49. Battle Continue

Kakashi's sword was only a few inches away from Yukio's head.

It seemed that when his blade would touch Yukio's neck, it would teleport the latter outside, marking Kakashi's victory.

However, life was anything but predictable, especially to Kakashi of all people, who had learned this lesson countless times since he was a kid.

Yukio created a Rasengan from his mouth, colliding with the sword.

'What the hell?' Kakashi.exe stopped working for a second as his sword clashed with the Rasengan, meeting resisting force from it.

Even Miyuki, who was outside, dropped one piece of her popcorn at this.

"I knew his mouth was good, but I was not expecting this," she thought.

Kakashi's eyes widened as the water tentacles, which were dispersed, reformed and headed towards his head, heart, and stomach simultaneously at a quick speed.

Normally, a Rasengan would be destroyed in front of his Chidori, and one this small definitely would have. But due to losing some momentum from the earlier tentacles, his Chidori slowed down.

Plus, if the sword and the Rasengan had clashed for a few more seconds, the former would have overpowered the latter. However, that didn't happen.

He quickly used chakra to release some explosions from his front body, breaking the deadlock between his sword and the Rasengan, and retreated his sword.

He was mid-air during this whole interaction, as he had attacked Yukio from above.

This explosion caused him to tilt his body slightly, and he quickly used the foot now aimed towards the ground to propel himself away from the tentacles.

Unfortunately, he was a bit late, as one water tentacle-drill managed to make contact. However, Kakashi had retreated quickly, resulting in him not suffering major injury from it, though he winced in pain.

Kakashi, now high up in the air, looked down at the tentacles coming toward him.

It might have been a bit of an exciting sight for a female ninja, especially for Miyuki at the moment, but to Kakashi, they were anything but that.

He quickly used a Chidori on his sword while creating some explosions to distance himself from the tentacles. Then, his sword increased in length and clashed with the water tentacles.

This time, the long blue sword obliterated the first tentacle on contact and cut through the other two with ease.

'The chakra in these ones was low. Was it because he created those quickly from the remnants of his previous jutsus, or were these just distractions?' Kakashi thought while disabling the chakra output of his sword.

Just as Kakashi looked down, he saw a massive water dragon heading toward him.

Kakashi cursed and used explosions to quickly change his path, but the water dragon seemed determined to follow him as it altered its direction.

This water dragon was small in size, but Kakashi didn't dare to underestimate it due to the amount of chakra he sensed.

It was compressed.

So, he started creating distance while weaving hand seals for a jutsu.

Meanwhile, Yukio created a shadow clone, assigning it control of the water dragon while he weaved a few seals. A green glow appeared in his hand and moved to his holed shoulder.

It might seem like he was weaving a lot of hand seals, but he was only using two or three seals on average for his jutsu—same with Kakashi. Due to the fast-paced battle, it seemed like it was taking them too long to weave hand seals.

In a battle, hand seal speed is rather relative, and comparisons are made against one's current opponent.

A few seconds later, Yukio stood with his wound closed and sealed the blood on his bracers.

Kakashi noticed this, and his eyes darkened. He quickly created earth clones that vanished into the ground.

Their mere existence would be enough to put Yukio on edge.

Yukio chuckled and created earth clones of his own, sending them underground as well.

He then dispelled his shadow clone.

Summoning water, Yukio recreated his tentacles.

Kakashi finally decided to deal with the water dragon and performed a vertical slash.

In the next instant, a large explosion echoed as the water dragon's front part evaporated, rendering the rest useless as it dropped to the ground, dispersing in various directions.

Yukio threw a kunai at Kakashi, who tilted his head to dodge it. But in the next instant, his eyes widened as the kunai, now a few inches away from his head, exploded.

Kakashi used chakra to create an explosion behind his head, neutralizing the kunai's blast while propelling himself away.

He felt disoriented for a second but quickly swung his sword horizontally, clashing against metal.

He noticed Yukio, holding three kunai with three of his tentacles while weaving hand seals.

"I didn't expect you to succeed in merging lightning and earth to create a new nature altogether," Yukio commented.

"Did you think you were the only one who could do it?" Kakashi snorted, using explosive bursts from his legs to launch himself to Yukio's right side.

Kakashi's forte was earth and lightning, and one day, he thought to combine them.

And now, here he was, using it in combat to gain explosive speed and unpredictability.

Kakashi thrust his sword at Yukio from the right, but Yukio parried it away with a kunai.

The tentacles changed direction, heading for him.

Kakashi used another explosion to reposition himself.

Appearing above Yukio, he thrust his sword toward his head, but Yukio quickly released chakra from his shoes, propelling himself backwards.

It was similar to Kakashi's explosion release, though less efficient as Yukio relied on refined chakra control instead of a special nature release.

Still, it was enough. Yukio now grabbed the sword with his earth-clad gauntlet-covered hands.

'Using Earth Release this way?' Kakashi's eyes widened as he saw the lightning on his sword fail to penetrate Yukio's gauntlet.

'No, it's just momentary. The gauntlet's thickness won't prevent conduction if I direct lightning to the part Yukio is holding.'

Kakashi began focusing his chakra, but the tentacles rushed toward him, forcing him to act.

In a last-ditch effort, Kakashi converted his chakra to explosive nature, creating an explosion on the part Yukio held.

The gauntlet lost much of its structure, forcing Yukio to let go.

'Finally.' Kakashi reached for his sword but felt resistance.

'Another tentacle? I thought he could only control three at once.'

Kakashi noticed a tentacle emerging from Yukio's hand, gripping the sword tightly.

Despite being made of water, its grip was ironclad.

Realizing only two tentacles were rushing toward him, Kakashi deduced Yukio's independent control limit was three.

The tentacles were now dangerously close. Kakashi released his sword and used an explosion to escape.

He avoided using lightning through the tentacle, recognizing it as a trap since the other two would pierce him.

Kakashi frowned as he saw his sword disappear, likely sealed in a storage scroll.

"That was my best sword," he muttered. "The others I have would break after a few clashes."

Opening a scroll, he rained projectiles on Yukio.

Yukio, now in control of the remaining tentacles, spun them like a disc, deflecting all the projectiles.

Kakashi did this only to buy time to think.

***

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