#::Hidden Spirits: Village Hunting & Side Effect::#
A Naruto Fan-fiction -- Sequel from 'Hidden Spirits'
By: Climax

Disclaimer for ALL chapters: Do not and never own Naruto. Except this story plot, idea, and my own characters I create on this story.

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Scroll 3: Something Wrong
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Naruto and the others were running with their cheetah speed. Nothing happened… yet—luckily for Naruto's simple brain, unfortunately for his burning fighting spirit. But as always, his hunch was telling him that something was definitely out of place. In the other hand, Rhaera didn't care much. It looked like that his brain only contained one thought. Finish the mission as fast as perfect as possible. No more, no less. Meanwhile, Sakura had another thought.

Strange, why there is nothing that tried to attack us or something like that? If my memory serves me right, the Blue Glow plant is something that people can find it only in here, right? It is strange enough that there is no trap that tried to stop us. Not that I hope it is, but still—something is not right…

She and Naruto were so deep in thought that they didn't notice what they should notice. The ceiling of the cave was cracking. Rhaera was the first one who noticed. All was because of his keen ears.

"PICK UP YOUR PACE!!" he shouted.

"Huh?"

"Eh?" Sakura wondered if it was a command, an advice, or a warning since Rhaera's tone—as usual— plain; even if he was shouting.

Her question was answered by the cave's crumbling. The cave cracked; followed by a bit of sands and rocks fell. It was the first wave. The second wave quickly approached. The cracks grew bigger and the rocks —big, large, and huge rocks I mean— began to fall from the ceiling.

"AAHH!! Stone rain!!" screamed Naruto.

"The ceiling is collapsing if that's what you mean…" Sakura corrected Naruto calmly. Why did she care anyway? And what was that calm tone?? Now she regretted why she felt something wrong and accidentally hoped for trap(s).

A basketball sized rock fell on Naruto's head. Though Naruto's head was the winner in hardness (the rock broke into pieces when it hit his head; much to Sakura amazement) it still hurt a lot. Now he knew what Ino felt.

"ARRGHH!! I don't care what it called!! Just—butt out from here!!" Naruto shouted as he picked up the pace. In his mind, there was nothing but get away from those falling rocks.

The others could do nothing but complied. They ran in their best speed but the trail was not as smooth as a cement path in a sunny day. They sometimes had to dodge falling rock(s).

"NARUTO!! Move to your left!!" shouted Rhaera. Naruto complied. He—like it or not—had to follow Rhaera's advice. That boy sure was something in predicting (falling) things.

Just as Naruto moved to the left —closer to Rhaera— a big as one of Jiraiya's big frog rock fell off the ceiling. It looked so heavy and hard. If Rhaera wasn't here, maybe he would be as thin as a pancake now.

Naruto's face was like he had seen the worst horror of the universe.

Sakura eyes widen in an impossible size.

"Thanks." Naruto managed to breath.

"Your welcome," said Rhaera as he dodged more falling rocks.

After a long moment they finally reached the part where the ceiling was not falling rocks. They stopped to catch their breath.

"That was ::gasp:: close…" sighed Sakura as she used a tall stalagmite to support her body. She noticed that the stalactites and stalagmites number were decreased. It was still many, but not as many as at the entrance.

"Guh… I thought I'm going to die…" mumbled Naruto as his butt reached the floor. Only Rhaera that amazingly calm. His breath was ragged, but not enough to make him gasp for air. God knows why it seemed that he was the calmest of the three. Maybe it was because he was a real walking corpse.

After they had collected their breaths, Rhaera began to speak.

"We shouldn't run back then. The cave is very unstable."

Sakura cursed. "Shit. Why we didn't notice it before? The rock here was so frail!"

"But I heard from Iruka-sensei that the natural caves like this are usually strong and stable!" Naruto wondered.

"I think the soil in here contains more sands so the cave's solidness decreased much. Though there are limes in the soil that helped to create stalactites and stalagmites pillars, some part of the cave contains less of them. That means we can run or make much noise in some part of the cave, but nothing of those in the other parts," Sakura explained in the simplest word so Naruto's brain could catch up.

Naruto looked Sakura in amazement. "Wow, Sakura. You sure know a lot."

Sakura smirked. Meanwhile aggressive her inner self became active and was shouting in happiness and proud-ness. "Well, I'm not and never will be a brainless-muscleman like you, idiot."

Angry veins popped. "Because I detest that, I take back my words—I mean sentence." Naruto quickly covered his wrong gap. His ninja way was 'I don't take back my own words'.

Sakura wanted to fight him but there would be no end if they fight. So she remained silent. But she slammed and clenched her right fist by her left hand as a warning. Knew what it meant, Naruto decided that this was the best time to stay silent.

"Guys, bad news we got here…" Rhaera broke the silence.

Naruto and Sakura turned their head to Rhaera. The archer now was far from them now; as far as when they were on the edge of their usual training field and Rhaera on the opposite side. He was checking the newly collapsed part. Naruto and Sakura found it hard to not to sweat-dropped.

What? When did he?

They didn't sense him leaving was the first; and how could his voice reached them without him trying to shout or at least yell? Sure the cave could produce echoes, but could echoes reach them from that far distance?

"What's the matter??" shouted Naruto. Totally unaware that his shout caused another crumbling. Sakura quickly covered her head, fearing that she would experience the same accident like Naruto. Naruto placed his hands on his mouth and produced an 'ooppss' sound. But Rhaera didn't seem to panic. It looked like he knew that the cave wouldn't collapse again—at least for now. And he was right. Not long, the crumbling stopped.

"What do you think you have done, idiot?? I thought I would be a memory!!" Sakura hissed as she let her aggressive self took control and smacked Naruto's head—right into his newly received injury.

It took all of Naruto's mouth control to not to yelp or scream in pain. He ended up moaning and mumbling. "Ouchh… it hurts."

There was another question in Sakura's head now. How could Rhaera reach that long distance in a short time without causing the cave collapsed? But she decided to ask him later.

Ignoring Naruto, Sakura asked Rhaera.

"What do you mean by bad news? Don't say that the rocks are preventing us from going back…"

"Unfortunately, yes it is. And I think it's gonna take more than two weeks to remove them with only three people. That means our way out is only that third entrance. Sakura-san, do you know if there is another way out beside the third entrance?" asked Rhaera.

"Hmm… I think Kakashi-sensei said that there's four entrance of this cave. The north gate, south gate, west gate, and east gate. The west gate is already collapsed like this one. That means that we are in either south or north gate."

Naruto looked at her questioningly. "Huh? Kakashi-sensei didn't tell you which gate we entered?"

Sakura shook her head. "Regretfully no. He said that this is the challenge for us."

Naruto grinned. "Then that's okay. We can use the compass right? Rhaera-kun! I think you are the one who bring the compass!"

Sakura stared at him. "You gave the compass to him?"

"Yeah! Why?"

Now a kick landed on his leg. Naruto nearly shout when he remembered that he mustn't shout. He hissed in pain instead while his hands clutching his injured leg. He lifted his leg so he stood on one.

"What-what's that for??"

"Are you pretended to be brainless or are you really brainless?? Rhaera is BLIND and a blind human cannot use a compass because he cannot see it! How if we separated each other and none of us are with Rhaera? We are lost at that time, you know!!"

"But! Two weeks ago you said I shouldn't bring important gadgets because I'm a slob and you afraid if I'll lost them!! Sheesh..!"

Sakura was taken aback by his words. "Thanks for reminding me. But you can give it to me! Like there is no me in here!"

"I thought you have your own compass?"

"In case your full of ramen brain forget, YOU accidentally dropped all of my navigation gadgets to a cliff two weeks ago so I swore I won't let you touch any navigation gadgets again. That's why I prevent you from bringing any important things."

"…But you can buy it again, right?"

"Do you think they are cheap?"

"Anyway, at the first place you made me bring your heavy packs, right? Your navigation gadgets won't lose if you didn't bring any useless things…"

"We were on VACATION, dammit!!"

"So? I only brought a small backpack."

"Girls things are many!"

"Eh-hem!" Rhaera interrupted their endless fight. "Please you two? You can continue this fight when we have found a safer area. I don't want any falling rocks again…"

Naruto and Sakura realized now. That the cave was crumbling. But fortunately it was not strong enough to draw rocks again. The crumbling stopped as soon as they shut their mouth.

"What a really risky cave…" mumbled Sakura.

"So is Sakura…" Naruto whispered loud enough to Sakura to be heard but low enough to be unclear.

Sakura gave Naruto a killing stare. "What?"

"By the way, here is the compass…" Rhaera interrupted before there was any fight began. He extended his hand so the two could see the compass.

The two fighting shinobi dropped their fight and looked carefully to the compass. At first the compass was swinging to right and left. But seconds later it was rotating fast.

Naruto and Sakura had a hard time to control their mouth. "WHAT the heck??!" they nearly yelled all their words. Rhaera who couldn't see what was happening to the compass left confused.

"What's the matter?"

"I think compass is a useless charm here…" said Naruto in a terribly sarcastic tone.

"There cave's soil must be contains magnet…" said Sakura as she softly knocked the cave's wall.

Rhaera silenced for a moment. Then… "Annoying training field."

"Yup. We definitely can't and won't make it in one week if we dig our collapsed entrance. And we can't use compass to find the direction. Not to mention that this cave is a giant maze—according to Kakashi-sensei's information. That means, if the remaining two entrances collapsed too then—"

"Say goodbye to the chuunin exam…" finished Naruto.

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Tsunade was reading some reports in her office. She hates paperwork because naturally she was a love to gamble woman. When she turned to the next file she heard a soft knock on her door.

"Come in."

A medical ninja stepped in. He bowed to Tsunade. And he began the conversation uneasily.

"Uhm… ano… Godaime-sama?"

"Mention your purpose for coming here and interrupted my work or out. I still have tons of file I should read," said Tsunade simply.

The medical ninja automatically went to mobilized state. "Hai! I'm requesting that we should close the training field with number 11!"

"Training field 11? Why we should close it? I think that field is one of the best training field and one of our best medical herbs resources? You should have a good reason for it…" said Tsunade. She mentally worried for Kakashi's and Asuma's team.

"Because of two reasons. First: we found some err… unique creatures roaming in the cave last month. The second is when we sent a team of ANBU to investigate it but the team wasn't come back. We waiting, waiting, and waiting but they never come back. And they are known as one of the best investigating team. In short, we decided that the cave is dangerous. We wanted to report this three days ago, but—"

Tsunade snapped and she quickly grabbed the medical ninja's collar. "WHY DON'T YOU REPORT THAT IMMEDIATELY??!"

The medical ninja quickly went into his fear state. "B-because three days ago we heard you were going to the capital city of Fire country to report about chuunin exam and some other important maters. Why you are so angry?"

"Because just two hours ago I gave Kakashi and Asuma the permission to use training field 11!!"

The medical ninja's face changed from fear into horror. "What?" he said weakly.

"Now call three ANBU captains to meet me here!!" commanded Tsunade.

The medical ninja wasted no time to storm out of the room. Tsunade may a real beauty but when she was angry she was the real demon…

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Started on: November 30th 2004
Ended on: December 11th 2004

HA-HAH!! Here is the scroll 3, chapter 4 D! Feels so refreshed! Especially after the school terribly terrible final exam!! But… MY MOOD IS NOT THAT GOOD!! Because the readers is really thinking that TWO reviews is enough for me!! I should raise it into ten back then. But I'm still thankful tough, it is better than nothing. I guess I should work harder. Well, bye for now!!

PS: No reviews, no chapters. REMEMBER THAT!!