Lethal Shinobi
Chapter 11
A sudden swarm of shinobi wearing headbands with either the symbol of the Land of Sound, or the Land of Sand flooded both the arena and the village entirely. Not a moment later, the sounds of shouted warriors and clashing steal filled the entire village.
Civilians were already being evacuated and defended by every able-bodied shinobi the village had. No questions were asked, no orders were given. Everyone knew what was going on and what needed to be done.
The village was being invaded!
Minato and the Kazekage were already clashed against one another. Minato using his custom-made three-pronged kunai against the traditional one used by the Sand leader.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Minato shouted as he gave a powerful shove, pushing the Kazekage away.
The Kazekage began to laugh. As he did, the sound of his voice changed and became more like that of a hiss than the gravelly tone the Kazekage was known for. As he laughed, the man's robes slowly fell away, as did bits of apparently false skin.
What was left was a thin man with pale skin, long black hair, and eyes that were as honest as a snake's. He had a strange ring on one of his fingers.
Minato's eyes narrowed as he recognized the figure. A level of hate that the man had not felt in years began to well up within him as memories from the past came flooding back.
"Orochimaru." Minato hissed. He risked a glance back and saw his family grouped together behind him, Naruto making sure to stand in front of his pregnant mother and little sister. Seeing his family still safe, Minato's eyes snapped back to the wicked man in front of him.
"I am so glad that you remember me." Orochimaru chuckled. It was a lighthearted tone, but was about as pleasant to hear as crumpling chip bag in the dead quiet of night.
"You were so young," The an continued. "I was afraid you forgot."
"What are you doing here?" Minato's tone was dead serious.
Orochimaru was famous as a powerful ninja, and a nasty schemer. Above all else, he was known as the physical manifestation of the term 'power hungry' and had been trying to gain the knowledge and power to master every single ninja technique that ever existed. And he was going to achieve that goal by any means necessary.
"I thought you would be a little more pleased to see one of you idols return home." Orochimaru chuckled, a nasty grin adorning his pale, bony face. "You have a lot of enemies Minato. A lot of enemies that would love nothing more than to see you gone and are willing to do whatever it takes for that to happen."
Minato's glare did not falter. "Tell me something I don't know." He pulled out another of his unique kunai. "It seems my policy has been a little lax. After I clean this mess up, I'll have a few words with my council."
"I don't believe you will." Orochimaru chuckled as he waved the hand wearing the strange ring. Minato suddenly found himself surrounded by five other shinobi, all wearing Sound headbands and with strange tattoos visible on their necks. "We want to make this quick, but a few of your friends also want things to be as painful as possible."
"Papa!" The sound of his daughter's shouted forced Minato to turn around and see several Sound shinobi grabbing at his family. Naruto was able to deliver a solid punch to one of the cheek of one of his attackers, but he was quickly overwhelmed by the entire group.
Minato made to go help his family, but the five warriors surrounding him quickly began launching attacks, forcing him to focus on them instead. He could feel his age as he fought. Minato was not the young man he was nearly twenty years ago.
In his mind, he knew if he was just a bit younger; just a bit quicker, he could have used his famous speed-based techniques to save his family and easily fend off these warriors. But now, it was taking all he could just to hold them all back. He was able to dodge and retaliate well enough, but any attempt at getting near his family was impossible.
The Sound shinobi finally got the rest of the Namikaze family bound up with special chakra infused rope; just to be on the safe side. All were quickly carried down to the center of the arena and forced onto their knees.
"You'd better stop playing." Orochimaru teased. "Or your family might receive the same fate you will."
No words could describe Minato's anger as he stood still for a moment. He immediately tossed his weapons aside and held his hands up as several Sound shinobi surrounded him and tied him up just like his family. He too was brought down to the center of the arena.
The fighting only lasted for a short while before word of the Hokage's capture reached the ears of the soldiers. All moral was broken upon hearing that their legendary leader was now on his knees. All were captured and brought to the arena, those that resisted were dealt with.
After only a short while, the arena was filled once again with the soldiers of all sides. Even the center of the arena was packed full, except for a small open circle where the Hokage's family was being held.
Gaara had finally emerged from his dome. The entire right half of his upper torso, right arm, and right side of his head was completely covered in that sandy flesh and was larger than the rest of him. His right arm had become that odd appendage that had grabbed Sasuke earlier while the right side of his face had become almost completely beast-like with jutting fangs and even a small triangular ear. His right eye was completely black, except for a small gold star-shaped pupil.
Currently, he had both Temari and another Sand shinobi; one wearing all black with a strange bound thing strapped to his back, trying to calm him down since it appeared he really, really wanted to kill Sasuke.
With everyone all gathered up, Orochimaru and his cohorts stood around the captured family. The massive crowd slowly parted to allow several figures to walk through unimpeded.
"Why should I be surprised." Minato sneered upon seeing none other than Fugaku and several other key council members, along with a few owners of major businesses in the village. They all stood within the circle, in front of the captured family. It really was nothing strange, the man loved to show off whenever possible. So, of course he would fill a massive stadium just to make himself the center of attention.
"You really shouldn't be." Fugaku responded in his classic, superior tone. "You have been such a pain for us all for so long that it was only a matter of time that one of us do something about you."
"Matter of time?" Minato scoffed. "Every single day, you idiots have been doing everything you could to get one over on me. It just looks like now you've either gone completely stupid, or insane."
Fugaku only chuckled at the man's anger. "Now, now." He chastised. "How is that any way for a leader to speak?" He paused. "Well, once leader."
"Am I to assume you will be the one in charge after this? Still sore after your failure of an ancestor couldn't beat a single shinobi?"
Fugaku's pleased demeanor faltered for a moment at the insult, but he refused to let his captive get the better of him this time. He had finally won against this blight upon the village. His end goal, of once again elevating the Uchiha to their rightful place as leaders was finally coming together. So he had no concern about what a failed leader had to say about him.
Insolence would be the first thing punished under his rule.
"Not at all." Fugaku replied, keeping his cool. "I am simply giving the village back it's rightful rulers. It just so happens that it is the Uchiha who are meant to fill that position."
"The village will never follow you." Minato scowled. "No sane person would allow themselves to be turned into slaves. No one wants mindless soldiers and breeding machines."
"They will all come to see my way, in time." Fugaku remained calm. "Especially after they all witness what I have planned for you and your family."
"Just killing us isn't going to make people afraid of you." Minato retorted. "You'll just be all the more pathetic. Can't even kill another man on equal ground."
"You are not my equal." Fugaku finally spat.
As the two grown men had their little argument, Naruto could be heard mumbling by those around him.
"We need to do it now." He tried to be as quiet as possible. The couple of glances he got from both his fearful mother and the few shinobi nearby him showed him that he was heard. He did not care at this point.
"If we wait any longer then someone is going to die." He paused for a moment. "I don't care if everybody sees." Another pause. "Good. Then hopefully everyone will get the message."
"What I have planned for you and your family." Fugaku finally decided to speak at a louder volume, so that the entire stadium could hear. "Is exactly what true traitors of this village deserve." He stepped forward. "You and your son will die and we will have your wife and daughter used to breed stronger soldiers for our military. It would be a waste to get rid of the power of the Uzumaki family."
He continued on for a bit. Going into detail about how exactly he was going to use the family line. Killing the males that didn't have the capacity for ninja-hood. Selling a few of the women to the highest bidders. Usual tyrannical nonsense. He was playing it up to such a degree that it was almost like he was trying to be the worst human possible.
No signs of any scheming or trying to trick the population; just straight up saying every terrible thing he was planning on doing. His eyes would occasionally shift his eyes over to Naruto ever time he put any sort of emphasis on the dastardly things he had planned.
It was clear he was trying to goad the family. But with them all tied up and at his mercy, no one could guess as to why. Even Orochimaru, who loved nothing more than to gloat over a defeated foe, was curious as to why his cohort was going into so much detail.
After about a half hour of just gloating and detailing terrible things, Fugaku finally stopped talking. He looked at both Minato and Naruto and scowled. He thought for a moment before flicking a hand.
"Why wait till later?" He asked nonchalantly. "We can start the new breeding program right now." He snapped his fingers and several of the surrounding shinobi moved forward and grabbed Kushina and her daughter.
"But first." A wicked smile formed. "We should get rid of that useless thing inside her."
One of the Sound shinobi looked at Fugaku with an incredulous expression before looking at Orochimaru. His leader returned the expression closing his eyes and giving a nod.
There was no point in doing this, beyond upsetting the Namikaze family that much further. Hell, the man was wasting perfectly good breeding stock as well as a potential soldier. Fugaku was not a stupid man, there must be a reason behind this sudden madness.
Naruto looked on in horror. He risked a glance at Sasuke, hoping his friend would at least try to reason with his father. To his credit, the boy did try, but the moment he opened his mouth, Fugaku silenced him with a cold glare.
Given that it would have been him against every possible free ninja, Sasuke did the only thing he could do and give his friend an apologetic look.
The Sound ninja gave a shrug before pulling out a kunai as his friends grabbed Kushina by the arms and forced her to lay back. They were sure to grab her fingers so she would not risk using any kind of technique against them either.
The man approached Kushina, who was glaring daggers at the man despite the tears rolling down her cheeks. She had nearly lost her son so many years ago, and now she was going to loose a child that had yet to have been born. She knew that there was no way she was going to be mentally, or physically, well after this whole ordeal was over. No matter how many years would pass.
"Maybe you shouldn't do that." Naruto finally spoke up loud enough to be heard. Everyone had pretty much begun to ignore his earlier muttering as him loosing it. Now he was looking up and at Fugaku.
The Sound shinobi stopped right before pressing the knife to Kushina's swollen stomach. To be honest, it was kind of surprising she was not already having issues with the stress of everything that has been going on.
"It seems you have a very poor memory." Naruto's iris' slowly began to shrink away, leaving just the white. "And have clearly forgotten what we told you would happen if you messed with our family."
Fugaku scowled and turned his attention completely to the boy. "How could I ever forget a threat made by a pathetic worm?" His voice was almost sarcastic.
"Good." Naruto responded in a low voice. "Because the moment that knife touches our mother, we are going to tear out your first born's eyes and turn your wife inside out." He paused for a moment and appeared to almost be thinking over something. "We will leave Sasuke alive, just because we like him."
Fugaku took a step towards Naruto. "I had hoped you would finally speak up and reveal your true twisted nature." He resisted the urge to just smack the boy. There was not way that a cannibal could truly become normal. You are just a sick, twisted little boy."
"Oh." Naruto grinned. "You are right on that, but we are not little."
"Maybe you are grown in age, but you are still but a child in mind." Fugaku argued, not catching that there was a double meaning behind the boy's words. He quickly raised his voice again so that others could here.
"Do you see this? The insolence that this abomination of a child dares to bring in front of the village's rightful ruler? Not only is he a horror that dares to feed on the good citizens of our beloved home, but he threatens any sort of authority. He and his family are a true danger to this village and-"
"Oh, we are a horror alright." Naruto interrupted. "An absolute nightmare." He chuckled.
"What are you doing?!" Minato hissed at his son. The man was busy trying to think of a way to get his family out of this terrible scenario, and his son was acting as stupid as possible trying to provoke the very man wanting them dead.
Naruto ignored his father completely. "And want to know the best part?" His grin grew wider, "It is all your fault."
Fugaku just sneered down at the boy. He did not want to reply.
"Yeah," Naruto's grin grew even wider, becoming almost too big to be natural. "We know what you tried to do. You read the report. So you must know who it was we ate, right?"
Again, no reply.
"The one you sent to kill us, twice." Naruto explained. "Don't you with it's a little strange how a civilian teenager could take down, kill and devour a highly trained shinobi? A jonin no less. Does that not sound strange to you? To anyone?"
He looked around and could see some people actually thinking about what he was saying. So, he continued.
"Not only that. But the same boy just ate the jonin, alive. No cutting up, no cooking. Just eating raw, still living flesh." Naruto turned his head a bit to crack his stiff neck. "Isn't that just a little too much to believe?"
"Do not believe this boy's foul lies!" Fugaku quickly tried to argue back. The sounds of the villagers starting to really understand the logic of the story they had been told.
"All these years of trying to get rid of our family." Naruto continued. "And you finally have as all down at your feet. So close to your ultimate goal, yet a few words are all it takes to get people to believe something else. You tried to use what we have done to make it appear that out family was the wrong thing for this village. You hoped the people would believe your story just because of how terrible it was."
A chuckle escaped Naruto's lips. "But the fact that you had to hire so many just to take the village shows how very little power your words really have. They clearly do not want you as a leader. Even before you can begin to lead, you are already seen as a failure to the village. Our words alone were enough to make the people start talking."
"I changed my mind." Fugaku said as he looked back at the Sound ninja that was still standing in front of Kushina. "Kill him first. I want his corpse drained dry and on display for all to see."
Said Sound ninja moved over to Naruto, who looked back up at him with that same wicked grin. It was starting to unsettle those around him. The milky white eyes was not helping either.
"You sure you want to try?" Naruto asked in a low voice. "You could just walk away. Sure you may be punished, but we can promise that we will make anything they plan to do look like nothing more than a gentle caress." He chuckled. "If you walk away now, you'll at least have all four of your limbs still attached by the time you leave the village. We can't really speak for after that though."
The ninja raised an eyebrow of concern at the boy's words. He knew better than to underestimate an opponent, especially one that was this confident while at, supposed, mercy. There was something going on, and he did not like it. He took a step back.
"Wise choice." Naruto chuckled as he noticed Orochimaru's face harden at one of his underlings cowardice. "Now who is going to take his place? Which one of you want to risk hurting the weak little boy that killed a jonin?"
Naruto laughed loudly as no one really stepped forward. The entire story just did not add up and not a soul wanted to risk something terrible happening to them.
"I thought your shinobi were better trained than this." Fugaku glared at Orochimaru. "I'm not sure if this partnership is even worth it, if cowards are all that your land breeds."
The snake-like man was now actually angry. He had agreed to go along with this little invasion just because Fugaku promised him the Uchiha eyes. He was even able to convince his old friends to help out. Claiming that Fugaku being the leader of such a powerful village would help supply the strangely garbed group of ninja with whatever resources they might need. What for, was still an unknown.
Orochimaru shot back a glare of his own before looking over at another of his underlings; a look of near rage gave the soldier no other option but to take his comrade's place. This one, too, was not so keen on the idea of attacking Naruto; but he was more afraid of his leader than he was of anything else.
"You can walk away too." Naruto tried to reason. "You could leave right now and know that not a single piece of you will be missing once you pass the village walls."
The shinobi just stared down at Naruto with an unreadable expression. This was his job, and he was going to do whatever it was his master ordered.
He gripped his knife tightly and began to reach down towards the boy with the intention of grabbing a fistful of his bright blond hair. Naruto's grin was massive as he watched the hand get closer. A small amount of drool could be seen gathering from the corner of his mouth.
It was only when Kushina let out a scream of pain did both men; along with everyone else, turn their attention to the pregnant woman.
Said woman was not being attacked, despite what the sound she had made would imply. It appeared that the stress of the day had finally caught up with the poor woman and her third child was about to be brought into the world.
It goes without saying that the chatter started to pick up a bit and everyone began to look at one another, looking for any clue as to what to do.
Fugaku was silent for a moment before a smirk showed up on his old mug. "Once the child is born, give it to me. I will prove the superiority of the Uchiha by raising an Uzumaki as the most powerful shinobi to ever live." Nobody really heard him though.
Just a few feet away, Gaara was still trying to be controlled by his siblings and fellow Sand shinobi. Their efforts appeared to be working since he appeared to be alright with standing there, staring hard at Sasuke, as opposed to killing the boy.
Mainly they just told him that he would get to kill him later as well as anyone else he wanted as long as he did not try anything right now. Which, he was more than happy to do. The more he killed, or the more important his victim/opponent, the more alive he felt and the more justified of his own existence he was.
He was content with that, until he heard the woman screaming.
That scream was meant to be something he was supposed to tear out of a person's throat. He was meant to be the only one causing such pain that even the strongest would not help but scream in fear and agony. If someone else was able to pull those kind of screams from someone, then what was he purpose?
He had to fix that.
He had to make sure that it was only him that could cause such agony.
With a swipe of his massive arm, Gaara easily pushed aside everyone in his way before leaping forward towards the shouting red-head. He swiped away ninja around him and glared down at her with saliva dripping down the transformed half of his twisted face.
The woman looked up at the boy. The pain of her incoming child made it impossible for her to really put enough effort into defending herself. The most she could do was reach for and grab one of the kunai dropped by a shinobi that had been knocked aside. She held it in front of her in a vain attempt at self defense.
Minato tried to move, to do anything to protect his wife, but found that any attempt at forming chakra of any kind was instantly impeded by the ropes that bound his arms and legs. He could not even stand up. He was about to resign himself to seeing his wife murdered before him before he noticed another discarded kunai and began to worm his way over to the sharp blade.
Gaara could not hold back his gleeful cackle as he raised his changed arm high into the air; hoping to reduce this fat woman into a nice big bloody smear on the hard ground.
But just before he could bring the limb down, something slammed into him with enough force to send him sailing to the ground. He quickly scrambled to his feet and shot a vile glare at whomever was foolish enough to get in between him and his kill.
None other than Naruto stood in between the half changed Sand shinobi and his mother.
He had snapped the ropes binding his legs and leapt at Gaara to save his mother. Now he was glaring at the boy with a vicious snarl, even as his arms were still bound behind his back.
Gaara looked more angry than confused before charging forward with his changed arm poised to smash the blond fool into the ground.
Naruto charged forward as well, but with his mouth held wide open. Just before the two collided, Naruto's mouth opened impossibly wide as every single one of his teeth were instantly replaced with massive misshapen fangs.
Gaara dug his heels into the dirt and forced himself to come to a halt just as those fangs came closing in. Naruto's teeth clashed together harmlessly just an inch away from Gaara's face. But were instantly open again and heading right for the boy, forcing the Sand ninja to start backpedaling away from the gnashing jaws.
He finally got a good enough foothold to bring his massive arm around and slam it into the side of Naruto, sending the boy sailing away.
With all of the sudden chaos, Minato was able to quickly free himself using the discarded kunai and began making hand seals. He stopped for just a moment when his son went zooming past him and smashed onto the ground, but finished right after to create several clones.
His clones instantly leapt into action, either freeing fellow soldiers or engaging the enemy directly. Not a moment later, the war had started back up and complete chaos erupted throughout the village. The main man focused on making sure his wife and daughter were okay.
Apparently Naruto could handle himself as the moment he hit the ground he was back on his feet. With minimal effort, the boy broke the remaining bonds holding him and glared at Gaara.
"Don't you dare harm our mother." His tone was violent and threatening. An almost otherworldly level of brutal rage could be felt with each word.
"You can do nothing!" Gaara shouted. "I will kill you, her, and everyone else in this village!" As he spoke, more of that sand colored flesh grew over him, covering all but his legs. His entire head no looked like the head of a demonic raccoon-dog; luckily, the saliva had stopped streaming down his chin.
"Everyone here is going to die!" He roared before launching both of his arms forward, stretching them far beyond any sense of normal.
Naruto instantly went down to all fours to avoid the attack; both hands and feet firmly planted on the ground with his limps sticking out to the side preventing his belly from touching the ground.
As the two pillar-like arms sailed over him harmlessly, Naruto opened his mouth and launched his tongue right back at Gaara. The appendage becoming long a very bright red.
The appendage wrapped itself around one of Gaara's legs and pulled, knocking Gaara off his feet and letting him fall to the ground before quickly picking him up into the air. Naruto got to his feet and held the upside down boy before noting both Fugaku and Orochimaru standing off to the side, letting their underlings do the fighting for them.
Naruto, not wanting them to feel excluded, decided to get both of the adult shinobi in on the fun. How? By tossing Gaara directly at the both of them.
The two adults easily moved out of the way and allowed Gaara to fall to the ground a good distance away.
Naruto made a short hop to get in front of the two, but mostly in font of Fugaku.
"What's wrong old man?" Naruto quipped. "Things not going to plan? If only your past attempts on our life had worked. But we doubt it would really have made much of a difference."
The Uchiha leader did not respond with words, but did flash a knowing grin as he looked past the boy in front of him.
Naruto risked a glance behind to see his father doing all he could to keep his wife safe as she and two medic shinobi were busy with baby-birthing. The five Sound ninja were all attacking Minato and were, luckily focused more on him than Kushina. Unfortunately, however, that left their daughter pretty vulnerable.
And one particularly big Sound shinobi was taking advantage of that fact. Currently, he was yanking on the girl's arm to try and bring her over to his master. But the feisty young, name-changing Namikaze was refusing him every step of the way.
Even though the young girl had just started her training into ninjahood, she still had absolutely no ability since most of the early years were spent in class rooms and learning basics and history. So the young girl really had no idea how to get her attacker to release her beyond panicking and beating against his strong arm with all the force she could while dragging her feet.
She did not scream though and looked more angry than scared as the man easily dragged her towards Orochimaru. The man still appeared to be annoyed with the situation since he had to stop periodically to readjust his grip on the girl's wrist. When the girl finally got a good enough footing, she yank back hard enough to make the man stumble back only for her to lean forward and chomp down on the man's arm, forcing him to release her from the sudden pain.
Naruto's younger sister tried to run away, only for the man to grab her again with his other hand. He growled out an insult of some sort before bringing his other hand around and smacking the little girl's cheek.
The sound of flesh smacking flesh echoed like a thunderclap. At least, in Naruto's mind.
He had failed.
He was meant to protect his family. Allow no harm to them at all. And here, his sister had just been hurt. Right in front of him. He had done nothing to stop it.
The feeling of failure quickly passed and was replaced with anger as a terribly roar tore itself from Naruto's throat. His back bulged out grotesquely as he hunched forward.
His head shot up and his eyes focused on the man holding his sister. Not a moment later, a large black tentacle tore itself out from Naruto's shoulder before launching straight for the man.
The target was caught completely unaware as the appendage pierced the side of his skull and exited through the other side in one smooth and quick motion. The man's body stood stock still for a moment before giving a few twitches and finally going completely limp. His body took longer to process he was dead than his scrambled brain.
Naruto yanked the appendage back as several more black tendrils ripped themselves free from Naruto's back and shirt. His face was twisted into an outraged snarl as he held body high for a moment before slamming it to the ground. A loud crack could be heard upon the corpse hitting the unforgiving Earth.
Naruto let out another angry roar as he raised the limp body into the air again. He brought it down just as hard as the first time; more cracking could be heard as well as visible tears showing through the skin, leaking large amounts of dead blood.
Naruto did this several times before suddenly turning his hate-filled gaze back to the ones who were truly responsible for the harm to his family.
Just like with Gaara, Naruto tossed the corpse at the men. But this time, he threw the twisted remains while charging towards them letting out another roar of anger.
Each time Naruto screamed, his voice became less and less human, and more and more twisted and distorted.
Again, the two adults got out of the way easily, but neither made any effort to get out of the way of Naruto's charge. With his hands behind his back, Fugaku snapped his fingers and several Uchiha suddenly appeared around Naruto; separating him from the family patriarch.
Or so they had planned.
Naruto did come to a skidding halt however, and slowly noticed that he had been completely surrounded. He snarled before letting out another monstrous roar with even more black tendrils tearing their way out from what was left of his shirt.
The Uchiha all activated their family's famous red and black eyes before quickly going into a small series of hand seals.
Instinctively, Naruto fell forward and firmly planted his hands and feet onto the ground. Just as the surrounding shinobi inhaled deeply, Naruto pushed himself lower and lower.
The very moment that the group began to exhale, Naruto pushed himself off the ground with enough force to crack the ground. This launched him straight into the air and allowed him to easily avoid the massive fire that was now exactly where he had been just a moment ago.
Ignoring the minions, Naruto focused completely on Fugaku and began to plummet back to the Earth with the express intention of landing on the man.
This time, the Uchiha leader had to get out of the way, or be crushed by the incoming man-shaped ball of incoming hate.
Naruto slammed back to Earth with enough force create a shock wave that knocked anyone nearby right off their feet. He instantly followed his landing by launching several of the tentacles sticking out of his back towards Fugaku. The limbs tried to stab, smash, or grab the man as he moved and dodged around each and every one.
Naruto decided to get more involved after it looked like attacking from a distance was not going to work. With another roar, the boy launched himself towards Fugaku, still attempting to to land an attack with his extra appendages.
Upon approaching his prey, Naruto held his left hand out to the side. With a small twitch, tiny black tendrils wrapped themselves around each of his fingers before lengthening further and quickly shifting into large blade-like claws.
He swiped his arm in a large arc, aiming right for Fugaku's midsection. The combination of multiple tentacles, plus the clawed hand, forced the Uchiha to actually use both of his hands to block and dodge. Naruto continued forward with the assault, making his prey back up more and more with each swipe of his claws.
Fugaku was both angry and concerned. He had planned for the boy to finally reveal what he really was. He did not exactly know what that was or how to deal with it. But he had planned on the combined forces of his clan, the Sound and the Sand being able to easily take care of both Naruto, his family, and the villagers.
He did not expect for Naruto to just come right after him and ignore everything else around. Fugaku's subordinates tried to get close and, at the very least, distract Naruto from trying to kill their leader. But the constantly flailing about tentacles made it impossible for anyone to get close.
Even still, Fugaku was a highly trained and powerful shinobi and there was no way that a completely untrained monster would ever get the upper hand over him. Even if he was forced to defend himself, there was no way the boy could ever cause him any kind of harm.
Without even using any sort of hand seals, Fugaku held his hand up in front of his face and exhaled; producing a large flame that engulfed most of Naruto's head.
The boy roared in pain as he swiped at the fire. His tendrils doing all they could to stay as far away as possible. The fire dissipated quickly and just left Naruto feeling burned and even more angry, pushing his attack even harder.
His other hand became clawed and his tongue had joined in the fray with sharp lashes and quick strikes.
With so many appendages coming at him at once, it was only a matter of time that Fugaku would slip up. And when he did, Naruto took full advantage.
The boy was able to snag onto the older man's ankle and yanked him forward with enough force to both, pull him off his feet as well as slide him across the ground.
Naruto gave a short hop as he dragged Fugaku towards him and attempted to slam both of his feet down on top of the man. He was too engrossed with finally catching his prey, that Naruto failed to see, or even pay a single moment of attention to the strong tingling to the side of his head. If he had, then he would have easily avoided the kunai that struck his temple and embedded itself deep into his skull.
The force of the impact was enough to knock Naruto out of the air and send him falling, harmlessly, to the ground. Naruto's body went completely limp with even the thrashing tentacles lying motionless.
Fugaku quickly got back up to his feet and dusted himself off before taking a glance over at who had saved him. He could not help but give a small, proud smile as his first born, Itachi slowly walked over. The young man had been against Fugaku's plan to return the rightful rule of the village back to the Uchiha, but it appeared that the boy finally remembered where his true allegiance lies.
Sasuke was the same, but never voiced his disapproval. He still refused to actively participate and even looked disgusted and upset at what his father was doing to his best friend and his family. But there was nothing he could do to stop them without risking his own safety. How could he be expected to betray his own family?
Fugaku was about to praise his first born when movement out of the corner of his eye drew his attention over to the supposedly dead Naruto. The boy slowly began to rise back up.
Once Naruto was standing again, he reached up with a single tentacle and ripped the kunai embedded in his skull out. Naruto looked at the bloody weapon for a moment, turning it one way, then the other before tossing it to the ground uselessly.
The boy turned his head to look over at both his prey, and his attacker. His mouth back at that nasty snarl as small black tendrils began to slowly crawl over the boy's face.
Fugaku took a step back as Itachi stepped forward.
"Remember what we are doing this for." The father told his son. "You are the best that this village has ever made and it is time that you showed the world what the Uchiha are capable of."
Itachi did not respond. Bowed his head slightly before looking straight forward, Sharingan activated and aimed at Naruto.
"I will end this quickly." His tone was dead and cold. He held no joy, nor hate, for what he was going to do. He was a shinobi of the Uchiha and he was going to fulfill his mission, no matter what it may be.
He drew the sword he kept strapped to his back and prepared himself to kill his little brother's best friend.
Or, he was prepared to, until a sand colored arm appeared from seemingly nowhere and tried to slam Naruto into the ground.
Naruto was able to sense the incoming attack, however and used the forest of tentacles sticking out of his back to catch the arm and hold it up. Naruto let out another enraged scream as one of the tendrils on his back became incredibly ridged and shoved itself right through the offending arm.
Gaara let out a cry of pain as the tendril tore through his mutated flesh. Once it had penetrated all the way through, the extended appendage split into two in a grotesque display before pushing at either side of the arm.
Gaara let out a roar of his own as his arm was sliced into. He grabbed onto it with his other hand and tried to tear it free, but the mass of tendrils holding onto it refused to yield.
With just a small bit more force, both tendrils slide cleanly through the limb, completely severing it. The arm dissolved into sand before it even began to fall to the ground.
Naruto let out another monstrous roar. He turned his attention to the screaming Gaara, the boy holding what was left of his sand made arm.
More sand come up and began to cover what little left of Gaara there was. Sprouting a scaled tail and clawed feet, there was nothing left to show that Gaara had once been human.
"I'll make you pay for that!" The strange one-armed raccoon demon roared.
Naruto prepared himself to leap towards the monster, but was interrupted by his senses warning him of a danger from behind. He instead, leapt to the side and avoided the sword that was aimed right for his spine.
Itachi had tried to use the demon as a distraction and attack Naruto while he was preoccupied. That plan clearly did not work. He was forced to leap out of the way as several black tentacles came down towards him. The appendages slamming down hard.
The Uchiha tried throwing several kunai at the tentacles to try and pin them to the ground, but the weapons were easily swatted away by more of the thrashing limbs.
An infuriated Gaara charged forward before turning midair and attempting to slam his massive tail into his prey. At the same time, none only Itcahi, but several other Uchiha decided to join in and throw their own weapons at the blond boy.
Seeing everything coming at him at once, Naruto gave an angry roar before extending his tentacles out in all directions and thrashing them about wildly, knocking aside anything that dared to get near.
Naruto's roar grew louder and louder as he began to slam his fists onto the ground repeatedly. He began to thrash about wildly as his anger grew and grew.
There were too many. Too many threats to him and his family around. And not a single one he could handle. Every time he tried, another just come around to interrupt and he'd have to start over. Not only that, but he had to some how help his father and mother. He also had to find his sister again since he lost sight of her after killing her attacker just a moment ago.
It was all, just so frustrating. There was just too much going on and it was impossible to focus. He needed to do something, anything.
"I need to be stronger." He growled lowly. "I need all the power you have."
Venom chuckled. 'Good. The first time will be the hardest.' It warned. 'But I will make sure that everything goes well.'
Naruto's tentacles slowly began to slow down in their thrashing and slowly started to wrap themselves around their host. Several remained to ward off any that dared to get close and were used to smack away any weapons or attacks aimed at Naruto.
Seeing that nothing was working, Gaara let out an irritated roar and summoned a large circle of sand around Naruto. He held his remaining hand outwards towards the boy and slowly began to close his strange and misshaped fingers.
Naruto could see the sand getting closer and closer, but found that he was having a very difficult time moving while Venom was doing his work. The tentacles did all that they could to try and push back the sand, but were easily overwhelmed. Quickly, his entire body was swallowed up by the tan soil, leaving not a single inch exposed. Not even the smallest bit of sound could be heard coming from the sandy cocoon.
While Kushina had been escorted to the very edge of the arena by the medical shinobi and was trying to keep herself as calm as possible while trying to bring a new life into the world. Her daughter had found her way to her without anymore trouble and told Kushina what had happen with her eldest child.
She really did not know what was going on with Naruto, but she feared for the boy's life as she could not see him through all the fighting and chaos. Her husband was doing very well against the five Sound shinobi. He even started to push them back as the previous Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen finally joined the fight after apparently assisting in the evacuation. The man had brought along more ninja as well who came to assist as well as give information about what was going on with the rest of the village.
As impressive as their fight was, there really was not too many techniques they could really unleash due to the high number of combatants all fighting around them. Even the five Sound shinobi appeared to restrain themselves and it was only when the old Hokage made an appearance and joined in did they decide it best to retreat. At least for the moment.
One of them muttered about who things were not going as planned, or they weren't paid to handle this. Something generic like that.
Seeing that the powerful enemy shinobi had left, bolstered the moral of the Konoha shinobi that much more, and the fighting began to tip in their favor quiet rapidly. Soon, more Sound and Sand ninja were beginning to retreat or surrender as the determination of the Leave shinobi had grown just that much more.
Being freed from his fighting, a tired Minato rushed to his wife and daughter to check on them as well as to find out what was going on with his son. Both girls told all they could. Now Minato had to decide if it he should go and find Naruto, or to stay with his wife.
It did not take long for the father to conclude that finding his son was better than just being there for his third child's birth. Also, his wife threatened him several times over to find their son. So, he did just that, just as Naruto was being engulfed in Gaara's sand.
But before the Hokage could do anything, Sasuke of all people, appeared suddenly next to Gaara and jabbed a kunai into the mutated boy's side.
The boy could simply not sit back and watch any longer. His belief in what his father was doing as the right thing had worn out. He was an Uchiha, but he was also a shinobi of this village.
And, while he was still very conflicted with his father trying to kill his best friend, Sasuke did know that he could not allow Gaara to kill him and potentially everyone else in his home.
Gaara let out an annoyed roar before swiping away the Uchiha. He suddenly remembered who he had been fighting at the very beginning. The first person to question his life's meaning by hurting him for the first time.
Even after being shoved aside, the sandy cocoon that encased Naruto remained and only fell to the ground and still retained it's shape.
Turning to his old opponent, Gaara could not hide the twisted grin that adorned his sand coated face. "It's almost time." He practically giggled. "After I kill this one, I'm going to let it all out. I will make sure that nobody well even remember the Village Hidden within the Leaves!" A small sandstorm began to whip up around the boy as he began to slowly grow larger in size. It even began to regrow the arm that had been severed.
Seeing that things were ow officially out of hand, Orochimaru quietly ordered a retreat. Whatever his goals involving the invasion were, they were not worth risking all of his troops to a sand demon. But, he had become curious about Minato's son and was planning on having another meeting with the boy to find out exactly what was contained within him.
Sasuke tried to reach Gaara, but the whipping sand made it impossible without risk of serious harm.
Gaara's form continued to grow larger and larger in size until it could no longer be ignored by those still fighting in the arena. Mostly because it had grown to almost eight feet in height.
As suddenly as it had began, the sand storm dissipated and the creature looked itself over with surprise.
"Hey!" It shouted in a voice completely unlike Gaara's. "What gives!?" It looked at it's missing arm before summoning a mass of sand to reform the limb. "I should be a hundred times bigger than this!" It glared at the humans in front of it. "What did you useless bugs do?!"
No letting this new creature get any kind of advantage, Sasuke and several other shinobi leapt towards the beast. A few were swiped away easily by one of it's massive arms. The rest by a large gust of air that the creature blew out of it's massive maw.
Minato even came into to try and stop the monster. He successfully dodged it's swinging limbs and closed in on it. With a powerful thrust, the Hokage embedded one of his custom tri-pronged kunai into the beast's large gut. He quickly leapt back out of the way as the creature let out an annoyed cry and attempted to slash the man's body into a nice red paste on the hard ground.
"What are you all trying to do?" The monster laughed. "Don't you know who I am? I am the great sand demon, Shukaku!" To show his mastery over the ground, the raccoon demon summoned up large pillars of sand that quickly snatched up anyone close to them. All the while, the sand beast laughed. "I'm going to turn this entire land into one massive desert!"
It swirled it's two massive arms and it's giant tail around, starting another sand storm. However, this one was already much bigger than the last, with it reaching far past the arena and beginning to encompass the entire village.
"This is going to be so much fun!" Shukaku burst into a fit of insane laughter.
"Oh." A deep and twisted voice boomed from within the sandy cocoon that Naruto had been buried within. "We could not agree more."
Shukaku glared at where the voice came from before bringing a hand up in it's direction and slowly balling his hand into a fist. The sand making up the small tomb growing harder and tighter around the body inside it while raising into the air a few feet. However, no matter how much effort he put into the final part of the technique, the sand would only tighten to a certain point and go no further.
Annoyed, Shukaku tried putting more sand around the tomb. But, nothing different happened. Whatever Naruto had been turning into at the time of his capture, it was simply not allowing the sand demon to crush it.
"You can keep trying." The voice from within it chuckled. "But you will never be able to crush us."
Even with him putting all of his efforts to crush the makeshift sand coffin, it started to slowly expand outward. Small black tendrils began to worm their way through the sand, making the overall structure weaker and weaker.
Shukaku brought up another hand to try and hold the expanding structure, but it changed nothing. He even tried adding more and more sand. Again, no real difference with every tentacle he covered easily poking right back through.
After trying for so long, Shukaku just got frustrated and decide to let whatever was inside out. If it was not going to agree with the quick and easy way to die, then it would have to settle for long and painful.
With the sand tomb once again fallen to the ground, more and more black tendrils poked out of it until finally, whatever Naruto had become was released in a burst of sand and tentacles.
The tentacles mass quickly retreated back to their host, who had finally revealed itself.
Whatever Naruto had become, was not too entirely inhuman however. Bipedal and humanoid in shape and musculature. What stood out, was everything else. The creature stood eight feet tall, had oily-black skin with white veins running all over it's form and had an almost slimy/wet appearance. The nails on the thing's hands and feet had become sharp dark purple claws.
The head of the creature was ever so slightly elongated, making the cheek-less jaws look much bigger than what would normally belong. Speaking of which, the mouth was filled to the brim with rows of long and misshaped, sharp fangs that were more than capable of piercing muscle and bone. It's eyes were two massive, milky-white splotches that were placed more on the face than in the skull like most every other living thing.
The creature looked down at it's hands before clenching it's fists. "Oh." It groaned happily. "It's good to be back."