Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or it's characters and make no claim on their copyrights.
Ranged Applications
Minute seals flared briefly as crystal lenses clicked silently into place. Yadome's vision blurred for a breathless instant, and then complete focus was resumed, only now her targets appeared only five meters distant, instead of the five hundred they truly were. The click had been silenced by a secondary sealing pattern, but she could feel the click against her skull in any case, confirming the adjustment.
The close up vision finalized Yadome's earlier assessment completely; she had her targets in sight. Two men, traveling side by side, disparate in almost all features, save matching dark robes with a red cloud pattern, the one of the right carried a body over his shoulder with ease. This man, quite tall and built powerfully, Yadome determined to be target one. The other would be target two. That was as close as she would ever get to their names; she had deliberately avoided learning them. It was not necessary to track these men, and Yadome disliked knowing the names of men she must kill.
Five hundred meters, and approaching at a steady walking speed, carefully paced. There were variations, no trained ninja walked in a perfectly even pace, but they were patterned, easily read and deciphered. Timing the shot was a simple matter.
Yadome twitched an eyebrow muscle. Lenses spun silently, and clicked into place once more, providing a tunnel of vision, a single straight path to the target. Again the secondary pattern covered the sound, insuring absolutely nothing betrayed her position.
It was extremely unlikely for Yadome to be detected, five hundred meters distant and concealed in forested terrain, but no chances would be taken. Another set of active seals shifted her appearance to fade completely fluidly into the background, a perfect chameleon. A third pattern obscured that one, totally masking any chakra signature. It was all part of the many abilities her sealed equipment provided.
Long past thinking about it herself, Yadome's equipment was a marvel. The bodysuit, glasses, and other components of her uniform contained four thousand six hundred and ninety-five seals, many of microscopic size. The long composite bow she carried was carved with another four hundred thirty three, and a number of her weapons and scrolls contained significantly more. It had taken the best fuuinjutsu master in the village five years and several months to make the equipment.
With practiced care, taking all possible effects, windspeed, leaf motion, the pace of her enemies, and many more, into account, Yadome took up her bow. She pulled an arrow from the quiver hanging at her waist. Without looking at it the perfect tactile sense of her gloves passed down the arrow, tracing the seal marks upon it. She brought her hands together for a brief moment then, invoking her own jutsu, completed her preparations. This done, the arrow was notched and the bow drawn. Her being perfectly controlled, her aim certain, Yadome channeled her chakra and then released.
Five hundred meters would be an impossible shot for any normal bow. With the seals embedded in hers, and the strength of chakra Yadome could make a straight angle shot of almost six hundred that still possessed the power to kill. It required special arrows to fire so far, but no enemy would anticipate an attack from that distance.
Unanticipated, there would be no warning. The arrow sped through the sky, a shaft of metal and wood boring through the air with more fury than even a diving falcon, but completely silent and totally invisible. Yadome's jutsu wrapped around it, making it undetectable, a simple matter in a thing so small.
The large man was thrown back as the feathered shaft suddenly appeared in his chest, the broad head and two inches of wood shaft buried there. He had time to grunt and his companion to gasp before the arrow did its true work. Many ninja could have survived such a blow, even though the man's heart was grazed, but the contact was only the lesser part of the strike.
The arrow, its grain inscribed with the seals for three separate explosion notes, unleashed its hideous energy.
The smaller man was thrown to the ground as fire and pieces of his companion slammed into him.
Even as the other was smashed into confusion by this blast Yadome was already acting. Three more arrows, these not explosive, were already streaking through the air. They had not the precise aim of the first shot, but did not need it. Imbued with electric force, they were magnetized, and sought any metal source, especially those carried by the other ninja.
Burnt and damaged, his senses still a step behind, the man managed somehow to draw a kunai and block the first arrow, twisting out of the path of the second and third, only to have the third screech and arc across space to strike him in the thigh.
Yadome leaped high now, a short motion to take her clear of the trees for a moment. Again and again she drew back her bowstring, snapping it forward twice a second. There were no arrows in that bow, but arrows of electrical force, formed of chakra, leapt forth from the bow with every snap of the string. Crackling with power these arrows, ten times as fast and more compared to a physical shot, streaked toward their target. So quick dodging would not be possible, certainly not for a disoriented target.
Her target did not make the attempt, but chose to try and block instead.
Twice he met the oncoming streaks of power, blue from the excitement they carried through the air, with his kunai. This did not spare him. Blocked by metal, the energy of those lightning arrows did not dissipate, but surged into the body, scourging and disrupting the signals of life. The first knocked him back a step, the second to his knees.
Three more struck unblocked, and here their energy did not penetrate, but sizzled and burned, leaving terrible blacked skin and emptiness of feeling. One more would strike in the shoulder, before the man fell and the last two lightning arrows passed over his head.
Yadome came to rest in the trees, slightly off angle from where she had attacked at first, to avoid detection. She fitted another arrow, this one fully real, to her bow, but waited before firing. Striking a prone target was difficult, even for one of her ability. She would allow a second to pass to see if he would stand.
Then something strange happened. A massive weapon, similar to a scythe but bearing three blades instead of one, erupted from beneath those robes, launching straight into the air. Yadome's arrow was released, but before it reached the target the scythe fell down, to slam into its wielder's chest.
Blackness poured from the three wounds, even as Yadome's arrow struck deep into the stomach to seemingly no effect. Black energy poured out, and the colors of the man's skin began to change, to seemingly bleach of life.
Yadome's lenses had already reacted, providing an explanation almost before she could be surprised. Yin chakra, a massive amount, the information appeared before her eyes. It implied a demon, or spirit possession, or some other method of obtaining energy beyond the personal. The next logical step was some kind of transformation.
Yadome's response was three-fold. First, she peppered her still prone foe with a trio of arrows, they did no apparent damage, but stuck in places deep enough to guarantee lethality to a human. Second, she created a simple bushin image of herself, and set it to close and pretend to conceal itself at slightly beyond two hundred meters. Third, she moved off to six hundred meters, out of effective range, but still able to easily observe.
The man, now a horrid image of white and black, with hideously distorted features, stood. He pulled the scythe from his chest effortlessly, and appeared completely unwounded. He ripped out Yadome's five arrows as well, leaving gaping holes in his body from the barbs on those broad heads. Slowly those wounds closed. The sniper watched in disappointment from afar at this. She had hoped the wounding would remain and her target would simply die when his ability to sustain this state failed. However, she was still certain victory was hers.
"Where?" the cry was bellowed with might force, a towering roar of rage and anger audible even at the great distance to Yadome's hiding place. It was not favored with a response.
Now the waiting game began, as Yadome knew her enemy had but two courses. He might flee and hope to escape her range, or her could try and find her hiding place and destroy her. Either option would need to be accomplished before his current state could no longer be sustained, for there would necessarily be a period of extreme vulnerability afterwards. Yet, a search should have seemed almost impossible to the target, for how could a lone man cover even a two hundred meter radius to find a single hidden ninja? He made no moved to flee.
"I will find you and slaughter you!" this was not a bellow, but instead a snide comment, filled with confidence. Clawed fingers raked across his face, and black blood dropped from the wound, dripping downward. Those droplets slid down the chin and into the air, but they did not fall to the ground.
With a scream of pain and anguish a shrieking human face formed from each drop, flashing out into the woods. Maddened insects, distorted in their agony these images swarmed through the woods, searching every nook and cranny. Emanations of pain and chakra only, they nevertheless made brutally effective searchers, no doubt they could find anything they sought.
Pity then for their master they ranged only three hundred meters out from his body. Two minutes only and Yadome's bushin was routed forth, to run and jump through the forest with brilliant speed. The bushin wore not Yadome's special suit of chameleon enabled cloth, but a simple ninja uniform. It excelled at evasion, and the shrieking visages could not catch it easily.
A minute passed in the pursuit, the bushin's convincing dodge and weave always nearly enough interrupted before a bowshot could be launched, an elaborate façade to conceal its inability to attack. The screaming creatures seemed unable to catch a speedy ninja concentrated on evasion, especially one as insubstantial as they themselves.
Tongues of blackness shot up from the ground, curling into scythe blades and ripping through the bushin's form.
A puff of smoke burst in the leaves, and then the image was gone.
"Damn!" the monstrous yin form spat. At a gesture screaming faces sped back to the search, their circle widening now. "Find her! Pierce her with your agony you ghosts of slaughter! Bushin or flesh, destroy them all!"
Yadome made no moves. All aspects of her were concealed, both from human senses and whatever powers these creatures might possess. The signatures of life and chakra were completely masked. She was naught but a strangely shaped dead branch and nothing more.
Long minutes passed, and ghostly screamers ranged wider and wider, gradually even coming to such a distance as Yadome herself, but they found nothing. One passed within meters of her face, a horrific vision of a soul in torment; still those agonized eyes saw nothing.
Yadome's own eyes remained glued to her target. At length, the search proving fruitless, the other's energy seemed to dissipate, his breathing became ragged, and sweat poured down his face. The sniper knew the moment would come soon, and she was prepared.
At last it happened, the pour tortured scouts swerved back toward their master, pouring into his body in some hideous assimilation. This done the target gasped and howled, and slowly his body began to slough off the dark and light, distortion unfolding and the appearance of humanity restored. Cautiously color began to return and the bleached bones faded from view. "I guess she fled before my power," the man laughed with sick glee. "A pity about Kakuzu though." He picked a lingering piece of flesh off his shoulder and let it flutter to the ground.
Now was the moment Yadome sensed, the yin chakra was dissipating, but the human energy had not yet been fully restored. The combination of essences was in flux, and vulnerable. It was time to act.
Yadome stood, and deliberately dispelled the camouflage about her. Her current maneuver required her to reveal herself, a slight risk, but since she did so, she intended her enemy to know her appearance at the last instant.
The target's face turned instantly, in time to see Yadome pull back her bowstring around an arrow shining like silver. Here the sniper spoke, her words clear as bells. "Hikari no Ya!" the bowstring snapped.
The arrow flared with the brilliance of the sun, and streaked across the distance in the space of an eyeblink, seen only in its brilliant afterimage by the target's eye.
The bolt of light slammed into the chest of the blackened man, piercing straight to the heart with Yadome's perfect accuracy. The holy power, yang chakra combined with mighty seals of purification, blasted through the polluted body of her target. Yin power, lingering yet in that body, combined with yang in the only way it could, through conflict. Massive amounts of energy burst forth within the body, and with no other path, sought to return to their sources.
The body of the target was left torn asunder on the paths to heaven and hell.
Yadome's lenses darkened against the blinding power of that flash then returned clarity once more.
Nothing remained of the man save a small metal plate, marked with three vertical curved lines and a crude slash through them on the perpendicular. This metal had been marked with color, no longer shining, but burnished dark and light on each side.
Slowly, never dropping her guard, Yadome approached the sight. She took the forehead protector in gloved hands, and then carefully wrapped it in a cotton cloth and stored it in a small pouch on her leg. There was no other usable evidence, so it was necessary to take the piece.
In truth evidence was unnecessary, the Raikage would not doubt her word, but Yadome was thorough, and the piece might have some value to a master of fuuinjutsu.
Briefly, as she left the scene, the sniper wondered what had caused the two men to do something so stupid as they had done. Steal a weapon from the Raikage? Such idiocy, a general does not freely part with pieces of his arsenal, and a more dangerous weapon would be dispatched to take appropriate measures.
It occurred to Yadome that perhaps her foes had foolishly thought the possession of power equated to the lethality of a weapon. It seemed a great idiocy to her, but it was surprisingly common, otherwise it would surely not be so easy for a simple jounin with only a modest amount of chakra to her own to bring down so many great targets.
- "HIkari no Ya" – this means, more or less, 'Arrow of Light.'