A Sand four-man squad that was rushing towards the next checkpoint assigned to them for finding any traces of the missing Roran Survivors stopped suddenly.

The captain of the squad quickly questioned the last man at the back, "Hey, Akira! What happened? Why did you stop all of a sudden? Did you find anything?" ​​

The Sand ninja named Akira who stopped all of a sudden pointed at the horizon on the left side in a daze, "Captain, look there! How come there is that golden light shining?"

Hearing Akira's words not only the captain but the rest of the members of the squad also turned to look at the left horizon only to find that it was shining brightly with a dazzling golden light. The brilliance wasn't any inferior to that of the Sun itself.

"Golden Glow?"

"Could it be the Sun?"

"Don't be idiotic fat chump, the Sun is shining above, how could it be Sun?"

"Then is it a Mirage?"

'Could it really be some sort of Mirage?' – thought the captain while observing the distant sky with a frowning expression.

And a similar scene was taking place around the other checkpoints where Kuroto's fight took place. Many four-man squads that were rushing to find the traces of Roran Survivors along the border connecting the Land of Wind and the Land of Rain all stopped and looked at the brilliant Golden Light Shining in the sky.

After some deliberation, the captain of the squad who was a Jonin asked the ninja next to him thoughtfully, "Check the map, see which squads are responsible for that direction?"

The ninja nodded and immediately answered after checking the map, "According to the details, Squad – 78 and Squad – 91 are responsible for that direction!"

"Squad – 78 and Squad – 91?....... hmm...… If I didn't guess wrong, Nobu and Yusuke should be the Jonin captain of these two squads!" – muttered the captain while tapping his chin with a thoughtful expression.

As soon as the rest of the ninjas heard the Captain's words, everyone's expression sank as the captain muttered with a gloomy look, "Neither Nobu nor Yusuke can make such big movements in the battle, for something to have caused such a scene that its traces are visible all the way here means that something isn't right!"

"But captain are you really sure that the golden light might be coming because of some battle?" – asked a ninja in worry.

"Although I am not sure, this is still the most logical explanation, Akira check; if you can sense any chakra signature being emitted from that direction!" – ordered the captain in a hurry.

Nodding at the captain's words Akira crouched down and placed his hand on the sand as he concentrated on sensing the chakra fluctuations from the direction where the golden light was being emitted.

Not long after, Akira opened his eyes in a horrifying expression, and seeing his expression; the captain understood that he is right.

To confirm his guess, Akira muttered, "This is the first time I have sensed such dense Chakra, there is definitely someone there and he/she is very strong, but because of too heavy chakra pressure, I can't determine anything else."

The Jonin captain nodded, he already expected as much.

The Sand Village has already mobilized a majority of its forces to not only chase down the Roran Survivors but also to find the person responsible for stealing the Ryuumyaku and also to search for traces of the person named 'Oni' responsible for disrupting their entire search operation in the starting.

There is still no confirmation whether the same person is responsible for all these things or maybe more than one person or an entire organization, so without taking any chances Yondaime Kazekage mobilized most of the ninjas of the Sand Village.

After all, the Ryuumyaku was personally sealed by the Yondaime Hokage of Konoha, someone was not only able to successfully break through the seals; that their entire village couldn't accomplish in so many years, but also stole it overnight.

This alone shows that the person they are dealing with is not some ordinary ninja; if Sand Village can catch them then not only can they obtain the Ryuumyaku but also torture out the much-needed knowledge of Fuinjutsu from him.

This is the reason why all the ninjas were ordered to be extremely serious for this mission. Therefore, the spectacle in the distance made the sand ninja all over the border realize that something is happening in that direction, and this also worried them for the safety of the two squads that were responsible for searching there.

Everyone more or less guessed that ordinary ninjas can't make such a scene, so the only possibility is that the person who stole the Ryuumyaku is in that direction.

Realizing this, the Sand shinobi squads did not dare to delay any longer and immediately rushed to the place where they might find the person responsible for stealing the Ryuumyaku.

…

On Kuroto's side.

"Damn it, the chakra consumption of the Golden Wheel Reincarnation Explosion is too high!"

Just now, a single slash from the Golden Sword exhausted most of the Ryuumyaku Chakra that Kuroto has refined, so at this time he was a little reluctant to maintain the Tenseigan Chakra Mode.

But Kuroto can't afford to deactivate the Tenseigan Chakra Mode currently, at least not until he kills Yusuke, because no other attack could reach down to hundreds of meters below the ground, therefore Golden Wheel Reincarnation Explosion is his best bet!

After all, at that depth, no simple attack would eliminate the guy.

Gritting his teeth, Kuroto directly used the Ryuumyaku Chakra without refining and forcibly urged the Golden Sword to accurately slash the target using the weak Chakra he had at this time.

Anyone who has witnessed his Tenseigan Chakra Mode must be eliminated, otherwise, the intelligence of his abilities will be revealed, Kuroto doesn't want his existence to be known yet, so eliminating any and all witnesses is necessary and will save him from the unwanted hassle.

Huala…

The Golden Sword again cut the deserts into a deep divide, easily slashing hundreds of meters this time, and at the same time completely eliminating any signs of life in its path.

wheeze…

After confirming that the Sand Jonin Yusuke was dead, Kuroto sighed lightly.

But before he could relax, the golden Sword in his hands automatically collapsed.

Not just that, starting from his fingers, the Tenseigan Chakra Cloak started fading away following which his fingers started turning grey bit by bit.

"This!?"

In shock Kuroto hurriedly landed on the ground and used the remaining of the Tenseigan Chakra to resist the petrification effect that began to spread from the tip of his fingers.

However, because he has already used most of the Tenseigan Chakra that he had refined previously in using the truth-Seeking Balls and finally in the Golden Wheel Reincarnation Explosion, therefore the Tenseigan Chakra in his body wasn't enough to resist the petrification.

As a result, the petrification gradually started to spread from the tip of his fingers up to his wrist and down to the elbow.

"I-it's the corrosion from the invasion of Natural Energy!" – Kuroto was suddenly panicked because of the situation.

If someone hasn't mastered the Senjutsu, then the person will be gradually returning closer to nature by the invasion of the natural energy, so the petrification effect that is slowly spreading along his right hand will eventually turn him into a stone!

The reason why Kuroto's body is petrifying is that the natural energy present in Ryuumyaku's Chakra has invaded inside him.

If he refines the Ryuumyaku's Chakra into the Tenseigan Chakra before using it then there's no problem, but because he didn't have any option left at the last second, Kuroto had to directly use the Ryuumyaku Chakra for the second slash of the Golden Sword, so this is the result.

Initially, he thought that just using it once shouldn't be that much harmful but because the chakra consumption of Golden Wheel Reincarnation Explosion is too high, so he unconsciously allowed the invasion of a large amount of natural energy inside him, and since Kuroto is a complete stranger to Senjutsu, therefore, his body is being petrified.

Even after trying to resist the corrosion of Natural Energy, the petrifying effect didn't stop and continued to spread up to the shoulder!

Seeing that the situation was getting worse by the second, and if the petrification spread to his internal organs then everything will be over, so gritting his teeth Kuroto used the Secret Technique of Physical Regeneration to extract more Tenseigan Chakra from the new cells in his body to resist the Natural Energy's invasion.

It will cost him his lifespan but Kuroto can't care about it for now.

As soon as the chakra from the newly divided cells was extracted; the Cyan flames of the Tenseigan Chakra Cloak again lit and resisted the petrification effect.

Slowly but surely, the greyish hands started to turn normal, and finally, after a few minutes passed, his hand returned to normal once again.

After a while, the natural energy inside his body was also cleared off.

"Phew…"

Breathing a sigh of relief Kuroto thought to himself, 'Fortunately it happened now, otherwise if the invasion of Natural Energy were to take place during a battle, then I would have been done for!'

While being attacked by the Natural Energy, let alone fighting, even defending or escaping would become impossible while resisting the corrosion of the Natural Energy, so experiencing this now although scared him, he was still glad that he did.

After all, it's a blessing in disguise; with this prior knowledge, Kuroto can try to see if he can find any countermeasure or simply try to learn Senjutsu.

With that decided, Kuroto glanced at the battlefield one last time to confirm that everyone was dead and he didn't leave any traces of his identity, and after putting away all his thoughts he quickly disappeared with a Body Flicker.

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Read up to Chapter - 227 on P.a.t.r.e.o.n. : p-atreon.com/Milta_translations