!?"
Standing atop the pale mound, Kakashi shouted his friend's name.
As soon as his voice fell, a small patch of the white powder about two hundred meters to his right shifted faintly.
Kakashi's sharp eyes caught the subtle movement instantly. He rushed over and began digging through the powder and shattered bones. After clearing nearly a meter of debris, he finally found Guy curled up underneath, unable to move but alive, and seemingly uninjured.
Relief washed over Kakashi.
"You okay?" he asked, seeing the pain etched on Guy's face.
Guy managed a strained smile and gave a thumbs-up. At the final moment, he had opened the Seventh Gate, using sheer physical might and a flurry of punches to withstand nearly a thousand high-speed bone spikes.
But opening the Seventh Gate came with a price, temporary weakness and paralyzing pain that made even the lightest touch unbearable.
Buried under that mound, Guy had endured what was likely the most excruciating pain of his life. If his will hadn't been so strong, he would have passed out long ago. Yet he endured it all through sheer resolve.
Had Kakashi not come, Guy might well have suffocated to death under the weight of the remains.
"You opened the Seventh Gate?"
Kakashi knew much about the Eight Gates technique. He had once considered training in it himself, but the conditions were too severe, even for him. Still, he understood Guy's mastery of it.
"Yeah…" Guy nodded weakly.
"Then I'll stay here until you recover."
Kakashi's eyes swept the area. Some clones had already noticed him, though most of the Edo Tensei were still occupied by the main force.
"Good thing we won when we did…"
Seeing the approaching clones, Kakashi tightened his grip on his blade. Had he been delayed even half a minute, Guy's situation would have turned dire.
If Guy hadn't opened the Seventh Gate, Kakashi would likely have sent him to pursue Ye Zi instead, while he as team leader, remained on the battlefield.
Kimimaro had staked his life to hold back a terrifying enemy.
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Currently on Chapter 627 - Caught Between Advance and Retreat