Naruto: Passerby and Returnee

Chapter 310 The Calamity of the Mad Tree

"The shadow clones that infiltrated the children have disappeared, and they are facing a life-or-death crisis."

At the same time, all of Naruto's friends received the news and immediately took action.

Because the king became extremely uneasy after losing his guards, Jiraiya and Sakura were both assigned to stay by his side as bodyguards. The king, of course, trusted Jiraiya, one of the legendary Sannin, more. He appeared incredibly calm, but in reality, he was extremely anxious about not being able to see anyone. However, Naruto's shadow clone wouldn't consider personal emotions in an emergency; he uttered a single sentence and flew away with Jiraiya, leaving Sakura alone.

On the other hand, the shadow clone beside Ye Ming also said the same thing. Ye Ming was so anxious that he was sweating profusely. He made up his mind and ordered, "Everyone, abandon your heavy armor! Only carry light weapons! Strive to get to Ramball City as quickly as possible!"

The crackling sound echoed all the way. Abandoning heavy armor wouldn't affect a well-trained unit; their armor was designed for quick disassembly, specifically for such situations. What was truly remarkable was that the squad executed the order without the slightest hesitation, uniformly discarding what was vital to the soldiers' lives.

It must have taken a lot of effort for a small country to train such a team.

On the other hand, Hashirama, who was initially very averse to direct contact with the Ten-Tails' roots, saw the situation through the tree at the entrance. Ignoring the possibility of being captured, he immediately remotely activated the trees underground to intercept the rampant roots. The sudden situation seemed to activate the roots' defense mechanisms; they began to grow wildly, threatening to collapse the temple.

Fortunately, Naruto had more than one clone left in the city. They had a clear division of labor: one was evacuating the frightened children, one was gathering power in unseen places to directly destroy the branch, and one was constantly using Wind Release to cut down trees, although it seemed that the more they cut, the more there were... but they had no choice but to cut them down!

By the way, what about the host who was controlled by Black Zetsu? Was it this guy causing trouble behind the scenes? The clone's senses aren't as sharp as the main body's, and it gets confused when there are many people. It's a bit much for him to be distracted while protecting the crowd and looking for someone.

Jiraiya landed amidst the chaos, next to the shadow clone responsible for crafting the decisive blow. The gradually forming black sphere sent chills down Jiraiya's spine.

"No, you're going to throw this into the city?"

"Of course I know we can't just explode here! Hurry up and go down to save people." Naruto kicked him off the building with a heavy kick, which had a hint of settling a personal score.

Jiraiya had no time to deal with the children. Even before he landed, numerous thick, eerily grayish-white branches had pierced the ground and the temple's thick outer walls, greedily reaching out to the terrified civilians who couldn't move. Jiraiya was skilled in Earth Release and Fire Release, but neither seemed to be very effective right now. He could only pull out his Lion's Dance technique, trying to rescue people while simultaneously cutting off as many branches as possible.

"Why don't you split into two?" In such a large area, Jiraiya didn't see many Narutos. This was completely different from the students he knew.

"Something happened at Hozuki Castle, and the main body isn't here," one of Naruto replied during a break from rescuing people.

Oh, no wonder there weren't many clones. It turns out they were clones all along, and they simply couldn't disperse too much chakra. Were these two incidents pre-arranged? And they all happened on the same day; this must be a real hardship for their only mobile unit. However... the incident at Hozuki Castle, and Konoha's Nine-Tails arriving immediately... that's not a good excuse to come up with. Hopefully, it's something truly serious, so Konoha can use the excuse of Kusagakure's inadequate oversight to cover it up.

However, now was not the time to think about such things. The branches surging from the ground had a second stage, shaking the entire plaza. The ground seemed like an endless black hole, constantly spewing out dangerous, man-eating monsters. Moreover, the tree roots were no longer just gray and white; many normal-colored roots were intertwined with the gray and white ones. These things seemed to be constantly writhing and growing, the danger level rising sharply. However, when Jiraiya prepared to set the fire, he discovered that some of the less thick gray roots had been cut off by the normal-colored roots!

Before Jiraiya could even process what was happening, a deafening roar came from the direction of the main hall, which had been pierced by tree roots. The building finally succumbed to the devastation and collapsed into ruins. But Naruto, standing above, was unaffected. He floated in the air, the black object in his hand almost invisible against the night sky. However, Jiraiya could still barely make out from the gap in the starry sky that the object was no longer spherical, but rather resembled a sharp horn.

"Clear the way!"

At Naruto's command, most of the Narutos disappeared, except for the original three. A sharp buzzing sound came from the wind, and Jiraiya watched as one of the Narutos pushed the Rasenshuriken towards the center of the emerging tree roots, while the other two followed him in a vertical line. In an instant, the three Narutos rushed into the ground and disappeared.

Although Jiraiya knew that shadow clones should be used in this way, his heart still skipped a beat for some reason. It wasn't that he was afraid of the thing that could destroy the city exploding, but that he was afraid that Naruto would just disappear like that.

Based on their brief contact, he deduced that these tree roots possessed the ability to absorb chakra. While not particularly fast, it was still extremely deadly for ninjas. This meant their attacks would be gradually weakened, and they couldn't afford to touch the roots carelessly, or they would face a double loss of chakra. This was something he had never seen before. If... Naruto's clones couldn't solve the problem, would Naruto himself rush in? The thought sent a chill down his spine. He quickly banished the dangerous idea and turned to light a fire around the outer edge of the plaza, attempting to restrict the roots' movement.

Fortunately, everything is moving in a positive direction. The roots are starting to slow down and gradually stop moving. Many of them are being pressed back to the ground by the roots of normal color, which means that Naruto underground has succeeded.

Jiraiya breathed a huge sigh of relief, but when he turned around, he saw a large group of soldiers scattered by the tree roots and a chaotic city, and immediately realized that he had relaxed too soon.

Their troubles have only just begun.