Of Leafy Fans and Hearty Attacks (continued)
"Retreat! Everyone retreat! Get out of the way!"
Darui's baritone rang amidst the chaos, choking slightly as his bulbous nose inhaled the smoky debris that had enveloped the area. He had entrusted the Konoha duo in handling Kakuzu for a few minutes after witnessing the Fire and Wind masks claim numerous lives with their continuous assault and rushed over to provide aid and take charge of his scattered troops. Having demolished yet another hill, the monsters had trapped many shinobi, the flames that had dispersed over the coastal area making it tough for the Jounin to free the men and women from underneath the fiery rubble.
"Suiton! Water Encampment Wall!"
The Kumo ninja released a wide fence of water from his mouth and increased the quantity of chakra to widen the range and strength of his technique in order to save as many lives as he could. Even then, he knew that he would not be able to save everyone, his eyes scouring over the vast area revealing numerous others trapped beneath burning rocks, reaching as far as more than two hundred metres away.
His heart skipped a beat as he caught sight of a lone figure bounding towards that area swiftly, and after catapulting herself into the air, summoning a voluminous flow of water that extinguished the flames within mere seconds. He watched with his mouth gaping and gut churning as the girl stumbled and landed on her right knee for a split second, before raising her head and staggering forward once again. Darui started to follow the young kunoichi but the cries for help in the vicinity stopped him in his tracks. Head spinning in a mixture of delight and fear, he gritted his teeth as he spied the departing figure mount treacherous slopes, knowing fully well who her targets were. Turning back to his responsibilities, he barked for soldiers to help free their comrades from their prison.
"Hang in there, Tenten! I'm sorry but I'll come as soon as I can!"
Mugi's face contorted in despair as he witnessed yet another plateau come apart under the duo masks' raging forces. Having brought Kurotsuchi to the Alliance medics for treatment together with Yabuza, he was now watching the calamity from afar, wondering where General Kitsuchi could be at the moment and if he should scout for him to handle those pesky masked elemental monsters. If they were not taken out soon, they would definitely be reaching this area in no time, and the medics and their injured charges would be in peril.
"Our Doton techniques might not be able to take out those creatures," he mumbled to no one in particular. "But we can reduce the casualties, I'm sure."
Standing upright, he was just about to inform his partner of his plan when his heart almost stopped beating. A wave of delirious joy coursed through his veins as his keen eyes spotted a deceptively small figure flying towards the two black monsters from behind and sending one of them spiralling downwards with an elemental summon of her own.
"Yabuza!" he yelled, overcome by gleeful anxiety. "It's Tenten! She's alive! She's attacking the masks!"
His fellow Iwa comrade was beside him the next second, marvelling at the sight of the small speck, now vaguely visible having landed on the edge of a flattened cliff, facing a hovering mass of black. Even from here, he could sense the dauntlessness of the girl, and he felt his heart give a lurch.
"We have to help her, Mugi… Remember, she said she only had a few swings left in her. Come on!"
"Not without me, you won't!" Kurotsuchi's own eyes were gleaming in wonder as she took in the distant scent from just behind her friends, who were already starting to protest in bewilderment at her quick recovery. "Don't give me the crap about me needing to rest. Tenten's done more than she should to help us so let us not be wimps now! Let's go!"
The towering figure recoiled in terror as he spun around, having detected that his Fire Mask had been temporarily repelled by an impetuously effective Suiton technique. His eyes bulged in unadulterated astonishment and his tentacles flailed in utter disbelief.
"No… The girl… That weapons girl! She's still… she's still wielding the Bashosen!"
Following Kakuzu's flabbergasted glare, the two Chunin exhaled audible gasps of relief as they saw their fellow Konoha comrade standing tall at the edge of yet another elevated plateau. Izumo gripped Kotetu's forearm as he stared, wide-eyed; a second later, his partner's hand returned the squeeze to his in celebration.
"I can't believe what I'm seeing," he mumbled, wide-eyed, as the girl's spiralling scrolls took to the air and regurgitated their contents from within.
"Snap out of it," Kotetsu grinned as he gently pushed his friend's fingers away. "She's doing her job, let's do ours and keep this imbecile down."
Ino swept her fringe from her eyes, her pupils dilated. Air-borne together with Shikamaru on Chouji's gigantic hand, she watched in rapt fascination as the clanging of weapons reached her ears, almost missing her friend's words.
"Her weapons… I didn't know she could do that!" Chouji's voice boomed.
"It may one of her last moves. Chouji, hold back. We… we can't get in her way. Stand by though. You may need to follow her attack."
Ino's heart fluttered as the gravity of Shikamaru's words sank in. While she wanted to ask him to clarify what he meant, she could tell from his narrowed eyes that his ingenious mind had already calculated what had been occurring and from his dour expression, she could sense his own anxieties for their friend. As Ino turned back to watch her friend launch this visually overwhelming attack, she prayed fervently that her teammate's words would not ring true.
"Oh Tenten… please be safe… please… stay safe…"
"Sogu… Tenjin Ranmen."
Refusing to falter despite energy being sapped from her entire body, the young kunoichi closed her eyes and breathed deeply as the hundreds of projectile weapons hovered precariously in mid-air. Manipulating the wire-strings she had meticulously attached, Tenten stood rigid as her ninja tools veered and swerved past one another into position. The surrounding air was heavy with tension, the weight of these multifarious metallic blades threatening to collapse on whoever was within a radius of a hundred metres in front of this mind-blowing and breath-taking sight.
While earlier comrades like Darui, Kotetsu and Izumo would have witnessed Tenten's Manipulated Tools – Rain of Steel technique earlier in the middle of her scuffle with Kakuzu and the Earth Mask, this was vastly different. The myriad tools at the weapons specialist's disposal had now been manipulated to form the shape of a stupendous raptor, each blade carefully positioned to form the body, wings and tail of a bird of prey. While present onlookers would be overwhelmed by this unbelievable sight of such a multitude of weapons aligned in this shape, they might also know that they would be ineffectual against an elemental mask like Kakuzu's.
"Katon. Hosenka."
Her quivering arms managing one more swing, Tenten felt her heart give a painful lurch as soon as she finished the move, the Bashosen silently releasing flames that took the shape of an ethereal phoenix that now enveloped the entire air-borne metallic raptor. Fire met metal and as Tenten's expert fingers instructed each and every single red-hot metal blade to spin, an eerie silence filled her mind and she shut her eyes momentarily to focus.
As her brown eyes flashed open, Tenten sent the fiery blades shooting towards the Wind Mask that had tried to scurry back to its vile master. The speed of the kunoichi's raptor structure made this a vain attempt, as within seconds, the flaming mass of metal had soared through the black threads, the impact of hundreds of burning blades thrusting and drilling through its body causing the Wind Mask to melt its way into oblivion.
"She did it!"
In scattered areas near the plateau where the kunoichi was standing – some nearer, some further away -, her allies and friends were cheering almost in unison as they made their way towards her. Almost immediately after being utterly enthralled by Tenten's successful assault however, each and every single one of her on-looking comrades stopped dead in their tracks and watched, eyes stricken in horror, as the tiger-shaped Fire Mask rose from below the craggy precipice and appeared almost right in front of Tenten.