Both Todoroki and Guy walked deeper into the village, and soon, the tallic stench of blood reached their noses.
They exchanged a look. Sothing was very wrong.
They checked a few houses along the way—each one empty. No signs of struggle. No signs of life.
"No need to search anymore," Guy said quietly, sniffing the air again. "I can sll it clearly now... the blood. It's coming from the center of the village."
Todoroki nodded. He trusted Guy's senses—especially his enhanced sense of sll.
But then, a dreadful realization struck him.
If the blood's fresh, and no one's in the houses…
"Damn it!" Todoroki cursed and broke into a sprint toward the center of the village.
Guy didn't waste ti. With a flicker of chakra, he used teleportation and vanished from the spot, reappearing at the village center.
What he saw made his blood boil—but not a trace of it showed on his face. His expression remained calm. His posture, still and steady.
Monts later, Todoroki arrived, panting slightly. But then his breath caught.
Before them stood a grim scene—a large, raised altar-like structure, dark stone stained with fresh blood. Around it, dozens of villagers lay lifeless, and more were lined up, bound and trembling, waiting to be the next sacrifice.
Surrounding the altar were 50 to 60 figures, all dressed in identical robes, each bearing a red blood-star emblem across their chests. Their presence was coordinated, deliberate. A cult.
A cult of evil ninja.
Todoroki's fists clenched.
"This…" he muttered, eyes narrowing. "This is the worst-case scenario."
…
Because Guy had used teleportation and was concealing his chakra, his arrival went completely unnoticed. Hidden in the shadows, he observed the scene silently, his presence undetected.
Todoroki, however, had arrived in a rush, his chakra only partially suppressed. His footsteps were loud, and his urgency obvious.
The mont he appeared, the eerie chanting from the 50 or so cult mbers halted. Dozens of hooded heads turned toward him, eyes cold and devoid of empathy.
An older cultist stepped forward, his voice low and questioning. "Is he from this village?"
Another cult mber, the one responsible for rounding up the villagers, replied, "No. I didn't see him here before. He's not from this village."
The older cultist's expression hardened. "Capture him. We'll offer him to our master as well."
Imdiately, five robed figures broke from the circle, moving swiftly toward Todoroki with clear intent to capture and restrain.
Todoroki didn't flinch. He glanced toward Guy's position and said, "Onii-san, let deal with these pieces of shit."
Guy, still unseen by the cultists, gave a small nod from the shadows. He remained still—watchful, but calm.
anwhile, the older cult leader turned toward another mber—a large man holding a broad saber, the blade still dripping with fresh blood. "Continue the ritual. The villagers must not be wasted."
The butcher cult mber gave a solemn nod, ready to resu the ritual. He raised his blood-soaked saber high above the trembling villager.
But before the blade could fall, Guy appeared beside him in an instant—silent and sudden—gripping the saber between two fingers.
The cult leader's eyes widened. Teleportation... and that speed? That caught him off guard.
However, seeing the blade stopped between fingers didn't impress him much. "Tch. That's nothing. Even a chunin could do that with enough physical strength," he muttered under his breath.
But his expression changed when flas erupted.
Without hesitation, Guy activated fire magic, and the butcher was engulfed in a sudden pillar of fla. Screams barely had ti to escape the cultist's mouth before his body was reduced to charred remains within seconds.
The bound villager, who had been seconds away from death, trembled and looked up at Guy with wide, tearful eyes. "T-Thank you... Thank you so much…"
Guy, a man of few words, gave only a short nod. "Hmm."
The villager began to cry. "We—we didn't know what was happening. They used so kind of ninjutsu. Everyone in the village... they controlled them. Started killing—sacrificing—like we weren't even people…"
Guy crouched and examined the villager carefully—his pupils, breathing, and skin.
He shook his head. "It's not ninjutsu. Most likely... they poisoned all of you with hallucinogens, then followed it with hypnotic conditioning. You weren't trapped in a genjutsu—your mind was twisted in real ti."
He looked toward the remains of the altar and the ritual area. "They probably lifted the hypnosis just before the sacrifice... possibly for so ritualistic condition. Conscious fear might have been part of their requirents."
The villager stared in horror as the truth sank in.
Guy said calmly, "Go. Stand with the others. Don't worry—no one else will die from now on."
The villager nodded quickly, his legs still shaky, and turned to rejoin the small group of surviving villagers.
But he had only taken five or six steps when the already cold night air suddenly turned unnaturally frigid. A sharp, biting chill swept through the clearing—as if winter had descended in an instant.
The villager paused, his breath visible now in the sudden cold. He turned toward the source of the temperature drop—and what he saw made his eyes widen in disbelief.
Towering before him was a massive ice formation, at least ten ters tall, jagged and shimring in the moonlight like a mountain of frozen death.
The cult mbers, too, had stopped what they were doing, montarily stunned by the sheer scale of the icy structure.
Todoroki stood at its base, one fist still outstretched from the technique he had just unleashed: Heaven-Piercing Ice Wall.
The cult mbers who had rushed to capture him were now completely encased inside the thick, clear ice. Their faces were frozen mid-motion, their bodies suspended like lifeless dolls.
Todoroki didn't hesitate.
He took a deep breath, then drove his fist into the base of the massive ice wall.
With a deafening crack, the towering ice structure shattered, splintering into countless jagged shards.
And with it, every cult mber trapped inside was pulverized—shattered and crushed, their bodies breaking apart like brittle glass.
The silence that followed was cold and absolute.
High on the altar platform, the cult leader stared in horror. He swallowed hard, his confidence broken.
First, the red-haired boy had appeared like a ghost, using fire magic without any hand seals.
Now, the boy with half-red, half-white hair had conjured a massive ice jutsu and wiped out a dozen of his n in seconds.
"Wh—What are these monsters?" he muttered under his breath. "Where did they co from…?"
----
Want to get daily updates and read chapters on a daily basis? Then join my Patreon!
Patreon Link: s[email protected]/Hkj822
User Comments
0 comments from readers