"Hmph. Idiot." The puppeteer gave a calm, contemptuous sneer.
And then—Natchi, who was barely a forearm's length from the puppeteer, suddenly stopped dead in his tracks!
It was chakra threads—a net of chakra threads—wrapped around Natchi!
Natchi—in danger!
Shing! Shing-shing-shing! The puppet limbs, still under the puppeteer's control, shot straight toward Natchi!
Natchi struggled frantically—but couldn't break free!
Crack! Slurp! That was when Tōji burst up through the ground beneath the puppeteer, yanking the man down into the earth with a violent tug!
With the puppeteer's control broken, the puppet limbs continued their trajectory by inertia. From the look of it, Natchi was still about to get grazed by a poisoned blade on one of the severed arms!
Tōji couldn't help any further…
Shrrrk! The puppet arm sliced through the net of chakra threads—but at that exact moment, Natchi forcibly wrenched his entire upper body backward! "What the hell—is he part cat-demon or what?!"
Having dodged death by a hair, Natchi seemed to lose all his strength at once—but with no one controlling the chakra threads, he broke free easily and landed steadily on all fours.
The puppeteer, meanwhile, had been completely dragged underground—only half his head was still visible, his mouth already buried in the dirt.
"How about that! My jutsu's not bad, right?" Tōji appeared beside Natchi.
"Not bad… But if I hadn't covered for you, you'd already be dead." Having fought together, Natchi was a bit more familiar with Tōji now—and more direct too.
"Then I owe you one, Natchi-kun." Tōji felt a wave of relief wash over him. The Suna puppeteer was subdued—they'd cheated death. And capturing a jōnin-level enemy alive came with a handsome reward!
"Too bad about Raicho-sensei and Akane-chan…" Natchi's tone turned somber as grief set in for their fallen comrades.
Tōji said nothing.
He couldn't fully relax and dwell on that yet. The Decapitation Technique only dragged a severely wounded puppeteer underground—who was to say it was foolproof?
Seeing that Tōji was still staring at the half-buried puppeteer, remaining on guard, Natchi didn't bother dispelling his Cat Cloak either. Together, they kept their eyes locked on the enemy.
Neither of them had any sealing or binding jutsu to use—and for all they knew, the jōnin-level puppeteer was only pretending to be trapped…
"Fine. We'll just wait him out. We've already called for backup anyway!"
"As long as Natchi doesn't suddenly do something stupid…"
He glanced at Raicho and Akane—both severely purple by now… "Sorry, you two. I really can't save you. Never learned medical ninjutsu. All I can do is pray you hold on long enough to get back to the camp for treatment."
"…" The puppeteer, right in front of Tōji and Natchi, tilted his head slightly to one side. His eyelids seemed to grow heavy, slowly closing… And a faint smell of blood rose from the dirt around his face!
"He killed himself?" Tōji frowned.
"Looks like it…" Natchi said, stepping back two paces before dispelling his Cat Cloak.
"There goes the capture bonus—it's downgraded to a kill reward. And this guy didn't even have any mutual-destruction move after all—was he just bluffing…?"
Tōji was speechless.
"Is there no honesty left among shinobi?"
"Whatever. At least I'm still alive!"
"And who knows what'll happen with the mission now—our supervising jōnin is dead…"
Tōji and Natchi fell silent. After all, it was their first time witnessing teammates die. Even if it was an enemy, there was still that sense of mourning a fallen foe…
Neither of them dared touch Raicho or Akane. For all they knew, touching them might poison them too. The Academy classes had mentioned that—unless you were a qualified medical-nin, you shouldn't come into contact with someone severely poisoned.
And so the two of them stood there quietly, feeling two lives slip away, moment by moment.