Chapter 96   - Ch96. Rei vs. B

B was about to jump to help A when he saw him being attacked by a sword-wielding redhead but Konan and Rei intercepted him, blocking his path. It was mostly Rei since Konan had her chakra tightly concealed to be around the mid-jonin level while Rei released enough of the concealing to come out as an S-rank shinobi to any sensor. B, as a very accomplished chakra sensor, naturally just glanced at Konan before giving most of his attention to Rei.

Rei smirked to himself as he half-turned his head towards Konan. "Jonin Yotsuba," Oh, how he loved nobody knew his last name. If he said 'Jonin Konan', he was sure B would put two and two together and their identity would be out. A bit of bullshit no Jutsu was needed for this performance. "go and help the troops, I will take care of the big bad guy." He said in an ordering tone as if he was her superior and gestured with a nod towards B.

"Yes, Rei-sama!" Konan exclaimed loudly, sounding a bit like a fangirl... loudly enough for B to hear 'Rei-sama' which made his head snap to Rei as his eyes slightly widened while Konan turned around with an amused smile and left to help the Kiri shinobi. Rei couldn't help but laugh his ass off internally. If B had even an inkling who Konan was and her power-level he would do his damnedest to keep her as far away from the regular troops... now that had to be avoided, hadn't it?

"So you ya the famous an' mysterious Rei of Downpour... ya are nuthin' special an' I feel kinda sour." B rapped in disappointment, half to make Rei mad and a half due to him thinking Rei would have more chakra than what he was showing.

"Yeah... I feel ya bro." Rei lazily said and rolled his eyes at B who furrowed his brows. That was the second Rei waited for, B lowered his guard. Rei disappeared in a quick burst of speed as his chakra invigorated his body and suddenly appeared in front of B with shunshin. B only managed to put his hands in front of his chin before Rei's kick impacted his palm and sent him flying upward to the sky because Rei used nature energy to strengthen that blow. He needed to get this perfect jinchuuriki away from the battlefield so he decided to take some minor damage to his leg because of the abrupt channeling of the nature energy rather than try to lure him away which might not work.

Rei dashed in the direction of the flying B, smiling to himself as he realized the burly brown-skinned man might not have been injured beyond getting a scr.a.p.e on his palm but he has indeed flown at least half a kilometer away. 'The wonders of nature energy' Rei inwardly chuckled as he marveled at the strength of his kick and the fact that the damage from it, while extensive, would heal in a minute or so.

B crashed into the ground, cracking it as he created a small crater while sending dust up into the air. He stood up and rotated his shoulders when he felt Rei stop near him. "That hurt, you runt." He dryly said, making Rei laugh.

"Well, B-san, there is no distraction for half a kilometer. Let's enjoy a full out fight." Rei said calmly and his body tensed in preparation for the fight. He knew that half a kilometer was not that much of a distance considering B being the perfect jinchuuriki who can spam nuke balls but it was better than nothing.

B grinned and raised his hand with a bull horn hand gesture while looking towards the sky. "Let's do this, Hachi! Veeeeee!"

Rei chuckled and watched as B transformed into the form of Hachibi. He was a bit happy that the man didn't underestimate him and instantly took Hachibi's form despite it being annoying. Rei was inwardly gleeful at having such a big target now.

The first thing B did was to pounce at Rei. His massive form was charged towards Rei, destroying the surroundings. It took him only a second to reach Rei and he prepared to punch the place where Rei stood. His arm struck forward, impacting the ground, creating meters-wide spider-web-like cracks and sending dust into the air, reaching as tall as treetops.

Before B could rejoice, Hachibi's voice resounded in his head. 'Careful!' He had no time to reach however as hundreds of chakra strings appeared all around his body, enwrapping it. Before he could form a coherent thought, Rei who now stood a bit away flexed his fingers and the blue chakra strings started to change into crimson red while also starting to burn in the same colored flame a moment after they changed the color. Rei was feeding the chakra strings with Fire, Wind, and Nature chakra mix to create his Destruction Flames, as he named this mix. It was the same thing he used to destroy the Liza-, uh, the Salamander Realm and Rei wanted to see how durable would Hachibi be against it.

'We gotta avoid that!' Hachibi told B as the strings were catching on the crimson fire.

B was too big to evade the fast-spreading fire so he charged a small bijuu dama and fired it at Rei who was flabbergasted it took only a second for the perfect jinchuuriki to literally create and throw it in his direction, destroying the chakra strings. As the bijuu dama flew, it caught on the crimson fire which started to make it smaller but strengthened its power. Rei had no other choice than to click his tongue and transport himself into his dimension.

The bijuu dama on crimson fire impacted the floor and the world quieted down for a moment before it burst with angry orange. A loud 'boom' shook the ground as a big ball of swirling crimson flames mixed with the orange of explosion tore everything to shreds, sending shockwaves all around. B in Hachibi's form didn't even manage to steady himself as he didn't expect the crimson flames would strengthen the bijuu dama so much and was promptly blown away by the impossibly strong shockwaves.

It took a whole minute for the explosive ball of energy created by bijuu dama empowered by the Destruction Flames to stop swirling and disappear, leaving only a fifty meters deep crater, four hundred meters wide.

'B, be glad you only fired small bijuu dama or this could have taken us with him! What the heck was that!' Hachibi's bewildered voice resounded in B's head.

'I don't know, partner!' B said, completely serious as he saw the level of destruction. 'These crimson flames are dange-' He didn't finish as his instincts flared and he was forced to push his body to the side to avoid a massive shuriken made out of the Destruction Flames.

Rei was looking at B with a raised eyebrow. "Are you sure you wanna keep that massive body?" He smirked and created a small hand-sized shuriken of the crimson flames above his palm. He obviously took some 'insights' of Rasengan and Rasenshuriken and implemented them in his own way. The shuriken B evaded impacted ground three hundred meters away from them only for the rotation of the crimson fire being too strong that the shuriken failed to keep its form and in-built chakra feature made the chakra burst upwards. B gulped as he saw the previous flame Shuriken of the size of his fist in Hachibi form explode in a bright pillar of crimson reaching the sky. The air shimmered around the pillar due to the intense heat and B could only awkwardly chuckle as he could feel it even three hundred meters away. B blinked as he saw another similar shuriken forming in Rei's hand and gulped. "Ya bro... you ain't throwing that at me, right?" He unsurely asked Rei who only eye-smiled before doing precisely that.

"Fu-!" Needless to say, B was in for some hard 'dodge' lessons.

Rei wasn't trying to kill B. That would be idiotic as B was a strong jinchuuriki which meant a good distraction for Akatsuki. No, he was just distracting B while ten of his closes were siphoning a small amount of Hachibi's chakra from B, storing them for later without being noticed.

They were playing dodgeball with dangerous crimson fiery shurikens and bijuu damas for fifteen minutes when Rei suddenly went rigid and B finally relaxed. Both were quite exhausted chakra-wise and while Rei looked outwardly fine, even he was breathing slightly harder. B's ragged form was outright panting due to all the running around he was forced to do.

The surrounding country was utterly demolished and many pools of lava were created on the island today as large patches of forest disappeared for good while fires still unceasingly raged in some parts whereas others were reduced to a big crater.

B was watching as Rei's face suddenly went from playful to cold and murderous one and could feel an incredible killing intent start pressing on him as it flooded the surroundings. 'Damn… something must have gotten him pretty mad.' Hachibi commented when the world suddenly darkened as Rei's chakra burst out, no longer under the hiding technique and both B and Hachibi had to widen their eyes at the massive volume for a human. Both were aware of the amount he was throwing around just a few moments ago so him still having so much available juice was an utterly ridiculous notion! Heck, without Hachibi even B would be already on his knees energy-wise!

"AAAAAAAAAA!" Rei screamed as his head snapped to the right and dashed away.

B just stood there for a second before his eyes widened as he realized... his brother must have defeated his opponent which pissed off Rei and... "F.u.c.k! Hachibi, we need to get to brother A or he will die!" He shouted, mentally asking for more chakra.

'Brother! Please be alright!' B prayed as he rushed behind Rei in hopes to prevent the death of his brother.

----

I actually thought I would finish this by now but writing fights is quite taking a toll on my imagination and it also takes A LOT of words to do it properly (or I at least hope I do it properly) so sorry guys but another cliff-kun :D. Tomorrow, Rei's rage and a new, third mix of elements with nature energy.