Disclaimer: No I do not own Naruto.
Note: This is not the original Chapter 26 of Wings of the White Angel. This is where the new written chapters start.
Wings of the White Angel
Chapter 26: Chuunin Exam Changes
Kakashi sat back in his chair overlooking the courtyard of the ninja academy, his uncovered eye looking out at the completely destroyed landscape before him with a rather disinterested look. ("I told the heads of the Watanabe households to order their participating ninjas to withhold their bloodline limits…didn't I?") Sighing, he barely moved at all when he heard the door behind him open. "Yes, can I help you Haru?"
"Yes sir, I just wanted to let you know that we've had something of an upset…amongst the examinees for the Chuunin Exam…" The blue-haired man rubbed the back of his head, rather wary to break this kind of bad news to the Hokage. "Well…"
"How many packed up and went home out of the original number?" Kakashi already knew this was going to happen. The Watanabe clan were physically inhuman, and when they did such a stupidly showmanship type of thing, it tended to scare off most ninjas of countries other than the country of Fire, who knew about them…sort of. ("Come to think of it, I still don't know which of the clans actually leads that whole clan…in fact, the whole Watanabe clan is very mysterious, and yet their members never really seem to try and hide anything. An anomaly of the universe, I guess.")
Haru took a deep breath and cleared his throat. "Originally we had a number of 132 entrees into the Chuunin Exam…unfortunately…now…" His voice got rather quiet and he mumbled out something.
"Speak up please, I already know those two idiots screwed things up rather badly…" Kakashi rolled his eyes and sat back a little bit. "Come on, just cough it out."
"45…" Haru groaned. "Two teams from the Hidden Village of Mist, one from the Hidden Village of Cloud, one from the Hidden Village of Smoke, three from Konoha, one from the Hidden Village of Sand, and one from the Hidden Village of…"
"Enough." Kakashi covered his face with his hands. "This is a disaster…and exactly why I think every member of the Watanabe should be forced to wear those chakra weights they use to train with permanently."
"On that note, sir…" Haru had seen the fight too, and was rather concerned now. "Why…that whole…"
"I don't have hours, Haru. Please, just call in the staff in charge of the exams. Apparently we're going to have a change of plans…" Kakashi couldn't believe it had come to this, but so be it…
----------------------------------------
Kirin's eyes slowly opened up to see the sun far above him… "Wow…did I take a nap at an inappropriate time again?" When he stood up, he saw that Lee was sitting on a rock nearby him. "Sensei…I just had the strangest dream where I fought my cousin and…"
A cold and angry female voice spoke from directly behind him, right into his ear. "That wasn't a dream…you big idiot. What did I…Lee-sensei…your father…everyone tell you not to do?"
The red-haired boy turned, crab-walking away from the speaker as quickly as he could. "Erika-san!" Then he back-flipped into a standing position, striking a dramatic pose as he pointed at her. "You, who has never known the burning passion of a true battle, would never understand the forces that drove me to fight my cousin at the level that I…"
Erika, a black-haired and brown-eyed girl with an intensely displeased look on her face, formed a few seals. Kirin went silent and just stood there, eyes out of focus. "Shut up, loud-mouthed stupid fool."
Lee sighed. "Was it really necessary to use a Genjutsu on him? Couldn't you have just struck him like you always do?"
"Why, when I know there's absolutely zero chance that he could ever escape from that Genjutsu…" She crossed her arms across her chest and walked towards the academy entrance. "When and if he snaps out of it, tell him that the next time I'll see him is when he's acting like a true ninja, and not some stupid loudmouth fool who should have just stayed home if he was going to pick fights with his weirdo cousin and his odd friends."
Lee just sat there, a rather pale expression on his face. ("She's so scary…like her father…but colder, if that's possible.")
-------------------------
Kakashi felt the air in his office change as a group of different prescense appeared. "I'm glad all of you managed to respond so quickly. As you probably know, two members of the Watanabe clan had a fight not too long ago right in front of every single arriving member for the Chuunin Exam. To make matters worse, they were the two leading members of the fire and wind sects…Kirin Watanabe and Kin Watanabe…and the two of them completely destroyed the chances of us having a normal Chuunin Exam."
"So what should we do then? Maybe we should cancel and…"
"No." Kakashi rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "Actually, I have simply moved up the schedule…we'll have to skip the first part of the Exam, or else we'll risk narrowing the number of actual candidates down to the point that it won't look good on our part to the neighboring countries…"
"So…we're moving straight to the survival part of the Exam? Isn't that taking a risk to the future of our ninjas…if they aren't up to par in the intelligence gathering category, what makes you think their survival skills are up to the letter?"
"Don't worry about it. For now, simply move everyone to the beginning sections for the survival exam…" Kakashi steeped his fingers together. "Trust me…by the time we're done it will be a completely different fight for our friends…in more ways then one. Since we won't be able to deliver quantity for the last parts of the Exam, we'll deliver the finest quality instead. Dismissed."
--------------------------------------------
Yurei sighed as he finally caught sight of Kin. "Hey! Would you stop walking around like you're the top of the top and tell me what those wings were?"
Kin continued to walk, his eyes looking ahead of him. "Sorry, but I can't share that information with you. Its top secret and all that, you know."
Yurei narrowed his eyes and then calmly slammed the flat side of Shadow Goddess onto his friend's head, watching as the Watanabe was sent face-first to the ground. "I'm not listening to those stupid excuses of yours about your clan having secrets. Just tell me what the wings meant."
Kin hopped to his feet, apparently unaffected by his meeting with the tiled ground. "Now isn't the time to discuss this." He seemed to tense up slightly, and that immediately told Yurei what was wrong. They were being watched. "Come out, I can tell you're nearby."
The sound of boots on clicking came from behind a nearby pillar, and the dark-haired, almost lazy-looking form of Hatred stepped into view. "That's very good, Prize. You can actually detect me…and here I thought you might not be worth the trouble of speaking to."
Yurei hefted up Shadow Goddess, hand inching towards the weapon's wrappings slowly. Right before he could get there though, Kin's hand lifted slightly in a silent message to not prepare for a fight.
Hatred watched this little silent game with a jaded look in his eye. "As much as I'd like pound you a million miles into the dirt, I'll have to wait until the fighting portion of the exam to crush you."
"Why's that? Orders from your murdering leader?" Kin had heard a lot more about Death while he had been training with Naruto, and just looking at a subordinate of one of the Sin's subordinates made him sick to stomach.
"That's part of it, though actually my father had commented that I'm not to do anything overly physical until that point in time." Hatred spoke as if he was being conservative with the very energy he was using to speak.
"Any particular reason?" Kin was rather interested in this boy. He knew that this person was part of the Hidden Village of Smoke because of his forehead protector, but he didn't even know this guy's name. ("And yet something about him just draws me in like a moth to a flame. Maybe I know him from a past life or something?")
Hatred smiled very weakly, his entire body seeming so frail. "I know of the Radiant Paradise technique, Kin Watanabe. And to defeat it I have spent the last month storing my chakra and physical power within this frame." He pointed at his chest. "In a short time we'll meet in battle, and to defeat a power that can destroy one of the Seven Sins, I'll need to use this stored energy to crush you."
"Why are you so hot to beat me? What did I do to you?" Kin felt on the edge now, because the senses he had been given were taking over now…and he could see something coming from Hatred's body. It looked like chakra, blood red in color…but it was writhing like a living creature. ("What is that? I couldn't even see it a moment ago, and considering its intensity I'm starting to fear what the implications of it are. It's like his true colors are showing themselves very slightly.")
"Because of you, my little brother was taken away from me." Hatred slowly walked past Kin and Yurei, adding in as an afterthought as he left. "And you make me wonder whether or not there is someone in this world who can truly push any member of my family to our true breaking point."
As soon as he was out of sight, Yurei blew out a deep sigh of relief. "Wow, that was an intense moment huh?" He nudged Kin in the ribs with his elbow. "Did you feel that chakra he was giving off? That's pretty strong…"
Kin stared at Yurei like his friend had lost his mind. "Why are you acting so calm about it? Aren't you afraid that he'll be your opponent in the Exam before he becomes mine?"
"And so what if he is?" Yurei smirked and rubbed a finger under his nose. "I haven't spent the last month slacking off you know. I've been in serious training to surpass both you and Kai."
Kai seemed to drop down out of nowhere and landed between the two of them. "You sensed it right, that chakra?"
Kin was currently latched onto the ceiling above him by his nails, his canine ears standing on end and his entire body tensed nervously. "Don't freaking do that!"
"We're ninjas, you fool. It's our job to possess attributes of stealth, right?" Kai glanced back at Yurei, who had already recovered from his initial surprise. "As for you, I doubt you've improved that much just by swinging your little toy around a lot. After all, compared to the power I have gained training, any advancements you have done are completely useless."
"I see you worked out that whole ego thing." Yurei dead-panned, leaning by an elbow on the hilt of Shadow Goddess. "You can have all the power in the world, but if you're an insufferable ass then it will all be for naught, Kai."
"This coming from someone who carries a huge sword around in public for no sensible reason." Kai scoffed and walked away, shoving his hands into the pockets of his shorts. "I have no time to waste on you right now though, because the exam should be starting soon."
Yurei looked up at Kin and rolled his eyes. "Seriously, did you need to leap up that high and that fast? He wasn't that scary, was he?"
"He was to me!" The boy dropped back to the ground and tried to smooth back his hair with his hands. "I'm not a big lover of stealth, and I like having it used against me even less!"
"You're a ninja, get used to it you big fool!" Yurei rolled his eyes and walked away with Shadow Goddess still hefted over one shoulder. "A ninja who doesn't like stealth…talk about your mysteries of the universe."
--------------------
He could hear the screams…the bloody and horrible screams that spoke of both fear and something beyond fear. It was terror…
Death didn't flinch in the slightest a storm of needles were stopped just a few inches from his face by his cursed tentacles. "It is pointless to try and stop me, fools. I will have the thing you have sealed in this village, and none of you will…" His words were stopped by a powerful blast of lightning that tore right through his tentacles and slammed into his body, sending him sliding backwards rapidly. "Oh? And what is this? Has the strongest of your village come?"
"You monster…" A human form, shadowed by the heavy flames that burned around them, began to form seals at a rapid pace. "I will burn you into the ground...by trapping you in my immortal technique! Feel the power of my Fire Prison, murdering bastard!" Then a fire exploded to life around Death's body, quickly changing into a heavy ball that allowed for no escape and no entrance. "Within that ball there is no air, so even if you protect yourself with chakra you can't move and you can't hold your breath either. The smoke should have taken care of that. Also, my prison possesses another useful ability…it can leech out chakra from its prisoner and give it to me, so that means I'll never run out of energy before you do, because by the time I'm out of energy you'll be dead. Do you understand? Your brute force tactics can't work against the determination of one who wishes to protect his village!"
Death stood silently, his skull-shaped pupils looking out of the fire and towards the shadowed form. However, because he couldn't see the eyes of his target, he couldn't use the Shinigan to slay the fool on the spot.
"You won't escape, murderer. I will let you feel every inch of pain that you made so many of out numbers feel when they tried to stop you on your way to the town! Their sacrifices led you away from the innocent people who lived in the farms up the way…"
"Farmers?" Death's expression didn't change at all. "I already went back and killed them, one by one."
"What?" The shadowed form nearly lost his grip on the Fire Prison, but quickly reinforced it to hold the murderer in place. "W…Why? You went in a straight line all the way to…"
"And once I reached the gates, I realized what you had been doing." His blood-red eyes somehow managed to pierce through the swirling fires. "And as a punishment to those weaklings who would hide under your wing, I turned around and found every single one of them…and slaughtered them slowly." Death tilted back his head to look up at the moon, which was partially haloed in a wreath of black smoke. "They all begged for their lives, living behind that weak excuse that they weren't fighters…that they weren't involved." When the Prison tightened its pull on him, he tilted his head back down to look at the shadowed form. "Tell me…do you believe that anyone in the world is truly innocent enough to be free of my touch?"
"Do you really believe yourself to be Death that much? You aren't the judge for who lives and who dies!" The shadowed form strengthened the prison as much as possible. They wanted to hear the murderer beg through pain before he died. "I'll consume you within this fire…using your own chakra to do it!"
"My own chakra?" Death's heavy cloak fluttered within the flame on its right side. "My own chakra, you say?" Around him, a black energy began to ooze out of him like some kind of disease. "You foolish human…do you know what you are facing? You really think I'm some kind of maniac who believes he is Death?"
"That's all you are, and I'll pay back the lost lives you took by burning you to a crisp!" The shadowed form prepared to unleash his powerful fire Ninjutsu techniques on the disabled murderer…but felt a tingle run up his spine. "What…what's…" Then he dropped dead to the earth.
As the fire prison diminished into nothing, Death strolled out of the subsiding heat without any reaction on his face. "It isn't an act…I am Death. There is no method of arguing it..." His cloak snapped up in the smoky winds, and he dropped to one knee to punch the ground. "Everything I touch will burn and suffer! Feel my pain!" Then a cloud of the black energy that had come from him exploded out in every direction, swallowing up miles upon miles of both village and surrounding countryside.
In his mind he could still hear those screams as he had done that…unleashed the power of his right arm. It had killed off the entire village in one fell swoop…they never had a chance to pray or beg for their lives. "Wrath, I will be taking my leave from this point onwards. You will continue to follow the mission parameters, while I will go and prepare." Without another sound, he disappeared.
Wrath nodded to the air and turned to look at Pain. "Go get Inferno and take him to the waiting room. Hatred will most likely be waiting for you."
"Very well." Half-bowing, the gaunt boy turned and strolled off casually, whistling a little tune to himself. ("I wonder…I wonder if I'll get a chance to kill that one guy…") An image flashed in his head. ("Yurei Akurei, was it?") "Next time I meet you…I hope for your sake that you're ready to die swiftly…I won't let you overcome me again."
To be continued…
Author's Notes: This is the first new rewrite for Wings of the White Angel. I just wanted to write that in because I know I've been getting a lot of reads on this story. I'd love it if you could drop off a review too, to help me fill in holes that might either be in the plot or in my explanations. Hell, if you made it this far and you hate it, then by all means flame me. Good or bad I'll take it, because I'd like to know the public consensus on what a Naruto story should be. After all, I've never written any Naruto fanfiction before this one, so I thought it would be a good idea to ask the members of its community what is right and what is wrong. Anyhow, next chapter should be up soon.