Clang!
Clang!
Clang!
As Li Anshi advanced, the sound of weapons clashing ahead grew louder.
Soon, Li Anshi arrived at Sakumo Hatake's battlefield.
Unsurprisingly, Sakumo Hatake was indeed entangled.
He was facing three puppets.
These three puppets had deep marks on their bodies, cut by the White Fang short sword in Sakumo Hatake's hand.
These were marks. If they were on a ninja, the ninja would have died several times over.
But these were puppets. As long as the chakra threads controlling these three puppets were still present, these three puppets could continue to fight.
It could be seen that Sakumo Hatake might also be encountering a Sand Village puppeteer for the first time.
Of these three puppets, two were humanoid puppets and one was a beast-type puppet.
The attacks of the humanoid puppets occasionally violated the common sense movements of humans, and the beast-type puppet would, from time to time, fire senbon from small holes in its abdomen and mouth, causing considerable trouble for Sakumo Hatake.
Near the battlefield, there were also two corpses.
Clearly, this attack on Li Anshi and the others was not a premeditated ambush, but rather a battle that occurred when a ninja squad that had entered the Land of Fire happened to encounter them.
Although it was unknown how long this Sand ninja squad had been in the Land of Fire and what kind of mission they had, it was clear that they were not there with friendly intentions.
One Jonin, three Chunin – this was already a powerful strike force.
The serious consequences that such a force could cause behind enemy lines were self-evident.
It was only because the team they encountered this time was led by Sakumo Hatake that they were able to be defeated.
If it had been a team led by an ordinary Chunin, they would probably have become souls under their blades.
"Anshi-kun!"
Although the battle between Sakumo Hatake and the Sand ninja puppeteer was very intense, Li Anshi did not deliberately hide his movements when he arrived. Therefore, both Sakumo Hatake and the Sand ninja puppeteer Jonin quickly discovered Li Anshi.
Upon seeing Li Anshi, Sakumo Hatake and the Sand ninja puppeteer Jonin had vastly different feelings.
After receiving Li Anshi's warning, Sakumo Hatake also quickly discovered this Sand ninja strike force and launched an attack on them.
At first, Sakumo Hatake did indeed instantly kill a Sand ninja.
However, even Sakumo Hatake didn't expect that there would be a Jonin in this team, and a puppeteer at that.
While Sakumo Hatake was entangled by the puppeteer Jonin, the other two surviving Sand ninjas, under the command of the puppeteer Jonin, split up. One stayed behind to intercept and kill the Konoha ninjas transporting the supplies and destroy the supplies.
The other Sand ninja stayed behind to deal with Sakumo Hatake together with him.
However, Sakumo Hatake's strength still exceeded the expectations of this Sand ninja puppeteer. In just a few minutes, Sakumo Hatake not only remained unharmed under his attacks and killed his subordinate, but even his puppets were severely damaged.
If the battle continued, his puppets would be completely destroyed, and the Sand ninja Jonin would definitely not escape Sakumo Hatake's pursuit.
What kept this Sand ninja puppeteer fighting was the Chunin he had sent to kill Sakumo Hatake's subordinates earlier.
That Chunin was also a puppeteer.
As long as that Chunin returned, whether it was borrowing that subordinate's puppet or having two puppeteers besiege the Konoha ninja in front of him, they would have a great advantage.
However, this Sand ninja puppeteer never expected that he did indeed wait for someone to arrive.
But, the person who arrived was not his puppeteer subordinate, but a Konoha ninja!
"Don't worry, Captain Hatake."
"I've already killed that Sand ninja puppeteer. Yoshikawa and Kitamura are fine."
After saying this to Sakumo Hatake to reassure him, Li Anshi quickly locked onto the position of this puppeteer Jonin through the chakra threads on the three puppets fighting Sakumo Hatake.
"Do you need my help?"
Although he had already found the main body of this Sand ninja puppeteer, Li Anshi did not rashly intervene in Sakumo Hatake's battle.
If Sakumo Hatake was at a disadvantage, then Li Anshi's intervention could be said to be to save Sakumo Hatake.
But the current situation was that Sakumo Hatake already had the upper hand and would soon be able to destroy the Sand ninja puppeteer's puppets and ultimately win the battle.
As such, if Li Anshi intervened, it would be like stealing Sakumo Hatake's credit.
"Yes, I'd be grateful!"
Hearing Li Anshi's words, Sakumo Hatake also knew what he was thinking.
Immediately, he nodded directly to Li Anshi.
For Sakumo Hatake, as long as Li Anshi could do it, he didn't mind becoming the support in this battle.
"Hmph!"
The conversation between Li Anshi and Sakumo Hatake was naturally also heard by the Sand ninja puppeteer Jonin.
As a Jonin of the Sand Village, this puppeteer naturally had his own pride.
Sakumo Hatake and Li Anshi both looked young. The fact that Sakumo Hatake could display Jonin-level strength was already shocking to this puppeteer.
In their Sand Village, perhaps only Retsuzan could compare to Sakumo Hatake.
And Retsuzan was the son of the First Kazekage, Reto. He had inherited the First Kazekage's "Magnet Release" and would surely become another Kazekage in the future.
It was already a blessing for each ninja village to have one such person in an era. Could Konoha have two?
Immediately, this Sand ninja puppeteer was slightly angry. He moved the chakra threads in his hands, and instantly, one of the three puppets besieging Sakumo Hatake broke away from the battlefield and attacked Li Anshi.
"Naive!"
Seeing this, Li Anshi shook his head and extended his right hand.
At some point, another flying knife had appeared in his hand.
When the Sand ninja puppeteer saw the flying knife in Li Anshi's hand, a strong sense of crisis suddenly arose in his heart.
He would die!
Swish!
As soon as this thought flashed through the mind of the Sand ninja puppeteer, he felt a chill in his throat. Soon, his pupils suddenly contracted.
"How is this possible?"
Opening his mouth, this Sand ninja puppeteer wanted to say something, but in the end, only a few bloody bubbles gurgled out of his mouth. With endless fear, he fell from the tree branch, losing his life.
Clatter—
With the death of this puppeteer, without his chakra control, the three puppets naturally stopped moving and turned into dead objects, scattered on the ground.
Whoosh—
Sakumo Hatake slashed off the head of the humanoid puppet with his blade, intending to continue and cut down the beast-type puppet as well, but found that this puppet had already fallen to the ground.