The Wanderers
Chapter 79 – Bring Down the Field
A/N: In response to a guest review, the character of Iceheart was purely my own creation. The concept of it was something I'd wanted to do in some other stories and the name was just something I randomly came up with.
A/N2: I know this chapter is long and could probably have been split into three battles, but I like having my chapters in a particular order. I hope this makes up for the delay.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. If I did, main characters would lose battles. Muhahaha.
***Previously-On***
The war in Sunagakure continued on as bloody as it had begun. Initially the Sunagakure shinobi had won several victories over the Quiraji forces, but when it became clear that the Quiraji were going to attack them relentlessly, the generals devised a new plan of defence. Attack. During the night they conducted a multi-tiered ambush on the encampment of the Quiraji army, killing a large number of soldiers and destroying several supply caches. However, when Shikamaru went to assassinate the enemy general, his move was anticipated and he was sent back with his tail between his legs and his life still in his own hands. The following day the Quiraji made no serious movements to attack the village from the front, but instead used the native giant sand worms to tunnel underneath the village and emerge inside. This attack killed a large number of civilians and low-rank shinobi before it was defeated, leaving the Sunagakure army demoralised. The next day the Quiraji reinforcements arrived, showing the defenders that they'd only faced a third of the real Quiraji army. Realising they couldn't win this battle with twice their numbers, the Sunagakure generals began an evacuation of their civilians and decided on a group to remain behind to keep the enemy at bay. Against his wishes, Shikamaru was given the task of going to tell the Kazekage in the Land of Fire what had become of the village and its people. With him, he took his wife and Kazekage's older sister, Temari, and their newborn daughter.
***End Summary***
The main strike team waited as long as necessary for the other groups to move out towards their positions before leaving the relative safety of the Fire Temple to the closest edge of the chakra-nullifying field to their target. Though they were a hastily-gathered alliance of shinobi from a variety of villages, the shinobi in the strike team were able to move quickly and speak to each other respectfully. The three Kages kept their own counsel, while the Konoha survivors discussed among themselves what they had been doing since they last spoke to each other. The pair of Tailed Beast containers from Kumogakure kept mainly to themselves, though Naruto still found the Eight-Tails container an amusing person and spoke to him at length, while Hinata spent what time she could speaking to her old friends.
None of them spoke at length about what they would face in the Quiraji stronghold, besides sharing information about the Four that would undoubtly face off against them. None of them had experience fighting about Benkei, with only Naruto having the privilege to speak with the enigmatic Quiraji leader, yet they all knew that he was their main target.
Their mission was vitally important, yet they could not yet begin it. The chakra-nullifying field was still up. They had to wait until one of the other groups destroyed one of the nodes and brought it down.
Now they had to wait.
The Kirigakure shinobi moved silently across the Land of Fire plains, keeping their mission at the forefront of their minds. Many in the two hundred Kirigakure shinobi ranks disliked the idea of taking orders from another village's leader, particularly one as young and inexperienced as the Otokage, but the Mizukage had spoken to them before they'd left and reassured them that the survival of their village depended on the success of the mission. She had convinced them to fight at their best and they would do just that.
The four surviving members of the Seven Swordsmen of Kirigakure were less convinced, but they had been given leadership of the mission and vowed to complete it to the best of their ability. Chojuro had argued that he should be at the Mizukage's side, as he hated the fact that she was the only Kirigakure shinobi participating in the strike team. However Ao, who was accompanying them as an advisor and sensory-type shinobi, had reminded him that the Mizukage could take care of herself, and the other villages didn't have anything to gain by assassinating her at this stage.
They all had a common enemy.
It had taken them a fair amount of time to swing around the Quiraji chakra-nullifying field to the area marked on the map they'd been given. There had been no designated time frame for them to complete their mission, but the other groups of shinobi attacking the other nodes had been given the same mission. By the size and scope of the field, the Kages had calculated that the field should fail if any one of the machine nodes should be destroyed.
It hadn't been said, but it was almost a competition to see which village's group can take out their targets before the others. The old ways were still in place, even in the state of all-out war.
Their node was closer to the border to the Land of Water than the other nodes and the Kirigakure shinobi had to travel a further distance to their target. The other groups departed at the same time, yet the field remained as they approached the target area. The Kirigakure leaders hadn't expected it to be down before they arrived, but it did tell them that it was likely that the resistance at the nodes were strong.
The forward elements of the Kirigakure force called for them to stop, and the Swordsmen leaders moved to the front to check on what had happened. The Kirigakure shinobi at the front acknowledged their presence and moved away to reveal why they'd stopped the column.
They'd been given no information on what their target looked like, or the numbers of enemies they would face, but as they looked at the field in front of them, it was plainly obvious.
The chakra-nullifying field could still be felt in the surrounding area, yet the Kirigakure could see a small lake within it and a large number of Quiraji soldiers standing in front in ranks with weapons in hand. There were 200 shinobi that had accompanied the Mizukage to the Land of Fire, each of which were some of the best fighters in their village. The Quiraji soldiers numbered just as many as them, with no specialist troops in their normal ranks. Many of the Kirigakure shinobi scoffed at the showing, as regular Quiraji soldiers were hardly a match for them, but the leaders of the force weren't about to underestimate their enemy.
At the front of the Quiraji army stood a single man that was both obviously the leader of the defenders, and a thoroughly dangerous-looking foe. He wore a simple black set of clothing with a long cape that touched to the bottom of the ground. His face was chiselled and almost impossibly symmetrical, yet each of the four Swordsmen present could see it was because he'd never taken a blow before.
And that wasn't due to a lack of battle, just by his stance and the hilt of a blade hidden beneath his cape.
They knew their target.
Mangetsu turned and gave Ao a single nod, conveying the message that they had their own battle to face and the rest of the Quiraji force was theirs to defeat. The sensory-type began to give out orders, while each of the four slowly pulled out their respective blades. The Quiraji army sat within the chakra-nullifying field and didn't demonstrate any interest in moving out of its protective field.
Just behind the Quiraji soldiers was the reason for their march on the location, the node that was powering a part of the chakra-nullifying field stopping the main strike team from getting to the Quiraji base.
The machine was comprised of three small pyramids in a triangle formation pointing towards a single pillar that sat in the centre of the formation. Runes ran along the sides of the pillar and glowed with an ominous light blue colour, while long wires threaded between it and the pyramids before threading down into the ground.
They'd brought special explosive material that didn't require chakra to activate, as the node was far inside the field and previous experiments had shown that any chakra-based attacks that began outside the field and delved inside simply failed as if all the power disappeared from them.
They weren't sure how long they'd be able to fight with taijutsu and weapons within the field before collapsing, but that's why the Swordsmen were there. The only blade between the four of them that required chakra to use was Chojuro's Hiramekarei, and by its nature it would retain the shape that it formed into before they entered the field regardless of the loss of chakra.
At the head of the Kirigakure forces apart from the Swordsmen, Ao stared at the enemies gathered in front of them with an unimpressed eye before turning to his shinobi and giving the order to attack.
The initial charge through the edge between normal air and the field was fast and furious; the Kirigakure shinobi still looking to avenge their fallen comrades from previous battles. They didn't even feel the draining effects of the field initially, though each of them knew that they wouldn't have access to their chakra at all for the fight. The pair of shinobi that held the explosive materials in their backpacks kept themselves out of the field and out of the battle, while Ao waited for a moment before charging forward with his shinobi.
The Quiraji soldiers didn't even budge at the charge. To an observant person they must have appeared cocky and arrogant within their technology-based advantage, but the Swordsmen that had held themselves back momentarily could see that that wasn't the case at all.
The only Quiraji that responded to the brazen and confident charge of the large number of Kirigakure shinobi was the single man at the front of their force with a serene look on his face. He appeared unintimidated by the display, even taking a moment to crouch down to the ground and grab a small handful of dirt to cover the palms of his hands before standing back up and placing a slow hand on the hilt of the sword concealed under his cape.
Both Mangetsu and Ameyuri noticed it at once, while Suigetsu and Chojuro were questioning why they weren't joining their countrymen in the charge.
"He needs to pull back right now…" started Ameyuri with her hands already on her swords, but Mangetsu shook his head even as he stepped forward to do the same.
"It's too late. He's already started." Just as the Swordsmen leader stepped into the field with his companions, the Quiraji leader made his move.
In a single step forward, he drew his sword from his belt and made a quick count of shinobi that were charging towards him. He pulled out a long blade that seemed to be twice as long as his body and watched as three shinobi tried to attack him with short swords that they'd been issued by the Otokage.
With no real demonstration of speed, the Quiraji leader moved his head the minimum distance necessary to avoid the blow to his face before stepping aside the slashing blow and almost gently dragging his long sword across the arm and body of the third shinobi. Still in that single motion, he spun around and manipulated his blade with unparalleled skill to remove the heads from their shoulders.
The three shinobi dropped to the ground, dead, while the Quiraji leader turned his attention to the next group of charging enemies. The front group, having seen their companions so easily butchered, roared out in anger and charged at him with the intention of removing him from the battle.
Mangetsu snarled and flicked his double-bladed glaive into place before giving the order for the four of them to attack. They were a fair distance between the edges of the field and where the battle was taking place and it would take a few moments for them to reach that position without chakra to increase their speed. Their view of the battle was blocked by the converging Kirigakure shinobi on the Quiraji leader, but by the time they reached the battle, it was already over.
The Quiraji leader was neither fast nor particularly strong. The Kirigakure shinobi were faster and several of those with larger weapons had clearly shown they were able to overpower the man. Yet despite that, by the time the Four Swordsmen had made their way through the lines of the now retreating Kirigakure shinobi.
In piles around the area they were fighting in, were the bodies of the Kirigakure shinobi that had found themselves at the wrong end of the Quiraji leader's sword. The man himself stood in front of his trophies without a single scratch on him, barely appearing as though he'd broken a sweat.
"He's unstoppable…" said one of the Kirigakure shinobi behind the Swordsmen, with several of her companions nodding in agreement.
Ao pushed his way to the front and tried to order them back into the fight, as the Quiraji soldiers hadn't even moved from their ranks. However, Mangetsu countermanded that order and pulled Nuibari into his other hand. He turned to Ao and gave him a look before turning back to the Quiraji leader and standing in front of his three companions.
The Mizukage's advisor got the message and gave the orders for the surviving Kirigakure shinobi to circle around the designated battlefield and attack the Quiraji soldiers that had simply been waiting behind. With their leader seemingly uninterested in engaging the other Kirigakure shinobi further, the Quiraji soldiers drew their weapons and began to march towards the enemies that were moving towards them.
In the centre of the chakra-nullifying field stood the Quiraji leader, facing off against the Four Swordsmen of Kirigakure. He turned his long sword and planted it into the ground before placing his hand on his chest and spreading the fingers outwards in a slight bow.
"What, now he wants to be respectable?" scoffed Suigetsu, hefting his giant sword off his shoulder onto the ground with a loud thud.
"He has been fighting respectably," observed Ameyuri with a disgusted snarl. "We just haven't been giving him a decent enough fight."
"He certainly knows how to handle that blade," said Chojuro in a rare moment of confidence. Normally he preferred to guard the Mizukage and fight battles that weren't as brutal as this, but before this battle Mangetsu had convinced him to take a pill that had vaporised any traces of fear and hesitation in his mind. It had several serious side-effects, but Chojuro was willing to take the risk if it gave them a chance to end the war. To that end, Hiramekarei had taken the form of a long hooked sword that was designed to fight against other sword-fighters and was the form that Chojuro had the most skill with.
Mangetsu stepped closer to the Quiraji leader and lowered his blade temporarily, which was the closest he was going to get to giving his opponent a show of respect. "What is your name, Quiraji? We of the Land of Water prefer to know the names of the wielders of weapons as powerful as yours."
He didn't expect a response, but to his surprise the Quiraji leader responded with a single line in a soft voice that betrayed the butchery he had just committed. "I am Muramusa."
"We should be cautious," warned Ameyuri behind her leader, but she knew she was just telling him what he already knew. She'd never seen Mangetsu so tense before, even after the Nine-Tails container had defeated him in battle. That scared her, which was also a first.
There were no more words to be shared between the five of them, as the distance between the two groups slowly decreased. The Four Swordsmen approached Muramusa cautiously, while the Quiraji leader picked his ridiculously long sword from the ground and clutched it in a single hand. Its reach was far greater than any of the weapons they wielded with the exception of Mangetsu's Nuibari and judging by the types of wounds inflicted on the piles of Kirigakure shinobi bodies it was clear that he was both fluid and flawless in his movements with the otherwise oversized weapon.
The battle around them had already commenced by the time they'd moved to attack him.
Muramusa watched as the four shinobi circled around him, holding their weapons expertly. Unlike the previous opponents he faced, he knew these were not such easy prey, though he cared little for butchery. The prospect of fighting such opponents was thrilling, despite his over-arching mission.
The Swordsmen continued to circle him cautiously, yet Mangetsu thought his enemy's eyes weren't entirely focused on them. Muramusa turned his head slightly as he caught the Mizukage's advisor shielding two shinobi from Quiraji soldier attacks. It didn't take a strategic genius to understand what that meant.
Muramusa placed a hand on sword's hilt and turned his sword towards his targets. The Swordsmen each seemed to realise his intent and closed in on him instantly, but they were a millisecond too late. In a burst of physical energy that came through the tip of his sword, Muramusa cut down the two shinobi from the side with a slash that tore them apart in a move that they'd seen Red Warriors do in the past. Ao had tried to get in between the strike and block it with a kunai, but he was woefully slow in comparison to Muramusa's air strike.
However, unlike in those instances, these shinobi were carrying explosive materials in their backpacks that had been brought for the destruction of the machine in front of them. The slash caused enough of a spark to ignite the materials.
The resulting pair of explosions knocked many of the fighters in the battle off their feet and even the Swordsmen were rocked by it, even though they continued their attack on the Quiraji leader.
Ao and the twenty shinobi around him never stood a chance.
Without losing a step, Muramusa brought up his long blade to block Suigetsu's giant sword that tried to cut him in half. As previously shown, his strength wasn't a match for the young Houzuki shinobi's and was already being pressured as Chojuro came up to his side and swung Hiramekarei to cleave off his head. The Quiraji leader dropped his weight so that Suigetsu lost his footing forward before being slammed in the face with the hilt of his long blade. The resulting misstep caused the fiery Kirigakure shinobi to stumble into Chojuro and send them both crashing backwards while Muramusa stepped away and reassessed the situation.
He still had the time to dodge the flying Nuibari that barely missed his eyes by a millimetre.
Mangetsu pulled back his flying blade with his gauntleted hand and watched as their opponent waited a moment before jumping up into the air and slashing down with his blade into the shoulder of the stealthy Ameyuri that had tried to strike from his blind spot with her twin blades.
The kunoichi snarled at the wound and tried to slash upwards to catch him off-guard, but the Quiraji leader blocked the blow with his own blade and landed without injury a short distance away. The slash in her shoulder was deep and bleeding heavily, but Ameyuri was used to worse and stood up without showing her pain.
"This guy is good…" said Suigetsu with an aura of fury about admitting that. "I can't pull out my full strength in here...I can't get as fast as I need to be."
"I'm feeling it too," said Ameyuri as she came to her companion's side. "It's this damn field. We're at a disadvantage in here."
Mangetsu pulled Nuibari into his hand and glanced around the battlefield. While the shinobi had suffered significant losses at the start, they were pushing the Quiraji soldiers back fairly well. The shinobi weren't as strong as they thought they might have been, however Kirigakure shinobi were adaptable and were inspired by the Swordsmen attacks on the Quiraji leader.
Even if we kill everyone here, we don't have the means to destroy the machine, thought Mangetsu to himself. We should scrub the mission… He considered it for a moment before shaking off the idea and re-centring his stare at their opponent. Mangetsu wasn't a particularly vengeful type, but the fact that their opponent was such a good swordsman just ate at his pride.
They'd kill this one, and then re-evaluate the mission.
"We aren't going anywhere," said Chojuro defiantly. The pill he had taken was now reaching critical mass and he could feel his blood pumping through his veins so much that he thought he was going to explode. "He's good, but he's not that good."
Mangetsu could appreciate the show of confidence by his subordinate, but he knew he wasn't entirely correct. Any swordsman worth his salt could recognise when he was outmatched in a fight.
That didn't mean they couldn't win. Just that it would be more difficult than simply beating him by sheer skill.
"How do we do this, boss?" asked Ameyuri quietly.
Mangetsu already had a plan in mind, but explaining it in detail would take too much time.
Besides, he doubted his younger brother would agree with it.
With his glaive in hand, Mangetsu gave a pair of hand signals to the other Swordsmen and shoved his brother in the shoulder. Their opponent seemed perfectly willing to wait until they made their move, even though he seemed perfectly capable at attacking them at range.
Suigetsu understood the plan and gripped his Kubikiribouchou tightly with both hands. His strength was being drained by the field significantly, but his own stubbornness kept him in check as he began to move from side to side towards their enemy. While his speed wasn't as high as he would have liked, he was still an expert swordsman and knew the ways to attack an opponent with a long blade.
Muramusa noticed the other shinobi moving around the sides in an obvious manoeuvre that he could take the time to ignore as he saw the Houzuki brothers running towards him. The one with the large sword seemed intent to give him another contest of strength, but it was the older brother that seemed to be the more dangerous.
The Quiraji leader was a cautious fighter, but he wasn't about to let his shinobi opponents dictate the battle.
In a short motion he sheathed his long sword into the scabbard beneath his cape and turned his attention to the shinobi charging at his right flank with the oddly hooked blue sword. As a Red Warrior he had all the physical abilities of his fellow specialists, however on a much more powerful scale. Chojuro was a gifted swordsman and knew danger when he saw it, pulling back his approach enough to dodge any long range attack that could come his way.
So when the Quiraji leader used an Iaido technique to slice apart the air between the two of them, he was able to bring up Hiramekarei to block some of the damage while moving out of the way of the rest of the strike.
It only took off an ear and slashed up his side and legs.
Chojuro crumpled to the floor with a roar of pain, but the distraction proved effective as Ameyuri and Suigetsu closed in on their opponent, while Mangetsu waited for his chance.
At once, the two younger Swordsmen tried to attack their opponent with their blades. Suigetsu used his large blade in a sweeping motion, while Ameyuri leapt high and hurled one of her blades at her opponent before gripping her other blade and trying to bring it down into the area between his neck and spine.
Their opponent was skilful enough to jump up from Suigetsu's blade and use it as a lever to kick away one of Ameyuri's Kiba blades before using a hand to catch her other blade as she tried to strike at him. While generally that wouldn't be a good idea with a blade that had curved sections to prevent such a movement, Muramusa simply turned the blade away and dropped down onto the ground while giving Suigetsu an unrighteous boot to the face.
He landed on his back foot and drew his blade just in time for Mangetsu to appear from his younger brother's shadow and slammed his glaive into the blocking long sword of the Quiraji leader. The Swordsman leader snarled a toothy grin at his opponent and attempted to clasp down on his foe's sword with one of the hooks before pushing the other blade into his opponent's face.
Under most circumstances it would be a perfect move, with nowhere to dodge or parry the Quiraji leader seemed caught in the Kirigakure shinobi's trap.
But Muramusa's long thin sword had advantages that other blades did not and he was able to turn his blade with a kick of his foot to push Mangetsu's swinging glaive blade away. The Kirigakure shinobi wasn't about to be dissuaded by such a simple trick and pressed his glaive back into the blocking sword of the Quiraji leader.
With his other hand he tried to manipulate the Nuibari's razor-sharp thread around to strike at behind the Quiraji leader while keeping his main weapon occupied with his glaive; however Mangetsu's opponent was far too skilled to be caught by such a simple trap. With a gauntleted hand, Muramusa reached back while keeping Mangetsu at bay with a single hand, taking the wire directly into his palm. He twisted his grip to catch the flying blade easily before dropping it to the ground. Flipping his grip on his massive long sword, the Quiraji leader kicked at the back of his weapon to push Mangetsu off balance before taking advantage of the opening to smash his foot into Nuibari's blade on the ground.
Recovering quickly, the Swordsmen leader snarled at the blatant destruction of a Kirigakure relic and slashed with his double-bladed glaive wildly, but his opponent simply stepped back and continued to observe him with a cold emotionless stare.
It was at that moment that Ameyuri and Suigetsu came up from behind quicker than the Quiraji leader had anticipated. Mangetsu was strong enough that he wasn't able to just simply drop everything to defend himself from his other attackers without the Kirigakure shinobi taking advantage of the situation.
So he did what any master-level swordsman would. He reached forward and slammed his forehead into Mangetsu's face to send him back long enough to turn around to deal with his other attackers. Ameyuri was the quicker of the attackers and with her dual blades was able to bite into the flank of the Quiraji leader with a burst of blood. Her eyes glinted at her success, however it was short lived as her blades seemed to stick in the leader's flank and he reached up to place his hand in the centre of her chest.
A part of Ringo's mind wanted to give him a piece of her mind for touching her without her consent, but she never got the chance to voice her protest. A burst of physical energy shot through her body and blasted her into the dirt, fracturing over a dozen of her ribs and bruising her to the extent that she wasn't sure she'd ever be pretty again.
She was wrong, but that wasn't important at the moment.
While Ameyuri was sent out of the battle, Suigetsu's large blade was slower and much more deadly to their Quiraji opponent. His Kubikiribouchou began to bite through the thin long blade that tried and failed to block his attack and Suigetsu could already see his older brother picking himself up and preparing his glaive for a follow-up attack, bringing a grin to his face.
However just as their victory was assured, the Quiraji leader showed he still had some bite left in him.
Stepping into the blade of the Kubikiribouchou with his body hardened by physical energy to limit the damage being done to him, Muramusa reached forward and clasped his free hand on the centre of Suigetsu's face.
It was only for a moment, but through the Quiraji leader's fingers Suigetsu could have sworn he saw his brother giving him a mournful look that was so uncharacteristic of the cold Mangetsu he'd grown up with it was almost enough to make him throw up in disgust.
A strange time to get sentimental, he thought with a quiet scoff to himself. Maybe he's starting to crack.
Just as Mangetsu's glaive came up behind Muramusa and slammed right through his back and out the front, killing him in a bloody mess, the Quiraji leaders hand on Suigetsu's face pulsed with physical energy.
The youngest of the Houzuki brothers never stood a chance. His body crumpled to the ground to leave such a mess that even his older brother that had avenged him couldn't bear to look at him. Had they been able to use chakra, the battle would have been over long before.
But now he was dead, as was their foe. That part of the mission was over.
Muramusa lay dead at his feet, yet Mangetsu was not happy with his kill. His younger brother was dead, though that wasn't why Mangetsu was upset. The Houzuki brothers weren't that attached to each other, his younger brother had made it clear to him that he would kill him to take over leadership of the Swordsmen at some point. But it was the fact that they'd almost been defeated by a swordsman of greater skill than himself was highly insulting to his efforts. Beside him, Ameyuri and Chojuro limped up to him with their blades hanging at their sides.
"Is he dead?" asked Chojuro meekly, his previous confidence having been shattered by the fight.
Mangetsu didn't reply even as Ameyuri kicked the side of the Red Warrior commander and nodded to her ally to confirm the kill. The Swordsmen leader looked over at the battle being waged between the Quiraji soldiers and the rapidly diminishing Kirigakure shinobi ranks. They'd been in the chakra-nullifying field far longer than they had originally planned and it was becoming clear that their shinobi were far outmatched with their chakra draining rapidly and their strength failing.
"Call the retreat…" he muttered to the other two. The Nuibari was broken into pieces onto the floor and his glaive was becoming impossibly heavy in his hand. Their shinobi were falling by the score, and the Quiraji soldiers seemed to be undeterred by the death of their commander. There were still dozens of Quiraji soldiers between him and the node, with Mangetsu unsure of whether he had the strength to bring the explosive materials through that many enemies.
He wasn't about to lose his life in such a pathetic piece of land. It wasn't worth it; there was no glory in this.
Chojuro looked up at his leader with an exhausted look in his young eyes, "Where will we go?"
The other Swordsmen gave the call to retreat, while Mangetsu folded up his glaive and began moving backwards out of the field. "It isn't that far to the border of the Land of Water. We can call for reinforcements and attack the node with greater numbers."
"You don't honestly believe that, do you?" asked Ameyuri with a defiant glare in her eyes.
Mangetsu didn't respond as they left the field and the surviving shinobi retreated with them, but she already knew his answer. If the Mizukage didn't survive the mission to take out the Quiraji leaders, then leadership of the village would fall to him, and Mangetsu was painfully aware of that. Because of the nature of the field, he was placing his bet on one of the other teams to take it down instead of them.
Enough Kirigakure shinobi had died in the relatively short battle. They had shed enough blood.
With a loud call, the Kirigakure force gathered their strength and fled the battlefield. The Quiraji soldiers, wary of a trap, remained within their chakra-nullifying field, triumphant. They knew the shinobi would not be coming back.
The mood in the Otogakure shinobi ranks was sombre, even as they felt confident that they would be able to complete their mission. The number of shinobi were few, as the majority of the Otogakure shinobi had stayed behind to protect their people and a small group had departed on their mission to attack a different location.
However Jin had taught many of the shinobi that followed behind him now and they were confident that he would keep them safe. He always played down his own abilities, but it was a well-known fact among their village that he was stronger than any shinobi in the village except for the Otokage.
As they came to the location that they'd been directed to, Jin called for them to close up their ranks and be on the lookout for any ambushes. They could sense the chakra-nullifying field in front of them, sitting in the middle of the forest they had just entered. The sensory shinobi that had accompanied them described the field as a giant dome of purple energy that made them ill just observing it. The node they were charged with destroying was the closest to the Fire Temple than the others, so they hadn't taken the time to experiment with the field, but that didn't matter now. Their group was specialised for long-distance combat and the two shinobi at Jin's side were holding the materials necessary to destroy the machine within the field.
They progressed through the forest slowly, wary of any Quiraji soldiers that could be hiding in the trees. Jin doubted that they would be attacked at this stage, as they were outside of the field and had an advantage in combat, but he had a bad feeling in his gut. The forest began to widen out and there was a large open plain that looked like it had been burnt out from the inside out, with their target sitting directly in the centre. The plain area was just inside the chakra-nullifying field and the shinobi at the front skidded to a halt just before entering it, waiting for their commander to assess the situation.
The machine they'd come here to destroy was a bulky block of metal and stone, with large spires pointing towards the sky. Beneath the spires were thick glass panels that showed numbers and equations none of them could understand, while there were large pipes that dug into the ground behind it. The machine was the size of a house, and bulkier again by half.
Jin was very grateful they'd thought to bring proper explosive materials for this mission. None of the shinobi in his ranks, including himself, had techniques that could be used to destroy something that big from outside the field, and he knew that barely any of them could fight properly within it.
However despite the obvious positioning of the node and the open nature of the plains within the forest, Jin and the other shinobi couldn't see any soldiers designated to protect it.
"What do you make of this, sir?" asked one of the shinobi at his side that was carrying the explosive materials in her backpack.
Jin frowned and slowly drew a kunai from his pouch. He held it back for a moment before tossing it as far into the field as he could. It made it a few dozen metres before it was struck down by an unseen projectile that dropped to the ground at its side.
The Otogakure leader waited a moment, testing to see whether his theory was correct. After a few moments, just as he predicted, a single arrow came screaming towards him with a spinning bladed tip that looked wicked enough to pierce through him regardless of armour.
However the firer clearly didn't account for the fact that he wasn't inside the chakra-nullifying field and had full access to all of his abilities. It was little trouble to step aside with a small burst of chakra through his legs to accelerate his movements before reaching forward and grabbing the shaft of the arrow with relative ease.
"Sir?" asked one of the shinobi under his command.
Jin turned to her with a grin and dropped the arrow to the ground after examining it for a moment. "The enemy is so predictable at times." He turned his head and motioned with a single hand to a group of shinobi coming into line with him. "Mortars! Fire on my command!"
In formation the group of thirty Otogakure specialists pulled out long cannons from their backs while their partners loaded in shells and began running through sets of handseals. It only took them a moment before they each activated their ninjutsus and drove their hands into the backs of each of the cannons.
"Fire!" called out Jin quickly, pointing in the direction that the arrow had been fired in. His voice was quickly drowned out by the explosive sounds of the mortar teams firing large fiery shells straight into the chakra-nullifying field. They didn't have any control over the shells once they entered the field, but the techniques only required the initial blasts to be controlled. As it went, the shells exploded inside the field to the exact effect that Jin was looking for.
The screaming was concerning to him as he disliked the deaths of anyone, even the enemy. But he swallowed his disgust and ordered the mortars to reload as the shroud concealing the Quiraji defenders that had been waiting for them. From the writhing front ranks of Quiraji soldiers that burned under the speciality molten materials they'd been stuck with, it was clear they hadn't considered the fact that shinobi had long since developed the ability to strike at long distance with necessary relying on chakra entirely.
A mistake they kept making in the war.
Before he ordered a second volley, Jin noticed there was a single figure that was trying to help the burning Quiraji soldiers that looked to be the leader of the enemy force. She was clad in segmented blood red armour that was indicative of her position as one of the Quiraji specialist warriors; however it was the weapon on her back that truly interested Jin. It was a long bow that was curved and spiked at the edges, made of what appeared to be pure bone. Beside it sat a quiver full of arrows of different types and shapes, with some bearing similarities to the arrow shot earlier.
An archer leader…how troublesome.
Jin went to motion for a second volley, but hesitated when he saw her turn around and saw her face for the first time. She wore a short head of bright red hair and a striking face to match, but with a pair of eyes that sent an odd thought through his head.
There was something about her that reminded him of his wife. That wasn't an unsettling thought at all.
She seemed to notice him and acknowledge his existence before unshouldering her bow and pulling out a single arrow from her quiver. At first it appeared as though she was going to fire at him again, but Jin recognised her intent and stepped back to warn his shinobi.
He never got the chance to give a defensive order, as she shot the arrow at the mortar teams beside him ten times faster than she'd fired the previous arrow. Unlike before, this one split into dozens of tiny splinters that seemed to have minds of their own as they screamed into the necks of every shinobi that had been involved in the process of firing mortars.
With the exception of Jin, who now stood in the middle of a cluster of bodies. He watched as a wicked grin emerged on her face, breaking any familiarity he might have had with the young woman.
"You've come a long way to die, shinobi!" came her voice across the battlefield. Her voice lacked the youth her face portrayed and did nothing to conceal the contempt she clearly held for her enemies.
One of the more impatient shinobi among Jin's ranks stepped forward with a stamp of his foot, "We've no intention of dying here, you Quiraji wh…" The shinobi found it difficult to finish his insult with a two-foot long arrow stuck in his throat.
Inside the chakra-nullifying field, the female Quiraji leader put down her bow and laughed mockingly at his expression before turning her attention back to Jin. "As I was saying, there is no victory for you here."
"We'll see about that," muttered Jin to himself before turning and motioning to the shinobi under his command. He recognised her proficiency at long range and knew that they were at somewhat of a disadvantage even outside of the field so long as she was in play. He brought two of his commanders to his side, "I want defensive teams pushing towards her, keeping her distracted. The rest of us will circle around and attack the soldiers. If we take out their legs, they cannot hope to resist us."
The pair of Otogakure Jounin nodded their compliance and began issuing orders, while Jin kept a wary eye on the pair of shinobi at the back of their ranks. The machine they had to destroy looked like a monstrous creation and he was grateful they'd had the forethought to bring along enough explosive material to blow a hole in a small city. However he hated the fact that he had been forced to give it to his shinobi to carry and it clearly made them vulnerable. Turning back to the Quiraji leader, he hoped that she wouldn't catch on to their presence.
Otherwise, everything they did here would be for naught.
They prepared themselves at the edge of the field to enter and begin the battle with the Quiraji defenders, as the enemy seemed content to sit and wait for them to approach at their own pace. Normally Jin would be highly suspicious of such a lack of movement, but something in the female Red Warrior's expression told him that she was extremely arrogant and entirely confident of her ensuring victory.
Standing at the front of his shinobi, Jin knew he wouldn't have to give formation orders to his subordinates. Every single shinobi knew their place in their force and had already taken their appropriate places. Without the ability to use ninjutsu within the field, Jin and the other Otogakure shinobi had gotten inventive.
At the front of their force stood a line of strong Otogakure Chuunin that bore massive steel shields that were a size again bigger than they were. These shields interlocked with each other and were impervious to almost any standard Quiraji projectile. As he gave the order to advance, the shield-bearers hefted their shields with their drug-fuelled arms and began marching forward at a quick pace; the only clear gaps in their formation were at their feet.
On the Quiraji side of the battlefield, the Quiraji leader who called herself Vikas eyed the shinobi formation with clear disgust. "Hiding in their shells like turtles. How predictable." She motioned with a wave of her arm, "Archers! Give them a volley!"
At her word, hundreds of arrows filled the air between the two armies and slammed into the fronts of the Otogakure shinobi shields to no effect. Several clusters of arrows had tried to fly over the shields into the shinobi ranks behind, however they merely fell down uselessly in front of the shields as they struck a wall of pumping air that was created by several Otogakure shinobi operating large air machines that they'd began constructing once they had arrived.
It was a strange form of warfare, but Jin wasn't one to argue with the weapons division. Their contraptions were keeping his shinobi alive, for the time being, even as they pushed into the chakra-nullifying field and began to feel the terrible draining effects on their systems. It felt like every part of them was being pushed and prodded from within their own skin; their blood seemed to want to boil and their systems began to fight themselves to maintain control. It was both draining and disheartening, as Jin tried to calculate how long they could stay and fight with reasonable proficiency.
He gave them little more than twenty minutes. Then people would start dropping from exhaustion.
Vikas watched the first volley fail with an appraising eye that had been born through patient hunting. Clearly her opponents were no fools and weren't about to let her dictate the flow of battle. She reached into her quiver and produced a single bulbous-tipped arrow that she threaded into her bow as she gave her second order.
"Fire on my target."
She released her unique arrow and watched as her subordinates followed suit with a storm of arrows directed at the same shield-bearer she had fired at. They followed behind the faster arrow and waited for it to take effect.
The Otogakure shinobi closed up their formation and stubbornly held their shields strongly against the Quiraji projectile assault. Vikas' arrow didn't spin as they expected it to, but instead it struck the centre of one of the shields with a soft thud. It seemed to be an ineffective shot, but the bulbous tip had bit slightly into the steel shield and that was all the projectile needed to do its duty.
As the other arrows came flying towards the single target, the arrow seemed to bounce back before slamming back into the shield with a thunderous clash. Unlike the previous strike, this was powerful enough to shatter the Otogakure shinobi's shield into thousands of metal chunks and send the bearer rocketing backwards. He knocked dozens of shinobi behind him off their feet, including several of the air machine operators, and was only halted by a combined effort of shinobi at the back that were trying to protect the pair of shinobi with the explosive materials in their backpacks.
However, before they could recover from the knockdown effect, the storm of arrows slammed into the ranks of fallen shinobi between the shields, killing dozens instantly. Many had only just entered the chakra-nullifying field and tried to bring up instinctive ninjutsu techniques to save themselves, only to be denied their own abilities within the enemy's battleground.
At the head of the army behind the shield-wall, Jin swore loudly and barked an order for the shield-bearers to close the gap and quicken their pace. Through a small mirror-based telescope he could see the satisfaction on the enemy leader's face as she started to draw another bulbous-tipped arrow to repeat her success.
Drawing a kunai from his belt, he barked out the next order of the formation. "Break off! Spread out formations! Crossbows and assassins to the front!" They weren't as close as he would have liked to enact this part of the battle, but he wasn't about to let her fire another one of those devastating volleys without response.
At his command, the shield-bearers broke their formation and began charging forward individually with their shields protecting themselves, while the second rank of Otogakure shinobi shot forward and pulled up the crossbows that were already preloaded with small explosives that didn't require chakra to ignite. Even as the Quiraji archers tried to fire a quick volley against the now-exposed Otogakure shinobi, they were shot straight in the stomachs by the Otogakure projectiles that exploded on impact, taking over small groups of Quiraji soldiers at once.
At the detonation of the crossbow bolts, the shinobi in Jin's force cheered loudly and charged towards their enemies with weapons in hand. The Quiraji soldiers were quick to recover and fire back on the charging force before drawing their own close quarter weapons and meeting their foes on the battlefield directly.
The Quiraji leader was furious at the change in circumstances and let loose her second arrow at the nearest shield-bearer and didn't even watch as it mutilated both the shinobi and several of those around him. She ran across the front of her army's battlelines, trying to knock down and deflect any projectiles that threatened her soldiers, while firing back at the attackers with vengeful fury. The shinobi were inventive enough to have brought so many different types of weapons to the battlefield, but Vikas noticed that their formations and movements had obvious patterns to them.
There were groups of shinobi that seemed bent on protecting their general from any possible attacks, but there was a similar, less-obvious formation near the rear of the shinobi force. She had excellent eyesight and the shinobi were rushing themselves to try and spend as little time as they needed to in the chakra-nullifying field.
Threading a new arrow into her bone bow, Vikas motioned for her soldiers to come forward to assist her as she fired it straight at Jin's exposed side across the battlefield. The Otogakure general noticed the projectile coming towards him at the last moment and turned himself so that it only struck him in the shoulder rather than in the liver as she had aimed. The arrow was spiked and bit into his flesh enough to cause him to drop to his knees in pain, but luckily for Jin one of his bodyguards noticed his plight and transposed themselves between him and the Quiraji leader, taking the arrow that had been fired to capitalise on his fall.
Jin roared in pain as he wrenched the spiked arrow out of his shoulder in a single motion, feeling his shoulder rapidly going numb as blood poured down his front and side. He saw his bodyguard fall and noticed the cocky look on Vikas' face as she seemed to enjoy his suffering while their armies clashed. The injury seemed to compound the draining effect of the field, yet Jin still stood on his feet and ignored the medic that had come to his side at the word of his injury.
The Quiraji leader seemed about to fire a follow-up arrow straight at him, but at the last moment she turned the end of her bow and fired at another part of his force.
Jin tried to call out a warning as he recognised what her new target was, but knew it was too late as her arrow spun violently into the group of shinobi that were guarding the shinobi in the back, splitting into tiny metal chunks that butchered whole groups of shinobi at once. It was only a small piece of metal that pierced through one of their backpacks, but that was all that was needed for the materials within to explode.
The Otogakure shinobi had to shield themselves from the blast, as did many of the Quiraji soldiers as their mission went up in flames. Jin had argued that carrying such volatile materials in simple backpacks was going to be a hindrance and he hated being proven correct, but that meant they had to re-evaluate their mission.
They were already in close quarter combat with the Quiraji force, and despite their losses were pushing the enemy back with their ferocity and determination. Vikas was the only untouchable one, easy able to dodge and weave her way around any physical attacks and retaliate with pinpoint arrows to gaps in armour or even using her own fists when necessary, as she was a Red Warrior as much as her brethren.
But there was something else that Jin noticed, as she leapt around the battlefield. Whenever one of her soldiers was in trouble, she would come to their side and take revenge on their attackers before sending them back to recover. She did this constantly along the battlefield, to the extent that Jin almost found himself respecting her as a leader.
Pulling a new kunai from his pouch, Jin steeled himself for the next charge and stared at his target. It wasn't going to stop him from killing her, but it would be an interesting thought for after the battle, assuming he survived the next few minutes. With his bodyguards at his side, he began to charge at the Quiraji leader intently, while their forces continued to butcher each other.
Vikas seemed to notice his charge with little concern, firing off a quick pair of arrows to take out the front two shinobi that were guarding him. Jin deflected one of her next arrows with his kunai and closed the distance between them quickly, causing her to snarl and draw another arrow in her bow.
The last of his bodyguards dove in front of the path of her arrow, as Jin powered forward as fast as he could, intent on cutting the head off of the snake. His strength was rapidly being drained by both the field and his shoulder wound, but Jin ignored his own fatigue and pushed forward.
With a burst of speed as the last bit of strength ran through his legs, Jin dove at the nearest Quiraji soldier that had been unfortunate enough to drift into their battlefield, pulling up his kunai to end his enemy's life before he even realised he was in danger.
Vikas' eyes widened at the sudden change in focus and shot forward to intercept him, her aim ruined as she overtook the shinobi from the side and dove in between the two of them with a new arrow notched in her bone bow.
However before her shot could land, Jin dropped to the floor so that the arrow skimmed the top of his head. His eyes shifted from the Quiraji soldier back to his original target, and Vikas realised her mistake. By moving to intercept his attack on her subordinate, she had removed the one advantage she'd had over the Otogakure shinobi: distance.
From his lower position, it took little effort for Jin to spring himself forward as Vikas rapidly tried to notch another arrow. He bashed away her weapon with a small burst of physical energy that he'd been saving for such an opening before spinning around and slashing through the small gap at her throat.
The look on the Quiraji leader's face was a mixture of surprise and fury, but the expression Jin wore was one of neither. As the Quiraji archer fell to the ground he knelt down and drove his kunai into her throat once again just to make sure, while one of his subordinates can up beside him and killed the Quiraji soldier that he'd used as a distraction. With a nod to her leader, the Otogakure shinobi rejoined the fight; with their leader dead the Quiraji were slowly being pushed back and being overwhelmed by the Otogakure force.
Jin slowly pulled his kunai from the Quiraji leader's throat and wiped it on her shirt with a remorseful look on his face. It had taken everything and more to take down the Quiraji leader, but the way she'd gone out was enough to gain his respect and more. He hated that he'd had to use such a trick to finish their battle, and that her end had been so anti-climactic, but what's done is done and he wasn't about to get sentimental over an enemy.
Standing up from the ground slowly, his eyes tracked along the battlefield and analysed the situation. They'd been in the chakra-nullifying field for longer than he would have liked and even he was starting to feel the debilitating effects to the extent that he knew he couldn't stay in much longer. The battle had turned in their favour and the few Quiraji soldiers that had remained were being cut down ruthlessly by the surviving Otogakure shinobi. Their losses had been significant, but the battle was essentially won.
However, the node still stood in front of them, its spires pointing up towards the sky defiantly. They had no way of destroying the machine without the explosive materials and Jin was at a loss of what to do. His shinobi couldn't stay in the field much longer without risking serious harm to their chakra systems, despite training for this type of scenario, but they needed time to analyse the problem and find a solution.
Assuming that Quiraji reinforcements didn't come bearing down on them and cut them to ribbons. Jin didn't like their position at all, despite winning the battle.
He shook his head and moved towards the nearest living Quiraji soldier that was within his reach.
One step at a time.
Long before they saw the machine powering part of the chakra-nullifying field, the Sunagakure force could feel it in their bones. They'd been given a particular task by their leader, in lieu of standing at his side on the battlefield. For the ANBU shinobi, it was a difficult mission to undertake, but one they would complete to the best of their ability.
Kankuro just wished Matsuri would shut up for five seconds so he could think straight.
"The node lies ahead," warned one of the Sunagakure ANBU that had gone ahead of the force.
The puppet-user nodded in acknowledgement of the information and fingered one of the scrolls on his belt nervously. They had no information on what they might face at the node, but with the number of shinobi he had, Kankuro wasn't too worried. There was no way the Quiraji could anticipate that they'd hit all five nodes at once, or that they'd send this much of their force to do the job.
Still, he didn't like going in blind.
The node was nestled at the front of a small section of forest that was entirely surrounded by the chakra-nullifying field. Even though there was no visual representation of it, each shinobi in the Sunagakure ranks could feel the inherent 'wrongness' that it portrayed. The machine itself was a large monstrosity; a circling sphere with lightning rods that kept it afloat and producing the power necessary to power the field.
However it wasn't the node that unsettled the Sunagakure shinobi truly. The only enemy they could see standing within the chakra-nullifying field was a cloaked figure that stood hunched in front of the large machine. It was difficult to get a proper look at the Quiraji enemy from such a distance, but Kankuro wasn't about to send the ANBU into the field without some kind of information.
Unlike previous times he had commanded shinobi into the field, Kankuro knew that he didn't actually have any real authority over the Sunagakure ANBU that had accompanied him. They were split into their four-man teams and had true autonomy in the field. He knew he didn't really need to give them orders; in fact it was likely they would advise him due to their collective overwhelming experience.
They all came to the same conclusion as Kankuro and halted just before the chakra-nullifying field, while the fastest of them came to the front and readied long swords. It was clear to all on the battlefield that the single enemy was a Black Robe and that required a certain type of tactic.
When they'd first encountered the Quiraji specialists, they lost a large number of shinobi figuring out what their abilities were and how to defeat them. To them, the Black Robes were the least dangerous to them because of their fragility to physical attacks.
So it wasn't with arrogance that a large number of ANBU entered the field with their weapons unholstered and charging with full strength straight at their single opponent. Kankuro and many of their group remained outside of the field to watch the battle unfold, with the heads of the groups making sure they all knew why they were there.
The ANBU within the field moved quickly towards their target, who was too far away for those outside of the field to get a proper view.
However, what unfolded was as clear as day to them.
Over thirty ANBU converged on the single Black Robe with their weapons in hand, stabbing and slashing straight through the area it stood in. However, none of the blows struck their intended target.
Instead, they seemed to strike against an invisible barrier that caused them to bounce back with no damage visible.
It was at that point that they saw that the Black Robe they were attacking was actually an old woman with pasty withered skin and pitch black eyes. She raised her head from within her black hood and cracked a wide toothless grin at the Sunagakure ANBU that had retreated a few steps at their failed attacks.
"Well, well. Children come to the fire, like water to a pan. Air blows through the sky and earth calls for your doom." She ended her rant with an ear-piercing cackle that was not as unsettling as the wild expression on her old face.
One of the ANBU that had attacked her turned to her companion with a cocked head to match her expression underneath her mask, "Is she serious?"
"Just concentrate on attacking, Kokori," replied her companion quickly.
They never got the chance to attack again, as the ground around them erupted upwards and hurled every ANBU shinobi around her high into the air. The earth slammed them up before dropping back down to the normal ground level to the same motions as the old woman Black Robe's hands motioned.
Without chakra to assist them, none of the Sunagakure ANBU were able to survive their long falls.
The watching Sunagakure ANBU outside the field could only watch in horror at the relative ease at which their companions had been killed. While they were usually calm and collected even in the heat of battle, there was something about that that brought out their inner fury.
Even before Kankuro could give the order to charge, a majority of the ANBU present charged into the field. They moved more cautiously than their previous brethren, but they also worked in groups to hurl large numbers of projectiles at their opponent. The clusters of kunai and shuriken followed the same pattern as the blade strikes from before, bouncing harmlessly off the invisible shields that seemed to simmer for a moment before disappearing once again.
It was becoming increasingly evident that her barriers were impervious to attack, so several groups of ANBU decided to move around the dangerous area towards the machine behind her. They weren't specifically designated to destroy it, but it didn't hurt to get some information on what they were dealing with while the other shinobi distracted her.
"Oh, no, no, no, no, no." The old woman turned her back on the Sunagakure shinobi fighting uselessly against her front barriers and rose a single finger towards the ANBU moving towards the machine. "Baba won't let you do that, young rabbits. Baba will get what Baba wants to get!"
With a thunderous sound, a single bolt of lightning shot out of her finger. It slammed into the back of one of the ANBU before arcing to the nearest objects it could find: the other Sunagakure shinobi in front of it.
In a single moment, she killed four groups of elite ANBU shinobi, without blinking an eye. She turned back to her original attackers and grinned once again in her unsettling way. "Does the wrath of Baba frighten you, children? Because I can tone it down if you'd like. Nobody likes a cranky old lady…especially when she muddles her lyrics!"
Sensing the danger, the Sunagakure shinobi began leaping back out of the field as fast as they could as large globules of water began slamming down into the ground, clearly trying to capture them in domes and drown them as they'd seen Black Robes do before. The attack patterns were erratic and unpredictable, as the crazy Quiraji leader seemed more interested in her own madness rather than properly killing her enemies.
It was beneficial enough for many of them to get out in time, even as Kankuro pulled out one of his first puppets and shot it into the field with a burst of chakra to cover their retreat. It only required a single burst to make the distance between his position just outside the chakra-nullifying field and he didn't need to control it once it entered the field.
The puppet sprayed a cloud of smoke cover over the retreating Sunagakure ANBU, before bursting into a mass of green poison around the Quiraji leader herself.
Kankuro knew that the poison probably wouldn't be able pierce the barriers, but he hoped it would be enough to panic their enemy so they could formulate a plan of renewed attack.
After a few moments all the Sunagakure ANBU that were able to get out had retreated, leaving Kankuro with a force that had been cut by a quarter in barely ten minutes of battle. Normally the puppet-master would consider retreating to make a better focused attack with greater numbers, but they had neither the time nor the numbers. He found himself clenching his fists in frustration and tried to calm himself to get a grip on the situation.
The Quiraji leader that seemed to call herself Baba's cackle continued to echo through the battlefield as the Sunagakure shinobi recovered from her latest attack just out of the chakra-nullifying field. Her barriers had proven impenetrable to any of the attacks and weapons they had thrown at her and the diversity and deadliness of her elemental attacks told all of the Sunagakure ANBU that this wasn't a fight that was in their favour.
Matsuri hovered just inside the chakra-nullifying field, testing the limits of her strength while trying to assess if their enemy had taken any damage from their attacks so far.
"You shinobi always crack me up! I might just have a pumpkin feast in your honour!"
The Kazekage's bodyguard groaned at the rambling dialogue and watched her waving hands carefully. She didn't have the spiritual energy techniques that the Kazekage's friend had shown himself capable of, so she couldn't see a way to penetrate the invisible barriers that seemed to protect the mad woman in all directions. After practicing heavily on the road, Matsuri thought she might be able to push through with some physical energy, now that she'd been in the field a reasonable amount of time.
But before she could make a move, she was pulled back by one of her ANBU allies just out of the field. "What the hell are you doing?" she snarled as she turned around to confront the Sunagakure shinobi; however she held her breath when she saw the serious nature of the puppeteer's expression.
"You think you can keep her occupied for a time?" asked Kankuro to her quickly.
"What do you think I've been doing all this time?" Matsuri brandished her short blade and tapped the sides of her shoes habitually. "What do you have planned?"
Kankuro felt in his side pouch and drew two small grey balls to fiddle with in his hand, "That barrier is too strong to be forced through. We have to think about this from another angle."
Matsuri had no real notion what he meant, but she was anxious to get this fight over and stop her companions from getting killed by someone who sounded awfully similar to her grandmother. She gave him a quick nod of compliance and pointed to two female ANBU nearby that she recognised. They gave no indication of their acknowledgement, but as she moved into the chakra-nullifying field with increasing speed they followed her by her flanks, moving faster and faster as they pushed their muscles to their limits. The remainder of the Sunagakure ANBU remained outside of the field, wary of the inevitable retaliatory attacks but also ready to provide support for their companions.
While the Quiraji leader turned her attention to the three kunoichi approaching her, Kankuro took in a deep breath and unshouldered the large scroll on his back. With a single hand he attached chakra strings to the small three-armed puppet that emerged. He placed the initial two balls into the first hand and watched his distraction for a reasonable opening.
"Haha! Stupid shinobi can't find the pickle in the field of daisies." Baba initially kept her mad expression before cocking her head and suddenly turning serious. Underneath her heavy robes she rose a withered arm and opened up her palm towards them. "Little flies should burn."
A burst of flames erupted upwards from where the Sunagakure ANBU were charging towards her, but their instincts were good enough to dodge the flames and circle around to continue their rapid approach. Her attack missing didn't seem to irritate or frustrate the Quiraji leader; rather she seemed mildly amused by her escaping prey. Her hand followed their trajectory and continued to cause large bursts of fire to erupt from within the ground, just barely missing the fast-moving shinobi.
However her shots were getting more accurate and the ANBU were being drained by the field just enough that even though they nearly reached her they weren't too sure they would be able to return.
However Kankuro only needed them as a distraction, as his puppet hurled the two grey balls far into the field. With precision that only a puppet-master such as himself could master, they landed just in front of the Sunagakure kunoichi as they approached Baba.
The balls exploded into a thick cloud of smoke that covered them in a veil that caused the Quiraji leader to lose track of them momentarily. In obvious annoyance she flexed out both her hands and lit up the battlefield with lightning that struck down one of the ANBU kunoichi that wasn't quick enough to leap over the wide spread attack. Matsuri and her companion kept themselves within the expansive smoke cloud and waited for their moment, but weren't too sure what they were waiting for.
Outside the field, Kankuro's puppet hurled the next cluster of balls into the battlefield, right at where he knew Matsuri and the other ANBU kunoichi would be. These were small green balls that weren't designed to explode on impact with the ground, but rather a speciality of Kankuro's that every ANBU in service to the Kazekage knew very well. The moment they pierced through the smoke cloud they knew what he had in mind, with the female ANBU catching the four balls in her hands and turning to her companion with a grim expression on her face.
Even through the smoke cloud, Matsuri could see her companion's face well enough to understand what she had in mind. Sunagakure shinobi weren't in the notion of self-sacrifice often, but they knew that if they had any chance of getting the field down then they had to take these kinds of risks.
With a heavy heart, she ran out of the smoke field and drew her blade with a threatening roar at the Quiraji leader. The old woman momentarily shifted her attention to the young kunoichi and sent a whip of water that shot out and gripped her by the neck. Matsuri gasped and dropped to her knees as she tried to grab at the water tendril, but her hands simply pass through without affecting it. She could feel her life draining away from her with nothing she could do about it, but through the corner of her eye she could see the other ANBU kunoichi charge at Baba's blind spot with the balls that had been gifted to her in her hands.
The Quiraji leader wasn't entirely unaware of what was happening and turned her attention to her other attacker with an amused expression on her wrinkled face. She waited until the kunoichi was just close enough to slam into her shield and glared at her with her dark eyes.
The Sunagakure ANBU burst into flames and dropped to her knees with a scream of agony as her mask melted into her face and her body followed with. However, just before her life completely vanished, her hand tossed the green balls at the old lady. Confident in her barriers holding, Baba ignored the objects and turned her attention back to her other prey.
It was at that moment that the green balls exploded on the barriers into small grasping hands that reached out and clasped onto the ethereal space that seemed to block all attacks striking against the Quiraji leader. As they made contact they began to fizzle and burn with an acidic smell until there was only a fine green mist remaining.
Baba seemed not to notice what had happened at her barrier and concentrated her efforts on squeezing the life from Matsuri's body. She cackled and muttered to herself while Matsuri tried to cut off the water tendril with her short blade and jump away, only to be knocked down and strangled again by a new one. Unlike her companions, the Quiraji leader seemed to be amusing herself by torturing the young kunoichi, which would prove to be her downfall.
Just as he had before, Kankuro used his puppet outside of the field to hurl a final cluster of objects into the field, directly at the crazy female Black Robe. Unlike before, they didn't bounce off a barrier and instead dropped at her feet with a soft thud on the grass. One of her barriers had been melted away by his previous attack and she was too distracted to erect it again, giving the puppet-master enough of an opening to finally strike at her directly.
There was little special about the small black balls that had landed at her feet. They were a simple enough mixture, with small fuses attached that quickly burnt down into the balls and ignited the powder within.
Baba finally noticed them at the fizzling sound and glanced down at them with an amused expression that dropped once she realised what had happened.
"Well that's not very fair…"
The small area around the mad Quiraji leader exploded in a spectacular fireball that was initially contained by the barriers that were still erected, however once the Quiraji leader breathed her last breath they collapsed and the fire spread quickly around the battlefield.
Matsuri gasped loudly and clasped her throat tenderly as the water tendril that was killing her fell away into the ground. She saw the flames approaching her and struggled to her feet to stumble away, only to be hefted to her feet by a pair of Sunagakure ANBU that had entered the field as back-up and carried away to relative safety.
The remaining Sunagakure ANBU watched as the Quiraji leader burned, while Kankuro turned to the ANBU that was their mechanical expert. With no other opposition to speak of, he wanted them to complete their mission as soon as possible, in case they needed to assist one of the other teams at another node.
While the ANBU shinobi moved quickly through the field towards the strange-looking machine, the others relaxed themselves and began checking their weapons. Kankuro went to order one of the medics to check Matsuri, but stopped himself when he saw they were already there. Several of their group had entered the field to begin the retrieval their fallen comrades.
The battle seemed finished, but Kankuro couldn't help but wonder if there was something they had missed. The Quiraji had made it a habit to underestimate them for years now, but this just seemed insulting. Their opponent had certainly been well-suited to slaughtering them and had done a good job before she'd been taken down.
But that didn't dissuade his feeling that something was off. He turned to ask for a report from one of the sensory ANBU at his side and nearly got decapitated by a swinging sword. It was only be reflex that he hurled the puppet he'd used to kill Baba into his attacker as he fell to the ground with a surprised look on his face.
Frantically looking around the area, he saw that he wasn't the only one that had been attacked. Seemingly out of nowhere, hundreds of Quiraji soldiers had laid into the Sunagakure force and attacked them with rapid fury. There was a large contingent of Red Warriors that had started to lay into a group of unsuspecting ANBU that never stood a chance.
With a loud snarl, Kankuro pulled back his hand and manipulated his fingers to pull up his puppet to attack the Quiraji soldier that had tried to decapitate him. With his chakra available it was child's play to destroy the soldier, but its presence along with the rest of the ambushers was highly suspicious to the Kazekage's older brother.
Why would they attack them in their place of strength?
It was only when he realised that many of the further out ANBU were nowhere to be seen from his point of view. They'd spread out in the area once they'd seen their opponent, as they were by nature a cautious group, but they never reported back.
They'd be taking us out one-by-one. We fell right into their trap.
Kankuro swore under his breath and unrolled the pair of scrolls at his side. The mechanic was already in the field and hopefully working to disable the machine, which meant that they had a new mission.
The node had to be disabled, and that meant they had to fight harder than they had against the Quiraji leader. He attached the strings to his pair of puppets and turned his attention to the closest Quiraji soldier he could find.
They were heavily outnumbered, and by the number of Red Warriors he suspected they were outmatched too.
But they were Sunagakure shinobi. They'd find a way.
Author's Note:
Sorry this chapter took so long to get out; I was travelling around the States and didn't have much time to write. Now that I'm back home I'll be doing my best to accelerate my writing schedule, but I can't make any promises at this stage.
I know I seem to make a habit of killing off secondary/tertiary characters, but trust me when I saw I don't just do it because I feel like it. Everything I do in this story has a purpose and drives the story forward. There is a writing saying that most writers abide to: every line in a story should either be describing something, or advancing the plot.
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.