18 Chapter 18
"Over there!" one of them yelled as Kuzo jumped out of the smoke. The three, no, the six if we included the ogres, started chasing after him.
"Damn it." After he cursed, Kuzo reached into his pocket and grabbed a series of flying weapons. He threw them into the air. After they clashed against each other, they headed toward the muscular man. One of the kunais was heading toward him from a blind spot.
A musical tone was played. One of the ogres appeared in front of the muscular man, extended his hand, and took all of the attacks.
"Shit." Kuzo cursed again. He weaved a series of hand signs and grabbed his weapons, coating them in lightning. He then threw them with all of his might, adding the thrusting power of the lightning. The ogres, still following the music, appeared in front of him. Despite his attack penetrating them deeply, they took it as if it were nothing.
An ogre with long hair and a giant mace appeared above Kuzo. He slammed down on him with his giant mace. Kuzo flipped above the mace, causing a huge crack in the ground. It would surely have killed him if it had landed. He then turned and kicked the zombie-like blind ogre, sending him gliding a few meters away. When the other ogres started attacking him, Kuzo backflipped.
"Got you." The other two appeared around him.
The musical tone, which was controlling the ogres, stopped.
Chains appeared from nowhere and held him by his arms.
Then, his arms started melting.
He opened his eyes widely.
He was caught in Genjutsu.
Luckily, he was just a shadow clone.
"It surely takes a lot of effort to catch a rat like you," said Sakon as the muscular man appeared behind him, holding Kuzo in a headlock.
-x-X-x-
The original Kuzo appeared behind the girl who was playing with her flute.
When he had used that smoke bomb and created the shadow clone, he used the body-flicker jutsu to get as far as possible while his clone moved regularly.
He placed his hand on her collarbone, where the curse mark of heaven was.
Kuzo had a curse mark in the past when he had become a civilian spy. But he managed to get rid of it thanks to the power of gluttony.
The girl, who was a monster-like now, lost her form all of a sudden as the curse mark on her body was being absorbed.
She seemed to realize that something was off. She became a normal human again.
"Always take the one with long-distance range first," Kuzo said as he held her by the neck and smiled as he lifted her. She was short, so she was easily overpowered by him.
He then grabbed her flute. "I'll take that."
Then, by increasing the power of his grip, he sent her to the other life.
A sensation of pleasure entered him as his power increased.
Kuzo looked at his hand. The curse seal of Orochimaru. He had absorbed it. Yet, he couldn't feel any difference. The seal contained a fragment of Orochimaru's soul, which would be the one to gather the nature energy to make anyone enter that type of sage mode. But without Orochimaru's soul, he wouldn't be able to use it.
Kuzo scratched the back of his head.
'Did I get his ninjutsu or bloodline? Orochimaru doesn't have a unique bloodline anyway.' Maybe he needed more soul fragments to get a better idea.
It didn't matter for now. What mattered was getting rid of the remaining two.
-x-X-x-
The ogres, along with Kuzo's shadow clone, turned into a puff of smoke.
"Apparently, the curse seal increases your power and jutsu. But it doesn't help with your brains," Kuzo, who was sitting on top of a tree, said to the remaining two. "No shadow clones, no elemental clones. No tactics. Seriously, does Orochimaru ever teach you the basics of being a shinobi?"
"We have never told you about Master Orochimaru."
"But you are not denying it," Kuzo replied, "I'm not going to ask you questions or interrogate you. I only need your head to know everything you ever knew, so don't worry, it would be a swift death."
The two monster-like people looked at him with disdain, with the intent to kill him.
"Say, Sakon, we don't have to keep him alive, do we?"
"I don't want that anyway."
"Let's get rid of him."
The two talked among each other.
Kuzo jumped off the tree. 'With the mind power of a Jonin from the ANBU, and the chakra and power I just got, I think I'm nearer to being able to use power on par with a Jonin.'
Once he landed, he gave the two a cocky smile.
The large muscular one dashed at him. He slammed with his palm. Kuzo, who was way faster, squatted, grabbed a kunai, and then slashed as he went past him, slashing a part of his neck.
"Tsk." His foe didn't give up. He scoffed, put his hands on the ground. The earth moved, and when he lifted his arms, he had a very large boulder. And by very large, he meant around a 100-meter-diameter boulder, which could crush an army easily.
"And now, you're going to die!" he yelled.
But you know, there was a reason why speed was a determining factor in ninja fights. Because timing was deadly. Wasting time to grab a boulder and show your strength was not something to use carefree in a battle. In this case, it allowed Kuzo to get very near to him.
Kuzo had his hand on the neck of the man. "Try that without your Curse Seal power." Kuzo then absorbed the seal.
The monster's appearance disappeared, getting replaced by a man who was lifting more than he could.
Kuzo then used body-flicker jutsu, getting more than a 100 meters away. The boulder was about to get down. But Kuzo didn't plan to let the kill go away from his hands. He grabbed two shurikens and coated them with Lightning Shuriken Jutsu. He then threw them toward his foe's neck, slicing the life out of it.
As the boulder collapsed, Kuzo saw the spirit flying toward him. A large dust cloud rose, and Kuzo closed his eyes.
And apparently, he wasn't the only one who managed to survive.
From his sensory ability, he could feel that the double-headed man managed to outrun the boulder.
A hundred-meter range wasn't something for an expert ninja.
Kuzo noticed as the two-headed shinobi ran toward him. Sakon punched. Kuzo dodged with ease. However, he got hit in his stomach when an arm appeared from nowhere from the man's stomach and into his.
"You're two in one." Kuzo could now tell that. "Actually, you have your twin brother inside you."
"What? Afraid of facing me."
"Don't get cocky because you got a lucky hit." Kuzo didn't back up. He put his fist on his palm and rose his hands to the man's face. "This is what I call an unlucky punch."
And then, with all of his power and chakra concentrated on his fist, he punched.
Sakon and his twin brother didn't have a chance to dodge as the fist already got into one of their faces.
They were then sent flying.
Kuzo ran after them. 'I don't want to give them a chance to split.' Using his superior speed, he caught up to them in no time. He then opened his mouth. A clay-like matter got out of it, forming the shape of a sword. It was the ability of the spider guy he had just killed. And guess who was good at using swords — Fu. It didn't take Kuzo more than one move to cut Sakon and his twin's head.
"Double Kill." He said as he threw the sword away.
The twins' powers were then absorbed by Kuzo again.
He didn't know how to describe his feeling.
But he now had a jutsu that would allow him to break his body into monocular level and merge with someone else to destroy their body from inside.
However, that had a risk as he would die if the one he'd possess decided to suicide.
'That's messed up.' Kuzo thought as he turned his head. He stretched his hands up and took a deep breath. When he checked his chakra levels, he found that it increased dramatically. He didn't know if it could be contributed to these guys solely or to Orochimaru's souls fragments.
'Orochimaru's soul is like the souls you get in Dark Souls, you break them and get more souls.'
He thought.
Now he remembered.
What did Orochimaru want to do with him?
At any rate, he needed to bring one head with him to scan for any memory.
He went to the twin's heads, and he grabbed them. He reached his pocket, grabbing an empty scroll. Usually, he would seal his puppet here. But he had something more valuable.
With chakra surrounding his finger, Kuzo started writing with it on the scroll.
After putting the heads on the seal, he formed a hand seal. The heads vanished and got into the scroll. Kuzo then rolled it up.
