Naruto screamed in agony as the Kurama's chakra was constantly being sucked out of him.
"This is taking too long." Momoshiki complained and Naruto smirked weakly.
"...Sorry, we shinobi... Don't like to make things easy for you." Naruto said as everyone looked up to see, Natsu, Gray, Erza, Mirajane, and Sasuke were flying down towards them.
Several lancers made of ice rained down on then and the two Otsutsuki members separated themselves from Naruto to avoid the attack. Erza requipped into her Heaven's Wheel armor, and cut the binds that held Naruto to the tree. Mirajane transformed into her Satan Soul and caught Naruto as he was falling, helping him to the ground.
"Are you okay?" Mirajane asked.
"Yeah... Thanks..." Naruto said in between breaths smiling. Naruto stood up and he stumbled a little bit. Mirajane reached out to help him but she hesitated when she saw him stand up straight.
"I'm sorry... For getting you guys involved in our problems." Naruto said and Mirajane shook her head.
"We're friends, I want to get involved. I want to help you. We all do." Mira assured him.
"You guys saved me, thanks a bunch." Naruto smiled.
"Here this is for you." Mirajane said as she handed Naruto his jacket. He smiled and accepted from her, immediately putting it on.
"Let's go." Naruto said as he leaped into action and Mirajane followed suit.
Meanwhile...
Gray and Erza were facing off against Kinshiki in an epic battle of sword play. Kinshiki was able to find an opening and he attended Erza in her abdomen.
"Erza!" Gray cried out.
"You're cornered!" Kinshiki declared as he moved to attack Gray with a battle axe that he made out of chakra. Gray smirked and asked, "Aren't you talking about yourself?"
Suddenly Kinshiki couldn't move as a pair of hands grabbed his feet from beneath the ground. He was pulled under the ground until only his head was above ground. Erza popped out the ground next to to him and winked, "Earth Style: Head Hunter Jutsu"
"Ice Make: Hammer!" Gray declared his attack as a gigantic mallet appeared and slammed onto Kinshiki's head.
"That's for Lili you bastard."
Natsu and Sasuke were chasing Momoshiki who continued to flee from his attackers. Naruto and Mirajane had managed catch up with them. Naruto was jumping from root to root and created the handsign for his most known jutsu.
"Fire Dragon's..." Natsu was inhaling and Mirajane was charging a dark attack
"Evil..."
"No! Don't use any magic or ninjutsu on him!" Sasuke warned as he finally caught up to Momoshiki and was able to stop him in his tracks. They squared off with each other, Sasuke with his sword pointed at him and asked, "You absorb Ninjutsu and magic and spew it back out right? It's not that different from the way Natsu's magic works."
"So taijutsu it is." Naruto grinned as he cracked his knuckles.
"Hand to hand combat? I can work with that." Mirajane said.
"Oh yeah I'm all fired up!"
"You should hide somewhere Happy, this is gonna get nasty." Natsu warned. Happy nodded and flew away, following his order.
Momoshiki gritted his teeth in frustration now that his weakness was exposed.
"You've certainly gotten much stronger Gray, I must commend you." Erza praised and Gray rubbed his head in embarrassment.
"But don't let your guard down. They're strong, I doubt they would be defeated so easily."
"Yeah..."
From deep beneath the rubble, Kinshiki thought to himself, "Lord Momoshiki, it's time to fulfill my duty."
The ground suddenly began to rumble underneath them as Kinshiki burst from the ground. He leaped high in the air and created a giant red scythe and landed next to Momoshiki. He swung the scythe with overwhelming force, slicing the world tree completely in half causing a lot of destruction in its path. Kinshiki was breathing heavily and breathing badly from his head and his arms.
"Lord Momoshiki... It's time... Take me, just as our previous ancestors have done. Do not hesitat-" He said and Momoshiki wasted no time in putting out his left hand turning Kinshiki into a chakra fruit.
"As if I would hesitate!" He said angrily and he began eating the fruit.
"To his own...!" Natsu growled as he was about to rush in for an attack but he was a bit too slow. The effect of eating the chakra fruit caused Momoshiki to explode with power pushing away the four who surrounded him a great distance. After absorbing Kinshiki, Momoshiki's appearance took a drastic change including; black sclerae, white irides, dark-red skin, a pointy chin, fangs, claws on his hands and feet which were exposed, white hair, ponytail enlarged and became much spikier, larger, sharpened bull horns, white markings under his eyes and a massive increase in size. His Rinnegan on his palms turned purple and he awakened a third one on his forehead.
Momoshiki salivated with power and he yelled out a might roar, containing all kinds of killing intent.
"What kind of power is this!? It's on a whole other level!" Gray thought.
"I've never experienced something like this not even from Naruto or Sasuke!" Erza panicked.
"I'm scared..." Mirajane collapsed onto her knees as shook in fear. There was silence but then the sound of footsteps were heard. Everyone looked up to see Naruto and Sasuke walking in front of them.
"Hn, it's like I'm looking at my old self." Sasuke said as he threw off his cloak.
"No kidding..." Naruto said as he activated his chakra mode.
"Let's teach him a lesson, Sasuke."
"Yeah."
Naruto, Sasuke and Momoshiki rushed each other and Momoshiki caught each of their punches with one hand. Although their punches were able to move the gigantic stump of the world tree ruining the landscape even more than it was before. They struggled against Momoshiki until Naruto ducked and Sasuke hit him with a strong reverse round house kick.
They rushed their enemy again and engaged in a taijutsu battle. Erza and the rest watched their battle take place and we're just in awe.
"They're both ridiculously strong individually, but their teamwork is flawless." Erza said.
"I feel ashamed to have to sit back and watch. I need more training." Gray scolded himself.
"I wanna fight too but... I think we'd only be in their way." Natsu said.
"Ohhhh? You've become a lot more mature since then Natsu." Erza cooed him and she squeezed his cheek like he was a child.
"Don't do that!"
Sasuke slid under Momoshiki's sword swing and kicked him in the chin sending him into air. Naruto met him in the air and punched him through a moon like object that was lingering in the air. Sasuke met Momoshiki at the other end of that moon and kicked him back towards Naruto. At this point they were playing tennis with Momoshiki's body. Naruto grabbed him by the legs and flipped several times in the air flinging him to the ground in the crevice of a mountain. Naruto and Sasuke dove towards him preparing to end it with a strike. However Momoshiki didn't plan on going quietly into the night as he created a chain and wrapped it around Sasuke, using it to throw him out of the picture. He rolled out of the way of Naruto's hit and hopped on the tree stump. Naruto's momentum carried him into the crevice and he hurt himself in the process.
Momoshiki clapped his hands together and the sides of the mountain came together entrapping Naruto. Sasuke recovered as he tried rush Momoshiki alone but had to dodge and block several projectiles on his way. At least until his feet got stuck in the root of the tree. Momoshiki rushed him with a giant mallet. Being unable to move, the most he could do was stab his sword into the ground and release lightning chakra from it in order to help block the attack. However, Momoshiki's brute strength knocked him high in the air and Sasuke recovered in the air. However the onslaught of attacks only continued when Sasuke was being bombarded by several boulders. Using his susanoo to block them, it only made matters worse because the rocks didn't fly off like they were supposed to, they instead clung to his susanoo and began to glow a red color.
"He's using me as an epicenter!" Sasuke said as he groaned in pain as the radiant heat coming from the stones burned him, so much so they actually combusted.
"Sasuke!" The left out crowd cried out. Suddenly the ground shook as Kurama in his full might leaped from the structure that Naruto was trapped in. Catching Sasuke in his chakra, Naruto noticed his burn marks and scowled. He fed Sasuke some of Kurama's chakra in order to help him recover. Suddenly several snakes made of the earth hooked themselves on Kurama's shoulders and thighs with their fangs. Kurama grabbed and ripped apart the snakes gripping his shoulders. Then a giant Phoenix like bird made entirely of flames sprang into life. Kurama grabbed hold of its wings, struggling against it.
Naruto growled as he struggled against all of the monsters he had to fight. However he felt a tug on his arm and when he turned he saw that Sasuke had completely recovered. He grinned as Kurama ripped apart the Phoenix. A monster made of magma started to come to life as soon as the Phoenix was defeated. However all of the snakes that were grappling on to the nine tails were obliterated by the building up of the Susanoo armor.
Sasuke's susanoo armor built up around Kurama, giving him the armor of a warrior. Momoshiki was controlling the Magma monster from the top of its head and used it to swing at Kurama. Although due to its size and body structure, the attack was slow, giving Sasuke enough time to materialize a sword for their combo. Kurama swiftly ducked under the punch and swung the sword like a baseball bat, slicing the monster in half and causing it to implode on itself.
The swing of the massive sword cause a huge shockwave across the land blowing Natsu and others away a bit, nearly as much as Momoshiki.
Kurama and the Susanoo both dissipated as Naruto and Sasuke landed on the ground. Natsu and the others ran up to them with smiles on their face.
"You guys did it!" Happy said ecstatically.
"Your teamwork is absolutely flawless. Good work." Erza praised but Sasuke immediately silenced all congratulation talk.
"We certainly did a lot of damage, but I highly doubt it was enough to kill him."
"If we could use our ninjutsu on him, we would have beat him already." Naruto said as they saw Momoshiki struggle to rise up out of the dirt, completely battered. He was breathing heavily and had a huge scowl on his face.
"You dare ruin my garments!? I'll kill you!" Momoshiki declared.
"Do the four of you think that you can eliminate the eye on his left hand while we accumulate power?" Sasuke asked.
"Heh, let's show off the fruits of our training!" Natsu declared.
"Hey, Kurama, can you try to absorb as much natural energy as you can?" Naruto asked.
"I'm on it."
"I've got a plan." Gray said as he huddled them together to quickly explain it.
"I see... That'll surely work." Erza said.
"Sasuke, when we give the signal, use your ninjutsu." Gray said and he nodded.
Momoshiki pulled a few round red pills and swallowed all of them, gaining back a lot of energy.
"Let's go, we won't get a second chance." Erza said as she threw down a few smoke bombs. Natsu, Gray and Mirajane jumped out of the smoke and Gray threw an ice boomerang who held out his hand to absorb it. However what he tried to absorb was a transformed Erza requipped into her lightning empress armor.
"Take this!" Erza was about to try and shock him with her lightning spear but he grabbed Erza and tossed her aside. Suddenly he was being raised up by a near mountain sized ice platform.
"Now Natsu!" Gray ordered. The center of the ice hill started to glow a red color.
"Don't you know how hard it is to melt ice without making it completely evaporate!?" Natsu complained as the ice instantly started melting into a giant pool of water. Once all the ice was melted Momoshiki stood in the water holding Natsu up by the throat.
"Your measly little attacks won't have any effect on me. You're too weak!" Momoshiki glared at Natsu who happened to smirk.
"You're up Mira." He said, barely having enough breath to do so.
"Evil Spark! The electricity of a demon can numb every cell in the body." Mira said as she electrocuted the pool of water. Momoshiki shrieked in pain and let go of Natsu unintentionally.
"And since you can't feel anything..." Gray smirked as he refroze the water, holding Momoshiki's feet in place. Ice began creeping up his body preventing even further movement.
"This ice will be child's play to absorb." Momoshiki said confidently.
"What!?" He looked down at his arm and saw that he was actually lacking one.
"Looking for this?" Natsu smirked as he tossed Momoshiki's arm up and down like a baseball in his claw like hand. They looked and saw Sasuke's perfect Susanoo charging Indra's arrow while a three headed Kurama was charging one massive rasenshuriken and one tailed beast rasenshuriken. Natsu used all his might to toss Momoshiki's severed hand away. He grabbed Gray and Erza and launched them towards Naruto while Mirajane flew there on her own.
"SIX PATHS: ALMIGHTY SCREAM!" Naruto and Sasuke declared their attack and launched it at Momoshiki who was defenseless. At the last moment Happy picked up Natsu and flew away from the explosion as fast as he could. After a few minutes the explosion finally subsided. Everything that had form was completely decimated, not even a trace of anything left.
"This place was already in bad shape when we came. Is there even a word beyond barren wasteland?" Mirajane asked as she looked on at the massive damage, her Satan Soul receding.
"Massive would be an understatement for this kind of destruction." Happy commented.
"That... Was... Awesome!" Natsu beamed.
"You gotta teach me how to do that!"
"If they taught you that you'd probably destroy all of Magnolia." Gray said.
Kurama and Sasuke's Susanoo began to disappear as they landed on the ground.
"It was necessary to defeat opponents as strong as they were." Erza said.
Naruto and Sasuke collapsed onto their behinds and let out a sigh of relief.
"Whew I'm beat." Naruto said.
"Yeah... I don't even feel like moving right now." Sasuke said.
"Those were incredibly powerful techniques, but they're pretty taxing it seems." Erza said.
"I want to know, where did you learn to use ninjutsu?" Sasuke asked.
"Fufufu. I thought you would never ask." Erza chuckled as she reached behind her back. She pulled out a cloth and raised it to her forehead. Trying it around her head, everyone with the exception of Mirajane had shocked expressions of their faces.
"I graduated from the Hidden Leaf Village's ninja academy." Erza said proudly as the headband on her head shone brightly.
"That's awesome Erza! But when did you go there? When we were there we didn't hear that you were too." Naruto asked.
"Well I didn't go there until about 6 months after you guys left. And I also wanted to make it a surprise." She answered.
"I'm impressed that you graduated in less than two years." Sasuke said.
"We'll talk more a bit later but we should go home first and check on Lili." She responded.
Everyone agreed and Sasuke stood up, followed by Naruto. The latter placed his hand on Sasuke's shoulder and supplied him with a suffice amount of chakra to get them back home. A large image of the rinnegan appeared before them before it turned into a black and purple portal.
Outside of Porlyusica's home, Lucy and Elfman were picking flowers when suddenly a portal opened up in the sky. Natsu, Gray and the others fell down in front of them. Moans and groans could be heard amongst the dog pile.
"Get off of me!" Natsu yelled from beneath the pile.
"You guys are back!" Lucy said excitedly.
"Will you stop all of the ruckus!? You're affecting the recovery of my patient!" Porlyusica scolded furiously.
"So that means Lili's okay then!?" Naruto asked, hope gleaming in his eyes.
"Yes, she is. She is conscious now and yes you may see her. But if I hear one loud noise, your out!" Porlyusica warned and they all rushed to see her.
Lili smiled when she heard Porlyusica yelling at them. She struggled to sit up but she managed.
"Don't strain yourself. You need to rest." Borelle said from her bedside. The door creaked open slowly as Natsu and the others poked their heads in. They smiled when they saw her sitting up and filed in.
"How ya feelin'?" Naruto asked. Lili turned her head to face them and saw that they were all dusty, battered, and bruised.
"I'm fine, but you guys look like you've seen better days." She responded.
"Well we did just come from battle."
Erza said.
"You guys managed to beat them!?" Borelle asked.
"Yup! But to be honest, if all of us weren't there, we probably would have lost. Those guys were on another level." Naruto answered.
"But it sure did take you guys a long time to come back." Lucy commented.
"Wait, how long were we gone for?" Gray asked.
"Three days." Lucy answered.
"What!? That fight felt like it only lasted like 10 minutes!" Natsu exclaimed. Erza immediately covered his mouth preventing him from making too much noise.
"You imbecile, did you not hear what Porlyusica said? Keep quiet!" Erza whispered.
"So time moves differently in their dimension than it does us..."
"By the way Borelle, how did you find out what happened to Lili?" Gray asked.
"We're brother and sister, I always know if something happens. Also a woman named Ultear contacted me by messenger pigeon." He answered.
"Ultear huh... I don't really trust her." Lilian said.
"I know what you mean. She has a malevolence about her." Erza added.
"I don't think she's all that bad. At least I hope so." Naruto whispered the last part to himself.
"Oh, Erza I see you're wearing your forehead protector." Lilian said.
"Yes, I'm glad that I took you up on your offer to join the academy." She responded.
"You know, Erza's name is already quite known throughout the village." Borelle said and Erza sweatdropped.
"Please don't talk about that..." Erza pleaded.
"What happened?" Naruto asked.
"Well you see, I'm sure you guys are well aquatinted with Erza's bad side." Borelle answered.
"Let's just say she's renowned as the reincarnation of the Red Hot Habanero." Lilian said and Naruto burst out laughing.
"That's so awesome! That's my mother's old nickname."
"It all started when a kid accidentally made her drop her strawberry cake and all hell broke loose." Lilian giggled.
"That sounds like Erza alright." Gray said grinning.
"Although this is true, she's also pretty adored throughout the village among the kids especially." Lilian added.
"Erza's the same no matter where she goes." Natsu chuckled.
"Aye, that's Erza for you!"
"Incidentally, what rank were you in the academy?" Sasuke asked.
"Same as you, she was the #1 rookie." Lilian answered.
"Well to be fair she was already trained in combat and was far older than the rest of the students. So it was only natural that she'd be number one." Borelle added.
"Wait, if Sasuke and Erza were both #1, then what were you?" Lucy asked Naruto who grinned.
"I was dead last." He answered and Elfman and Lucy keeled over at his answer.
"How could you be so strong and yet you were dead last!? Does that mean that Sasuke's like a God then?" Lucy asked.
"It's because he's a man!"
"If you work hard and train every single day, dead last really doesn't mean anything in the end." Naruto answered.
"Yes, and I took it upon myself to help all the kids improve as much as I could." Lilian said.
"That must've been some rigorous training, her taijutsu is pretty good for someone with only about a year and a half under her belt." Naruto said.
"Please don't praise me so much. I still have a long way to go." Erza said a little sheepishly and everyone laughed.
"Still, when you fought Natsu, you used his own hands against him to create handsigns, that was really impressive." Naruto praised.
"She did that? But we never taught her that she could do that." Lilian said.
"So where'd learn that?" Sasuke asked.
"I learned it from you." She responded and everyone was shocked.
"How did you learn that from me?"
"Near the end of the year in the academy, Lilian showed us a movie that was created that simulated your final battle with Naruto. Then I saw you use Naruto's hand to weave signs for a fireball and I decided to try it if I ever got the chance." She answered.
"I always thought that ninja were nothing but legends, but here they are, standing right in front of me." Lucy said.
"Well the way this world is right now, we are nothing but legends." Sasuke said.
"Speaking of which, have you two checked that book recently?" Erza asked.
"Well let's see right now." Naruto said as he pulled the book out seemingly from nowhere.
"Oh wow that's pretty useful, how'd you do that?" Mirajane asked.
"Flying raijin." Naruto answered. He opened the book to the first page and it read, 'One night, the moon turned red as if it was stained with blood.'
"Okay, here goes." Naruto said as he slowly began turning the page. Everyone's eyes widened when they saw that the page was no longer blank. There was a silhouette of the ten tailed beast with all of its tails swinging with just the rinnegan in its head being the only visible feature. An army of shinobi stood before it and the caption read, 'On that day, stood the mightiest creature of all, the Ten Tails. The shinobi of all the great nations banded together to fight this mighty beast'.
Naruto turned to the next page and it was blank like before.
"So this book takes place during our time." Naruto said.
"The ten tails? What's that?" Lucy asked.
"It's a mythical creature, now all of you get out. You've been crowding my patient for too long." Porlyusica said.
"Awww but we just got here!" Natsu complained.
"I said get OUT!" She yelled as she started swinging at them with her Broom forcing them out.
"Jeez what is it with that old hag? Is she always like that?" Naruto asked.
"More than you know..." Erza answered.
"What could have possibly caused that page of the book to be revealed?" Gray asked.
"I can only think of two possibilities. It was either the defeat of Momoshiki and Kinshiki or it was the destruction of Lullaby." Sasuke suggested.
"Well, the only way to confirm that is to slay another demon from the book of Zeref." Mirajane said.
"Well I'd love to find out the secret behind it but for now... I think I'm just gonna take a nap." Naruto said as he collapsed onto the floor and began to snore loudly.
"I guess he lost more chakra than we thought. He's exhausted." Happy said.
"I'll take him, I could use the rest myself while I'm at it." Sasuke said as he slung Naruto's arm over his shoulder and carried hm towards the bulding where both of their apartments stay.
"Honestly, I'm just glad that everyone's okay." Mirajane said.
"How about it? Do you guys want to exchange stories back at the guild?" Erza asked.
"Yeah! And I'm gonna eat until I drop!" Natsu declared
"Aye sir!"
Next Chapter: Erza's School Days/Training Day
