8.Brawl(2)

The fire engulfed #13's entire figure, its hungry flames licking at the air.

Delta's eyes widened in disbelief. "#13 couldn't have been hit by a mere fire jutsu. S, did he escape?"

S-chan's voice trembled, betraying her shock. "He... he didn't. I can't believe it, but he's still there."

Suddenly, S-chan gasped. "Wait! Something strange is happening."

"What is it?" Delta demanded, tension evident in his voice.

S-chan's brow furrowed in concentration. "His chakra... it's disappearing."

"Disappearing? What do you mean?"

Panic gripped S-chan's voice as realization dawned. "Delta! Is #13 dying? Did I kill him?" The white-haired girl's face paled, the weight of her actions as the unintentional arsonist hit her.

"On it," Delta growled, already prepared to extinguish the flames. He had started moving the moment S-chan mentioned the vanishing chakra.

A wave of ice engulfed the fire, hissing as it met the heat. The group rushed towards the site, watching as the flames finally died down.

"Wait," S-chan whispered, her voice small. "Did I really kill him?"

The yellow-haired ninja knelt, examining the ground. "Look here. There are signs of earth release. It might have been an earth clone."

Delta frowned, turning to S-chan. "But you were tracking him from the start, right? How could this happen?"

"Perhaps he used seals to mask his chakra and deployed a clone as a decoy?" the swords girl suggested, her hand resting on her weapon's hilt.

S-chan shook her head. "I would have noticed the chakra transition. It doesn't make sense."

"Maybe," the yellow-haired ninja ventured, "he was a clone from the beginning."

Delta's eyebrows shot up. "Why would he send a clone to the meeting? It wasn't even a shadow clone. Did he anticipate a battle royale?"

The swords girl shrugged. "It's possible. Or he might have prepared for any potential conflict on our last day of training camp."

"If that's the case," Delta mused, "how do we find him?"

S-chan's eyes suddenly widened. "Wait! Didn't your twin go to set traps in the forest alone?"

The realization hit everyone at once. Without a word, they flickered towards the forest, searching frantically until they reached its edge.

The yellow-haired ninja sighed. "Let's assume he's eliminated for now. It's the safest option."

"We shouldn't split up," the emerald-haired girl warned. "He could use divide and conquer tactics."

The white-haired girl nodded. "And we can't let S-chan get separated. She's our best defence against an ambush. He'll probably target her first."

"I would be fine and senpai wo-" S-chan's words cut off abruptly, her eyes growing wide with alarm. "Everyone, jump!"

But her warning came too late. The ground beneath them transformed into a swamp, dragging them down. From the trees, a volley of kunai and shuriken launched, propelled by nearly invisible seals.

S-chan, the only one who had managed to jump in time, exhaled forcefully, creating a gust of wind that deflected the projectiles away from her trapped comrades. But as she maintained the jutsu, she sensed a presence behind her. She was aware of the danger but caught mid-technique, she couldn't react.

In those crucial seconds, her ambusher struck. A chakra disruption seal found its way onto her neck.

"Take a nap," a voice whispered, and darkness claimed S-chan's consciousness.

#13 materialized, catching S-chan's limp form and tossing her to the ground, where she too was swallowed by the earth.

A railgun attack sliced through the air, aimed at #13. He dodged with a burst of chakra from his left side, then used a chakra thread to pull himself to a nearby tree.

"You!" the white-haired girl screamed, her eyes blazing. "What did you do to my brother?"

#13 rolled his eyes. "Calm down, girl. You're acting like I killed him or something. He's just out of the game, same as the others."

The white-haired girl's anger faltered, replaced by embarrassment. Before she could respond, the emerald-haired girl charged at #13, her blade poised to strike.

Steel met steel as #13 parried with a kunai. They danced across the tree branches, trading blows and chakra slashes that decimated the surrounding foliage.

#13 realized her strategy – to eliminate his cover and limit his escape routes. Below, the ground froze over with purple-tinged ice, while the yellow-haired ninja's hands crackled with electricity.

"Okay, that's annoying," #13 muttered. "But I think I'll be leaving now."

"Get out of the way!" Delta yelled at the emerald-haired girl, who leapt aside.

A beam of water, too fast to dodge, connected with #13. As the yellow-haired ninja moved to electrify the water, #13 spewed his own water jutsu, drenching the emerald-haired girl.

The electricity arced through both #13 and the emerald-haired girl. #13 grinned. "Hehe."

Then he vanished in a puff of smoke.

"A clone!" Delta shouted in frustration.

The white-haired girl's voice cut through the chaos. "Remove the ice! She's falling!" The ice had a skin-touch poison in it.

Delta complied instantly, but as the emerald-haired girl neared the ground, it opened beneath her.

"Damn it!" the yellow-haired ninja cursed, his lightning cloak activating. "He's going to eliminate her too. This might be our chance to find his real body – he must be low on chakra."

But another barrage of kunai and shuriken forced them on the defensive, losing any chance to pursue #13.

As the attack subsided, Delta turned to his companions. "Now what should we..." His words died as he saw the shock on the yellow-haired ninja's face. Following his gaze, Delta realized the white-haired girl had vanished.

"I... I didn't even notice," Delta admitted, his guard rising. It felt like facing S-chan all over again.

The yellow-haired ninja stood rigid, his lightning cloak humming with energy. Coins hidden beneath his clothes waited, ready to become deadly projectiles at a moment's notice.

"Should I fire railguns randomly at the ground?" he suggested. "He can't have gone far."

Delta shook his head sharply. "Don't! You might actually kill someone."

"Tch," the yellow-haired ninja clicked his tongue in frustration, as they both realized how precarious their situation had become.

The forest fell into an uneasy silence as Delta and the yellow-haired ninja waited, their senses on high alert for #13's next move. Hours crawled by, the tension palpable as they tried to recover their depleted chakra. Despite #13 being a sensor, they hadn't changed their position—a calculated risk.

Suddenly, the air filled with a deadly hail of kunai and shuriken. Reacting instantly, both ninjas sprang to the treetops, unwilling to risk being trapped on the ground again. They'd learned their lesson from #13's earth-style ambush that had claimed one of their comrades without a sound.

#13 materialized from the shadows, his hands a blur as he launched chakra-coated kunai. These weren't ordinary projectiles—each knife cut through the air with unnatural speed and penetrating power, rendering even the yellow-haired ninja's B-rank Electromagnetic Tussle jutsu useless.

Realizing their disadvantage in the canopy, Delta and his companion made a strategic retreat to the forest floor. Delta's hands flashed through seals, and a sheet of ice spread across the battleground, transforming the terrain to their advantage.

As the yellow-haired ninja engaged #13 in close combat, Delta began his next move. Ice climbed skyward, forming a massive dome that sealed off any escape routes. They had #13 cornered—or so they thought.

"I could be a clone, you know," #13 smirked, deflecting a sword slash with practised ease.

A manic grin spread across the yellow-haired ninja's face. "Oh, let's find out." His voice dropped to a whisper: "Railgun: Chaos."

The air crackled with energy as six coins, sheathed in visible blue chakra, shot from the ninja's hand. But these weren't ordinary projectiles—they zigzagged through the air in completely unpredictable patterns. Four missed widely, one whizzed past #13's ear, and the last pierced his left leg like butter, drawing blood.

"So, you are real," the yellow-haired ninja sneered. "Don't die now."

On cue, the ice beneath #13's feet liquefied, grasping at his ankles. More ice melted, water rushing in from all sides to envelop him. The yellow-haired ninja's hands crackled with electricity as he shouted, "A-rank: Lightning Charge!"

Electricity surged through the water, creating a lethal web of energy. The yellow-haired ninja stood unaffected at the epicentre of his technique, while Delta protected himself with a brilliant defensive manoeuvre—a thin shell of circulating water that conducted the electricity around him rather than through him.

As the light faded and the water receded, both ninjas stared at the spot where #13 had stood, anticipation building. Had they finally bested their elusive opponent?

The smoke cleared, revealing... nothing. No body, no blood—just empty space where #13 should have been.

A slow clap echoed through the incomplete ice dome. "Impressive," #13's voice came from everywhere and nowhere at once. "But not impressive enough."

The ice dome began to crack, fissures spreading like spider webs across its surface. Delta and the yellow-haired ninja stood back-to-back, eyes darting from one break to another, unsure from which direction the real attack would come.

***

lol, How was the chapter?

damn, I felt like I was seeing the difference between Nokia and iPhone 10

jokes apart, I used Claude to rewrite my chapter and you can clearly see the results.

Special thanks to Thecentipede for this wonderful suggestion, if you want to thank somebody, thank him. 

Next chapter will be last in the Brawl arc, Missions are on the horizon, also don't expect fast updates like this one as I have already written this one 75 percent yesterday only along with previous chapter. 

Till then cya

Word Count- almost 1.5K