A few seconds after Kisame got engulfed in the aftermath of Naruto’s Rasenshuriken, the dust settled and revealed Kisame with hundreds of small gashes all over his body.
Naruto’s jutsu would have undoubtedly killed him despite his sword absorbing a big part of it beforehand if Kisame were an average shinobi. However, he was far from being an average shinobi. His body was incredibly tough, and he managed to resist the weakened Rasenshuriken for a while. Additionally, he was the wielder of Samehada, a sword that could not only absorb chakra but even heal its wielder with the previously absorbed chakra.
So, while Naruto’s jutsu was trying to tear him apart, he was constantly being healed by Samehada, allowing him to survive the attack pretty much undamaged except for the bloody scratches on his body, which would heal within seconds.
Naruto couldn’t help but frown when he saw Kisame’s wounds healing at a visible pace. This was the third time he was facing him in a fight, and he couldn’t help but feel annoyed at how many of Naruto’s strong skills Kisame, or rather Samehada, was a natural counter to.
Well, the ability to absorb massive amounts of chakra within an instant was a counter to pretty much everyone, but it was especially bad for people like Naruto, who usually fought with their whole body covered in chakra.
Despite that, Naruto wasn’t too worried about this fight. Kisame might be called the tailless bijuu, but in front of the perfect Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi, that title meant very little. Yes, Kisame had a lot of chakra, but how could he possibly compare with Naruto?
Naruto shook his head to get rid of his idle thoughts as a mischievous smirk appeared on his face. Now that he thought about it, there might actually be a chance to finish this within an instant.
“Hehe, so we meet again, Fishface. Ready to get your ass kicked a third time? If you surrender right now, I might even allow you to keep some of your dignity intact.”
Naturally, Kisame was instantly enraged when he heard Naruto’s words. The first time they fought, Kisame was only playing around with him, so Naruto managed to get away, and the second time, Kisame had barely any of his chakra, allowing Naruto to defeat him. Right now, he was in his peak condition, so he did not doubt that he would win.
The enraged Kisame took the first step towards Naruto, and as soon as he was about to take the second one, he stopped moving and instantly jumped back a few meters, causing Naruto to widen his eyes in surprise.
“Y-You actually didn’t fall for it a fourth time!?”
As soon as Naruto stopped speaking, a small seal appeared where Kisame would have positioned his second step and fizzled out of existence a few seconds later.
Naruto pretended to wipe away a tear from under his right eye and looked at Kisame proudly.
“To think you would smarten up to such a high degree. Itachi would be proud of your progress, Fishface.”
Kisame almost had one of his blood vessels burst in anger when Naruto started looking at him like a toddler who just managed to put the square block into the square hole, but despite that, he managed to contain his anger and didn’t mindlessly charge Naruto. He at least had learned that carelessly approaching Naruto was not a good idea.
Although Naruto pretended to look happy that Kisame improved his brain’s capabilities from zero to a little more than zero, he was actually pretty annoyed by it. He was hoping that Kisame would charge him like an idiot again and that he could finish him off in one move after he gets flung to the ground by his seal.
Naruto pondered how he should approach this fight for a moment before he decided on what he deemed the best approach. He flicked his wrists, causing six unique-looking kunai to appear, which he swiftly tossed towards Kisame.
Naturally, Kisame noticed the way Naruto’s kunai looked and immediately understood what Naruto was planning to do. He wielded Samehada in a vast arc, punting all of Naruto’s kunai away while simultaneously sucking out the chakra keeping the seals on the kunai functioning.
“Hehe, that won’t work o…”
“[Giant Rasengan]”
Before Kisame could understand what was going on, Naruto appeared behind him and slammed a big Rasengan into his back, sending him hurling away while tearing a huge wound into his back.
However, Kisame managed to right himself in midair and landed on his feet while continuing to slide backward due to the force of Naruto’s attack. Samehada had already started healing his wound, but Kisame still had an ugly expression on his face since he could feel that there was almost no chakra that could be used for healing left, meaning he had to absorb more from Naruto.
“You bastard, how did you manage to get behind me!?”
Naruto chuckled in amusement as he casually spun a kunai on his finger.
“Isn’t that pretty obvious? I teleported.”
“Bullshit, I blocked all your seals and disabled them! There was no place for you to teleport to!”
“Hehe, are you sure about that?”
What was the greatest weakness of the [Flying Thunder God Seal]? Everyone knew how it worked, at least to some degree. The user would prepare special kunai and use them as teleportation points. Everyone “knew” that that was how it worked.
However, a lot of people tend to forget that the important part wasn’t the kunai. It was the seal on the kunai. Isn’t creating special-looking kunai to carry the teleportation marker incredible stupid? After all, it will instantly tell your opponent that the kunai has a mark on it. No, that was simply part of the trick. It was a distraction to make people focus on the kunai instead of the seal itself.
So, how did Naruto manage to place a seal directly behind Kisame? He distracted him with the six obviously marked kunai, took out a small metal plate with the necessary seals engraved into it, which was rolled up to make it look like a small, almost impossible-to-see needle, and stealthily threw it behind Kisame.
Unfortunately, using such a thin metal plate instead of a solid metal piece like a kunai to hold the seal made it a one-time use item.
Those needles were a pain to create, so Naruto had only very few of them, but he was certain that he had enough to empty Kisame’s chakra before running out of needles.
He was just about to toss another set of kunai at Kisame when a massive shockwave washed over Naruto and Kisame, causing Naruto’s eyes to widen in surprise.
‘Damn, seems like things are getting quite dangerous.’
Naruto pondered for a split second before a severe expression appeared on his face.
‘I have no time to take this slowly. Time to switch from a strategic approach to brute force.’
A yellow chakra coat with black stripes covered his body as his pupils turned cross-shaped and the skin around his eyes changed color.
He flexed his hand, causing another Rasenshuriken to appear on top of it, which he tossed towards Kisame without a moment of hesitation.
“Let’s finish this! [Rasenshuriken]”
