Fire Release: Radius Blast
As soon as Seimei activated the Jutsu, potent fire-natured chakra flooded from his tenketsu. It formed a fiery, scorching, almost blindingly white ring with a yellow hue around his waist.
The ring had a diameter of one meter, radiating scorching heat outward without affecting Seimei.
Next, in the blink of an eye, the fiery ring dropped to the ground. And the moment the ring touched the ground, the compressed, fire-natured chakra trapped within the ring exploded outwards in a ring shape.
BOOOOM…
A wave of extremely hot yellow-white flames, along with ring-shaped repulsive shockwaves, spread outwards, clashing with the incoming wave of a tornado containing sharp wind blades.
Sizzle… Boom…
The fiery shockwaves and the wind blades fell into a brief stalemate and tried to overpower each other.
Seimei's fire tried to devour the wind and burn Echo until not even his ashes remained. Meanwhile, Echo's wind blades tried to penetrate the repulsive flames and shockwaves and slice Seimei apart.
The stalemate, however, lasted less than a second before both the flames and wind blades intertwined and exploded with a loud bang.
Boom…
The resulting shockwave sent both Seimei and Echo flying in opposite directions.
Fortunately, both of them retreated early and reinforced their bodies with chakra to withstand the heat and sharp winds that pushed them backwards.
As Seimei was flying backwards, he adjusted his body mid-air and put his feet on the ground. He slid backward for a few more meters before finally stopping.
He dismissed the Earth Release: Hardening Jutsu, which helped him withstand the heat and stray wind blades hidden within the explosive shockwaves, and looked at his attire.
"Well, this outfit is ruined."
Seimei's lips couldn't help but twitch as he looked at his singed clothes that also had several cuts.
His protective ninjutsu saved his skin, but it couldn't protect his clothes, after all.
But Seimei quickly shifted his focus to Echo, who had also landed on the ground. He was at least a hundred meters away from Seimei.
And from the looks of it, he did a good job protecting himself from the shockwaves as well. Apart from the deep wounds and lacerations he had inflicted on Echo's body, the guy looked relatively unharmed.
It looks like he wasn't affected that much by the explosion and its shockwaves. That damn Rending Shell Technique of his is really convenient. Seimei mused as he looked at Echo's figure with a trace of pity.
Why pity?
Well, he has already been targeted by Reina, that madwoman.
As soon as this thought appeared in Seimei's mind, he heard a loud booming sound coming from behind him.
He didn't even need to look back to see what was going on.
With his Tenseigan, he could clearly see that Reina had activated her Fire Release: Explosive Body Flicker Technique.
And she was charging straight at Echo.
A few seconds earlier…
Uchiha Reina, standing far behind, watched the clash of steel between Echo and Seimei without even blinking her eyes.
The tomoe of her Sharingan spun rapidly, helping her capture every detail of the fight with vivid clarity.
Every flash of blade, every swipe of claws, every application of chakra nature transformation—her eyes captured every single detail.
She didn't make her move.
Witnessing such a high-speed battle, her blood boiled. Her hands were itching to take action. But as a qualified ninja, she knew it wasn't her time to intervene yet.
So, she kept waiting.
She kept waiting for an opening.
She waited for a chance to strike with full force.
It didn't matter if her attack failed to end the fight decisively.
All she needed was an opening.
An opening to startle the opponent. An opening to mess with the enemy's psyche.
Once her opponent made a mistake, she and Seimei would strike relentlessly.
They wouldn't give Echo another chance to breathe.
And sooner or later, Echo's step would falter.
From a small opening, Echo would show bigger openings.
And when he did…
…That would be his end.
Finally, a few moments later, the opportunity arrived.
Reina saw Seimei and Echo separate after their last clash of Jutsu, and she knew that her opportunity had arrived.
"Now!" Reina muttered and started molding her chakra.
Whoosh!
The blade of her ninja short sword ignited in blue flames so hot that it distorted the very air. At the same time, a large amount of fire-natured chakra began rapidly gathering beneath her feet.
Fire Release: Exploding Body Flicker—Five-fold Burst
Boom…
This was, of course, the first booming sound that Seimei had heard after he was forced to distance himself from Echo.
As soon as she activated her Jutsu, fire-natured chakra exploded under her feet, accelerating her body forward.
She quickly disappeared from her spot and appeared ten meters ahead in less than a few milliseconds. The moment her foot touched the ground, the newly accumulated fire-natured chakra under her feet exploded again.
Boom…
Her figure accelerated once again. Her speed increased even more.
A few more milliseconds later, her figure reappeared twenty more meters ahead, only for the accumulated fire-nature chakra under her feet to explode again, making her figure vanish once more.
Boom…
This time, her figure crossed forty more meters.
The moment she appeared forty meters ahead, and her feet touched the ground, the fire-natured chakra exploded beneath her feet once more, helping her move like a rocket.
Boom… Boom…
Less than two-fifths of a second after she activated her unique body flicker technique, she had crossed more than three hundred meters and was just five meters away from Echo.
She pushed the principle of the chakra flow technique to the extreme, gathered the majority of her fire-natured chakra and blue flames to the tip of her ninja short sword, and thrust it forward at Echo in a stabbing motion.
"What?" Echo exclaimed in surprise and horror.
Reina's movement was so fast that it even left Echo, the user of Swift Release, speechless. He could already sense the horrifying chakra and flames concentrated on the tip of her sword, burning like the flames of the sun.
His pupils contracted, and a deep sense of dread washed over him.
But he was still an experienced ninja who survived countless deadly scenarios, after all.
So, even while being completely gobsmacked by Reina, he didn't freeze up and immediately took action.
Swift Release: Kinetic Shockwave
BANG…
Echo condensed a large amount of Swift Release chakra in his palms into a highly condensed ball and thrust both of his palms toward Reina with incredible speed.
At the same time, he detonated the condensed Swift Release chakra in Reina's direction, producing a loud kinetic shockwave like a sonic boom with enough power to rip steel apart, knock down forests, and repel everything in Echo's line of sight.
For an average ninja, being struck by it would mean guaranteed death.
But Uchiha Reina was no ordinary ninja. And she was fully prepared to deal with it.
The moment Echo cast the Kinetic Shockwave jutsu, Reina detonated the highly condensed blue flames and fire-natured chakra gathered at the tip of her ninja short sword, unleashing a catastrophic explosion to destroy and evaporate everything in front of her.
BOOM…BOOM…
Two explosive blasts collided mid-air, cancelling out the majority of their explosive power and shockwaves.
But the remnant force was still strong, and the resulting shockwaves still sent Reina flying backward and made Echo skid several meters back.
While Reina was still flying backward, Echo had already stabilized himself and gathered a large amount of Swift Release chakra to unleash several deadly Kinetic Wind Blades at her.
However, before he could even swipe his arm to release the jutsu, Seimei's figure suddenly appeared before him. His left hand carried a basketball-sized glowing blue spiraling chakra orb.
Rasengan!
Seimei slammed the Rasengan at Echo's torso, forcing him to cancel his attack on Reina and use his left hand to activate the Rending Shell Technique and create a semi-spherical, vibrating, Swift Release chakra field before him to block the deadly blue chakra orb.
Screeeeeech!
The Rasengan made contact with the chakra field of the Rending Shell Technique, producing an uncomfortable, ear-piercing screeching sound.
The vibrating, kinetic chakra field slowly ground the Rasengan. However, the high-frequency spin of the Rasengan also weakened Echo's Swift Release chakra field.
Seeing it, Seimei decisively channeled more chakra into his Rasengan, making it swell to at least three times its previous size.
Next, he ruthlessly detonated it.
Boom…
With a thunderous boom, the detonating chakra impact blasted Echo backward, causing him to slide back tens of meters once more, leaving deep gouges on the ground.
Fortunately, although his defensive Ninjutsu almost crumbled, it protected him from the horrifying power of the Rasengan.
Not wanting to give Echo even a moment of respite, Seimei immediately rushed forward with his ninjato. Potent lightning-natured chakra flowed into the ninjato, making its blade vibrate at a high frequency.
Lightning Release: Chidori Katana
Crackle… Crackle…
Seimei appeared right before Echo and swung his blade, crackling with purple lightning arcs, at the Swift Release ninja's neck, determined to end the battle.
With cold, indifferent blue eyes, Seimei said in a chilling tone, "Got you."
But Echo didn't panic.
Instead, he revealed a ferocious grin.
"No, I got you," refuted Echo as he thrust his palm forward.
Swift Release: Kinetic Shockwave
Boom!!!
A loud, kinetic shockwave, like a sonic boom, burst forth from Echo's palm and engulfed Seimei's figure.
The single-directional shockwave tore the earth and stones from the ground, distorted the air, and created a huge linear gouge on the surface that was at least three meters deep and fifty meters long, spread in a fan-like shape from Echo's location.
It was a sudden and devastating strike—one that would ground even an S-class ninja's body into meatpaste.
But Echo couldn't smile at all.
Because the one who had been caught in the blast wasn't the real Seimei at all.
"So, it was a shadow clone!" Echo ground his teeth as he realized this.
As soon as the attack engulfed Seimei, he disintegrated into a puff of smoke.
What else could it be if it wasn't a shadow clone?
What a hateful little ninja brat!
He was about to look for Seimei when Reina struck.
Water Release: Sea Serpent Bite
Reina suddenly expelled a large amount of water from her mouth, which formed five humongous, twenty-meter-long water serpents that opened their gaping maws and charged at Echo.
And in the blink of an eye, these giant water serpents arrived before Echo, slithered around him, and tried to bite him from five different directions, all while carrying crushing momentum.
Meanwhile, Echo narrowed his eyes as he watched the water serpents approaching him with their gaping maws.
This is surprising. An Uchiha using water release. It's indeed rare. But this Jutsu is troublesome. Even if I dodge them, these water serpents will still come after me.
And they are much faster and more agile than the water constructs created by the Water Dragon Bullet Technique or Water Dragon Biting Bullet Jutsu. Tch, I hate jutsu with homing features.
Echo's mind worked fast, and his hands moved even faster.
Swift Release: Revolving Severance
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