Chapter eight: The beast unleashed
Recap: Naruto tried to move out of the way but Orochimaru still hit the seal on his stomach and all hell broke loose as a combinated version of the power of Reok, Tona, and BRea surrounded him much to the observers horror/interest.
-Let the new chapter begin!-
Naruto voiced a scream of untold pain as the power from three of the six lords fought over which creature he would become, the power struggle nearly tearing the blond apart in the process. The jewelry from all six lords on Naruto began to glow brightly even as Sasuke and Sakura took cover behind a tree while Ruto took off flying to get at least Tona for help at Rose's order.
Skin began to split from the presure while Orochimaru watched with curiousity from only few feet away. With his body trying to with stand the overwhelming drive to transform into one of the three Naruto screamed, "NEITHER!!"
At the blondes scream the power around him seemed to be taken aback before shrugging and beginning to work together to transform the boy into something completely new.
Naruto's human form couldn't remain any longer and burst, letting the beast the blond had free. The beast stood twice as tall as the boy used to at nearly nine feet with the basic shape as a lycanthrope, broad chest, animalistic head that seemed to lean more towards a fox unsurprisingly, and the hind legs of an animal plus the clawed and furred arms. However instead of the chest being covered in fur Naruto was covered with crimson flames with flecks of gold and orange as well as flames decorating his wrists and hind paws.
Wings made of fire sprung from the newly freed beast, two pairs made of flames but framed in what could only be a dragon's wing format, scaled fingers sperated the burning flames into four sections while the upper edge pointed outwards from where they sprouted from Naruto's back. A dragon like tail thudded against the burning bark of the branch Naruto had been held over, the tail being over ten feet long and tipped with a series of spikes pointing outwards from a club in three rows with four spikes sticking out the end.
"Oh fuck, that snake pedophile is so dead, if Naruto doesn't kill him I give you three guesses on who will and the first two don't count," Sasuke stated sarcastically before noticing the looked Sakura was giving him, "What? It's true and you know it."
Shaking her head the pinkette simply looked back at their third teammate and muttered, "You've been hanging around Naruto too much, you're starting to sound like him."
Blinking several times, Sasuke thought about that but shrugged and also went back to watching as the beast that was their friend began to stretch out new muscles before fixing its attention on the snake sannin.
Growling, Naruto bared dagger-like teeth at the sannin before lunging, moving faster than the large form should've allowed. Orochimaru underestimated this creatures speed and paid for it with five buring claws slashing through his chest, barely missing the vitals.
Naruto threw his head back and voiced a sound that was a strange combination of Kyuubi's roar, a dragon bellow, and a pheonix song before attacking once again just as three figures appeared higher up in the trees, all were watching the flaming beast with interest.
Reok, Tona, and Brea let their eyes follow Orochimaru as he was used as a pinball for a very pissed, newly transformed Naruto.
"That's new," Reok stated bluntly looking at what Naruto had turned into with interest.
"Should we go save that snake pedophile?" Brea inquired, half heartedly.
The other two lords gave the dragon lord a weird look that asked if she was insane at the same time and she raised her hands in surrender with a shrug so all three went back to watching their mutual student maul the life out of the slimy sannin.
Sasuke looked around when he felt the energy of three of the lords before looking up at where they were watching Naruto and yelling, "Aren't you going to stop him!!"
The deadpan looks the Uchiha boy got made him sweat drop but Sakura chimed in, "What if he goes on a rampage?"
Sighing, the lords looked at each other, each extending a hand in a fist in a game of Rock-Paper-Siccors. With several grumbled curses Reok hopped down to stop Naruto...she lost.
"Oi, Naruto chill for a moment," Reok called walking casually up next to the beast.
Naruto shook off his rage even as he held Orochimaru by the throat, bleeding and close enough to death to wave at the Shinigami. With the blond paying attention to her, Reok pointed upwards at the other two and Naruto hurled the snake sannin up at them before paying attention to the lord in front of him again.
"Alright, take a deep breath and relax, there is no longer a need to be angry," Reok instructed calmly with Naruto doing as he was told, even as she for no apparent reason removed her cloak and held it up in front of herself between them.
Slowly Naruto reverted back into his human form as he calmed his rage but the observers quickly realized why Reok had blocked her view of Naruto, he was nude.
Blushing at his state of undress Naruto snatched Reok's cloak from her hands and wrapped in around himself dispite her protests.
Huffing, Reok pointed out, "Since you insist on wearing my cloak none of the beasts in this area will come anywhere near you. By the way is this important for something, some weak humans tried to attack us on the way here and they had this with them."
Reok held up a earth scroll and the members of team seven slapped their hands to their foreheads and dragged their hands down their face.
"It's for the exam we're taking part in," Sasuke deadpanned and Reok laughed but tossed the scroll over since she had no need for it.
"Hmm, I wonder if we should have entered a team in this, I think it would have been fun," Reok muttered and everyone conscious enough to hear her sweat dropped at the random comment but didn't respond, "Anyway, if you transform again I'll instruct Kain and Koi to treat you like a new lycan in order for them to show themselves to help you turn back. You're transformation appears to lean towards that of my army so that should take care of that until we can train you on transforming at will. Until then try to steer clear of anything that could even remotely piss you off or you might go into a rage."
"However you seem to lean towards the pheonix when it comes to body type so when transformed keep clear of high powered water techniques until we figure out what element your dragon parts lean towards," Brea commented off hand.
"Wait wouldn't he be fire," Sasuke pointed out.
The lords shrugged and stated in unison, "That's a toss up."
'Great,' the three genin drawled in their minds with a growing sweatdrop on the back of their heads.
"Dragons can look like one element but be something completely different, trust me on this," Tona stated with a shudder and Naruto grinned in understanding but said nothing about it as the blond accepted the scroll from Reok and the three headed off.
Reok turned towards the shadow behind her and growled deep in her throat, summoning three werepanthers from the darkness, "Sendo Brothers, follow them and elimanate anyone that smells of snakes that gets anywhere near them except that purple haired jounin. Also tell Kain and Kio they have my permission to show themselves but the others are to remain hidden unless something dire comes up."
The three brothers nod at the same time with a chant of 'hai' before vanishing once again into the shadows to do as they were told while the other two lords walked up to stand on either side of the beast lord looking after Team Seven.
"Was that wise? You know what could happen if the humans of the village know what's lurking around the protective walls of their home," Tona muttered questioningly.
Reok narrowed her eyes and stated, "I think its about time Konoha knows that Naruto is the only thing standing between them and mass slaughter. You two go back to the armies and tell them what's going on. I'm going to go say hi to the old man."
Sighing with resignation the pheonix and dragon lord left as Reok turned her attention towards where Orochimaru was trying to gather what strength he had left in order to escape. Walking over Reok lifted a booted foot and brought it down hard enough to sever the snakes spine before crouching down and snarling, "You aren't going anywhere asshole. You're mine now."
Lashing out Reok inflicted claw wounds across the sannin's shoulder blades and stood, grabbing the back of the now unconscious sannins neck and turning to head towards the middle toward but stopped to looked over her shoulder.
"Who are you and what are you doing here?" Anko demanded, apparently she had gotten over her embarressment from whatever Naruto had whispered into her ear.
"A friend of that blond brat," Reok growled out before jumping towards the tower not caring if the jounin saw Orochimaru, which she did.
Following the armor wearing woman closely Anko trailed behind somewhat as she looked over her former sensie, taking notice of all of his wounds caused from claws or fangs as well as burns.
Reok ignored the woman following her and bound through the trees with casual ease, heading steadily upwards until she finally just launched off one of the branches at one of the highest points, practically flying towards the tower and causing Anko to pick up speed in order to keep her within view.
The two women and the nearly dead sannin entered the central tower and waited until someone noticed the inhuman energy coming off Reok and the chakra of the snake sannin.
Several squads of ANBU shunshined around the trio with the Hokage, who went sheet white when he took in WHO was standing there with a wary Anko and a beaten sannin.
"Ah Reok what a surprise, has something happened that would cause you to show yourself?" Sarutobi asked after clearing his throat and trying to hide his unease about this person from the other shinobi.
"Nothing you need to worry about old man, though you can count Orochimaru as dead and give the money to Naruto," Reok stated bluntly tossing the sannin to rest at the old man's feet with a curious look on her face as she watched the corpse.
Sarutobi waved the ANBU off and also watched the body as the skin began to ripple and pulse with feral energy before it split and revealed a humanoid cobra looking creature. 'Orochimaru' looked around with a hiss and tensed as if to attack but Reok's power flared, slamming the snake man into the ground to writh and thrash in pain.
"YOU WILL OBEY," Reok snarled, "YOU ARE NO LONGER HUMAN YOU ARE MINE TO DEAL WITH."
"What did you do to him?" Anko asked, semi sickened by what she was seeing but leaning towards justifyed internally.
"This is my power and my curse," Reok answered cryptically before turning to look at the tower door and saying, "Well, well, well, what do we have here?"
Laughing nervously the rain nin team made as if to back away slowly but Reok laughed and walked farther into the tower to find something to eat, whether it was alive or not she didn't care.
The beast lord was bored out of her mind by the time the second part of the exam ended that she resorted to playing Shogi or Go with Shikamaru, who was beginning to get the feeling that this woman wasn't what she seemed but found it too troublesome to call her on...the snake thing that followed her around like a loyal but pissed puppy didn't help.
Reok stood on the balcony watching Sarutobi explain the reasoning behind the Chunin exams, enjoying the expressions on the faces of team seven when they saw her and what used to be Orochimaru of the sannin standing slightly behind her.
"Joining us today is a general of a very powerfull army, impress her and you might get an offer to join," Sarutobi stated, ignoring the feeling of dread that fell on him from behind as he continued until a sickly looking Jounin showed up and said their would need to be a prelimanary round to decide who would continue on to the third part of the exam.
Snorting Reok said nothing while everyone wandered up the stairs of either balconey, leaving Sasuke and some random nin below to fight. Naruto walked up next to Reok and demanded in a low tone, "What are you doing here?"
"I think its time Konoha realized that they aren't even close to the top of the food chain, don't you?" Reok retorted and Naruto blanched at the thought but said nothing farther as the match began.
Sasuke kicked the nin's ass without trying once he figured out that the bastard's right hand could steal his chakra, lets just say he won't be using that hand for anything ever again since the Uchiha deep fried it until is was a husk.
Reok glanced to the side when the members of team seven walked up beside her but returned her attention to the match with Shino and the Sound genin with metal tunnels in his arms.
"Why have you shown yourself? I thought you guys didn't want to draw attention to yourselves," Sakura mumbled as Kakashi pulled out his little orange book.
"It's been decided that Konoha is in over its head. Something is up and whatever's going on is way above what this jackass was doing," Reok growled out before jerking her thumb over her shoulder at the pissed snake-man.
Naruto blanched and asked, "Did I do that to him?"
"No, your a mix of three different creatures so you can't turn anyone else. I did that to him to avoid any mishaps in the future with him surviving. He's more like a coakroach that a snake," Reok growled before once again paying attention to the matches in time to see Kankuro defeat a sound nin with rubber joints, "Brutally effective, I like him."
"No," Naruto growled to the tone in the beast lords voice.
"Don't worry I'm not going to do anything, it would be more a pain in the ass than I would be able to keep my temper in check for," Reok murmered as the next two contestants hopped into the arena, Sakura and Ino.
Naruto shuddered, he had seen her irratated before and it made his transformation look weak and pathetic so he didn't want to ever see Reok, or any of the lords, pushed to the point were they would show their true forms. It was something he had learned within his first month after meeting them, all of them were once human but they had been changed into what they were today.
Sakura took Ino's punchs and brushed them off as nothing, like a child trying to hurt a dragon's scales, before Gem took matters into her own claws and lashed out. Small but diamond hard claws stopped just short of the blonde's throat as the dragon hatchling revealed herself and curled around Sakura's neck.
Reok chuckled at the look on the blonde's face, apparently she must have thought the hatchling was merely a prop or decoration.
Sakura was called the winner since Ino was in a bit of a dangerous position...even if it was a bit bizarre even by Konoha's standards(Gia, Lee, Anko, Orochimaru; need I continue?)
Next to fight was the chick from Sand and the local weapon mistress, the fight was rather onesided in Reok's opinion but she said nothing even as one of the Sendo brothers whispered in her ear without showing himself.
Reok snapped her fingers when she saw the wind user position herself so that Tenten would land on her raised fan and 'Orochimaru' vanished from sight briefly, reappearing on the fan and catching the bun haired girl before vanishing again and setting her down by his new master.
Kneeling down Reok looked at her without touching her than stated, "She's unconscious, call it."
Clearing his throat the proctor proclaimed Temari the winner even as team nine came over to reclaim their teammate.
"YOUR SPRING TIME OF YOUTH BURNS-" Gai started only to feel Reok's KI focus on him like the eyes of one of the beasts from the forest of death...times about a thousand.
"Shut up, take your student and go as far away from me as this room allows," Reok snarled and Lee snatched up Tenten and retreated with Neji, who tried not to show that he was just as effected.
Naruto however stopped Gai and whispered, "Reok hates loud noises, they tend to piss her off very quickly."
Gai blinked and wondered how Naruto knew but retreated to be with his students without asking about it since he could still feel a lingering pressure on him from the beast lord.
"That boy could probably beat out Curro with how lazy he is," Reok muttered and Naruto snickered as he thought about the only weresloth...ever.
"I don't know Curro doesn't do anything unless you force him to, he doesn't even eat unless Mou threatens his limbs," Naruto muttered back and Reok smirked at that, Mou was a weretiger who had her maturnal instinct on overdrive so she treated everyone as her family and tried to keep them healthy...ironically she was also the lead medic for Reok's army.
Both snickered at the thought of putting Shikamaru in the same room as Curro and seeing who moved first.
Kakashi tuned out the laughter from his blond student and the beast lord in favor of watching the screen and noticing it was Naruto against Kiba.
Kiba wasn't stupid, Akamaru had been staring fearfully at Reok since they walked into the room for the simple reason that she was giving off the feel of an alpha, not just an alpha but THE alpha to all animals. Her scent lingered on Naruto like that of the scents of the other creatures the blond hung out with but Kiba also didn't have balls to forfeit without trying.
"Let's go Akamaru," Kiba muttered to his compainion.
Naruto hopped into the ring while Kiba walked down the stairs so the blond looked up at Reok and asked, "Hey since you're here can I use Ruckus and Mayhem against him?"
"I don't see why you'd need to but I see no reason why you couldn't, if Roni gets pissy I'll take the blame," Reok stated, scratching her jaw than shrugging.
Grinned from ear to ear Naruto channeled chakra to his vocals and called out in the language of the rodents, consisting of chattering and clicking in various tones and lengths.
The two wolf sized raccoons dropped into view on either side of the blond and the audiance froze and tried to figure out where they had come from but Kiba kept walking until he was standing in the ready position across from Naruto.
"Alright boys, keep the puppy busy but don't hurt him too bad, I'm going to show everyone here something I learned from year number five," Naruto stated and up on the balconies Reok raised an eyebrow.
'So, something he learned from the vampires...oh, it must be that one jutsu Vam taught him herself this is going to get good,' Reok thought with a feral grin the made the jounin nervous before her beastly gaze shifted to the old man hokage standing a ways away, "Hey old man how about a wager..."
Naruto and Kiba attacked each other head on with their companions but Akamaru couldn't defend against two raccoons several times his size, the puppy did put up a good fight before he was pinned down though.
Kiba tried to save his companion but Naruto appeared in the way with a burst of speed.
"Oh don't you want to see something interesting," Naruto taunted, lifting a hand to his mouth, where he slashed the pad of his pointer finger, "This is something that should keep you busy."
Naruto burst foward faster than Kiba could followed and reappeared behind the dog boy as circles of blood appeared around Kiba's neck, torso, arms, and legs.
"So you wrote on me with blood so what," Kiba taunted back, turning to face his opponent.
Grinning, Naruto made a strange handseal and muttered, "Blood binding no Jutsu."
The blood on Kiba glowed slighty before tightening like charka absorbing rope, cutting off the dog boys air while at the same time pinning his arms and legs together as the blood acted like magnets to itself.
Kiba fell to the floor gasping for breath so the proctor called the match so Naruto snapped his fingers with a bit of a flourish and the blood bindings vanished into red dust at the same time that Ruckus and Mayhem released Akamaru and vanished without a trace, like a bad dream.
Naruto walked over and offered a hand to Kiba, who looked up at him with one eye as he rubbed his throat causiously but in the end the dog boy accepted the offered hand and got pulled to his feet just as the little white puppy ran over.
Picking up he companion Kiba returned to his team as Naruto jumped up to rejoin his own in time to see Reok put a hand out to a stunned Sarutobi and beckon for something. The old man pulled out a handfull of bills and slapped them into clawed hand with a grumble about 'being too old for this shit.'
"Oh come on Sarutobi, even you should know to never expect Naruto to follow the logical line of thought," Reok pointed out as she counted her winnings absently.
Sarutobi was still grumbling when the next two contestants were called down to fight, it was Neji and Hinata.
Reok's eyes narrow when the match started with Neji belittling his cousin while at the same time keeping an eye on Naruto since his hands were making the railing groan in protest, his knuckles white at the effort he was putting into restraining himself.
Naruto finally lost the grip he had on his temper when Neji went for a killing blow, the blond partly transformed as he went for the male Hyuuga's throat with his burning claws, stopping short only because of Reok intervening, taking the strike ment for Hinata on her armored stomach while holding Naruto's wrist just centimeters from the pale eyed boy's throat.
Neji froze, as did everyone watching, even the jounin that stopped mid motion to intervene froze at the partly transformed blond. Naruto sported the flaming claws of his beast but retained his human form except that his wings had burst into view, shredding his shirt and extending back to be on either side of Hinata, who was staring at her crushes back with shocked awe.
"Naruto restrain yourself before I do it for you," Reok ordered in a low growl without taking her eyes off Neji, who had yet to move, "You got lucky brat if you wouold have landed that hit you wouldn't even be a smudge of you left big enough to fit inside a match box. You won now get lost."
Neji scoff at the threat and walked away from the beast lord calmly as if he was invincible while Reok turned her gaze over her shoulder where Naruto was leaning his forhead against the armor on her back taking deep breaths in an attempt to leash himself...until he heard the thud of Hinata hitting the concrete.
Whirling around, Naruto knelt to check on the girl and couldn't stop the lone tear from rolling down his face to drip into Hinata's slightly parted lips.
Reok knelt next to the blond and whispered so only he could hear, "What is the one thing Tona prides her kind for above all else?"
Naruto blinked in confusion at the sudden question before racking his brain before it clicked and he laid Hinata down on the cold concrete before going into a long string on handseals none of the shinobi recognized.
When his hands began to glow with a pale red color, Naruto laid them on Hinata's stomach and chest, just below her throat and closed his eyes. Sweat began to roll down Naruto's face as he focused on the jutsu taught to him on a whim by one of the pheonix's during his training.
"Be healed under the gentle care of the roaring flames," Naruto whispered and the red glow began to spread out from his hands to cover the girl completely, but it didn't hide her from view.
A minute later Naruto flopped limply to the side and Reok chuckled as seh picked up both teens before jumping back up to her viewing spot, ignoring the protests of the medic nin that had just shown up.
"Shut up, she's fine now so there's no use in looking her over. If it makes you feel better run a dignostic on her," Reok growled the the medic that followed her to the balcony.
Looking at the beast lord with disbelief the medic knelt down as the next match started up, the creepy mini me of Gai and the crazy looking red head from Sand.
The medic was in shock, Hinata was in such good health it seemed like she had never been injured in her life but he ran a check on Naruto and blanched at the hell his body had been through.
Before the poor man could comment on Naruto's condition Reok grabbed him by the back of the neck and hurled him towards the doors with a growl of annoyance as she stated, "I hate nosey people that want to know everything there is in the world."
The snake-man winced at the comment since he still wanted to know all the jutsu in the world but Reok ignored him in favor of watching Lee open the innner gates before beating the hell out of the sand kid.
Reok watched nuetrally until Garra went to crush the bowl haired boy, than she brought her power over beasts down on him HARD. The force froze the red head and his sand instantly as Shukaku whimpered and began to tremble, mumbling about how the master of beasts wasn't happy.
Teal eyes looked up at Reok with bloodlust and Reok increased the pressure on him until he dropped to his knees trembling like a man in a blizzard without any clothes on.
"Winner, Garra of Sand," the proctor called and Reok let up slightly in order to allow Garra to retract his sand hurridly and return to the stands leaving Lee very confused about what just happened with the red head while the jounin and above stared with wide eyes at the beast lord.
"Keep staring at me and join him," Reok snarled with a jerk of her head towards the snake-man behind her, eyes were averted instantly.
Chouji got defeated by the sound genin rather quickly though Reok was curious about the strange techniqe he used to turn himself into a human boulder.
Those moving on to the final exam drew numbers to find out the order they would be fighting in.
"4," Naruto stated holding up his number, he had been smacked upside the back of his head by Reok to wake him up.
"6," Shino said in a monotone.
"3," Garra wrasped, eyeing Reok warily like a rabbit would a fox or a raccon would a wolf.
"2," Neji stated holding out his number.
"8," Shikamaru said with a lazy yawn, one hand in his pocket while the other held out the little piece of paper.
"1," Sasuke stated, holding up the number he had drawn.
"10," Sakura informed the jounin writing it down.
"5," Kankuro stated casually.
"7," Temari said curious as to what the point of this was.
"9," Dosu grumbled.
After writing everything down the jounin held up a sheet of paper that showed the match ups.
Sasuke vs. Neji Garra vs. Naruto Kankuro vs. Shino Temari vs. Shikamaru Sakura vs. Dosu
"Alright the matches have been decided. You all have a month to prepare before the final exam takes place, until then enjoy your stay in Konoha," Sarutobi declared and the contestants nodded and walked off to do their own thing.
Reok scooped up the Hyuuga heiress before suddenly reappearing behind Naruto and grabbing him by the scruff of his neck and growling, "I little bird told me that you got hit by a low level chunin on that misson to wave a couple months ago."
Naruto whimpered and pleaded, "Not boot camp please, I learned my leason I've been training my ass off since we've gotten back."
"You shouldn't have slacked off in the first place," Reok retorted, her eyes narrowing before she vanished completely with both Hinata and Naruto with 'Orochimaru' following her.
Kakashi, Sasuke, Sakura, and Sarutobi stared at the place where Reok had just been and shared a collective thought, 'Naruto is so boned.'
Just then Tona popped up, grabbed Sasuke and vanished before anyone that hadn't already met her knew she was there while Brea did the same to Sakura.
"Why do I get the feeling the those three are going to go through hell just trying to survive the next month," Sarutobi muttered and Kakashi looked straight at the old man with a blank look, "What?"
"Sir, they aren't going to go through hell, they're going to get dragged down to the lowest level and be forced to claw their way back out," Kakashi corrected and both men shared a grimance before praying that the genin of team seven returned alive at the end of the month and mentally whole.
And there it is, sorry for not updating in forever.
READ AND REVIEW
WHAT DO YOU THINK THE FINAL EXAMS WILL TURN OUT LIKE WITH OROCHIMARU NOW PART OF ONE OF THE MYTHICAL ARMIES!!
ATAY TUNED UNTIL NEXT TIME IN NARUTO AND THE MYTHICAL LORDS!!!
god I feel like a radio announcer...
