Chapter 536: Fire Dinosaur Evolution! (10,000 votes per day)

Green energy continuously gathered on Rockruff, and this sudden situation attracted the attention of everyone on the battlefield.

“Is it evolving? But why does it look different from Charmeleon and Milotic?” Kakashi was a little excited and a little confused.

He was excited that Rockruff was finally evolving, and at such a critical moment when combat power was lacking.

He was confused because the light emitted by Rockruff’s evolution was different from that of other Pokémon; compared to the pure white light of other Pokémon, Rockruff was mostly green light.

“I hope it’s an evolution like Milotic.”

Excluding the newly evolved Rockruff, whose abilities were still unknown, there were currently two evolved Pokémon: Milotic and Charmeleon.

Charmeleon’s strength had improved significantly after evolving, but compared to Milotic, it was a drop in the bucket.

At this critical juncture, Kakashi naturally hoped that his Rockruff would receive a boost similar to Milotic’s after evolving.

Rockruff’s body gradually changed within the light; its size increased, its limbs became agile, and even its tail underwent a significant transformation.

When the light dissipated, Kakashi saw the Dusk Form Rockruff.

Rockruff’s neck, like during its Rockruff period, had rocks, but the rocks on Rockruff’s neck were thicker and sharper, looking more lethal.

Most of the fur on the Dusk Form Rockruff’s body was sunset orange, while the mane on its head was pure white, and its tail, like during its Rockruff period, was also pure white.

“What’s going on? It suddenly turned into this.” Sasori didn’t quite understand what happened to Rockruff, making it seem like Rockruff had matured four or five years in an instant.

“Howl!”

The evolved Rockruff howled and stared intently at Sasori’s main body with its glowing green eyes.

‘Stone Edge!’

Rockruff condensed dozens of head-sized stones in front of it and hurled them towards Sasori.

Accompanying the attack, Rockruff’s green eyes turned a more dangerous red.

“Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique!”

Rin Nohara formed hand signs and released Water Release Ninjutsu to attack Sasori’s main body along with Rockruff.

Sasori’s fingers twitched, rapidly controlling the Third Kazekage to retreat and create a thick wall of sand iron in front of him.

Obito instantly relaxed, breathing heavily.

He had almost failed to withstand the pressure; fighting the Third Kazekage’s Human Puppet alone with Charmeleon was still too strenuous.

Fortunately, Obito hadn’t trained much himself today, having spent all his time helping Charmeleon train, so he had more stamina and Chakra preserved than Kakashi.

“This white-haired puppy is quite handsome after evolving.” Obito looked at Rockruff with some surprise.

He found that, except for Charmeleon, the other Nin-Beasts changed significantly after evolving; Feebas became elegant and beautiful after its plan, and Rockruff became handsome after evolving, while Charmeleon, who evolved first, had the smallest overall change.

“If the white fur turned red or black, it would definitely be even more handsome.” Obito was very displeased with the large amount of white fur on Rockruff’s neck and tail, believing it severely affected its appearance.

Obito seized the rare breathing room, exited Flame Breathing Chakra Mode, and quickly refined Chakra.

Charmeleon collapsed to the ground, exhausted; it had already been tormented by Obito and was now close to giving up.

Seeing its opponent, whom it had narrowly defeated before, evolve and its aura become stronger, Charmeleon felt a pang of bitterness; among the few Pokémon now, it seemed it could truly only consistently win against Zorua.

Although it was the best friend of Zorua, Charmeleon surprisingly had the thought of hoping Zorua would evolve later at this moment, which made Charmeleon feel ashamed of itself.

It should be thinking about becoming stronger itself; how could it wish for its friend to remain weak?

“Magnet Release: Iron Sand Shower!”

The sudden change in Rockruff made Sasori feel uneasy, so he consumed a large amount of Chakra to make the Third Kazekage unleash another powerful, wide-range Magnet Release.

Under Sasori’s control, the Third Kazekage formed hand signs with both hands, and a large amount of iron sand rapidly gathered around him.

Seeing that it was the same wide-range Magnet Release as before, Kakashi quickly shouted, “Manewra, let’s use Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall together!”

He had been refining Chakra with all his might during the periods he wasn’t fighting; his current Chakra was barely enough for one Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall, but not enough for the stronger Multiple Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall, so he needed Manewra’s assistance.

“Howl!”

Manewra responded to Kakashi with a howl and began to condense Earth Release Chakra.

“Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall!”

Kakashi’s hand sign speed was extremely fast, instantly creating a wide earth wall on the ground.

“Water Release: Water Formation Wall!”

Rin Nohara followed closely, adding a water wall in front of the earth wall, hoping to use the water wall to absorb some of the impact of the iron sand.

To avoid affecting the defensive capabilities of the earth wall, Rin Nohara exerted her Chakra control to the limit, maintaining a non-interfering distance between the water wall’s water and the earth wall.

Immediately after, Rockruff let out a loud howl, and an earth wall, slightly inferior to Kakashi’s, rose up.

Whoosh whoosh whoosh!

Bang bang bang!

Large amounts of iron sand needles slammed into the Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall, rapidly breaking through the water wall and tearing the Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall to shreds.

Rockruff also knew its Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall wasn’t strong enough, so it quickly condensed Chakra again and released another earth wall to strengthen the defense.

Watching Rockruff and Milotic fight side-by-side, while it could only hide beneath the earth wall created by Rockruff, Charmeleon felt extremely unwilling.

Recalling earlier, it had almost become the strongest Nin-Beast in the team, only slightly losing to Rockruff.

Now, it could only watch them display their strengths, how could Charmeleon be content with that?

Would Milotic look favorably upon a dragon that lacked strength and hid in the back?

“Roar!”

Charmeleon let out an angry roar of defiance and a longing for strength.

Obito was about to ask Charmeleon why it was suddenly making strange noises, but then he saw white light suddenly appear on Charmeleon’s body and instantly shut his mouth. This was an evolution, so it was fine.

Obito became excited; Charmeleon had already evolved once, and this would be its second evolution. It had to soar; it couldn’t possibly be worse than Milotic, right?

Dazzling pure white light enveloped Charmeleon, and the light of evolution reappeared on the battlefield.

Kakashi looked at Charmeleon with surprise, not expecting Charmeleon, who had already evolved once, to evolve again.

“Ninja Master Sōsuke didn’t say that Nin-Beasts could only evolve once. Can Rockruff and Milotic evolve again?” Kakashi thought to himself.

“Charmeleon evolved again, that’s great.” Rin Nohara realized that Charmeleon and the others were truly a special group of Nin-Beasts.

Whenever their contractors encountered danger, Charmeleon and the others would unleash their potential.

The white light dissipated, and Charizard, with its sturdy belly and thick tail, made a grand entrance.

“Ugh, I should have used genjutsu to help you lose weight.” Looking at Charizard’s protruding creamy white belly, Obito couldn’t help but complain.

Why did other people’s Pokémon either become handsome or elegant, while Charizard seemed to get fatter after evolving?

What relieved Obito was that after evolving into Charizard, it gained wings, and one protrusion from its Charmeleon days became two, making it look even more imposing.

Just looking at its upper body, it still had a majestic feel, about two-thirds as handsome as him.

However, if he looked at the whole, Obito could only say it was decent, with a hint of Haki, but its handsomeness was less than half of his.

Charizard poked Obito’s head with its finger. This little brother doesn’t know his place, does he? Now it wasn’t the Fire Dragon it used to be; now Obito was the little Obito!

When it first evolved into Charmeleon, Obito used Flame Breathing Chakra Mode to intimidate it, and it stood there like a subordinate.

Now it had shed its old skin and evolved into a dragon, it was time for the tables to turn.

Feeling Charizard’s ill-intentioned gaze, a friendly smile suddenly appeared on Obito’s face.

“Besides our contract, we’re also good friends, right?” Obito suddenly understood Charizard’s hard work and decided to lighten Charizard’s burden.

A smile with a hint of coldness appeared on Charizard’s face.

It tapped Obito’s head again with its finger, then flapped its wings and flew away.

Although it really wanted to give Obito a taste of its freshest flames, now was not the time to play around.

Play is play, and fooling around is fooling around, but only its own contractor could be bullied by itself, no one else could bully him.

The flame at Charizard’s tail end was exceptionally vigorous at this moment, with even a few wisps of blue-white flame appearing at the tip of the flame.

‘Fire Blast!’

Charizard opened its mouth and spat out a huge column of high-temperature fire, attacking the Third Kazekage.

For it, with its flying ability, even with the wide-ranging Iron Sand Ninjutsu, it could easily find an attack angle.

“What is this now?” Sasori frowned, wondering why a flying Nin-Beast had suddenly appeared.

The Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall had blocked Charmeleon’s evolution, so Sasori didn’t know that the current Charizard had evolved from the Charmeleon. At most, Sasori could only tell that Charizard might have some relation to the previous Charmeleon.

Sasori was confused. He had hidden his strength to kill Kakashi. What were Kakashi and the others hiding all this for? Were they trying to assassinate Ninja Master Sōsuke?

Although he didn’t know what was happening, the Attacking high-temperature flames forced Sasori to control the Third Kazekage to use Magnet Release: Iron Sand to defend.

A flying and powerful Nin-Beast posed too great a threat. Sasori directly controlled the Third Kazekage to create two gigantic triangular iron sands, sending them piercing towards Charizard.

Although Charizard looked like he had a not-so-small belly, his flying speed was not slow at all; in fact, it was very fast. Sasori’s iron sand couldn’t catch up to Charizard for a time.

Moreover, after the large-scale iron sand Ninjutsu ended, Rin Nohara and Milotic also launched their attacks again.

“I must quickly deal with the enemy and go back to prepare the antidote,” Rin Nohara thought, feeling extremely anxious.

Poisoning in reality is not like a poisoned status in games. In reality, poisoning becomes more severe as time passes. Sasori’s poison was of a very potent kind, and even with Ninjutsu suppressing it, they couldn’t delay for too long.

“Awooo!”

Accompanying Rockruff’s howl, the rocks on his neck suddenly flew out, then enlarged, rapidly piercing towards Sasori’s main body.

Rockruff had always remembered Kakashi’s instructions: dealing with the main body was the top priority.

“Damn it.” Sasori’s expression, hidden within Hiruko, became extremely grim.

If he didn’t deal with Charizard first, then Charizard, with his fast flight speed, would definitely cause him a lot of trouble.

But if he let the Third Kazekage deal with Charizard, his own weak puppet master body, relying only on Hiruko, wouldn’t be able to withstand the attacks from Rockruff and Rin Nohara.

No matter how Sasori thought about it, he hadn’t anticipated that Kakashi and his Nin-Beasts would be so bizarre, suddenly experiencing a surge in power.

Originally, in Sasori’s estimation, ambushing and wiping out Kakashi’s trio should have been more than enough.

“I was reckless. It would have been much safer to wait until Kakashi was alone before making a move.”

If it were just Kakashi alone, no matter how bizarre Kakashi’s Nin-Beasts were, Sasori would have been confident in killing Kakashi.

Helpless, Sasori had no choice but to control the Third Kazekage puppet to defend and block the attacks from Rin Nohara and the others, while also throwing out a scroll containing nine puppets.

Although controlling ten puppets simultaneously meant he couldn’t use the Third Kazekage’s ultimate move, in the current situation, controlling ten puppets simultaneously would be better.

After all, he could use more puppets to offset the opponent’s numerical advantage.

However, the development of events exceeded Sasori’s expectations.

Even though he controlled the Third Kazekage to entangle the most troublesome flying Nin-Beast, the situation was still heading in an unfavorable direction.

Milotic stubbornly used Self-Regeneration, enduring the puppet’s attacks, and shattered one puppet with Water Tail.

Kakashi and Obito stayed on the sidelines, assisting with Ninjutsu once they had refined enough Chakra.

Rockruff was extremely fast and liked to go around to the back, forcing Sasori to keep three puppets guarding his surroundings.

Sasori began to consider retreating.

He wanted revenge, yes, but this clearly wouldn’t lead to successful revenge, and he would only get himself caught.

The final straw that crushed Sasori’s idea of killing Kakashi on the spot was that his arrangements nearby had been triggered; someone was coming.

Since Raging Sun Mu Yue was Kakashi’s teacher, it was normal for him to visit while Kakashi and his team were training, so Sasori had made some arrangements in the surroundings before acting.

Sasori unleashed his Chakra, making all the puppets attack frantically and recklessly, temporarily forcing Rin Nohara and the others back a distance.

Immediately after, Sasori abandoned the other puppets, connecting all his Chakra threads to the Third Kazekage. He used his last bit of Chakra to make the Third Kazekage release a wide-range Iron Sand attack.

Because Charizard was given special attention, he also had to retreat to a distance, while everyone else tried their best to use Ninjutsu to resist.

At this point, Sasori directly used his Chakra threads to pull out the Third Kazekage’s Chakra core, then, without looking back, he threw out dozens of explosive tags and rapidly retreated amidst the sounds of explosions.

The core of a human puppet is the Chakra core. As long as he had the Chakra core, he could recreate an equally powerful Third Kazekage human puppet.

As for the other human puppets, Sasori didn’t bother to retrieve them. Besides the Third Kazekage, the other human puppets were merely consumables.

When the sound of iron sand faded, Rockruff jumped onto the wall, sniffing around, wanting to pursue by scent.

“Don’t pursue a cornered enemy,” Kakashi stopped Rockruff.

Although they would most likely be able to kill Sasori if they pursued him, it was unclear if other unexpected events would occur.

Currently, he and Obito had basically lost their combat ability, Milotic was poisoned by a potent toxin, and Rin Nohara had consumed a large amount of Chakra.

On their side, the only one in relatively good condition was probably Rockruff.

Kakashi estimated that Charizard’s condition was also average, because Kakashi had studied Charmeleon for some time, and when Charmeleon was in poor condition, the flames on his tail would be more vigorous than usual.

Rather than killing the enemy, Kakashi hoped that no one on their side would be sacrificed.

Rockruff obediently turned around and walked back to Kakashi’s side.

Kakashi nodded in his heart. It seemed that Charizard not being obedient after evolving was just an isolated case; evolution wouldn’t affect emotions.

“Let’s go straight back and report this matter to Teacher Muzuki,” Kakashi then said.

Rin Nohara nodded in agreement, saying seriously, “I need to go back quickly and prepare an antidote for Milotic, otherwise there might be danger.”

Upon hearing Rin Nohara’s words, Charizard instantly showed a worried expression, quickly ran to Milotic’s side to show concern, and even indicated to Rin Nohara that she could ride him to fly back, which would be faster.

Obito: …

Although he couldn’t fully understand Charizard’s words like Zorua could, Charizard’s actions were very clear; he even rested his head against Rin Nohara’s front.

“I haven’t even ridden him yet,” Obito thought, feeling speechless at Charizard’s eagerness to please.

If it weren’t Rin Nohara who was riding, he would definitely have to step forward and say something.

Then, the few of them quickly rushed back to Six Paths City.

To Rin Nohara’s relief, Milotic had strong vitality, and with Muzuki’s help, Milotic’s poisoning problem was ultimately resolved without incident.

…

On the other side, Sasori burst forth with Chakra, running at extreme speed, occasionally looking back at the sky to see if Charizard was pursuing him.

When Sasori had run a certain distance and saw no sign of Charizard, he breathed a sigh of relief.

“I must quickly perfect the human puppet technique. If I were a human puppet myself, even if Uchiha Shisui were present, everyone would still be unable to escape death.” Sasori, uncharacteristically, yearned for strength.

Actually, Sasori didn’t care much about Ninja strength. The reason he had always researched human puppets was not to increase his strength, but for his eternal art.

Although no one was pursuing him, Sasori still didn’t slow down. He planned to leave Six Paths City first.

Because his strongest puppet now only had a Chakra core, his combat power was greatly reduced. Even if he stayed here, it would be difficult to kill Kakashi. It would be better to recover his strength first and then look for an opportunity.

Anyway, after transforming himself, he would have eternal life, and by then, the opportunity for revenge would eventually come. There was no rush in these few days.

“Bansho Tenin!”

Just as Sasori was plotting his future path of revenge, a powerful suction force erupted, pulling Sasori’s body towards it.

“Nagato? Why is he here?!” Sasori was filled with confusion.

“Nagato, I am Sasori. We have no grievances, so why are you attacking me?” Sasori tried to use words to make Nagato stop.

He didn’t have the Third Kazekage with him at the moment, and his body’s Chakra was running low. He truly had no ability to fight Nagato.

But Nagato seemed to not hear him. The moment Sasori was pulled over, he unleashed Shinra Tensei at Sasori towards the ground.

Boom!

The powerful repulsive force struck Sasori’s body, creating a large crater in the ground.

The exhausted Sasori, suffering such a heavy blow, directly fainted.

PS: This chapter is 5k, and the total word count for two chapters is 11,000.

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