Zabuza had planned to force Carl to give up the powerful Zen staff through the Water Dragon Bullet Technique, leaving him defenseless and easy to kill. But he never expected that Carl had already taken precautions.
Did Carl really have no weapon?
In truth, he had all kinds of weapons—knives, spears, swords, halberds—stored in his mission space, which he could summon or store in an instant.
If he wanted, he could face an enemy barehanded one moment, and the next moment have a longsword in his grip. The moment after that, the longsword could become a giant axe.
Compared to someone like Tenten, who still needed to unseal weapons from scrolls, Carl's method was far more unpredictable and difficult to counter.
"What the—where did he pull out that weapon?"
Kakashi, still trapped in the Water Prison Technique, widened his eyes in shock as the water clone dispersed.
He hadn't seen Carl take anything out. Could it have been a summoning technique? That couldn't be it—summoning required a blood offering and hand seals, and Carl hadn't done either.
Could it be… a special Kekkei Genkai?
"That was awesome!!"
Naruto, hiding in the distance, cheered excitedly upon seeing Carl destroy Zabuza's clone. Beside him, Sakura finally let out a breath of relief.
As for Sasuke, his expression was as constipated as ever—clearly lost in another one of his inner monologues: Why am I still so weak? When will I have the strength to kill my brother?
Carl landed softly, longblade in hand, and slowly walked toward Zabuza near the riverbank.
"So, Mr. Zabuza, would you rather release the Water Prison Technique yourself, or shall I come over there and help you with it?" he asked with a calm confidence.
Zabuza let out a cold snort and immediately withdrew the technique, backing away quickly to create distance between himself and Kakashi—and more importantly, Carl.
With the strength and battle instinct Carl had just displayed, Zabuza knew that holding the Water Prison with one hand would be dangerous. If he couldn't move, he'd be at a severe disadvantage.
Rather than risk being flanked, he gave up the Water Prison and retreated, intending to rely on ninjutsu to regain the upper hand.
"Carl, leave the rest to me!"
Kakashi, now freed from the Water Prison Technique, was visibly angry.
Being outmaneuvered by Zabuza had nearly put the mission target and his three young students in danger, and now a quiet fury simmered in his eyes.
"Alright, then I'll protect Mr. Tazuna."
Carl rolled his eyes and immediately agreed.
He needed to stay on good terms with both Kakashi and Zabuza.
"It's not a wise choice to face me alone."
Seeing Carl turn and walk away, leaving only Kakashi standing across from him, Zabuza sneered and began forming hand seals.
But the sneer quickly vanished—Kakashi was forming hand seals at the exact same time. Every movement was identical, and the moment Zabuza finished, Kakashi unleashed the same jutsu simultaneously.
Zabuza had always believed that Kakashi's Sharingan allowed him to copy a jutsu only after witnessing it. He hadn't expected Kakashi to mirror his technique in perfect real-time.
"He's coming."
Meanwhile, reunited with Naruto and the others, Carl kept a close eye on the battle. Suddenly, his ears twitched.
He sensed a new presence in the nearby woods.
If I'm right, he thought, it's that masked companion of Zabuza's—Haku.
He knew Zabuza's primary goal was to assassinate Tazuna. But if that failed, his secondary objective was for the highly intelligent Haku to gather intel on Kakashi during the fight, looking for weaknesses.
"Water Style: Great Waterfall Technique!"
As the battle intensified, Kakashi used his Sharingan to copy Zabuza's ninjutsu and movements flawlessly, while also casting a subtle genjutsu that broke down Zabuza's psychological defenses. He finished the fight by unleashing the powerful A-rank Great Waterfall Technique.
"Climb the tree!"
Seeing the enormous wave of water sweeping toward them, Carl reacted immediately. He grabbed Naruto with one hand and Tazuna with the other, leaping high into a nearby tree.
Sasuke and Sakura followed close behind.
When the water passed, Zabuza lay gravely injured beneath a tree. His arms and legs were pierced by several kunai thrown by Kakashi, leaving him unable to continue the fight.
However, just as Kakashi approached with a kunai, ready to deliver the final blow to Zabuza, two steel senbon, each about 30 centimeters long, shot out from the dense forest and pierced Zabuza's neck with surgical precision—striking what appeared to be fatal points and instantly rendering him "dead."
A moment later, a boy around fifteen or sixteen years old wearing a Kirigakure Hunter-nin mask appeared, standing on a tree trunk.
"Thank you for your help. I've been waiting for a chance to eliminate Zabuza."
Every hidden village had its own hunter-nin corps, tasked with tracking down missing-nin to prevent their corpses—and the secrets they held—from falling into the hands of rival villages.
So the boy's intention was clear: he had come to kill Zabuza, a traitor to the Hidden Mist, and retrieve his body to take back to the village.
Kakashi stepped forward, checked Zabuza's pulse at his neck, and nodded after confirming the absence of a heartbeat.
Now was a time of relative peace, and as a shinobi of Konoha, Kakashi had no right to stop a hunter-nin from reclaiming the body of a rogue ninja. Interfering could spark diplomatic friction between nations.
"Wait!"
Just as the boy moved forward to retrieve the body, Carl suddenly called out to stop him.
The boy turned his masked face calmly toward Carl.
"Is something wrong?"
Kakashi and the others also looked over, curious.
Carl smiled lightly.
"I forgot to mention—while I'm not skilled in ninjutsu, I do have some medical training. Those two senbon that pierced Zabuza's neck? They didn't hit any fatal points. They only struck his acupuncture nodes."
"Which means… he's not dead. Just in a state of suspended animation. If you remove the senbon, he'll wake up."
"What?!"
Kakashi and the others were shocked.
Realizing he had been exposed, Haku, disguised as a hunter-nin, quickly hurled a few senbon to distract them, scooped up Zabuza's body, and darted into the trees.
Carl deflected the incoming senbon with his long sword, then sprang into action—leaping from branch to branch in pursuit.
"You protect Mr. Tazuna. I'll chase after them!"
"I'm going too!" Naruto shouted, starting to rush forward.
But Kakashi blocked him with one arm.
"There could be other enemies. Protect Tazuna and head back first."
Naruto looked like he was about to protest—until Kakashi's eyes rolled back and he collapsed to the ground.
It turned out that while Kakashi had emerged victorious in the fight against Zabuza, he had exhausted nearly all of his chakra, and his body had taken heavy damage.
Unlike his own techniques like Chidori and Raikiri, which were powerful but chakra-efficient, the Water Style techniques he copied from Zabuza were large-scale, high-consumption jutsu that had taken a serious toll on his reserves.