Take Two Round Two

by Third Fang

What do you get when you cross several interdimensional god like beings, raw boredom, a world of Naruto that went wrong, several years worth of off screen training, common sense, insanity, humor, sarcasm, the Log, explosions, plot, and overall chaos? Apparently a lot of headache medicine for Tsunade. May the Games Begin. Sequel to Yet Again With A Little Extra Help.

28. Chapter 27

Chapter Twenty Seven: The Janitors are on strike! All is lost! The monkeys have all the ammo they need! Repent! Repent!

I don't own Naruto, any of its characters, or any references in this story. If I did, horrible things would happen. Neither do I own any other anime that I reference. I do own all OC's and new Jutsu in the story as well as every ounce of pure awesome spawned by this.

o. o. o.

Kisame had had a suspicion that the day would go wrong from the beginning.

Well, they were going to invade Iwa with the full force of Akatsuki and a small army of Iwa rebels, so that deviation from the norm in itself was to be expected, but he stood by what he meant.

It first started with a subtle tingling in the back of his mind. A gut feeling that something big would happen. He would have brushed it off as a pre battle jitter if it weren't for the fact that he didn't get those anymore.

He got pre battle boners.

Itachi rarely spoke in general, but he almost became mute the first time he found that out.

And considering the fact that the Uchiha was at most fourteen when he first joined Akatuski... well, even Kisame felt a tad bit embarrassed and guilty from that particular revelation.

He was a murderer and a battle junky, not a pedophile and exhibitionist people.

He never really gave much thought to sexuality. He was never going to turn down a good time if he had a say in the matter so long as his partner wasn't carrying anything he'd regret later. But it didn't define him in any way. He didn't really have any particular preferences. He liked who he liked at that given time. It's not like he could be picky with his looks and reputation. What was the term again?

Oh right, pansexual.

But again, he didn't get jitters anymore, or at least he shouldn't.

The second hint that something was off was when Samehada started to get jumpy on their way up the mountains that surrounded Iwa. His beloved sword started taking in a good deal of chakra from seemingly thin air for about ten minutes before the mystery source was cut off and left his weapon noticeably put out. It creeped out the weaklings near him when she started to writhe on his back in disappointment, just enough for some of her razor sharp scales to poke out from the wrappings, which admittedly amused him.

Still, that should have been his biggest clue of what he was approaching. He should have known better. He had known that the Oogakari that taught the Kyubi had been here recently, and just written it off as Samehada eating the dregs of his wind technique.

He should have known his luck better by now.

The third hint was just before they made it to Iwa. Everyone in Akatsuki could tell that they were being watched, but the feeling was different from usual. It was as if thousands of eyes were looking at them from a single moving point in the sky that was constantly jumping around, but he could barely feel out where it was exactly, and he couldn't see anything to prove it was there in the first place.

It was just a feeling after all.

Presence. That was the power that "Tobi" gave them all. It was a useful trick that he'd enjoy figuring out later on. They didn't have much time to practice it, but he could already tell that there would be many benefits to reap later. No wonder those nut jobs in Konoha had made such progress lately. They've all had years to build their own natures up, and those Oogakari guys even longer. He was interested in seeing just what this new power could do when put up against itself.

Itachi apparently took to it naturally, not surprising seeing as he was a genius. Kisame could already tell that his partner knew exactly what to look for. Maybe Presence worked well in conjunction with the Sharingan. He'd have to ask about that later.

Hidan, surprisingly, could tell as well.

That guy creeped him out now. He was always annoying, but ever since the Nanabi failure, he had changed. Turned… wrong. After learning Presence, Kisame could confidently say that there was something seriously off about the mad priest. Something very dangerous. Even for them, which was really saying something. All of the other Akatsuki members could tell as well.

There was already a silent agreement to observe and watch Hidan's performance and behavior today. There was a chance that their group would unfortunately have to sustain additional, but necessary losses in the near future.

The last hint had been, of course, the Konoha spies that had been captured not far from the village.

Spies from all five villages were everywhere. That went without saying. It was an obvious fact, like, fish need water to live, and fire is hot.

But spies in uniform in enemy territory just when your group are about to make a move is another story entirely.

Despite what most civilians thought, shinobi didn't always wear their headbands that portrayed where they came from. While they did wear the pieces of metal to express their pride for their village, they also did it for a far more selfish and practical reason: advertising. The more jobs a Konoha shinobi was seeing doing, the more jobs Konoha would get.

Unless of course, it was a job that no one wanted to take credit for doing.

For that simple reason spies and assassins in particular rarely went out of their home in full village uniform when on the job. No one was to know they were shinobi in the first place.

More so when you were in the middle of enemy territory.

Kinda made things unnecessarily more difficult for no good reason.

Which begged the question, why the hell were three Konoha shinobi here in the first place?

Say what you want about Zetsu, but the freak was just as good if not better at detecting others as Pain and Itachi, and he didn't even have a cheating doujutsu to help him out.

Pain would have taken some time to delay their movements to interrogate the three if Itachi didn't point out the seals on their bodies, set to destroy their minds and bodies before any real information got out.

ROOT agents. Konoha shinobi were annoying to one degree or another, but those guys took it to a higher level. They couldn't fight for shit against someone that was actually good, but they were trained in virtually every and any way to piss you off. Cowards, the lot of them.

No one missed the peculiar expression that Pain and Konan made for the briefest of moments when Itachi made the revelation. No one seemed to know what they were thinking, but Pain's decision to turn them into a show for Iwa came far too quickly for it to be an off the spot improvised decision.

Well… that technically was the last hint if you didn't count the faint random yelling heard from the middle of the village occasionally after they made their appearance, but he just chalked it up to the masses freaking out at that time.

But oh boy, of all the things that could have happened, the Kyubi showing up in person from out of fucking nowhere and taking the hit for the last ROOT agent was not one of them.

The clothes didn't change, but the brat sure did. Taller. Stronger looking. Way more chakra. An even bigger smartass. But most of all, the kid had one hell of a mad gleam in his very pissed eyes. There was no mistaking him in the slightest from the midget he dealt with years ago.

His hand reached for his sword the second the Uzumaki showed up, and it didn't let go since.

Any hopes of this being a clean and easy invasion were abandoned as far as he was concerned.

The brat had been a massive pain in their asses when he was small.

He wasn't small anymore.

Most of his "coworkers" were on guard as well, but for the most part they weren't too worried. He couldn't blame them. They all had tried their hands at fighting Pain at one point or another. They all knew the trick he could pull with that seemingly bland looking metal spike in his hand. Even Kisame wasn't immune to it, and his chakra was bigger than even Pain's.

But he knew, oh he knew that the kid was going to pull something from his ass that would make things difficult for them. It was what he did then, and it was what he was doing now. Shit was about to get real at record speed and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.

"You were supposed to stab me in a place that didn't hurt so fucking much."

The second the kid's Presence crashed down on everyone and he saw all six of the Pains seize up as if they were the ones that had been stabbed, Kisame's predictions proved correct.

"So this is what real Presence feels like…" He trembled, feeling the very air around him turn into an enraged beast, using the kid as its only tangible face.

It was as if he was facing down a Biju all over again. The kid was a monster and he wasn't even using the Kyubi's power.

His fanged cheeks widened to the point of splitting his face.

Good god, what a rush. He had forgotten what it felt like to be put up against a monster like himself.

The next second came, and their leader, Pain, wielder of the Rinnegan, was obliterated by five shadow clones wielding massive balls, literally and figuratively, of pure chakra coming down straight from above. The main body was decapitated with a blade of wind by the same brat he had supposedly trapped with the rod of chakra conductive metal still in his chest.

By this point, literally every member of Akatsuki was already almost on top of the kid with techniques and weapons ready to be unleashed.

It wasn't the first time one of Pain's bodies had been wiped out. It had been the first that all six had at once. They'd have to wait and see if he could come back from this, but until then, the mission still took priority.

Iwa would fall, and they would capture the Jinchuriki.

Kisame couldn't help but bark out in excited laughter as he spotted from the edge of his peripheral vision dozens of the blonde's shadow clones floating over the village itself a short distance away, all with cheeks puffed and hands making seals.

In front of him, Pain's main body was falling in slow motion, its head separated from its corpse. Likewise, the main body of the Kyubi, no, Naruto Uzumaki was standing there. His left arm stretched out with a fiendishly sharp looking blade of wind extending from it, black metal still through his chest, his hair overshadowing the top half of his face, and his slit blue eyes glowing with power underneath it without a single hint of fear or panic.

Of course, the power radiating in his eyes could only do so much to express the disgustingly magnificent Presence that he was emitting over what felt like the entire fucking village.

This kid was not going to fall anytime soon.

Oh sweet merciful lords and spirits above and below, this was going to be fun.

Pity that "Tobi" wasn't here to join in at the moment. Maybe if he was lucky the brat would hold on long enough for him to get back.

o. o. o.

"So this is where they've been hiding you."

Han lifted his head up, glaring at whoever it was that interrupted his nap this time. "Who are you?"

The short man wearing a one eyed mask tilted his head to the side curiously. "Does it matter?"

"You smell of more blood than half the people here combined." Han's eyes narrowed, taking in Tobi's image. "You're not from here. I'm guessing that you're one of those Akatsuki guys the old man's been up in arms about. Collecting biju and all that."

Tobi's lone eye twitched ever so slightly. "Hoh? I didn't know that we were so well known here in Iwa."

"Everyone is known by someone somewhere. Even you." Han shrugged casually before flinching. "Ah, my Biju doesn't like you. Or your chakra. Hey. Is it true? That you're gonna wake up this so called Ten Tails and cause hell all over the place?"

"… Those monsters are smarter than I thought. My plan's already spreading out this far among my enemies. How annoying." The Uchiha didn't hide his murderous intent this time. "You look quite calm for someone that's practically gift wrapped for me. Don't tell me that this is all one giant trap. It's quite poorly done if I do say so myself. I can escape from this place easily."

He looked back at the path he took to get here. Primarily the hallway littered with corpses and open jail cells that had once held Iwa's greatest criminals.

The few that he allowed to survive were already on their way out of the facility. No need to waste a perfectly good distraction for his enemies. A pity the more powerful ones had already fallen three years ago.

For a high security facility underground, its defenses were rather lacking once you got inside. Disappointing really.

"The Iwa I serve doesn't exist anymore. I couldn't care less about this place or Onoki." Han smirked. "But, I was thinking, if you guys are desperate enough to actually bother coming here in person, maybe we can strike… a deal of sorts."

o. o. o.

In Takigakure, Lee, Kin, Neji, Fuu, and Hiruzen were glued to the 80 inch television that was in their room.

They had long forgotten, or shunned from their minds, the fact that Crypt had literally regurgitated the thing in front of their very eyes despite every law of physics that said otherwise.

Likewise, they had decided to ignore how and why there was an electrical socket in the guest room that they were absolutely certain was not there before.

"That's him." Lee glared at Hidan. The priest looked back at the screen, smiled, and waved. There was no doubt in any of their minds that the monster could tell they in particular were watching. They could feel his gaze upon them.

"Yeah. That's him." Neji nodded, not trusting himself to speak any more than that.

They forced themselves to keep quiet as Akatsuki moved.

They were stunned into silence when Naruto and Jiraiya were shown.

"Well… shit." Kin summed up their thoughts quite aptly. "And here we thought his first major moment when he got back would be manageable."

That train of thought stuck with them, only intensifying as Pain started executing the ROOT shinobi, when Naruto pulled his replacement stunt, and finally when he obliterated Pain while surrounded by the rest of Akatsuki.

"He doesn't believe in half measures, does he?" Hiruzen blinked owlishly. "We really have to stop putting a limit on what that boy can get himself into. It's not good for our health."

The younger people in the room shook their heads in total agreement.

Crypt merely rubbed his head on the door frame. His face was itchy.

o. o. o.

The entire section of the cliff Naruto was on literally exploded as nearly a dozen S classed shinobi assaulted where he was with discrimination.

Seconds later, it exploded again as nearly fifty blasts of wind ninjutsu launched by just as many shadow clones of Naruto struck home. The combined assaults and shockwaves generated caused a good portion of the cliff line in that part of the village to literally collapse down below in an unstoppable avalanche. Had anyone been underneath it, they would not have survived.

Needless to say, the cloud of dirt and dust kicked up was dense enough to prevent anyone from seeing what was inside.

The audience didn't have to wait long for a new development though, as a single body was launched from the center of the chaos…

… Running away…

… Leaping so that he was roughly a third of a kilometer in the air above an enemy village…

… With his back turned to the enemy and the metal rod still in his chest…

… With a facial expression that told everyone what his thoughts were…

… Primarily: "Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope. I am not doing this."

There were so many basic rules of combat he was breaking in that one leap that it literally hurt many of the veterans watching.

He could practically hear everyone watching him at that moment face palm at once.

Screw those guys. He got the drop on Pain, but there was no way in hell he was sticking around to fight the bulk of Akatsuki head on with most of his powers sealed and a fucking pole through his chest.

Especially when he'd practically have his hands full dealing with just Hidan. They didn't even fight yet and he could already tell that the guy was a monster in the shape of a human.

Got this, he did not.

"!? NGH?!"

His body seized as he felt chakra course through his body, rippled eyes pulsing through the inside of his head.

"Oh fuck you Nagato. I swear, it's like being a sore loser is a genetic trait for Uzumaki." Naruto hissed, knowing that his distant relative was probably not taking the fact that he had wiped out all six Paths of Pain in one shot. The asshole wasn't here and couldn't do any real damage, but so long as the rod was in his chest, he could still make simply moving a pain in the blonde's ass.

"You damn well know it!" Kushina shouted from inside his head.

"Not helping mom!"

"Who is he talking to?" Nearly everyone that didn't know of his unique condition wondered briefly as they only heard his part of the conversation.

Behind him, a cacophony of poisoned needles, fireballs, clay birds, paper daggers, sharks made of water, kunai, shuriken, tentacles shot out at his spine with perfect accuracy. Any single one of them could easily end his life if it hit dead on.

Countless people watching the scene shouted in alarm, not knowing of any way that the blonde to take on or avoid all those attacks at once.

The few that knew him remained mute and watched patiently.

Naruto didn't pay them any mind as he grabbed the rod in his chest with his left hand and ripped it out of himself viciously in a way that would have most people watching wince in pain from just watching it, and many medical professionals scream at him for being a reckless and suicidal dumbass.

Likewise, he didn't bother to notice as all the attacks missed him completely thanks to the chaotic, yet invisible winds that were between himself and the projectiles. They then either lost momentum and fell harmlessly into the village below, or exploded viciously.

For a moment, he was surrounded by explosions in every direction, giving him and everyone there a sight that would be hard to replicate or forget for some time.

Much like the initial attacks, the follow up explosions, shrapnel, and shockwaves did not so much as ruffle his hair as it was all diverted, muted, and canceled out before it got anywhere close to him.

Absolutely none of them had enough force or intent behind them to break through his defenses.

Thanks to all that debris near him though, the audience were able to see countless thick winding trails that surrounded him from all angles, whipping and coiling about wildly with no pattern or reason save for the fact that they were all focused around the blonde. It was if he was generating them unconsciously… no, that was not right either. They were there because he was there.

A fire gives off light. A planet has gravity, and Naruto's presence naturally incurs the air around him to react as such. All he had to do was control the intensity and direction.

Actually watching the trails of air move around him so viciously, yet easily, was almost hypnotic and soothing.

Slowly, the person in the middle of the chaos breathed out a deep, heavy sigh.

Good news. Pain's dealt with. The pole was small enough that it slipped through his ribs, meaning nothing was broken. There were some nicks on the bones, but his natural regeneration could handle that. Plus with his absurd control over air, he didn't have to worry about having a collapsed lung or air pockets inside his body.

Bad news. Until he got some better healing in place, his right arm's functionality was shot. There was no point fighting with it. Some larger blood vessels had been damaged from his rather impromptu removal of the rod too, so he was bleeding something fierce. On top of that, one of his lungs was stabbed through, meaning he couldn't use any of his stronger breath attacks in his current state. Between those debilitations, nearly all of his stronger non-rasengan related jutsu were literally out of grasp.

If he had shit odds against all of Akatsuki at once before in a straight up fight, they had dropped to non-existent now.

Speaking of which…

The Insatiable Ocean Beast of a Thousand Fangs opened its Maw…

With a twirl of the hand and body, Naruto spun in multiple ways.

Every fraction of a degree he turned added countless kilograms of rotating mass to the rod he held in his hand. Natural experience and practice that came from years of using Rasengan and the wind itself made the feat almost second nature to him. Atmospheres upon atmospheres of pressure spinning, condensing, and elongating out of the end like a twister…

… A twister that hammered into Samehada before the boy had managed to complete his about face.

… And was stopped cold by the tides that reap the Heavens themselves, rendering its judgement on those that trespass where they don't belong.

The space between them literally cracked due to not just the raw power between the two strikes, but the mere metaphysical forces conjured by the warriors as well.

From a spectator's perspective, Kisame's shark was halfway eating and halfway muzzled like a mad dog by a horizontal twister, one that seemed, endless, a part of something far larger hiding in the background, and far more solid and distinct than the shark.

While Kisame had his absurd strength, Naruto had in his spin accumulated mass and momentum from the sky above Iwagakure itself around the weapon that had just speared through him moments earlier.

"Ngh?!"

Out of all the members of Akatsuki, Kisame Hoshikagi was head and shoulders above everyone else in three departments, swordsmanship, chakra, and raw physical strength.

Of the three, his swordsmanship was admittedly the weakest when put up against the other two. There were others out there who were vastly more skilled in the art of blades than he was, but his chakra and raw power covered for that in spades, and when that didn't cover his bases, Samehada's natural abilities handled the rest.

It was rare when the man was ever surpassed in raw power in any shape or form.

One of those moments came to pass the instant their weapons clashed.

It was like getting hammered by an entire slipstream.

The shark man's eyes widened as his vision adjusted to what he was seeing.

No.

It wasn't like getting hammered by one.

It was hard to see it at first, but cycling around Pain's former tool and extending for what looked like a kilometer, was a transparent funnel of air spun and followed the boy's movements like a whip, or a flexible club that extended far longer than it should have.

He was getting hammered by an entire slipstream.

Even the greatest of beasts that dwelled in all the world's oceans knew better than to fight against the tide.

They thought that the brat was just running away desperately, jumping off of the cliff like that, but here… way up here…

They might be in Iwagakure, but the sky above it was without a doubt the kid's territory, and he had just jumped right in without a second thought.

It was no contest. Kisame was literally a fish out of water this far up in the air, and no one in Akatsuki aside from Hidan was remotely close to the blonde when it came to Presence.

Any hope of getting through the day with his clothes intact were abandoned instantly.

His beady eyes met the kid's. Slit blue eyes that he had seen several times years ago, but they were different now.

The playful childishness was still there in abundance, but it was mixed with the coldness that came with power, responsibility, experience, and knowledge.

And despite the panicked look he had earlier, and all the times he had freaked out years ago, there was not a single shred of doubt, uncertainty, or fear in him now.

For the briefest of moments, Kisame felt like he was matching glares with "Tobi".

It was at that point Kisame knew that they had made a big mistake.

Naruto Uzumaki wasn't a target of Akatsuki's.

He was a genuine threat.

The sharing of agony. The sympathy of pain. Its majesty and magnificence approached from above like the gift of a bloody knife. All would be thankful.

Thankfully, Kisame was not handling this threat alone.

Somehow, Hidan had reached unnatural heights in the moments that no one took note of him, and was coming down upon Naruto from above, scythe in one hand and spear in the other. The grin on his face made him appear as nothing less than the grim reaper mad for blood.

In a few instants, it would be the kid's blood.

Two claws that did not exist tensed…

"Hidden Art."

"Level Two."

With his current injuries, Naruto was unable to use many high power techniques.

His clones did not have that restriction.

All senses were instinctively drawn below, where two shadow clones of Naruto's were floating in midair, hunched over to either side with their hands at their hips. One fist in the palm of the other hand, giving them the appearance from some angles as if they were about to draw a blade like a samurai.

Regardless of who was watching, or where, anyone aware of the two had their instincts screaming at them in full alarm and danger.

… Two lines were to be in the Heavens.

"NGH?!" Hidan's eyes dilated in alarm, and instead of going through with his attack on the defenseless Naruto, pulled his weapons back in a defensive posture.

This was not Empathy's territory. It did not have the time, means, authority, nor power to avoid the lines in this realm.

"Invisible Black…" The first clone growled, his fist pulling from his open hand with physical strain, the barest slivers of a hyper concentrated chakra blade of wind connecting the two limbs.

"Crosswinds." The second finished, eyes glowing with power as it and its partner's arms flashed in perfect synchronization.

Kisame felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end as the attack literally blinked past him and crashed into Hidan with as much if not even more power than what he was dealing with now. The shrieking of the madman's weapons against the kid's absurd ninjutsu was second only to the backlash he was experiencing through his entire body.

For the briefest of moments, the sky became disjointed, fissured along two hair thin lines.

For the briefest of moments, the swordsman felt nothing but genuine relief.

For the briefest of moments, Kisame thought he was going to die right then and there.

The force of both impacts combine blasted away any dust or debris that was kicked up from Naruto's earlier attacks

The Reaper of Empathy. The Thousand Fanged Shark. It did not matter.

The two shockwaves that came from Naruto's counter attack on Kisame and his clone's counter on Hidan combined into a massive wave, rocking the entirety of Iwagakure, shattering the glass in the buildings below, repelling any follow-up attacks that the other members of Akatsuki had made, and temporarily stalling any of the rebel Iwa nin that had attempted to jump ahead and into the fighting ahead.

In the world above, the Fanged Lord of the Chaotic Heavens reigned supreme.

With the image burned into everyone's minds, both Akatsuki were blasted away in different directions.

Kisame was repelled like a baseball hit by a bat made of Deidara's clay, hitting the cliff behind him so hard that the section he was embedded in collapsed under the damage, burying him under the rubble.

Hidan on the other hand, couldn't handle the combined attack in the slightest. The spike in his offhand was severed instantly while his scythe slammed against his body so hard one could see it digging into his flesh. Both he and the attack fired off like a missile into the sky above the village at even faster speeds than Kisame to the point that he was a blur on camera and soon vanished.

Those with sharp eyes noticed a small speck in the distance falling moments later, but even that was momentarily forgotten when the clouds in the distance split apart viciously in a familiar cross shape and exposed the sky above.

Those watching from all distances could not help but pause and take a moment to digest and process what just happened.

o. o. o.

"That bastard." Everyone looked at Zabuza, seething and glaring at the screen, his hand gripping Kubikirihouchou tightly. "I knew he was holding back during our fight, but by this much? There's being considerate, and then there's being fucking insulting."

Haku couldn't help but agree with her father figure slightly, but she didn't let her pride blind her to details. "Zabuza. Please calm down. Those clones were using that concentrated chakra he used on us. We never saw his clones do that before. There's probably a reason for that. Shadow clones made with that power… there has to be restrictions on something that costly. Even for him."

The swordsman looked at her with a very unpleasant look in his eyes before relaxing slightly, breathing deeply through his nose in the process. "Haaah. You're probably right Haku. That kid is the type to make a jutsu like that. A high power support clone. Costly, but able to hold its own. Probably has a long life, but is a pain to move places, make, and hide. Probably a few other hidden caveats as well knowing his luck. Yeah… something like that sounds useful and something he'd come up with. Perfect for a big fight that needs preparing for, and matches his fighting style to a T."

Mei frowned as the man began to laugh bitterly. She had heard it only a few times, but she knew enough to know that it meant nothing good. "Something wrong?"

"That brat." Zabuza shook his head, focusing on the screen again. "He just can't stop finding ways to get more disgustingly strong, can he? I'm starting to see why Ghost sealed off the Fox and Natural Energy from him."

o. o. o.

Naruto sighed, allowing the force of his counterattack on Kisame to launch himself further away from the cliff and allowing his body to relax as gravity took hold. While most people would freak out at the idea of free falling from such a great height, Naruto merely took it in stride, acting as natural as if he was lying on a bed.

After what he had just done, what his specialties were, and just how far out into open air he was, there would be exceptionally few people that would be willing to follow him out this far without at least a few moments preparation. A few moments he could use to gather his thoughts.

He lifted his left hand, still holding Nagato's metal rod, and watched it shake from the brief clash he had with Kisame. He could barely feel his fingers at the moment.

Power and mass were important when it came to brute force. He didn't compare when it came to physical power, so he made up for that deficiency with using his chakra to accumulate outside mass and motion in his own strike.

But that could easily be undone if that same mass and power he accumulated was severed from his control. That fucking sword of Kisame's almost ate away his connection to slipstream he had made. If the guy had actually known how to use his Presence to enhance the weapon's chakra absorbing abilities in the first place, there was a good chance he would have been in seriously deep shit right now.

That guy really is his absolute worst matchup. Considering the amount of chakra his sword ate just now, he doubted that the shark man would sustain any damage once he got back on his feet again.

As for Hidan, personally his decision to use his level two clones to counter him was a bit of a gamble as well.

Acolytes were not a laughing matter, even ones severed from their source. He could tell that the Priest was at least as powerful as he was, and even more aware to the true nature of all things. Honestly, Naruto had half expected the madman to do something to avoid or counter the attacks, not actually defend.

No, the fact that Hidan went straight to defending at all was peculiar. High Presence. Immortal. Being hit shouldn't have mattered that much… unless…

… Ah. Maybe he really was stronger back home than he thought.

Pain flared through is body.

Not that all that power did him much good with a hole in his chest. He would have to retreat and get that looked at if he wanted a hope of surviving any intense battles. His accelerated healing took a while for severe things like this unless he tapped into Kurama's power, which, surprise surprise, he couldn't do at the moment.

Movements all around him snapped him back to reality, even if all he personally saw was just the sky.

Ah. Now that he thought about it, it really was good weather out today. Not too hot or cold. Shikamaru would have killed to spend the entire afternoon just watching these clouds go by. It was too nice for something like this to be happening. How annoying.

A little above and to the side was Deidara on one of his clay birds, recovering from the shockwaves and making some of his models to attack him.

To his other side, Konan was flying on her paper wings, preparing to spray him with more improvised paper weapons.

Huh. Now he was wondering if she took requests and did birthday parties.

Most of the rest of Akatsuki were still on the cliffs, either preparing to support the two, or yelling orders to the rebels who were stunned or starting to scatter and do their own thing.

Five dozen normal clones were hovering behind him, already prepared to unleash another slew of jutsu. Konan and Deidara probably would have gotten to him by now if they weren't so busy avoiding their attacks.

He had five Level Two clones. His greatest assets in this clusterfuck. Each one was essentially as powerful as an S class shinobi, with all his techniques and access to the Seventh Sense, but they didn't last forever. The more they fought, the less power they had, and their tanks could not be refilled due to running on Level Two chakra. They had to be used carefully.

Two below for counterattacking from irregular angles. Two near him, hidden by illusions, for covering his blind spots using the Seventh Sense to minimize chakra usage whenever possible.

And the last…

"Ahh!?"

"What the hell?! Hmm?!"

He had the fun task of what he had dubbed "troll duty". Essentially, it was his job to hover around, invisible and at a distance, and annoy the living hell out of everyone with subtle jutsu and using as little power as possible.

Primarily while he was in the middle of fighting, and thus confusing the hell out of his opponents while they tried to figure out what he was doing to screw them up.

For example, making any of his potential attackers that could fly, no longer be able to fly.

He had a name for opponents stuck in midair that could no longer fly.

The two clones that had countered Hidan each took a target and finished making seals.

Even from up here, he could see their eyes dilate so much that they were nearly all white now.

"Son of a-" "Shi-?!"

Practice.

Two members of Akatsuki were helpless as they were blasted down into Iwagakure so fast that they broke the sound barrier, the wind jutsu that hit them powerful enough to spawn temporary miniature tornadoes upon impact and devastating the unoccupied buildings below.

Knowing his luck, at least one of the two had managed to survive that with minimal damage, but still, killing two Akatsuki wasn't too shabby given the circumstances. Eight if you counted each Pain as an individual member.

By himself, he'd be screwed in this situation, terrain advantage or not. But with the clones, covering his blind spots and attacking where and when he could not, he was on a completely different level.

He could see how Nagato could keep the rest of Akatsuki in line like this. It really made things disgustingly easier this way.

Another slew of sharp implements and jutsu flew past him. Some exploded when they got somewhat close, but nothing strong enough to actually get past his defenses.

Ah, wait, there were still those guys on the cliff. From the looks of things they were gathering the rebels for additional support or forwarding them to the village below.

Couldn't have that.

"Wind Style."

His voice, mere whispers in the wind, focused on half of the normal shadow clones behind him and holding two fingers up with his good hand. The afflicted clones glowing brightly, their chakra twisting and concentrating them to the point that they lost their forms and became balls of pure power. Nothing as elaborate as Rasengan, but still strong in their own ways.

The other thirty clones backed up, already knowing what was going to happen next and not wanting to get caught up in it.

"Touhou."

Thirty balls of pure wind chakra blasted towards Akatsuki and its army. More importantly, they were thirty balls of pure wind chakra that were each spewing out copious numbers of smaller, yet just as deadly blasts and blades of wind chakra, as if they were wound up springs that were rapidly unleashing its twisted contents in all directions.

He really wanted to call this technique "Bullet Hell", but "Touhou" in hindsight just gave it a more exotic sound to it… that and it didn't tell everyone what the hell it did in the first place.

No one here at least.

He wasn't looking at the cliff, but judging from the shouts of alarm and screams, he was doing a bit of damage.

Actually, now that he thought about it, he might have to apologize to Onoki later for wrecking so much of his village's defenses…

… Wait. Scratch that. Never mind. It was a cliff. Cliffs are evil. Fuck cliffs. Fuck all cliffs. Forever.

A sudden massive wave of something spread out and caught his attention, shielding the cliff and the rebels from his attack.

His first thought was, "who dares protect the cliff from my justice?!"

His second, and more rational one was, "wait, that stuff feels like it is moving like Gaara's sand."

Stopping in midair, the blonde rotated himself up to look at what Akatsuki was doing.

Or rather, what a giant mutable wall of black was doing.

o. o. o.

"Sasori." Chiyo growled angrily as she saw a small tidal wave of iron sand encompass all of Akatsuki's forces.

"The Third Kazekage." Gaara frowned. The most notable of his predecessors, the man was a legend of his people. Even if he was growing in popularity, it still didn't compare with the legacy the man had left behind… although there were whispers of people trying to figure out who would win if the two had ever fought in real life.

"Fuck. I thought I managed to at least damage that thing for it to not be usable in big fights anymore." Kankuro swore in disappointment.

"Wait." Temari squinted and looked at the screen harder as the wave ebbed away. "Sasori looks different from the reports."

"Hmm?" Chiyo blinked before leaning forward… and nearly having a heart attack. "No. No. Sasori, you didn't."

Everyone in the room grimaced or gaped at the image came clearer…

o. o. o.

The amalgamation twitched and jittered in the shape of a hybrid, no longer a spider, no longer a scorpion, both but neither…

Sasori stood on top of a small floating platform of black particles that bent to his will.

He was alone.

His hands were free. There were no strings on or from him.

It was just him, and the Kazekage's body that he was commandeering.

Ever searching for more parts to use for its being, to add to concoction that was its disposable being. Its ideal form will be realized, and all shall witness its efforts until the promised day.

It took some effort to get this to work. Human puppets were special due to the fact that they converted his chakra to the puppet's in order to use their jutsu. Finding a way to stick his heart into one directly and still have it work optimally had been a challenge, but he had needed to make major repairs to this body in the first place, so the time and opportunity were both present.

And he had succeeded.

The Third Kazekage was his, and he was for all intents and purposes the Third Kazekage…

… No.

Like most members of Akatsuki, Sasori hated his co-workers. That didn't mean that they didn't have decent ideas every now and then.

Sasori's power flared, the four containers mounted on his back containing the still beating hearts of several shinobi he killed providing more power than he could ever generate by himself.

He was better.

Between the two of them, it only took a few days for Kakuzu and Sasori to find all the quality parts they desired.

They worked well enough that Kakuzu even gave him a discount for his services. Fancy that.

Just as Naruto had made a wide scale attack earlier with barely any effort, the puppet master replied in kind, his wall of poison laced iron pelting out black rain at the target, each projectile moving at the speeds of a high caliber sniper rifle and blurred out everything in a hail of black that looked more like a rapidly moving wall than individual pellets.

Naruto didn't so much as blink as they all missed him without seemingly doing anything. He didn't even dodge. Each projectile missed him completely like all the others, like he knew they would. "Hmm. This… is new, and yet, I can't help but get the strangest feeling of déjà vu right now…"

As he contemplated his quandary, he completely ignored the sand that had shot past him accumulate into a giant ball of death the size of a building at his back.

Likewise, he completely ignored one of his Level Two clones pulse its chakra, causing the Seventh Sense's chakra to suddenly spike, which interfered with the magnetic fields that Sasori was conjuring to manipulate the sand from a distance. The end result was the sneak attack falling apart instantly, making it fall lifelessly to the village below.

Judging from the screams below, there were apparently some people that didn't use their heads and stay away from the combat area and suffered from their lack of judgement.

Meh. Not his problem. He wasn't responsible for idiots that stayed close to high stakes fighting.

He couldn't do anything about the tons and tons of metal particles that were right on top of Sasori. The man had too much chakra to disrupt at that range, but at a distance the results were the same as everyone else's.

That was, of course, so long as the attacks were projectiles and not extensions of the user himself.

Such as, for example, Sasori producing a single spear like appendage from his fortifications, extending it at speeds comparable to his attacks earlier while making sure it stayed in contact with said fortifications, and impaling the spot that Naruto would have been had he not moved at the last moment.

"…"

"…"

Everyone was quiet as they digested the fact that Naruto was forced to dodge for the first time since he started floating in midair.

Slowly, hundreds of sharp points started to poke out from the iron wall…

o. o. o.

"And that, ladies and gentlemen, is a textbook example of Naruto's luck kicking in again." Sasuke shook his head, knowing full well what was going to happen next.

Every single one of his friends and teachers there, and the small fox that Shion carried, all nodded in agreement.

o. o. o.

"… Please don't." The blonde futilely pleaded to the ever impassive Sasori with puppy dog eyes, who was staring right back at him.

The Akatsuki didn't say anything. He just tilted his head to the side ever so slightly while maintaining his expression. As if to say, "What now bitch?"

"… Shiiiiiit." Naruto's self-hating groan, in stereo since all of his clones were groaning as well, matched perfectly with the spawning of several hundred more tentacle like appendages shooting from Sasori's barricade, sporadically changing directions at sharp angles and splintering out at irregular intervals, but never once slowing down.

He knew he should have just bolted the second he was floating over the village while he had the chance.

"Scatter!" One of the clones shouted in alarm as they all bolted in separate directions to avoid getting skewered.

More than half of the normal clones didn't last more than a few seconds. The rest followed soon after, unable to keep pace.

The spreading cacophony didn't just head in the blonde's direction, but out to the village below as well.

Buildings, streets, and stalls were skewered indiscriminately and effortlessly. Dozens of shinobi, be they ANBU, normal forces, or spies, were impaled without hesitation as they tried to escape the onslaught. A few tried to go under the assault, only to do so too late and inadvertently make their own graves. Others tried to make stone walls, only to be gutted alongside their creations an instant later.

Naruto and the Level Twos on the other hand were made of stronger stuff, and performed as such.

Weaving through the spikes that tracked their every movement as if it was second nature, gliding through holes that they should not have been able to see or detect in the chaos that was following them. The few spears that actually did have a hope of landing their marks were cut down effortlessly by the blades of wind that extended from their arms. It was a mad death dance between six identical blondes evading an encroaching tide of ebony spikes that seemed endless.

From an outside perspective, both Naruto and Sasori's attacks were nothing but lightning fast blurs that only the most experienced and fastest of individuals could keep up with. Even then, many of them had at one point or another lost track of what was happening exactly, or momentarily froze as Naruto or one of his clones managed to bend or move out of the way of a strike that they had not seen coming.

o. o. o.

"Damn. The Red Sand's really stepped up his game." Darui grimaced.

"Not bad, for a whiny brat." The Raikage watched with interest. Personally he would have just plowed through the attack with his raw strength, but in hind sight that probably would have been the wrong move. Sasori was infamous for using poison with literally everything he had. This sand was probably no different.

He'd probably have to use his chakra to make an EMP effect to disrupt Sasori's control over the sand first before charging in. It wasn't hard to do. He's practiced fighting magnet users all the time here in Kumo.

"Bust a move! Yeah!" Bee cheered, trying to dance in time with Naruto's movements.

Unlike them though, everyone else in the room couldn't help but swallow heavily as they watched. There was no way any of them would have been able to survive such an onslaught, let alone dodge all of those attacks. Did Uzumaki have eyes on the back of his head?

o. o. o.

Itachi stepped next to Kakuzu, never looking away from Sasori occupying Naruto. "This changes things."

"Indeed." Zetsu nodded, approaching them as well. "Who would have expected the Kyubi to be here as well? Let alone kill Pain in one go?"

True. There was nothing left of their leader. Not a single body was to be seen.

Not even the main body.

"Mmm." The miser nodded, just as stoic as Itachi, but pretending not to notice Zetsu's amused tone. "Pain's loss is a big hit, but we'll continue with the plan. If the boss really is a so called God, then he'll be back, and I don't want to be around if we do bail on the plan. Still, this entire situation's one giant mess. That kid's an army's worst nightmare with those clones and jutsu of his. We have to keep him occupied or else our forces are going to be obliterated. Even if we win here, we wouldn't be able to control the village without serious investment that can be put elsewhere."

"We'll start sending out the signals for the sleeper agents to act, and spread out our forces. We have to rely on confusion to regain the situation." Black Zetsu hissed. "Still, that brat is our biggest roadblock, and it will only get worse once the Tsuchikage steps in. Odds are high that he's going to regroup with the boy soon. Without Konan, Deidara, and Pain, we've lost most of our air superiority. We are at a disadvantage."

"Do not consider me food already Zetsu. I am not some weakling that can be brushed off so easily." Konan firmly chided as a plethora of papers flying through the air accumulated nearby. Her body formed and her face was as impassive as Itachi's, however it was clear that she had not come out of Naruto's attack unscathed. Her coat was scratched up, and there was a small trail of blood coming from the top of her head down past the right side of her face. "Deidara is alive as well, however he cannot fight anymore. He was in poor shape to begin with, but now he is barely operable. One of his arms has fallen off, and the other is partially paralyzed. He's in the process of retreating now. At best he will be supporting from the back. Zetsu will aid him."

"Wonderful." Black sighed reluctantly.

"I told that idiot not to push it." Kakuzu grunted, being the one that reattached the limbs in the first place.

"Uzumaki has an absurd advantage in the air, and he clearly knows how to use Presence better than we do." Itachi stated the obvious. "That's not the only problem though."

"Do tell. I love listening to bad news." Kakuzu snarked.

"Oh? There's more?" Zetsu grinned eagerly.

Crimson eyes with tomoe spun slowly, tracking Naruto's movements as he retreated while constantly avoiding Sasori's pursuit. "There are five clones with him that are different than the rest. Some are hidden with air based genjutsu, and their movements are more careful and conservative. Their chakra is vastly denser than the others. Disturbingly more."

"I take it that the ones that hit Hidan, Deidara, and myself were among them. Their jutsu is potent." Konan nodded. "A strong vanguard to cover his defenses that he can make when he wants. For an immature child, he has some clever tricks. How much chakra would you say they have?"

"Each one has roughly as much as Kakuzu." Itachi spoke honestly. Considering the heart thief was in the upper tier in their organization when it came to reserves, Itachi's observation was not taken lightly.

"No kidding?" Zetsu blinked in genuine surprise. "No wonder why he's so relaxed and they hit so hard. If they had their own unique techniques, I'd almost think he was copying Pain."

No one bothered to delve further on that particular scenario. It was best not to think about it.

"That brat can move." Kakuzu mused, watching Naruto still avoiding all the oncoming attacks without so much as a scratch. "Taking him down is going to be hard. Taking him alive even worse. Rumor has it that he can regenerate body parts. Sasori's poison might not be able to do much."

"There's still the Kyubi itself to consider." Itachi added. "He already had a notable grasp on its power three years ago. Now…"

"We need Kisame for this before it all gets out of hand, and fast. If he's allied with the Tsuchikage and regroups with loyalists, this will be a problem." Konan came to the conclusion that they all would have arrived at. "We need that boy removed, one way or another."

"Someone say my name?" The Tailless Biju grinned as he appeared from above. Half his coat was torn up, but otherwise he looked fine if his trademark fanged grin was any indication. "Sorry it took so long. The kid packs a bigger punch than I thought. What did I miss?"

o. o. o.

"Haaaaah. Finally."

Naruto sighed in relief as he took in the ebony lattice of iron that stretched for over half a kilometer from the cliff in an attempt to skewer him. He was far enough that he would have more than enough time to avoid a follow-up attack, but still close enough to see all the sharp points still aimed at him.

"What's his problem?" One of the clones grumbled. "You'd think that he had a personal grudge against us with all that chakra he just used. Fuck. Don't know why. He's one of the only ones that we haven't screwed with in some way, yet."

"No kidding." Another sighed. "What a pain. Fighting this guy's gonna take up too much juice if we try and keep damages to a minimum. Where did he get all that iron sand from anyway?"

"Probably seals." A third shrugged, flicking a finger at the tendrils and cutting several of them off with a minor blade of wind that was invisible to the naked eye. "He's stretched his chakra thin. Breaking through isn't a problem, but up close his defenses will probably be even greater than Gaara's. The Third Kazekage used Magnet release. Troublesome. The one branch of jutsu that can be easily handled with large scale Water, Fire, or Lightning release, which we didn't particularly practice much. I knew we should have branched out more. This sucks."

"Oi oi. I'm still injured here." The main Naruto grimaced, pulling his left hand away from his chest to find it coated in blood. The near five perpetual minutes of high speed evasion and movement did not do his injuries any favors. He was likely more injured now than he was freshly stabbed. And now he had blood soaking his clothes, which sucked because fighting in drying blood felt weird and uncomfortable as hell. "Don't go throwing me back into the mess like this."

Though everyone knew he was the speaker, he didn't physically talk. It hurt to do so with his injuries. Instead he was projecting his voice through the air. It was how he talked while as a fox, and was easy enough to do now.

"Konan and Deidara are still alive." Another clone sighed, tapping into the Seventh Sense. "Figures, though Deidara feels weak as hell. That's some good news at least."

"Fuck. We could have finished him off in the chaos with a couple of disposables. The guy's going to be careful as hell now." The original groaned, lamenting a missed opportunity. "I'm guessing the ANBU didn't nab them."

"Nope. By the looks of things, anyone still near the cliff base is either dead, dying, or the enemy coming into the village."

"Shocking."

"What is he planning with all that iron sand anyways?" One frowned. "That guy's supposed to be methodical as hell. A precisionist. This is too much by any means unless he was trying to host a siege, which isn't his style…"

"Or fight a Biju." Another cut him off with a grim expression. "All this might be preparation against Gaara later. Counter the quantity of sand with the quantity and quality of iron. Fire with fire."

"Shit. You're right. This is probably just a test run."

"Quick question." The fifth clone spoke up, quiet until that point. "Anyone else having Déjà vu right now? Like we should be glad that we weren't wearing metal armor going into this thing for some stupid reason?"

"Oh thank Log, I thought I was the only one." Another clone sighed in relief as all the other blondes there nodded in agreement.

"Why would we even be wearing metal armor in the first place?" One frowned in confusion. At their level, armor in general was next to useless unless it was made of some absurd stuff, or served some purpose.

"Beats me. All I know is that I half expect a snarky pervert robot with a personality like ours to show up any second now." The first clone sighed, knowing how stupid he sounded. They all blamed Ghost for that.

"You mean Franky?" One asked curiously.

"No. Another snarky pervert robot." The first replied.

They all paused for a moment and looked around. Nope. No robot. They were doing this pro bono.

"Oi! Brat! You still alive!?"

"Well, we got the pervert part right at least." The fifth clone sighed in disappointment.

"Been better!" He yelled at Jiraiya, who was followed by Onoki, Roshi, Kurotsuchi and a slew of Iwa's forces without looking. About time they showed up. "Been worse, but been better!"

He paused and coughed up a glob of blood, only to swallow it down a moment later. Fuck, he hated getting his chest pierced.

"If I didn't know better, I'd think that you planned that all from the start." Onoki snorted.

"Nah. We all know that the idiot's good at pulling shit from his ass by now." Roshi smirked.

"You know that wording is a compliment because it's coming from the shit throwing monkey." One clone deadpanned.

"I heard that!"

"What's the status?" Jiraiya got to the point. "Na-Pain's illusion broke the instant you came down on him with your clones."

"Um, in order of importance, I took out all of the Pains, no pun intended, Sasori's possessing the body of the Third Kazekage and knows how to use it, hence all that black stuff behind me, Hidan's somewhere over there…" The clone speaking pointed to the opposite side of the village where he was blasted, "I hit Deidara and Konan hard enough that the former's going to be back lines for a while, Kisame's was embedded in the cliff from when I hit him last I checked, and… if I'm sensing things right, the rebels are being spread out and starting to attack the place."

"Tried to hold them off. Sorry." The original shrugged sheepishly, hand still pressed against his bleeding chest.

Everyone stared at him in silence.

Or rather, it would be silence if the sounds of screams and fighting were not progressively growing in volume and variety from all directions.

"Not even five minutes since it started." Jiraiya's voice was muffled due to the hand covering his face. "You see what we have to deal with?"

"I'm starting to." Onoki deadpanned.

"How much time you need to deal with that hole in your chest?" Roshi getting back on track.

"For it to heal completely? A day. To not hold me back? A few hours. Give me a competent healer and I'll be good to bug everyone again without soaking myself red in half an hour. No. Give me fifteen." Naruto answered honestly.

"I could help ya boy." Much to Naruto's surprise, Ma and Pa hopped from behind Jiraiya, Pa landing on the Sage's head and Ma landing on Naruto's shoulder.

"Ma's quite a hand with medical techniques. She's patched up Bunta more than a few times back home when he was young." Pa smirked. "Her bedside manner has mixed reviews though."

"Ma? Pa?" All the clones blinked in surprise before looking at Jiraiya. "You called them out already?"

"It was a pain to summon them the last time I was in something like this, and that was when you weren't around." The Toad Sage grinned cheekily. "Better safe than sorry."

In ninja speak, "sorry" was often synonymous with "dead".

"How's Sai?" Naruto changed the subject.

"He's being treated and interrogated." Onoki firmly stated. Much to the old man's slightest surprise, the kid didn't explode on him. His gaze merely sharpened slightly as he made eye contact. "I know enough about seals to know that the one on his tongue will stop him from talking about why he's here and secrets about Konoha, but he was captured by Akatsuki. He's giving my men information on the enemy forces as we speak. After that he'll be kept in a safe location to recover."

"The poor child wouldn't stop apologizing, even in his state." Ma sighed. "Anyone could tell that he did not want to worry you boya."

"Aaah. This is such a pain." The blonde sighed, his eyes going slightly vacant as he scratched the back of his head…

And was skewered from behind by black tentacles, as was all of his other clones.

And then they exploded.

"Called it." A voice chuckled, equal parts amused and bitterly disappointed. "That kid never lets his guard down unless it's for a trap."

"Hoh? And here I thought we'd have to put in an effort to find you." The Tsuchikage rose a bushy white eyebrow as the real Naruto and Level Two clones reappeared above his group.

Standing on an individual iron tendril, Itachi, Kisame, and Kakuzu looked down at their enemies.

"Jiraiya-sama. Onoki-sama." Itachi greeted politely.

"The Toad Sage is here too. This day just keeps getting better." Kakuzu grunted in annoyance. "What next? Is the Hokage here as well?"

"Nah. The old bat's just busy watching the show from home. Wave for the audience everyone." Naruto mocked, waving to the point where everyone was watching him.

o. o. o.

"Kill him!" Tsunade shouted at the Akatsuki.

"Tsunade-sama, we're supposed to be on Naruto's side." Shizune wept.

"I know what my priorities are!" The Hokage snapped.

o. o. o.

"Huh. The kid noticed it too… hey, mind telling us what the hell that thing is?" Kisame asked. "I can tell something's there, but for the life of me I have no clue what it is and its annoying the hell out of me."

"No clue." The blonde shrugged, wincing as it agitated his wound. "Probably some temporal technomancy that projects its focus into synchronized mediums that simultaneously exist in alternate coordinates."

"…"

Everyone stared at him blankly.

"I know words and things now." Naruto elaborated.

"Sorry, he does that sometimes." Jiraiya apologized, bowing deeply.

"Why are you apologizing to the enemy?" Onoki growled.

"Force of habit." The Sage shrunk in embarrassment.

o. o. o.

Literally every single person that has ever worked with Naruto for a given amount of time nodded in agreement and sympathy.

o. o. o.

"It's been some time, Naruto." Itachi greeted his target with the same dead even voice as ever.

"Itachi." Naruto's tone suddenly became cold… and his expression childish. "Damn you! If it weren't for you, I'd be the one holding the record for youngest person to hit S Rank! I will hold this grudge for the rest of my life until I have my righteous and totally justified revenge!"

o. o. o.

Every member of Konoha's rookie 13 still in the village slowly turned to Sasuke, but did not utter a word.

"I know he's doing that on purpose. I know he knows I am watching this. So, I believe it is only proper to respond in kind." Sasuke took several long, deep calming breaths, and then looked up with glowing crimson eyes of murder.

"Itachi, if you can hear me, please. DESTROY. HIM."

o. o. o.

I have a nagging suspicion that Sasuke wants me to hurt Naruto right now.

"Sorry." Jiraiya wept more.

Crack! Ma's tongue smacked the blonde upside his head. "Boya! This isn't the time to be an idiot! I can see past that stupid illusion you have up! You're gonna bleed out at this rate!"

"Why not say that a bit louder Ma? I'm pretty sure that Kirigakure didn't hear you." Naruto glared at the toad, his illusion fading to reveal that his complexion was far paler than he originally appeared. His skin was clammy and if he wasn't bleeding so much, someone would have assumed that soaked in sweat instead of blood.

He wasn't about to fall over anytime soon, but he was still at risk if nothing was done.

Sasori's attack had not touched him in the slightest, but it did far more damage than anyone had anticipated. All that rapid high speed evasion and contorting his body really messed up his already painful wound. If he wasn't already used to torturous situations and extreme agony, he probably wouldn't have made it out of that without any additional injuries on top of that.

His chest had hurt before, but now it was absolutely on fire.

"Kid." Jiraiya paused for a moment to realize, yes, Naruto was for once injured in a way that was genuinely concerning.

"Yeah yeah. I know. I'll tap out for now." Naruto brushed off the severity of his situation as if it wasn't a big deal, slowly floating away from both groups. "You guys should be able to handle things for now. A Kage, a Sanin, and a Jinchuriki. Sounds like the opening to a bad joke."

BOOM!

"Ma!" "Naruto!"

Up from above, Kakuzu's wind heart unleashed a titanic blast of pressurized air while Naruto was talking, catching everyone by surprise and completely shrouding the teen's image from view. The building below the teen was instantly gutted by the pillar of scathing air and…

"Did… did you seriously just try to kill me with a wind jutsu?"

Apparently it did absolutely nothing.

It took a moment for everyone to notice that the blur that was supposedly Naruto had not moved since being assaulted.

With some unseen gesture, the technique that could instantly plow through steel and stone effortlessly dissipated like a popped balloon, the recoil strong enough to make the head of Kakuzu's monster snap back harshly.

"… Eh?" More than one person around the continent blinked in genuine confusion at what just happened.

It was understandable for people to be surprised. Mastery of a jutsu or an element did not grant the user an immutable defense against it, or elements that it is strong against, no matter what other people thought. Some natural resistance was developed, yes, but outright immunity from a direct hit? No. It simply didn't work like that. The closest thing that a shinobi could have to something like that is an absolute mastery over lightning jutsu to the point that they could redirect the flow of power through their body subconsciously, which had to be trained. Or, the more basic, have so much bloody chakra that attacks below a certain level do jack shit to you. However, even those ways could easily be altered if the enemy used enough chakra or the right moves in turn.

So the fact that Naruto did appear to be blatantly untouched from Kakuzu's attack without doing anything was something that caught many flat footed. Including Kakuzu.

"I know you guys are trying to kill me by taking Kurama and all, but honestly? I find this more insulting." Naruto looked at Kakuzu bewildered, looking no different than how he had before. Granted he looked terrible, but he didn't look worse.

CRACK!

"Gah! Son of a bitch! What the hell, Ma?!"

Shima smacked the blonde upside the head with her tongue hard enough to make even Akatsuki pause. "I'm insulted that you let me go through that without warning me, boya! You nearly gave this poor old woman a heart attack! How inconsiderate can you be, letting me go through all of that stress! Do you know how many wrinkles I just got from this?!"

"Clearly not enough to make a difference." Jiraiya muttered, only to get cracked upside his head by Fukasaku. "Oi!"

"That's my wife you're talking about." The sage glared at him.

"You complain about her more than I do." Jiraiya argued.

"Exclusive husband rights."

"WHAT WAS THAT?!" Ma shouted from above.

"Nothing dear!"

"Rights? What rights?" Jiraya grinned vindictively.

"Quiet you."

The masked creature, not caring or reacting at all to the toad's ranting, recovered from being stunned quickly, cracked its mouth open, and prepared another attack.

Naruto looked at one of his clones, wincing as Ma chewed him out from his shoulder. "Hey…"

"Got it." One sighed, lazily lifting a hand up and splayed his fingers out wide. The other hand made a half ram seal. He wasn't even bothering to look up at the target.

As if it was slammed by a weight from above, the heart monster jolted downward helplessly, flying straight to the clone and landing mask first into the copy's grasp.

The abomination thrashed about wildly, grabbing onto the almost bored clone, flailing its tentacles, and preparing to unleash a fast jutsu-

Shink.

Only to be cut short literally as a wind blade from the clone's hand impaled its skull completely.

There was no hesitation. Not even a cold decision. It came as naturally as breathing.

The single blade was followed up by several dozen more that spawned from the clone's copy of Naruto's Fox Talons and skewering the creature from every possible angle.

And then spinning for three seconds like a blender, chopping the thing up into tiny pieces effortlessly.

If there was a heart in it, there wasn't anymore.

More than one experienced shinobi looked at him with some curiosity.

"Tch. And I had just gotten my hands on a solid wind heart too. What a waste." Kakuzu grumbled.

"I warned ya." Kisame chuckled, taking his sword out. "Kid's gone hardcore. Still acts like a jackass, but you can't fake that look in his eyes. Drop your guard around him and you're screwed."

It was only natural. The clone's execution was too well practiced and fluent to be something that he had decided on just then and there.

Naruto had killed people that way before. Enough times that it came natural to him.

For someone from Konoha, it was a particularly brutal method of execution. Fast, but brutal.

"I'm gonna go now. Don't want to spill blood on everyone." Naruto, the original, waved before turning around to fly away, only to stop half way. "Actually..."

They don't know how, but no matter the angle, the top half of the teen's face was suddenly encompassed by shadows, with only bright floodlights in the shape of eyeballs shining visible from beneath.

Two fingers pointed to the black forest of iron Sasori made, as if issuing a command. "Show them a real wind jutsu."

"Heh. I know that look." Kisame grimaced before jumping up in an attempt to land a blow on Naruto. "Get him before he does whatever it is he's gonna do!"

The clones moved in unison.

The swordsman didn't even make it halfway before he was slammed back by a blast of wind made by one copy, while another flashed through seals at a pace that few could keep up with, and then breathed in…

… Deeply.

A vacuum. A black hole. A pit in reality. That was the only way watchers could accurately describe the rate at which the shadow clone literally inhaled the atmosphere around them.

"Cocky brat. Showing off like that just makes you an easy target." Kakuzu grimaced as he steadied himself against the wind, preparing his own jutsu with his lightning and fire heads popping up on his own shoulders, their mouths cracking open and preparing to counter attack.

Itachi on the other hand reacted in a way that no one expected as he watched the folds and waves of chakra in the clone gather and condense with his sharingan...

"RUN!"

There were some things that simply did not happen.

Deidara admit that his art was not the best. Kakuzu donating to charity. Hidan acting rational.

Among the top of that list, was Itachi raising his voice above inside house volumes. It simply never happens.

Kisame and Kakuzu moved without a hint of hesitation.

All was focused. The Heavens were concentrated.

It is an abnormality of the highest order, and thus must be rectified with the equal impunity.

"Sky Art. Level Two." The clone seemed to whisper to the world itself, head arced back and chess inflated with so much air that he should have exploded several times over.

All the way on the cliffs, Sasori, Zetsu, and Deidara froze as they instinctively detected the impending danger they were all in, the direction it was coming in, and the form it would take.

"Heavenly Pillar of Balance."

It was less of a blast of air, and more a horizontal cylinder of raw power that cored out all in its path, more akin to Onoki's Dust Release techniques than a Wind one. More than loud enough to deafen any and every person unfortunate to be close enough to feel the effects.

Fifty meters in radius, the abnormal blast of chakra and compressed gasses ripped apart literally anything and everything at speeds that bordered on hypersonic, be it iron, stone, or flesh. It tore through Sasori's Iron Sand Forest like it did not exist in the first place, not slowing down at all.

But only those caught within the attack were damaged.

The edge of the beam was akin to the edge of the sharpest of blades. All on the inside were obliterated, while all on the outside as left more or less intact. A perfect, circular cut that all but symbolized the line between life and death.

The cliff was no different, as a massive hole was cored through it, almost without pause. In one side, and out the other, travelling through the mountain range that surrounded the village, clipping and obliterating sections of at least two other mountains until it finally lost enough steam to be redirected by the third, shifting up to the air where it dissipated soon afterwards.

No one said anything initially. They were too stunned by the display of raw power. Even the members of Akatsuki were taken aback by the destruction. The first wall the attack went through was not simply dirt and stone. It was a Village Barrier, fortified with seals, jutsu, and chakra of the highest quality. It was something that was not seen the likes of since the Biju, Dust Release, or Hashirama, and Madara.

No, more than that, Iwagakure's natural defenses were some of the strongest in the elemental nations. Kiri was on an island and surrounded by chakra enhanced volcanic steam. Suna was in the middle of a desert, and made even more dangerous by the genjutsu enchanced heat strokes imposed on idiots that tried to sneak in from the wrong directions. Kumo was also in the middle of a mountain range, with vicious wildlife and massive frequent storms, and Konoha was surrounded by dense forestry with even more vicious wildlife, and their sensory system was outstanding.

Iwa's though were simple, blunt, and by FAR the most sturdy of the five Villages. It was a near unbeatable fortress in war time that no army could surmount, and something that the locals took tremendous pride in. It made them safe. It made them feel strong.

It, now had a perfectly circular giant hole in it, made from a giant wind jutsu.

Done by a shadow clone.

Naruto might as well have just used War Scars on the population if he wanted to traumatize them.

"What… the fuck?" Kurotsuchi surprisingly found her voice first. She knew that Naruto was strong. Hell everyone did, but… this kind of damage was something that should have only been possible with the help of a Biju.

If only they knew.

The technique the clone used was a bit of a mix of various applications of chakra theory and atmospheric physics on a titanic scale. All in all, it used about a quarter to a third of its reserves, but that was only because the rest of the technique's power came from the Seventh Sense itself, or rather, all the chakra that had been in the air that the clone had inhaled, hyper compressed, and focused to the point that it's explosive power was almost comparable to a Level Two Rasenshuriken.

If Itachi had bothered to speak up, he would have informed everyone that nearly half of the chakra in the air around them had been used up in that single attack. Which was good for him. He had been getting a headache trying to see past the chakra fog the kid had set up around the village.

Obviously he didn't. Otherwise everyone would learn that it was not an attack Naruto could use often in a single place.

He didn't use that move simply to punch a hole in a cliff, as cathartic as that was. He did it for the shock factor. To grab everyone's attention.

To instill a sense of fear in something other than Akatsuki.

"Iwa." Naruto's voice echoed throughout the village, using the same exact technique that Ghost had used barely a week before. "I am Naruto Uzumaki, give or take Namikaze, and I am the one that just made a huge hole in your village walls. Also, I'm also that blonde guy that just got stabbed through the chest on wide screen tv. Yes. It really hurts. Thank you for asking."

o. o. o.

"You have a healing factor! No one cares about you! Get back to the fighting!" Shadow heckled, causing Hana, Anko, the triplets, the ANBU bugging Ghost, Specks and Skyler to jump in surprise.

Ghost, Sylvia, and Dima didn't even flinch.

"She still does that I see." Dima sighed, not bothering to note that the woman was covered in burns and occasionally discharging errant sparks from Scab's last attack on her.

"Must be a nightmare during the Superbowl." Sylvia noted.

"You have no idea how many TVs we've lost because of that very reason." Ghost muttered.

"I know you're probably tired of overpowered assholes coming out of nowhere without warning, talking down to all of you like this, but then again, I'd rather not be here either, so we're both shit out of luck in that regard."

o. o. o.

"You're all probably wondering why on earth I, of all people would be here. Most of you hate me because of that guy that died the day I was born. The one that's responsible for half my genes. A man that I've never met in life. Some hate me, because I'm simply from Konoha. Some, because I didn't die when I beat down Han a few years back and don't like the hit to your reputation even when I was the one that was attacked in the first place. Then of course, some of you simply don't like me because of mob mentality, and you want to all fit in with your friends. And then there are the few that have met me in person, and know that I am in fact, an insufferable jackass. Whatever it is, you've made your point by now what your feelings are in general. And you know what? I'm fine with that."

Gaara swallowed heavily. He knew this tone. Naruto was speaking from the heart. His beaten, exhausted, and jaded heart.

"I'm about to tell you all a little secret that you might not like. The thing is, I don't care about you. Any of you. At all. And by that I don't mean you should all die horrible deaths, or you should bow down to Konoha or any brainless drivel that any violent idiot can spew. I'm not a bad person. An asshole at time, but not a bad guy. In fact, if you guys suddenly were the wealthiest place on the planet next week for some stupid reason, I'd say, "good for you," maybe pat one of you on the back, and get on with whatever I was doing because like I said, I don't care and have better things to waste my time worrying about."

"You know, up until now, I was pretty sure that there was no way that he could make an entire population hate him anymore than they already did without flat out insulting or attacking them." Kankuro winced, hearing some people shout angrily in the background. "I really have to stop having expectations with that guy."

"Keheheh. That boy. He's as sharp as a sledge hammer with his words, and he still cuts deep." Chiyo laughed.

"Which, again, begs the question, why am I here?"

o. o. o.

"I'll keep this quick. Akatsuki wants to wake up something very old and very dangerous. The kind of old and dangerous that can wipe out all life on the planet on principal if it gets up and going, and drive people insane just by being looked at. They need the Biju to do this. If they do it, everyone is fucked. End of story. As a reminder, you guys are a part of "everyone". Also, if they win here, Akatsuki is going to use you as disposable forces to get the other biju in the other elemental nations. Which includes me. And I don't want to bother with that shit if possible. You will die for a cause that is not yours, a cause that requires my death as one of its steps. I'm pretty sure that we share some common ground with regards to this."

"Finally, he gets to the damn point." A complained.

"Long story short, I'm on your side, or rather, I'm on Onoki's and Roshi's side for this. They're crabby old geezers, but really, you need to give them some more slack. They're pretty cool if you just let them kick back and relax a bit. Bit of booze doesn't hurt either."

"Duly noted." Bee nodded firmly, already making plans in his head.

"Bee. No. You're not going to Iwa to hang out with the Tsuchikage and Roshi." A glared at his brother.

"Aww."

"That being said, I have a hole in my chest and need to heal. So, I'm going to this nice big and open training area to get treated. Meanwhile, Onoki and you lot can fight or do whatever. Problem is, you have the numbers, but Akatsuki's made up of S ranked shinobi. Quality over quantity, and I don't like those odds."

Poof.

Over the entire village, what looked like a small army of blonde haired clones manifested and dropped down below.

The screaming started anew.

"Every half an hour or so, I'm gonna drop about five hundred of my shadow clones into your village, just to keep things somewhat balanced. I'd put each one at roughly chunin level. If anyone wants to stop me from making more, all you have to do is come and get me. But you better hurry…"

Naruto began to float away from both groups, almost as if he was the bad guy in this entire debacle.

"After all, I am far stronger when I'm not injured."

o. o. o.

Explosions ran rampant all around Naruto from above and below.

Kakuzu tried to burn the boy alive with a mix of fire and lightning, while Konan made her appearance from above, pelting him with a rain of exploding origami shuriken.

Both did next to nothing as a clone addressed each of their attacks, bending their paths through the air and shielding against the residual explosions and heat they generated.

"Oh? I was wondering when you'd show up, Auntie Konan." Naruto's grin widened even more as he flew higher, all but making him impossible to hit from below.

Judging from the sounds and explosions below, it was apparent that things had started to pick up again.

"The rumors didn't do you justice, Kyubi." The Angel of Ame glared at him, her impassive mask cracked to near shards as her two white wings extended their full length. "You are truly infuriating."

"And you…" The teen's grin faltered a bit as he took her image in. "… actually, no offence, just being honest, but uh, you kinda look fat in that cloak. Couldn't you have gotten one that fits better? It's not really a flattering look on you."

o. o. o.

Once more, all around the world, the sound of a collective mass face palm was heard.

o. o. o

"Hey, somewhat sorry to tell you this, but the kid's gonna die painfully now," said Kisame, as he faced off against Roshi. The Akatsuki cloak was a symbol of the group. Everyone wore it without exception. Still, it was a universal and unspoken rule among all its members that no one would ever mention just how unflattering it was on Konan.

Deidara had made the mistake of bringing it up once when he first joined.

That was all the reason they needed to never speak of it again.

"Normally I'd agree with you." The Jinchuriki chuckled as he flashed through seals. "But I've seen him train by raiding the female Jonin hotsprings, stealing their underwear, and then leading a chase for three hours without getting caught covered in them. The kid knows how to get away from angry women."

"Heh." The Shark grinned as he swung his sword. "You don't say? Well then, sorry for being distracted. Roshi of the Yonbi. Shall we?"

Roshi smirked, his arms covered in lava so superheated that his limbs looked more like white silhouettes more than anything else. "It'll be my pleasure, Kisame Hoshigaki."

"That idiot." Jiraiya grunted as he stood in front of Itachi. Neither one of them moving from their spots. Both appeared to be as calm and relaxed as can be, as if it was just another Monday afternoon. "He just can't keep his mouth shut can he?"

Itachi didn't say anything.

"Yeah yeah. I know. I shouldn't be asking you that." The elder shinobi sighed. "Hopefully Konan will come out sane after dealing with him."

"You're worrying for her sanity? That is a peculiar concern."

It was that at that point that Jiraiya began to cry genuine tears. "No. It's not. Out of everyone I've ever taught, Konan is the only one that isn't insane or dead now. She's literally my last bit of living proof that I am not a failure as a role model for the younger generations. Do you have any idea how much it hurts acknowledging that?"

"…" Itachi, much like everyone else watching, really did not know what to say to that.

"Wait what?! You trained a member of Akatsuki!?" Kurotsuchi shouted in alarm before jumping away from one of Kakuzu's monsters.

Her reaction resembled that of many that were watching the fight.

"Two actually." The sage shrugged, completely unfazed as a massive explosion of lava and water took place so close that he got pieces of pumice in his hair. "They were such nice kids too. I didn't raise them to be like this."

Knowing that he wasn't going anywhere at this rate, Itachi did the only thing he could think of.

While it looked like he didn't move at all, it didn't stop the half a dozen kunai he threw at his opponent.

The whip like tongue from Fukasaku though stopped them just fine, right before cracking Jiraiya on the back of the head. "Jiraiya-chan! Get your head in the game! You can complain about your bad luck with kids later!"

"Fine…" Sulking like a petulant child, the Sanin sagged his shoulders and looked around briefly. Kakuzu was fighting Onoki and Kurotsuchi. Roshi had Kisame, and the ANBU they had brought along were occupied with the oncoming crowd of rebels. As far as he knew, there was no one left on the building.

Might as well see how good Itachi is now that he isn't dying and all that.

With a quick but firm tap of his foot, a deep fissure cracked into the rooftop they were both on and spread outward.

Naturally, the Uchiha moved out of the way of the breaks, keeping his eyes on Jiraiya as the man's cheeks puffed out, gathering an absurd amount of fire chakra in the process. More kunai shot out at the man, but they were deflected once again by Fukasaku.

"Fire Style. Hell's Uprising!"

Instead of unleashing his attack at Itachi directly, the sage unloaded all of his devastation into the cracks he had just made, flooding the building below within seconds.

Itachi's eyes widened in alarm as he saw what was happening and shunshined to another rooftop just in time for the one he had been on to turn into an inferno in one massive explosion. No mastery of fire chakra or illusion would have protected him from being hit with that.

Even if he was fighting seriously, the spy was at a severe disadvantage. Jiraiya specialized in wide range ninjutsu, the kind that altered the territory to fit his needs. His chakra reserves were titanic, and the man could deal out and take huge amounts of damage in equal measure.

Unlike Itachi's Genjutsu, everything Jiraiya did to his surroundings was a hundred percent real, meaning the man could easily counter what Itachi did with his own moves blow for blow.

Use of the Mangekyo was practically required against an opponent of this caliber, but even then not without a disadvantage. Tsukiyomi required direct eye contact that was unfiltered by illusions, meaning he'd have to expose himself to use it. Amaterasu worked under the same rules, only it was simply too hard to use it while keeping up another illusion at the same time. And as for Susanoo… he'd rather not use it if he could.

It felt like an eternity ago when he had first encountered Jiraiya with Kisame. Even if he wasn't acting as a spy, he had not been stretching the truth when he said that the best the two could accomplish would be their mutual deaths.

The title of Sanin had lost some of its notoriety as of late, but it was still a title that everyone knew for a damn good reason.

"GRAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

Itachi jumped away, just as a burning white creature that reminded him of Kakuzu's monsters leaped from the inferno, charging straight at him.

He didn't even get that far before he was skewered by burning white needles that sprayed literally in every direction from the creature.

The sounds of metal deflecting metal were heard in the opposite direction as Itachi's corpse dissipated in a murder of crows.

"Found you!" The monster rushed in at the grimacing Uchiha as the latter faded into existence with a kunai in hand.

"Tch." Jiraiya was faster than he looked. It was like fighting Kisame, only instead of that troublesome sword, his opponent was smarter, more diverse, and had more combat experience than him by leagues.

Normal ninjutsu, taijutsu, and shurikenjutsu wouldn't work. Not with that cloak of weaponized hair that was the size of a summon. Amaterasu was just as useless. Tsukiyomi needed eye contact. Normal genjutsu was pointless against the man's wide range attacks. Same goes for summons. Close range combat was suicide.

He could just use his illusions and run away. He was faster and more evasive than his enemy. Escaping was well within his ability to do, but, that would just leave the Sage to take out his "comrades" in quick order. While the idea was appealing, it wouldn't exactly leave him in a good position later on.

Itachi couldn't help but allow himself to smile ever so slightly. Leave it to Jiraiya to push him to such extremes from the get go.

CRACK! BOOM!

The burning white beast flew back, landing roughly on the top of an adjacent building.

"Hoh?" Jiraiya's face emerged from the folds of chakra infused hair. "I'm somewhat disappointed Itachi. I expected you to have some more tricks up your sleeve before you decided to bring that out. If this is what merits for a genius these days, then I worry for the future."

"My apologies, Jiraiya-sama." Encased in a burning rib cage, complete with forming arms and a skeletal fist stretched out, Itachi politely bowed. He looked up, again, revealing his Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan: a three-sided shuriken design with multiple lines accompanying the blades, as though there was a second layer behind the first. "Just as I failed to meet your expectations, you have surpassed mine. Just as there are places that talent can reach that hard work and experience cannot, the same is just as true for the opposite. This is merely a result of such an outcome."

"Cocky little shit. Where do you get off calling me old like that?" The sage chuckled darkly.

Susanoo.

The abnormal giant that was perpetually growing stuck out like a sore thumb to the local populace. Nearly everyone there was practically obligated to pause and look at it at one point or another.

"Susanoo!?" Onoki grimaced, getting flashbacks of his encounter with Madara as a child. "That Uchiha brat can use that infernal technique!?"

"Gramps!" Kurotsuchi unleashed a wave of limestone to counteract the fireball that was launched at her elder. "Watch yourself! Don't tell me that you're finally going nuts in your old age! And what the hell is that thing?!"

"Something that I prayed had died with Madara."

"You and me both." Kakuzu agreed, having encountered the man as well as Hashirama in his youth. "Fortunately for me, that monstrosity is on my side."

"Looks like you have some admirers, kid." The Jiraiya grinned, his burning hair still flailing about wildly with what looked like fanged mouths at the end of each elongated section.

"It's only natural. Though our numbers are diminished, the Uchiha are still lauded as the strongest." As they spoke, the monstrosity around Itachi developed further, gaining muscle mass and a more complete body, as if decomposing rapidly in reverse.

"Is that so?" The Sage grinned, making his hair recede so his body was once more fully exposed. "Well then, that's probably because none of you have ever fought the all mighty Jiraiya-sama before!"

Naruto paused and looked away from Konan's failing attempts to get past his clones to look down at Jiraiya's fight with Itachi. Both their chakra were spiking rapidly by the second. "Susanoo? Already? Ero-senin, for a guy that disappoints expectations all the time, you really are too much… wait, what the..."

"This here is the legacy of the Yondaime Hokage! It took me three months just to get the basic version down!" Floating less than an inch above Jiraiya's outstretched hand was an enlarged Rasengan that was triple the normal size, radiating with raw power. The man's grin was downright savage.

"Listen and listen well you entitled brat! I'm no genius and I'm damn proud of it! I bled and screamed to get where I am today! Most of what I do I learned from others and mastered them to perfection! And because I am not some proud pompous ass that limited myself, I have only grown stronger as I aged!"

Before anyone realized what the man was doing, Jiraiya and Fukasaku both took in a deep breath, puffed out their cheeks…

And blew a torrent of burning oil and white fire into the orb.

Itachi's eyes widened in surprise at first, then in alarm. His sharingan took in the image of the fire chakra and fluid melding perfectly into the orb, turning it into a practically a singularity of raw heat and power with a disturbingly dangerous existence with a crimson outline, a black center, and an ominous white speck core.

"It took me three months to master the basic Rasengan. I learned it from Minato." The Toad sage's smile widened as the severity of his jutsu sunk in. "It took three years to get down the final form. I learned this from Naruto. You could say that this jutsu is my reward for sticking to being such a screw up as a sensei all my life."

For the first time ever, Itachi felt like he was not safe within Susanoo.

"Oi oi. Ero-Senin, that's flattering and all, but are you really going to use that in the village, so close to everyone else?" Naruto swallowed heavily, feeling the power of the technique from where he was.

This was a completely different beast from his Rasenshuriken. Both acted and were formed in a similar way, but this fire element one just felt disgustingly dangerous on principle. Volatile as hell. The thing was a handheld super bomb that could wipe out half the village if it wasn't handled right. No direction or control at all. In fact, how the hell was the guy going to use it without killing himself?

"Heh." Jiraiya couldn't help but laugh in amusement. It was the first time he managed to catch the kid by surprise since he got back. It was a satisfying and nostalgic feeling, to know that he could still pull one over that brat when push came to shove.

Itachi's twisted eye's dilated, and instantly his Susanoo had fleshed out completely, sword, shield, and all.

In a blink, he had warped just a meter or two in front of Itachi, arm stretched out and hair rapidly coiling around it.

"Be blown away by my unparalleled greatness! Fire style. Hell-Sage Rasengan!"

At the peak of his thrust, the hair encompassed the sage's arm, coiling and engulfed the burning technique in a way that made it appear as though it was being launched by the rapidly rotating mouth of a monster, its neck shooting forward at unnatural speeds until it crashed against Susanoo's shield.

The world went white.

Sight and sound and touch were momentarily impossible sensations for anyone in the vicinity for what seemed like an eternity…

And then it all came back with a vengeance.

"Son of a!" Naruto swore as he manipulated the air around himself as best as he could to avoid getting steamrolled by Itachi's Susanoo as the latter flew past him, just before the titanic wave of heat and pressure hammered the area.

He probably would have been killed by sheer bad luck if he wasn't already used to situations like this.

Konan on the other hand, was not so fortunate as she did not have the same natural protections as Naruto did, and was sent away violently to the skies.

Naruto grimaced as things began to calm down. His Seventh Sense was always a jumbled mess whenever he was near a massive explosion like this if he wasn't prepared, and it tended to mess with his head. The disorientation made it feel like he was drunk, only there was no pleasant buzz to enjoy. All in all, it was a pretty glaring weakness to have in high level fights, and one that he wasn't completely accustomed to just yet. Thankfully his clones were already stabilizing it at a fast rate.

Looking to his sides, he saw the clones reacting in a similar way. Dazed, but more annoyed than anything.

Their eyes took in the results of Jiraiya's ridiculous attack. All in all, it was exactly what they had expected, and slightly not at the same time.

Half of the top of the building he was on had been obliterated, as well as the tops of the next three dozen buildings in front of him. A few more looked like they had collapsed from the brute force of the shockwave generated, and there were more than a few fires and melted… well lots of things were on fire now.

The blonde would not have been surprised if all the mirrors and windows within a kilometer of the area were all shattered fragments now.

However, the direct damage had been mitigated to only the tops and upper levels of the buildings nearby...

… And apparently the cliff in the distance if the molten crater the size of his earlier attack in the distance was any indication.

Fuck you cliff. You know what you've done. Everything, that's what.

"He spun his hair." One clone noted, taking note of the burned and shorter ponytail on the Sage below. From what they saw, it looked like the man had just lost half his ponytail. "The rotation and the strength of it focused the detonation into a focused direction."

"Barely." Another snorted, noting how wide spread the damage was. If anything, the explosion and heat damage had been warped to resemble a sawed-off shotgun spread. The part that reached the cliff was the core of the bare center of the attack.

"A rotation to focus a rotating explosion. Feh. That logic's so stupid it's genius. Looks like he got more than just the jutsu from us." The original smirked, getting matching amused looks and nods of agreements from the others.

"… I want his shampoo." One drooled as if he was Crypt.

"Agreed." Another nodded seriously, followed by the others.

"JIRAIYA! YOU AND THE BRAT ARE SUPPOSED TO BE HELPING ME DEFEND MY VILLAGE, NOT HELP DESTROY IT!" Onoki's clearly pissed off roar brought everyone back down to reality.

The accused did not seem to appreciate coming down from his victory high. "GIVE ME A BREAK! THAT WAS SUSANOO! NOT EVERYONE HAS ACCESS TO JINTON LIKE YOU DO ONOKI! IT WAS EITHER THAT OR I SUMMON GAMMABUNTA IN THE MIDDLE OF THE PLACE! TAKE YOUR PICK!"

And like that, the fighting resumed again.

Kakuzu tried to take advantage of the arguing by going after Kurotsuchi, but was cut off by an ANBU who apparently wasn't as dazed as everyone else by the explosion. The girl managed to get away, but the ANBU didn't.

Making things worse, Kakuzu had used the shinobi as a human meat shield against the jutsu and kunai thrown at him as he retreated, ripping out his heart in the process and jamming it into his own chest.

"Hoh? Well isn't this a surprise?" The man frowned as he felt power course through him. "It's not a wind element, but…"

With a massive swing, he punched out, detaching a fist from his body so that it was only connected to him by black tentacles.

His hand made contact with another ANBU several meters away, and then exploded.

Kakuzu had just stolen the heart of a Bloodline user.

"I think I can make due without a wind element for now. Feels odd, mixing two elements like this."

"Bastard!" Onoki snarled, flashing through several seals, only to abandon it half way in order to dodge a blast of lightning from Kakuzu's heart monster. "Tch. I'm getting nowhere like this. That guy's coordinating his strikes so I can't get away long enough to counterattack."

No one bothered to comment or look at how Kisame and Roshi were doing. The relentless explosions of magma and water less than fifty meters away were enough to keep even the most hardened of them away and not ask questions.

Kakuzu looked around and assessed the situation.

Itachi was gone, probably dead, let alone in fighting shape. Jiraiya was still fresh and free to do as he wanted. Kisame and the Yonbi were going at it so intensely that there was no point in going after either one of them.

As for Konan…

"Why are you still here?" Naruto asked in genuine confusion as the lone female member of Akatsuki tried to attack him from behind with what looked like a giant wave of paper that would have overwhelmed most shinobi with ease…

A giant wave of paper that took a massive wind jutsu blast head on, and was literally blown away along with its caster.

Konan was effectively useless against the boy. No matter how she attacked, regardless of the angles and shapes her projectiles took, it couldn't get through his defenses. Paper could never fly through the air unimpeded against the wind itself. She was fighting a losing battle against her natural enemy and weakness.

The best she could do was prevent him from running away, which he was pretty sure was something they wanted right now. The fact that she was still trying to get him was just embarrassing at this point. A bad joke that only idiots would laugh at.

If they survived this mess, Kakuzu made it a personal mission to never let her live this down.

On the bright side of things, he was managing Onoki far better than his encounter with Sarutobi, but that could change in an instant of the old geezer had enough time to set off even one of his jutsu. The Kyubi was injured too and was probably going to retreat soon.

Still, if the brat left his clones behind, they'd be a big problem. And Jiraiya, that insufferable man child, hadn't even bothered to summon any of his trademark larger toads yet. Only those two old ones that yelled more than they fought. Regardless, Akatsuki was in a tough situation.

Damn. Itachi should have taken Onoki and he should have had Jiraiya. They would have had better odds that way.

But, despite the situation, the Kyubi brat didn't join the fighting and take the initiative. He had simply stayed on the defensive against Konan and his heart monsters.

Even with those overpowered clones protecting him, he didn't make an offensive move unless he had to or was buying time.

Was he injured more than he let on? Or was there some sort of limitation to his clones? Or was he waiting for something else?

He said he was going to leave and recover. If he wanted to ensure that nothing happened, he'd bring most of those monstrosities with him, but was being held back by Konan…

Kakuzu loathed gambling. He despised randomness, even when the odds were in his favor. Still, sometimes he knew that poor odds were better than none.

"Konan! Take Onoki! Make sure he doesn't use any jutsu!" He yelled out orders, startling everyone. "I'll handle Jiraiya!"

"No! Konan! Fight me! It's been so long! You're all grown up! Let me get a closer look and see how much you've grown! Take off that coat and show me you've grown! Preferably in three numbers!" Jiraiya instantly tried to cut Konan off from Onoki by jumping an absurd height straight to his former students.

It was a stupid move that no one expected and caught everyone by surprise. It probably would have worked too… if it weren't for the fact that the old pervert was looking at her with a face that screamed impure thoughts.

Skilled kunoichi or not, there were few things that could get a woman moving faster than the rapid approach of an uncontrollable middle-aged pervert that looked like he couldn't keep his hands to himself and smelled of burnt hair.

"I'm sorry! We really did try to fix his borderline compulsive molestation habits back in Konoha but he's really good at running away and hiding like a pussy! Please don't hold his behavior against us! Or press charges!" Naruto apologized to the fleeing woman, not that she was listening.

o. o. o.

"Can she press charges?" Shadow asked curiously. "I mean, she's a missing nin. How would that even work?"

"You'd probably represent her just to prove you could." Ghost deadpanned.

"I can see that happening far too easily." Anko matched his expression.

"Me too." Hana agreed.

Sylvia rolled her eyes. Three. Two.

"… Challenge accepted! I call dibs! You hear that Scab?! I called dibs!"

She glanced at Dima with an amused smirk, and received a brief one in turn.

Some things never changed.

o. o. o.

Before the man could make it halfway to them, Konan had already abandoned her attempt to attack Naruto and went straight for Onoki at speeds that surpassed what she had accomplished so far.

For a guy that managed to actually get his hands on the woman of his dreams, Jiraiya was surprisingly susceptible to the whims of his penis.

"Uh. Ero-senin…" Naruto pointed at something behind the man.

"Jiraiya-chan!" Ma shouted.

Snap.

"Eh?"

Both warnings were too late as a hand attached to a slew of tentacles grabbed the older man's leg.

"Never mind."

"Whaaaaaa?!" With a loud yell of surprise, the sage was thrown harshly back down to earth by Kakuzu below thanks to the abnormally long black tendrils coming out of his arm. The impact the victim made on the building he crashed into was significant enough to total it almost instantly.

Naruto was fairly sure Jiraiya was ok. He landed on his head after all.

"Well?" Kakuzu glared at Naruto with expectation. "I thought you were going to run away, brat."

"And they call me mouthy." The original grinned bitterly. Still, Kakuzu did have a point. He did overstay his welcome, and his wound wouldn't heal itself… actually, it would, but not anytime soon at this rate. Shrugging, wincing in pain, and turning around, the blonde was about to leave when something caught his attention.

Accumulating rapidly, right over the titanic hole he had made in the village's defenses, a small mountain's worth of iron sand was forming into a titanic monstrosity with multiple legs and appendages that did not look healthy to encounter. From that distance, it looked like it could match the size of a boss sized summon or a biju.

That… looked like a problem.

Before he could get a better look, the construct literally jumped off of the cliff edge it was on, charging straight at them.

Yes. Yes. That most certainly was a problem.

Fighting in person was out of the picture, but he had to save his clones for the bigger fights ahead. The only thing he could do was figure out some way to quickly take out one of the Akatsuki from the picture in order to oh who was he kidding? He had already planned on doing this long before the shit hit the fan.

"Oi. You have exposition duty." He patted the clone that had attacked with the massive wind jutsu on the back sympathetically.

"Ugh. Fine." The clone sighed before spiking its chakra high enough for everyone to notice…

… And then flew at high speeds, over Sasori, and out of the village.

"Oi! Auntie Konan!" Naruto addressed the paper ninjutsu user before she could attack Onoki in earnest, his tone held an "I know something you don't but really should" feel that couldn't be ignored. "Take a guess where my clone's going!"

"Konan! Don't listen to him! The brat's trying to pull something!" Kakuzu snarled, knowing that whatever Naruto was doing would not end well.

Against her better judgement, the blue haired woman focused on the flying clone, and soon enough she was starting to get a bad feeling in her stomach.

"I'll give you a hi~nt." The original taunted, twirling the metal rod that Pain had stabbed him with earlier in his fingers. "These things go both ways if you know how to use them right."

It took a few moments for Konan to get what he was saying, but it was abundantly clear when she did.

For the first time in years, a member of Akatsuki showed genuine alarm and fear in public.

"Better hurry." Naruto grinned as though he was the bad guy. "These guys make pretty nasty exploding clones."

"We're forbidden from talking to Deidara." One of them threw in. "Everyone's scared we might give each other ideas. Cowards."

"Nagato." Without even hesitating to think about the consequences of her actions, Konan shot up into the air and pursued with singled minded desperation.

"Konan! You stupid woman! Where the hell are you going?!" Kakuzu shouted angrily, completely caught off guard and disbelieving that she'd take off like that.

He didn't have much time to worry about her though.

"Sage Art. War of Words."

A viciously sharp stream of pressurized water impaled where the heart thief had been just moments before, slashing through the taller building behind him as though it didn't exist.

"Ah. Tough luck. We almost got him." Sighed a mildly disappointed voice from the rubble below.

"Almost nothing. You're a terrible base to stand on Jiraiya. You threw off my aim. How on earth you ever managed to master Sage Mode, let alone stay still to absorb natural energy in the first place, I will never know."

"Oi. Cut me some slack Pa." Standing out of the rubble, Jiraiya cracked his neck as though he was just waking up. His normally coal black eyes were now yellow and slit sideways, the skin around a good portion of his head dyed blood red, but otherwise he looked perfectly fine. "Sage mode or not, it takes a bit to get good footing after landing on your head."

o. o. o.

"I didn't think he'd get serious so early in the fight." Kakashi commented, his book put away in his pocket.

"What's with those two toads that he and Naruto have?" Chouji asked. "I've seen some of the toad summons before, but I've never seen or heard of those two before.

"Those are the two great toad elders." Sasuke crossed his arms, his sharingan active and taking in every detail. "If the rumors are true, they're over 800 years old. I only know about them because I asked my hawk summons about the toads a while back. Even if they are small, they supposedly have as much if not more authority and power than Gamabunta himself."

"You're joking. Those two tiny things pack as much juice as a boss summon?" Ino gaped.

"You'd be surprised what you're willing to accept after you spend some time in the summon realm." The Uchiha examined Jiraiya's appearance closely. "But, Kakashi's right. If Jiraiya summoned the two elders and is using Sage Mode already, then things are going to get hectic fast."

"I've heard of Sage Mode. One of my clan's founders was a Sage, however the feat has not been replicated since in my lineage." Shino pushed up his glasses skeptically. "Is it that formidable?"

"I haven't seen it myself, but from what I've been told, it's not formidable." Sasuke not once turned away from the screen, unwilling to miss a single moment.

"… It's broken."

o. o. o.

"Humph." Fukasaku snorted, meshed to the man's shoulder. "You're just fortunate that the air around Naruto-chan is rich in natural energy and easy to take in. You could have taken some serious damage from that fall. Even your head isn't that thick."

"I'll take that as a compliment." The Toad Sage grumbled, seemingly not noticing something block out the sun.

The world around him collapsed, an iron monstrosity crushed what remained of the building he was in, collapsing the stone structure all the way down to the basement.

"Hooh?" Three blocks away, sitting on the edge of another building next to Onoki and his forces, Jiraiya casually took in Sasori's new state as if watching a spectacle that didn't involve him in the slightest. "That looks pretty dangerous. I heard he had turned the Sandaime Kazekage's body into a puppet, but to literally use it as his body? He must have gotten the idea from his time with Orochimaru. Talk about desperate."

"Huh?!" Kurotsuchi jumped back in alarm. None of them save Onoki had detected the man's approach at all until he was already there. "What the heck?! How did he get here so fast?!"

"Sage Mode too? What's with all these disgusting techniques showing up today?" The Tsuchikage grunted, recognizing one of Hashirama's lesser known tricks instantly. Another monstrosity he would rather have left forgotten. "I suppose your title isn't for shits and giggles after all, Jiraiya."

Rinnegan. Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan. Sage Mode. Biju. All these absurd powers that were more whispers than fact, each one alone was enough to cause havoc to a Hidden Village, but together? The old man was genuinely worried if there would be an Iwagakure after this. His only saving grace was that some of these forces were on his side.

Well… that and he had his own Gekkai Touta to even things out.

"Yeah well, if you don't have it down right, it's not exactly suited for picking up chicks. Be off by a tiny margin and I could have a nose almost as big as yours, Onoki." The Sanin shrugged off the jab and ignored the Tsuchikage's pissed glare.

That monster of Sasori's in particular was going to be hard to deal with if all that iron sand actually is poisoned. Summons and direct combat were a no go until something was figured out. Kakuzu was here as well, one of the few shinobi in the continent that had the age and experience to match Onoki and Sarutobi. If Naruto hadn't had managed to deal with Konan and her wide range of versatile jutsu so quickly, they'd be in a bit of a rough spot, Sage Mode or not. How annoying. And to top it all off…

"Oi! Brat! What the hell are you still doing here?! Go heal already!"

"That's what I've been telling him!" Ma shouted from Naruto's shoulder. "The boy worries more than I do! You try to play it off like you're more interested in screwing with everyone but you're paying more attention to everything that's going on than anyone else!"

"Fine! Fine! I'm going already! Fuck. I feel like I'm in a nursing home with all these cranky geezers." The original snapped in annoyance, sulking and pouting at his uncool accusation. "See what I care. At this rate, you old pricks are probably gonna just going have your hearts fail on you before those guys get any headway."

Before anyone else could say anything witty in retort, the blonde seemed to grab the air to his side with his good arm and draped it around him like a cloak, shrouding and masking his image almost instantly. His clones did the same moments later.

"Been a while since I came across someone halfway decent in elemental genjutsu." The Tsuchikage mused, stretching his arms and back to limber himself up as he watched Sasori and Kakuzu rally the rebel forces that had finally reached their position. He had underestimated Kakuzu earlier despite the information he had, and as a result had been forced on the defensive. Now though… "Toad Sage. Mind leaving Sasori to me? I have some Kage responsibilities to address."

"Rule of Three business I take it?" Jiraiya grinned, getting a bitter snort from Onoki.

It was an old joke that no one in the younger generations used. While the first Kage of all the major villages were revered and respected by all, especially in Konoha, it was the generation of the third Kage in each village that brought them all to their greatest heights. The Third Kazekage. The Third Hokage. The Third Tsuchikage. The Third Raikage. The Third Mizukage. All of them were revered as absolute monsters and pioneers in one way or another, the notoriety of their legacy vastly outshining nearly any and every other kage before or after them.

While Hashirama brought up the mean power level of his generation's power, it still didn't compare to the absurd might and authority that the Third's generation had accumulated.

So much so that many of the older shinobi these days had referred to the time where all of the shinobi nations were at their peak as "the Rule of Three".

"?!" Everyone looked at Sasori, who had suddenly spiked his chakra.

A small bulwark of stone shot up in front of everyone just in time to shield them from the bulletstorm of iron pellets, each one fired off fast enough to tear through a human body with impossible ease. Even then, the stone walls were being chipped away at a fast pace.

"Kurotsuchi. You lead our forces against the rebels. I handle Sasori." Onoki pressed a hand on her back, instantly allowing her to fly as easily as run.

"I guess that means Kakuzu's mine." Jiraiya casually stood up and brushed the dirt off his clothes as if he was about to go out for a leisurely stroll. "Fine by me. I owe him for that bruise he gave me."

"Everyone else take on the rebels. Stay away from our fights when possible. Both Akatsuki can use your bodies and hearts to make themselves stronger! Don't be useless!" Onoki barked out orders as he began to make seals. "Sasori may have the Third Kazekage's body, but that bastard lacks his skill! Anti-Magnet style tactics! Medics, stock up on antidotes and prepare to use detoxing jutsu continuously! Use the ruins as cover! If something doesn't make sense, too bad! Don't expect anything to! Today we get to kill a Suna shinobi with a Leaf bastard's help if that makes you feel any better!"

"Right!" The cheer of his forces came just as their defensive wall gave into Sasori's onslaught.

And all hell broke loose.

o. o. o.

"How is anyone going to find you all the way out here Naruto-chan?" Ma asked Naruto as he floated with cross legs in an empty training ground. Off in the distance, they could hear the sounds of the fighting continue to escalate and smoke rising from the village.

"Eh. I'll give them hints if they take too long." Yawning, Naruto focused on ignoring the slimy and quite frankly disgusting feeling the toad mucus covering the hole in his chest had. Ma was feeding the concoction with her Sage chakra to accelerate the healing process that, when combined with his natural healing factor, was fixing his wound fast enough for the process to be visible to everyone watching.

Now, instead of feeling like half his torso and arm were on fire, he merely felt like he was impaled by a nice and cool slime. It still fucking hurt, but at least the burning was down.

Still, how is it that out of all the messed-up ways he had been healed in the past three years, this one sat near the top?

… Wait. Oh dear log. It was coming up the back of his throat every time he breathed! He could taste it! Gross! So gross! Why? Why did this always happen to him?! It was like forcing back cold vomit back down! It was chunky! Why is chunky?! It should not be chunky! What sick and deranged purpose was there for it to be chunky?! No! Focus! Focus Naruto! Focus and ignore the chunky cold toad bile in your lung!

"Naruto-chan, are you ok? You're shivering. Why is your face green? Was the weapon that stabbed you poisoned?"

"I could mock everyone in the village from a distance with clues. Make a giant twister. Tell them where I am. Set up a scavenger hunt…"

The world around him exploded as something large and red crashed down from above. The ground beneath him cratered magnificently, sinking down at least five meters and caving in everything in another thirty in radius.

"Or, you know, they can just follow the sounds of the rampant explosions. Kinda like what everyone at home does when they want to find me." Naruto went on, not perturbed by the turn of events in the slightest as he still floated just at the edge of the ridge.

"I worry for your future family life." Ma bluntly stated. "I truly do."

"One mind scarring ordeal at a time Ma." The human chided before looking down at the epicenter of the new hole. "Yo, Han. Sup? I see you busted out of jail again. Did you at least get a solid meal first, or did you miss me just that much? You really shouldn't waste opportunities to enjoy the smaller things."

Standing at his full height, dressed in full armor, and radiating pure malice, Han glared at the teen.

"Oi oi. Don't tell me you dropped the soap while you were locked up." If he wasn't being a complete asshole, one would almost assume that the blonde was actually concerned for the man.

Han snarled flashing through a slew of seals and throwing his arms forward. "Steam Art! Crimson Skald!"

A titanic pulse of superheated steam blasted forward, too widespread and too fast to dodge for all but the fastest shinobi.

Naruto didn't so much as blink as his left hand shot forward with two fingers pointed straight at the attack, his entire arm twisting in the motion. "Coiled Spear."

A single warped point shot from the boy's fingers into the deadly wave. A minor glowing dot surrounded by some twisting phenomena that distorted the image of everything around it. At first, those watching the attacks on the screen thought that the distortion was some sort of secondary effect that was blowing outward as the point moved forward…

… It proved to be far more than that as the two moves collided. The main tip of Naruto's attack sunk into Han's with little fanfare or effect for that manner, but a moment later, everything within a two-meter radius contorted, spinning around the path of the point not as if blown, but bent.

o. o. o.

"That's…" Skyler blinked in surprise as the point of Naruto's attack speared through the entirety of Han's without so much as slowing down while contorting and widening the hole it made in the process.

"Space manipulation. A minor demonstration, but unmistakable." Specks shifted his classes, his demeanor cool and collected, not showing any emotion as Han was forced to jump away at the last moment, only for a portion of his armor on his leg to be destroyed as it was caught in the twisted aftereffect of the technique.

"You've only been teaching that kid for five years?" Dima looked at Ghost skeptically.

"Space manipulation?" Hana looked at the commentators skeptically. "You mean like in Time-Space?"

"They don't know the five fundamentals?" Sylvia looked at Ghost curiously.

She completely ignored the fact that Ghost was now, for some insane reason, had a beer hat on, complete with beer, a Styrofoam hand with "number Q" on it, and had a pair of striped panties covering half his face and glasses.

Oh, and he was now wearing a full body fish costume for no apparent reason.

On a side note, he was somehow drinking from his beer hat straw through the panties, causing the cotton to develop a very awkward brown stain at the point of entry.

Everyone stared at him, taking his new image in slowly, digesting it in all its majesty, and reacting in the way they thought best.

A moment later, Ghost was pretending he didn't have several egg sized welts on his head.

Great. Now it was going to be a pain to keep his hat on right.

"I was going to teach them when I got back, but things happened. Obviously." Ghost grunted before turning to Hana and Anko. "Bare basics? Every possible thing in existence boils down to a combination of five things. Time. Space. Rule. Will. And Power. Mastering Presence means mastering those five things that make up your own existence in some form of balance. You get good enough, you can utilize those five things in certain ways."

"You don't "get good" enough to use advanced raw space manipulation in just five years. It doesn't work like that." Dima grunted accusingly. Even by that standard, brute forcing space is harder and more exhausting than it looks. Most masters don't even bother with it, preferring to abuse the other branches most of the time. That included Ghost.

More importantly, it was general policy for dimension travelers to not teach anyone advanced uses of Presence until after they were properly indoctrinated into whatever multiversal organization they were part of. This was to prevent some of the more… volatile, facts of reality from spreading to unwanted ears and cause unneeded headaches. Even the Family followed these unofficial rules fairly strictly.

The fact that Naruto actually knew how to use Space was… concerning.

Judging from the looks that Sylvia and Shadow were giving Ghost, they were going to have a long talk with the man in the near future.

o. o. o.

A genuine hole had been screwed into Han's attack, penetrating it straight back to the source.

While Naruto had no need to move, fitting comfortably in the tunnel surrounded by lethal steam, Han darted to the side just barely in time to avoid getting caught in the unnatural vortex.

Almost.

The Jinchuriki skidded to a halt, a portion of the armor on his right side had shattered as it and his body had bent at the very edges of Naruto's attack, the flexing proving too much for metal, but not enough for his strong body underneath.

"Oi. Do we really have to do this?"

A spontaneous strong gust of wind seemed to explode with Naruto at the epicenter. Not enough to be considered an attack, but more than enough to blow away all of Han's steam and any dust he had kicked up earlier instantly.

Despite being targeted and healing from a normally devastating wound, Naruto looked… bored. Completely put out and unenthusiastic in the slightest.

"Haaaaaa!" Instead of replying, the elder Jinchuriki charged forward, steam propelling him to move at speeds few could match, all but teleporting the madman right in front of his target.

"Apparently yes."

CRACK!

The blow delivered hit so hard that the screen itself rocked momentarily from the aftershock.

Out of all the people that were watching, Han was probably the person that understood what happened the least.

It probably had to do with the foot that was embedded into his stomach so deeply he felt like he was being speared through. The strike had completely shattered the armor protecting his front.

"Ha? Ahhh?"

The Level Two clone that had seemingly materialized in front of Naruto was completely stretched out. One leg extended from the ground to the hips, the other from the hips to Han's stomach. A perfectly straight line in the form of a split that transferred all the force from the attack to either the ground or Han's body.

If a person looked, they would have noticed the myriad of cracks on the ground where the clone's foot lay planted.

"Korui Nuki."

A secret taijutsu technique designed for locating, targeting, and obliterating the opponent's defenses in a single move.

Naruto had only trained with Kenichi for six months in that hell named Ryuzanpaku, but he had made the best of it. Surprisingly, he never managed to get a hang of the Ki techniques there, but he made it up in other departments.

He made a mental note to teach Lee this move later.

For now…

The clone's body twitched ever so slightly, and Han was sent rocketing away at terminal velocity.

He had a mad dog to put down.

o. o. o.

It was a wild dance that almost no one could follow.

All four of Naruto's Level Two clones were, to put it bluntly, tearing apart Han in midair, chaining their attacks rapidly in a way that left the man unable to even comprehend just how badly he was being destroyed. One by one they came in the form of a black and gold blur, striking and leaving their mark just before another had their turn. Han's armor shattering and flying in all directions with each blow that carried the weight of a small mountain.

The rapid-fire maiming was so relentless and quick that to most viewers it looked like the man was being destroyed by a dozen if not more clones at once instead of just the four.

By the time one attack had completed, another was already in the process of striking from another angle that no one had noticed earlier, seemingly fading into reality as former vanished.

Where one might have been able to handle Han alone at the cost of a great expense of chakra and time, all four at once made the task entirely trivial.

No wonder Pain had little issue fighting anyone once all six bodies were called out. Moving this many high-powered bodies at once in perfect coordination would decimate all but the most overpowered opponents.

In hindsight, even if the Deva Path had been exhausted, Naruto really should not have been able to win the first time he and Nagato fought, Sage Mode be damned.

Han was absolutely helpless against the onslaught. Each hit carried enough weight to shatter a part of his armor, twisting and throwing his body in a random direction that prevented him from regaining any sense of coordination before the next one hit and renewed the process. His mind was clouded with the unrelenting jolting motions that wound not stop and the agony that came along with them.

The one thing he had going for him was his unnaturally strong body, chakra, and stamina, but those only seemed to be used to prolong his suffering. No normal shinobi would have been able to survive for a tenth of this. No normal shinobi would have wanted to.

A flying kick to the side demolished what remained of the armor around his chest, sending him reeling and flying, or it would have if another clone had not grabbed one of his legs and used the momentum of the previous attack to spin him around at high speeds before launching into the air.

He didn't even get close to the apex before a third fell from the sky and dropkicked him in the spine, all but mutilating the furnace on his back and nearly folding him in half before physics kicked in and he was sent crashing back into the ground again, creating a new crater.

All the while, the original floated where he had been the entire time, an unreadable look of boredom on his face.

"Ngh… ah. Ahhhhhh." The man could only mutter incomprehensible words as he finally realized that the pain he was experiencing was not from an unrelenting beating, but from its aftermath.

It felt like an eternity to him.

It had only been at most three minutes.

"Fast." Ma blinked in some surprise. "That was the Gobi Jinchuriki and you won so effortlessly… you really showed no mercy boya."

"It was the clones that did it Ma. Working together increases our ability and efficiency exponentially, not linearly. It wouldn't have been nearly as easy if I was just by myself." Naruto's eyes were unamused from the edge of the small crater, ignoring the sight of his clones vanishing in the sky. "You're weaker than before, Han. Three years ago, you would have easily broken out of that onslaught after the first few hits, but now look at you. Don't be a fool. Even with a hole in my chest, you don't stand a chance. Throw away this petty anger you have and stand down. I honestly feel bad for Kokuou right now. It's embarrassing."

"Em-barrassing?" The man stiffened, despite the pain of his entire being clouding his mind, Naruto's words seemed to strike even deeper. His rage triggering the corrupted power in his body, forcing him to move even in its broken state. "Embarrassing?!"

In his anger, he completely missed the shadow clone that had materialized behind him and put a hand on his back.

"Sky Style. Atlas."

The crater deepened instantly, with Han's body at the bottom, pressed flat against the ground with several thousand kilograms of mass holding him down.

"Nami-kaze!" Han hissed, struggling to move whatever body part he had left to free himself. Steam burst from his back as he fed chakra to the scraps that remained of his armor, and a menacing crimson aura began to leak from his pores…

The only hint that Naruto gave before what happened next was a slight narrowing of the eyes.

CRUNCH!

"Haaah?!"

The crater that Han was in doubled in every dimension instantly, flattening him even though he was using his biju's powers. The only thing the audience saw that indicated the presence of the titanic weight on the man were the irregular black streaks that blurred out Han's image and the air above him.

o. o. o.

"… Ruthless." Sakura shivered. "He's completely dominating the guy."

"This is the first time I'm seeing it too." Kakashi frowned.

"Seeing what exactly?" Shion hesitantly looked between the silver haired man and the screen. The boy she knew and remembered… he was completely different now.

"He's in control." Sasuke subconsciously tightened his fists. "Not just of himself, but of the entire situation. Not adapting or games or tricking the enemy to lower their guard, but genuinely establishing himself as the dominant force there from the very start."

"What do you mean by that?" The Priestess pressed.

Kakashi was the one that answered next. "… For the entirety of his life, Naruto's almost always had to deal with random shit thrown his way. Missions. Enemies. Events. Fights. Just… living. He's always been forced for one reason or another into the role of the person reacting, defending, the guy that's been swept up in someone else's problems and the one that's had to figure a way out of them. And, for as long as I've known him, no matter what he's said or done to say otherwise, he's absolutely despised it with every fiber of his being."

Sakura looked down briefly, depressed as she recalled some memories she'd rather not dredge up. "From his perspective, it was as if he didn't even have control of the smallest decisions or events in his life most of the time."

It was a bit hypocritical, but for all of Naruto's claims that he lived, breathed, and thrived in chaos, he absolutely loathed being subject to it.

Unable to control his life.

Unable to protect himself.

Unable to have a single say in what direction he wanted to go.

It was absolutely maddening.

He could not even find genuine solace in his own mind. Not with the Kyubi and his parents co leasing it.

The rest of the shinobi there grimaced. The more they thought about it, the more they came to agree with what Naruto's team was saying. As casual and wild he could be most of the time, the things that seemed to matter most to him upon closer look were always outside of his grasp.

"This… this is his answer. What came out of him losing his patience with all of it. He's always been strong, but he's constantly been stuck against real monsters almost constantly. Now? He isn't the underdog anymore. He doesn't have to play by their rules anymore. He's one of them, not because he wanted to, but out of sheer necessity."

Now, instead of being subject to the madness… Naruto was the source, and anyone that dared to mess with him would be subject to the consequences.

"Winds to deflect ranged attacks. Clones for more precise actions at all ranges at greater frequency. All under his influence, but not requiring his constant attention so he isn't distracted from what he wants to do. Flight for mobility. Genjutsu to hide. Ninjutsu to cause fear in his enemies. He's actively covering as many possible bases and potential threats at once. Fighting him now is less confronting a highly trained team of shinobi, and more like confronting a highly mobile offensive siege garrison" Hinata continued, not looking at anything other than the screen, pity and sadness were in her eyes.

"This, what he is now, is the monster he decided to be in the end."

o. o. o.

"Namikaze. Namikaze. You're such a one-dimensional character it's honestly insulting. Can't you think for yourself? Or is half baked revenge the only thing that can motivate you?" Naruto sighed, floating to the man without any concern that he might be in danger. The chakra cloak around Han was only growing in intensity to the point that three tails were already visible and the air growing stagnant with power, but Naruto didn't care in the slightest. The clone that had cursed Han faded from view, already using his air illusions to stay out of sight.

Stopping over his anchored opponent, he couldn't help but look at the man in pity. Han reminded him so much of Gaara before he was sane it was scary. Was this what the current Kazekage could have been if he didn't smack some sense into him?

Naruto didn't know what disgusted him more. The fact that Han had become this failure of a person on purpose, or that he had no desire to help the man regain even the slightest slivers of humanity.

If he had encountered the original young and insane Gaara as he was now… he… he probably wouldn't have been able to save the kid.

That idea alone turned Naruto's stomach in ways that he had not experienced in a long time. He knew he wasn't the same person as before, but this new disparity nauseated him more than anything since coming back home.

"Haaaah. Ridiculous. This whole thing is just troublesome in every way." He let out a drawn out and weary sigh, as if he was an old man. "Fuck it. I've already shoved an exploding kunai up your ass and beaten you into the ground twice. Might as well try to go all out in trying to talk some sense into you. At the very least, I should be able to get some common ground with Kokuou."

Holding out his good hand, Naruto gently tapped Han's barely exposed forehead.

o. o. o.

Images flashed on the screen, focusing on a boy growing up while going through what looked like a cruel hybrid procedure of training and torture. Isolation training. Physical conditioning. Pain tolerance. Indoctrination. Chemicals. Emotional conditioning.

For years and years and years and years and years and…

"As bad as Iwa was, I never thought that they'd stoop to something on par with the Bloody Mist." Mei hissed, watching the flashbacks which soon revealed to be that of Han.

"That's…" Haku gasped in surprise as she saw the screen warp into a black and white amalgamation, showing Naruto and the Kyubi on one side with Han and Kokuou on the other.

"Han's mindscape." Zabuza frowned, taking note of the spiked chains around the Gobi's ankles and neck. If the beast was in such a seal for decades, then it was no wonder why the creature drove its hosts mad.

Naruto didn't say anything. His eyes were shadowed by his hair, but everyone saw his teeth grinding in anger and his fists tightening unconsciously to the point of drawing blood.

"Brat! What did you do?! Why are you in my head?!" Han roared, dashing forward in his newfound freedom in an attempt to kill Naruto.

He was backhanded almost effortlessly by his target, and sent flying into the distance. While Han may be bigger and stronger than Naruto in real life, he had no idea how to fight in a mindscape to his fullest potential.

"That was… anticlimactic." Mei noted.

A dog. No. Less than a dog. A mindless tool. Han was the result of conditioning that went beyond what he would have tolerated, beyond what Gaara himself had been through. He was little more than a zealot for a flawed idealistic cause that did not exist beyond the delirious. For the grand and sparkling untainted image that was Iwagakure, the village that stood head and shoulders above all others… or so only the most blind, egotistical, and ignorant liked to believe.

Han had been raised with that image. Not as a citizen. Or a shinobi. But a tool with a lone function. A function that the Fourth Hokage had denied. A function that needed, needed to be fulfilled, because not doing so would disprove everything that Han had grown up knowing and accepting as fact.

It had been so long living this way… he was literally incapable of existing by any other rule but this one.

It was disgusting, painful, and nauseating to Naruto. As bad as Gaara was, Han… Han was genuinely a lost cause.

He took in a deep breath, his chest wound did not exist here, so there was no pain.

Just calm down Naruto. You've seen worse. You've done worse. You have shit to do. Don't work yourself up before the real fight has even started.

"Oi! Kokuou! I know we don't have the best history, but can you calm down your container for a bit!? Now's not exactly the best time for him to have another pissing fit!" Walking forward, Naruto did not seem at all worried that he was literally between two of the strongest creatures in the planet.

"Kokuou." The fox grunted, stunning nearly everyone listening the world all over. It was the first time that anyone had heard him speak, more so considering most didn't think he could talk at all. "You're fighting the wrong mortal. There is a risk of the Jubi being awakened soon. We cannot waste time distracting ourselves fighting pettily one another for meaningless things as if we are humans."

The audience had mixed reactions to the beast's words, but their reactions were soon forgotten.

"Ku… ra… ma…" The Gobi seemed to have trouble forming words as it struggled against its bonds.

"Fucking hell. This sealwork is absolute shit. Even I can do a better job, and I'm a moderate level at best." Naruto scoffed, inspecting the chains before looking up at the creature's head. "Look. I'll make a deal. Cut us some slack… and… we'll…

His trailing off was understandable, as was the audience's sudden silence.

The screen zoomed in on the Gobi's face, or rather its eyes.

Eyes that had three tomoe rotating in each one.

"Uchi… ha… trap… run…"

The world inside the mindscape turned crimson red and burned…

o. o. o.

Hovering just over Naruto's real body, "Tobi" silently made himself corporal, reaching out with a single ominous hand…

"Naruto!" Half the world seemed to shout in alarm while the other half was mute with shock.

… And faded through his body.

"Clever." Tobi muttered, taking note of the blade of wind going through his forehead had he not turned intangible. Looking up, he saw a shadow clone with normal chakra pointing a single finger at him, spawning the blade.

Very cunning, but it was expected. He had been keeping track of the stronger clones the entire time with his Sharingan, but these weaker ones seem to be all but invisible in the Kyubi's conditioned air. Like hiding a green stick in a front lawn.

"What?" Ma blinked in surprise and turned around, completely caught off guard by the newcomer.

The Uchiha flicked out a kunai and attempted to move away from the blade just long enough to materialize and take out the toad, only to be forced back as more blades of wind got in his way from different angles.

"Ahh? Scary scary." He adopted his immature persona, squirming and wiggling like a child. "I thought I had you too!"

He felt a click both inside and out of his body, followed by a minor pulse of chakra.

"Mmm." The original Naruto groaned, fully awake and cracking his neck. "Not only do I have to deal with a fucking mind trap, but now I have to listen to your half-baked attempt at looking harmless? I just can't get a break today."

"Huh?" He tilted his head to the side. How did the Kyubi break out of his illusion? He had originally set it up to deal with any mind experts that attempted to shut Han down. It should have been more than enough to take down another unstable Jinchuriki. "What do you mean? Tobi is Tobi."

Naruto gave him a dry look. "I just spent three years with a guy that pulls off the whole, "Hey look I'm an innocent annoying fool but I'm really just patronizing everyone I meet because I consider them to be idiots! Ignore me!" thing perpetually. Unlike you, he doesn't overplay the bit to the point that it looked as if he's liable to wear an adult diaper in public."

o. o. o.

Sylvia, Dima, Anko, Hana, and Shadow slowly turned to look at Ghost.

"…"

"Fuck you guys. Fuck that one time. Fuck false advertising. Get back to the damn story."

o. o. o.

Tobi tilted his head to the side curiously, his posture still a mess. "Hoh? You seem pretty confident for someone in enemy territory."

"And you seem pretty confident for someone that isn't armed with a baby wrapped in exploding tags this time." Naruto didn't so much as flinch.

That got the man's attention if the minor twitch in his hands was any indication.

"You can come out now. I know you're here too. That greenbean guy."

"Haha. Wow. This kid really knows how to get under your skin. Kisame wasn't kidding." The white half of Zetsu chuckled as he slowly popped up from the ground. The murderous look indicated that he didn't appreciate Naruto's nickname for him.

"I'm going to enjoy making him quiet." The black half grunted.

"Naruto-chan. This doesn't look good." Ma looked at both enemies warily. In their current state, it was three on one. Even if Naruto had clones, it wasn't favorable odds.

"You're quite well informed." Tobi's tone dropped several octaves, giving him a brand-new impression to everyone watching. "Showing up in Iwa. Knowing our members and identities and plans. Who was it that told you? Oogakari? Or is there a spy among us?"

"Oogakari? No no. I've been avoiding those guys since I got back in the area. Believe it or not, I wanted to get some peace and quiet for at least a little while before I was stuck in something stupid like this." Naruto waved his hand in denial. "I have heard that Sasori and Kakuzu occasionally sell some minor info on you guys on the side every now and then, and there is that one guy that's off doing his own thing somewhere… but that's the best I know about any recent spying on you. I haven't been trying to keep up to date on recent events. Truth be told, this shit just kinda fell into my lap completely by accident."

It was hard to argue against the genuine face he had. Naruto really looked like a kid explaining his side of things, with a wide and innocent look. There were no tells of lies or deceit in his body language or words. He was completely honest.

After all, he didn't know if Itachi was a spy anymore. He wouldn't dare risk implicate an innocent man of crimes he didn't commit.

The lone sharingan narrowed. "That one guy". The kid obviously was referring to someone not related to Akatsuki or Konoha. It could be a red herring, but somehow, he doubted it. He'd have to do some research later to find out who this person is.

Those clones were annoying. Both the normal ones and the stronger ones. His eye scanned the area around the Kyubi, seeing multiple chakra bodies weaving around and about in a slow but complex pattern. The annoying brat looked like an overconfident and inexperienced fool, but he knew what he was doing. This entire field was already prepped to his advantage.

Pain. Han. Konan. Deidara. Without using a hint of the Kyubi's power, this boy had handled nearly half of Akatsuki with unnatural ease and effort.

It wasn't just ninjutsu, being prepared, power, luck, or intelligence. It was a combination of all of these, while being actually proactive.

The way those unwavering and confident blue eyes looked down on him, but his focus was around him, wary of traps and more surprises… it was almost like looking in a mirror.

This was someone that knew and played the game the same way he did.

He was dangerous, and not in the way the Kage were.

There was a risk to the stronger clones. They reminded him of Kakuzu's heart monsters and Pain's bodies. There had to be a reason why the kid only made five of them. Preparation? Cost? No, if the boy was like him, he'd abuse the clones near perpetually and have an army of them on hand at all times, regardless the cost and situation. There was an inherent flaw that made having large numbers of them inadvisable.

As for the normal clones… they'd be annoying, but manageable. Once he got his hands on the original, the rest could be dealt with in an instant.

He couldn't rush things, but he couldn't wait though. The toad was healing the wound that he got from Pain earlier, and he had no intention of seeing what the kid could do at a hundred percent.

He took a few steps away from Zetsu. The kid was close enough to rush, but far too skilled to attack recklessly. The plant man was already setting up his own clones underground. Dividing the target's focus was a bare basic but none the less effective tactic. "I was quite surprised when you and Jiraiya showed up. Out of everything I had possibly anticipated for, Konoha was not one of them, much less you two."

"I already gave the entire village a speech about why I'm here. I'm not repeating myself." Naruto seemed to completely ignore Zetsu for Tobi, but no one believed that was true.

"I heard. You certainly have a way with words."

"I'm an overconfident ass. Comes with the label. The voices in my head help with some of the more elaborate speeches though. Can't do anything without a solid beta reader these days." The blonde smirked.

"I'll take your word for it." Apparently, the rumors about the kid being insane were true. Maybe Namikaze dropped him on his head when he had attacked. "I couldn't help but notice that you were rather familiar with what we were going to do with the Biju. I find it hard to believe that that mad beast, the Kyubi would be willing to speak to you at all, let alone tell you of the Jubi."

"Speaking from personal experience?" Naruto's grin widened, getting a single annoyed eye glaring back at him. "Don't tell me you're still having trouble controlling the chakra you stole from the fox after all these years? What with your Sharingan, I would have expected more from the big bad Uchiha."

"The creature's told you about that as well I see. No wonder you know so much." His plans would have to change depending on how early the boy and his half of the biju started to work together and talk in detail. This was not good.

His sharingan caught a small twitch on the lips. Something amusing. He was wrong about that statement in a significant way.

"Who knows? I don't know your setup, but the jerk is sleeping most of the time in me. He enjoys dealing with the shit in my life as much as I do." Naruto blew off any accusation with a half assed shrug.

"That's an interesting way to act given what happened to him, what you know, and what's going to happen. I thought he'd be more interested in tearing me apart." Tobi stopped, positioning Naruto between himself and Zetsu.

"Apparently, dealing with me is a worse fate as far as he's concerned." Naruto's grin widened. "So long as the Jubi isn't brought back, he isn't caught, and you suffer, he's all good with sitting on the sidelines and watching the show."

"For someone as confident and capable as you are, I find it hard to believe that you are fine with catering to the whims of that monster."

"Eh. It's not so bad. Be crazy strong. Save the world. Get bragging rights. Destroy the prick that's responsible for pretty much most of the shit that's trying to kill me in my life. All things I was going to do whether or not I got along with him in the first place." The teen brushed off the accusation as easily as breathing. "Pretty generic, but overall not that stupid. At least the monster I'm gonna stop is original and not some overused cliché, even if its name is stupid."

There are times where the events of the world can change on the smallest of actions. A flip of a coin. Left or right. The flapping of a butterfly.

And sometimes, it's simply a few choice words…

"It's not like we're dealing with some idiot that's trying to resurrect some old sealed up spirit, or gain some forbidden power and take over the world, or trying to access some hidden secret ancient weapon, or spawn a World Tree, or become God or why did you and Zetsu flinch when I said world tree?"

… And a minor, barely noticeable unconscious reactions to them.

o. o. o.

"A world tree?" Hana and Anko blinked in confusion, not familiar with the term in the slightest.

"Fuck. A world tree? Are you serious?" Shadow groaned loudly as Tobi and Zetsu all but confirmed what their end game was. "All this shit over a pointless world tree? Talk about a buzz kill. It doesn't even make sense! How the fuck does one of those overgrown weeds fit into a world of ninja? There's no continuity or fluidity in that at all! It's like, the king of all lazy ass pulls when an author can't be bothered with making an original final boss!"

"Uh oh."

Sylvia turned to Ghost curiously. "Why uh oh? It's just a world tree."

The God of None shifted uncomfortably in his seat, bracing himself for what was to come next. "This uh, this might start to get ugly real fast if the kid reacts like I think he's going to."

"How ugly exactly?" Dima warily probed.

"Um. You know how I left him alone since we got back so that he could relax and recover from all the shit I put him through these past few years?" Ghost grimaced as he watched Naruto on the screen hunch his head forward, his shoulders jerking up and down as though he was breathing faster…

… Or laughing.

"He's relapsed and lost all progress, hasn't he?"

"Oh yeah."

o. o. o.

"You… you're kidding me, right?" Naruto smiled unevenly, as if not wanting to believe what he was hearing. "All this bullshit over a stupid world tree?"

"You sound like you know what you're talking about." Tobi accused, slowly getting into a better position to attack.

"A world tree. Used as the general name for multiple planetary level plant life forms, but the ones that are actually a threat or danger to planets at large are the ones that are essentially just giant overgrown weeds that sap the life out of whatever planet it's planted on. They are frequently used by lazy power-hungry idiots since many variants accumulate the stolen power in the fruit of its branches, granting huge wells of power to those that eat them. How far am I?"

Zetsu and Tobi frowned. It sounded like the kid actually knew what he was talking about after all, but there were some details that were off. "Power hungry idiots? You sound like there is more than one world tree."

"They aren't natural, dumbass. Use your head. What part of "saps the planet of all its energy" don't you get? Someone brought that thing here in the first place. You didn't think it just magically showed up one day like that, did you? Hehe." Naruto giggled unstably, his emotions growing more rampant by the second. "Like I said, there are idiots that travel to all sorts of worlds and dimensions, sowing the seeds of these things, killing all life there, and reaping the spoils. The more killed, the more power harvested. It's lazy. It's cruel. It's sloppy. And it does absolutely nothing to help them get closer to the level of the real monstrosities that are out there. All that death, completely pointless! Really, haha, it's funny really. Its common knowledge that anyone that relies on those things is considered nothing more than a joke! Lazy fucks that can't do shit on their own! Hehehe!"

Zetsu, both of them, glared murderously at the back of Naruto's head. How dare he insult their mother like that? What right did he have to make such a claim?

"You really are mad." Tobi frowned. "Worlds? Dimensions? You speak of nonsense and fantasy."

"Heh. Heheh. Idiot. If I'm wrong, then why was your buddy back there getting so pissed when I talked?" Naruto's mad grin widened as he jabbed a thumb back over his shoulder at Zetsu, who he had not looked at since Tobi had walked to the other side. "A weed man from a weed tree. He probably knows more about the thing than you do! Ha! You're probably being used like everyone else! This just gets dumber and dumber!"

"This brat." The black half of Zetsu may not have had a face, but it was clear from his tone and stance that he really wanted to murder Naruto.

Tobi growled, his fists tightening fiercely by Naruto's accusation. How dare that kid say such stupid things! All the work and effort he had gone through to get this far. Akatsuki. The Rinnegan. The Kyubi. Kirigakure. All that blood and war. He was not going to be dissuaded by some boy that had clearly lost his mind!

o. o. o.

"Ha. Haha. Hahahaha. That's. You're. A fucking world treeahahahaha!"

"Kakashi-sensei? Sakura? Sasuke?" Chouji swallowed heavily and took a step back from the image of Naruto growing increasingly more hysterical. "I know we're all supposed to be close, but have you ever…"

"No." The cyclops was anchored in his spot.

"This… this is bad." Sakura paled immensely. "This is bad in a way we've never seen before."

"Hahahahaha! SO HAHA! SO FUCKING STUPID AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

It was not a normal laugh. It was not a happy laugh. It was not a laugh meant to put a smile on anyone's face.

This… was the laughter of someone that had finally, finally, after years of stress and pressure and relentless pain and trials…

… Completely, and utterly snapped.

"Guys? What's going on?" Ino looked around nervously to see everyone's reactions.

It wasn't just them. Everyone in the audience was looking nervous.

Those not in the know had obviously been thrown through several loops already. The whole fight in Iwa. Akatsuki's prowess and abilities. Naruto's competency. The Biju. The fighting. The violence…

… But this was different. Everyone in Konoha knew Naruto in one way or another. They knew what he was like. The constant joking. The random chaos. The annoying personality. The confidence.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA! ALL THIS TIME! ALL THAT FUCKING BULLSHIT WAS FOR AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Not once had anyone ever expect him to absolutely lose it like this. No. Rather, Naruto was the sort of person whose performance only increased the direr and insane a situation was. He did freak out every now and then but this was on a whole different level.

"He's finally lost it." Sasuke swallowed genuinely shivering in fear. He was in a completely different country than his best friend, and yet he was still utterly terrified of what was going to come of this. "He's actually reached his limit on the bullshit he's willing to tolerate. I didn't think I'd ever see it. I didn't think it could happen. He's so pissed that he's shot past every stage that we've seen before and gone completely hysterical."

"He's going ballistic over some tree?" Tenten asked incredulously.

"He's going ballistic because whatever this tree is, it's not only the base reason why everything in his life is a mess, but apparently it's not even something special or interesting from his perspective, making everything he went through feel cheap and worthless." Sakura corrected. "I have no idea what this world tree thing is, but from what Naruto's saying, it's bad news and something that's well known enough that the fact that it is the source of what's going on is genuinely insulting to him."

"Naruto." Hinata gripped the railings tightly. She was scared. She was honestly scared. Not of Naruto, but for him. Something was wrong. Whatever this world tree was, confirming its existence as the reason for everything that's happened to him had apparently been the final straw.

"Hold on. If this is serious, then it would not be best to inquire…" Shino turned to Shion, or rather, the small golden fox that she had with her, and froze in his place.

The small creature was not laughing, but the look in its eyes held nothing short of pure rage and murder. The sort of anger that told other people that this individual was actually likely to literally tear apart the next person that even accidentally caught its attention.

o. o. o.

All around the shinobi world, people watched Naruto laugh his heart out.

His smile was so wide it was painful to look at.

His tears so frequent that those that knew him felt his pain, even if they didn't know why.

But his eyes… his eyes were full of nothing but absolute malice and rage.

And not a single person could look away.

o. o. o.

Tobi lost patience.

He lifted two fingers up and focused.

Han, still in a crater by Naruto's feet, exploded in raw power, his seal twisted into a joke.

Naruto was sent flying into a stone outcropping, hard enough to shatter its side and send cracks throughout its entirety.

"Finally. That laughing was getting on my nerves." Zetsu sighed.

"GaaaaaaaaHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"Careful." The black half warned, taking note of the crimson and ebony monster that had roared loud enough to blast away the ground around him. Waves of corrupted power washed over the area, suffocating the senses of any unprepared idiot that was too close by. "Incomplete or not, that's still a second stage jinchuriki. It's not something that can be easily controlled on the fly. He might kill us or the Kyubi if we get sloppy."

Tobi didn't say anything. He just watched everything unfold from a distance. If he was lucky, the two monsters would wear themselves out for him. After that, he could turn his attention back to Iwa.

But judging from what his Sharingan saw…

With explosive force, Han shot forward like a missile to the crater that Naruto had made, crossing the distance between the two in less than three seconds. Demonic mouth wide open. Bright white soulless eyes. Sharp cruel claws. He was the very image of a monster to those watching, and many of those unprepared screamed on pure reflex.

"Rasengan."

Instead of his prey, Han had collided face first with a giant ball of chakra as big as he was. The clash between the two titanic forces obliterated what was left of the stone outcropping that was right on top of them.

With the dust and debris flying away, the audience had a perfect view of Naruto standing sideways, holding his good hand out, fueling and pushing forward to repel Han in a way that honestly looked like he was barely putting in any effort at all.

"Ha?! AAAH!?"

With a final minute nudge, Naruto's attack reached its apex, consuming and blasting back Han the way he came with interest, creating a massive trench in the ground for the duration of the trip and absolutely wrecking a portion of the nearby mountain where it ended.

"Idiot. He holds a grudge for that long and yet he forgot I could do that? He's not only stupid, he's lazy too." Naruto chuckled, shaking his hand as if it was slightly numb.

"Naruto-chan! Stop being so reckless! I still have to heal you and I ain't no spring tadpole!" Ma shouted irritably. She didn't look like she was harmed in any way, but no one doubted that it must have been rough hanging onto Naruto when he's being attacked.

"Sorry. Sorry." He apologized while brushing the dust off his clothes, though there wasn't much heart in it. He stopped for a moment and looked up at what was supposed to be empty space, but was where everyone not in Iwa was watching him with dropped jaws. "Oi! Stop being so surprised! Rasengan was based off of one of the Biju's attacks in the first place! This one wasn't even a third as strong as the one I made to beat him last time! Stop acting so surprised!"

From Naruto's perspective, and the spectator's view, everything momentarily went blurry and tilted to the side.

Better to act like a confident jackass than show any weakness. He had let his guard down. Han's transformation caught him off guard. He was still a bit dizzy from being thrown a few hundred meters, and judging from his lightheaded state, he was probably anemic by now from all the blood he had lost. If he didn't sense Han attacking earlier, he wouldn't have been able to manifest enough chakra for a Rasengan big enough to counter the madman's attack.

Oh well. Look the part to be the part, and all that crap.

He took one step forward…

… And was face to face with Tobi, less than half a foot between their heads.

The Uchiha leapt back just as fast, avoiding the blade of wind that nearly cut him in half.

"Hoh?" Naruto's fanged grin widened.

He wondered what prompted the man from jumping away. Was it his natural instinct to do so when surprised, or did the Uchiha instinctively know that he wouldn't be able to with the way he manifested his Presence?

It really was a bloody useful thing. Get good enough in certain areas, and you could negate most of the tricks that time-space manipulators used to appear untouchable the moment your physical space came in contact with theirs. Stops teleportation, warping, some methods of augmented speed, physical modification…

… And, of course, the ever popular and incredibly annoying, intangibility.

The bottomless pit. The swirling hole. Whatever dwelled within its unknown depths stirred in anger.

Wait. Nope. It was just his Presence giving the Uchiha warning that he wouldn't be able to phase through the attack.

"You." Tobi growled, clearly unnerved if the uncertain stance was any indication. "What was that?"

"Hard work, determination, and a dash of fuck you." Naruto chuckled. He had not stopped smiling since he had found out about the world tree. "Please don't tell me that phasing trick you have and your sharingan are your only good points? That the secret, excuse me, supposed secret leader of Akatsuki, is just some one-trick pony?"

Before Tobi could reply, an explosion in the distance caught their attention momentarily. Judging from the distance and location, it was likely Han finally coming to again. Stage Two jinchuriki transformations were rather hardy things, so it wasn't surprising.

In that instant, Tobi had vanished, sucked into a wormhole that originated from his Sharingan.

Zetsu had already vanished from sight.

"Heh." Naruto wasn't worried about the new development. Or Zetsu's disappearance. Neither were his clones, which hovered above him. Instead he reached for his belt. "You know. I really have to hand it to you. As dangerous and retarded as you idiots are, I've met worse. Fought worse. Stronger. More insane. More vicious. More bloodthirsty. More terrifying. More intelligent. More confusing. More bullshit. More literally everything you could possibly imagine and more than you. But despite all that, you managed to do the one thing those twisted freaks couldn't."

He didn't seem to notice the crimson and black blur charging right at him from the front at absurd speeds, or the twisted wormhole that was manifesting behind him.

Naruto's grin widened. He thumbed the scroll in his hand.

"You made me want to genuinely not care about any of this bullshit anymore. And that's a joke so bad I can't help but keep laughing."

Another explosion rocked the screen, and everyone watched in tense silence.

The dust and debris that clouded their view of everything lasted only for a few moments before two bodies flew out from opposite sides of the cloud, and the latter being blown away in a brief whirlwind.

o. o. o.

"Is… is that?" Karui gaped.

"No way." Darui's expression turned pale.

"Hooh?" Bee frowned.

"WHAT?" A roared.

o. o. o.

"Zabuza. I am only going to ask you once. Did you know of this?" Mei didn't look at her lover, but her irritation and anger were clear for all to feel.

"Yeah." The swordsman didn't budge, his arms crossed and his frame stoic.

o. o. o.

"So, he's decided to go all out after all." Gaara's expression didn't change.

"Wait. You knew about this?!" Kankuro yelled at his brother, positions of authority be damned.

"It was a need to know basis." Chiyo all but whispered. "And the boy has clearly reached his threshold on keeping this one a secret."

o. o. o.

"Hooh?" Hidan looked up curiously, away from the body of the person he had been graciously bestowing his gift upon personally. "It looks like things are finally getting interesting. Hmm. Hmhmhm. Ah. I should get going soon. I am a generous individual, but it is simply lazy to disregard prior appointments. Especially when there are so many more possible inductees to accumulate…"

Hoisting his tri bladed scythe onto his shoulder, the Acolyte leisurely walked to his next destination.

He left behind an entire building of corpses.

Some were bisected.

Others were dismembered.

He had torn one shinobi literally into shreds in a single strike of his scythe. He had to swing at just the right angle to pull that off.

A few were run through, two were decapitated, four crushed, three impaled on the scaffolding, and he had let one bleed out through her stomach and wrists.

Most though? Most did not have a scratch on them.

They were simply dead. All with horrified looks of terror and agony the likes of which should never be known.

And they did not have a single scratch on them.

o. o. o.

Konoha was silent.

Not a single person said a word.

Those that did not know were trying to process what they were seeing, trying to convince themselves that it was real and not an illusion or a bad joke.

Those that did know, were contemplating just how bad things were going to get from here.

The crimson whirlpool. The endless violent tides, each stream a life and force of its own. An endless phenomenon of nature that no manufactured force could rival.

Standing between Naruto and Tobi was the red headed Kushina Uzumaki, surrounded by glowing chakra chains that extended seemingly endlessly in all directions, moving and coiling like snakes.

The golden bolt. The flash of precision that repeated endlessly but always with purpose. Powerful, frequent, relentless, blinding, yet never wasteful.

Standing between Naruto and Han was the golden-haired Minato Namikaze. The Fourth Hokage. A dead man walking, a legend from the past in the present. His trademark tri pronged sealed kunai in one hand, and a rasengan in the other.

Both supposedly deceased shinobi were positively glowing, not by their own merit, but by the one tailed chakra cloak they donned.

"I keep on telling people that I have voices in my head." Naruto chuckled, the scroll he held unwrapped enough to circle around him once. "It's not my fault no one ever takes me seriously."

o. o. o.

Omake:

Hindsight

Naruto and Ghost were eating ramen at a food stand in a random universe.

"Hey." Ghost muttered after swallowing a mouthful of noodly goodness.

"Hm?" The blonde grunted, speech impaired by his own meal.

"How fucked do you think you'd be if Kisame ever bothered to learn the shadow clone technique and replicated his sword?"

Naruto paused and thought pretty hard for several long moments before swallowing. "… Pretty fucked I think."

"Yeah. I thought so too." Ghost nodded before going back to eat. "Good thing most shinobi are lazy bastards that don't like learning new tricks that deviate from what they know and are familiar with."

"Yup." Naruto agreed.

The two continued to eat in blissful peace.

And then some asshole appeared from nowhere and shot Ghost in the head.

True story.

o. o. o.

Omake:

It's hard to keep a determined man down:

"Heheheheh."

"Bwahahahahaha."

"Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeep potato."

"This is going to bite us in the ass real soon." Waltz deadpanned, watching Scab alongside his siblings travel about in his new mobile support device. "And yet I can't look away."

"Exterminate. Exterminate. Exterminate."

Said mobile support device was in the form of a Dalek robot frame, only Scab's mummified head was sticking out of the top. It looked stupid as hell, but it still scared the living shit out of the locals as the body chased them around the streets.

Scab would have said and done something about it, but Shadow had made the frame, and was moving it via remote control.

"Extermin-bzzt."

"And like that, retribution comes full circle." The old man sighed, seeing the telltale signs of Scab's electron manipulation warp, alter and hack the device he was in.

"I regret nothing." Shadow grinned.

"Totally worth it." Ghost agreed.

Scab stopped moving, generated some more lightning for a few seconds, and then slowly turned to their direction.

"Science."

All four sibbling's looks of amusement dropped instantly and were replaced with images of utter and incomparable horror.

"I change my mind. I regret this now. I regret this immensely."

"Why did I agree with you!? Bad things always happen when I agree with you!"

"Science. Science. Science. Science."

o. o. o.

A/N:

Again, Thanks Kagaseo for betaing.

Ladies and Gentlemen. Boys and Girls. Let me bring you back. Back to a wonderful time of bliss and innocence. When we still had hope and reasonable expectations for the things we loved and cared for.

Back to a time, where we were happy, and were not disappointed and completely disillusioned with the plot of Naruto.

Back… before Kishimoto decided that it was a good idea to put the World Tree into the damn story.

Do you remember that? I barely do.

I do remember, more vividly, how utterly pissed I was when he made a World Tree part of the central plot for no good reason at all.

Do you remember?

It was a sellout. It was unoriginal. It was bullshit. It was pointless. And it ruined the plot and any sense of wonder that we might have had for what came next.

Now remember why we hated the World Tree. Remember how often it shows up? Remember how bullshit it was? Remember how overused it is?

Remember that Naruto has spent the past three years in the story travelling universes and learning about all sorts of things like this?

Yeah. He has every right to be pissed. Not scared. Not worried. Not alarmed.

Pissed. Completely, and absolutely, without restraints or exceptions, PISSED.

It's like working hard every day in your life to get into the mystery dream school that your family's been going to for generations, and finding out it's barely a step above a local mid tier general college with a reputation for parties and a mediocre hiring rate.

It's a complete let down and flat out insulting and disrespectful to everyone and everything involved.

That is how I felt when I heard about the World Tree in Naruto. That's how most readers felt when they heard about it, and that is how TTRT Naruto WISHED he felt about it when he found out this chapter.

Heads are going to roll. Blood will be spilled. Plans will be thrown away and absolutely Zero shits are going to be given now.

As. It. Should. Be.

Any reaction less than this after what TTRT Naruto has been through would simply not work or be realistic in the slightest.

As for Naruto's performance with his clones and appearing OP? Yes. That is intentional. Naruto has found a way to use his current set of skills and break them to their limits. He's more akin to the broken final boss in most anime and manga that are just unfair to deal with.

Why? Because he's not trying to play fair. He's playing to win. Not just here, but in other worlds as well. And he's lost enough times to not give a shit about how badly he curbstomps others now.

But that doesn't mean it's going to be easy for Naruto. There are major flaws and risks with Level 2 clones, and obviously, not everything goes to plan.

This whole thing should be done in two chapters of pure savage fighting, emotional trauma, and pure rage.

After that… Back to FFD.

On more personal news, I've just started a new rotation at my job at Ford, and… well… it's turned my 40 hour work weeks into 55-60 hour work weeks. I do get paid some overtime, but… yeah, it's tiring.

Also, I'm going on a cruise with my family for 4th of July week. It's a break that I've been looking forward to for a while. Nice. Relaxing. And don't worry, I'll still be writing during it when I have the time.

On a side note, I'd like to clear something up with some of you loyal readers.

Some people have been asking me if I have a or set up to accept donations, whether as thanks or as a means to try set up some scheme where the more money I get the faster I write.

I want to say this bluntly for everyone. Any and all fanfiction I write is for free. I will not, nor will I ever accept money for writing any of this.

I have many reasons for this. I don't want to make money off of a franchise that I don't own. I don't want to potentially break any laws. I already have a steady paying job with a solid paycheck, and I don't need the extra money, even though it would be nice.

But really guys? I'm just doing this for fun. It's a nice hobby. It's free. It lets me think, and vent at times. People like what I make. And I enjoy it. If I want to make money from writing, I'll start that book I've been talking about that focuses on the Oogakari's origins, and I'll tell everyone about it. But this? What I do here? Pro bono. Enjoy.

That's about all I have this time guys. Next chapter should have way more fighting and bullshit. Keep an eye out for it, and I'll try to make it shorter than this monster. I didn't mean for it to get this long.

And for anyone here in the US, enjoy your 4th of July break.

SO REVIEW! WORSHIP THE LOG! NARUTO HAS FINALLY REACHED THE EVENT HORIZON! AND REVIEW AGAIN!