The Wanderers
Chapter 71 – A Counter Offensive
A/N: A large portion of the inspiration for the chapter was taken from a particular part of the Band of Brothers series, which of course took cues from true events. If you can recognise it, then I applaud you. If not, definitely watch that series, it's very good.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. If I did, the enemy would be a whole force, not just one dude.
***Previously-On***
The invasion of the Land of Fire by Otogakure forces has begun. In a bold move the Otokage sacrificed his village to destroy a Quiraji army before taking everyone from the shinobi to the civilians with them. They broke through the barricades at the border and destroyed a number of smaller Quiraji outposts before slamming into a large force they'd lured to their position, destroying it utterly. Neji sent a single survivor back to send a message to the Quiraji as they consolidated their position within his old homeland. With his best shinobi in tow, they took over and occupied the Fire Temple of the Land of Fire. Their scouts were sent to far areas of the Land of Fire as Dosu and Zaku caught up with the main group and gave their report.
Besides a few small incidental incursions by Quiraji forces, everything seemed quiet at their position.
***End Summary***
The Otogakure shinobi yawned loudly and rubbed at his eyes. "This is so dull…" He turned to his partner to see her dozing into her arms at the edge of their dug-out hole.
With a groan he shoved her with his shoulder, "Wake up, Sasaro."
His partner muttered incoherently and turned in her hands to continue to sleep quietly. He rolled his eyes and stared out at the boundless grasslands that expanded out from the Fire Temple behind them. They were only one of dozens of dug-outs that spanned all around their temporary hideout in the Fire Temple. The dug-outs were highly defensible and connected by long tunnels that could be accessed for a rapid retreat, or to reinforce instantly.
If the Quiraji came anywhere within several kilometres of the Fire Temple, they would be countered before they came within striking distance of their main base. In addition to their long range scouts it was an almost foolproof way of ensuring the village was always prepared for any sort of attack.
But that didn't stop the border guards from getting bored out of their minds. Even with a reasonable rotation of guards, the hours dragged on endlessly.
Over a week had gone by since the first attack by Quiraji forces. The soldiers had been soundly defeated, yet no follow-up attack had come.
Being on edge for so long was draining for anyone and shinobi were no different.
The Otogakure shinobi sighed for what felt like the hundredth time and started counting the blades of grass in front of him.
It seemed to change every time he did it.
Hako slammed his cards down onto the wooden table, "Gin!"
The other Oto shinobi at the table snarled and threw down there cards in disgust, though the one who had the smallest pile of counters in front of him stared at his cards for a moment before looking at his companions in confusion.
"We were playing Gin?"
The others laughed at his confusion and took long draughts from their drinks. It had been a quiet night for the most part, barely a peep from any of the civilians underground for a change.
"Have you heard anything from your brother?" asked Riko to her female companion beside her.
Yui shrugged and began shuffling the cards for the next round, "His mission will take weeks, apparently. The Otokage's desperate to get word out to the other villages."
"Our esteemed leader is always hard at work," joked one of the players.
Hako put a finger to his lips, "Shh! Don't you know that our great leader can see and hear everything?"
"I heard he doesn't sleep or eat," said Riko.
"And eats babies and farts lightning, we've all heard the stories," said Yui.
The atmosphere seemed to drop several degrees as Jin walked into the room and crossed his arms over his chest. "Working hard, people?"
They all shot to their feet and gave him a salute. He was well respected by all the shinobi in the room, having taught most of them himself.
Jin looked over their faces for a moment before rolling his eyes, "As you were."
The Otogakure shinobi all relaxed and took their seats, while Yui offered him a place at the table.
"Any word from the outside?" asked Hako, shuffling the deck of cards for a new round.
"Nothing, all seems quiet," said Jin, walking from the doorway towards the window. "It's strange; they know we are here."
"Maybe they're scared of our fearless leader," japed Yui, causing those at the table to laugh loudly.
"Who's on duty at the northern tower?" asked Jin, glancing out the window with a deep frown.
Riko reorganised her cards in her hands and glanced over at him, "Tori and Makunouchi, why?"
Jin didn't say anything back, his frown deepening as he moved back to the doorway.
"Something wrong, sir?" asked Riko, tossing away her terrible hands and covering her chips with her hands.
"Hopefully it's nothing," said Jin, though his tone said anything but that.
After a few moments Hako threw down his cards and grabbed his sword from its resting place on a nearby table.
"We've still got three rounds before we raise blinds!" protested Yui, but Hako shook his head and strapped his sword on his back.
"I'm just going to give Jin some back-up, that's all." He moved to the doorway while tapping for one of the others to join him. She sighed and picked up her own weapon to join him.
"By the way, you guys really suck at picking card games," came his voice from the hallway.
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"What…what the hell happened here?" stammered Hako, pulling his sword out of its sheath just for the sake of his own self-confidence.
The three of them stood in the tiny room that was on one of the outer edges of the Fire Temple, designated as a room for contemplation and self-reflection.
The blood of their Otogakure comrades was smeared on the walls, with barely enough body parts to accommodate the two people they'd known to be in the room.
"Monsters…" muttered Hako, shaking his head frantically.
Jin turned the other shinobi and ordered the kunoichi to raise the alarm and made sure she left before turning and kneeling down next to one of the bodies that looked more like Makunouchi than Tori.
"What are we going to do?"
The Otogakure shinobi stood back up and slammed his fist into Hako's face. The shinobi recoiled backwards and clutched at his face.
"Get a grip! We don't have time for you to have your mental breakdown!" Jin jabbed at the outside area, "Go with Noriko and get everyone on standby."
Hako grabbed the sword he'd dropped when Jin punched him and ran out of the room. Though he was horrified by what he was seeing, Jin was able to detach himself enough to analyse the situation properly.
They were cut up by straight blades, probably swords or long knives. Jin looked around the room as the picture began to make less and less sense. From the blood spray it looks like the killers were drenched in it, but there are no tracks outside the room. It's like they just vanished into thin air.
Despite his confusion, Jin could draw one obvious conclusion.
There were assassin's in their midst.
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Like a well-oiled machine the shinobi on duty had their weapons ready and began searching the Fire Temple for the assassins within minutes of the discovery of the butchered remains of the first two victims.
But by then, it was already too late.
Search teams swept over every part of the Fire Temple for the attackers, but when several groups didn't come out when the alarm was sounded the search parties began to get suspicious. The rooms and housing that didn't respond were subsequently searched and a similar pattern started to emerge.
In every case it was small numbers of shinobi in confined areas that had been butchered, leaving no trace of the attackers or any account that they'd been able to fight back at all. It only took ten minutes for the searching Otogakure shinobi to ensure that the civilians were completely secure, and little more to make sure that there were no enemies at all in the Fire Temple area.
The forces around the border had been adamant that no Quiraji force had broken through them, and from all accounts Jin was willing to believe them. By the time he was able to get the word to the Otokage, it had been twenty minutes since he'd first discovered the bodies, and they'd gotten the final confirmation of the number of casualties.
"How did this happen?" demanded Neji, throwing his shinobi clothes on over his sleepwear. His wife sat wordlessly in his bed while their children slept without a care in the world on a bed beside them.
"You didn't hear the alarm?" asked Jin, watching as Neji shouldered on his Kage robe and motioned to the door.
He didn't answer his subordinates question as they ran out into the main Fire Temple area; not wanting to admit that he and his wife had chosen that time to rekindle a part of their marriage they'd been neglecting in all the madness of the past few months.
He saw the bustle of his subordinates running around the temple area and felt a stab of pain in his chest. He'd brought them to this place and they were the ones doing the dying. Not for the first time he felt regret at the choice he had to make as the leader of the village.
"Is the area secure?" he asked to Jin at his side. He was grateful for his assistance in many different areas, but it was clear that everything was under control for the time being.
"As far as we know," said Jin. "There's no trace of how they got in or how they left though, they could come back at any time."
"They won't return," concluded Neji. "We aren't easy targets now that we are all active. The damage has been done."
"Monsters," muttered Jin, reiterating his subordinate's earlier statement.
"Clever," said Neji with an unamused tone. The enemy's strategy was obvious but effective and the fact that he hadn't predicted it bothered him immensely. "How many dead?"
"Ninety four."
Once they secured the Fire Temple area and ensured that it couldn't happen again, the Otogakure shinobi settled in for the night. Nobody had seen the attackers or how they had come into the area to kill the shinobi, but they could all agree that they weren't going to leave them alone any longer.
Any doubt that the Quiraji were aware of their presence at the Fire Temple had completely vanished over night.
The Otogakure shinobi that weren't patrolling the border remained in the various internal buildings in their regular groups. Some had decided to form large groups for the night, while others were confident enough in their companions that they wouldn't come under attack.
As the sun set, the shinobi settled into a tense evening, waiting for their enemy to come to them.
In one of the worship centres that his clan had been using as a recovery area for their wounded, the clan leader of the Fuuma clan took a long draught from his flask and glanced at the injured around him.
Arashi's clan had suffered many casualties since agreeing to join the Hyuuga's new village, yet he hadn't felt any regret for the choice until they had come to the Land of Fire. He hated seeing his people killed without being able to protect them, but he knew that they wouldn't have lasted any longer on their own.
He sighed and placed a hand on the edge of the closest bed to him. His cousin, Sasame, was one of the stronger shinobi in his clan, but she'd suffered a terrible blow across the throat during the night from one of the Quiraji infiltrators. It was only because of their clans special techniques that she had survived the night at all, and their medics were doing everything in their power to make her regain consciousness so she could tell them about her attackers.
She'd clearly given a reasonable fight, her hands had been covered in Quiraji blood when they'd found her.
"You'll have to sleep at some point," commented one of the nurses from a nearby bed. She knew he hadn't left his cousin's side since they'd brought her in; even using his own secret clan techniques to keep her alive.
Arashi smiled at the nurse and went to make a charming comment as he usually did with his people, but his expression shifted as he felt something very wrong run up his spine.
The nurse noticed his expression change and started to make a comment, but froze in place as she saw the air behind him shudder before ripping apart to reveal an ominous shadow within.
She watched in horror as the shadow crawled out of the rip and took shape. It slowly formed into a tall man wearing white and grey clothing. His white boots made no sound as they touched onto the ground, and the expression on his face was paved with hatred as two long knives emerged in his hands. He brought them back to stab down into the Fuuma clan head's back, but before the blow could fall his target disappeared in a puff of grey smoke.
The assassin hesitated for a second at his lost prey and that was all the time Arashi needed to get behind him and grab at his arms. The pale purple-haired Otogakure shinobi held his foe's arms to the point that he could feel the bones being crushed between his fingers, but Arashi wasn't the type to just leave it at that.
"Now I've got you," he whispered into the assassin's ear. Without waiting for a response he planted a foot in the middle of the assassin's back and wrenched his arms backwards.
The Quiraji assassin's arms made a horrific snapping sound before he dropped to his knees at the attack. Arashi walked around and knelt down in front of the Quiraji assassin, batting away his long knives so that he couldn't attack him.
"You made a mistake coming after the Fuuma, Quiraji scum." Arashi tapped him lightly on the cheek with a clenched fist, enough to cause the assassin to spit into his face uselessly. "Now you'll really find out how good our hospitality is."
The nurse that had been in the room with him screamed again behind him, but Arashi paid no attention to her. It was only when her screaming was silenced that he realised that he had made a grave mistake.
He'd assumed there had only been one assassin in the room.
The Fuuma clan head shot to his feet while almost absentmindedly shoving a kunai into the throat of the defeated assassin to see half a dozen identically-clad Quiraji butchering their way through the hospital staff and injured Fuuma shinobi that were around him.
Arashi roared out in fury and his hands sped through handseals to try and save his clansmen.
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Touro snarled at his foe and clutched at his wounded side tenderly. The Chiza clan had positioned themselves in such a position that they had covered every entrance and were prepared for all sorts of different avenues that the Quiraji could use to attack them.
He couldn't have expected the enemy to appear out of thin air and attack them at the same time.
Within seconds he had lost five of his men before they'd even sighted the enemy.
But the Chiza were resilient and fought back with as much tenacity as they were known for. Once they understood what they were facing, his shinobi were able to fight back against the white-clad assassin's, even taking some of them down in the process. It was difficult, but the battle was starting to sway into their favour.
That was when he realised that it wasn't just them that were under attack.
Everyone was under attack at the same time.
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Unlike the other clans from Otogakure, the Nakaru mostly consisted of the reserves force, since most of their techniques were designed for assisting their companions.
So when the alarm rang to signal the village was under attack, they rushed to the defences of their companions, while their clan head ran to get the leader of their village.
However when he got to Neji, he discovered that the Hyuuga leader was well aware of the attack on his people and immediately directed them to every point he could see with his Byakugan. Within his black and white vision he watched as white-clad assassins appeared and disappeared at a whim, attacking his shinobi in the same pattern over and over again. The technique to constantly appear and disappear reminded him of something Naruto had shown him before he had left for the Land of Earth.
After almost a full minute of observation, Neji understood everything about the technique and how to counter it.
With his guards at his side, the Otokage shot out into the open area of the Fire Temple and began a systematic cleansing of the Fire Temple.
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Sakon sat at a table in his quarters eating a small bowl of soup silently. It was rare for him to get some downtime between missions and he couldn't stand to listen to everyone panicking over people jumping at shadows.
Besides, he'd finally gotten the recipe right and was starving.
He was so focused on eating his soup that he didn't notice the change in the air that indicated one of the assassins had come into his room. It made no sound as it pulled back its two long knives to remove his head from his shoulders.
Before the blow could fall however, a pair of arms shot out of Sakon's shoulders and grabbed at the assassin's arms. The head between the arms looked up and Ukon yawned with a tired expression.
"I was napping…" he muttered, glancing at the white-clothed assassin that had tried to kill them.
Sakon put down his spoon and sighed in turn, "And I was eating. Never a dull moment around here."
The assassin tried to pull away, but Ukon's grip was ironclad. The brothers stood up and Sakon's head turned around to sit beside his brother's.
"You took we were a weak target? You Quiraji are a bunch of fools."
Sakon's fist emerged from his back and slammed into the assassin's side. The Quiraji's body dropped from the blow, causing the Otogakure shinobi to release their grip and stand over their victim with pitying looks in their eyes.
"This is the danger everyone is flipping out over?" said Sakon with a scoff.
Ukon nodded his agreement, "I'm going back to sleep, brother. Take care of this."
Sakon rolled his eyes and turned around while his head turned around to fix back into place. "Fine, fine."
The Quiraji assassin glanced up at its attacker for a moment before disappearing in the blink of an eye. There wasn't a single trace of the assassin in front of him, though it was hardly the first time this had happened to the Otogakure veteran.
He spun around and reached out with a hand, only to have the attacking Quiraji assassin disappear again before he could grab onto it. Sakon growled loudly in frustrating and watched as his attacker reappeared on the other side of the room.
It seemed clear from the expression on the assassin's face that he was highly outmatched by the Otogakure veteran, but Sakon could tell it couldn't escape just yet.
Probably an issue with his technique.
I am aware of that, brother.
Then don't let him get away.
Sakon snarled and leapt forward, his arms outstretched to grab onto the assassin once again, intent on ripping him apart piece by piece. Just as his fingers clutched at the white material on his shoulder the Quiraji assassin teleported away once again, this time far away from the Fire Temple.
But this time, Sakon and Ukon both disappeared with him, having been holding onto him at the time he teleported away.
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Neji pushed out his palm towards the Quiraji assassin, "Hakke: Kuusho!"
The blast of air barely got to the white-clothed assassin before she disappeared into thin air, leaving two bodies behind in her wake.
"Damnit!" shouted Kazumi, kneeling down beside one of the bodies. She shook her head like she couldn't believe what had just happened. "I knew her…"
Neji signalled for the other shinobi accompanying him to secure the room while he scanned the Fire Temple with his Byakugan. Despite coordinating their defensive efforts through his doujutsu and getting to the attacked areas as quickly as possible, he counted at least thirty more bodies.
They still weren't able to catch any of the assassin's, or even take any of them out.
But now our enemy has a face and a method, he calculated quickly in his head. We've got to get quicker and more effective.
"Are the civilians okay?" asked Kazumi to him, knowing that her twin brother had been sent on guard duty underground.
Neji nodded and deactivated his Byakugan, "They attacked a few of the guards, but specifically left the civilians alone. It's clearly part of their tactics."
He turned away from them and swore silently, it was infuriating to say the least.
"What do we do now?" asked one of the shinobi, putting away his sword into its sheath.
The Otokage collected himself and turned back to his subordinates, "Collect the dead. Next time there won't be any losses."
He said it with such conviction he almost believed himself.
But Neji knew that nothing was so certain, particularly in times of war.
The next night the Otogakure shinobi were prepared for the assassins to come into their midst. Neji and Jin had ordered for groups to be no smaller than ten shinobi a piece, with the majority out in the open to ensure that they could account for everyone else.
Several volunteer groups stood prepared in small rooms like the ones that were attacked in the previous two nights. If Neji's assessment that the assassin's were using the same technique that Naruto had demonstrated to him, there was a short delay between teleportations; he had given standing orders that he wanted at least one assassin captured for interrogation.
Once the sun set in the sky, the Otogakure shinobi held their position with their weapons ready, wanting to get revenge for their fallen comrades.
They weren't going to get away from them this time.
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The Otogakure shinobi waited with baited breath until long after the sun rose before realising that no attack was going to come. Eventually Neji ordered them to stand down, but the fatigue damage was already being done to his people.
With his personal frustration at a record high, Neji called in his commanders to his command area and requested a solution. He phrased it as a question, but made it sound like a command and they understood exactly what he was asking.
"What do we know?" asked Jiroubo with his hands on the table.
"They disappear once they attack, though they seem to only be able to do it a few times before leaving the area." Jin shook his head, "It's damn infuriating. They're cowards."
"Have you tried to check the area with your eyes?" asked Touru to their leader. "Maybe they have a camp nearby."
"I've looked, nothing in the nearby area," said Neji. He went to say more, but a thought occurred to him and he put up a hand to ask for silence. He correlated all the facts in his head before he realised what was happening.
"You're right, they must have a camp. But not so nearby, just within range of their abilities."
"How can you tell that?" asked a confused Tayuya.
Neji motioned to everyone in the room, "Because we're all exhausted. It makes perfect sense. They attack for two nights straight to keep us on edge, and then wear us down for the next day so that the next attack is devastating."
He put up his hand in a single handseal and activated his Byakugan as his subordinates discussed the problem. His range of sight was extremely long, even for a Hyuuga, but the further out he looked the harder it was to concentrate on a single area. His father once described it like listening to a group of people singing all at once. You can concentrate on a single voice if you concentrate hard enough, but they tend to blur with the rest.
Neji scanned the area with his Byakugan, stretching his doujutsu as far as he could.
"Can you see anything?" asked Tayuya, clenching her hands back and forth. She was itching to do some violence and hated that she hadn't been able to get her hands on their enemy.
He put a hand to ask for patience, his veins stretching on the sides of his temples. After a few moments he gasped, realising that he'd been holding his breath through the effort. It had been a long time since he'd strained his eyes so much, but he figured so long as he didn't use the second stage he would be okay.
"Well?" demanded one of the clan heads.
Neji pulled the map of the region across the table and grabbed a nearby pencil, drawing frantically on an area near the edge. His drawing abilities left much to be desired, but he was still able to convey what he had to.
Once he was done he jabbed at the middle of his drawing, "This is a ridge about 12 kilometres to the north east."
"That's where they're stashed?" asked Jiroubo, glancing at the drawing.
Neji nodded, that's what he'd seen in the blurs of his Byakugan vision. It was unreliable due to the fact that it was further out than he'd even known he could do, but it was the best they had to work with.
Jin swore under his breath and turned to the clan heads, "We've got to get a strike team to take them out now. I'll take five of our best; we can be there in minutes."
The Otokage resisted the urge to smile; he didn't even need to give the order. He watched proudly as his subordinates made the plans and moved out within a minute of his discovery of their resting position. He'd only gotten a glimpse, but it was clear that the effort of teleporting around had a serious effect on them and they needed time to recover before they could attack again.
If they were quick about it, they might be able to get them and stop the attacks.
Though Sakon and Ukon's absence was troubling.
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When Jin's strike team reached the ridge that Neji had found the Quiraji assassin's hiding place, they'd expected a hard fight but a swift victory.
What they hadn't expected to find was Sakon and Ukon, standing over a large group of corpses, both their hands and bodies drenched in blood. The Quiraji assassin's looked like they'd put through a blender, to the point that two of Jin's team dropped to their knees and violently threw up.
Sakon looked over at the newcomers and wiped some sweat off of his forehead, which only served to spread some of the blood from his hands to his face. "You guys took your time."
"We've been here for hours," said Ukon, cracking his neck to the point that everyone including his brother winced at the sound.
"Do we even…want to know how you two got here?" asked Jin, doing his best not to look at the bodies and failing miserably.
Sakon and Ukon looked down at their handiwork before speaking at the same time. "We were bored."
Jin threw up his hands in dismay and turned back to see that he could see the area near their new base. It was a long distance away; he was amazed Neji had been able to see this far.
"What the hell is that?" asked one of his strike team, pointing in the distance.
He looked in the direction she was pointing for a moment before his eyes widened and his hands clenched subconsciously. "We've got to get back, right now."
"We're not finished here," said Sakon, kneeling in front of one of the bodies.
Jin turned around and grabbed at the Otogakure shinobi's shirt, picking him up, "Another time, Sakon! The others are under attack."
"How the hell can you tell? We're ages away from the temple," said one of his team.
He pointed back towards where the others were stationed, "Because there is a group of giant creatures heading straight towards them and we don't have time to chat!"
Ukon pouted uncharacteristically, but tapped his brother on the shoulder. They shared one of their silent conversations before both sighing and turning to Jin. "Fine, we'll come back later to finish up."
Sickos thought Jin, but he was grateful that they were willing to come with them.
If what he saw was accurate, they didn't have long before their people came under attack.
This time it wasn't going to be from the shadows.
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Placing her hand on the ground, the Quiraji leader grinned a toothy smile at her prey sitting in front of her. The shinobi thought they were safe within their precious little temple, but they didn't realise that she'd been hunting them since they came into her territory.
Shiori was very territorial.
Around her packs of bloodthirsty hounds appeared from under the ground, spikes coming out of their backs and breathing hot smoke from their open jaws. It was little effort to summon such minor creatures, such that Shiori summoned hundreds within seconds just to pad out her attack on the Otogakure shinobi.
The main meat of her army came from the gigantic creatures that she rarely used on her hunts. They were reserved for special types of prey.
Four large rhinos that were the size of buildings began scrapping their toes on the ground, waiting for the order to charge into the Fire Temple in front of them. They were accompanied by a half dozen oversized gorillas that bore massive weapons akin to those wielded by Shiori herself.
Above her other summoned creatures flew a large flock of giant crows that had terrible claws and foamed at the mouths from the diseases they were desperate to spread to their victims in front of them.
But Shiori's favourite creature was the one that would spearhead the hunt.
A white and gold striped tiger clad in the finest white armour that her predecessor had created. It wasn't as large as the rhinos that would do the most damage to the buildings, but Shiori had personally ridden down hundreds of shinobi on its back. Its claws were the size of swords and had an attitude to match.
Shiori had no interest in taking part in this hunt. It was inevitable.
She gave the sound for her creatures to attack and disappeared into a tear in the air. She had other business to attend to that was far more important.
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"DEFENSIVE FORMATIONS!" yelled Jin, running through a rapid set of handseals and taking his place at the head of the front group of two hundred Otogakure shinobi.
The border guards had given them enough advance warning of the impending attack on their position by the army of wild animals and the entire force of their village was prepared for the attack. The commanders had their groups in specific positions, while the reserves held back for the call to relieve their companions if there was a threat of being overrun.
Many of them had experience in fighting giant summoned creatures from previous wars, but these creatures were known to be much tougher than the creatures shinobi were able to summon. They weren't made of chakra and didn't have personalities to reason with.
There were also a lot more of them than any shinobi could summon at the same time.
At the western entrance, Dosu flipped the switches on a line of sound cannons and signalled for the other weapon-users to do the same. "Wait for the word before firing."
"Are we sure they'll work?" asked one of his subordinates, her hands shaking as she held the cannon towards the animals bearing down on them.
"They're the legacy of our weaponsmith," said Dosu with conviction. "Trust in her work."
The other shinobi nodded in agreement, pointing their weapons to the hounds that were threatening to attack them. It was clear that the commander of the beasts didn't realise that they were fighting shinobi that used sound as a weapon.
Dosu would make sure they paid for such a mistake.
At the centre of the defensive line, Neji placed his Kage hat on his head and relayed every piece of information he could see with his Byakugan through his assistant. From his view he trusted his people to hold firm, but the summoned creatures were something he hadn't seen before. He'd seen the void in his vision that indicated one of the Quiraji leaders had been present, which he assumed was the hunter, Shiori.
"Tell Jiroubo to move against the third rhino on the left," he instructed as he took his position in the front lines.
"Nice to see you here, sir," said one of the Otogakure Genin.
The Otokage turned to the young man with a frown, "You shouldn't be here; you're too young."
"I don't think they give a damn…sir."
Neji scoffed and clenched his fist, "Isn't that the truth?" The animal horde was almost upon them, but his shinobi weren't about to let them attack them on their enemy's terms. He put up his arm and released his fist, "Take them down!"
At once the Otogakure shinobi sprung into action, attacking the animals at the same feverish pace as they were being attacked. The front lines clashed with the initial first ranks of the hounds, meeting the animals with steel and ninjutsu.
The hounds were larger than the average shinobi and much faster than their initial movements had indicated, but the Otogakure shinobi were well trained and fought back as hard as they could. Unlike normal summoned creatures they were far more resistant to damage and more than one shinobi fell under their claws when they thought their target was done for the count.
"Fire!" called out Dosu, depressing the buttons on his cannons to fire large sound waves into the hounds charging at them. The high pitched weapons made the hounds falter enough for the backup shinobi to charge forward and butcher the hounds with their weapons.
"Look above!" shouted one of his subordinates, pointing to the sky with her hand.
Dosu glanced up and swore as a crow with a massive wing-span almost took his head off with long claws. "Get the auxiliaries in here! Our weapons don't have the range to deal with aerial foes."
He dropped his cannons and put his hands together into a handseal, but stopped his technique when he saw one of the crows exploded into a cloud of feathers. Without turning around he picked up his weapons again and fired into a hound that tried to leap onto his face. "You're late!"
Zaku dropped down beside his old teammate and blasted two crows out of the sky with bursts of air from his hands, "Since when are you so impatient?"
Dosu went to say something back, but held back when he saw a pair of oversized gorillas charged towards them, moving weapons in their hands that showed they would slam through their shinobi line with little resistance, unless they stopped them first.
"I'll take the one on the left," said Zaku, shooting forward and leaving his subordinates behind. He wasn't much of a leader of people, but his charge was inspirational enough for them to roar out and follow after him.
His old teammate sighed and blasted another hound from attacked Zaku from the side. "Cover your comrades," he ordered loudly. The sounds of the battle were almost deafening in his ears, but Dosu couldn't afford to let it distract him. "Hold the line!" he shouted as he saw several of his subordinates fall under the claws of a group of hounds.
Behind the attacking hounds rampaged the large rhinos the Quiraji leader had summoned, with two of them moving to charge into buildings at the side of the Fire Temple while the other two seemed set on boring through both their companion hounds and the shinobi they were fighting.
But being beasts they weren't away that the ground shaking beneath their giant feet was only partially due to their own rampage.
Before the rhinos could get near the main area of the Fire Temple where the Otogakure shinobi were fighting for their lives, a massive slab of earth shot up from the ground at a curved slant, causing the rhinos to trip over themselves as they couldn't keep a grip on the ground beneath them.
Feeling that the rhinos had fallen into his trap, Jiroubo shot out of the ground and slammed one closed fist into his open hand. Summoning up a massive amount of chakra, Jiroubo shot his hands forward and fuelled his chakra into the earth he'd just used to stop the rhinos.
To his surprise, as he was activating his high-level technique he saw several Otogakure shinobi that had broken through the hounds defending him from the sides, forming a defensive circle around him. A grin came across his face before he put on his usual angry expression he wore in battle and pushed out his arms. "Doujutsu Ougi: Ishigami!" (Secret Earth Element: Stone God)
The rhinos rolled back onto their feet quickly and roared loudly, but were quickly silenced as giant fists made of earth slammed into their heads. In front of them a golem made of earth slowly stood back up and raised a fist high up into the air.
Back in the Fire Temple battlefield the Otogakure saw the golem appeared and shouted out a cheer before redoubling their efforts in the fight against the summoned beasts.
Jiroubo put down his fist and strode towards the two rhinos, knowing that he could only maintain the technique for a limited amount of time before his chakra ran out. He reached forward with the golem's hand and clasped one of the rhino's by its horn, using it as leverage to turn it onto its side before slamming a stone foot straight into its neck.
Any normal creature would have died instantly, but Jiroubo wasn't going to take any chances with Quiraji trickery. He leaned forward and began pounding the creature with the golem's fists until there was little more than blood and bone beneath it. He pulled back and regarded his handiwork for a moment before the golem was rammed in the side by the other surviving rhino.
The impact sent a shockwave that almost knocked Jiroubo off his feet even as his golem was driven into the ground, but his companions steadied him on his feet and kept him in the fight. The large man held back a curse word; he had an image to maintain after all.
"Thank you," he said as he recovered his golem from the ground and silently cursed his foolishness for forgetting the second foe. The rhino had backed up after charging the golem and began stamping its feet on the ground, taunting him.
Jiroubo had no issue taking the bait.
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Karin let out a huff and pushed her glasses up her nose, "All this noise is giving me a headache."
One of her scientists dragged one of the hounds towards her with a spiked chain around its neck. It snarled and snapped at its captor, but the scientist's grip was ironclad. "Where would you like this one, mistress?"
The red haired woman leaned forward to examine her prize, "Full grown male, five foot tall, modified. Fascinating. Put it in sector F-4."
"That one is full of the special project, mistress," said the scientist back, while the Otogakure shinobi assigned to guard them took down any animals that tried to get near them.
"Which one?" demanded Karin with a deep frown; she could have sworn she knew about all of her currently in development.
The scientist coughed awkwardly and made a signal with his free hand in such a way that their guards couldn't see it. Karin let out an ah and motioned for him to pick a different place for the hound for future study.
"Everything is just getting out of control," she muttered quickly before walking up to one of her male guards and pointing past him to one of the fallen gorillas that had been impaled by a large number of lightning strikes from their dear leader. "I'd like a sample of that creature, please."
"What are you looking for?" asked the guard, wary of the bizarre things he'd had to fetch for the young woman over the years. He recognised the contributions she'd made to the village and the war effort, but he wondered how far into her mad-scientist role she was going to go.
Karin flicked at one of her red hairs that was always getting close to her eyes and gave him a look like it was obvious.
"I need its brain for examination. Do I need to spell it out for you?"
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Tayuya pulled her flute from her lips and ducked with a loud curse as an arm came flying towards her, almost striking her in the face. She glanced up to see the large tiger tearing off another arm from one of her subordinates and hurled it at her before biting into its victim's neck, killing him.
"We've got to retreat!" shouted a female Chuunin, but Tayuya grabbed her by the collar and threw her back into the fight.
"You are a shinobi!" she instructed loudly. "Do your jobs!" She placed her flute to her lips and began playing again, a deep mourning tune that flowed throughout the battlefield. Unlike her previous forms of genjutsu, Tayuya had modified her technique so that it enhanced those fighting around her. Upon hearing the tune the Otogakure shinobi felt their strength doubling and their chakra reserves replenishing, fuelling their efforts to get back into the fight.
They fought back against the large tiger that was tearing through their ranks, trying to pierce through its armour with their weapons and throw different types of elemental techniques at it, but nothing appeared to be effective.
After another minute of killing Otogakure shinobi, the tiger's head reared up and its bright gold eyes focused on a single target within the enemy ranks. It could smell his blood from here, recalling the orders from its mistress.
Jumping off its powerful legs, the striped tiger leapt over the ranks of Otogakure shinobi and bashed its way through with a loud bestial roar.
"Sir, watch out!" called out several of the Otogakure shinobi, but Neji was well aware of the danger heading towards him.
He turned just in time to see the tiger pull back a claw to rend him into tiny pieces.
With an almost casual gesture, he activated a sealing technique on the ground. If the beast was made of chakra it would have been crushed under the weight of the yin-yang seal, but the Quiraji creature was only slowed temporarily.
Enough time for the Otogakure Jounin around him to pile onto the creature and begin stabbing it in the weak points of its armour, pinning the creature to the ground. It roared at the attack and swiped out with its arms, ripping open the stomach of a shinobi that came to close to its claw.
Not one to shy away from battle, Neji leapt forward and stood on the tiger's head. He placed his open palm between its eyes, seeing the hateful look in the animal's eyes.
He had no sympathy for the creature.
A large vacuum of pressure extended from his palm and slammed into the tiger's head. Even a Quiraji creature of extraordinary toughness couldn't hope to stand up to a point blank attack of that strength.
The Otogakure Jounin didn't cheer or demonstrate any joy in their defeat of the creature; they were too professional for that. They went about their business of defending their comrades fighting the other creatures around them, while Neji stood back from his defeated enemy and surveyed the area again.
Something about this battle felt wrong to him. The pattern fit perfectly to what he had predicted, but there were no Quiraji soldiers like he was expecting. If they had suffered an attack by both the creatures and trained soldiers, or even some Red Guard and Black Robes, the battle would be much more one-sided. Even the summoner, Shiori, had chosen not to participate in the battle.
There was a greater game being played and he couldn't see all the pieces.
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The massive rhino bore down on the group of Otogakure shinobi, its horn aiming to gore them in a straight line into the Fire Temple. As courageous as they were, they had no techniques that could stop the summoned creature within their small group.
"It's been nice knowing you guys," said Riko with a weak grin on her face.
"If it breaks through here, it'll get to the civilians," said Hako, holding his kunai tightly in his hands.
Yui sighed as the rhino came closer to them, "I never got to sleep with Jiroubo…"
"Gods, if we're about to die, I don't want to hear about your weird fetishes," complained Riko at her side.
The group braced themselves for death, but it never came.
Just before the rhino could strike them, its face was covered in a ball of fire that sent it crashing to the side, screaming in pain. The Otogakure shinobi looked around to see who had saved them, but they could only see a small figure flying in the distance, on top of what appeared to be a flat square of wood.
On the other side of the Fire Temple as the Otogakure shinobi were fighting back against the horde of rapid hounds that were attacking them relentlessly, Neji summoned up his chakra and sent a blast of air through his palm and beat back their attackers.
"You're late!" called out Jin, wiping his bloody sword on his pants. He watched as the Otokage walked up to him and clenched his single hand.
"I had to make sure the other areas were holding," said Neji, using his Byakugan to survey the immediate area. His heart sank at the image of the bodies around them, but they weren't out of the fire yet.
From what he could see, Shiori had clearly underestimated how desperate his people were, and how strong they had become. The battle was slowly turning to their favour.
"I think we're winning," observed Jin quietly. "Though I think my arms are about to fall off." His strike team had fought their way through an army of hounds to get to their companions and he'd lost half his shinobi in the process, but he suspected their charge had broken the enemy animals' resolve.
"How are the reserves?" asked Neji quickly.
"Fine, they gave us enough time to recover our strength. We're not out of the woods though; we might still be overrun if she summons up another batch of those big ones."
The Otokage glanced to the side of the area, his white eyes widening at what he saw. He turned back to Jin with a slow smile emerging on his face, "Somehow I think we'll be okay."
His subordinate went to ask what he meant, but it became clear when the horde of beasts was suddenly struck by hundreds of orange blurs at the same time, moving through them like a tidal wave of bodies.
"What the hell is that?" exclaimed Jin, watching as the orange blurs made short work of the hounds attacking them before moving on to some of the other areas under attack.
Neji put down his hand and saw his shinobi relaxing in exhaustion; they'd been fighting for almost two hours straight.
"Unnecessary back-up."
Author's Note:
Please review and tell me what you think. I try to take each review into account, and believe me I read them all. Tell me what can be improved, what you liked, what you didn't, everything. I'm a writer so I'm always open to criticism.