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Bomb after bomb plummeted from the sky. Shikaku and his three comrades scattered in every direction, leaving Deidara and Mui staring down from above in sheer disbelief. Dropping bombs from the air certainly packed impressive destructive power, but the accuracy was simply abysmal. Worse still, with all four targets bolting in completely different directions, they could only chase after one. Perhaps they could manage to bring down their chosen prey, but the other three would undoubtedly escape. And with the forest canopy obscuring every movement, even going after a single target offered no guarantee of a kill. Deidara refused to let that happen.
Mui descended from the giant bird, and Deidara followed suit, setting off in pursuit of Shikaku. It didn't take long before Deidara had Shikaku squarely in his sights. The corner of his mouth curled upward. "You flies from the Leaf Village can just die right here!" As he spoke, he extended both hands. Small clay spheres, pinched between each of his fingers, hurtled toward Shikaku. In midair, the spheres suddenly expanded, transforming one by one into tiny spiders that latched tightly onto Shikaku's body.
"Let me give you a taste of true explosive art!" Deidara howled with laughter.
The detonating clay clinging to Shikaku erupted. Shockwaves rippled outward in every direction, and the smoke swallowed Shikaku whole. Deidara's lips curved in satisfaction. He was just turning to leave when he suddenly spotted a Leaf shinobi perched on a tree branch in each of the four cardinal directions—including the very Shikaku he had just bombed.
'A clone jutsu?!' Deidara spun back toward the site of the explosion. Aside from the lingering smoke, there was nothing there at all.
"You people really are amusing... Still, you didn't actually think you could kill me with a trick like that, did you?" Deidara jeered.
"Your name is Deidara?" Shikaku asked.
"What, you've heard of the great me?" Deidara shot back.
"Were you the one who captured the Nine-Tails jinchūriki?" Shikaku pressed.
"That's right."
"In that case, you truly deserve to die," Shikaku said with a cold laugh.
"Plenty of people have wanted to kill me, but in the end, they've all been turned into fireworks," Deidara replied, rubbing his palms together. The two mouths embedded in his hands were chewing through clay at a furious pace.
"Be on guard—all of his chakra is converging into his palms," Sō warned. The others instantly heightened their alertness.
Deidara had no intention of hiding his moves. Seeing that the Byakugan had already exposed his little trick, he decided to simply bring out the explosive clay he had just finished chewing. With a burst of smoke, a massive creature—a dragon so enormous it rivaled a castle in scale—materialized before their eyes. Its tail swept sideways, uprooting and toppling the surrounding trees as though they were twigs. Standing on the ground beneath it, Deidara looked even smaller than an infant.
"That just now was C1—fairly limited in power. Now let me show you the might of my C2 Dragon," Deidara declared, spreading his arms wide with a grin.
Shikaku hadn't anticipated Deidara producing something this colossal. After a series of rapid leaps to evade the crashing trees, he finally landed on a large tree directly in front of Deidara, though the distance between them had now stretched to over twenty meters. Even so, he could still clearly see the gargantuan C2 Dragon continuously spewing out spheres the size of leather balls. Based on their previous experience, those spheres were undoubtedly more bombs.
"What do we do?" Tsume asked. "Kuromaru isn't suited for this kind of fight." A ninja hound's sense of smell was vastly more sensitive than a human's. The relentless explosions of Deidara's detonating clay would cause a ninja hound extreme discomfort. The Inuzuka clan's hounds were also fundamentally different from those of other shinobi—their hounds were expected to fight alongside their partners and launch attacks, not merely track scents. If Kuromaru's mobility were compromised, Tsume's combat effectiveness would be crippled as well.
Shikaku's mind raced at top speed. As he watched the C2 Dragon vomit out an ever-increasing number of spheres, his anxiety mounted. He had to admit, their squad's composition was abysmally suited for dealing with an opponent like Deidara. Whether it was Sō, Might Guy, or Tsume, every one of them specialized in close-quarters combat. And Deidara's explosive clay was specifically and lethally effective against close-quarters fighters—the nearer you got, the harder it was to dodge.
"If only Kakashi were here..." Shikaku sighed. But the longer they delayed taking action, the more thoroughly Deidara could prepare. If they dragged this out any further, the only thing waiting for them was death.
"Might Guy, you're our spearhead—go straight for Deidara! Sō, you handle defense! Tsume, coordinate with Guy and keep the pressure on Deidara!"
He knew full well that they were at a severe disadvantage in terms of team composition, but under these circumstances, they had no choice but to confront the enemy head-on. Even if they wanted to flee, with Deidara having already brought out his C2 Dragon, escape had become deeply unrealistic.
The moment the words left Shikaku's mouth, Might Guy charged directly at Deidara without a shred of hesitation. When facing a formidable enemy, you needed a sharp mind directing the fight. If Guy allowed other considerations to cloud his thoughts, it would only hamper his combat efficiency. He had to raise his focus to its absolute peak. Even if it meant taking injuries, he would bring Deidara down.
"Hey, are you people underestimating me?" Deidara scoffed. But Might Guy's speed was simply too overwhelming—in the blink of an eye, he was already right in front of him.
"Take off!"
The C2 Dragon beat its wings and lifted its feet off the ground. Deidara leaped onto the dragon's back.
"Fang Over Fang!"
Tsume spun at ferocious speed like a vertical drill, aiming to crash into the C2 Dragon, but she just barely grazed past its underbelly, missing by a hair.
"Idiot! Did you actually think you could slam into my C2 Dragon without dying?!" Deidara gasped, a cold sweat breaking out across his body. Yes, Tsume might have died, or at the very least been severely injured—but standing atop the C2 Dragon's head, Deidara would have suffered the exact same fate. He had been caught in his own explosions before, after all.
High in the air, the C2 Dragon's tail shortened, and its mouth yawned open. A smaller dragon "hatched" from within its jaws.
"Watch out—the C2 Dragon is absorbing his chakra..." Sō raced over to the spheres the C2 Dragon had just spat out, snatched up several in quick succession, and hurled them at the airborne dragon before immediately retreating at top speed.
"Hey, that trick won't work on me!" Deidara shouted, maneuvering the C2 Dragon to evade the incoming spheres. At the same moment, the smaller dragon shot from the C2 Dragon's mouth, streaking straight toward Might Guy.
"The Eight Gates..." Guy had been about to open a gate, but upon seeing the incoming mini-dragon, he abandoned the idea without a second thought and bolted in the opposite direction. The moment the mini-dragon hit the ground, it detonated. Soil and debris were blasted skyward, and the shockwave from the explosion surged outward in every direction like a tidal wave.
Deidara's lips curled with satisfaction. "Truly beautiful..."
Suddenly, three dark silhouettes tore through the smoke and dust, hurtling straight toward Deidara. In the span of a heartbeat, they were right in front of him. Shuriken?! Deidara dodged frantically. When he looked back down at the ground, the Leaf Village squad had vanished.