Chapter 194

At this moment, Aoi hid in a hidden chamber, staring in disbelief at the scene in the courtyard.

'How is this possible!?'

If not for the mismatched appearance, he would have thought the figure standing there was the Raikage of Kirigakure.

Looking at the figure's pale skin, Aoi muttered involuntarily: "Akatsuki's Aoi."

"A dragon?"

The middle-aged man hadn't expected the opponent's codename to be identical to his own.

But now was not the time to ponder such things; the most important thing was to eliminate the two people in the courtyard protecting the employer.

Thinking this, Aoi began rapidly forming hand seals.

In the courtyard.

Li Ang looked around at the complete stillness and felt a pang of frustration.

For him, dealing with these Kirigakure ninja was simple—Junyan could easily blow the entire estate sky-high.

But the problem was, he wasn't here to carry out an annihilation operation.

Junyan exploding would be satisfying, but who would replace the Byakugan he was missing?

At that moment, countless whistling sounds suddenly erupted, followed by a dense hail of ninja tools flying toward Li Ang and the other.

Ding ding ding—

Clear clanging sounds rang out as Odin swept away the massive barrage of ninja tools.

Seeing this, Li Ang quietly exhaled in relief.

If these Kirigakure ninja were willing to attack, that was good—he feared they'd flee the moment things turned bad.

After casually throwing two kunai that killed two Kirigakure ninja, Li Ang began searching for the Kirigakure jonin's whereabouts.

Just then, a rustling sound came from nowhere, and a torrent of water surged through the buildings, turning the estate into a flooded marsh.

Water Release: Water Cannon Technique!

Simultaneously, thick, blinding white mist engulfed the estate.

Clearly, the Kirigakure ninja had coordinated a combo.

At this moment, the situation seemed to be turning against Li Ang.

With a casual thrust of his spear, Li Ang impaled a Kirigakure ninja who suddenly emerged from the water at his feet, then slowly walked toward the origin of the flood.

As he walked, he spoke: "All these years, Kirigakure still relies only on these petty, beneath-dignity tricks."

Facing Li Ang's mockery, Aoi, hidden within the thick mist, showed no change in expression—even found it slightly amusing.

He had no idea what this man thought ninja were.

Moreover, as a veteran of the Third Ninja World War, Aoi could never be provoked by mere words, and this man had no idea what he was about to face.

Did he really think the Water Cannon was just for fun?

Thinking this, Aoi rapidly formed hand seals.

Ox-Monkey-Rabbit-Rat-Pig-Rooster.

After completing the seals, Aoi looked at the unguarded figure in the mist and smirked.

The next instant, a massive water dragon coalesced from the courtyard's floodwaters and slammed toward Li Ang's position.

Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique!

Aoi was confident in this B-rank technique—he had no idea how many enemies had met their end beneath this attack.

Boom—!

The roaring water dragon opened its monstrous maw and instantly swallowed Li Ang whole.

'Won!'

Seeing this, Aoi involuntarily thought this in his mind.

Yet the next instant, a towering figure smashed through the water dragon and charged toward his position.

Feeling the violent wind rushing at his face, Aoi's pupils shrank sharply.

!?

Before he could react, a cold, gleaming spear pierced through his chest.

Splash—

The middle-aged man dissolved into a puddle of water on the ground like a punctured balloon.

Water clone.

As a Third War veteran, Aoi certainly couldn't be killed so easily.

Now, the Kirigakure jonin hid in the shadows, trembling as he touched his chest:

'The mission must be aborted.'

That monster was far beyond their capacity to handle.

After all, which ninja could survive a Water Dragon Bullet Technique unscathed!?

As he thought this, he suddenly noticed the Akatsuki member codenamed "Aoi" had turned his gaze toward his hiding spot.

'! Found?'

The moment this thought crossed Aoi's mind, he saw the man raise his spear and aim it directly at him.

'What does he—'

The next instant, a streak of light like a meteor struck.

Bang—

In response to the attack, a wooden post replaced Aoi's figure.

After moving from his previous position, he was just about to relax—when the expected outcome never materialized.

The spear showed no sign of slowing after piercing through the wooden stake; instead, it curved mid-flight and continued streaking toward him.

'What kind of ninja tool is this?!'

This time, Ao truly had nowhere to dodge.

Puchi—

Accompanied by a sharp pain in his chest, he slowly lowered his head and muttered in disbelief, "How could I die here of all—"

This Jonin of Kirigakure never imagined that merely carrying out a commission assigned by his village would cost him his life.

He was, after all, an elder of Kirigakure, and the "Byakugan Killer" that the Hyuga clan gnashed their teeth over.

Carrying his unwillingness, Ao collapsed onto the ground and lost all sound.

Li Ang held Gungnir, which had returned to his hand, and was not at all surprised by the results he had produced.

A divine spear possessing the 【Sure Hit】 property—even one merely forged by Old Tang—was a dimensional reduction strike against the vast majority of ninjas in this world of Naruto.

Using it against Ao could even be considered overkill.

Even without Gungnir, Li Ang had plenty of ways to finish the man off.

He had only chosen this method in pursuit of certainty, since he had to guard against the possibility of the Byakugan being destroyed at the moment of death.

After ordering Odin to go and hunt down the remaining Kirigakure ninjas on site, Li Ang came to stand before Ao's corpse.

He looked at the Byakugan in the man's right eye, and an involuntary smile crept across his face.

However, before extracting the Byakugan, Li Ang first removed the talisman-like ornaments hanging from both of Ao's ears.

'Something used to protect the Byakugan?'

After a brief inspection, he tucked it into his spatial ring.

Li Ang didn't think this thing could bypass spatial effects.

At this point, nothing could stop him from obtaining his first material.

Thinking as he went, Li Ang took out a container he had prepared long ago from his spatial ring, then carefully used a scalpel to extract the Byakugan and placed it inside.

Looking at the eyeball soaking in the solution, he felt his mood lift considerably.

'That counts as one material collected.'

Meanwhile, the Kirigakure ninjas currently being hunted down by Odin had no bandwidth to spare for any of that—they never imagined that an elder of their village would die so carelessly, without even putting up a proper fight.

As for revenge—

Let them survive first before talking about that.

Moreover, compared to revenge, the surviving Kirigakure ninjas felt that getting this mission's intelligence back to the village was more important.

Unaware of what these small fry were thinking, Li Ang put away the container holding the Byakugan.

He had just stowed the container when a voice sounded beside him: "Mission complete, withdraw."

It was Sasori.

He had resolved the mission's target with almost no effort.

Of course, the main reason was that the commotion Li Ang's side kicked up was simply too great, drawing away the vast majority of the Garrison Commander's forces.

This was also one of the reasons Li Ang had summoned Odin.

After all, not everyone in this world was like Sasori, able to sense what was off about Odin; Odin, dressed in the same black-based red-cloud robe, was perfect for passing as his partner.

Thus, with two enemies appearing on the front lines, Kirigakure at most left a small number of men to protect the employer, while the rest chose to reinforce the main battlefield.

At this moment, Sasori glanced at the Jonin's corpse on the ground, then at Li Ang, whose clothes were only slightly damp, and a flicker passed through his eyes.

This partner of his was even stronger than expected.

And from the look of it, he hadn't used that devastating Kekkei Genkai from earlier in the fight, but rather an ability he had never shown before.

Hearing Sasori's voice, Li Ang couldn't help stretching lazily: "This mission was pretty easy. Let's pull out."

A fight of that intensity didn't even count as a warm-up for him.

And while the two were talking, the vast majority of the Kirigakure ninjas had already been wiped out by Odin; only a small number had seized the chaos to escape.

Li Ang couldn't be bothered to chase those people down. He briefly dealt with Ao's corpse, then stored it in his ring as well, and after that, he and Sasori swaggered out of the mansion that had already been reduced to ruins.

Such a tremendous commotion naturally drew the attention of other parts of the city, but from the moment Li Ang and his partner left the city, not a single person dared come over to investigate.

After all, no one wanted to invite trouble from three terrifyingly powerful ninjas for no reason.

And just after leaving Ducheng, the Land of Craftsmen, a notification popped up on Li Ang's class panel.

【Completed one S-rank commission, Class EXP +21000】.

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