"Hm~" Deidara hummed as he sat crossed leg on his clay bird, reading the details on Konoha's unit.
"Little girl with blonde hair and blue eyes? There's two of them too. That sounded like Konoha's jinchuriki." One of them refers to Ino, though her eyes were light green her blonde hair was more light compared to Tsuyu's.
In Deidara's opinion, logically all villages would safeguard their jinchuriki and wouldn't send them on missions that were dangerous like this. Those were trump cards after all.
Kannabi bridge was really in a deeper part after all and Iwa could send reinforcement fast and could encircle them. He didn't think it was Tsuyu and it was just someone that had similar hair and eye colour. Maybe Konoha had those colours quite common?
Hey, he himself had blonde hair and bluish eyes~
He forgot to consider Tsuyu could in fact run away easily and so being sent on a 'dangerous' mission in deep enemy territory wasn't exactly dangerous for her.
After 2 hours of flight, he finally reached Kannabi Bridge. There was no one, only devastation. The bridge was utterly destroyed by explosives.
Now that's an art!
He hummed, appreciating the aftermath of explosions against the bridge. It was akin to beautiful sculpture, carefully sculpted using explosion art.
Though where are they?
Tsuyu and the rest were camped underground a hundred metres away from the bridge. With earth release she created an underground camp. She gained inspiration from Yamato's use of Wood Release to create a wood cabin and practiced a little to make an underground bunker of sorts.
Hinata opened her Byakugan, checking every 15 minutes or so to observe the vicinity.
Hinata's eyes widened, looking above the Kannabi bridge. A figure was riding a bird-like thing that also contained a lot of chakra.
"Captain. There's enemy sightings. Only 1. Aerial capability, riding a bird like creature. His chakra was really high, an elite from his chakra alone."
Hinata quickly reported to Tsuyu who's enjoying her gourmet warm coffee with a book in her hand.
"Just 1?"
Hinata focused her Byakugan, trying to extend her range. "Within 6 kilometers, it is only him."
Tsuyu frowned. Is this a trap? Or that person was their trump card. There's no way Iwa would send a single person as reinforcement. How would Tsuyu guess Deidara was just impatient and didn't wait for others to solo.
"You three will scout and stay around the perimeter, careful of enemy reinforcements. I believe he is a bait or he is a very strong opponent. Keep your guards up at all times. I will engage with him on my own." Tsuyu said seriously to the three of them.
"Yes, captain." Hinata felt worried that Tsuyu was overconfident, but thinking again she did have the capital to be confident. She could run if anything goes wrong as well…
Hinata put down her worry, her expression turned serious, ready to fulfill her role to its utmost.
As the 4 people prepared their gears, Hinata used her Byakugan to check again. She suddenly gasped in exclamation.
"Everyone, something… like spiders were crawling on the ground. It's… heading towards us at fast speed!"
***
Deidara released clay spiders down the ground to prepare the battlefield and to scout. It would search on any chakra signature other than himself. In a matter of seconds, the spiders crawled and searched throughout the area.
Deidara turned to face a direction, a grin carved on his lips. He moved his hand and made a single hand sign.
Found you! Katsu!
Explosions rang, smoke and dust bellowed. Deidara wondered if he got rid of them, but to his surprise, 4 shadows flew straight out of the smoke below up to the sky.
Tsuyu's squad observed Deidara from above. The same way Deidara observed his opponents flying in the air encircling him.
"Captain, the bird he's riding was not a living thing. It's a jutsu, having similar chakra to the spiders earlier. I believe it's an explosive like the spiders too. Be careful." Hinata observed with her Byakugan.
"Follow the plan. You three, leave him to me. He's Deidara, that nutjob who could destroy a village easily." Tsuyu could feel from her instinct and from the intel she had on this rogue nin, this guy was a strong one.
"Yes Captain!" The three, although reluctant, change their flight path and move away from the battlefield to remain only on the perimeter, constantly keeping their guard up and watchful for enemy reinforcements.
"Hm?" Deidara watched in confusion seeing 3 of them seemed to run away, leaving just the blonde haired girl. From their speed, he figured out he had to chase them with his bird to keep distance close.
"Hey hey! As if I am letting them escape!" Deidara moved with his big bird towards the three, wanting to destroy Tsuyu that's blocking the way. He placed both his hands into the bags on his waist. In seconds, he had already done his molding.
"Now the genre of my Art is Pop!"
6 clay birds flew to attack Tsuyu! Tsuyu put more chakra into the thruster of her wings, suddenly increasing her speed in the air.
So fast! Deidara was surprised. The homing explosive birds were unable to catch up to her. With a twisting of her body and a barrel roll, she reached a good distance and turned to face the approaching explosives.
Her rifle was already loaded with explosive rounds.
Bang! Bang!
One missed and exploded just behind. But the other hit, destroying all birds in one fell swoop with a power boom. Multiple colours of explosion, red, green, blue, yellow, orange linger on the aftermath.
Seriously? Tsuyu had a distorted expression seeing the colours of those explosions.
"Hahaha! Amazing! Pop is definitely the genre now!" Deidara laughed and no longer cared about the three that ran away and focused solely on Tsuyu seeing she's too capable.
"Girl! Our battle… will be legendary! Come! Show me your art of explosions!"
Sky against sky, explosions against explosions.
"You nutjob! Fine by me!" Tsuyu grinned as he looped in the air to gain higher altitude and shoot down a barrage of explosive rounds.
"You get it!" Deidara threw clay birds after birds. The two were fought and spun in the air, chasing, or at times running from each other while sending explosives to each other in a frenzy. The two were crossing in the air, and it was unknown who would win.
"Hahaha! HAHAHA! YEAH!!! MORE!" Deidara was having the best time of his life. Explosions rang left and right, the sky was painted with explosions of various colours.
This nutjob is not serious at all…!
Tsuyu charged Ashura with her chakra, focusing on dodging manoeuvres as more clay birds homed towards her.
Seeing 3 birds on her back, she looped a full circle, and dive straight down, using increased speed to outpace the birds.
She turned her body, grinning as Deidara, the clay birds and herself was in a straight line of sight.
"Die!" She pointed the nozzle of charged up Ashura, blasting a beam of chakra light.
"What is that!".
The birds exploded, and the chakra beam continued and hit Deidara's clay bird as it tried to dodge.
Boom!
"I almost died! Haha!" Deidara threw a dragon clay below him, with a poof, it turned into C2.
"Now face my C2!"
The dragon's tail shortened slightly as the clay used up to create a missile in the dragon's mouth.
"Explode her!" The dragon shot mini dragon clay towards Tsuyu at astonishing speed.
Too fast…!
Tsuyu had to put more chakra into her thruster to barely outspeed the mini dragon torpedo. She looped in the sky, and instead headed towards Deidara.
"Oi girl don't come this way!"
Deidara chewed more clays with his hands and created swarms of mini bat explosives that would explode on contact.
Tsuyu looked straight at Deidara, not caring much about the bats. Her entire body was filled with chakra. Facing the bats…
Raging Fist: Heaven's Roar!
With a boom, a wave of chakra blasted and exploded all the bats in the way, the aftershock sent Deidara back a little. But out of the smoke, Tsuyu's cold gaze locked onto her.
"Hick!" C2's body was too big and couldn't make a sharp turn, so Tsuyu actually landed on the dragon and directly launched a power raging fist on his chest.
Splat!
Her fist went straight through his chest, but feeling the texture, it was… clay cone?!
Just then, from within the clay dragon, the real Deidara was shat out from the dragon's butt, looking at Tsuyu like he's a good prankster.
"Too bad girl! I would have wanted to fight more with you!"
Shit! Tsuyu used chakra blast from all her tenketsu to create as much distance as possible and quickly made a hand sign.
Too late! Katsu!
The clay dragon shined with chakra light and set off with a bang.
Boom!
Smoke and dust covered Deidara's own vision, his expression excited at first, but then a little sad. He never had so much fun in his life. He finally found a fellow explosion artist… He summoned a new clay bird and caught himself from falling.
Hm? A kunai?
Deidara turned to dodge the incoming Kunai from the ground. Looking down, he saw that blonde haired girl, in her raised hand, a black ball of dense chakra.
She's alive? Impossible…! Unless… she IS that Tsuyu that could use Flying Raijin…! The jinchuriki!
In the next second, her figure disappeared from Deidara's vision. But right then Deidara felt his scalp tingling, turning his body to look behind him.
The grin on her lips made Deidara shudder. The dense chakra ball in her was thrown right toward his face. Deidara quickly threw literal mush balls of explosive clay that had no artistic value at all to save his own life!
Earth Release: Rasenbakudan!
The clay balls and the dark sphere made contact. With a bang, the sky flashed with brilliant light for a split second.
Deidara was sent tumbling down with his bird from the sheer aftermath. He felt his body was almost crushed from the explosion, thankfully the explosive clays detonated the dark sphere before it could reach close to him. But still, his entire body was burned and injured from the force.
What… an art! Deidara had a happy expression on his face looking at Tsuyu in the air. Her technique was exquisite! The explosion almost killed him! He struggled to create a bird and manage to save himself.
Tsuyu wasn't going to let him escape and rushed with her chakra wings, shooting down rounds of explosives. But even when he's seriously injured, Deidara's manoeuvres in the air were good enough to dodge non-homing projectiles.
Deidara threw a few more explosive birds to block her attacks and cover her vision.
"Captain, 100 enemy shinobi coming from northwest! 6 kilometers away! Half of them are capable of flight!" Tsuyu received the voice from Ino.
"Roger."
Tsuyu felt a bit down. She never planned to kill Deidara because he was a treasure trove of intel. But he's more difficult than she thought. She couldn't use Collapse Release in the air either unless she completed the techniques she was still developing.
She almost wanted to give up on the mission, but just then Deidara in front of her seemed to slow down. He flew toward higher altitude and from the bird's rear, massive egg clay popped, launching itself toward her.
Boom! It exploded halfway, creating thick dark smokes covering her vision entirely.
As if… Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!
Tsuyu blew wind release on her front, blowing the smoke away as she approached Deidara. But after the smoke cleared, what greeted her was a giant clay doll. Its wing-like arm spread wide, as if it was an angle of death.
Deidara was already running away, looking back at her with a grin. To respond to the beautifully made Rasenbakudan, Deidara as a fellow artist wanted to have an equal exchange! It's my turn to show you my art!
Ohako C3! Katsu!
An explosion that could annihilate a village painted the sky in bright orange light. Deidara gasped for air after using a lot of his chakra.
He planned to detonate it while the bomb itself and Tsuyu's vision was still covered by smoke, thus taking her off guard. As for that level of explosive, she's the jinchuriki and had a tough life. But he didn't know she knew Wind Release to clear the thick smoke that fast.
"Too bad…!" Deidara said he's disappointed but he's secretly happy that she lived.
Tsuyu already appeared at a very far distance, dodging the explosive as expected with Flying Raijin. If she didn't clear the smoke and had chased blindly she really would have died there.
"We will retreat." She spoke through the radio. A hundred enemy reinforcement with that nutjob would be suicidal at this point.
Her squad gathered quickly, and like a shadow, disappeared from the area of Kannabi bridge.
***
"To think you almost died… But from what others said you used your explosive that covered the whole sky. Too bad there's nothing left. Still, good job killing them." Onoki read the report, assuming the ones Deidara fought were dead.
There's a hundred witnesses of the explosion engulfing the sky, no way the girl survived.
"Eh? She's not dead sensei…" Deidara rubbed the back of his neck.
"Huh? How come?"
Deidara thought for a second how to say it. But then Pain never said he couldn't indulge her abilities. No actually, she used Flying Raijin in the battle so it was in fact his own observation.
"She can use flying raijin. Hm!" Deidara nodded to himself and said it nonchalantly. But when he looked back Onoki already fell from his chair and was shaking on the floor.
"Eh? Sensei! Sensei! Call medic nin!!!"
***
For those wondering, Onoki already caught up with blonde hair, blue eyes, flying raijin = daughter of Yelllow flash and had a stroke.