Naruto: The Chosen Undead-Chapter 139 - no.138 Dark Souls

The knight froze.

A long, jagged crack spiderwebbed down its body, splitting the helm, the breastplate, the legs in a single breath. With a shudder, the stone giant collapsed into chunks of crumbling rock and a pool of blackened ooze, the echoes of its fall swallowed by the mist.

Naruto rolled his shoulder, exhaling slowly.

He formed a set of shadow clones with a quick one-handed seal, sending them weaving through the underbrush to quietly dispatch the remaining ents and knights. Stealth was critical; he didn't dare draw the attention of the Moonlight Butterfly looming somewhere above. Keeping low, Naruto followed the trail of faintly glowing flowers, their eerie light guiding him toward a distant, crumbling tower.

When he reached its base, he found a shattered stone knight slumped against the entrance.

But that wasn't what caught his eye.

Tucked behind a pair of bushes beneath the crumbling stone staircase, he spotted the wide brim of a very familiar hat.

Naruto pushed aside the leaves, revealing Beatrice curled up against the cold stone wall, her arms wrapped protectively around a glowing green soul drop—his soul drop. He reached for it carefully, but her eyes snapped open, and in a blur, the tip of her staff pressed hard against his throat. "Easy! Let's not kill me twice."

For a heartbeat, Beatrice didn't move, her grip steady. Then, with a sudden shudder, she lowered the staff and pulled him into a tight, desperate embrace. She pulled away, her voice low and wavering. "Mine deepest contrition, noble squire. Yon magicks... they didst betray thee. Yet ne'er was it mine intent to cause thee harm."

Naruto awkwardly patted her back. "It's fine," he muttered. "Anyway... I'm about to try and kill the butterfly. You in? It's gonna be awesome, dattebayo."

Beatrice adjusted her wide-brimmed hat, her lips curling into a vengeful smile. "Verily, let us smite the foul wretch. 'T hath lingered here far too long." Together, they sprinted up the spiraling stone staircase.

As they climbed, Naruto spoke, breathless. "Just a heads-up... it's got fast energy spears, some weird laser beams, and this annoying explosion move?"

Beatrice glanced at him as she moved. "Your knowledge is... appreciated, good squire. That beast..." she hesitated for a second, her speech shifting slightly, "the creature is called the Moonlight Butterfly."

Naruto stumbled slightly, staring at her. "Wait. Hold up. When could you speak... like... normal?"

"Oh, I've always had the ability to speak normally, my dear squire. It merely took me a moment or two to understand the evolution of language."

"Eeh, evolution of language?"

"Language, like all things, evolves with time. The tongue I speak is rooted in an older dialect. Thy speech... pardon, your speech is a more modern variant. When you spoke, I observed the structure of your sentences, the common verbs and inflections, and began to decode how far the language had shifted."

Naruto shook his head, staring at her like she was some rare, magical creature which, in fairness, she kind of was. "Holy crap. What the hell is your intelligence stat?"

"Oh, it's nothing special," Beatrice replied modestly, though a proud glint sparkled in her eyes, betraying the truth.

"Nothing special?!" Naruto exclaimed, grinning wide. "That's the most terrifyingly amazing thing I've ever seen! We literally just walked up some stairs and you updated your entire dictionary!"

"Careful, squire. Flattery may win thee strange favors."

Naruto laughed. "Not trying to flatter you! You're just... seriously awesome."

She looked away for a moment, adjusting her hat again to hide her growing smile. "Please, do inflate my ego further," she teased, lifting her staff with a flourish. "Raise thy blade, and let thy mettle speak where words fail thee."

Naruto nodded as they reached the top of the bridge. Ahead, a broken stone path stretched toward an even taller, crumbling tower.

A rhythmic, ghostly flap echoed from above.

It was enormous, its wings a shimmering veil of green and blue, rippling like the surface of a hidden pond. Its body was spectral and slim, no face, no legs... just magic given form. Between its wings, a strange crystalline device pulsed with an eerie, steady rhythm.

[Name: Moonlight Butterfly]

[HP: 3,500 / 3,500]

"Beautiful," Naruto whispered, stunned by the otherworldly sight.

Beatrice, however, remained stone-faced. "Beware, Naruto. There is danger in beauty. The Moonlight Butterfly is being made from the highest form of magic... and it will not fall easily."

Naruto grinned, gripping his sword tighter. "Good. I like a challenge."

The Moonlight Butterfly's horn began to glow, gathering swirling green energy that pulsed like liquid starlight. In a single focused breath, it fired a spear of concentrated magic, sharp as a comet and blinding in its descent.

Naruto's form flickered from existence with a burst of wind. The spear slammed into the stone walkway behind him, detonating on impact. A thunderous crack echoed through the air as scorched stone and shattered gravel sprayed outward, leaving a smoldering crater where he had stood a heartbeat before.

He reappeared beside Beatrice, who remained steady, unflinching. Her wide-brimmed hat fluttered in the wind as she raised her staff skyward. Its tip burned with a radiant azure light. She spun it once, deftly, and released a spiraling arrow of raw magical energy. It corkscrewed upward, leaving a trail of blue-white sparks in its wake as it raced toward the floating beast.

The Moonlight Butterfly tilted midair, its wings rippling like the surface of disturbed water. With graceful momentum, it twisted out of the arrow's path, the projectile narrowly missing its glowing wing and vanishing into the night. Naruto clicked his tongue, already tracking the creature's position as it gained altitude.

The Butterfly pulsed again, this time gathering a rolling mass of green-blue power in the air before it.

"Attack the Butterfly!"

Something in the young witch's tone made him freeze not in fear, but in understanding.

It wasn't a warning.

It was a setup.

With a one-handed flourish, he withdrew a shuriken from his pouch and spun it around his index finger through the central ring. His left hand blurred through a sequence of hand signs as he inhaled deeply, chakra flooding into his lungs.

Wind Release: Vacuum Blade.

A translucent vortex of slicing wind wrapped around the shuriken, sharpening its edges to a whisper-thin death wheel. The very air around it distorted as it spun. In one smooth, explosive motion, he flung the weapon skyward. It screeched through the night, trailing a whistle that built into a scream, aimed straight for the creature's left wing.

And then Beatrice's spiraling arrow, the one that had missed, curved.

It looped down from the sky above, a magical boomerang veering off its original trajectory. It smashed directly into the charged green orb the Butterfly had conjured, detonating it prematurely in a burst of multicolored energy. Blue and green sparks exploded in a firework bloom, lighting up the ruins with cascading brilliance.

Naruto smirked mid-motion. Perfect timing.

The wind-shrouded shuriken tore through the cloud of magic debris, streaking toward the Butterfly with merciless precision. But the creature responded instantly. Its body flared with blinding white light as it discharged a razor-thin laser beam, a pure, searing line of death that cleaved the shuriken in half mid-flight. The beam didn't stop. It cut a swath through the air and into the bridge itself.

The bridge screamed.

Ancient stone cracked like glass. A web of glowing fractures split across the surface beneath them. One whole section, nearly a third of the bridge, gave way with a thunderous groan, tumbling into the abyss below. Dust plumed upward in choking clouds. The ground beneath their feet trembled as another tremor threatened to collapse even more.

Above them, the Butterfly hovered, wings pulsing with renewed light. It gathered magic for a final assault. This time, the orb was massive. A crackling blue-green sphere larger than a man, radiating with destructive potential. The entire tower groaned under the pressure of its buildup.

Naruto didn't hesitate.

He swapped weapons mid-sprint, drawing the drake sword in one fluid motion. The blade responded, glowing with a serrated arc of wind.

He exhaled and stepped forward, swinging the sword with his full weight behind it.

The air split with the force of the blow. The glowing wind arc launched upward. It met the Butterfly's descending orb midair.

The resulting explosion was cataclysmic.

A flash of blinding light engulfed the night. The sound was deafening, a boom that echoed through every stone and bone in the ruins. The shockwave tore through the bridge like a god's breath. Massive chunks of the walkway ripped free, hurled into the void below. The ground cracked beneath Naruto's boots. He didn't wait.

In one breathless movement, he lunged forward and grabbed Beatrice by the waist, lifting her effortlessly. He sprinted with chakra-enhanced speed as the stone crumbled beneath them, the edge of the platform falling away piece by piece. The wind roared past his ears as he leapt across the last collapsing slab and skidded to a halt just before the ledge gave out.

Dust and smoke filled the air. For a moment, the world was silence and ash.

Then, before it even cleared, Beatrice stepped forward from Naruto's grip. With a flick of her wrist, she conjured another spiraling arrow, this one glowing brighter than the last. She didn't hesitate. She fired.

The projectile cut through the settling haze and struck true.

The Moonlight Butterfly screamed, a distorted, echoing wail that wasn't sound so much as sorrow. Its left wing shattered at the point of impact, splintering into crystalline shards that fell like stardust. Sap-like blood sprayed from the torn appendage, sizzling as it touched the ruined stone below.

The creature faltered. Its once majestic flight twisted into a broken descent, wings flailing unevenly. It careened downward in a wounded spiral until it crashed into the far side of the bridge ruins, one wing dragging limp behind it, the other still trembling with fading light.

[Name: Moonlight Butterfly]

[HP: 1,700 / 3,500]

Naruto and Beatrice didn't lower their guard. They felt it... this fight was far from over.

The Moonlight Butterfly twitched, its torn wing quivering as a new light emerged. White energy began to swirl, slow at first, then faster, converging around its wounds like ribbons of divine fire. The torn wing reknit itself, and the gaping hole in its chest pulsed with a soft, eerie glow.

"Slay it now!" Beatrice's voice rang out like a bell of war, urgent and unwavering. Her staff burned with arcane light. "'Tis healing... it draws upon divine energy!"

Naruto gritted his teeth. The butterfly's glow brightened, and he could feel the surge of power radiating from its core. They had only seconds before it fully regenerated.

He glanced down at the drake sword in his hand. The blade trembled, veins of glowing red running across its surface like cracks in glass. It couldn't take another heavy swing.

With a sharp breath, he discarded it and drew the Zweihander from his back. The weight slammed into his palm like an old friend returning to the fight.

A single puff of chakra smoke flared beside him as a shadow clone formed, mirroring his stance.

They exchanged a nod.

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Then, as one, they weaved through a rapid flurry of hand signs, wind chakra flowing through their bodies and blades. A faint shimmer surrounded them as the air thinned around their forms.

The world blurred.

They exploded forward, wind-enhanced movements turning them into twin phantoms sprinting across the fractured bridge. Their footsteps barely kissed the stone before launching into the next.

Above, the Moonlight Butterfly began gathering energy again, its wings glowing with green light, spiraling into another charge. But it never got the chance to release it.

Naruto's gaze locked onto the spiraling horn that crowned its head.

With a powerful roar, he and his clone leapt simultaneously. The real Naruto spun in midair and brought down the Zweihander with a single, crushing diagonal slash. The wind-enhanced blade screamed as it cut the air and then sheared clean through the butterfly's horn.

Shhhraaak!

The crystal shattered in an explosion of green light. The Moonlight Butterfly screeched in agony, reeling as magical energy surged chaotically through its body.

Naruto hit the ground in a crouch and rolled aside, kicking up stone chips as he shouted, "Now, Bea—!" He didn't even finish the sentence.

Beatrice had already acted. Her spiraling arrow flared with raw power as she hurled it forward. The projectile ripped through the sky and collided dead center with the Butterfly's chest.

A crack ran across the creature's body, then burst outward.

Crystalline plating shattered like glass. From within, something stirred. Out spilled thick, glowing green sap, and from the ruined core of the Butterfly's body, long, segmented insectoid legs emerged. Strangely, the Moonlight Butterfly began to rise. Its massive, wounded form ascended silently toward the broken tower above, wings shimmering with residual magic.

Naruto narrowed his eyes, tracking the creature's path. "What is it doing?"

Beatrice's voice was low, troubled. "Like a butterfly to nectar... I believe it's drinking the Divine Fire."

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[ Personal Note: First off, thanks a ton to all of you for sticking with this story. Seriously, you guys are awesome. Now, if you're interested in supporting me on P@treon, let me just say that over there, I post these massive 5k-word Chapters. But heads up, if you're jumping to P@treon, you'll need to start from Chapter 66, since that's where this Chapter lines up with the content there.

To everyone here just reading along, please don't forget to leave a comment! Honestly, your comments make my day, and they let me know you're as invested in this story as I am. So yeah, thanks again, and I hope you have an amazing rest of your day!