Chapter 207: Cloud Ninja Participants
Kumogakure had taken the bait just as Ishiro had planned, but Ishiro wasn't in a hurry to find trouble with Tanimoto Naoto.
Tanimoto Naoto was, after all, representing Kumogakure to participate in the competition. This event was highly beneficial for increasing Iwagakure's influence, and Ishiro didn't want to ruin the joint Chūnin Exams because of his own Lightning Release training.
However, while Ishiro couldn't directly confront Tanimoto Naoto, letting the younger generation spar was still feasible.
Ishiro led his and Ikura's six disciples straight to Kumogakure's lodgings.
Before they even arrived, Ishiro started shouting, "Senior Tanimoto Naoto, an old friend is visiting! Come out for a chat!"
Soon, Tanimoto Naoto emerged from the lodgings with Kumogakure's participating members. Upon seeing Ishiro, his expression soured.
It was Ishiro who had killed a Kumogakure squad back then, and then Tanimoto Naoto had been sent by the Third Raikage to deal with Ishiro.
But at that time, neither could do anything to the other in their fight. Not only did it needlessly disperse Kumogakure's forces, but he himself was also duped by Ishiro for a good while with some piece of intelligence that may or may not have existed.
If not for Konoha later revealing a weakness, and Kumogakure hoping Iwagakure and Konoha would wear each other out, leading Kumo to proactively reduce friction with Iwagakure, Tanimoto Naoto certainly wouldn't have let Ishiro off.
So, upon seeing Ishiro, he didn't have a pleasant expression. He asked coldly, "What? Are you Iwagakure ninjas planning to take this opportunity to make a move against us Kumogakure?"
Ishiro shook his head and said with a smile, "Senior, you jest. Kumogakure and Iwagakure have always had good relations. In this war, we even targeted Konoha together. Although we are not allies, our relationship is pretty close to that of allies."
"This time, Lord Raikage being willing to participate in the joint Chūnin Exams hosted by Iwagakure is furthermore an expression of goodwill towards Iwagakure. How could we Iwagakure ninjas possibly damage the friendship between our two villages?"
Hearing Ishiro mention the Third Great Ninja War, Tanimoto Naoto became even more infuriated. The overall rhythm of the Third War was the four nations besieging the Land of Fire. However, the Land of Earth was the first to sign a peace treaty with the Land of Fire. In the eyes of the other ninja villages, Iwagakure was a traitor.
Moreover, the Third Raikage had no desire to participate in any joint Chūnin Exams, needlessly boosting Iwagakure's prestige.
Actually, the Fourth Kazekage didn't want to either, but he couldn't withstand the wishes of the Daimyō of the Land of Wind. To maintain the normal operation funds for the village, the Fourth Kazekage had reluctantly agreed to the Daimyō's request.
Therefore, every part of Ishiro's speech hit Tanimoto Naoto's sore spots perfectly.
Tanimoto Naoto immediately said, "Ishiro, right? If you want to provoke me, just be direct."
Ishiro quickly said, "Senior misunderstands. As Kumogakure's envoy attending the joint Chūnin Exams, Senior is our esteemed guest. How would I dare to provoke Senior?"
"It's just that Kumogakure agreed to participate in the joint Chūnin Exams a bit late. These few individuals beside Senior probably don't know much about the contestants participating this time, right?"
"As for me, I happen to have brought a few of our Iwagakure contestants. It's a good opportunity for the children to interact."
Tanimoto Naoto couldn't quite figure out Ishiro's intentions, but taking the opportunity to gauge the strength of Iwagakure's new generation wasn't bad either. So, he changed his attitude and said, "If Iwagakure wants to compete, we will naturally accept the challenge."
Tanimoto Naoto agreed too readily, which made Ishiro somewhat puzzled. However, since this was what he had hoped for, Ishiro didn't dwell on it. Ishiro led everyone to a training ground and then arranged for his disciples to fight Kumogakure's Genin.
After several matches, Ishiro's face darkened. No wonder Tanimoto Naoto didn't care about sparring; it turned out these Genin he brought were just very ordinary Genin. While their strength wasn't bad among all the Genin in their village, they were far too lacking to represent the village in vying for benefits and prestige.
Although Kumogakure used participation in the joint Chūnin Exams as an excuse, their perfunctory attitude was far too obvious.
Fortunately, Ishiro wasn't worried that Ogura Saki and the others would leak much intelligence. Kumogakure ninjas of this skill level wouldn't be able to gather much useful information. It was just that Ishiro's plan to obtain some insights into Lightning Release training from the Kumogakure ninjas wouldn't be easy anymore.
Ishiro felt annoyed for not achieving his goal, but Tanimoto Naoto was even more annoyed. Although Kumogakure hadn't attached much importance to this joint Chūnin Exam in the first place, watching the contestants he brought be defeated one after another was also embarrassing.
This training ground wasn't secluded, and there were quite a few civilian onlookers around.
After another defeat, Tanimoto Naoto gritted his teeth and said to a dark-skinned young man standing beside him, "Yanagihara, you go test Iwagakure's strength."
The young man responded softly and then walked past Ishiro's group into the sparring field.
Looking at this person's demeanor, Ishiro's eyes lit up. This one's strength was not bad. After focusing his attention on "Mind's Eye," Ishiro was even more delighted; this ninja should be a Lightning attribute user. Please don't let me down.
Ishiro clasped his hands behind his back. While the two opponents in the field were forming the seal of confrontation, he secretly formed hand seals and activated his sensory ninjutsu.
The one fighting this Kumogakure ninja named Yanagihara was precisely Ishiro's disciple, Matsutani Shinya.
Matsutani Shinya inwardly complained. This Yanagihara was clearly different from the Kumogakure ninjas who had been easily defeated by Ogura Saki and the others earlier. Just from his aura, one could tell he was much stronger than the other Cloud ninjas.
Moreover, this Yanagihara wore a longsword at his waist, so he was probably a close-combat type ninja, which was a direct counter to himself.
The path Matsutani Shinya walked was one of breadth rather than depth; he had no particular strength in hand seal speed. His number of hand seals had seen some progress under Ishiro's supervision, but he didn't know if he could withstand this Cloud ninja's swordsmanship.
As Ishiro shouted "Begin!", both immediately chose the response most advantageous to themselves.
Yanagihara rushed forward quickly, his hand gripping his sword hilt during the charge, looking ready to draw his sword at any moment.
Matsutani Shinya, on the other hand, continuously retreated. While retreating, his hands formed seals at the fastest possible speed.
Finally, before Yanagihara closed in, Matsutani Shinya successfully cast the C-rank area-of-effect Water Release: Water Trumpet. And under Matsutani Shinya's deliberate control, the range of the Water Trumpet was much larger than normal. The large-area attack ninjutsu directly blocked all of Yanagihara's advance routes.
Yanagihara was briefly forced back by Ishiro (Translator's note: should be Matsutani Shinya, as Yanagihara is fighting Shinya. This might be a typo in the original text referring to Ishiro's presence or influence, or a simple character name mistake by the author).
And Matsutani Shinya continued to cast his ninjutsu. This time it was the C-rank Wind Release: Breakthrough, also an area-of-effect ninjutsu.
After two waves of ninjutsu, not only had the distance between the two not been shortened, but it had actually increased due to Matsutani Shinya's continuous retreat.
After estimating the distance between them, Matsutani Shinya cast his third ninjutsu, the Earth Clone Technique.
Then, the earth clone and the main body coordinated, preparing to cast a combination ninjutsu. This was precisely the method Matsutani Shinya had come up with to leverage the advantages of his multiple attributes.
This move was quite effective. When the earth clone's Rock Smashing Technique was accelerated by Wind Release, this ninjutsu, which originally relied on surprise, actually achieved power close to that of a B-rank ninjutsu.
Ishiro admitted to himself that when he was at the Genin level, he also couldn't have handled this kind of combination ninjutsu. Of course, with Ishiro's hand seal speed, he wouldn't have given others such an opportunity.
However, Yanagihara was no ordinary Genin either. Seeing that he couldn't dodge this large-area combination ninjutsu, he decisively chose to defend head-on.
This Yanagihara formed three hand seals, and then a layer of lightning rapidly spread from his sword-gripping hand to the entire sword body.
Then Yanagihara quickly slashed the rocks flying towards him into pieces. Enhanced by lightning, Yanagihara's sword strikes were extremely fast, and most of the rocks were reduced to dust under the lightning. Occasionally, a few that were missed were easily dodged by him.
Even the invisible wind blades mixed in the combination ninjutsu were all shattered by Yanagihara.
Matsutani Shinya's face was pale. He didn't have much chakra, and that last move was already his ultimate technique. Now his chakra was completely depleted.
However, Ishiro, as his teacher, watched with great excitement. Yanagihara's series of actions gave Ishiro a feeling of sudden enlightenment.
Ishiro used his naked eye, plus sensory ninjutsu, and then coordinated with "Mind's Eye" – three methods, observing Yanagihara's chakra flow carefully from different angles.
Sensory ninjutsu detected life force, mainly focusing on physical energy; "Mind's Eye," this S-rank ninjutsu, primarily detected spiritual energy; combined with naked-eye observation, Ishiro got a special feeling about Yanagihara's chakra flow.
So this is how Lightning Release is used. Ishiro couldn't help but exclaim this inwardly.
Unfortunately, the time was too short. In the field, Yanagihara, after seeing the combination ninjutsu blocked by himself, immediately dispelled his previous Lightning Release.
Taijutsu ninjas learning Lightning Release truly is a perfect match. It seems I need to increase Takumi's training. Pure taijutsu, no matter how fast, can it be faster than the Lightning Release stimulation method? Unless it's Konoha's "thick-eyebrows" type.
Takumi still has to learn ninjutsu, especially Lightning Release ninjutsu; this absolutely cannot be given up.
In the field, seeing Yanagihara successfully defend against the combination ninjutsu, Matsutani Shinya, whose chakra was depleted, directly chose to concede defeat.
Seeing this, Ishiro could only sigh inwardly. Early-stage ninjutsu specialists were at too much of a disadvantage. Casting ninjutsu was troublesome, not to mention chakra-consuming. And high-consumption ninjutsu, after being cast, were often easily dodged by the opponent.
Ninjutsu specialists only had an advantage in multi-person battles, where various combination ninjutsu could be coordinated to leave taijutsu ninjas with no escape.
Tanimoto Naoto, finally winning a match, breathed a sigh of relief; at least he hadn't completely lost face. However, he had originally intended to probe the Iwagakure contestants' information, but ended up exposing his own seed contestant's trump card as well.
Fortunately, Yanagihara also gained something from this battle. That Matsutani Shinya, according to intelligence reports, should be Ishiro's new disciple. When he first graduated, his strength and talent were abysmal. Unexpectedly, he could now complete a combination ninjutsu on his own.
This Ishiro's skill in teaching disciples was truly astonishing. Thinking of this, Tanimoto Naoto looked at the others beside Ishiro. They had all fought earlier, but he hadn't obtained any useful intelligence from them.
Tanimoto Naoto also thought: Anyway, Yanagihara's biggest trump card in the previous battle has already been exposed. Why not let him fight others again and probe their information further?
So Tanimoto Naoto spoke, "Ishiro, how is our Kumogakure's swordsmanship? Do you dare to send someone else to try?"
Tanimoto Naoto, fearing Ishiro wouldn't agree, even used a taunt. Little did he know that Ishiro, upon hearing his words, was a hundred percent willing.
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