Chapter 41: I, Your Father, Eclipse the very Heavens

With three weeks passing without incident, Wu was starting to think Kumo didn’t want to play with him anymore. He kept himself busy by focusing on his training and teasing the increasingly affectionate Tayuya, but he didn’t appreciate being ‘ignored.’

Catching his destined lover a little off guard, Wu caressed her head while casually remarking, “I think I might visit the village of Kumo today…”

Ceasing the movements of her head, Tayuya raised her face to meet Wu’s gaze, wiping her mouth before asking, “Are you planning to attack them?”

“Hmmm…”

Running his hand along the side of Tayuya’s face, Wu gently cupped her chin as he replied, “That depends on them. I’m primarily just planning to take a look around and deliver a…message. What will you do…?”

Without having to consider her response, Tayuya replied, “I’ll wait here for you to return…”

Narrowing his eyes, Wu’s voice deepened as he mused, “That’s my girl…” Then, without him needing to remind her, Tayuya combed back her scarlet bangs and dutifully lowered her head…

…

..

.

With sharp mountains stretching far beyond the horizon, most of Kumo’s buildings needed to be built within or around mountains. Hundreds had been hollowed out to make space for Kumo’s residents, each connected by reinforced wooden skyways. This made getting around Kumo relatively inconvenient for ordinary villagers, but few complained openly as it was widely regarded as the safest of the Shinobi Nations.

Though he could have simply flown into Kumo, taking advantage of the fact it was located within a bunch of mountains, Wu climbed one of the spiraling paths carved for merchant caravans, intending to enter from the front gate.

As could be expected, the Shinobi tasked with guarding the ‘entrance’ to Kumo quickly realized Wu didn’t belong. However, as they had been given a description of the person known as ‘Saiko Dadi,’ none attempted to stop him. They just cleared a path and relayed messages to their higher-ups as quickly as possible.

Amused by the hive-like reaction, a toothy grin developed across Wu’s face as he slowly meandered his way up the mountain’s interior. He was a little interested to see who they would send out to ‘greet’ him, so he took his time reaching the entrance proper.

To Wu’s surprise, the first person of note to arrive was an impressively muscled man with bronze skin, sandy-golden hair flaring away from his scalp like fierce spikes, and rather…curious facial hair. He had shurikens tattooed on each of his shoulders, a large golden belt, and his iconic arm guards, but, even without them, Wu could have identified the man as the Raikage based on his aura alone. That, and the fact he was covered from head to toe in crackling lightning…

With an expression that looked like he could swallow the Sun whole, A glared at Wu and shouted, “So you’ve finally decided to show your face at my village, Saiko Dadi! Eager to test your strength, huh!? Let’s see if you can endure this, you snot-nosed little punk…!”

Finished with his ‘greeting,’ A managed to make every hair on Wu’s body stand on end as he blitzed forward with the literal momentum of a bolt of lightning. Wu didn’t even have time to blink before he was sent crashing into the interior wall of the mountain, accompanied by A’s muscular bicep as he shouted, “Lightning Bolt Lariat…!”

Following through with his attack, A blasted a hole in the side of the mountain, sending Wu’s body crashing through it, lightning crackling in and across his body as he internally groaned (“I may have been a little too daring…”)

Before Wu could plunge into the icy waters that filled the intersecting ravines below, A appeared next to him in an instant, grabbing him by the shoulders and hefting him over his head as he shouted, “Liger Bomb…!”

Feeling a legitimate threat to his life, Wu arrested the fall of himself and A using the greaves that allowed him to bound through the sky. This caught the dark-skinned Raikage by surprise, but his movement speed wasn’t the only thing accelerated by the lightning enveloping his body.

Using his hold on Wu’s shoulders, A tried to pull himself up and place the much smaller boy into a headlock. The moment his grip lessened even a little, however, Wu seemed to ‘disappear’ into thin air, reappearing shortly after so he could wave and remark, “You’re really fucking fast, ain’t ya…?”

Unable to change direction in mid-air, A could only grit his teeth, a sober expression on his face as Wu pulled out his red and gold staff, aiming at him before increasing its size and length in an instant. A was able to block the attack with relative ease, but he ended up being smashed into the icy waters below.

Despite nearly losing his head, Wu couldn’t help grinning as he stood in the air and waited for the Raikage’s reaction. Fortunately, the enraged ape didn’t let him down, bursting from the water and ascending into the sky as if he could fly. Wu was fortunate that he couldn’t, as it would have made dodging and his potential escape considerably more difficult.

Dodging the Raikage’s charge, Wu found himself shouting, “Olé~!” despite not knowing what it meant. Because the Raikage had targeted the face of a mountain, however, he immediately had to dodge a second time as the man came bounding back in an instant.

Unable to contain himself, Wu spun through the air, holding his gut as he cackled like an actual monkey. Then, as he dodged another one of A’s charges, he shouted, “This is fucking great! More! Show me more of what you can do…!”

“This brat…”

Burying his fist into the side of a mountain, rather than simply standing on it like a normal Shinobi, A stared up at Wu as if the latter had lost his mind. He had heard that ‘Saiko Dadi’ was a battle junky that seemed determined to challenge the entire Shinobi Wold, but seeing a young boy laughing like a crazed lunatic while his life was on the line was…disconcerting.

Seeing the Raikage just staring at him, Wu raised his brows and remarked, “Oh? You’re not coming to me? Then I suppose this grand-daddy will have to come to you!”

Contrasting his words, Wu ascended hundreds of meters into the air in an instant, a kunai appearing in his hand as he reached up to grab a clump of his longer hairs. The duration of his Hair Clones wasn’t actually fixed. The cap seemed to be an hour, but if he split hairs or cut them short, he could produce tens of thousands of clones that would ‘pop’ after a few minutes.

Though he was briefly confused by Wu’s contrary words and actions, A’s expression turned incomparably grim as the sky was abruptly blotted out by tens of thousands of clones. He knew from the reports that each clone possessed strength comparable to the original, but the most troublesome thing was-

Completing A’s thought, the 19,387 Wu’s hoisted their staves like throwing javelins before unleashing them towards the chaotic village below. To add insult to injury, each staff abruptly grew to its maximum size, quite literally blocking out the sky as the thousands of clones shouted, “Monkey Style – Imperial Bamboo Descent…!”

Though he was kind enough not to aim for any residential structures, the force of Wu’s combined blow was enough to cause a powerful earthquake throughout the Land of Lightning. It was like someone had wrung a gong, a powerful vibrational force spreading for hundreds of kilometers, causing countless landslides.

To Wu’s considerable surprise, Kumo emerged comparably unscathed, at least compared to the surrounding ten kilometers. Similar to how training weights could be reinforced with seals and chakra, drastically increasing their weight, density, and durability, the mountains comprising Kumo had been fortified to their core. It was honestly a little impressive…

Interrupting Wu’s appreciation of his work, a sphere of superdense, inky purple Chakra came hurtling toward him the moment his clones vanished. Its density was so great that it caused the space around it to distort, but Wu just had to dodge a few meters to the side for it to sail past him and toward the horizon.

*Big Bada Boom*

As a bluish-white explosion bright enough to humble the Sun dominated the horizon, its size dwarfing and annihilating the surrounding mountains, Wu’s left eye twitched as he remarked, “Am I being one-upped…?”

Interrupting Wu’s thoughts, a dragon formed of black lightning surged up and enveloped him in an instant, sending excruciating pain throughout his body. When the lightning dispersed, eyes were eerily unaffected, simply gaining a fiery hue, but a plume of black smoke emanated from his throat when he coughed.

Despite enduring more pain than he had ever experienced, the smile on Wu’s face appeared relaxed, almost affectionate. He felt as though his insides had been charred, but he didn’t give a damn as he combed his fingers through the smoking remains of his hair and sighed, “So I’m not the strongest…what a relief…”

As his consciousness began to slip away, Wu released the charred hair in his hands before shrinking down to his smallest size, entrusting his body to one of his clones while hundreds more split off and charged into Kumo, thrashing everything with a headband. Most lasted less than a minute, but that was more than enough of a distraction to let Wu to escape, even with two Jinchuriki doing their best to track him…

…

..

.

With hours passing since Wu’s departure, Tayuya was beginning to feel nervous and, though she would never admit it, lonely. Ever since she had placed her future into Wu’s hands, the two of them had grown closer at an almost alarming level. Wu had explained this was likely due to something called the ‘Suspension Bridge Effect,’ but when she asked what he meant, not even he knew for sure.

Exhaling a hot sigh, Tayaya removed her hand from between her thighs, unceremoniously wiping it on Wu’s pillow before rising from the bed they shared each night. She was currently nude but didn’t mind it as much of the initial chill that had permeated the cave had waned. Now, the interior was filled with warmth and the lingering smell of delicious food. Wu took cooking ‘very’ seriously, so everything he made was equal parts nutritious and delectable.

Opening the small freezer that Wu had produced from his seemingly magical bag, Tayuya briefly eyed the large container of ice cream in the corner before immediately tearing her eyes away. The last time she had pilfered some of the delicious treat for herself, Wu had literally smacked her bottom until she apologized. Thus, even though she, like most girls her age, had an affection for all things sweet, she pulled out one of the frozen slabs of meat and prepared to grill it.

As someone who had only cooked over a campfire, never caring about the taste of her food, Tayuya was unsuccessful in her attempt to emulate Wu. She avoided burning the meat, but the texture was dry, and the flavor was all over the place. She was sure she had cooked it the way Wu usually did, but the taste couldn’t even be compared…

After begrudgingly devouring the piece of meat, still completely naked, Tayuya wiped her hands and face clean before using Wu’s toothbrush to brush her teeth. He had given her an incredibly judgmental deadpan the first time she did it but never expressly forbade her from doing so. Thus, even though it was ‘incredibly unhygienic,’ according to Wu, Tayuya gave her teeth a good scrubbing before rinsing her mouth and spitting into the bucket placed off to the side. After that, with nothing better to do, she crawled back into the bed and continued where she had left off before, her cheeks immediately gaining a ruddy hue as she exhaled a faint, “You better fucking return…”

…

..

.