Chapter 1197 - 1192: First Time in Action

"Damn it!"

Picking up the mockery dripping from Seimei's words, Tagorihime cursed under her breath and instantly decided to go all-out and wipe everyone here off the map.

But right at that moment, a figure appeared in the center of the field, completely silent.

"?!"

Tagorihime's heart jumped. The foot she'd just lifted slammed back down as she shot backward at full speed.

She stared at the newcomer, her face deadly serious.

She hadn't sensed a single thing; how the hell had this guy gotten here?

And then… she probed his aura.

Instantly, an overwhelming pressure crushed down on her chest like a giant boulder had dropped right on her heart. Breathing suddenly got a lot harder.

How long had it been? A hundred years? Two hundred? Three hundred? She couldn't remember the last time someone besides Lord White Snake had made her feel this suffocated.

Yet now this random human was giving off the exact same vibe.

He was strong. Insanely strong.

Tagorihime went on full alert.

On the other side, the wood clone let out a small sigh of relief when he saw who it was.

"You're here," the clone said.

"Yeah."

Seimei gave a short nod.

Yep; the one who just showed up was the real Seimei.

After flipping through the shadow clone's memories and tuning himself to peak condition, he'd locked onto the Flying Thunder God mark here and teleported straight in.

The stealth of Flying Thunder God had let him catch Tag identifiedorihime completely off guard right from the start.

Seimei glanced at her coolly, then with a thought dismissed both Multiple Shadow Clone and Wood Clone techniques.

Poof, poof, poof!

In an instant, every surviving shadow clone and the lone wood clone burst into clouds of chakra.

A flood of memories rushed into his mind.

Thanks to his monstrous Spirit stat, he skimmed through them all in seconds and got the full picture of what had just gone down.

"Tagorihime, huh?"

He turned back to the extremely wary snake sage and asked flatly, "Mind telling me why you suddenly showed up here?"

From the wood clone's guess, she'd probably noticed someone was hogging all the natural energy, tracked it down, and stumbled onto this place by accident.

But that was just a guess. Given Orochimaru's tight connection with Ryūchi Cave, Seimei couldn't rule out the snake sannin's involvement.

For all he knew, Orochimaru had deliberately lured her here.

It had already been five or six months since he started training here, and Orochimaru hadn't managed to dig up anything useful in that time.

Sending someone to test the waters would be a totally logical move.

Of course, it was also possible she really had just followed the natural energy trail on her own.

Either way, the truth was sitting right in front of him; he'd get it out of her himself.

All those thoughts flashed through his head in a split second.

Tagorihime finally steadied her breathing and focused on him.

She heard the question but didn't answer. Instead she shot back, "You're the real one?"

Seimei's brow twitched.

He shook his head, then vanished with a Body Flicker and reappeared right in front of her, hand already reaching for her throat.

If she wasn't gonna talk, he'd just read her mind the hard way.

The killing intent rolling off him was ice-cold. Tagorihime didn't hesitate; her legs instantly morphed into a massive serpentine tail and she shot backward.

"Think you can run? Naive."

Seimei activated his Byakugan to the max, thrust his right hand forward, and unleashed a terrifying suction force straight at her.

Far away, Tagorihime felt her body lock up for a split second before she was yanked backward through the air.

Panic flashed across her twisted face.

No time to think; she ditched her human form and fully transformed into her true body: a huge emerald-green venomous serpent. She wasn't as massive as Manda, but her aura was several times denser.

That barely let her stabilize herself mid-air.

Seimei narrowed his eyes.

The next instant, the pull from his palm exploded into something monstrous.

Ever since his Byakugan's evolution passed the (10,000/100,000) mark, he could control up to ten thousand tons of gravitational force.

Just now he'd been toying with her.

This time? Full power.

Tagorihime couldn't resist at all; her gigantic body rocketed toward him.

But she reacted fast; almost instantly she stopped fighting the pull and used it, hurling herself forward like a living freight train.

Most people would flinch at a several-ton snake barreling straight at them.

Seimei didn't.

He saw through her plan in a heartbeat, smirked, and flipped the force from attraction to repulsion.

The sudden reversal hit Tagorihime like a truck; she spewed a huge mouthful of blood.

Still, she gritted her fangs through the pain and whipped her tail down at him while flooding the area with a barrage of real-and-fake illusions to mess with his vision.

Useless.

The moment Seimei activated Heavenly Imperial (Ten no Go), everything she threw at him became pointless.

His figure vanished from sight.

The repulsive force vanished with him.

Tagorihime slammed back to the ground and regained control of her body.

But there wasn't an ounce of relief on her face; only thick unease.

"What… was that? The Rinnegan?!"

Exactly.

To stay completely hidden, Seimei had opened his Rinnegan the instant he vanished, cranking his Mangekyo techniques to the max.

And the fact he'd used it meant one thing: he had no intention of letting Tagorihime leave alive.

While dread filled her eyes, he reappeared; right in front of her face.

Tagorihime was already on maximum alert and reacted instantly, casting Sage Art: Inorganic Reincarnation to screw with his line of sight while flaring her chakra to escape back through the tunnel to Ryūchi Cave.

But the very next second, time around her body reversed. The chakra she'd just flared snuffed out, her body slid back to where it had been, and even the look in her eyes reset to the moment she first saw him appear.

This was the exclusive Rinnegan ability: Time Reversal (Toki no Go)!

And this was its very first real combat use.

So far? Pretty damn effective.