Hello, everyone, here's the newest chapter of the "Pyro" story! Enjoy!
* Review response:
InTheYearOfTheCat, is that a threat? ...KGB...
Vendetta419, Naruto will change Tayuya (obviously) and C.C. (if you remember her wish, and then look at the pairing, it's obvious too.) Others? dunno.
ogihcI ikasoruK, ^_^
RE5 forever, maybe yes, maybe no, who knows...
Paul Namikaze, doragonclaw, OBSERVER01, thank you.
nobother, Naruto will eventually learn about Jiraya being his godfather... Inheritance, what inheritance?
Hakkyou no Yami, I needed that... Sorry if that wasn't the best moment of the story... Netsu won't have any action in the story. Despite her continuous attempts to get some.
jmg1988, Naruto and Tsunade are nothing more than clansmen through Uzumaki line - they are separated by - what? - 5 generations or more... Such pairing isn't even considered to be incest. As for the rasengan, well, Naruto's close combat is built much like Hinata's twin lions jutsu moves - they are flowing attacks, while rasengan is a single forward thrust. Plus, tell me, how many stories there are where Naruto doesn't learn the rasengan?
Tatamae, No one forces you. Don't like - don't read.
Psudocode Samurai, Tayuya will permanently join our blond in the next chapter. And after what I had put her through, she'll be anything but abusive ([SPOILER] Ibiki). And Naruto will not file her into the same category as the most of the villagers, because of how they ...well, come together. Hinata will NOT know about that.
* Jutsu list:
(A-rank) Dimensional shift - Naruto's personal jutsu he learned from Kyuubi. As the jutsu's name suggests, the jutsu transports user to the location he chooses (has range limitations though, but generally can allow further transportation than shunshin... May as well be counted as an advanced version of the 'body flicker')
Shunshin - (D-rank) Body flicker - 'Teleportation' jutsu.
Kuchiyose no jutsu - (A-rank) Summoning - Time-space ninjutsu that summons object/animal (requers signed contract with that type of animals) to user's location.
Suiton: taihoudan - (?-rank) Water style: large projectile - User spits a stream of water towards the target.
Doton: dorou gaeshi - (C-rank) Earth style: mud overturn - Raises a protective wall in front of user. The wall can be destroyed by powerful strike or drilling attack.
Doton: ganchuusou - (unknown rank) Earth style: rock pillar spears - Creates rock spears, nothing more, nothing less.
* Poll:
I'm starting a new poll for this story. The question is: What should I do with Sakura Haruno?
1. Kill her during the "Sasuke running away to Orochimaru" arc - 11 votes so far
2. Maim her during the "Sasuke running away to Orochimaru" arc - 9 votes so far
3. Land her into the hospital, but otherwise leave her be - 1 vote so far
Other notes: kasa is a bamboo hat like those Akatsuki members wear.
Disclaimer: still don't own 'Naruto' or any of it's characters... Same with the 'Code geass'.
"speaking"
'thinking'
"speaking of higher beings / Naruto while using Kyuubi's power / jutsus / Sasuke under the effects of cursed seal"
'thinking of higher beings / Kyuubi talking to Naruto through mental link'
AN: This chapter is NOT bate-read.
Pyro
chapter 10: Clash of powers
Naruto, surrounded by almost visible fiery aura of anger, stormed towards the Hokage's office. Equally angry Tsunade was several steps behind him. Jiraya happened to be wise enough to hide somewhere for the time being. Sandaime's secretary too felt that it won't be a good idea to try to stop these two now and just continued reading her magazine, just pressing a button to notify elderly Hokage that he had visitors... It was a good thing as it might have saved old man's life: who knows what these two would have done had they caught Sarutobi reading certain orange book written by one of his students...
"Old man, why were you lying?" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki shouted as he burst into the office, releasing enough killing intent to make the Hokage flinch. Tsunade agreed to wait her turn for interrogating the elderly Hokage. "Why were you lying that you don't know who my parents were?" Taking a deep breath, Sarutobi Hiruzen answered.
"I had to lie for your protection, Naruto. You were young and I was afraid that you won't be able to keep the secret. Your parents had a lot of enemies who wouldn't hesitate to harm you." The blond shinobi calmed down a bit, but still was flooding the office with his killing intent.
"And when were you going to tell me?" He asked the Hokage.
"You are to be given the information about your mother either on your sixteenth birthday, or when you become chuunin, whichever happens first. And you would have been told about your father on your seventeenth birthday or once you attain the rank of jounin, but I take it, you already know who your parents were?"
"She told me." Naruto said, referring to the demoness he was containing. "You've promoted me to chuunin, Hokage-sama. Why wasn't I told about my mother at least?" Sarutobi sighed again.
"Honestly, I forgot. With this whole mess after the invasion, I just had too much on my mind. Please, forgive me, Naruto." The blond shinobi sighed and shook his head, finally stopping radiating the killing intent.
"I see..." There was a short pause. "I will forgive you, Hokage-sama, but for the time being, I'm really angry with you." Another pause. "If I am dismissed..." Sarutobi nodded. Naruto turned around and walked up to the doors. "Oh, and my godmother also wants to ask you a couple of questions." He stated, before leaving the office. The Sandaime Hokage paled: when Tsunade was angry, she could scare anyone, and if his gut feeling was right, she was as angry as Naruto was... His feeling was proven correct when the female sannin stormed into his office moments later.
"Now, sensei, tell me why was I lied to?" Sarutobi sighed: he desperately needed aspirin...
~/ *** \~
It was a week since Tsunade returned to the village. So far she was doing all that was in her power to find out who made an ANBU lie to her about Naruto being dead all those years ago, as Sarutobi wasn't the one... The relationship between the blond shinobi and the Hokage was still strained, but they saw each other only during mission briefings, so there wasn't much problem there...
Naruto and his team entered the Hokage tower, heading to the briefing hall for their new mission, when they met team eight...
"Dobe, give me your power." Sasuke said, glaring at the Kyuubi jinchuuriki.
"Yeah! Give it to Sasuke-sama. He's the only one worthy of it!" His pink-haired cheerleader yelled, much to Kiba's discomfort... Kakashi paid no attention to what his genin were doing as he was reading the 'icha-icha' book. Naruto looked at the dark-haired avenger.
"No." The blond said rather coldly.
"I order you to give me your power, dobe." Sasuke demanded, raising his voice a bit.
"First, you have no right to demand anything from me, genin." The young jinchuuriki ignored Sakura's yells of disagreement with this statement. "And, second, it is impossible anyway." And the blond shinobi walked away to catch up with his team, paying no attention to fuming Sasuke. At least Uchiha was clever enough not to attack fellow ninja in the Hokage tower...
The new team seven under jounin-sensei Yuhi Kurenai entered the briefing hall. Unlike what it normally was, Hokage, it seemed, had already selected a mission for them.
"Good morning." The four ninja of the team seven bowed politely, returning the greeting. "And here's our tracking team... There is a mission that I want to give you. Recently, there were a reports of a band attacking towns in the north regions of the River country. As local militia can't stop them, there is a reason to think that the band has members with ninja training. Your mission would be to track down the band and, if possible, eliminate them. This is a B-rank mission." Sarutobi said.
"We accept this mission, Hokage-sama." Kurenai said, taking the scroll with more mission details from the elderly village leader. After she finished reading she turned to her three subordinates. "Go pack for a month long mission. Meet me at the western gates in three hours." She waited for Sarutobi to nod, giving her the right to command in there. "Team seven, dismissed." Three secondaries nodded and disappeared from the briefing hall, either via dimensional shift – Naruto, or just by walking through the doors – Hinata and Shino.
"I take it, you have something else to discuss, Kurenai-san?" The Hokage asked. The genjutsu mistress nodded.
"Yes. I'd like to file a complaint on Uchiha Sasuke for overstepping his official authority in demanding a chuunin under my command to give him his power, going as far as trying to order my subordinate to do so." The elderly Hokage nodded, while writing something in his notepad.
"I take note of this, Kurenai-san." He said. "But even if I am the Hokage, I'm afraid, there is only so much I can do about this. The council, unfortunately, hold too much power regarding ninja matters currently, and they wouldn't like their precious Uchiha getting punished for anything..." The sensei of the team seven sighed, knowing full well that with how much the council was spoiling that brat: he won't even get a slap on his wrist for the misdoing.
"Still... Do what you can, Hokage-sama." Sarutobi nodded.
"I will... Now, if that's all, you can go, Kurenai-san, dismissed." And the genjutsu mistress shunshin'ed to get ready for the mission...
~/ *** \~
Four days later the team seven arrived into the town in the River country that was attacked last – from the message that was sent to Konoha – by the mysterious band they had to track. The four ninja headed straight to local major's office, but the man wasn't there. Instead, he was personally supervising the dismantling of the destroyed houses on the outskirts of the town...
"Good afternoon, Konoha shinobi. It's good to see you there so soon." The major, short and bald man who was close to his sixties, said hastily, as he pattered towards the approaching ninja team.
"Good afternoon, major-san." Kurenai said with a small polite bow. "We are here to try to solve your bandit problem." The major nodded.
"Oh, yes, yes, bandits... They attacked us six days ago, took a lot of our food from the warehouse there and then destroyed the rest... The Minoguchi Gai and Hasumachi Gai towns report that they were attacked a little after us, presumably by the same group of bandits." He said as hastily as before. Kurenai nodded to herself as she evaluated the situation. It was too late for Shino to use his bugs to try to find the bandits by the chakra residue. But on the other side, the two other towns that were attacked were rather close from this one and it was possible that the bandits had a base somewhere not far from here. Hinata's byakugan, despite its ability to see everything within three miles in each direction, wouldn't be a lot of help either as they'd need to check thousands of square kilometers of forests... Still, they needed to find those bandits somehow...
"We will do what we can about it." The jounin said finally.
"Kurenai-sensei, I think we should use aerial reconnaissance. This way we'd be able to check large areas for possible camp locations in a short time." Naruto suggested. The idea was sound, if you don't count the moment that Kurenai didn't know how to do this with what they had.
"But..."
"Kurentai-sensei, I will summon firebirds for the task." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki reassured the jounin.
"Naruto, you can summon birds too? I thought your summons were big four-armed creatures with lion heads." The blond shinobi smiled.
"Actually, I can summon fire devs of all kinds, including firebirds. What you saw during the invasion was a contract boss, Honogyoku-sama, who is raja." The genjutsu mistress nodded.
"Well, then. Proceed." Naruto bit his finger and flashed through handseals, before slamming his hands onto the ground.
"Kuchiyose no jutsu!" A giant cloud of reddish smoke exploded into the existence around him... When the smoke was blown away, four giant birds made from red fire, each having a wingspan of about sixteen meters, were surrounding the Kyuubi jinchuuriki.
"O-OK..." Kurenai said a bit surprised that chuunin in front of her could do something like this. "Each of us will take a bird and scout an area..." Using a rough map of the northern River country, the genjutsu mistress showed her subordinates zones where they were supposed to look for a signs of bandits' camps. "Return here in three hours. We will form a plan of our further actions from there, depending on the results of the information gathering. Go, go, go." She, Shino, Hinata and Naruto picked themselves a bird and took of for the aerial reconnaissance...
Three hours later, the team seven reassembled on the outskirts of the town. As soon as all four ninja were standing on the solid ground, Naruto canceled his summons, returning the firebirds to where they came from.
"Report." Ordered Kurenai.
"No signs of any bandits' camps found in sectors A through F. Possible routes between local towns through the forests are like this..." Said Hinata, giving a hand-drawn map to the jounin.
"Found abandoned camp in seven kilometers from Naraku Gai. No signs of bandits in sectors N through S either." Added Naruto.
"Three more abandoned camps in sectors G through M." Kurenai reported the results of her own reconnaissance. Everyone looked at Shino.
"Bandits' camp in sector U. Seven men present. Judging by the effectiveness of their attacks on the local towns, it's logical to assume that they all have ninja training." The bug user reported.
"Good work, Shino." The genjutsu mistress said. "We will retire for tonight and tomorrow we will attempt to close in to these bandits."
"There is no need for that, Kurenai-sensei." Naruto interjected. "My chakra reserves are at about eighty percent right now. If I use a soldier's pill now, they would be full by the time we reach the camp. And it's less than five in the afternoon right now. We still can attempt to approach and, if possible, eliminate them today." The red-eyed jounin nodded.
"Very well. In that case, let's go. Shino, lead the way to the camp you found."
~/ *** \~
It took the four ninja from Konoha about an hour to reach the 'sector U' where Shino had spotted bandits' camp. And even before they could reach the location where the camp itself was spotted, they were met by a group of three. Two of the three were males in late teens, dressed in a similar outfits, consisting of kasas, gray jackets and pants. The third one was, presumably, the leader of the band himself. He was a man of about thirty five years old, average in height, with short spiky brown hair. He was wearing sunglasses and light gray cloak over gray jacket and pants. The most prominent detail about him, though, was a tattooed kanji 'shield' on his left cheek.
"So, these are those little flies that found us?" The 'leader' said aloud. His comment made Shino lose his cool for a moment – the Aburame heir was deeply offended when someone belittled insects... Kurenai studied the man for several seconds, before she finally recognized him.
"Damn... This is yousai no Irakusa, an A-rank missing-nin from the Hidden Grass village. If he was alone, we might be able to defeat him without any casualties on our side, but as the things are right now..." She made a small pause. "Naruto, I'm sorry, but it looks like you will need to hold him back..." The blond jinchuuriki nodded.
"It's my job to ensure the survival of the team." He stated with barely a hint of emotions.
"Oh, no, no, no, I can't let go, knowing, who I am. Makoto, Ataru, attack!" Irakusa commanded. The duo in kasas quickly did a set if handseals.
"Suiton: taihoudan!" They spat two balls of water towards the team seven simultaneously. Seeing that, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki flashed through his own set of handseals, activating his geass and summoning sparks from the seals on his palms at the same time.
"Doton: doro gaeshi!" A wall rose from the ground, protecting the four Konoha ninjas from water jutsus, while three fire dragons sped towards the three bandits. One of the kasa-wearing duo was hit straight on his chest and incinerated on spot, while his partner barely dodged. Irakusa himself was protected from the fire by almost invisible shield made form chakra. "Run!" Naruto shouted to his teammates. Kurenai nodded, and she, Shino and Hinata started running away.
"A-a, I can't let you do that." The Kusa missing-nin said, sending two valleys of 'shields' towards the retreating shinobi. Naruto's earthen wall was destroyed by them, but the young jinchuuriki was quick enough to block this strange attack with a wall made from fire. Needing to buy his teammates a little more time, before they will be at the safe distance from these men, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki split the remaining fire dragon into four, directing three of them to attack the Kusa missing-nin from different sides, while distracting the other bandit with the forth. As the man in kasa was trying to dodge the fire, the blond shinobi threw a kunai with explosive tag at his head, killing him too... Irakusa didn't move an inch as three fire dragons approached him from different sides – he didn't need to, as three shields of chakra appeared around him, protecting him.
"Doton: ganchuusou!" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki yelled as he, dropping the firewall, slammed his onto the ground, making several rock spears rise from underneath his opponent. Unfortunately, those shields protected the man again. This was a damn absolute defense, much better than Gaara's sand! Irakusa sent a new valley of 'shields' at Naruto, forcing the blond to roll to the side to avoid being hit.
"You know, little fly, I'm honored to fight you. After all, there are only so many of us there..." The Kusa missing-nin said suddenly. When Naruto looked at him, he lowered his sunglasses, showing the Kyuubi jinchuuriki his eyes. Geasses. In both eyes...
~/ *** \~
Team seven, now one member short, headed straight to the Hokage tower, once they checked at the village gates. Thankfully, The Hokage was unoccupied at the moment, so they reached his office without any delays.
"Kurenai-san, team seven?" The elderly village leader asked, a bit surprised to see them back at the village so soon. "Report."
"Mission was a partial success: we managed to find out a presumable leader of the bandits that raided River country's town, Irakusa the fortress, an A-rank missing-nin from the Hidden Grass, but we were confronted by him and two of his henchmen and had to flee." Seeing the upcoming question about the final member of her team, the genjutsu mistress continued. "Naruto stayed behind to fight him, buying us some time, but I'm afraid, the chances of his survival against such opponent are close zero." Sarutobi slowly nodded.
"I'm afraid, you are right there... But knowing Naruto, he might pull some trick and survive the encounter. I will send an ANBU cell to find him and eliminate the bandits. For now, unfortunately, Naruto will be listed as Missing In Action..."
Ten days later the ANBU cell returned from the River country. They found bodies of Irakusa and two of his men at the location that the team seven gave them. They also found the four other bandits from the group, all dead, at another location nearby. But there was no sign of Naruto, dead or alive, anywhere... And as two weeks since he went MIA had passed by now, Sarutobi had to list the Kyuubi jinchuuriki as Killed In Action.
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