Wood Leaf.
Inside the hospital room, under the soft lighting, Rin lay quietly on the bed.
Her face was deathly pale. Her eyes were closed. Various tubes and wires connected to monitoring equipment were attached to her body.
The readings on the machines beside the bed were noticeably higher than before.
The nurse slowly pushed the cart closer to the bed. She first checked the data on the monitors like a professional, then picked up a disinfectant cotton swab from the cart, soaked it in alcohol, and appeared to be preparing to clean one of the equipment ports.
However, the moment the nurse lowered her head, the cotton swab in her hand suddenly transformed into a sharp kunai and stabbed viciously toward Rin's heart.
The speed was extreme—faster than the hidden ANBU could react, and even the surrounding barrier didn't have time to respond.
Just as the tip of the kunai was about to pierce the clothing over her chest, a hand shot out and precisely grabbed the nurse's wrists.
"I've been waiting for you, rat from the gutter!"
With a puff of white smoke, the "Rin" on the bed transformed into Taiichi. The nurse clearly hadn't expected the patient to be a fake.
He tried to pull back and retreat, but it was already too late. His hands were locked in Taiichi's grip. No matter how hard he struggled, he couldn't move an inch.
"Let me see who you really are."
Taiichi drove his fist straight into the nurse's abdomen. With a heavy thud, the solid punch sent the nurse flying across the room and slamming into the corner.
The impact also shattered the White Zetsu disguise. The nurse's appearance rippled and twisted, revealing a half-black, half-white humanoid monster.
The commotion immediately drew the attention of the ANBU outside. Just as Black Zetsu tried to get up, two full squads of ANBU burst through the door and surrounded him.
Only then did everyone get a clear look at the enemy.
A half-black, half-white yin-yang face. More accurately, his entire body was split down the middle into black and white.
He wore no clothes. His exposed body clearly didn't belong to a normal human.
His chest was flat—not a woman—but when their eyes naturally drifted lower, the area between his legs was also completely smooth.
At that moment, everyone confirmed that this thing was definitely not human.
The two ANBU squads instinctively tightened their grips on their weapons, eyes locked on the strange creature in front of them. Several of them even swallowed nervously.
These were elite operatives who had taken countless lives. They were far from being inexperienced genin.
Yet facing this humanoid monster, they couldn't help feeling a sense of disgust and tension. It was the uncanny valley effect in full force.
Taiichi stepped forward calmly, moving to the front of the ANBU formation. He looked Black Zetsu up and down.
This was the first time he had seen Black Zetsu's true appearance with his own eyes. To be honest, it was deeply unsettling.
He couldn't imagine what kind of mood Uchiha Madara must be in, having to look at that face every single day.
Still, the performance had to continue.
"Not going to introduce yourself, uninvited thief?"
Taiichi asked knowingly, hoping Black Zetsu would say a few more words and reveal more information.
Unfortunately, Black Zetsu was a thousand-year-old monster. He was extremely cautious and had no intention of wasting words with Taiichi.
"Matsushita Taiichi… do you really think you can catch me like this?"
Before Taiichi could respond, Black Zetsu's body sank downward, attempting to disappear into the floor.
Taiichi wasn't about to give him that chance. He lunged forward, using Body Flicker to appear right in front of Black Zetsu in an instant.
He gathered chakra into his right fist and slammed it straight into the floor beneath Black Zetsu instead of targeting his body directly.
BOOM!
Dirt and wood splinters exploded outward.
The entire floor was punched clean through by Taiichi's monstrous strength.
Black Zetsu, who had only managed to sink halfway into the ground, was violently interrupted and blasted back out of his Earth Release state.
"Damn it… who the hell is the real monster here?"
A curse came from within the flying dust, followed by the sounds of flesh striking flesh.
The surrounding ANBU didn't dare intervene carelessly. They could only watch the fast-paced fight with intense focus.
Taiichi was actually holding back quite a bit. Despite the fierce, overwhelming appearance of his attacks, he was deliberately giving Black Zetsu room to breathe.
Black Zetsu's appearance was grotesque, but his techniques were still within the realm of ordinary ninja abilities. Taiichi wanted him to reveal more of his power before the higher-ups of the Hidden Leaf started taking him too seriously.
Black Zetsu could feel it too. As time passed, Taiichi's speed and strength kept increasing.
At first he had been able to fight back and forth, but now he was clearly being pushed into a disadvantage.
His eyes flicked around the room. The two ANBU squads weren't joining the fight, but they were watching every exit. In the distance, he could already hear more footsteps rapidly approaching.
If Taiichi managed to restrain him with his sealing techniques, the consequences would be catastrophic.
"Oi, you're fighting me and still have time to look around? Do you really look down on me that much?"
Taiichi sidestepped Black Zetsu's kick, twisted his body, and turned his right hand into a whip-like strike aimed at Black Zetsu's head.
The sharp sound of his fingers cutting through the air made Black Zetsu's scalp go numb.
He couldn't afford to drag this out any longer. He had to escape immediately.
Black Zetsu made his decision and stopped holding back.
He barely managed to lean back and avoid Taiichi's whipping hand, but the air pressure from the strike still tore open the skin on his chest.
Without hesitation, Black Zetsu swung both arms. Dozens of sharp wooden spikes shot outward in every direction.
Wood Release: Tree Spikes.
Taiichi's eyes narrowed. This was exactly what he had been waiting for.
He kicked off the ground and leaped backward while forming hand seals.
Water Release: Water Wall.
A wall of water erupted from the spot Taiichi had just left. In an instant, it rose over a person's height and rapidly expanded outward, forming a semi-circular barrier that trapped Black Zetsu inside.
The wooden spikes slammed into the water wall, creating ripples. At first, no one paid them much attention, assuming they were just some kind of special projectile.
But when a few of the spikes managed to slip past the water wall and dodge the ANBU's blocks, one unfortunate operative was struck.
In the next moment, the wooden spike exploded inside his body, branching out wildly, expanding, and piercing through him from the inside. He was turned into a bloody, mangled mess.
The sight was brutal and horrifying. The previously confident ANBU all took several steps back, and gasps of shock rippled through their ranks.
"Wood Release… that's Wood Release!"
"How does the enemy have Wood Release? Isn't that a Hidden Leaf technique?!"
In that moment of hesitation, a gap opened in the encirclement. Black Zetsu immediately seized the opportunity. He leaped through the body of the fallen ANBU, smashed through the window, and jumped out of the building.
Taiichi had known things would go wrong the moment someone was hit by the Tree Spikes.
He had already expanded the Water Wall's protective range. Only a few spikes had gotten through, yet one ANBU had still been struck. The quality of this batch of ANBU was clearly lacking.
As expected, Black Zetsu successfully broke out of the encirclement.
Taiichi stomped on the ground, stopping his backward momentum instantly. In the next second, he appeared at the shattered window and fully activated his chakra sensory abilities.
Below, Black Zetsu had just landed. His body began sinking into the earth like a fish slipping into water.
He was about to use the Mayfly Technique to escape.
"Clean up the mess here. I'm going after him."
Leaving those words behind, Taiichi gathered his spread-out chakra perception and locked onto Black Zetsu, who had already disappeared underground.
Thanks to their earlier exchange, some of Taiichi's chakra still lingered on Black Zetsu's body. That trace was what allowed his concentrated sensory technique to catch him.
Taiichi spread a pair of chakra wings behind his back, kicked off the ground, and surrounded himself with raging winds. Using Wind Release to accelerate rapidly, he shot off in pursuit of Black Zetsu.
Back at the hospital, the two ANBU squads looked at each other in silence. They glanced at the direction Taiichi had vanished, then at the mangled corpse on the floor, and remained speechless for a long time.
Wood Release had appeared again in the shinobi world. Worse still, this Wood Release belonged to an enemy of the Hidden Leaf.
The sound of approaching footsteps finally snapped the two ANBU captains out of their daze.
"Seal off the scene. Do not let word of the Wood Release spread," one of the captains ordered immediately.
"Understood!"
The other captain nodded and flashed to the doorway of the room, blocking the reinforcing ninja from entering.
---
While the two ANBU squads were dealing with the aftermath of the Wood Release incident, Taiichi was already far outside the village, chasing Black Zetsu at full speed.
His speed had risen to the point where he was little more than a streak of light flashing across rooftops. The extreme velocity kicked up violent winds that sent pedestrians stumbling in the streets below.
People watched in confusion as the afterimage disappeared into the distance in the blink of an eye. They had no idea what had just happened.
Fortunately, security forces quickly arrived to maintain order, preventing any major chaos within the village.
By now, Taiichi had already left the Hidden Leaf far behind. However, the distance between him and Black Zetsu wasn't shrinking—it was actually growing.
Every time Taiichi increased his speed, Black Zetsu underground would suddenly make a sharp ninety-degree turn, forcing Taiichi to take a wide detour to catch up again.
If he hadn't already made preparations in advance, Taiichi would have been cursing out loud by now.
The Mayfly Technique truly was an incredible ninjutsu, combining reconnaissance, infiltration, ambush, and escape into one. Most importantly, it was flexible, convenient, and fast.
Taiichi couldn't help but feel a bit envious. He almost wanted to learn it himself.
Seeing the distance continue to widen, Taiichi stopped simply chasing and quickly reviewed all the ninjutsu he knew.
Unfortunately, none of them were particularly useful in this situation.
Left with no better options, he could only fall back on Lightning Release to harass his target.
For a while, Lightning Balls, Lightning Pillars, and other long-range Lightning Release techniques rained down from Taiichi's hands.
Although Lightning Release was his weakest of the five basic natures, that was only in comparison to his other mastered techniques.
Compared to most other ninja, his Lightning Release was still solidly at the Kage-level of Lv11.
Above the ground where Black Zetsu was moving, the soil crackled and exploded. The violent electricity not only blasted dirt into the air but also sent residual currents through the ground and tree roots, numbing Black Zetsu's entire body.
From the air, Taiichi could clearly sense Black Zetsu's movements slowing down slightly. He immediately attacked with even more Lightning Release techniques, like he had been injected with adrenaline.
Black Zetsu was suffering in silence. The numbing sensation from the scattered electricity made it extremely difficult for him to maintain the Mayfly Technique.
He had never expected the Mayfly Technique to have this kind of weakness. Because it relied on plant root systems to move, it couldn't go too deep underground.
That limitation gave Taiichi's Lightning Release the perfect opening. Although the raging electricity couldn't directly hit Black Zetsu underground, it still severely hindered him.
Black Zetsu was forced to change direction even more frequently, using more erratic movement patterns to shake off Taiichi above.
Gradually, just as Taiichi was approaching the border of the Land of Fire, he finally lost track of Black Zetsu's presence.
He flew in circles for a while longer, staring at the direction where the trace had disappeared. A strange smile appeared on his face.
Then, his figure suddenly vanished from midair.
---
Far away, Black Zetsu, who had been fleeing nonstop, finally slowed down after sensing that the thunderous attacks from above had stopped for quite some time.
He carefully emerged from the ground and looked back at the sky behind him.
The sky was clear blue. There wasn't a single cloud, let alone any sign of a person.
Black Zetsu let out a long breath, feeling a wave of lingering fear.
"That damn Matsushita Taiichi… he really is a monster. I've never heard of him having Lightning Release at that level. I'll have to stay far away from him from now on!"
Muttering to himself, Black Zetsu sank back into the ground and rapidly headed toward his base in the Land of Earth.
The mission had failed. Rin was still alive. The Hidden Leaf had already been alerted. He needed to report all of this to Madara as soon as possible.
---
Wood Leaf.
The special care room that had been the site of the battle was now heavily surrounded by ANBU.
Inside the room, Hiruzen Sarutobi, Koharu Utatane, and Homura Mitokado had gathered.
They stared at the mangled corpse of the ANBU operative on the floor and remained silent for a long time.
Compared to Hiruzen, who had already anticipated something like this, the two advisors were far more shaken.
Wood Release. And not just any Wood Release—this was one that could be used effectively in combat. It was practically digging at the very roots of the Hidden Leaf.
"Hiruzen, what exactly happened? Who used Wood Release?"
Homura Mitokado was the first to break the silence. He knew that Hiruzen had a Wood Release user named Yamato under his command.
But Yamato was still just a child—the only successful result of the previous Wood Release experiments. After Danzo's death, Hiruzen had discovered him and brought him into the ANBU archives for training.
However, the kind of Wood Release that could only grow a small sapling was nothing compared to the one that had just instantly killed an ANBU operative.
"Taiichi discovered that during the recent Kannabi Bridge mission, a third party secretly interfered and ambushed Kakashi's team. They even abducted Uchiha Obito. One of the people involved was a ninja who can use Wood Release."
Hiruzen gave the two advisors a rough summary of Taiichi's analysis. As long-time elders of the Hidden Leaf, they immediately understood the implications.
"A pair of Mangekyō Sharingan… and Wood Release. What kind of organization is this?"
Homura muttered under his breath. Koharu Utatane spoke up at the same time.
"Besides the Hidden Leaf, who else in the shinobi world is this familiar with both of those bloodline limits? This was a carefully orchestrated setup meant to force the awakening of the Mangekyō!"
"Could it be the Uchiha? Besides themselves, who else would understand every single Uchiha clan member so precisely and know exactly who has the potential to awaken those eyes—"
Homura's habitual suspicion immediately turned toward the Uchiha clan. Ever since Danzo's death, he had become the "second Danzo," always quick to blame the Uchiha for anything unusual.
"Homura, don't jump to conclusions. Besides, the Uchiha don't have that kind of power."
Hiruzen cut him off directly. He had considered the possibility, but if the Uchiha truly possessed Wood Release of this level, there was no way they would still be keeping such a low profile.
"Taiichi went after them. I hope he finds something useful. An organization this hostile toward the Hidden Leaf, possessing both Wood Release and a Mangekyō… their threat level is no less than that of one of the Five Great Nations."
Koharu looked toward the shattered window. Outside, the prosperous streets of the Hidden Leaf were visible, but the scene now carried a faint shadow of unease.