Chapter 11

Like Open Doors

"Guah!!" Chouji gasped as the mutated fist of Juugo slammed into his stomach yet again. The man was a monster, and Chouji could barely keep up with his moves.

"Are you ready to die yet?!" The tall man asked madly. The death and power Chouji had seen hidden behind his eyes was now fully revealed, and the Akimichi boy didn't know how he could manage to beat him. Perhaps he had taken on too much…perhaps this would be it for him…

"N-never! I've…b-barely just begun!" Chouji bluffed. He had to think of something fast…or else this would be the beginning of the end for him. He gritted his teeth and raised an enlarged arm to defend himself from yet another punishing blow from Juugo. It was too powerful though, and the Akimichi shinobi tumbled backwards, falling on his back. As he did so though, he pulled his feet up underneath his chin, and all at once his body became a large, spiked ball, spinning backwards and kicking up a storm of dust. The massive ball, with all that traction, shot away from the cursed man at a blinding speed, bearing left in order to come around and head towards its enemy.

"The ball thing? Come now…don't tell me that's the only trick you have!!" Juugo taunted, smiling wildly. Sickening cracking sounds erupted from his arm as it mutated and grew grotesquely. He held out the palm of this newly grown appendage before him, ready to catch the gyro that was coming at him at deadly speeds. However, Chouji already knew that someone like him wouldn't fall for the same trick twice.

Jairo Tama Jishin!! Clawing its way out of the dust it had kicked up was a spiked ball ten times larger than what Juugo had expected. In a flash he leaped back to avoid being run down by it, but with it's added traction thanks to its size, the ball was traveling even faster than before. The size of a small mountain now, Chouji's rolled up body barreled into the cursed fugitive full force, pressing his body forcefully into the ground. As soon as it had crushed him, Chouji launched himself skyward, the ball seeming to shrink with its growing altitude. The second part of his attack, the Gyro Sphere Earthquake, began the moment the mighty sphere of spiked destruction smashed into the ground.

It was as if the earth itself had opened its hungry maw to swallow up the Akimichi shin obi's sphere form in its entirety. With it's size, the ball was unavoidable, and literally shook the ground in the area when it came down, giving the attack its name. Once the dust had settled, the enormous spiked ball was two-thirds buried into the surface of the earth, Juugo buried even deeper beneath it.

"……..k-kill…" An almost demonic voice creeped from beneath the giant human boulder. "….k-kill…I'll…kill…." The voice seemed to fade for a moment, the entire area falling silent once more. But just as suddenly as it faded, it came back, stronger than ever, and Chouji's body began to shake, outside of his own control. "I'LL KILL YOU!!"

Chouji could feel the horribly enormous amount of chakra building beneath him, but before he could do anything about it, he was suddenly airborne again. He let his body revert back to it's normal form and size as he flew through the air. He landed on the ground with a brutal thud and he was coughing as he managed to pull himself to his feet. He stared through wincing eyes at the animal before him. Juugo, as he knew him, was no more. The black, almost disease-looking curse mark had spread over his entire body. His eyes shined with a sinister and dark power as his wild grin spread across his face. His body had twisted and mutated to an absolutely sickening form, black spikes and bumps growing everywhere, his arms six times the size they used to be, and his spine protruding backwards to form an almost reptile-like ridge.

"Haaaa….haaaaahhh…." The creature called Juugo breathed hoarsely, "Kuhaaaaahahahahahahahaaaa!!" His breathing grew into a gradually maniacal laugh. "Kill! I'll kill you!! Hahahahahahahaha!!" The fact that he seemed to find Chouji's death funny only made the boy shiver slightly. Not good…that last attack took about all of my chakra… The Akimichi boy thought to himself, his teeth clenching as he fought off the pain of his now broken ribs. Looks like that's the only way… Slowly, he reached back to his tool pouch, digging in it to withdraw a single, small plastic case. Inside of it a deep black ball about the size of his thumb was visible. Suddenly he felt his heart skip a beat and he looked up to see the monstrous form of Juugo standing only inches away.

"DIE!!" The madman shouted in his face, and in an instant Chouji was utterly blown away as one giant fist planted itself into his chest, shattering much of the sternum and central area of his ribs. As he flew back, the capsule he was holding was thrown from his hands from the impact, falling down amongst the many cracks in the ground from Chouji's earlier, earth-smashing attack. The boy rolled, not on purpose this time, brutally until he finally smacked up against an outcropped slab of earth and came to a stop, his body laying motionless.

"Hahahaaahhahahaahahaha!!!" Juugo cackled again, launching himself towards where Chouji had landed. "You're dead! You're deaaaad!! Hahaaha!!" He gloated, kicking one of his mutated feet into Chouji's side to both injure and turn him over. The boy's breaths were hollow and strained, and he seemed barely conscious. But despite that, for no apparent reason at all, a slow smirk began to crawl across his face. Juugo noticed this, and his head tilted to one side curiously. "What's this? A smile?! Hahaha!! Are you enjoying your death too?!! Haaaahahhahaha!!" In response, Chouji's hand slowly slid from its place on his chest, rolling out to be splayed on the ground, revealing a rectangular piece of paper stuck to his chest where his hand had been. The cursed man noticed this, but by then it was already too late.

KABOOOOOM!!

The explosion from the tag consumed both of them in its fiery blaze. When the dust finally cleared some time later, there was a large crater in the ground. Juugo's mangled body was laying several hundred feet away, while Chouji's had been forced deeper into the ground. Slowly, as the eerie wind that flowed through the trees blew through the site of destruction, the black, twisted limbs of Juugo's mutated body began to twitch. Eventually, this twitching grew to movement, and Juugo began to turn over, forcing himself to his feet. At the same time, Chouji, who had passed out from the force of the blast, had started to awaken again. He groaned in pain as his entire body felt broken and numb. He shifted a little, in an attempt to roll over, but soon found that to be impossible in his state. After a few moments of trying, a dark shadow cast itself across him. It was Juugo. The man was standing only feet away from the Akimichi boy, heaving struggled breaths in and out of his body. One of his arms appeared to be completely gone, while blood could be seen dripping down and off his legs from the large wound in his chest.

"D-die…K-kill…I…I will……I'll…k--" Juugo gasped, somehow still smiling madly. Chouji squinted up at him, his own breathing struggling, unable to move at all. H-how…I…I'm done…this is it… He thought miserably, sure that Juugo would kill him with one ending blow now.

I…..failed…

But after a few moments, Chouji noticed that the man known as Juugo hadn't moved. Struggling to again open his eyes, the boy peered up at him. Silhouetted in the late afternoon sun, the black, cursed body of Juugo was rigid, his eyes blankly staring down at Chouji. As the wind picked up, the mangled and broken body of the insane and cursed fugitive began to make cracking sounded, and all at once he crumbled and deteriorated into a pile of dust, his ashes blowing away with the wind.

Juugo was dead.