The barren, desolate landscape of the final battle of the fourth ninja war seemed to finally brighten as the two heros were half-assisted, half-dragged from the Valley of the End. As Kaguya's Infinite Tsukuyomi began to wither away, Naruto couldn't shake the feeling that something wasn't quite right.
"It's only in your head, brat." Kurama, the great nine tailed fox rumbled.
His container, no his friend, didn't respond, opting instead to only dive in his head. Naruto knew what victory felt like, he had tasted it enough. But this, this didn't feel like he had won anything at all. Sure he knew that victory was not always without cost. He had learned that from the very first mission Team 7 had taken out of Konoha.
He had felt betrayal, when he believed that Haku had killed Sasuke on that bridge. 'Wow, that feels like a lifetime ago now.' The blond shinobi pondered, 'Hard to believe we've come this far.'
"Hmph," Kurama snorted, "Not as far as you might think. You're still a headstrong brat."
'What is that supposed to mean!?" Naruto grumbled, his one good arm crossed over his chest as Kakashi dragged, ahem, assisted him down to where the five kage were set up. Even though the tailed beast had a change of heart in his view of the last Uzumaki, he was still a bit of an ass.
The silver haired former cyclops gave him an amused eye smile, but went ignored as Naruto continued to reminisce.
. He remembered their clash with Orochimaru in the Forest of Death. That may not have technically been a victory, but the squad of genin had survived, which was good enough for the time.
He remembered the fight with Neji. How for the first time, he had been recognized by the village, if only in passing.
The fight with Gaara, the kinship that formed between the two biju containers.
His fight with Kabuto, where he had used his father's technique for the first time.
He thought of the Land of Snow and the Land of Tea.
His clash with Sasori and Deidra when they captured Gaara.
Peins attack on Konohagakure.
Obito provoking the fourth shinobi war.
The other six Jinchuuriki.
Madara decimating everything in his path.
Kaguya Otsutsuki, the literal progenitor of chakra.
Each and every battle, every victory he remembered. There was a special feeling when you know you defeated someone above your class. The pride, the jubilation he felt in each of those moments was almost enough to get addicted to. Sure he knew that not every fight ended in complete victory. The death of Asuma and Jiraiya, Neji sacrificing himself, he remembered every loss just as clearly as every victory.
But he knew what triumph felt like, and this didn't feel like that at all. He glanced down at what was left of his right arm before looking toward Sasukes left arm. The bleeding had stopped thanks to Sakura's haphazard healing jutsu. He didn't blame her, she was just as exhausted as he was, the only difference being he had a giant chakra battery in his gut.
Sasuke had been oddly quiet since they had been found by Kakashi and Sakura. Even when they had come together to release the Infinite Tsukuyomi he hadn't said a word. It felt as if everything they had seen, everything they had created during that final fight was gone.
The nods and pats on the back he received from the members of the newly release shinobi alliance did nothing to calm his frayed nerves.
He was finally broken from his trance when he felt a solid grip on his good shoulder. He turned to see his revived father grinning at him.
"You did it son," The Minato stated proudly, "You proved that Jiraiya's peace could be achieved." The Fourth Hokage stood as regal as ever, despite having lost an arm to a truth seeking orb in the conflict. It gave him an odd sort of symmetry with his son.
Naruto said nothing, opting to instead return the grin, though his was notably less bright, something the revived Hokage did not fail to notice. He glanced around at the gathered shinobi around him. Mist and Sand, Rock and Leaf, men and women who had once been bitter enemies were now laughing and celebrating as if they had known each other their entire lives.
'Maybe I should just relax, it's all over.' Naruto thought.
"That's exactly what I have been saying, brat. Maybe you should learn to listen as well as you fight." Kurama butted in.
'Maybe you should learn to leave your opinion away from where it's not wanted!' Naruto shot back.
"Why you little…" Kurama started, before pausing, "Wait, did you feel that?"
"Who's being paranoid now?" Naruto mumbled before hearing what sounded like a sandbag hitting the dirt. Naruto shot around to see Sasuke standing over Sakura, a light blue coating of chakra over his remaining arm. Naruto didn't have time to react as Sasuke hit him, sending him tumbling down the steep embankment of the crater. Naruto struggled to his feet just in time for a hard punt kick to connect with his jaw.
"Sakura barely had any chakra left," Sasuke mused aloud, "But it should be enough."
Naruto looked up at his old friend, disbelief evident on his face. He struggled to his feet just as Sasuke brought his hand up to catch the blade of the revived second Hokage before quickly draining the Edo Tensei shinobi as well. The white haired man crumbled away, leaving only the corpse of the white zetsu clone behind. Sasuke smirked as he charged toward Naruto again, stopping briefly to swat away 2 random shinobi. A brief flare of purple sprang to life around Sasuke's arm as his incomplete Susano'o barrelled into Naruto. Naruto skidded across the barren landscape and slammed into a boulder,
"I thought I made it clear," Sasuke remarked, "Now is the time for a revolution. With you out of the way, no one can stand against me." Another flare of bluish-black chakra exploded around Sasuke as his signature Chidori exploded to life.
"I don't have enough chakra for a full cloak," Kurama grunted, "Pull in Nature Chakra, now!"
Naruto pulled in as much Nature Chakra as he could handle as Sasuke charged toward him. What Naruto did not anticipate, however, was his father flashing to his side and pulling him through a Hiraishin jump just as the last Uchiha reached him.
Disoriented and confused, Naruto lost control of the Nature Chakra inside him. He felt his body beginning to turn to stone and instinctively forced the Nature Chakra out of his body. Minato shouted in surprise as the volatile substance exploded around him. Minato's vision flashed white as he desperately tried to locate one of his Jutsu-Shiki while trying to balance the now overwhelming amount of nature chakra pouring out of the boy he was holding on to. The two blonds were finally expelled from the dimensional void that his signature technique travelled through. The father-son duo landed in a heap.
"W-What?" Naruto slurred out, "What happened."
Minato didn't respond, choosing instead to observe the new landscape around them. 'This definitely isn't the battlefield anymore.' he thought to himself.
Naruto regained his bearings and drowsily sat up. He looked around to observe their new surroundings.
The forest was beautiful, a stark contrast from the desolate site of the fourth shinobi war. The deep green of the treeline stood stark against the mountain range in the background. The trees themselves, while not as tall or as thick as the ones surrounding his home, were dense and suffocating, casting the forest around them into a permanent darkness with only flecks of light fighting their way to the forest floor.
"Where are we?" Naruto rasped, turning to face his father. Naruto was shocked to see the fourth hokages reanimated body flaking away.
"I don't know." Minato responded, "But I can't feel any of my tags anymore," Minato turned to Naruto, the left side of his face completely gone. He took Naruto's hand and forced the tri-pronged knife into his hand. "You have to find a way back," he warned as his body continued to disintegrate, "You have to stop him."
Naruto tried to respond, but Minato held his hand up to silence him. "There's no more time. My connection with the Edo Tensei has been cut, you have to work out the Hiraishin. Use it to go back to Konoha." Minato tried to continue, but it was too late. The corpse of the sacrificed white zetsu clone flopped to the ground.
Naruto stared blankly at the kunai in his hand. He grimaced as he struggled to his feet, only to collapse against a tree.
'Kurama, can you feel any people nearby?' he asked his partner as he deposited his father's knife into the pouch on his thigh. While he would have liked to rest for as long as possible, Sasuke's words rang in his head like an echo. He had to get back as quickly as possible.
'There are a couple of odd signatures to the southwest,' Kurama responded, 'But they do not feel like shinobi.'
'Civilians?' Naruto inquired, confused.
'No, they all have some sort of energy, but it does not feel like chakra.' Kurama answered, 'Two of them have a noticeably smaller presence than the other two, though the largest easily dwarfs all three of the others.'
"Well, I guess we don't have any other options." Naruto muttered as he limped his way through the forest. The dull ache of his stump was a constant annoyance as he fought his way through the dense underbrush. He stopped to rest against a tree when a massive shockwave reverberated through the forest. Naruto was nearly thrown to the ground as he force hit him.
'Seems like a fight,' Kurama remarked, unhelpfully, 'The largest energy signature just spiked. You may want to avoid the area for now.'
'We need to find a way to a town or something,' Naruto said, 'Unless you can find anyone else, that's our best option.'
Kurama did not respond, but Naruto could feel his disapproval reverberate through his mind.
It seemed like a miracle when he finally stumbled out of the forest into a small plain a few moments later, only to be met with a bizarre sight. On a small path through the middle of the field stood four people dressed in some of the most bizarre outfits he'd ever seen, bar maybe Lee and Gai. From where he stood, it seemed that three of them were trying to box in the last.
Furthest from him were two people standing side by side. The first person was a dark-skinned woman with mint green hair. She reminded Naruto a little of one of the other Jinchuriki that he met after Son swallowed him. She wore an olive green top that left her midriff exposed. She also wore a pair of shorts the same color as her top underneath dark brown chaps. In her hands were what Naruto could only assume were weapons of some sort. They looked kind of like some of the short clubs he had seen members of the Shinobi Alliance using expect these looked to be hollow with a hole at the end. Under the bottom of the strange weapons were Kama blades, a weapon Naruto was more familiar with.
Beside the green haired girl was a man with slicked-back grey hair a few shades darker than Kakashi's. He wore a grey and black zip up shirt and a pair of black pants that seemed to be burnt off at the knees, showing his lower legs. The oddest part of his appearance was his legs themselves, which seemed to be covered in armor made out of some sort of metal.
Closest to him stood a pale woman with short, pitch-black hair. She wore a short red dress with separated sleeves. The dress had gold designs running along the sides and up the sleeves. She also wore heeled shoes similar to the heeled sandals that Tsunade wore. In her hands were a pair of strangely shaped curved swords.
The final person standing in the middle of the group was another woman. She had shoulder length brown hair. She wore a white blouse under a brown corset and a few pieces of gold armor. Her brown pants were scuffed and torn from the fight. She wore long, gold heeled boots and was leaning heavily on a wooden staff topped by a pink crystal.
Naruto stumbled out into the field, but none of the four noticed him as the green and grey duo charged the lone woman. The solo fighter held her own admirably as she fought them off, eventually kicking away both the green girl and the grey boy, but she failed to notice the woman in red drawing the bow that her swords combined to make. Naruto thought of calling out to warn her, but decided against it as three arrows were fired into the ground surrounding the lone brunette. The arrows took on a deep orange glow and exploded, causing the woman to cry out in pain as she was thrown back. The trio tried to take advantage of the opening and charged forward, only to the pushed back when the brunette waved her arm and unleashed a massive gale of wind, with the woman in red taking the brunt of it and being sent sprawling down the path.
The man recovered quickly and charged forward, along to be struck by a bolt of lighting fired from the brunette woman's fingertips. She then turned and flung a fireball toward the empty space about ten feet to the side of the green haired woman, only to follow it up with another that hit its target dead-on.
The brunette struggled to her feet and limped toward the green haired woman. The pink-tipped staff was raised above her head when Naruto saw her eyes go wide before she collapsed forward. The woman in red stood victoriously and stalked toward the downed woman. The brunette could only offer a few easily contained struggles as the man and the other woman grabbed her by the arms, forcing her to look at the woman in red.
Naruto limped forward as fast as he could. At first, he was content to just let the fight play out. He didn't know what was going on between the four and he honestly didn't think he could risk reopening his injury, but something about seeing the trio manhandle the lone brunette didn't sit right with him. His suspicions were confirmed when a soft black aura surrounded the ravenettes hand. The brunette began to struggle as hard as she could against her captors, but was unable to break free.
Naruto finally reached the wooden fence lining the path as the woman began to desperately squirm in an attempt to free herself. Red dress reached out her hand to the brunette. The downed woman's eyes widened in desperation as she stared fearfully at whatever was in the younger woman's hand. Almost subconsciously he reach into the pouch on his thigh and slid his father's knife into his palm.
'Naruto, don't,' Kurama warned, 'You can't afford to get involved. Remember what the Fou-'.
Kurama was unable to finish his thought before the knife left Naruto's hand.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
'All according to plan.'
Cinder Fall was one happy woman. Months of planning and tracking had finally produced the results that she and her mistress had longed for. They finally found the elusive fall maiden. All that was left now was to take that amazing power for herself. Then she would be an unstoppable tool for Salem. As she felt the new Grimm appear in her palm, she was almost giddy with delight. Only a few more moments and everything she wanted would be hers.
Cinder reached her hand out to create the connection, but before the Grimm could do its work, she heard a low whistle. An odd, tri-pronged knife collided with her hand, causing her aura to flare. The Grimm beetle in her hand was sent careening off into the grass beside the road. Cinder snarled in annoyance as she turned to meet the fool who dared to interrupt her plans. She was met by a fist roughly colliding with her cheeking, causing her to barrel into Emerald and Mercury. The fall maiden, now unsupported, collapsed forward with the arrow in her back. Cinder shot to her feet and took in what might be the most pathetic looking boy she had ever seen.
He couldn't have been any older than her. His golden blond hair clashed harshly with his orange and black track pants. The tattered and ripped fishnet shirt he wore was barely holding itself together. But what really caught her attention was his right arm, or what was left of it. The blackened limb ended in a jagged stump at the elbow. Cinder thought he looked like an Ursa Major had gotten a hold of him and not let go.
Cinder snarled as she fired a glowing orange arrow at the interloper. It exploded just as it reached the blond boy and threw him back in a ball of fire. He grunted in pain as he rolled with the flame, landing roughly on his stump. Cinder smiled vindictively as she noticed the wound reopen and begin pouring blood into the dirt around him. She drew another arrow into the newly formed bow, intent on ending this miserable creatures life. She lined up the shot and prepared to fire before the boy flashed a brilliant gold and disappeared from sight.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
'This isn't good.' Naruto thought as he struggled to his feet, 'Kurama, do you have enough chakra for a sync yet?'
'Only stage one,' Kurama responded, 'And only for a few seconds, half a minute at most.'
Naruto cursed in his head. That wasn't enough time to make sure he could beat all three unknowns. He glanced at the downed girl, who was now trying to drag herself to her discarded staff.
'Naruto' Kurama got his attention, 'Another signature just entered my range. You're going to have to hold out until they get here and hope they are friendly.'
'How do I do that?' Naruto asked.
'Stage one cloak, taijutsu only.' Kurama grunted, 'Neither of us have recovered enough to risk any ninjutsu.'
Naruto nodded as he glared up at the woman in red. He felt Kurama's now familiar power course through him as the golden cloak exploded out.
Cinder was unprepared for the brutal uppercut that forced her off the ground. Naruto spun on his feet and hit the woman with a massive mule kick that flung her even farther down the path. Mercury and Emerald gaped at the sheer speed that the newcomer showed, even with what should be a fatal injury, but that did not stop them from trying to help their leader. They didn't make it far before the now golden interloper backhanded Emerald and launched her through the wooden fence. Mercury flipped forward and attempted to land a heel drop on their mysterious opponent. Naruto caught the grey haired boys leg and threw him in the same direction as Emerald. Mercury collided with Emerald just as she regained her barings, causing both of them to roll out into the field.
Naruto turned his attention back to Cinder, only to see a glowing orange arrow flying toward him. Naruto could only raise an eyebrow at the attack. The attack seemed like it was moving in slow motion compared to what he was used to. Sasuske was twice as fast as that even after fighting Kaguya.. Naruto dashed to the side, allowing the arrow to harmlessly pass and explode somewhere behind him. He raised the stump of his right arm and willed Kurama's cloak to expand. The new chakra arm rushed forward and attempted to grab Cinder. Cinder was able to barely avoid the appendage and fired a quick volley of arrows at the blond. Naruto swiped the arrows out of the air and prepared to rush the black haired woman again.
Naruto had planted his foot into the ground and prepared to dash just as the last of his partners chakra gave out. Naruto grunted in exhaustion as he collapsed forward, barely stopping himself from hitting the dirt with his good arm. He forced himself to roll to the side as another arrow planted itself right where his head had been.
Emerald and Mercury trudged out of the field. Emerald had a murderous look in her eyes as she raised her guns to end the blond annoyance. Just as she lined up her shot she was blown off her feet. Mercury looked to the side to see that Amber had finally reached her weapon. She fired another lighting bolt at Mercury that he avoided easily. Amber reared her staff back again, but gasped in pain as another arrow buried itself into her shoulder.
Cinder stomped angrily back up the dirt pathway. She drew her bow once more, but never got the chance to fire again. The only warning of incoming danger that she got was the low whistle of something slicing through the air. She pivoted on her foot to see another interloper bring a sword down on her head. She leapt to avoid the blow, landing beside the downed Emerald.
Cinder growled in annoyance as one of the few people that her mistress warned her about made his presence known. She grabbed the green haired girl roughly by the arm and motioned toward Mercury.
"We're leaving." she told her underlings, her normally sultry voice now little more than an annoyed growl. Mercury and Emerald looked conflicted but didn't question their leader. The trio dashed into the forest in an attempt to put as much distance between them and their new enemy.
Naruto rolled onto his side and apprehensively observed as the newcomer rushed over to the brunette. The girl looked slightly annoyed by the new man, but by the way she relaxed he didn't think she was in any danger.
The newcomer had spiked, greying black hair that looked oddly like a birds feathers. He wore a two tone grey shirt with a red cape flowing off his back. His legs were covered by silky black pants and he wore what looked to the shinobi to be the most uncomfortable shoes possible.
"Qrow," the brunette addressed the man, "I'm fine. He needs help more."
The new man, Qrow, looked over at the blond man. His crimson red eyes widened as he took in the boys war-torn appearance.
Naruto attempted to get to his feet as the black haired man approached him but he weakly collapsed back into the dirt. A wave of exhaustion hit the blond hero as darkness took him.