Kakashi didn't believe the Hozuki clan Genin could have survived his Lightning Clone. He dispelled the Water Prison Technique holding Terumi Mei.
The situation was dire. They were completely out of supplies, their bodies barely capable of continuing the fight. Facing the remaining Ninja Swordsmen would demand everything they had left. His chakra levels and injuries were critical. Carrying the girl whose arms had been broken, the young shinobi shoved two soldier pills into his mouth, chewing hastily before swallowing.
He coughed up mouthfuls of blood, his breathing growing increasingly difficult. His eyelids felt heavy. Overwhelmed by pain, Kakashi collapsed. The impact jolted Mei awake. Her hair, tangled and matted with mud and water droplets, spread across the ground. The smell of rotting leaves made her want to sit up, but she realized her hands wouldn't respond.
Rolling over and using her core strength, she managed to sit up. Only then did she see the silver-haired boy hovering on the brink of death.
"Kakashi!"
Tears didn't even have time to fall. The boy on the ground looked like a discarded rag doll, head lolling downwards, blood seeping into the damp soil.
Mei knelt beside him, using her thighs to gently turn his head aside, preventing him from suffocating in a puddle.
"I'm... not dead yet," Kakashi managed, his lips barely moving. His Lightning Clone had self-destructed and vanished; even if that Hozuki kid wasn't dead, he wouldn't be coming after them again. Any random Genin could probably finish him off in that state.
Vision began returning to his left eye. The intense pain racking the silver-haired boy's body started to recede, replaced by something else.
Chakra Unit Upgrade Complete.
A faint smile touched Kakashi's lips. Perfect timing.
He had 1.3 units of chakra left – just enough to exchange for a recovery potion.
Mei had fallen into despair, certain they would both die here. Even if no other ninja came to finish them off, their injuries were too severe to survive until morning.
Suddenly, a small bottle materialized beside Kakashi. The girl blinked, thinking her eyes were playing tricks on her...
"Why... how did that potion appear again?" she murmured, bewildered.
"You still have the energy to question things? Good."
Kakashi, whose hands were miraculously unbroken now, twisted off the cap. He pinched Mei's chin, forcing her mouth open, and unceremoniously poured half the contents down her throat.
He downed the remaining half in one gulp.
Amazingly, Mei felt sensation returning to her arms.
"What is this medicine?"
"Life-saving medicine."
Aside from her arms, the girl's other injuries weren't severe. As feeling returned fully, the relief of escaping death washed over her, but there was no time for joy. Several other Mist shinobi were still eyeing this small island menacingly.
Kakashi felt his torn skin slowly knitting back together, even sensing his internal organs repairing themselves. The recovery process was much faster this time compared to the first and second times he'd used the potion. Does it heal based on a percentage? he wondered briefly. How it fixed broken ribs and arms, the boy couldn't comprehend. But then again, this "system" defied science and logic, so there was no point dwelling on it.
Vision fully returned to both eyes. The unobstructed field of view felt wonderfully familiar. Fighting with the blind spot on his left had significantly hampered his taijutsu.
Kakashi was certain the other Mist ninja had heard and seen the battle on this island.
His senses picked up the two remaining chakra signatures closing in. They felt familiar – Nuibari and Shibuki. As for why one swordsman was still missing, Kakashi could only assume they had retreated earlier or were outside his detection range.
The Shibuki user was approaching much faster than the Nuibari wielder and was closer.
Kakashi walked back to Suikazan Fuguki's headless corpse. He picked up the ninja pouch from the blood-soaked ground and opened it. Inside were soldier pills several times larger than normal, almost the size of small fruits. Ignoring the grime and blood, he stuffed them into his mouth, chewing and swallowing quickly to replenish his energy.
His body rapidly converted the pills into chakra. Kakashi truly felt the advantage of the system now; after such a brutal fight, his stamina and injuries had recovered by over seventy percent in such a short time. It gave the silver-haired boy the dangerous illusion that he could take on several more opponents.
Arrogance is the surest path to death.
He immediately squashed the thought. Kakashi waited until his chakra recovered to just over 1.2 units, then exchanged it for another recovery potion, storing it away for the next battle.
Mei also ate one of the oversized soldier pills. The metallic tang of blood on it nearly made her gag, but this was no time for squeamishness. She forced herself to keep it down.
She recognized the headless body, and the severed head she'd seen earlier – Suikazan Fuguki, the wielder of Samehada, the most difficult of the Seven Swords to control.
He was fighting an enemy like that...?
Recalling her own inability to defeat the Genin from her village just moments ago, Mei's expression turned complex, her spirits sinking. She didn't even want to count how many times Kakashi had saved her. Weakness felt like the original sin.
"We'll have to fight the wielders of Shibuki and Nuibari next," Kakashi explained succinctly. "We should encounter the Shibuki user first, then the Nuibari user within half an hour. If we can kill them both, we might be able to escape this hellhole. Kirigakure, having lost several Jōnin consecutively, probably won't send more fodder to die. They'll likely investigate covertly first, giving us some time to rest. We'll probably be number one on Kiri's most wanted list by then."
"Mn." Mei nodded, using the relatively clean water near the edge of the battle-scarred clearing to wash her orange hair.
"Kakashi," she said softly, "I believe you can make it out of the Land of Water alive."
"It's we," he corrected her deliberate slip of the tongue. The silver-haired boy understood she was falling back into self-deprecation, feeling weak again. He wasn't sure how to comfort her.
"If you want to get stronger, I can teach you."
Mei didn't answer. Getting stronger wasn't something that happened overnight. Enhancing a Kekkei Genkai required a foundation of physical conditioning and chakra capacity, both of which demanded time.
The recent battle had made the difference in their abilities painfully clear. The title 'Konoha Jōnin' hadn't been a lie; Kakashi had never deceived her. It was her own misplaced pride and the sense of superiority derived from her Kekkei Genkai that had made her refuse to believe someone her age could possess such strength. Stripped of her bloodline advantage, the girl felt like she had nothing left, and rebuilding her confidence would take time and effort.
"Wait... the situation's changed..."
At the very edge of Kakashi's sensory range, two new chakra signatures suddenly appeared. Their intensity, their speed...
The silver-haired boy instantly retracted his senses to avoid detection.
"We have to go. Now! If we don't leave right now, we're really finished."
Confused as to why Kakashi, who had just been planning to fight the two swordsmen to the death, was suddenly urging retreat, Mei felt a simultaneous wave of relief and puzzlement.
"Where can we go?"
"Inland! Hurry!"
Grabbing the girl's hand, Kakashi took off, running faster than he ever had in his life.
The newcomers were his sensei, Konoha's "Yellow Flash," Namikaze Minato.
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