Chapter 695 : WEAK (Patreon)

Ay's arm hit the desk, obliterating it to smithereens! However, at that very instant, the eyes of all Kumogakure ninjas present widened. They instinctively raised their guard and grabbed their weapons. The reason for their reaction was that the desk that had blown up suddenly released some fluids. In addition, Nanako suddenly sensed some additional seals!

Ay, who had one of the best reaction speeds of all ninjas, was caught off guard. To make matters worse, his speed was far lesser without the Lightning Chakra Mode active. Due to how close he was, his right arm was covered by that fluid. In addition, his clothes, the parts of his chest and even some parts of his face and neck were sprayed with that liquid!

“Brother!”
“Raikage-sama!”
Instinctively, Ay activated his Lightning Chakra Mode as others called out worriedly. Nanako cursed, ‘Shit! How did I not see those seals? If that liquid is poisonous, then we would be doomed!’

Nanako recalled how horrifyingly strong their opponent was. However, what horrified her even more was his bag of tricks! If the Raikage was subdued and Akuro managed to neutralize Bee in a similar way, Kumogakure would be doomed. The same thoughts ran through the minds of the four Elite Jounins.

To their relief, Ay showed no signs of pain and said loudly, “Calm down, I'm fine.”
He turned his gaze towards the Elite Jounin who had some expertise in medical ninjutsu and said, “Check what this liquid is. Even though I didn't feel any pain, I felt a mild burning sensation initially. It might have some other effects or a delayed reaction.”

The Elite Jounin nodded and immediately inspected Ay. Ay's right arm as well as the golden vambrace were dyed pink! Half of his face, nearly his entire neck and his exposed chest were dyed pink as well! The Elite Jounin frowned and was about to check his clothes when Nanako shouted, “Be careful! The seals are behaving weirdly.”

Nanako had a grim expression. She could sense that the few foreign seals left inside the building were activating. In addition, the seals on the outside walls were behaving strangely as well. In a grim tone, she muttered, “We may have fallen into a dangerous trap!”

Lightning appeared around Ay's body once again as he said seriously, “Let him come.”

The others prepared themselves as well. To their surprise, Akuro didn't appear. The seals didn't trigger any additional attacks on them either. Instead, words started appearing on the wall.

Boring… I'm disappointed. I expected better after fighting those kids. Seeing your desperation, I shall spare this village for the time being. I will visit again in the future. If your Raikage continues hiding cowardly, then I won't show any mercy.

As they read the message, every single one had a dark expression. Ay's expression was a sight to see. He clenched his fists and gritted his teeth. Under normal circumstances, several things, perhaps even the walls, would have been smashed. Unfortunately, Ay couldn't even do that in case something else sprayed on his body!

Outside the building, the two thousand ninjas had a shocked expression as well. The seals covering the building had disappeared. Instead, a few large and bold letters carved into the building appeared.

The Raikage Building was a five-storey building, located at the heart of Kumogakure. Every single person in the village looked at it with awe and admiration. However, at this moment, the ninjas standing outside, along with some others who had good eyesight, were seeing something they never imagined.

A large ‘W’ was carved on the four walls of the top floor. Right underneath it on the next floor was an ‘E’. These two letters were followed by ‘A’ and ‘K’ on the floors below them. Due to how they were written, they were visible from almost every direction.

Thousands of people living inside Kumogakure saw ‘WEAK’ written on the building which was a symbol of their power! A wave of humiliation and anger washed over them. Thousands of fists clenched and teeth gritted against each other. Never had they experienced such humiliation. Even though Kumogakure suffered several losses in history, they had never been bullied to such an extent!

Needless to say, Fujin had no interest in humiliating Ay or the citizens of Kumogakure. If it didn't benefit him, he would never engage in such superficial acts. The reason why he went out of his way to humiliate Ay was to enrage him even more and ensure that he would go all out to hunt Akuro down. That would ensure that he could get a battle whenever he wanted it.

Similarly, the reason for humiliating others in Kumogakure was to spur them further. Even though Kabuto's absence would make Obito's side much weaker, Kumogakure's losses due to Fujin's actions were very high. Even though the number of ninjas he killed was less than 10% of Kumogakure's total force, the ninjas he killed were all elites who were ready to participate in a war. Among the ones he killed, there wasn't even a single Genin!

As such, Kumogakure's losses were far worse than what the numbers indicated. In a way, it was comparable to Konoha losing most of their veteran Jounins during the Nine Tails’ assault. Luckily, they weren't reeling from the losses caused by a great war and their Kage and Jinchuriki were still safe. Otherwise, they would have been in worse shape than what Konoha was in after Minato's death.

Under normal circumstances, Kumogakure might require around 5 to 7 years to guide their young ninjas and turn them into elites to replace the dead. Fujin just hoped that humiliating them in such a manner might push them to do so in 3 to 4 years, right when the Akatsuki would be very active.

Of course, doing so also left some holes in the persona Fujin created for Akuro. The fact that he set a trap which was triggered by Ay destroying the desk would make Kumogakure suspect that Akuro wasn't unaware of the Raikage and his personality, which in turn could make them suspect all of Akuro's words. He made some arrangements to confuse them further, but they weren't foolproof.

However, Fujin didn't care much about that. After all, he had just created the backstory to mess with the minds of anyone who tried to investigate him. If anything, such suspicion would just confuse them further. Even if they obtained irrefutable evidence that he wasn't from the ancient era, it wouldn't harm him in any way. As long as no one connected Akuro to Fujin, he didn't care.

In the Raikage's office, a stunned expression was visible on Nanako's face. Ay asked, “What's the matter?”

Nanako replied, “After this message appeared, all the foreign seals disappeared. I don't sense any strange seal inside the building.”

She turned her gaze towards the sensor and said, “Try sensing. See if you can sense the entire building.”

The sensor nodded and activated his chakra field. He said, “I can't extend my chakra field into the Anbu Headquarters due to the seals there, but I can inspect the entire building. I don't sense anyone here.”

Despite such an answer, Nanako wasn't thrilled. She muttered, “I wanted to observe the seals and study this formation. If I could, we could have recreated it and strengthened our Fuinjutsu knowledge. I didn't think he'd leave a trigger that would destroy the entire formation! I have to admit, his application of Fuinjutsu is far superior to mine.”

Ay didn't want to see one of his handful Grandmasters demoralized. He said, “Don't underestimate yourself. He should have had access to far more information than you. I'm sure that the next time the two of you meet, you'll break his formation.”

Nanako nodded and said, “Thank you, Raikage-sama.”

Bee suddenly asked seriously, “Didn't Darui say that he claimed to be from an ancient era and didn't have an idea about how strong you were? How did he know that you'd smash the desk?”

Ay was puzzled as well. Before he could think of anything, Nanako answered, “The trigger might not have been the breaking of the desk. I assume that he wanted to show this message to Raikage-sama. So the trigger could have been simply touching the desk. In addition…”

Her expression became grim as she continued, “Inazuma had ordered to check whether everyone had escaped from the building. We found out that 5 didn't make it. Four were the dead Anbu we found. However, the last one is still missing. And that person is Kiyoshi.

So many seals can't appear suddenly. In addition, keeping them hidden from not just me but also the other Grandmasters is incredibly difficult even considering Akuro's expertise. As difficult as this is to believe, I suspect that Kiyoshi helped him by secretly placing these seals after our last inspection. He could've given Akuro some information about you.”

“Kiyoshi…” Ay muttered, having a tough time believing that he was a traitor. One of the Elite Jounins said, “I would've never imagined old man Kiyoshi to be a traitor. He was so cheerful and always helped everyone.”

Nanako nodded. She couldn't believe it either. Suddenly, the one who was examining Ay called out, “Raikage-sama, I've examined this liquid…”

He had a weird expression on his face as he spoke, making everyone curious. Ay asked, “What is it?”

Ay's expression became increasingly dark as the Elite Jounin replied strangely, “I still need to do more studies to confirm, but everything I have seen so far makes me believe that it is nothing but a conductive pigment. However, it is a very strong one and bonds very quickly with our skin. Your lightning amplified it even further. I'm afraid that the stains it left behind will be very difficult to remove…”

[A/N: Initially planned to use explosions when Ay smashes his desk, but this suggestion was far better and suitable to the situation, lol. Hope you guys enjoyed and thanks for the ideas in the comments :)]