Ever since his first spar with Kazama, Kakashi had always remained wary of Kazama’s genjutsu.
But this time was different.
He had fallen under the illusion silently, without noticing anything at all.
If he hadn’t eventually sensed that something was wrong and forcefully disrupted the genjutsu with a burst of chakra, he might have lost without ever realizing what had happened.
In that case, Kazama really would have won the entire match without moving from where he stood.
Whoosh!
Kakashi still refused to concede.
This was their final spar before the graduation exam, and losing like this left him deeply unwilling to accept the result.
So Kakashi decided to go all out.
Short blade in hand, he charged straight toward Kazama.
Crackle!
Crackle!
Faint arcs of lightning danced across Kakashi’s blade.
Although he had not yet fully mastered Lightning Release nature transformation, being able to produce visible lightning chakra on his weapon at his age was already extremely impressive.
Whoosh!
The lightning-coated blade tore through the air.
Kazama stepped rapidly beneath his feet.
“Soru!” His body instantly flashed backward, avoiding Kakashi’s strike.
If Kakashi had been a genuine enemy rather than a sparring partner, Kazama probably wouldn’t have bothered retreating like this.
He would have combined Soru with the Body Flicker Technique, rushed straight in— and slammed a Rasengan into him.
Of course, if Kazama actually hit Kakashi with a Rasengan right now, whether Kakashi would even survive was another question.
Even if Tsunade personally treated him afterward, he would probably need at least half a year to recover.
Perhaps even longer.
“Fire Release: Dragon Fire Technique!” Kazama might not be able to use the Rasengan against Kakashi, but that didn’t mean he intended to give up his fortieth victory.
The instant he leaped backward, his hands blurred into a stream of afterimages.
Four seals per second.
The hand seals for the Dragon Fire Technique were completed in barely a second.
Practically instantaneously.
Whoosh!
A stream of fire erupted from Kazama’s mouth.
The flames compressed into a straight, sword-like torrent and shot directly toward Kakashi.
By now, Kakashi had fought Kazama so many times that he had long since grown accustomed to his absurd hand-seal speed.
Whenever he attacked, he always deliberately left himself enough room to evade a sudden ninjutsu.
Kazama formed seals far too quickly.
If Kakashi committed all his strength to an attack and failed to leave himself an escape route, Kazama might complete a technique before Kakashi even had time to react.
“Geppo!” Bang!
Kakashi jumped into the air.
Then he stepped against empty space, forcing his body even higher and narrowly avoiding the incoming Fire Release.
Boom!
The Dragon Fire Technique slammed into the spot where Kakashi had just been.
A large crater exploded open.
Flames scattered across the ground along with chunks of broken earth and stone.
The students watching nearby hurriedly retreated to avoid being caught in the aftermath.
“This kid has quite a lot of chakra.” Inside the Hokage’s Office, Tsunade watched Kazama casually unleash the Dragon Fire Technique through the crystal ball.
“And his chakra control is excellent too.” His hand seals had been extraordinarily fast.
At that speed, poor chakra control would have caused the technique to lose power or even fail entirely.
Yet Kazama had executed it smoothly and with ease.
That alone demonstrated just how refined his chakra control had become.
“But ninjutsu, genjutsu, and taijutsu aren’t really my specialties.” Tsunade continued watching him.
“And I don’t intend to stay in Konoha for much longer.” “Once Shizune graduates, I’m planning to leave the village and travel for a while.” Tsunade certainly appreciated Kazama’s talent.
But with her hemophobia, there was no realistic way she could properly teach him.
Besides, judging from Kazama’s powerful spiritual strength and extraordinary bodily control, he was clearly developing toward becoming an all-round shinobi.
Tsunade knew some taijutsu.
Her genjutsu knowledge was limited.
Her true specialty was medical ninjutsu.
Jiraiya and Orochimaru remained silent, continuing to watch.
There was obvious interest in Jiraiya’s eyes.
He thought highly of Kazama.
And since he was already teaching Minato Namikaze, taking Kazama as another student didn’t seem impossible.
As for Orochimaru— he was simply watching the show.
He had no interest in taking on a student right now.
His experiments had recently made considerable progress.
If the old man hadn’t specifically summoned him here, Orochimaru wouldn’t even have come to the village these past few days.
He would have been “out on a mission.” “Geppo is a taijutsu technique I created!” Kazama’s voice rang out.
Compared with Kakashi, his use of Geppo was far more practiced.
Bang!
His body seemed to blur from one position to another.
He crossed the distance between two points almost instantly.
Only when his foot struck the air did a faint afterimage briefly appear.
The sheer speed of his aerial movement shocked everyone watching.
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
Once airborne, Kazama continuously stepped through the air around Kakashi.
At the same time, he attacked relentlessly with both fists and kicks.
Kakashi had effectively trapped himself.
He knew Geppo too— but his mastery was nowhere close to Kazama’s.
His stamina and chakra reserves were also inferior.
Worse still, the earlier genjutsu had already consumed a considerable amount of his physical strength.
Now that they were fighting in midair, Kakashi had to use both feet merely to maintain his position.
His short blade couldn’t keep up with Kazama’s far more agile aerial movements.
Instead, Kakashi was struck several times.
If this had been an actual life-or-death battle— he would already have been cut apart several times over.
“Rankyaku!” Kazama finished with one final kick.
At his current physical strength, he still couldn’t produce a true vacuum blade.
But the explosive force generated by the Rankyaku kicking motion was still considerably greater than that of an ordinary kick.
Clang!
Kakashi raised his short blade vertically and blocked.
The impact slammed into the weapon.
The blade visibly bent.
Kakashi’s body was launched backward as though he had been rammed by a raging bull.
Splash!
Without any chance to recover— Kakashi crashed straight into the nearby stream.
Water exploded upward.
Tap.
Kazama descended from the air.
Quite a bit of sweat covered his face.
That last burst of Geppo had demanded tremendous physical strength.
Its explosive aerial speed had looked spectacular, but the stamina consumption was equally severe.
“Damn it…” “You beat me again.” Kakashi placed chakra into his hands and pushed against the surface of the stream.
Then he stood upright on the water.
He was completely soaked.
Even his normally upright silver hair had collapsed against his head.
“We’ll settle this again at the graduation exam.” Kakashi snorted.
He was frustrated— but he had no choice except to admit defeat.
His strength had continued growing.
Unfortunately for him— Kazama’s strength was growing too.
And because Kakashi often trained alongside Kazama, he knew one thing very clearly.
Kazama was still hiding part of his strength.
Kazama had mastered all the ninjutsu Kakashi had lent him long ago.
After that, Kazama’s shadow clones had stopped training together with the rest of them.
Instead, he kept them back at home.
Kakashi knew what that meant.
Kazama was almost certainly studying or developing other ninjutsu or taijutsu in secret.
Otherwise, there would be no reason to separate his shadow clones from his main body and have them train elsewhere.