Chapter 8: Crashing Waves Part 2
Beta: Darklord331 Author's Note: Should I post more Nindo chapters, so that it catches up with Odyssey? To even them out? Vote in profile, Poll ends at the end of the month.
Karasu kept his weapon at his side as he advanced on the two thugs.
"We'll teach you what it means to mess with Gato and his business!" The other one yelled before they both lunged at him, their weapons raised intending to cut their prey down where they stood.
Ducking under the shorter of the two thug's swing, parrying his blade to one side, while sending a punch to the stomach, using the pommel to hit the back of the man's head, made him crash into the floor.
"Holy sh–" The last guy tried to say, trying to slash at Karasu.
Moving fast, Karasu slashed at his side before kicking the back of one of the man's legs, making him fall down bleeding.
Sheathing his sword, Karasu glared at the remaining conscious thug.
"Where is Gato?" Karasu demanded.
The thug seemed to hesitate before Karasu activated his sharingan for intimidation.
"He sent us here to kidnap the bridge builder's daughter for ransom." He said, looking around fearfully.
"Again, where is he?" Karasu asked.
"He's with around a hundred mercenaries, waiting at the bridge. He wants to make sure that the old man doesn't leave the bridge alive."
"And the ninjas he had hired Zabuza?" Karasu asked, putting his sword on the thug's throat. "What will happen to them if they succeed?"
"Gato's planning to kill them when they had exhausted themselves fighting you guys so he won't have to pay them." He said, fearfully. "That's all I know, I swe–"
Karasu knocked him out with a quick punch before he could finish his sentence.
Tying the two thugs up with shinobi wire, Karasu turned to address Tsunami who was holding on to Inari who had appeared at the destroyed door.
"Stay here Tsunami-san." He said, as he turned and leaped away towards the direction of the bridge.
'They shouldn't have been there for a few more days… Have I changed canon? Maybe it's because there were two teams instead of just one.' Karasu thought, heading towards the bridge.
Karasu quickly caught up to the rest of the team after disposing of the two idiots, arriving at the bridge just in time to see Kakashi and Anko fighting with Zabuza and Sasuke being encased in Haku's strongest technique.
Sakura, who was standing a few meters away from the fighting, guarding Tazuna.
"Karasu-kun! You're here!" she yelled. "Kakashi-sensei is fighting Zabuza, I think Anko-sensei is knocked out! Sasuke-kun and Naruto are fighting the hunter ninja alone." she continued, worriedly.
"Don't worry about it." Karasu said, activating his sharingan. "Just protect Tazuna."
'Damnit! I can't reach Anko, she's too far and Kakashi is fighting too close for me to get to her.' Karasu thought, as he helplessly watched from the sidelines. 'Sasuke and Naruto should be able to handle Haku alone, despite canon happening faster.'
Kakashi blocked the blow from Zabuza's blade with his kunai. The other man was swinging the huge sword like it was a mere toy, judging by the ease the man had been able to execute sword moves that normally were associated with smaller and thinner swords.
Karasu continued to watch the fight between Zabuza and Kakashi, intent on copying their moves.
[Kenjutsu: 80%]
[Iaido: 15%]
'It's climbing, climbing real fast.' Karasu thought. 'I should have done this ages ago.'
Kakashi narrowed his eyes as he sidestepped the blow that was aimed at carving him in half, letting Zabuza's sword crash beside him before bringing his kunai up to slash at Zabuza's neck, making the man jump back, pulling his sword along with him.
Gripping the massive blade, Zabuza charged forward and swung again, Kakashi dodged the assault by stepping to the side, as the size difference in weapons was too big.
The two shinobi continued their fight with Zabuza clearly having an advantage due to both the larger size of the weapon and longer reach compared to Kakashi, who was relying on his speed and reflexes to counter the strikes of the blade.
Karasu's eyes widened as one of Zabuza's slashes almost took Kakashi's head off, but the teacher easily ducked under it before holding his kunai in a reverse grip and tried to counter but was forced to back away from one of the strikes.
'Damn, didn't think they were this good… in retrospect, they should be this good.'
The two weapons met each other again as both wielders tried to overpower each other. One was succeeding and the other was being pushed back.
'Zabuza was a better swordsman than Kakashi but Kakashi's Sharingan helped to even the odds. But the difference between the fighters was the experience one had over the other.'
"Oh?" Zabuza said, in a curious tone. "It seems that your backup has arrived, and one of the other Uchiha as well."
Kakashi evaded a strike and weaved around the blow and went for a swipe at Zabuza's back. However, he anticipated it and pulled his sword, twisting his body, towards his direction to block the slash.
"Hmm? If you're their sensei that means that.." Zabuza said, as his weapon was locked once again by Kakashi's own.
Karasu's body tensed as his eyes continued to watch for any openings to rescue his sensei's unmoving body.
Kakashi's eyes narrowed as he went for the offensive, his Sharingan countering every move that Zabuza was making. Kakashi tried to make a swipe with his kunai, but before he could land it a powerful wave of power of chakra suddenly exploded from the other half of the bridge.
– Kakashi Hatake –
Narrowing his eyes at Zabuza, as he tried to attack him head-on. Mid-attack Kakashi was suddenly hit with a wave of malicious chakra.
'Naruto?' Kakashi thought, looking behind him. 'Just like that night. Now out of all times, shit.'
His lone sharingan gazing upon his student, the chakra surrounding his body as it filtered through his chakra network. The chakra being used to combat Haku, allowing Naruto the upper hand.
'The nine-tails chakra slipped in his system, but the seal still holds.' Kakashi thought, unwrapping a sealing array.
"Sorry Zabuza, but it seems that I'll have to stop playing with you, then again we're both busy people eh?" Kakashi said, using the sealing array to summon his dogs. Just as Zabuza continued to hide in the mist, his voice echoed in the bridge.
'Shit, where's Anko? Did her student take her away when I was distracted?'
"Summoning? Don't you know you still can't find me? How disappointing Kakashi, I expected more from you." Zabuza's voice echoed, as the sound seemed to come from everywhere.
"What?!" Zabuza said as he was quickly surrounded and held by dogs.
"Hold him down like that." Kakashi said as he saw his summoning the dogs, hold down a weakened Zabuza.
"I couldn't see you, so I had to rely on another sense," Kakashi said, forming hand signs.
Lightning chakra wisped and twisted around his hand and Zabuza's eyes widened in fear. The lightning-covered hand then made the chakra took the shape of a blade.
Zabuza tried to move but Kakashi's dogs were all too well trained.
"Raikiri!" Kakashi said as he ran straight at Zabuza at high speeds but before he could strike he pierced another's flesh.
Looking to the side, Kakashi was met with the face of the hunter ninja who was evidently Zabuza's companion, the man himself, didn't even wait and launched a big overhead swipe to Kakashi.
Kakashi quickly grabbed Haku's shoulder and leaped backward a safe way from Zabuza's reach.
"Sensei! You're okay! What do we do?" Sakura said as Kakashi was blocking Zabuza from her, Karasu with a knocked-out Anko and Sasuke.
'Karasu must have rescued both Anko and Sasuke, to minimize the damage, good thinking on the kid.' Kakashi thought as he laid down Haku to close her eyes.
"Isn't that disappointing Zabuza." A voice said, on the other side of the bridge accompanied by a dull tapping noise coming from across the bridge.
"Gato." Zabuza growled out.
"He's here. Interesting." Kakashi said with narrowed eyes.
Soon, Gato's form was revealed, one hand holding a walking cane and another arm in a cast, short and a little bit rotund. Behind him, his hundred or so mercenaries were standing behind him, trying their best to look menacing with their weapons.
– Karasu Uchiha –
"Amazing everyone! Truly!" Gato said, clapping sarcastically. "Perhaps I should've hired you Konoha shinobi instead to kill the bridge builder. But then again, I would've killed you all the more sooner."
'What a fucking prick.' Karasu thought as he put himself between Gato and Sakura and the two unconscious shinobi and the civilian.
"You were never going to pay us, were you?" Zabuza said, tired.
"Of course not! You ninjas are just too expensive! Better to kill you now rather than pay you off later. And I see that bitch of yours is alive too. Good, I need to repay her for what she did to my arm." He said, smirking at the shinobi.
A sound suddenly escaped Anko's body as she woke from being unconscious, Karasu immediately was by her side.
"What's going on?" she said,
"Hey, you're back, Gato backstabbed Zabuza and we're about to get into a big fight." Karasu said, a bit relieved.
"Oh," she said, before passing out again.
'She's still out of it, the hell happened to her before I joined the fight.'
"What?!" Naruto said, trying to rush them. Kakashi quickly grabbed him before he could do anything else.
"Kakashi, we're done here. We have no reason to fight anymore." Zabuza said as he hefted his sword. "Let me deal with this scum of the earth."
"We'll help you." Kakashi offered.
"Yeah!" Naruto said, putting his hand in the iconic hand sign.
"Naruto, don't destroy the bridge." Karasu said, pocketing a few shurikens.
"Why me?!" Naruto said, incredulously.
"Because I doubt that you wouldn't." Karasu replied.
"Grrr I'll show you, Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Naruto said as smoke enveloped the bridge before a group of Narutos suddenly appeared.
Gato saw them coming at him, fearfully shoved men in front of him, frantically shouting orders.
"What are you waiting for?! Kill them!" he screamed.
"Yeah!" the mercs shouted as they charged, weapons raised and victims clear.
"Hah. They must be stupid if they think they could take us all–" one of the mercs began, but he never finished his sentence when a kunai from Karasu was put in his throat, killing him.
– End –
Author's Note: This was supposed to be released a week ago, but I was busy with IRL stuff. Again, just a reminder: Should I post more Nindo chapters, so that it catches up with Odyssey? To even them out? Vote in profile, Poll ends at the end of the month. SGO discord link: /wd3tUYWVCd, join the server, get updates as to when I post a new chapter and feel free to ask me any question you might want to ask, and suggest ideas.
I'll see you next time, bye~