Chapter 141: Shadow Puppet Technique
Zhen Li was very close to the fish-shaped puppet. She saw her teammate desperately hugging the puppet, so she hurried forward, stabbing nonstop with kunai, nearly dissecting it by dismantling the puppet’s important joints.
When she wanted to save her teammate, she saw a face full of abnormal terror, ferocity, and unwillingness.
She was startled. Why did her teammate have such an expression?
When she went to save her teammate again, she found that her teammate was already dead.
Why?
Zhen Li had just thought her teammate’s fearless charge was due to bravery, but why did a brave person have that expression before dying?
Just like those enemy village ninjas executed by the Torture Department.
At that moment, a splashing sound of entering the water rang out.
The Sand Ninja on the pier discovered the Leaf Ninja underwater and jumped into the seawater.
Yoru pasted an exploding tag under the pier above his head, infiltrated the water bottom, and detonated the exploding tag first.
No one understood fishing like Yoru. He quickly used the exploding tag to disengage from the battle and infiltrated the sea bottom.
Underwater, Yoru saw the water surface illuminated by firelight, and also saw shadows spreading like tentacles.
The Nara Clan’s Shadow Secret Jutsu, spreading out on the sea surface.
In the darkness, the shadows seemed able to extend freely along the darkness.
A shadow followed the water surface straight toward Zhen Li’s back of the head.
Zhen Li’s head jerked, controlled by the shadow.
Nara El and Zhen Li swam parallel to the side. Nara El escaped the encirclement, but Zhen Li was right in the center of the encirclement.
Nara El raised his hand, and Zhen Li raised her hand too.
Zhen Li pasted the exploding tag under the pier, her eyes showing terror, just like her recently deceased teammate.
She had already seen four or five black shadows swimming toward her from underwater!
But she was still setting up the exploding tag, her body completely out of control.
An octopus-shaped puppet drilled under Zhen Li. Each of its tentacles was composed of sections of puppet joints, with spikes at the tentacle ends.
Tentacles full of spikes wrapped toward Zhen Li from several directions.
Zhen Li was not tall, about to be swallowed by the tentacles.
At that moment, fierce Water Style suddenly appeared beside Zhen Li.
Water Style: Water Wall Jutsu!
Yoru adjusted his chakra, creating a circular Water Wall Jutsu around Zhen Li.
The Water Wall Jutsu blasted away the octopus puppet, and more importantly, dispersed the water flow and broke the shadow.
Zhen Li regained control of her body. After hesitating, she still prepared to detonate the exploding tag first.
The mission opportunity to complete it was right in front of her; she instinctively wanted to risk her life.
This was a good opportunity. Surrounded by the circular Water Wall Jutsu, no Sand Ninja could interfere with her now.
However, her foot was suddenly pulled by a strong force, dragging her into the water.
As soon as she entered the water, she saw a fierce explosion on the water surface.
Nara El didn’t care about Zhen Li’s safety at all and detonated the exploding tag from afar.
Another large pit appeared on the stone pier.
Zhen Li in the seawater only felt icy cold all over her body.
The ruthless Nara El captain, the bone-chilling seawater, and the unknown person who pulled her into the water—whether enemy or friend—all made her feel despair.
Why had the battle turned into this?
She had long prepared to sacrifice for Konoha. In her imagination, the whole team should unite as one, desperately blowing up the pier.
Yoru saw Zhen Li frozen stiff, raised his hand to pinch her round face, and shook it.
Zhen Li came back to her senses. The person who pulled her into the water shouldn’t be a Sand Ninja, or she would have died already.
Was it Tengbei?
It was too dark underwater; she couldn’t see anything.
Yoru dispersed his chakra into the seawater, sensing the surroundings. Nearby were two Sand Ninja and two puppets.
In the dark water bottom, he formed a seal and used the Karma Seal of Retribution.
The rushing enemies were instantly locked by the sealing runes, unable to move.
Yoru pushed Zhen Li toward the surface, while he quickly dealt with the Sand Ninja and puppets underwater.
After Zhen Li surfaced, she stared at Nara El.
Nara El floated on the water surface, his nose and below submerged, only a pair of Byakugan eyes exposed, staring deadly at Zhen Li.
Zhen Li felt even icier.
Shadow Imitation Jutsu rushed over again.
She was controlled by the captain once more.
Nara El couldn’t control the Sand Ninja, but he couldn’t control a newly promoted chunin?
In a mission last month, Nara El saw a Sand Ninja’s puppet and suddenly came up with a brilliant idea.
He could completely use Shadow Secret Jutsu to control teammates—teammates would be his puppets.
Nara El named this technique Shadow Puppet Jutsu.
Teammates were much more useful than puppets.
Under the Shadow Imitation Jutsu’s manipulation, Zhen Li turned around and rushed toward a pier pillar.
As long as this pillar was destroyed, the pier would be unusable for a short time.
Zhen Li’s body was out of control as she pasted the exploding tag on the pillar.
Her heart was full of desolation.
Before the battle started, Nara El had given her ten exploding tags. She was truly grateful to the generous Nara El captain from the bottom of her heart, thinking he was considering her.
Only now did she realize it was because Nara El didn’t want to risk himself; his goal was to use her to complete the mission.
As she approached the pillar, two black shadows swam toward her, unsure if they were Sand Ninja or puppets.
Suddenly, the hold behind her loosened.
Shadow Imitation Jutsu disappeared?!
Zhen Li looked back and found Nara El’s position left only with lingering ripples.
He had disappeared, seemingly dragged underwater by Sand Ninja.
Zhen Li hurriedly dodged the surrounding Sand Ninja.
Yoru drilled into half a fish-shaped puppet, pushing the half puppet to swim quickly, slamming the spikes on the fish puppet’s back fin harshly into Nara El’s abdomen.
Nara El was busy manipulating Zhen Li; his abdomen was pierced, and he sank into the seawater.
Nara El felt pain in his heart. Shadow Puppet Jutsu had the same weakness as Puppet Masters—the body was the greatest vulnerability.
He actually died to the Shadow Puppet Jutsu he developed himself…
Yoru came to Zhen Li’s side, saving Zhen Li once again.
Yoru surfaced and said, “Zhen Li, you set up the exploding tags. I’ll cleanse the Sand Ninja!”
Upon hearing this, Zhen Li continued pasting exploding tags on the pier pillars.
Yoru then killed the two Sand Ninja underwater.
The two infiltrated the water together. The pier pillar was blown up, and the mission succeeded.
Yoru pulled Zhen Li and swam toward the shore.
The pier was already in ruins.
Two large holes created by exploding tags, plus one pillar destroyed by exploding tags—they had completed the mission.
The surrounding battles were also intense.
Beside the neighboring pier, several Leaf Ninja used Fire Release together to burn a large ship over twenty meters tall.
At the warehouse by the dock, the battle was also fierce.
There were also Konoha squads stepping on the water, rushing toward other ships anchored in the shallow offshore waters.
Konoha’s surprise attack caught the Sand Ninja off guard; they had the advantage everywhere.
After observing the battlefield, Yoru said:
“Zhen Li, you’re a chunin, I’m a genin. After Captain Nara El sacrificed, you automatically became the squad leader. You tell me, what should we do next?”
Zhen Li’s eyes were dazed for a moment. Nara El had controlled her several times to complete the most dangerous exploding tag setups.
Nara El schemed everything, yet died to Sand Ninja.
Did he count as a sacrifice…
“Let’s go find the squad leader to receive a new mission!”
Yoru nodded repeatedly. Zhen Li had a petite figure but contained powerful courage. After just experiencing a perilous battle, she could still quickly dive into the next one.
Zhen Li rushed ahead of Yoru, while Yoru blocked Sand Ninja from behind and observed the performance of Konoha’s various squads in the battle.
The captain’s command, the squad leader’s lead, the squad leader’s choices, and outstanding ninjas’ combats—all were in Yoru’s observations.
This information would form a report, ultimately delivered to the Hokage’s hands, allowing the Third Hokage to grasp Konoha’s front line combat power situation.
