Shing shing shing shing! At that very moment, there was movement. Twelve figures appeared at the front of the transport convoy…
"Ah! Ah! Ah!" By the time they could make out who it was, some of the convoy had already fallen with screams!
Shinobi were really hard to predict…
You thought you were close to camp—and that's exactly when enemies dared to launch a surprise attack!
The Hyūga shinobi in the convoy had only been activating their Byakugan at intervals for reconnaissance. At this critical moment, they hadn't expected it—and the ambush caught them off guard.
"The enemies are all strong—probably jōnin!" No matter how much Tōji complained internally, Jakkō had already spoken up in warning.
Tōji and his squad were positioned toward the rear of the convoy. Along the convoy, there was a jōnin stationed at intervals.
The enemies had appeared right between Hizashi at the very front and the second Konoha jōnin. They were specifically targeting chūnin.
Tōji was still some distance away and couldn't see exactly how those Konoha shinobi had died.
But since Konoha had the numbers—even if most were chūnin and genin—they should be able to hold their own against twelve Iwa jōnin.
At this point, no extra commands were needed from Hizashi. Four jōnin immediately moved forward, with full chūnin squads following behind them, while the other squads pulled back slightly and held position, ready for orders.
One chūnin behind Hizashi calmly fired a signal flare.
This was exactly what Hizashi had instructed before departure—how to handle a small group of enemies.
But Tōji hadn't expected the enemies to come with such overwhelming force. At minimum, they were twelve tokubetsu jōnin.
Fortunately, with Hizashi as the anchor, no one panicked.
And with the camp not far away, reinforcements from the main Konoha force wouldn't be hard to get.
"【Earth Release: Retsudo Tenjō】!" Before the Konoha shinobi could fully get into formation, four Iwa-nin had already cast the same jutsu together!
Massive fissures rapidly split the ground.
The heavily laden supply carts looked like they were about to tip over and sink into the cracked earth. Some of the less skilled genin fell into the crevices.
Cries of alarm rose one after another.
At that moment, the chūnin mixed in among the genin at the rear began showing off their skills—some with brute force, some with jutsu, some with tools—steadying the "wagons" and their cargo, while pulling the genin out of the churned-up ground.
Tōji had put serious effort into his Body Flicker—handling a quick escape from an area was second nature.
Natchi, being a beast-imitation shinobi, was especially agile even without transforming, despite his stocky build.
And Jakkō, being a chūnin, was even more capable.
A wide-area jutsu like this, when not specifically targeted, posed almost no threat to chūnin.
But in just that short span of time, the focus of the battle had already shifted.
The Iwa-nin used Earth Release to quickly split the battlefield. Each Konoha jōnin was being engaged by two Iwa jōnin, while the remaining Iwa forces were already cutting through the ranks.
The Konoha jōnin weren't significantly better in quality than the Iwa jōnin, so the two chūnin teammates of each Konoha jōnin moved in to assist.
But the four "unattended" Iwa jōnin looked like they were about to go on a rampage.
The Iwa-nin, despite using Earth Release techniques, mostly relied on 【Earth Release: Hardening Technique】 or 【Earth Release: Rock Fist Technique】 for taijutsu combat.
And those four Iwa-nin were doing exactly that—cutting a blazing path through the crowd of Konoha chūnin!
Tōji watched as the Konoha chūnin couldn't seem to organize an effective defense. He tactically retreated half a step…
『Surely it won't be overrun before reinforcements arrive!』 Tōji couldn't help thinking.
Then Natchi's voice came from beside him, "What should we do?"
Jakkō, his intention unclear, said, "We wait for orders before acting!"