Team ROOT
Chapter Three, Part Two: From Battle to Battle
(A/N: And here is the latter part of the chapter, as promised. Enjoy! Also, for those of you who read and enjoyed Blade in the Shadows before it went on hiatus, rejoice! I had a think and I've decided I will rewrite it from the ground up, which means you might be seeing something new from Naruto Uzumaki, Grand Master of the Assassin Order soon.)
The youngest missing-ninja attacked; arcs of lightning flying from his hands as two of the others moved as well; one Kusa-nin suddenly faded from view and the Iwa-nin's skin suddenly turned grey. As the two ROOT shinobi jumped apart, pulling their masks down over their faces, Naruto registered that the Iwa-nin was now behind him. Flipping aside as the Iwa-nin's fist cracked the ground where he had stood, Naruto quickly analyzed his opponent, "Okay seemingly that grey tint to his skin has more to it than meets the eye. Seemingly it is some kind of ability which gives him greatly increased strength and I would guess resilience as well…"
"Naruto-kun, behind you!"
Hinata's mental cry drew Naruto's attention just in time for him to duck as a lightning-sheathed, razor-edged chain whip cracked in the spot where his head had previously occupied. Had it hit home, his head would have been cut in half.
"Let's try to avoid that," Naruto remarked.
"Indeed," Hinata replied, before both their heads snapped around as they heard a cry from the single Konoha-nin,
"Jouro Senbon!" (Senbon Shower)
The missing-nin threw his umbrella into the air, which promptly filled with a hail of needles.
Hinata leapt in front of Naruto and twisted rapidly on the spot, "Hakkeshō Kaiten!"
A dome of spinning chakra rose around them, the senbon pinging off it as the Konoha missing-nin watched in mounting frustration. Finally the onslaught stopped and Hinata slowed to a halt.
Naruto's left ear twitched as he heard a cry of "Dokusei Kiri!" (Poison Mist) and he whipped around to see a huge purple cloud bearing down on them, a cloud which he could tell at a glance would not be good to make contact with.
Raising one hand he shouted, "Fūton: Daitoppa!" causing the cloud to be blown back and forcing the second Kusa-nin who had created it to Kawarimi away so as to avoid his own attack.
A soft jingling sound drew their attention and they both leapt away, somersaulting backwards over one of the tents to dodge the chain whip as it snapped through the air. Naruto and Hinata landed, Hinata just in front of Naruto as the blond sensed a faint chakra signature behind them, "Hinata, behind us!"
The duo reacted instantly, Hinata dropping to one knee in mid-turn so that Naruto's wakizashi passed over her head; their four blades cut through the air and caught on something, their successful impact rewarded with several gouts of blood and a cry of pain.
The first Kusa-nin reappeared, staggering backwards with several lurid red cuts across his chest and legs. His face contorted in fury, "Impossible! No mere children can see through my camouflage technique!"
Naruto smirked, "We're no mere children, moron. We're Konoha shinobi, and we don't lose."
A pair of sickle-like blades appeared, one in each of the Kusa-nin's hands as he snarled and raised them, "Well you're going to lose today, or I'm not the Kusa no Kakushi Kamakiri!" (Hidden Praying Mantis of the Grass)
Naruto brought up his weapon and deflected both blades to one side before bringing the other round in a vicious stab at the ninja's side, "The Kusa no Kakushi Kamakiri, huh? Well, after I kill you I should get a nice bounty from Kusa!" The Kusa-nin dodged and then the duo was off, their blades colliding so fast the air rang with the sound of metal.
Hinata watched this for a split second before realizing that she wasn't alone; she whipped around just in time to see a huge purple cloud bearing down upon her. Her hands flew together, flicked through seals and she took a deep breath, "Suiton: Teppōdama!"
The ball of water that flew from her lips hit the cloud, absorbed its contents and kept going, taking the Kusa-nin who had created it by surprise and hitting him in the face.
As he staggered backwards, his own poison taking effect on him and sending rivulets of blood pouring from his lips with each cough, Hinata sprang forwards like a tiger, "Hakke Rokujūyon Shō!"
Her fingers powered into the Kusa-nin's shoulder, sending him staggering backwards before she struck again, "Two palms! Four palms! Eight palms! Sixteen palms! Thirty-two palms! Sixty-four palms!"
Her final blow hit the Kusa-ninja squarely in the dead-centre of his chest and sent him flying backwards. He crashed to the ground and did not get up again.
"Naruto-kun," Hinata broadcast to her bondmate, "My adversary is down."
"Okay, give me a minute."
With her Byakugan, Hinata saw one of Naruto's Kage Bunshin be skewered by the Kusa-nin and disappear. The nin just had time to mutter, "Kage Bunshin!" before Naruto reappeared behind him and ended his life in a spray of blood.
"You know," Naruto commented, wrenching Cortana free and allowing the corpse to slump to the ground, "You guys don't seem quite as good as you apparently think you are."
The Iwa-nin snarled and charged as the first Kumo-nin flashed through seals and dropped to one knee, planting both hands on the ground, "Ranton: Kumo Kumo no Saito!" (Storm Release: Web of the Cloud Spider)
Arcs of lightning immediately began spreading, blossoming out from the nin's position and remaining a few inches from the ground at all times as he straightened back up. Naruto surveyed the ground as he dodged the charging Iwa-nin, "The pattern appears random, which means…"
Hinata took over, "…that the technique is uncontrolled by him. The main danger seems to be that if one of the bolts connects with something that links it to the ground, say a person's leg, the current earthing itself in the ground through the leg will electrocute the victim. That means…"
"…that earthing the technique with something will weaken it drastically since it already has a route to the ground!" Naruto finished, quickly planning his next move and kicking off the ground. Less than a second later a bolt of lightning shot through the space previously occupied by his right foot. Had it connected, he'd have become a human sparkler.
The Iwa-nin looked up as his blond adversary flipped over his head and threw both his wakizashi, before he was forced to cover his face as sparks showered in every direction, the bolts of lightning now effectively earthed as Naruto's wakizashi served as impromptu lightning rods.
Naruto twisted his body in midair and began making handseals, "Kitsune Hanyō Hijutsu: Kitsunebi no Ōda!" (Bludgeoning Fox Tail)
His tail became instantly stiff and the fur fluffed out, forming spikes along its full length. Before the Iwa-nin could dodge, Naruto twisted and swung the tail as hard as possible.
The Iwa-nin was lucky; if his bloodline had not been active he would have lost his head there and then. As it was, he was knocked back with enough force to make him lose his balance and fall into the lightning web, which gave him enough of a shock to disrupt his chakra control and deactivate his kekkei genkai.
Naruto landed in a crouch on the Iwa-nin's chest as Hinata landed behind him, throwing a few shuriken to knock a swarm of flying kunai off course.
"In my opinion, knowing my father was the Yondaime Hokage is irrelevant to me," Naruto muttered as he raised one hand, a cone of wind chakra forming over his knuckles, "Hinata and I will defeat whoever Iwa sends to get revenge."
The Iwa-nin glared up at him, "A Tsuchi, a member of the strongest clan in Iwa, defeated by a mere child. How can I pass on and face my ancestors under such a burden of shame?"
"Tell them that you were defeated by the son of the Yellow Flash, the jinchūriki of the Kyūbi no Kitsune. They may understand." He drew back his chakra-coated fist, "Go now in peace, Tsuchi-san."
The man chuckled, "You are worthy of your father's name, boy." Naruto smiled behind his mask, then his hand plunged down.
The dark Kumo-nin cursed and cancelled the technique, allowing Naruto to retrieve his wakizashi. Hinata moved to cover his back, but was forced to dodge away as a crackling blast of electricity from the youngest Kumo-nin narrowly missed her.
The ninja with the whip tried to exploit the distraction; Hinata barely managed to avoid death by blocking with one of her tantō, which became entangled in the chain.
As Naruto caught hold of his wakizashi and turned, the whip was jerked back and Hinata's tantō blade snapped off just above the hilt.
Naruto shunshined to her side as she staggered, letting the now-useless handle fall to the ground, but was prevented from retaliating by a cry of, "Ranton: Fukanō Dasshutsu!" (Storm Release: Impossible Escape)
The duo split up as the attack streaked past, but were unpleasantly surprised as the attack multiplied and hit them anyway, sending them flying in different directions.
"KITS!" Kyūbi yelled, "Stop yourselves rolling or you'll black out!"
Naruto stabbed Durandel into the ground, arresting his momentum enough to flip back onto his feet and shunshin to Hinata. His arms were cramping horribly and from what he could feel through the link Hinata's were completely numb.
"You were both careless," Kyūbi admonished, "You could have both died just now."
Naruto winced. His shirt now had several gashes in it; all of them charred black and smoking. Hinata was no less singed-looking, though thankfully her dignity was still preserved since Naruto had taken a bigger strike than her. Both sighed with relief as Naruto felt the cramps vanish and sensation returned to Hinata's arms.
"I'll take the guy with the whip," Naruto said, "While he's there we can't fight the others properly." Without waiting for a reply he went into a shunshin, leaving six words floating in his wake, "Fūton: Shinoni Kaiden." (Wind Release: Two Steps of Death)
Even if the whip-wielding Kumo-nin had known what was coming, he still would not have been able to stop it. Before he could even blink, a wind chakra-enhanced blade slashed upwards across his chest from his right hip to his left shoulder. Barely a second after that, another attack laid his back asunder and Naruto reappeared beside his partner, looking just as if he had never even moved.
Before the shinobi had even hit the ground, Naruto and Hinata were distracted by a loud crackling noise. When he saw the source, Naruto tilted his head slightly, "Huh. After we failed to retrieve it the first time, I wasn't expecting to see the Raijin no Ken ever again… Aoi Rokushō."
The missing-nin smirked, "You recognize me then?"
Naruto nodded, "I'm afraid so. But at least the only black mark on your ROOT mission records can be dealt with today."
Aoi scoffed, "You seem rather certain of my defeat."
Naruto raised his wakizashi, the subtle glow around the blades revealing that they were saturated with wind chakra, "Lightning beats Earth; Earth beats Water; Water beats Fire; Fire beats Wind and Wind beats Lightning. Given that I am a Wind-type and that sword is a Lightning-type…"
He sprang forwards and clashed blades with Aoi, who was shocked to feel the Raijin's blade give a little, "W-What…?"
Naruto nodded once, "My scissors beats your paper. Game over." The Raijin gave a little more, and then Naruto's blade cut straight through it and severed Aoi's neck. The Raijin deactivated as it fell from Aoi's hand and Naruto caught it, immediately sealing it away to be returned to Konoha's vaults after the mission.
A massive chakra surge drew his attention as he heard the Storm Release Kumo-nin roar, "RATON: TSUISEKI ARASHI!" (Storm Release: Tracking Storm)
-TR-
Yūgao, Sai, Yurihime and the two Kage Bunshin left by the absent duo turned as they heard a distant rumble of thunder and saw storm clouds gathering back the way they had come.
Yurihime immediately began complaining that she was going to get wet, but Yūgao shook her head, "Those are from a jutsu; they're not natural." This was reinforced a second later as the clouds began firing lightning bolts downwards.
Silently she prayed her two students were alright. If they were fighting in that, they would need all the help they could get.
-TR-
Naruto swore as he dodged another bolt of lightning. "Is it my imagination," he thought, "or are they getting faster?"
It wasn't his imagination it turned out, as he and Hinata were forced to evade about four bolts in five seconds.
"Try blowing the clouds away," suggested Kyūbi.
"Don't talk unless you have a helpful solution!" Naruto snapped back.
"This is a solution, you moron!" Kyūbi snarled, "Are you a Wind-user or aren't you? Just use some of my chakra and blow those clouds away!"
Naruto sighed, delved into Kyūbi's chakra and drew up as much as he could. Flashing through seals while still running from an endless barrage of electrical attacks intent on frying him, he twisted and jumped, "Fūton: Daitoppa!"
The resultant blast was nothing like Naruto was used to. Instead of the usual powerful gust which blew away anything in its path, what came from Naruto's hands could only be described as a concentrated hurricane, which blasted the storm clouds away in less than a second.
The Kumo-nin's hands flew into a new string of seals as he snarled, "Ranton: Jūden Ōkoku!" (Storm Release: Charged Kingdom)
The two Konoha ninja immediately noticed the effects of the technique; Naruto's tongue and mouth tasted like they had been plated in copper and his hair stood on end (meaning, more than usual). He looked to his right and saw that Hinata was experiencing the same phenomenon, though the halo of indigo surrounding her head looked far more amusing.
"There's something wrong here," Hinata remarked, "There has to be more to this technique than just charging the air with static electricity."
Naruto agreed and began drawing on his chakra, only to grunt with pain as electricity coursed over his body and shocked him.
A second later, Naruto heard a gasp of pain as Hinata discovered that she got shocked from channelling chakra too. Kyūbi's voice sounded in both their heads, "Stupid girl! If your partner is being shocked, why would you think you weren't going to be?"
"I had to check," Hinata replied.
Naruto cut off Kyūbi's retort, "Kyūbi! Chew us out later! Right now I need you to analyze this technique and find a weakness for us to exploit, because at the moment all we have are kenjutsu and taijutsu against two people who can fry us into a fine crisp at close range! Hold on, how the hell'd he get tha- oh shit, INCOMING!"
They leapt as one, only just avoiding the Ranton chakra-imbued chain whip as it hit the ground where they had been standing, blasting a large hole several feet across with a flash of light and a clap of thunder.
"That thing's even more dangerous now!" Naruto began cursing their foolishness, "Why didn't we pick it up before? Kami above and Yami below, we're making every rookie mistake in the book on this mission!"
Hinata was spared the trouble of responding by Kyūbi, who chose that moment to interrupt, "I've got it! His technique electrocutes you if you use chakra but it's limited by his ability to maintain it; you have to overload it!"
"How?" Hinata asked, "He's an adult jōnin or higher, how can we overpower him?"
Naruto ducked a crosswise attack. The Kumo-nin wasn't using the chain whip properly; he was just swinging it at them like a flail. Evidently he did not know how to use it properly.
As his container jumped over an attack aimed at his legs, Kyūbi continued, "The key is my yōki. No matter how big that guy's reserves are, they aren't even a drop in the ocean compared to my own. I'll give you the chakra and you form a chakra cloak. It should protect you from the static… in theory." The last two words were whispered.
"What was that last bit?" Naruto asked suspiciously.
"Nothing! Here's the chakra!"
Naruto's eyes narrowed, but he finally decided it wasn't worth the migraine and began wreathing his body in the chakra cloak as Kyūbi's chakra bubbled into his coils.
The two Kumo ninjas' eyebrows rose as Naruto straightened from his crouch, sparks skittering over the sheet of red-tinted chakra wrapped around his body, unable to reach skin and deliver their payload. "A jinchūriki!" the older missing-nin thought, "No wonder he has those ears and the tail, not to mention the energy to have held out this long! This is less than good news for us!"
Naruto growled, then flung his head back and unleashed a deafening howl. The chakra-enhanced sound wave instantly blew away the Ranton chakra filling the air and three both Kumo-nin backwards a short distance as bodies and tents were tossed around by the force of Naruto's roar. The only thing unaffected was Hinata, the bijuu chakra flowing through her coils protecting her, her hair whipping in the winds swirling around her but otherwise unfazed as she anchored herself to the ground with chakra.
Naruto settled into a crouch and slowly drew his wakizashi, having sheathed both of them during the technique with the lightning storm firing bolts at them so that he had a better freedom of movement. As the two Kumo-nin recovered and turned, Naruto sprang.
Both shinobi smirked and prepared to counter what seemed like a blind charge, the elder raising the whip in his right hand and the younger taking aim with both hands, each waiting until evasion was impossible to attack.
Just before that moment came however, their target simply vanished from sight. The Kumo chūnin swore, "Fuck! Where did he go?" His answer came not a second later and most certainly not in the fashion he'd been expecting; a spray of blood drenched his entire left side from head to toe as his only remaining ally fell to his knees, clutching the stump of his right arm while the limb itself lay in the sodden grass at his feet.
"It's a shame," intoned the blond shinobi's voice, startling the chūnin, "that you will not life to learn this lesson; Kumo shinobi you may be, wielder of a powerful bloodline you may be, and A-rank or higher you may have been ranked in the bingo book, but the only people who can win a battle of attrition against a jinchūriki are other jinchūriki, Kages and perhaps the most powerful of S-ranked shinobi. You fit none of those criteria, I'm afraid." His wakizashi flashed through the air and the Kumo-nin's head rolled.
Suddenly it was just Naruto and the Kumo chūnin eyeing each other and waiting for the first move to be made. The chūnin's eyes flicked to the whip on the floor, but before he could move to grab it Hinata beat him to it. She landed next to Naruto and immediately sealed it away.
The chūnin's eyebrows furrowed. "So what?" he spat, "I don't need that to kill you! My kinjutsu can do that by itself!" he fired twin streams of lightning at them, but they dodged. "Dodging won't save you!" he roared, b ringing both arms up over his head.
Naruto and Hinata charged, but were thrown back as a bolt struck in front of them. As they both staggered up again, they saw that storm clouds had rolled in and their opponent was looking triumphant, "Konoha fools! You can't possibly beat me now! Kinjutsu: Zen'nō Raijin no Chisei: Shinseina Hatsubai!" (Forbidden Technique: Reign of the Omnipotent Lightning God: Divine Release)
The clouds above them began to glow, becoming brighter and brighter until thousands of lightning bolts exploded out of them, converging on the laughing Kumo chūnin and enveloping him in a crackling sphere.
"Uh oh," Kyūbi muttered, "I know this technique."
"You do?" Hinata replied, "What is it?"
"It's called, as you heard, Reign of the Omnipotent Lightning God. The Rikudō Sennin created it, and only one person has wielded it since him; the Shodaime Raikage, though he had the wisdom to never use its most powerful ability as this little upstart has just done."
"How powerful is it?" Naruto asked curiously.
"You know how Kaminari no Kuni has all those mountains and valleys? Well let's just say that it didn't look anything like that until after the Jūbi fled its battle there with the Rikudō Sennin."
There was a pause, then Naruto said quietly, "Are you… serious?"
"Oh don't worry," Kyūbi said happily, "This kid, Divine Release or not, is still nowhere near the level of the Rikudō Sennin. He was able to wound the Jūbi multiple times, cause that much damage to the surrounding landscape and maintain that technique long enough that the Jūbi was eventually forced to flee due to its injuries and because it had used up so much of its chakra during the fight, and even then he still survived using the technique. This guy… I give him half an hour at most before he dies from the overload of power running through his body, and that's being generous."
"So… what? Do we just stand and fight him until he dies then?" Naruto asked.
He gasped as a stinging sensation ran through his head courtesy of the Kyūbi, "Absolutely not. This guy may be about as powerful as a kitten by comparison to the Rikudō Sennin, but he's still using this kinjutsu. No matter how much of my power you try to use, if you stand and try to fight him you will die. Both of you."
"So if we can't fight him," said Hinata, "What will we do?"
"Your only available option is to run away. Run away and try to keep enough distance that he can't attack you."
"Right." The two ninja looked back at the sphere and were immediately forced to cover the eyeholes of their masks for fear of losing their enhanced sight as the sphere became blindingly bright and imploded.
What had once been the Kumo chūnin was no longer any such thing; the creature which straightened up and turned to look at them held a roughly humanoid shape but that was where the similarities ended.
It was comprised entirely of lightning so purely white it was tinted blue, with a large yellow light glowing in the centre of its chest and blood-red eyes slanted in an expression of terrible malevolence. Then it opened its mouth and laughed, and its voice cracked like thunder. In short, what stood before them may once have been a normal human, but that was no longer the case.
"Hahahaha! What do you think now, Leaf dogs? I will destroy you both and you can do nothing to stop me!"
Naruto and Hinata didn't reply; they just turned around and started running. "Cowards!" roared the Kumo-nin, immediately giving chase.
-TR-
Naruto and Hinata bounded from tree to tree with all the speed they could muster, "Hinata, how far ahead are we?"
Hinata activated her Byakugan, "He's gaining on us!"
"Use chakra cloaks, it might give you enough of a boost to keep ahead!" They each felt bijuu chakra flow into their coils and immediately formed their cloaks.
"Incoming!" Hinata called and the two ex-ROOT split up, the tree they had been about to land on exploding into splinters as their pursuer's attack missed them and detonated against the trunk. They were each pelted with fragments which caught fire and burned up on contact with their chakra cloaks.
"Those freakish jinchūriki powers won't save you, pests!"
"Maybe, maybe not;" Kyūbi snickered, "but time sure will, you arrogant little worm."
Naruto drew his wakizashi, drawing the fox's attention, "What ARE YOU DOING? You can't fight him!"
"I'm not. We need to gain ground so I'm delaying him!" Out loud he roared, "Fūton: Ni Kaze no Yaiba!" The resulting wind blades were so strong that the air visibly rippled. They cut through the trunks of four trees on either side and brought them crashing down on the Kumo chūnin as he passed beneath them.
"Quite ingenious, I must say," Kyūbi remarked as Naruto and Hinata took a second to pause on a branch and look back, "however I am unsure that it will hold him for…"
"Raiton: Myaku!" (Lightning Release: Pulse)
"…long. LEG IT!"
The two genin obeyed; even as the pile of fallen trees glowed and exploded, they turned and continued running.
It turned out that they were less lucky this time. A chunk of jagged wood about a foot in diameter flew towards the back of Naruto's head and Hinata failed to see it in time. The log ploughed right through Naruto's chakra cloak before the bijuu chakra could reduce it to ash and impacted, instantly knocking Naruto unconscious.
Hinata cast a brief glance back at the Kumo chūnin before creating a Kage Bunshin, helping it lift Naruto off the branch and carry him as they proceeded onwards.
-TR-
Several miles north, the two Kage Bunshin with Yūgao and Sai suddenly turned and looked back.
The cat-masked ANBU leading the group noticed, "Is something wrong?"
The Hinata-Bunshin turned to look at her, "The originals are in peril."
The Naruto-Bunshin nodded, "The boss has been incapacitated and Tenshi is alone. They seem to be being pursued by a Kumo-nin with a kinjutsu that allowed him to turn his body into lightning."
Yūgao turned to march back down the road, but the two clones stepped in her way, "There isn't any need to intervene. Apparently the ninja they're fighting's technique will kill him in thirty minutes and they've already been running for four. They'll get through."
Yūgao's tense body posture told them plainly that she wished to assist her genin, but finally she said, "Alright. But you are going to dictate the whole story to me from the moment they left us."
-TR-
"Hinata? Put me down; I can walk."
"Naruto? How do you feel?"
"Like I got hit in the back of the head by a large lump of wood. I am steady, however."
"No time for small talk," Kyūbi interrupted, "You have twenty-six more minutes, so keep moving. Having to carry you is slowing your little mate down so that pest is catching up, and even though I can't see him I can tell he's probably mightily pissed off right now."
Naruto slipped from the Hinatas' shoulders as the Kage Bunshin, her job done, dispelled. He paused a second to make sure he was stable and they set off once more.
A tree exploded off to their right as they zigzagged back and forth to avoid their pursuer's attacks, a trick that was evidently not lost on their enemy as he began swearing and yelling at them to stay still.
"I hear water," Naruto said, "up ahead."
Before Hinata could respond, they ran out of forest to tree-jump through. The pair of them landed hard on the grass and kept running, the thunderous sound of water getting louder and louder, until they both stopped on a rocky outcropping and looked down. Across the waterfall and frothing, churning water below it, they could see a huge statue holding a seal, and from what they could see they were standing on the head of one directly across from it.
"Oh, the irony," Kyūbi growled, "The Valley of the End, again. Kits, do me a favour? You're standing on Madara Uchiha's head. Please destroy it."
The two genin ignored him as Hinata activated her Byakugan. "We can't get across from here," she reported to Naruto, "We could get down, but we're right by the waterfall and the rapids at its foot look far too fierce to try water walking on them." She stiffened, "Behind us!"
The two of them whipped around as their enemy landed before them, chuckling, "Nice chase, but I'm afraid that for you two this is the end of the line. Fitting isn't it? You both die within spitting distance of your own wretched country, unseen and unaided."
Naruto and Hinata settled into attack stances but the Kumo-nin simply brought his hands together, blue-white lightning accumulating between his palms before he flung both arms wide. The ball of lightning expanded immediately, transforming into a narrow shaft about four feet in length.
As the creature that had once been a human being grasped the middle of the shaft, one end expanded into a huge spearhead while the other end bloomed into a crackling cloud of electricity. "Raiton: Ransa Deru Reranpāgo." (Lightning Release: Lance of Thunder and Lightning) Faster than either genin could react, he drew the lance back over his head and flung it at them like a javelin.
Time seemed to slow to a dead crawl as Naruto watched the attack fly towards them and strike Hinata high on the left side of her chest, sending her spinning backwards off the edge. He turned in mounting horror as Hinata seemed to hang in the air. He saw her reach out to him, heard her voice in his mind whisper, "Na… Naruto-kun…"
And then she was just… gone.
(A/N: DON'T PANIC! Hinata isn't dead, so you can put away the torches, pitchforks and lynching rope RIGHT NOW. Right, a little announcement. This was originally intended to be a two-part chapter only, but it would appear that it will now be a three-parter at least. As such, this is where ROOT concludes until such a time as I can finish the third (and hopefully last) part of this chapter. Until then folks, this is Leonineus saying GOODNIGHT!)
(A/N: This is a message for all writers who read my stories. Some of you may be encountering a slight issue with the Document Uploader (I've asked around and some are just getting bold and italic removed while others are getting nothing odd at all), and I just discovered an easier way to remedy it than having to read through the entire document in the Document Uploader re-adding the spaces. Simply delete all the text in the Document Uploader File View, then copy and paste the text from the document itself. Spread the word people, hasn't done crap about it even though I've sent in six e-mails about this exact problem (and I'm sure others have as well), so we'll have to make do with this until then.)
