Uchiha orphan, so what if I'm ruthless?

Uchiha Sasuke reached both hands into the ninja tool pouches on his thighs. Spreading his fingers, he held a shuriken between each one.

The black shuriken lined up between his fingers, their edges gleaming with a cold light under the sun.

With a flick of his arms, the shuriken flew from his grasp simultaneously, scattering from his hands like a flock of black swallows.

The shuriken carved various arcs through the air. Some flew straight at Karin, some curved to strike from the side, some soared high to drop from above, and others skimmed low along the ground.

They collided with each other mid-air, producing a crisp chorus of metallic clinks.

After colliding, the shuriken changed direction—some speeding up, some slowing down, shifting high and low. They shot toward Karin from every conceivable angle, direction, and height.

Hyuga Neji's figure darted and weaved through the scattered debris.

With a light tap of his foot against the ground, his body glided forward several meters. He tilted his head, allowing a piece of rubble to whistle past his ear.

His Byakugan remained active, its near-three-hundred-and-sixty-degree vision allowing him to track the trajectory of every single rock. He struck out with his palms from time to time—light, seemingly effortless blows. Yet, every time his palm connected with a piece of rubble, the stone shattered, sending pale gray dust drifting through his fingers.

His speed barely dropped as he closed the distance to Uzumaki Karin.

"That's monstrous strength! It's too dangerous, don't take it head-on!"

Uchiha Sasuke's voice rang out from behind, laced with urgency.

It was obvious he had recognized the way Uzumaki Karin channeled her power when she punched the ground earlier.

Hyuga Neji didn't say a word.

His lips pressed into a tight line and his eyes locked onto Karin, he didn't stop moving.

Uzumaki Karin stood at the epicenter of the cracked earth, watching Neji charge at her alongside the shuriken swarming in from all directions.

The corners of her mouth curled into a grin.

In the next moment, her body blurred with rapid, minute movements. The shuriken whizzed right past her—some grazing her ears, some skimming her shoulders, and others brushing past her waist.

Not a single shuriken managed to touch her.

Hyuga Neji arrived right in front of her. Shifting his left hand from a palm strike to a thrust, he brought two fingers together and aimed straight for Karin's chest.

His fingers moved so fast that the air ahead of his fingertips compressed into a white burst of pressure.

It was the Gentle Fist's chakra point strike. Wherever his fingers landed, the target's chakra would be sealed and their tenketsu closed.

Uzumaki Karin's body swayed again, bending backward into a deep arch. Her waist dipped so low that Neji's fingers thrust right over her, striking nothing but empty air.

She lifted her right foot off the ground and kicked squarely toward Neji's abdomen.

The kick was blindingly fast. Hyuga Neji sensed it instantly, twisting his body mid-air and dropping his left arm to block his side with his forearm.

Bang!

Her foot slammed into his forearm.

A muffled thud echoed out.

The force of the kick sent Neji flying to the side. His feet skidded across the ground for several paces, his soles plowing two shallow trenches into the dirt. His left arm trembled slightly, the sleeve torn open from the impact to reveal the reddened skin underneath.

Uchiha Sasuke reached into his ninja tool pouch again, drawing several more shuriken.

With a flick of his wrist, he sent them flying.

This time, he didn't make them collide mid-air; instead, they shot straight toward Karin.

The Two-Tomoe spun slowly in his eyes. His Sharingan was active, analyzing Uzumaki Karin's every move.

Uzumaki Karin snapped back up from her arched position, standing tall.

She raised her right hand and waved it through the air, her fingers flicking against the incoming blades. Clink, clink, clink. She swatted the shuriken away as casually as if she were shooing flies.

Hyuga Neji steadied himself. His left arm still hung limply at his side, unable to lift.

He stared at Uzumaki Karin, his brows furrowed and his expression grave.

His left hand twitched. He curled his fingers and straightened them again—it wasn't broken.

The next moment, Hyuga Neji charged at Karin once more.

The two of them locked into a fierce melee.

Neji's hands struck out relentlessly. Palms, fingers, fists, elbows, shoulders, knees, and feet—every part of his body became a weapon.

His movements were so fast they left behind a string of afterimages. His palm strikes were dense, flowing one after another like a net cast over Uzumaki Karin.

But Uzumaki Karin was even faster.

Her body wove through Neji's barrage of strikes, dodging left and right. Her feet shifted constantly across the ground in rapid, tiny steps. None of her movements were large, but every single one was perfectly placed.

She evaded every single one of Hyuga Neji's attacks.

Standing in the distance, Uchiha Sasuke rapidly wove hand signs in front of his chest.

"Fire Style: Phoenix Sage Fire Technique!"

He opened his mouth and exhaled a volley of fireballs. They weren't large—only about the size of a fist—but they burned so intensely that the air warped and distorted around them.

The fireballs shot toward Uzumaki Karin at high speed, resembling a cluster of orange-red meteors.

Catching sight of the fireballs from the corner of her eye, Uzumaki Karin darted away from Hyuga Neji. With a tap of her foot, she glided several meters away.

The fireballs flew right through where she had just been standing and crashed into the ground, exploding and leaving behind several scorched black craters.

Hyuga Neji didn't pause his assault because of the fireballs. He chased after Uzumaki Karin, clenching his right hand into a fist and driving it toward her abdomen.

Uzumaki Karin raised her right hand, catching Hyuga Neji's fist in her palm and wrapping her fingers tightly around it. Her left hand shot up from below, aiming an uppercut at his jaw.

Hyuga Neji leaned his head back, narrowly dodging the punch.

Uchiha Sasuke's fireballs flew over again. This time there were six of them, denser and faster than before.

They streaked past both sides of Neji's body, hurtling straight for Karin's face and chest.

Uzumaki Karin shoved Neji's fist away with her right hand and immediately ducked down.

The fireballs flew right over her head, singeing a few strands of her red hair and releasing the scent of burnt ends.

Seizing the opening, Hyuga Neji brought his left index and middle fingers together and thrust at Karin's shoulder.

Karin's body shifted to the side, evading the strike.

She tapped her right foot against the ground and retreated several meters, opening up the distance between them.

Uchiha Sasuke's hands were already weaving signs again. This time, the sequence was longer and far more complex.

"Fire Style: Dragon Fire Technique!"

He opened his mouth and expelled a concentrated line of fire from his throat.

The stream of fire wasn't thick—only about the width of a finger—but it was blindingly bright, shooting toward Uzumaki Karin like an orange-red serpent.

The flame traveled so fast that the air sizzled and popped as it burned.

Uzumaki Karin sidestepped, letting the line of fire streak past her and strike the ground behind her. It carved a long, scorched trench into the earth, the edges still smoking.

Hyuga Neji used the distraction to charge in once more. The two boys coordinated flawlessly—one attacking from range, the other fighting in close quarters. Uchiha Sasuke's Fire Style and shuriken cut off Karin's escape routes, while Hyuga Neji's Gentle Fist forced her to keep moving.

But they couldn't hit her. Not even once.

Her speed was simply too great, so fast that their eyes couldn't keep up with her movements. Every single one of their attacks missed by just a hair's breadth, yet that tiny margin might as well have been an uncrossable chasm.

What started as a back-and-forth exchange quickly devolved into Uzumaki Karin completely dominating the fight.

Hyuga Neji was forced onto the defensive. His Gentle Fist couldn't land a hit, but he couldn't block her punches either. As the battle dragged on, the bruises on his arms multiplied, and his breathing grew increasingly ragged.

Uchiha Sasuke's chakra was draining rapidly. Casting several Fire Style jutsu in quick succession had taken a heavy toll on his reserves.

With a powerful kick, Uzumaki Karin sent Hyuga Neji—who had crossed his arms to block—flying backward. He soared over ten meters and skidded several more before finally coming to a halt, both of his arms trembling violently.

Her figure blurred as she dashed straight for Uchiha Sasuke.

Uchiha Sasuke was startled. His Sharingan managed to track Uzumaki Karin's trajectory, but seeing it didn't mean he could dodge it.

He instinctively reached for the ninja blade at his waist. His fingers gripped the hilt, drawing the blade halfway out of its sheath.

A hand clamped down on the hilt, shoving the blade back in.

The hand wasn't large. The fingers were slender, the nails neatly trimmed.

Uzumaki Karin stood right in front of him. They were so close their faces were practically touching.

She could clearly see the Two-Tomoe in his eyes, and he could see his own reflection in her light red pupils.

She was smiling.

"Got any other tricks, pretty boy?"

Uchiha Sasuke's face darkened. He glared at Uzumaki Karin, the Two-Tomoe in his pupils spinning frantically.

The tomoe spun so fast they blurred into two dark shadows swirling within his eyes.

Then, a third tomoe appeared.

It surfaced near his pupil—first as a faint little dot, then growing darker, shifting from gray to pitch black, expanding from a speck into a fully formed tomoe.

Finally, it settled beside his pupil, slowly rotating in his eye alongside the other two.

The Three-Tomoe Sharingan.

It was obvious that Uchiha Sasuke had been pushed to his absolute limit.

Not long after leaving Konoha, he had run into an opponent like this—a girl his own age. Even teaming up with Neji, they couldn't beat her. He didn't want to lose. He couldn't lose.

Anger, frustration, humiliation... all these emotions violently clashed within him, and then, that third tomoe awakened.

Seeing this, Uzumaki Karin looked surprised.

"Wow, is it really that easy to add a tomoe to the Sharingan?"

Her voice carried genuine curiosity, as if she were observing a fascinating phenomenon.

Uchiha Sasuke ignored her, violently leaping backward to put distance between them.

Uzumaki Karin didn't pursue.

Gritting his teeth, Uchiha Sasuke began weaving hand signs.

Blue lightning gathered in his right hand. The electricity flared from his palm, spreading outward until arcs of lightning crackled across his entire body.

The lightning was so intense that his clothes began to smoke. His hair stood slightly on end from the static, and his facial expression twisted as if he were enduring immense pain.

Uzumaki Karin raised an eyebrow as she looked at the mass of blue lightning in his hand.

Then, she giggled.

The next moment, two flashes of golden light flared from her lower back.

Two golden chains shot out from her back, moving so fast they looked like streaks of golden light tearing through the air. One chain flew toward Uchiha Sasuke, while the other shot toward Hyuga Neji.

The chains slithered through the air like two golden serpents—agile, swift, and deadly accurate.

Uchiha Sasuke still had his right hand raised, but the golden chain reached him first, wrapping around him and binding him tightly.

Instantly, the lightning extinguished, and Uchiha Sasuke collapsed to the ground, his body completely stiff.

Hyuga Neji had just managed to stand up when the other chain arrived, binding him just as securely.

He tried to expel chakra from his tenketsu to blast the chain away, but it didn't budge. His chakra washed over the chain like water crashing against a rock, flowing harmlessly over its surface without any effect.

Uzumaki Karin stood between the two of them. She looked down at them, the corners of her mouth curling into an amused smile.

"If you haven't mastered that jutsu yet, you shouldn't try to use it. Aren't you afraid of half-killing yourself, pretty boy?"

The chains tightened.

The golden chains retracted toward her lower back, dragging Uchiha Sasuke and Hyuga Neji's bodies closer to her.

Uchiha Sasuke struggled, using every ounce of his strength. His muscles bulged and his veins popped, but the chains remained completely unyielding. He tried to mold his chakra, but as it flowed through his meridian system, it was suppressed by some strange power radiating from the chains. Unable to circulate his chakra smoothly, he couldn't use any ninjutsu.

On the other side, Hyuga Neji tried using his Byakugan to analyze the structure of the chains, but they were formed entirely of condensed chakra—they had no weak points.

Uzumaki Karin let out a soft chuckle as she watched them struggle.

"Be good now. The results are already in."

Her gaze shifted back and forth between Sasuke and Neji.

"So tell me, what is your true purpose for coming here?"

She paused, then added one last thing.

"Oh, and stop struggling. You're too weak. It's pointless."

Uchiha Sasuke stopped struggling. He clenched his fists so tightly that his nails dug into his palms.

He glared at Uzumaki Karin, his lips pressed tight, the Three-Tomoe in his eyes spinning rapidly.

Hyuga Neji also stopped struggling, his gaze similarly locked onto Uzumaki Karin.

Neither of them answered.

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