Black Lightning
Chapter 9: Kiri's Assault Part 2 - Akatsuki's Strength
'Thoughts'
"Thoughts speech or Telepathy"
"Speech"
'Kyuubi'
"Half Demon"
Sound Effect
Author: I've modified the sentence types up there to only include the types that are in the chapter itself. Thanks to a reader for telling me that it's nin, not nins. Japanese words don't have plurality.
On a side note, I began an 'Enemy Ranking' list at the bottom, describing the ranks of enemies shown in the chapter, and some description. Oh, and I removed the stats thing at the top. Annoying to update. –Shifty eyes-
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, merely the several OC's that I painstakingly made up.
"Outer Crotch?"
"Suiton: Suijinheki!"
"Doton: Doryu Heki!"
Naruto and Kasumi quickly performed defensive jutsu around themselves and the other members of Assault Group 4. The earthen wall formed a thick dome over a semi-sphere of water.
Silence ensued, and one of the Akatsuki ANBU decided to check the surroundings because of the lack of painful screams. Creating an opening in the water and earth defenses with a toss of two separate explosive kunai, he looked out. Grimacing to himself, he returned to report to the blond.
Now, the reason the defenses created holes with merely explosive kunai, is because the chakra coats the outside, making the inside vulnerable to attack. Of course, the smart shinobi, would make domes to prevent this, right? The downside is, you have no visibility whatsoever. To that extent, Naruto swore to never use enclosed defense ever again.
"Naruto-san, all the surviving enemies have disappeared, and so have the stalactites," he said shortly, with a salute.
Cursing, Naruto checked the outside for himself. Looking out, he could see that the ANBU was right. Only the dead bodies from the previous fight littered the floor.
"Damn! They must have fooled us with a genjutsu!"
Naruto turned to the tall, blue-skinned man that was currently his partner. "Can you smell the enemy?"
Kisame sniffed the air, and then gave a thumbs up, a wide grin on his face. Strangely, it looked like a baring of teeth on the man.
"Yeah, I smell their wounded. They went through the second passage on the right." He said this while pointing to said door, a single one amongst five or so other doors. He leaned a bit closer to Naruto. "I also smelled a bit of clay."
Naruto nodded, and turned to view the ninja in the task force. 'Good, we got no losses, just wounds.'
"Alright, into the door, we're going ninja hunting!" he announced.
Running near the back of the group with Kisame, he waited for the tall man to swerve sharply, taking them into a new path. This one, unlike all the others, was paved in earth. There was not one bit of metal. Because of the lack of the scent-reducing metal, Naruto began sniffing the air with his lesser sense of smell (A shark's is better).
"I can smell the clay now, too," he muttered to Kisame. Turning another corner and into a doorway, a bloody sight lay before them.
Corpses were strewn all over the floor, leaving the two no choice but to walk on the bodies. The bodies themselves were deprived of random limbs, and their innards hung around the ceiling. Blood covered sand covered the walls and the bodies, along with a large clump of sand on the ceiling. Sudden movement behind them sent Naruto and Kisame into battle stances, prepared to take on any enemy.
"Oh… hello, Naruto-san, Kisame-san."
Naruto looked up to see Tobi hanging from a large hole in the ceiling, the rather childish Akatsuki trainee caught in a net of sand.
"Could you perhaps get me down? Gaara-san threw me up here so suddenly…"
Kisame sweat-dropped and cut the sand holding Tobi with Samehada.
"Where are Gaara and Deidara anyways?" Kisame grunted, while Tobi picked himself up from the floor and dusted himself off.
"I'm back, Tobi! Did you have fun hanging around, yeah?"
Deidara entered the room and froze, his hand automatically coming up to point at the two newcomers.
"What are you two doing here?"
Sand flowed around Deidara and pulled him down, saving him from a horizontal swing by Kisame.
"I should be the one asking you that, you retard! And on another note, that pun just sucked." Kisame roared.
While Deidara and Kisame argued, Naruto moseyed next to Tobi.
"Hey, what's your face like, under that mask? Can I see it?"
"Sure, Naruto-san!"
Tobi's hand slowly moved up to his mask, and Naruto was just about to get a glimpse of his face when…
SLICE!
Samehada cut through the ceiling, causing dust and smoke to sweep over the entire room.
"Fuuton: Daitoppa!"
The smoke was blown away and Naruto looked around wildly to see Tobi with his mask no longer off.
"Remember Naruto-san, I only take my mask off for a person once."
Naruto face-vaulted. Getting up, he began advancing towards Kisame, fangs in hand.
"Now's not the time for infighting," Gaara muttered, his sand flowing between the two swordsmen. "We have renegades to slaught- I mean... defeat."
Eyebrow raised, Naruto stared questioningly at the redhead but kept his mouth shut.
"We're nukenin too. What reason do we have for fighting other nukenin?" Deidara grumbled.
Kisame grunted in annoyance. "Blondie here decided to go join a shinobi village called Akatsukigakure. I might decide to join..."
"Oh, that reminds me!" Tobi nearly yelled out. "Sorry for yelling, but where's Itachi-san?"
"Yes, where is he?" Gaara echoed.
"Geez, do I have to tell it to everyone?" Kisame complained obnoxiously. "He Mangekyou'd the Iwa-nin's asses and now he's recuperating from severe chakra exhaustion."
A resounding explosion rocked the compound, though it was composed of stones and steel. "Well, looks like our forces have engaged the enemy," Naruto predicted. "How's about we go support them?"
"Sure."
"Whatever."
"Can I blow things up?"
"Kill..."
The five shinobi flickered out of the room, unknowing of the consequences of rushing blindly into battle.
Akatsuki entered the room cautiously. The noise had died down, and none of them knew whether the Kiri or nukenin forces were victorious. Passing through a long metal hallway, they entered another room to see masses of enemy corpses littering the ground, added with a resting H.A.C.S ANBU force. The captain strode over quickly to the new arrivals.
"Naruto-san, we await further orders," he said while saluting.
Two sets of eyebrows raised. One couldn't because he had a mask, the other didn't raise eyebrows, seeing as he had none. "All right captain, give me a status and situation report," Naruto ordered.
"We've lost five of our own troops in battle, due to their overwhelming numbers. Several others were wounded as well, but are healing and resting as we speak," the captain reported. "The nukenin's forces grow smaller, but they also become stronger as we move further into the compound. We have determined that the cannon fodder consists of Kiri-nukenin, while the stronger force is made up of Iwa nukenin. It is safe to say that not many of them know of many potent Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, or Taijutsu to match us in combat."
Naruto nodded, while a Kiri Jounin entered the room hurriedly. "Mizukage-sama! Where are you?" he called out.
"Up here, you idiot." Naruto and the Jounin looked up to see Kasumi sitting on the ceiling, upside down. "What's your report?"
Saluting, the Jounin recounted his orders. "All nukenin outside of the compound have been annihilated, but we've also sustained heavy casualties."
Silence passed, and Kasumi glared at the now silent shinobi. "Well?? Aren't you supposed to tell me what happened?"
The Jounin stood straight nervously and recalled his story.
"The attack started without a hitch, but we were swarmed by entire droves of nukenin. We destroyed them all eventually, but the Jounin forces suffered a sixty percent loss, and the ANBU force suffered a twenty-five percent loss. The statistics are based on casualties, the wounded excluded."
"Dammit!" she cursed aloud. "God damn, how are we supposed to stage an attack with such a small force? Half my standing Jounin and ANBU are gone... those bastard nukenin!"
"Calm down, will you?" Kisame yelled. "There's no need to make such a huge fuss!"
Sand pulled Kisame backwards, fast enough so that the blue-haired man avoided being stomped on.
"Let's see you do a Kage's job, fish-face!" she yelled in retaliation.
Kisame growled, while waving his Samehada around slightly.
"Now you've gone too far, girl! You want to fight me? Bring it on!"
Before Kisame could move forward to engage, Deidara had him in a headlock.
"Watch your step, boyo! You don't want to pick a fight right now, yeah!"
Struggling fiercely, Kisame slowly wormed his way out of the hold. "Let me go, you idiotic, dumb blonde!"
CLONG
Kisame lay on the floor, nursing a head wound and growling in annoyance.
"Enough of this foolishness!" Naruto hissed, still holding the blunt kunai that he had used to smack Kisame on the skull. "Now's not the time for such petty feuds. And besides, blondes aren't dumb. That's just a false stereotype."
Turning to the Kiri Jounin, he said, "Go and gather all remaining forces and meet here in thirty minutes."
The shinobi nodded before running back through where he had come from.
"What's your plan, Naruto?" Gaara asked with slight curiosity.
"We're going to... take all forces and storm them past all their lines of defense."
"Are you crazy?" Kasumi yelled. "I've already said that we can't stage an attack with our forces in shambles!"
Standing up, Tobi began pacing. "We don't have enough forces to fight on equal grounds... so I assume you're going to do something involving that massive chakra capacity of yours, Naruto-san."
Naruto nodded, a grin appearing on his face. "Good job, Tobi. You've figured it out."
"Are you going to use the remaining shinobi as meat shields, like you did to get into the compound?" Gaara questioned.
Naruto smiled ruefully. "We need to conserve what forces we have left, so I came up with something else. I'm such a genius!"
"Just get on with it!" Kasumi grumbled. "What's the plan?"
"If I know the kid like I do, it's going to be a tricky one," Kisame muttered.
Naruto gathered all of them into a huddle. "Alright, here's the plan."
Kiri and Iwa nukenin shuffled their feet nervously. Out of the more than three thousand shinobi they had begun defending with, only eight hundred remained. The surviving ninjas feared for their lives, but knew that it was too late to try and escape. The Kiri and Akatsuki nin had taken control of the entrance, and were most probably ordered to kill any nukenin on sight. One nukenin in particular, was shaking in his sandals.
"We're all going to die!" he wailed. "I saw the Kurodenkei and four others in Akatsuki cloaks!"
Hearing this, others soon began panicking as well.
"They're S-Class shinobi! How do we beat them?"
A tough looking commander roamed the ranks during the initial stages of panic, searching for any sort of dissent.
"Quiet, you maggots!" he barked. "Don't remember? We recruited three Akatsuki members!"
The first shinobi protested, "But sir, I saw those three! They joined two Akatsuki members on the Kiri side, and now they're on their way here!"
"How would you know that?" the commander growled. "It's probably just your imagina-"
The massive door on the opposite side of the room slammed open, revealing several hundred Kiri-nin. Surging out, they charged at the nukenin forces.
"DEFEND YOURSELVES!"
Nukenin met Kiri-nin, and chaotic battle erupted. The commander roared a battle cry, stabbing a Kiri shinobi, only to have his opponent disappear in a cloud of smoke.
POOF.
"What in the..." he rasped out.
Turning, he could see others noticing the problem as well. The realization hit him like a hammer. "THEY'RE KAGE BUNSHINS!"
An explosion tore an entire wall away, revealing the forty-five remaining H.A.C.S ANBU.
"FIRE!"
They each went rapidly through seals. Dozens of elemental attacks flew to the combating clones and nukenin.
"The clones are decoys! SCATTER!"
Sadly, the commander's order came too late. The fresh and diverse Akatsuki ninjas chucked one jutsu after another at the tightly knit group of nukenin, slaughtering large amounts. In the face of annihilation, the remaining nukenin, half as many as before, turned tail and bolted further into the compound.
The smoke set into the air by the techniques settled, revealing widespread destruction. Dead ninjas lay everywhere, bodies partly to fully intact, depending on what technique hit them. Kiri-nin walked amongst the corpses, re-supplying their dwindling resources, replenishing their stocks of kunai, shuriken, explosive tags, and many other necessities of battle. Naruto staggered in from the destroyed wall that the Akatsuki ANBU had created, groaning.
"I don't know about any of you, but making hundreds of Kage Bunshin, with thirty different facial and body variations is tiring as hell."
"Complain later. We've got a job to do," Kasumi muttered. "We still have yet to see the commander of this 'joint'."
Tobi bounded up to the two Kage's bubbling with excitement. "That was fun, yeah! Let's do it again, yeah?"
He immediately received a fist on the head, courtesy of Deidara.
"Don't you dare mock me, yeah. If you do, I'll kill you, yeah."
Gaara growled darkly, giving both shinobi the hint to stop bickering.
"Kasumi's right," Naruto said while sitting down to rest a bit. "We still need to eliminate their leader. What's your status?"
"We're still fresh!" Tobi, Deidara, and Kisame shouted in unison.
"I am... fresh," Gaara said afterwards. "I'm still ready to murd... I mean... fight."
Hikaru walked up to the group of S-Class ninjas. "I'm still raring' to go as well. Akane received an injury during the first assault, so she won't be fighting this time around."
"The Kiri no Shinobigatana Nananin Shu and I merely suffered mild injuries. We can still fight," Kasumi informed them. "Izumi in particular is quite excited." She then spotted the fact that Naruto was still panting. "What about you, Naruto? You think you can fight?"
Said blonde sat up and groaned. "I've got to be at around thirty percent chakra. I'm still coming, though."
Tobi moved to argue against it, but was stopped by Kisame.
"Naruto still needs to vent anger on those nukenin, especially the ones from Iwagakure. Remember, Akatsuki was like a sort of... displaced family to him..." The blue-haired man trailed off, while Tobi nodded silently in acknowledgement.
Naruto walked slowly to the exit that the nukenin had used, and looked back.
"Well? We're heading out. Now."
The Kiri and Akatsuki ninjas went quickly through the exit, leaving the injured behind to recuperate and wait for the others on the return trip. That is... if they were victorious.
Naruto and the remaining ninjas rushed through the halls, intent on catching up.
"We're going all out. Don't hesitate to perform any jutsu, unless it's one that you don't have the chakra for," Naruto ordered. "If you aren't smart enough to dodge or even distinguish friendly fire, you don't deserve the title of 'elite'. Understood?"
"Sir, yes sir!" the several hundred ninjas chorused.
The now 'small-to-medium' sized assault force burst out of a doorway, only to meet face to face with several dozen nukenin in the middle of performing hand seals.
"Everybody, SCATTER!"
The ninjas still standing at the doorway were bombarded with spires of earth and torrents of water, halting their advance to an all time low.
Naruto himself jumped up and stuck to the ceiling with chakra, viewing the battle. Looking further into the large room, he spotted a rough looking Iwa-nin. He was quite large in fact, at a height of around six and a half feet (6'6"), and had a well built body. The blonde assumed that all Iwa-nin had either black or brown hair, with the occasional random color, because this one also had brown hair like most others.
"That must be the leader... I'm going in."
The ANBU telepathed their confirmation and returned to the battle at hand.
Running across the ceiling and past the unsuspecting nukenin on the floor below, Naruto smirked.
'No one ever thinks to look up and below in the heat of battle...'
Dropping down after a certain point, he faced the supposed nukenin leader, who merely smiled at his entrance.
"So... the infamous Kurodenkei wishes to fight with me? I'm honored."
Naruto said nothing, merely unsleeving his two chakra fangs. The nukenin smiled lightly, and fifty lesser nukenin appeared around him in a semicircle, all of them tense, waiting for an attack that they predicted would come.
And come it did. Naruto sprinted forward, feeling confident for a reason he couldn't currently comprehend. As he neared the fifty-one nukenin, water, explosive clay, and sand fell from the sky, bombing the area and taking out five nukenin that weren't paying attention to any 'out-of-place' noises. The remaining ninjas went through hand seals, yelling out a variety of jutsus. Twisting and turning, Naruto ducked under a Doton: Doryuudan no Jutsu volley, leapt over a Suiton: Suiryuudan no Jutsu, and barely avoided capture in a Suiton: Suroi no Jutsu.
'Sheesh, and I thought Kage Bunshin were annoying opponents...'
The leader began barking orders as Naruto closed in on his position.
"Leave the Kurodenkei to me! The rest of you, attack the others!"
With a wordless acknowledgement, the surviving nukenin jumped into the air and landed in front of Gaara, Tobi, Deidara, and Kisame, effectively cutting them off from Naruto.
"Your battle is with us, mooners," one obnoxious looking nukenin yelled. Some looked in disbelief at the man, while others clapped their hands to their faces in shame.
"We're Dawn, not Red Moon," Kisame growled, cutting the offending nukenin in half. His beady little eyes moved left and right over the group of remaining nukenin. "So... who's up for a kill fest?"
Smirking at their confused expressions, he jumped into the air, Samehada in one hand, the other performing one-handed seals.
"Prepare to pay for choosing to fight with us!" he roared all the while. Landing, he yelled "Suiton: Suiryuudan no Jutsu!"
A dragon of water burst forth from around Kisame, taking form from his chakra, and streaked like a bullet towards the group of nukenin.
Tobi flashed through his own hand seals, stopping on the seal of the Tiger. "Katon: Tsuinkaryuu Endan no Jutsu!"
The twin dragons of fire burst forth from where his mouth would've been had his mask been off, and roared in a helix formation towards Kisame's water dragon. The two jutsus combined, the two dragons of fire spiraling around the dragon of water in a helix.
Tobi and Kisame yelled the name of the jutsu at the same time.
"Konbi Jutsu: Sanjuuyouso no Jutsu!"
The nukenin's eyes widened, and they scrambled to take cover. The triple dragon combination of fire and water killed five nukenin that were in its path because of their delayed reaction, and then blew up in mid flight. In the midst of the explosion, the three different dragons split outward in a triangle shape, streaking to yet more nukenin. The three separated elements killed three more nukenin, before exploding in brilliant flashes of red and white. The triple explosions shook the room, and when the smoke cleared, the damage revealed another two dead nukenin and four severely injured.
Two nukenin, convinced of their plight at the amazing display of the devastating attack, turned to run, but found them immobilized by sand, which slowly crept its way up their legs.
When they were completely captured, a menacing voice whispered out, "Sabaku Souso."
The two nukenin exploded in a shower of blood and guts, the remains falling like rain onto the surviving nukenin, further paralyzing them with fear.
Viewing the destruction that Kisame and Tobi had wreaked upon the area, Gaara frowned. 'Any experienced ninja would have set up an elemental defense to disperse the attack, whether or not it would have held. The nukenin here ran freely and dodged as if...' Gaara's eyes widened. 'Then... they're just more cannon fodder!"
Before he could let out a warning, Iwa Bunshins emerged quickly from the floor, taking hold on the Akatsuki shinobi's ankles, Gaara excluded, because his sand shield had blocked the path of the stone arms.
"Heh, even the mighty Akatsuki falls for such petty tricks like the Iwa Bunshin no Jutsu."
The real nukenin burst from the floor. In all, there were sixteen, and they did not seem like the pushover type. The one who had spoken, a normal man with dark red hair, shot forward, slashing horizontally at Kisame using a katana.
"GWAH!" Kisame roared, swinging his arm with massive strength, pulling along the Iwa Bunshin as well and using it as a shield. Clang. Metal hit stone, and the ninja jumped back, narrowly avoiding another flying Iwa Bunshin that swung from Kisame's outstretched leg.
"Impressive... I see now why Akatsuki was so feared, and still is," he murmured.
He turned to the fifteen others who stood silently behind him, waiting for him to speak. "Kill the others. Don't let them- DUCK!"
Confused, they did not understand what he was trying to say until two of their heads exploded. The presumed nukenin captain whirled around to see a smirking Deidara, with piles of rubble surrounding him - the remains of the Iwa Bunshin that had captured him.
"You're going to have to do better than that, yeah," Deidara commented, before throwing more homing bird bombs past the nukenin. Out of the corner of his eye, the captain could see the birds circling around and turning back towards the group.
"These guys are S-Class shinobi," he warned, taking out the bird bombs with a few well-placed shuriken throws. "At any given chance, go for a killing blow. Break!"
Four groups of three nukenin split off to fight the four remaining Akatsuki shinobi. The nukenin captain went through several hand seals, while his subordinates engaged the cloaked menaces.
"Doton: Iwanadare no Jutsu!" Large pieces of the stone floor lifted up, and two of the several stones threw themselves at Gaara and Deidara.
Not caught unawares, Deidara jumped, twisting in mid-air while letting lose bird bombs at the incoming boulder, at the same time throwing clay shuriken at the three nukenin that had him occupied.
Indeed, the clay hit their target, exploding in a brilliant flash, but the boulder kept on coming, undeterred by the explosives. Of course, this surprised the blonde, as he'd never before met rocks that didn't blow up when he wanted them to. Sand rushed around Deidara and rose, protecting him from the boulder by stopping it cold. Deidara turned to Gaara, who had already stopped the boulder that had been sent after him.
Meanwhile, the nukenin captain watched the proceedings in interest.
'Those boulders were sharpened and imbued with chakra. No normal defense can stop them, yet mere sand halted their advance completely...'
Smirking, he directed another boulder at Kisame, prepared to fire. 'This will prove to be the greatest challenge of my career... no... My life.'
Flinging the large object, it flew at high speeds towards Kisame. The blue-skinned man, adept as he was in the arts of fighting, had already figured out the trick behind the boulders' durability.
Grabbing Samehada by the handle, he swung vertically starting from the bottom, cutting the boulder in half effortlessly.
"Heh, my Samehada feeds on chakra, whether it's at a short or melee distance, it doesn't matter. Without chakra, your jutsu is throwing mere rocks at me instead of lethal weapons!" Kisame boasted.
Of course, the nukenin captain nodded in understanding. After all, he wasn't quite as dull as any of the other nukenin. He knew what predicament he was in now.
'One has a near impenetrable automatic defense... Another has a chakra-feeding blade... To top it all off, I can see that the blonde hasn't used any of the larger explosives... This does not bode well for me... not at all...'
Naruto glared down the nukenin commander, the two shinobi circling each other warily, looking for any opportunity to strike or retaliate. Several explosions sounded behind their position, sweeping the area with smoke. Squinting their eyes, they continued to circle each other, thinking up and rejecting strategies that they could use. Then, another set of explosions shook the room, forcing more smoke into the arena. This time, the commander's eyes shifted momentarily to see what had happened. Taking the opportunity, Naruto flickered forward at high speed, repositioning his chakra fang and swiping horizontally at the man's head. His eyes widened considerably, when a large chunk of stone blocked his attack.
'What the...?'
Another piece of stone exploded from the ground underneath him, slamming into his chest and sending him hurtling into the air. The commander flashed through hand seals. Realizing his position, Naruto did the same, intent on covering his fall.
"Kuro Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu!"
"Doton: Iwa Ame no Jutsu!"
Black flames spurted from Naruto's mouth like a hose, the giant fireball hurtling towards whatever jutsu that the leader had performed. Said technique had caused a steady stream of chakra-enhanced stones to fly up at the incoming fireball. The two elements battled for dominance, the flames continually melting the rocks while more took their melted companions' places. In the end, the nukenin decided not to waste any more chakra in the stalemate and canceled his technique. While all this transpired, Naruto was on his return path to solid ground. As the flames grew closer, the commander pumped as much chakra as he could into his feet in a short amount of time, and jumped aside with all the strength that he could muster.
A resounding explosion threw him even further, extreme heat breathing down his neck and black flames whipping around the impact area wildly. The nukenin groaned slightly, regaining his wits. Standing up, he looked back to the point of impact, to find that the stone floor had slogged down into a large crater with a depth of about ten feet.
'I've never seen black flames, or damage at that scale of what's supposed to be a C-Rank technique to boot,' he thought hazily.
Staggering to the edge of the crater, he surveyed the damage, estimating that it was about twenty-five feet in diameter.
'It's no wonder that one of my stronger jutsu was cancelled out like that...'
The smoke cleared, revealing a worse for wear Naruto, who was panting heavily from the chakra use.
"That was quite a jutsu that you pulled off there, Blondie," the nukenin called out. "You're quite the challenge, and I can appreciate strength when I see it."
Naruto took in several deep breaths of air, attempting to straighten up, even with severe chakra exhaustion striving to claim his consciousness.
'Heh... black elemental jutsu take three times more chakra than the original technique... but that's a small price to pay for having a technique of four times the normal strength...'
Settling into the fighting stance he had used against Rock Lee during the Chuunin Exams, a feeling of nostalgia swept over him.
'It feels like it's been so long... so long since the time where life wasn't so difficult...'
Surging forward like a bullet, his intent to knock his opponent out, Naruto thrust with his fingers, each laden with deadly power. The brunette ducked under one thrust, and lashed out with a foot to keep the blonde at a distance. Slowed down from exhaustion, Naruto took the kick in the knees, halting his advance. Another kick sent him skidding across the floor like a rag doll.
"Even I, an A-Class nukenin, can defeat even the most powerful of ninja when they're exhausted, such as you are."
Naruto shot at the nukenin once again, intent on trying once more. Hopping into the air, he spun like a ball and attempted to 'squish' his opponent. That would've worked, had his opponent been slightly slower. The nukenin threw himself to the side, and then pushed off hard, intent on taking the offensive. Taking a punch to the gut and a jab to the neck, Naruto faltered, and the nukenin took his chance. Whirling out a kunai from his holsters, he aimed for the heart. That would've worked as well, had Naruto been any other ninja. Charging his teeth with chakra, his head bobbed forward, biting onto the metal of the kunai.
'Damn!' the nukenin thought.
Performing a roundhouse kick, Naruto tried to stun the nukenin, but that failed. Catching the leg, the commander twisted, picked up the leg, which lead to the picking up of the entire body, and slammed the blonde to the earthen floor.
'Shit... I'm utterly exhausted... My ninjutsu and genjutsu don't have the chakra reserves to be performed, nor do I currently have the speed to use taijutsu...'
A dull realization hit him. 'Of course! I'm such a shit-head. I can use that!'
"Yeah, you're a huge shit-head."
"Shut the hell up, Kyuubi." Getting up slowly to his feet, Naruto stood his ground shakily.
"Why don't you accept your fate?" the nukenin asked solemnly, while going through hand seals. "Why do you keep fighting?"
Naruto grinned devilishly, his eyes full of determination. "Because... it is not my fate to lose... I shall be... victorious!" He flew through familiar, but unused hand seals.
Dragon, Tiger, Horse, Dragon, Snake, Dragon, Ox, Dragon... "Yami Tsuki Henshin!"
Just like in the Chuunin Exam preliminaries, Naruto transformed into a midnight-black skinned, armored monstrosity. The nukenin gazed in silent awe at the terrible sight of the seven-foot demon. Eight, three-foot long spikes emerged from the enormous backside, in two rows going down, four on each side and spaced evenly. His neck elongated, and his head gained the appearance of a demon-dragon fusion.
Though the head resembled that of a dragon, the fangs were unusually long, six-inches, and the eyes contained demonic, blood red pupils. The whites of the demon's eyes were black, dark demonic black. In comparison to the previous version, this form was less muscular and more on the bony side, but sacrificed strength for demonic offense. The claws, previously five-inches, had a length of six-and-a-half-inches, and if one looked close enough, had tiny barbs that would tear flesh and muscle from bone. The tail, though not much different than the last, was thinner, but that was made up for the increase in the amount of spines that dotted the length of the appendage.
One major change was the addition of wings. The fleshy appendages extended outwards from the shoulders, each wing measuring about five-feet in length, with a leathery quality of dragons, yet the bony and unnatural look of demons. This explained why his toe claws were larger and more curved; this was to provide brakes that would allow the half-demon 'avatar' to come to a complete stop more quickly and launch another offensive just as swiftly, making this form twice as deadly.
Naruto the half-demon held out both of his bony, clawed, arms to be perpendicular to his hunched body. The curved outline of two, large, nine-foot-long crescent-moon scythes appeared, before solidifying. The appearance of the weapons was terrifying. The cutting edge was spiked, whose purpose was similar to the half-demon's claws - to rip and tear the enemy apart. Red, demonic runes ran across the pure black blade of the scythe, making it glow eerily.
"Ready or not, here I come!"
Grasping the handle of both scythes, one in each clawed hand; the half-demon gave one toothy grin to the nukenin before disappearing and reappearing behind said ninja.
'What the f-' His thoughts were interrupted as the butt of the scythe slammed into him, sending him hurtling into a wall.
Naruto set both scythes in an x-like position, and then slashed horizontally in front of him, each scythe moving one different direction. The shockwave emitted from the attack surged toward the nukenin at the speed of sound, slicing up huge pieces from the floor and wall in its path towards its target.
Zeeehyooong! (Yes, I know, crappy sound effect.)
The nukenin had just barely replaced himself with a stone before Naruto was on him again. Disregarding the destruction of the previous wall, the demonic offense continued. Slapping both of the scythes' butts together, the two weapons merged into a single weapon, one in which each end had a scythe, one pointing left, and the other pointing right.
Spinning the newly combined weapon in front of himself, Naruto advanced slowly towards the nukenin. The commander paled considerably, when he tried to throw kunai at the spinning instrument of death, only to have the weapons become cut into pieces so thin he could swear that they were merely threads of yarn. He went quickly through hand seals.
"Doton: Iwa Kuuchuufuyuu no Jutsu!" Large pieces of hardened earth and rock rose from the floor, hovering around Naruto, who watched in interest.
'Hmm… what's he doing?'
"Doton: Iwahakai no Jutsu!" The rocks exploded into thousands of shards of rock, further intriguing the half-demon.
'Heh… looks interesting… I wonder if it's destructive…'
"Doton: Iwa Ame!" the commander finished. The thousands of rock shards tilted, until each and every single one was pointed at Naruto.
The chakra covering them glistening in the light, there was a three second reprieve before they all shot towards the half-demon. Naruto grinned just as the attack impacted. Dust blew from the ground, and flew every which way, the dust cloud enlarging and filling up parts of the massive stone room.
The nukenin held his breath in anticipation – watching to see if his attack had killed, wounded at the least, his opponent. But no, his hopes were crushed when the dust that was thrown into the air blew clear. Naruto stood where he had been previously, and had not moved an inch. There was not a single scratch on the half-demon, which would've been impossible. Of course, he didn't know about the extreme, demonic healing-factor. Indeed, Naruto had taken damage, albeit they were merely cuts and gashes, but they were all healed as quickly as the damage had been taken.
Decidedly bored, Naruto shoved his right-handed scythe into the ground, and flickered forward, one clawed hand ablaze with black and blue chakra, the other hand wielding the second scythe, which was now glowing an eerie red.
"Eat this!" he roared, striking with the claws.
The nukenin jumped back as fast as he was able to, but took a large gash to his left shoulder nevertheless.
'Not good… if I get hit head-on by that attack of his, I'll certainly… perish.'
He flickered next to Naruto, kicking the leg with as much strength and chakra-enhanced power as he could muster. The half-demon merely took it in stride and lashed out with the scythe. The nukenin ducked, but he could see after-images appearing and following the scythe's trail.
'Strange… why does it do that?'
Naruto grinned in a feral manner, his sharp fangs jutting out.
"You'd like to know what these scythes do, don't you? Too bad!"
He crouched, and then released another shockwave at the brunette, who jumped over it this time. That proved to be a mistake, as Naruto intercepted him in midair.
'Che, he's pretty agile…' Naruto thought grumpily. 'It's a good thing that my scythes are doing their job.'
He grinned to himself, as he had at the time Kyuubi had told him the scythes' purpose. To put it simply, it threw off the opponent. When twirling the scythes at high speeds, the after-images would become undistinguishable from the real things, and then this miscalculation would lead to death.
In this case, he wasn't aiming to do that, though. He was throwing off his opponent by making him wonder what the scythes were doing, of which it was essentially doing nothing at this point. He loved screwing with his opponents.
The nukenin flipped forward, landing on the wide, bony shoulders of the half-demon, and flipped out a pair of explosive kunais. Leaping from the shoulders to avoid being whacked off by a swipe, he turned around in midair and threw both at the head.
BOOM!
Roaring in anger, Naruto rushed forward at a sprint.
'God dammit! That hurt!'
The head was already in the process of healing, and the excessive head wounds and burn and scorch marks faded rapidly.
'This is… impossible!' the nukenin commander thought, in heavy annoyance. 'Both his stamina and chakra improved when he transformed, and he heals like a bastard! Add to the fact that he looks like he came from hell…'
"This is boring. Time to end it," Naruto uttered, his voice a deep growl.
'This will be an awesome finisher, I'm sure.'
He opened his toothy maw, chakra gathering into a large sphere of energy just outside of his mouth. The chakra continued gathering, and then began shrinking. The final result was a ball of high-density chakra, which consequently looked quite dangerous.
Swallowing the super-dense ball of chakra, he inflated his body quickly like a balloon, and opened his mouth to blow out the energy.
SheekaBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
The gigantic energy blast tore it's way to the nukenin at speeds matching the speed of sound. (If you're confused, read the Naruto: Shippuuden chapters, where he goes into four-tailed Kyuubi Naruto mode.)
The brunette panicked, and did the only thing that came to mind - replace himself with a piece of a rock that was stuck to the ceiling.
Meanwhile… Gaara had finished off his final opponent, courtesy of Shukaku, when he heard a strange noise. Turning, he saw a blast of energy approaching at very high speed. Time seemed to slow down, as the dull realization of impending hit the redhead.
'Well, shit.'
Time still seemingly slow, he yelled out something incoherent, before doing what he didn't do best – run from an attack.
He and the other Akatsuki members jumped, and he fashioned platforms using sand from the earth. The four shinobi hovered in the air, watching the energy shoot past, obliterating everything in its path. The blast itself was about one hundred meters in diameter at it's current state – The blast grew larger as it traveled farther, and it had traveled a distance of five hundred meters in two seconds – and dropped the jaws of all ninja that weren't killed.
The attack itself had hit the back lines of the nukenin forces, effectively wiping out and obliterating sixty percent of the ninjas. Their bodies did not exist, as they were vaporized on impact.
"…" Kisame mouthed out.
"…" Deidara stared on.
"…" Gaara wanted to know what that move was, so he could slaught- err, defeat more people.
"… I think Naruto-san went a little overboard with that," Tobi commented quietly.
"You can say that again," the nukenin captain muttered from his position on the ceiling. He had abandoned all pretenses and saved himself by sticking to the roof, at the cost of all of his subordinates' lives.
"I think Naruto-san went a –oomph!"
Kisame growled, his fist ready to hit the idiotic fool if he dared say it again. "It was a figure of speech, you moron!"
Out of the dust caused by the exhalation of extreme, destructive energy, Naruto emerged, no longer in his demonic form. Off in the distance, if he squinted his eyes and concentrated really hard, he could see the widespread chaos that he had caused. He glanced sideways at the nukenin commander that was still on the ceiling.
'I never did find out how he manipulated the earth without hand seals…'
"Well… I guess I'd better leave before Kasumi does something to me for scaring her…"
With that, Naruto left the scene with a simple Shunshin no Jutsu, the other Akatsuki members following suit moments later.
"God damn you, you bastards!" Kasumi half-screamed into the air after watching them disappear. "How dare you leave me like that, and force me to 'clean up'??"
Gosh, I had to invent like, so many new jutsus. I'm not even sure if they're written correctly… If you can find mistakes, please tell me, so I can make it more accurate. Anyways, 21 pages, not bad. I finally finished the damned chapter, and I apologize for taking so long.
Enemy Ranking
Nukenin (Kiri) – C-B-Ranks – The ranks of nukenin groups and armies are filled with C and B-ranked ninjas, who are the most ideal for combat. Against stronger foes though, the most useful task for them is to become cannon fodder.
Nukenin (Iwa) – B-A-Ranks – The missing ninjas from Iwagakure are a hell of a lot better than the cannon fodder from Kiri. These dudes take orders and can work together as a team, though that's rare amongst random pairings.
Nukenin Captain (Iwa) – A-Rank – Your average, everyday 'powerful' nukenin is at this rank, and you'll usually never see a nukenin at a higher rank. The captain works under the commander, and acts as a type of overlord, relaying commands and fighting with their troops.
Nukenin Commander (Iwa) – A-Rank (Elite) – The commander is still an A-Rank ninja, but is still many times stronger than the captain, and is on the verge of reaching S-Rank status. Commanders do what their names suggest – they command. Though they rarely fight, when they do, they are a force to be reckoned with.
Jutsu List
Fuuton: Daitoppa (Wind Element: Great Breakthrough) C-Rank – The jutsu sends out a powerful explosion of wind, easily destroying anything in its path. This jutsu can be modified in a variety of ways, such as breaking it up into smaller pieces and sending enflamed wind at the enemy.
Katon: Tsuinkaryuu Endan no Jutsu (Fire Element: Twin Fire Dragon Blast Technique) A-Rank - The same as the original Karyuu Endan no Jutsu, except that there are two dragons that attack the opponent.
Konbi Jutsu: Sanjuuyouso no Jutsu (Combination Technique: Triple Element Technique) S-Rank - This combined attack only works for certain projectile techniques, and requires the caster(s) to perform extra hand seals to add the extra effects. Different hand seals cause different effects, and as such, the technique is extremely versatile, damaging, deadly, and most of all, extremely awesome.
Iwa Bunshin no Jutsu (Rock Clone Technique) - D-Rank - A spin off of the Bunshin no Jutsu, the technique gathers minerals from the ground and forms a rock clone out of it. Unlike normal Bunshins, Iwa Bunshins are solid. Unlike Kage Bunshin, Iwa Bunshins don't dissipate in a single hit, but are much slower as a consequence. Their attacks are all taijutsu, and can pack quite a punch.
Doton: Iwanadare no Jutsu (Earth Element: Rock Avalanche Technique) - A-Rank - The user lifts large-sized pieces of rock from the floor, or if there are none, gathers minerals to form rocks or hardens and compacts the existing earth, and sends them flying at high speed towards the enemy. Being enhanced and sharpened with chakra, these rocks cannot be destroyed with conventional methods such as blades, or even explosives. Chakra enhanced weapons and jutsu can all counter this technique.
Kuro Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu (Dark Fire Element: Grand Fireball Technique) - A-Rank - A modification of the normal Goukakyuu no Jutsu, the user adds a single demon seal to the beginning of the set, causing the jutsu to become demonic in nature. Dark elemental attacks are four times as strong as their non-dark counterparts, but also require three times the chakra a user would use to perform the original technique. All ninja can use this, but very few know the actual demon seals to perform the technique.
Doton: Iwa Ame no Jutsu (Earth Element: Rock Rain Technique) - A-Rank - Related to the Iwanadare no Jutsu in nature, the user lifts medium-sized pieces of rock from the floor, or if there are none, gathers minerals to form rocks, and sends them flying at high speed towards the enemy. Being chakra enhanced, these rocks cannot be destroyed with conventional methods such as blades. Explosives, chakra enhanced weapons, and jutsu can all counter this technique.
Doton: Iwa Kuuchuufuyuu no Jutsu (Earth Element: Rock Levitation Technique) - C-Rank - A basic part of the Iwanadare no Jutsu and the Iwa Ame no Jutsu, the Iwa Kuuchuufuyuu no Jutsu is the part of these techniques that lifts the rocks from the floor and imbues them with chakra. In each of the two jutsu, the hand seals already contain the seals for this technique, but it can also be performed alone. The only advantage of not combining it with another jutsu is to be able to position the rocks in advance in preparation for the next technique.
Doton: Iwahakai no Jutsu (Destruction of Rocks Technique) - C-Rank - A stepping stone in preparation for an offensive jutsu, the Iwahakai no Jutsu shatters rocks into many small pieces, each still sharpened with chakra.