Rise of the Namikaze

by s15945

Twelve years ago Uzumaki Kushina sacrificed herself in order to protect her village from the Ninetails by sealing it into the eldest of her recently born twin daughters.

10. A Royal Pain in the Neck

As Kurenai, Mizuko and Sakura escorted a sullen Haruna away from the peddlers, she said, "Why are we going this way? We should have just gone with the villagers and continued along the path to the Land of Wood! It's a lot closer than The Land of Noodles!"

Mizuko grunted and said, "This again? Have you heard nothing we've said? If we did that, then the peddlers could get attacked anyway. A cold-hearted murderess like you might be alright with that, but we aren't."

"You take that back!" Haruna demanded.

"Why should I? When the term fits…"

When Haruna was about to start responding, Kurenai sighed, gaining her attention. She said, "Haruna, tell me this, did your father ever consider himself more important than his people?"

"What was that?! How dare you try to question me! I am the only one that has the ability to revive this nation!"

"Tell me then, do you think that 'your' people, would follow a lord that didn't consider how their decisions affected them, or their loved ones? Or that your guards would let you last more than a year in your office if you continued to sacrifice them for your own satisfaction or benefit?"

"I don't think that I like how you said that."

"Said what?"

"You said it as if they weren't my people."

"Technically you aren't the lord of this land. Even if you weren't the lord at the time, you have now been effectively deposed. As such, to 'take back' this land, you will need allies with military might to back your claim. Exactly what do you think that you'll need to do to acquire those allies? Or what you'll have to give up? Even if you were willing, or, in the unlikely event that you didn't need to do anything in order to gain that military backing unconditionally, you said it yourself, those people that live in The Land of Vegetable don't know you, so why should they care who is leading them? Especially since, in my view, currently you are no better than the ones that killed your father."

Haruna angrily exclaimed, "How dare you!" furious that the muscle that she'd hired thought that she had the right to talk down to her the way she was.

"You were willing to betray those peddlers, with a truly futile plan."

"What do you mean 'futile'? It would have worked, and most of the useful peddlers would have gotten away!"

"No, it wouldn't," Sakura said.

"Shut up, children have no right to a say here."

"No," Sakura firmly said. "You need to listen. The shinobi that are chasing us must know what you look like, so even if, by some miracle, they didn't attack the slower group, they would still be able to easily figure out that you weren't among them and continue on chasing after you and the second group!"

"You don't know that."

Kurenai sighed and said, "She's right, Haruna." She then quickly looked up and into the trees. She said, "You two might as well come out now."

"Hmmm, we've got an astute one here, brother," a ninja, that had his brown hair tied into a ponytail, said as he appeared on a branch in a nearby tree. He was wearing beige shinobi pants, a dark teal sleeveless turtleneck shirt and long, bicep-length fingerless gloves and shinobi sandals the same colour as the shirt and gloves. Around his waist he had a leather strip acting as a kusazuri attached under his belt. He was covering his lower face with a black shinobi mask.

Kurenai said, "Girls, you can handle them," as she cast a genjutsu on the enemy and his partner that was wearing an identical set of clothing, with the inclusion of a bandana the same colour as the clothes.

When she heard what Kurenai said, Sakura exclaimed, "What?! No, don't go, Kurenai-senseii!" scared since, even on their last mission, she had basically let her teammates take care of everything that had to do with fighting.

Mizuko, seeing Sakura start to freak out, tisked, and said, "Fine, if you're not going to be any help…" she then made a handseal and said, "Suiton: Heisui Bunshin no jutsu!" and had her clone rush to force the ninja's sword away from Sakura as he tried to thrust his sword through her midsection.

The ninja said, "That's an interesting jutsu you're using there, girlie," looking at the shape that Mizuko had given to the suiton chakra flowing through her kunai.

"Geez, thanks," the clone said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Don't be like that. I'm serious. It's really too bad." As he talked, his sword turned black. The clone's eyes narrowed as she discarded the handle of the broken kunai in her hand as she grabbed Sakura and jumped away, narrowly avoiding being destroyed by the sword that the enemy shinobi had augmented with doton chakra. The clone drew the two kunai from their holsters on her hips and said, "Namikaze-ryū: Reisui no Tsurugi, Suiton: Kaichō no jutsu," transforming the shaped chakra of her chakra blades into water and lengthening one of them," at the same time as the original did with hers.

The shinobi that the original was fighting said, "Did that clone say, Namikaze, just now?"

"That's right. What about it?" Mizuko asked.

"How strong are you compared to your brother or father?"

"Who knows? Why do you want to?"

"Because, I want to know if I can judge my strength against theirs."

Mizuko glared at him and said, "If you want to 'judge your strength', against them, why don't you go off to where that killing intent was coming from and fight him yourself?"

"Why would I do that when there is a perfectly acceptable proxy here."

"A proxy, huh?" Mizuko said, hanging her head. She glared at her opponent. As she did, a sickening feeling made its way around the clearing, as a strange chakra surrounded Mizuko as she let loose with her killing intent.

The shinobi that she was fighting shrugged it off without a problem. As he did, he gruffly said, "That's cute," and advanced on her. His partner, wasn't so lucky. He staggered under the weight of the force, letting Mizuko throw the smaller water blade through his neck, severing it from the rest of his body. As it fell to the ground, Sakura's eyes widened and she shrieked, never having seen something so brutal as what her former classmate had just done.

Sakura's scream unwittingly drew the attention of the other shinobi. Mizuko used the chance to use the new technique that Naruto had started her on, on their way to the Land of Vegetable. She reappeared behind him, her sword no longer in her hands, but buried in his chest. Sakura dropped to her knees as she looked from the clone to the original, who was retrieving her chakra blade that had fallen from the shinobi's chest when it lost the chakra sustaining the elongated blade. Sakura stammered, "How…why? No! What are you doing!?" as Mizuko started to remove the shinobi's belt.

Mizuko looked at Sakura as if she was stupid. She said, "What do you mean? Obviously I'm taking his tools."

"Why? He's dead! You should show some respect for them!"

"That's right Sakura, he is. That's why he won't be needing them anymore, and, no matter how much I like travelling with Aniki, we won't be stopping in any shinobi villages any time soon, so I'll need to get some new tools somewhere anyway. Besides…" Mizuko said as she sealed the tools into a scroll. "…this sword he's got is pretty well made. You should take that other guy's," as she put the sword back into the scabbard that she'd taken off of the shinobi's belt.

"What? No! Don't be absurd! Why would I do that?!"

Mizuko shrugged as she sealed the sword into her cloak and said, "Fine then, if you don't want it…" as she moved over to the shinobi that her clone had killed and started sealing away his tools and sword. When she was done, she picked up the shinobi's head and put it up against his neck before drawing out another sealing scroll and sealed him inside. The head was left unsealed. Sakura was horrified when, in a dispassionate tone, Mizuko said, "Huh, would you look at that? It looks like I'll have to talk to Aniki about teaching me a fūinjutsu that seals dismembered bodies into it," and scuttled over to pick up the head and seal it into the next slot of the scroll before going back and sealing away the one that she had killed.

When she was done, she started to walk away in the direction that she'd seen Kurenai leaving. Before she got too far she realised that Sakura wasn't coming with her. She looked back and said, "Sakura, what are you doing?" when she saw her staring at her blankly.

"No! What are you doing?! You just…just…Why?"

Mizuko asked, "Are you seriously asking why I just killed them?" with a stunned expression on her face.

"Yes! We could have just…you know…knocked them out…or something."

"What? And let them come after us again once they'd woken up? Don't be absurd!"

"But…how could you just…"

"Well, my clone decapitated one, and I pierced the other through the heart. It should be pretty obvious."

"Well…yes…but how are you alright with doing it?"

"We're shinobi. Exactly what did you think that we'd be doing?"

"I…don't…I mean, I know that we'd eventually have to kill someone, but…"

Mizuko sighed and said, "Look, the very first thing that I saw Aniki do, after seeing him for the first time in years, was completely obliterate every trace of a shinobi that he'd been chasing from our village. Trust me, this is tame compared to that." With that, Mizuko continued after Kurenai.

Sakura stared at Mizuko's back with a concerned look on her face, thinking, 'I'm going to need to talk with Hokage-sama about this when we get back home. Her brother is clearly instilling some kind of insanity into Mizuko, if what she said about her brother is absolutely true!' Even with that decided, she found it surprisingly hard to reconcile what she was being told with her interactions with Mizuko's brother thus far.

XXXXX

Meanwhile, there was a particularly fat shinobi, that had four red stripes on his face, standing in front of Kurenai and Haruna. He said, "Oh? It's only some woman? When I saw the blue haired runt using those suiton jutsu on my way, I thought that I would get to face down The Second Flash." As he talked, he spun the weight attached to the end of the chain of his kusarigama.

Kurenai thought, 'Those marks on his face…' She said, "You're Jiga, one of the Janin, aren't you?"

"That's right," Jiga said. "Since you know of me, you are also probably aware of what I can do, right?"

"That's right," Kurenai said.

"Then you'll know it's pointless to stand against me. So give Haruna to me, and I'll let you live."

"We've been hired to protect her, and, unlike you traitorous wretches, Konoha shinobi keep their word."

"Then in that case, getting destroyed by Jiga of The Legendary Janin, will give you something to brag about in the afterlife!" Jiga let the weighted end of his kusarigama fly at Kurenai, who quickly drew a kunai and batted it aside. But, to her surprise, her hand was yanked sideways as the kunai was ripped from her hand, stuck to the weight. He quickly drew the weight back to him and quickly spun it around and let the kunai fly at Kurenai, far faster than he would have been able to throw it.

Kurenai released a kunai from a seal on the bandage wrapped around her right wrist and threw it at the kunai. It clashed against it and fell to the ground. She then ran at Jiga and punched him in the face. But, when she did, she winced as the area she'd hit flashed black. She jumped back away from him as he punched at her, barely tapping her hitai-ate before she was out of his range. Purposefully landing near her kunai, she said, "It would appear that our records are lacking when it came to your abilities if you can use doton to augment your defences."

"Jiga grinned and said, "It's not doton."

"What? Don't be absurd. That's the only elemental chakra variant that allows for increasing the body's defences."

"As I grew up, I consumed iron every single day. Thanks to that, I have a lot of metal within my body's cells. If I need to, I can focus on it and bring it to the fore as a form of makeshift armour. I call it the Fukakaina Yoroi no jutsu."

Kurenai thought, 'He consumed iron? Is that why that magnet release jutsu of his functions differently to what it should? My kunai must have only gained a weak magnetic charge when it was hit with the weight on the end of his kusarigama if he can no longer control it after getting hit with my second kunai. It's too bad that I can't use raiton or katon ninjutsu. If I could, I could probably have used it to counteract his magnetism." Kurenai bit her lip. 'Sakura and Mizuko won't be much help in this situation either. Sakura can't use any elemental chakra yet, and according to what she said earlier, Mizuko only has suiton and fūton that she can use. It's too bad that Naruto has been held up by that suiton user. He would be really useful against Jiga.' Just then, Mizuko and Sakura came into view of Jiga, who grinned and said, "Heh, now there's more ants for me to crush!"

Kurenai turned back to see what it was that he was talking about and saw the two genin kunoichi rushing towards them, Mizuko talking animatedly, gesturing wildly about with her hands. She bit her lip as she thought on what the best plan would be. She quickly drew a scroll and tapped it before tossing it over her shoulder. Sakura caught the scroll as Kurenai said, "Take that to Hinata. Mizuko, go and get your brother."

Mizuko nodded and took off. Sakura though, stared at the scroll in her hand. Eventually, she said, "But why? Aren't we supposed to…"

Kurenai turned to face Sakura and said, "Go, now Sakura! Or do I need to report you for insubordination." As she did, she glanced at Yurinojō before flicking her eyes at Haruna, then into the trees.

Sakura gasped, realising what she was doing and said, "No! Of course not!" and ran back towards the village.

XXXXX

When Mizuko arrived where her brother's fight had started, she looked around and blinked, stunned at the destruction that had been wrought. There were very thick trees that had been broken barely a metre from the ground and what she supposed had been a clearing, was now little more than a muddy mess. She shook her head, remembering the mission that she'd been given and focused on the task of tracking her brother and his opponent. It wasn't difficult. All she had to do was follow the trail of destroyed trees and patches of water strewn around. As she did, she thought, 'Yeesh, I knew that Naruto-nii said that his fights can get rather big, but this is just nuts! Will I be able to do this in the future? If so, then damn! I wish that I'd gone through with that plan and snuck into the shinobi library instead of waiting for Naruto-nii to get back! I shouldn't have let that old turtle guy talk me out of it, or even force him to do it! Either way, I suppose ifs and buts don't really matter if what's done is done.' She saw a large spout of water rise up above the trees in the direction that she was heading and said, "I'm headed the right way, that's good to know." She kept on walking as she said, "Though I'm not so sure that I like how far away that looked," and forced chakra to her limbs, doubling her speed.

As Mizuko picked up her brother's trail, Sakura reached the village just as Hinata and Chōji were leaving. Chōji said, "Sakura? What are you doing here?"

Sakura, heaving heavy breaths, said, "Kurenai…-sensei…sent me…scroll…" She thrust the scroll towards Hinata.

Hinata hesitantly said, "Sakura-san…what is…" as she took the scroll.

Sakura, getting her breathing under control, said, "Who knows? Kurenai-sensei just touched it once before giving it to me with instructions to give it to you for some reason."

Hinata opened out the scroll and silently read 'Hinata, the only way to defeat the enemy that I'm facing is by using either katon or raiton ninjutsu to counteract the magnetic forces being used by him. As you know, I am unable to use either, unfortunately, the only one with us that can, is Mizuko's brother, who Mizuko is currently retrieving. In the event that he is unable to get here in time, I need someone else that has that ability. I know that it might be a bit much so soon, but with your Byakugan, you should be able to make use of certain chakra manipulations on short notice. With that in mind, raiton ninjutsu are achieved by vibrating your chakra at a very high speed. Against this opponent, you will need to insert it into his body somehow, so gathering the raiton chakra into your palm and combining it with your Jūken should be the most effective way to disrupt his control over his chakra, shutting down all of his abilities.'

Seeing Hinata bite her lower lip, Chōji asked, "What is it, Hinata?" Hinata silently looked at him and handed the scroll over for him to read.

When Chōji was done, he said, "Hinata, this is…"

"I…don't know…if I can…"

"Kurenai-sensei is trusting you to do this, Hinata. Besides, Kurenai-sensei said it herself, Sakura and I can't do that anywhere near as soon as we'd need to."

Hinata said, "Sakura…-san…you should…read this…too."

"Me? Why?"

"Your chakra control…should be…good enough for…what Kurenai-sensei needs. So if…I can't…" Hinata bit her lip.

Sakura nodded and took the scroll from Chōji. When she was done, she said, "I see. That makes sense. But, even then, your taijutsu is still far superior to mine, so it will probably be easier for you to actually hit him. Besides, even if I can learn this in time, I probably wouldn't be able to get it deep enough to shut his jutsu down."

"Hmm…" Hinata said. "I…wonder about that…"

"What do you mean?"

"It is…true…that you would have difficulties attacking the chakra system. However, the nervous system should be easy enough for you to attack."

"The nervous system?"

"There are nerve clusters in the pressure points that were discussed in the academy. There should be enough in the joints to cause enough damage too."

Sakura said, "On my way there, I heard him saying something about consuming iron when he was a kid, and that being the base of his techniques. So I'm not sure that that would be particularly effective."

Chōji said, "Actually Sakura, iron conducts electricity, so raiton should be amplified, at least a little."

Sakura asked, "How can you be sure of that?"

"I'm on a team with Shikamaru and we ran up against some raiton users on our first C-Rank."

"I see. Alright then. I'll try. But I still think that Hinata's our best shot at this."

Hinata said, "Thank you…Sakura-san," before activating her Byakugan and starting to follow Sakura as she walked in the direction that she'd come from to give Hinata and herself the greatest chances of being able to produce the electric charge that Kurenai had written about.

XXXXX

As they left the town, Mizuko came upon her brother's battle. When she'd first heard voices, she'd turned right and went into the bush and crept through the forest to stay out of sight. When she was close enough to see what was happening, she crept into a bush and sat down to watch through the leaves.

When he saw a shrub move unnaturally, Naruto thought, 'Damn her! What the hell is Mizuko doing here? I thought that Kurenai would have known that this would be too dangerous and make sure to keep her as far away from here as possible!' He said, "Suiton: Mizurappa!" and placed his hand next to his mouth, with his index and middle fingers pointing upwards, and shot a large stream of water from his mouth at Ruiga.

Ruiga formed a quick series of seals and said, "Suiton: Mizurappa!" shooting a large jet of water through cupped hands.

The two streams met in the middle and clashed against each other. Naruto thought, 'Damn it!' and put more chakra into his jutsu, causing it to double in size, and speed, pushing through Ruiga's counter with ease. Due to the size of the attack though, it lost any penetrative force it might have had, and became a blunt force attack that swept Ruiga off of his feet and sent him rolling along the forest floor. As soon as he had seen Ruiga get sent flying, Naruto stopped the steady supply of chakra that he was feeding the attack and turned to the bush that Mizuko was in and said, "Quick, why are you here?"

Mizuko stood up and walked out of the bush and said, "So, you saw me, huh? I was trying really hard to sneak in."

"Quickly, that wasn't enough to put an end to the fight, Mizuko."

"Right!" Mizuko said. "Kurenai-sensei told me to tell you that she needs your help fighting some guy that uses some kind of messed up version of Jiton."

Ruiga came back into the clearing, cracking his neck. He said, "So, Jiga's moved out then, has he?"

"Jiga?" Naruto questioningly said. "Is that another one of you Janin?"

"Yeah," Ruiga grinned. "I'd be sorry for your friend if I were you. Well, not that you're going to have the luxury to be sorry when I'm through with you!"

"You've been saying that for a while now…" Naruto said, motioning for Mizuko to get the hell out of there, fast. "…but, last I checked, you're yet to land a single blow on me."

Ruiga grinned and said, "That may be so, but that was before," as he started swinging his tonfa.

"Before? Before what? I fail to see how anything's chan…"

Ruiga grinned and said, "Suiton: Suiten Hōfutsu," and nothing happened.

Naruto said, "Okay, I get that you want to prove just how ineffective your jutsu are, but seriously, don't you think that this is taking it even a little too far?"

Ruiga laughed as he said, "Oh, it was ineffective against you, certainly. But, you're not the only one here now then, are you?"

"I'm not…" Naruto gasped and looked behind him, to see Mizuko trapped in a large, airborne, mass of water. He gasped and said, "Mizuko!" as she invariably attempted to walk, punch or kick her way out of it.

As Naruto pinched the bridge of his nose, he heard Ruiga say, "Suiton: Akafune Suisen." As Naruto's attention returned to Ruiga, and he turned to see what he'd done, he saw a red, watery arrow pass in front of his eyes and shoot into the water. Ruiga then said, "Kuchiyose no jutsu: Oruka!" and, from the arrow that he'd shot a cloud of smoke burst that quickly expanded outside of the mass of water. When it was clear again, a gigantic black and white killer whale was in the mass of water with Mizuko. When it saw her it charged at her.

Naruto quickly formed handseals, finishing on the bird seal. When he was done, he said, "Byakugan!" and his right eye turned white and the veins around it bulged up, stunning both Ruiga and Mizuko, neither of whom had even considered the possibility that he could possess a power that only existed within the Hyūga clan.

Ruiga grinned. He said, "Oh, this is great! When I'm done killing you I'll take that eye and be even stronger!" and started laughing maniacally.

Naruto said, "I'm done playing around. He reached towards Ruiga and said, "Suiton: Chikamizu Kasui no jutsu!" Three large spikes of hardened water burst from the ground and pierced through Ruiga. Naruto then pushed his hand into the water that his sister was trapped in and spread his chakra through it. He then moved it away from his sister, cutting the orca's path short. It changed direction, charging for Naruto's hand. But it disappeared before it reached him, disappearing into a cloud of smoke, no longer able to remain after its summoner died. He then went over to Mizuko and released her from the mass of water.

When she was out of the water, Mizuko said, "What was…how did…wait! Byakugan!? You can use the same thing as Hinata? How? Does that mean that Miwa and I could use it too?" She didn't let Naruto answer before changing her voice and melodramatically announcing, "Then we could be like, 'Namikaze Siblings: Byakugan Warriors'!"

Naruto said, "What!? No! Well, about that last bit anyway. As to the rest, who knows?"

"What do you mean?"

"According to what Hidamari-sensei said when I activated it, it is only very rarely that a non-Hyūga descendant of the clan will activate the ability to use the Byakugan, and even then, only in one eye. As to mine's abilities…they pale in comparison to an actual Hyūga's, though they do come in handy when I need to track down some annoying siblings that don't listen to me from time to time." Mizuko chuckled sheepishly, scratching the back of her head. Naruto then went over to Ruiga's corpse and sealed it away before he headed back to his sister and said, "Come on, lets go and see what Kurenai's gotten so worked up about."

"Right," Mizuko said, nodding as she followed her brother into the treetops.

XXXXXXX

A/N

Attacks

Mizuko

Namikaze-ryū: Reisui no Tsurugi - Namikaze-style: Cold Water Sword

Suiton: Kaichō no jutsu - Water Release: Sea Bird

Fūnyū no Jutsu - Enclosing Technique

Kurenai

Magen: Kokoni Arazu no Jutsu - Demonic Illusion: False Surroundings Technique

Jiga

Fukakaina Yoroi no jutsu – Impenetrable Armour Technique

Jiga streams chakra to the cells of his body, focusing on the iron that are a part of them and transforms the cells of an immediate area into makeshift armour. This can only be done in a limited area, his control of his chakra not being good enough to apply it to his entire body.

Naruto

Suiton: Mizurappa - Water Release: Wild Water Wave

Suiton: Chika Mizu Kasui – Water Release: Groundwater Spikes

The user produces a barrage of large spikes able to impale clean through a target. This technique can be performed from afar through any existing water source.

Fūnyū no Jutsu - Enclosing Technique

Byakugan - All Seeing White Eye

Naruto could use the groundwater with the Suiton: Chika Mizu Kasui only after he'd used his byakugan; without it, he is unable to make use of water from a source that he can't see. It is also why he could take control of Ruiga's water.

Ruiga

Suiton: MIzurappa - Water Release: Water Trumpet

Suiton: Akafune Suisen - Water Release: Bloody Vessel Water Arrow

An arrow made of water that has the user's blood mixed in with it that allows them to use blood-related abilities from a distance.

Suiton: Suiten Hōfutsu - Water Release: Water-Heavens Convergence

Kuchiyose no jutsu: Oruka - Summoning Technique: Orca