"Raiga! Watch out!"
Toroi's cry of warning came too late.
But it was already too late.
Thump!
The muffled sound of claws penetrating flesh clearly reached the ears of everyone present.
Sora's dragon claw, like a hot knife through butter, effortlessly pierced through the chakra defense Raiga had hastily gathered around his neck, and grasped his neck with pinpoint accuracy.
Crack!
A sickening sound of bone breaking rang out.
The panic and disbelief in Raiga's eyes instantly froze. His body stiffened violently, then quickly went limp.
Instant kill.
A true instantaneous kill.
In the peak semi-beast state of the second phase Sora envisioned, his speed and power completely overwhelmed Raiga, a Jonin-level opponent.
"Raiga!!!"
Ganko let out a roar of shock and fury. Watching his companion be easily killed like a chick, immense fear and anger overwhelmed him.
"Bastard! I will kill you!"
Ganko went completely berserk. Disregarding everything, he channelled all his chakra. His Earth Release armor thickened once more as he roared and charged at Sora, his massive fist smashing down hard.
Toroi's expression changed drastically, finally snapping out of his shock completely.
Although he didn't understand what had happened to Sora, there was no doubt that this monstrous youth before him had raised his threat level to the maximum. It even exceeded any powerful enemy he had encountered before.
"Magnet Release. Iron Sand Needles!"
Toroi no longer dared to hesitate. After casually throwing two shuriken to sever the Fox's leg tendons, he formed hand seals. Manipulating magnetism, metallic particles from the surrounding sand were rapidly drawn out, coalescing into countless chillingly cold iron sand senbon that shot towards Sora like a rainstorm.
He aimed to stop Sora's attack on Ganko and deliver an area-of-effect strike.
Facing Ganko's furious giant fist and Toroi's wide-ranging iron sand attack, there was no fluctuation in Sora's cyan-gold vertical pupils.
He casually threw Raiga's corpse aside. The dragon tail on his back, as if possessing a life of its own, suddenly lashed out.
Thwack!
The dragon tail, striking later but arriving first, precisely whipped against the giant rocky fist Ganko was smashing down.
BOOM!!!
An explosion louder than any previous collision erupted.
Ganko's supremely confident, multi-layered Earth Release hardened giant fist shattered the instant it made contact with the dragon tail. Countless stone fragments flew in all directions.
"Impossible!!!"
Ganko let out a scream of disbelief. His entire arm twisted into a grotesque angle, blood gushing from the cracks in the shattered rock.
His massive body, as if hit by a high-speed train, flew uncontrollably backwards.
At almost the same time, Sora, facing the overwhelming rain of iron sand senbon, simply opened his mouth.
Whoosh!
A scorching hot, cyan-blue tinged dragon breath flame spewed forth.
Not a spherical shape like the Great Fireball, but more like a fan-shaped flame storm, instantly engulfing everything in front of him.
Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle!
The iron sand senbon, infused with Toroi's chakra and magnetism, rapidly melted and vaporized like ice and snow the moment they contacted the dragon breath flame.
They simply could not penetrate this flame storm.
After the dragon breath, the area in front of Sora was clear. All the iron sand senbon had vanished, even the sand ground had been melted into a glass-like substance.
Silence.
Deathly silence.
Only the sound of the desert wind and Ganko's groans of pain remained.
Toroi stood in place, the hand holding his shield trembling slightly, a drop of cold sweat slowly sliding down his temple.
But then, the initial shock in his eyes transformed into extreme gravity and wariness.
He looked at the half-dragon youth standing proudly in the center of the sand, radiating a terrifying aura. He looked at Raiga, instantly killed with casual ease. He looked at Ganko, sent flying and severely wounded by a tail swipe. He looked at his confident Magnet Release attack being effortlessly neutralized by a single breath from the opponent.
A chill swept through his entire body, but it did not make him lose his will to fight. Instead, it ignited the ferocity of a Kumo elite Jonin.
He was Toroi, master of Magnet Release!
This Konoha brat, no, this humanoid monster, was an enemy of unprecedented strength in his career. But the more that was so, the more the glint of battle lust shone in Toroi's eyes.
Defeating such a monster would prove the weight of his name, Toroi of Magnet Release.
"Ganko! Can you still move?" Toroi did not attack immediately, instead asking in a low voice to Ganko, who was struggling to get up in the distance.
"Cough... Not dead yet!"
Ganko spat out a mouthful of blood-streaked saliva. His right arm had a comminuted fracture. He could only use his left arm to support himself as he stood up, glaring viciously at Sora.
"Boss, let's team up and slaughter this little monster!"
Though severely wounded, his tenacious vitality allowed him to retain some combat ability.
Sora's cold vertical pupils swept over the two, then his figure blurred again, directly pouncing towards Ganko who had just steadied himself.
"Don't even think about it!"
Toroi was prepared. Almost the instant Sora moved, the square shuriken in his hand were already thrown.
"Magnet Release. Thunder Fang. Twin Assault!"
Two shuriken entwined with intense electricity and magnetism, following bizarre arcs, crossed from left and right to block Sora's attack path, moving extremely fast.
Sora's pupils contracted. He had to abandon the attack. His dragonized legs forcefully pushed off the ground, narrowly passing through the gap between the two shuriken.
Buzz, buzz!
Although he successfully avoided them, the intense magnetic field still made Sora feel his body grow slightly heavy, his movements sluggish for an instant.
'Indeed troublesome! This Magnet Release can not only manipulate metal, but also affect the body to some degree!'
Sora thought warily to himself. The formidable physique granted by the Azure Dragon Fruit gave him extremely high resistance to purely physical attacks and most ninjutsu, but the effects of this magnetic force would be significantly lessened.
"Earth Release. Rock Spear Gun!"
In this instant of Sora's delayed movement, Ganko seized the opportunity, his lone arm slamming the ground.
Thump, thump, thump!
Several sharp rock spears suddenly thrust up from the sand beneath Sora's feet.
Sora reacted extremely quickly. His dragon tail lashed out like a steel whip, smashing the first few rock spears. Simultaneously, air currents swirled around his feet, using the force to flip backwards, avoiding the subsequent attacks.
But Toroi's pursuit had already arrived.
"Magnet Release. Shield Charge!"
Toroi charged like a raging bull. That massive shield erupted with lightning, carrying terrifying impact force and magnetic interference, crashing hard towards Sora who was mid-air with no leverage.
If this hit connected squarely, even with Sora's dragonized defenses, he would definitely not be unscathed.
'Can't dodge!'
A fierce glint flashed in Sora's eyes. If he couldn't dodge, then he would meet force with force.
He took a deep breath, his chest swelling slightly, cyan-blue light gathering deep in his throat.
Whoosh!
The scorching dragon breath spewed forth again. Not the wide fan shape from before, but condensed into a searing beam, accurately blasting towards the charging Toroi.
Toroi hadn't expected Sora to counterattack so quickly and accurately while in the air. His expression changed, hastily shielding himself with the shield held firmly in front.