Hello, everyone!
First of all, I must say that I'm amazed by how well-received my fic was. I've got a lot of really good reviews as well as other compliments in PM answers, and they made me super happy! I mean, right now I have over 150 followers, as well as almost 100 favorites and 50 reviews...
Special shout-outs to gio08, Chewie Cookies, Meow382, Sashu, Serious Sam, and RyoshiMorino for reviews that made my day! In particular, extra thanks to gio08 and Chewie Cookies for posting a review for every chapter/update! (And though it came all at once, the same goes for Sashu!)
Though... I'm also worried if I will be able to keep posting satisfactory chapters like I (supposedly) have been doing... I mean, from now on I will start working with the canon arcs, so yeah. Unlike the prologue arc, you guys now have a very, very good idea of many things that will happen... and it goes double for this specific chapter, since Kakashi and Kurenai already know the big plot twist about the people chasing after Tazuna and stuff.
Another thing about this chapter... Despite the main draw of this fic being Naruhina, this chapter focuses mainly on the OTHER pairing we will be dealing a bit more in-depth during the story, which is Sasusaku. Mostly we will be dealing with Sakura today, so yeah. I promise more Naruhina during the coming chapters, indirectly (like in chapter 2 and 3, and the Sakura/Hinata conversation) and directly.
Also, there's a small OC in this chapter. Please don't mind him. He also goes unnamed, but I explain why in the ending A/N.
One last, important note: As far as this story is concerned, the original introduction arc of Naruto (from the first chapter til Team 7 officially becomes a thing) happened in late March (because that is more or less when the school year ends in Japan), so right now it's early April.
Anyways, sorry for being long-winded... and enjoy the chapter! (Hopefully there aren't too many mistakes...)
The Land of Waves
Chapter 7 – Beyond Konoha's Gates (Current Version: 2.0)
It was just a little after 7 a.m when Sakura sluggishly approached the northeastern gates of the village, one of the many pairs of wooden doors that separated Konoha from the forests that surrounded it.
After yawning, stretching and rubbing her eyes, the girl tried to mask the sleepiness from her features as best as she could and proceeded with her walk, hoping that nobody would comment on the black circles around her eyes. Having already seen herself in the mirror today, she knew better than to expect nobody would notice them, and the guards at the gate seemed to have seen that detail as well.
On the road just outside the gate, she saw that all members of Team 8 were already waiting for her, talking between themselves while watching as Kurenai checked their backpacks to see if they had forgotten to bring anything, despite all of them insisting that they hadn't.
Sasuke was a few feet away from the trio, outside of the road, but he was watching Team 8's conversation with surprising interest. Shockingly enough, Kakashi was already there too, reading his favorite porn book (which was not so shocking) while leaning against a nearby tree.
Lastly, Tazuna was also with them, scowling at Kiba while rubbing his own temples. 'Hmm... I guess he has a hangover. Sheesh, if he is this pissed with just the mutt, I wonder how cranky he will be once Naruto gets here,' the girl thought, noticing that her blond teammate was the only missing member of their party now that she arrived.
After greeting everyone, Sakura immediately made a beeline for Sasuke, like she was used to. After taking no more than three steps forward, the Uchiha made eye contact with her, freezing her on the spot.
Hurriedly, Sakura changed her mind and turned to talk with Hinata instead... but after glancing at her, she saw that the blue-haired girl was still busy talking with her teammates. Looking back at Sasuke, who had an eyebrow raised at her in silent questioning of her unusual behavior, she realized she had little choice but to go with her first plan and continued to walk towards him.
There was one problem with that plan, which is why she considered aborting it in the first place: she had no idea of how to properly interact with Sasuke after the previous day's events.
Kurenai had implied that she needed to take her role—no, her profession—more seriously and that she needed to change how to approach Sasuke if she truly wanted to have a relationship with him one day. Fighting and training, with or without Sasuke, wasn't that hard. But staying around him without entering "fangirl mode", as she had heard Kiba describing it once when they were at the academy (a mistake that earned him a good clobbering), that was the real challenge. Kurenai had merely said to her that she was doing it wrong, but there were no hints as to what the "right way" was supposed to be.
In the end she just stayed by his side, looking at the ground glumly. Unknowingly to her, Sasuke was struggling with practically the same issue, except with the added bonus of not knowing what to think of being practically ignored by his teammate. As annoying as he found it, Sakura's incessant chattering was something he grew used to and he had actually expected it. He wouldn't say that he missed it, but it was definitely unsettling not having the girl fawning over him.
With both of them not knowing how to act around each other, but feeling that they should be having a conversation deeper than "good morning" and "hn", the silence between then grew tense and awkward. That is, until Sasuke glanced at Sakura once she yawned for the fourth time in the past ten minutes and noticed the dark circles around her eyes when she was busy rubbing them.
"Did you have trouble sleeping last night?"
"Eh?" Sakura mumbled intelligently before realizing that, yes, Sasuke had just initiated a conversation with her, and no, it wasn't just because he was asking her to punch Naruto for the blond to shut up.
"Oh! Um, kinda... I didn't have trouble last night per se, but I woke up early because of a nightmare and it took me a while to get back to sleep..." Realization flashed in her features, which were soon hidden after she buried her face into her hands. "I look horrible, don't I?" the pinkette groaned.
While part of Sakura was indeed worried about her appearance and now regretted her choice to not wear any makeup before going out, her real intention was to subtly change the subject. She didn't mean to mention her nightmare, but between being surprised that Sasuke was willingly talking with her and the fact that she was still drowsy, the words escaped her mouth before she could hold herself back.
Had she been looking at his eyes instead of looking away while faking exasperation, Sakura would have noticed a rare softness in Sasuke's gaze. "It was about that genjutsu, wasn't it?"
'Welp, that didn't work... it backfired completely.' Sighing, the girl uncovered her face and glanced at him for a moment before dropping eye contact and staring at the ground again. "Yeah... yeah, it was."
Her nightmare hadn't been much different from what Kurenai showed to her with the World of Nightmares genjutsu, but there was one key difference: Sakura realized that she was in a genjutsu, but she couldn't break out of it.
As a result, she was forced to watch Itachi's Great Fireball hit Sasuke, turning him into a molten corpse that she had the pleasure of seeing first-hand thanks to the older Uchiha's use of a Suiton jutsu to put out the fire. The man then slowly started to walk towards her, mocking her for being a burden during the fight and, after seeing her attempt to dispel the illusion by biting her own tongue, he mocked her for not being able to break out of a simple genjutsu.
Though Sakura still tried to run away, Itachi caught her by the hair, broke her limbs and then stabbed her multiple times with his tanto before leaving her to bleed out in the grass. The girl's pained screams and pleas for help resounded through Training Ground 3 the entire time, but nobody heard her.
The memory still made Sakura shudder, which didn't go unnoticed by Sasuke.
"Er... do... do you want to talk about it?" Sasuke offered, hoping that maybe he'd be able to cheer her up somehow if she was a bit more open. That worked nicely for Kiba and Shino when dealing with Hinata yesterday, after all...
"Thank you Sasuke-kun," she said with a tired smile, "but... just forget I said anything, ok?" Sasuke's eyes narrowed, but he nodded and turned away, giving her some space for the time being, much to girl's relief. While Sakura was truly appreciative of his efforts to lift her spirits, the attempt only made she feel worse on the inside.
Unlike her dream version, the real Sakura's screams didn't go by unheard. Sakura's parents heard her voice and immediately barged into her room, fearing for their precious little flower's safety. Though they were relieved that she was just having a nightmare instead of being attacked by someone, they weren't pleased by the fact that Sakura completely refused to talk about what had haunted her in her dreams, considering how shaken the girl still was afterwards.
Nonetheless, her mother had offered her a hug and comforting words that assured Sakura that it had been nothing more than a nightmare, while her father was busy brewing a cup of chamomile tea to help her calm down.
She was very thankful for their support, but then she remembered what Kurenai had told her before:
"You, on the other hand, have a much less turbulent life. This won't be for long; your career will inevitably leave you broken sooner or later—all of you—but your teammates don't have a family or friends to support them when they break."
It was only then that Sakura realized how lucky she truly was. Because, unlike her, Sasuke had nobody to comfort him after his nightmares... and no one to tell him that it wasn't real. And that was, in fact, the reason he didn't have someone to support him to begin with... because the nightmares were his reality, no matter if he was asleep or not.
Knowing that made her feel like she had no right to be this affected by something that hadn't even truly happened. And it became worse once Sasuke offered his help because, to Sakura, bothering him with her problems would be just selfish of her, considering what he had gone through that night and likely every other night since then.
But after being comforted by her parents and even by Sasuke, Sakura also realized the true meaning behind another thing Kurenai had said to her. 'So... this is what she meant by supporting them out of battle, huh? I need to be there for Sasuke-kun... oh! That's right, of course.' Her eyes then detected an orange dot rapidly approaching them from within the village. There was only one thing in the entirety of Konoha that had the guts to wear that garish shade of neon orange, of course. 'And then there is Naruto too... this might be a problem,' Sakura thought as she glanced at Hinata, who was still talking with her teammates.
"I believe that Naruto will arrive within the next two minutes," Shino stated after his bugs started to react to the one he had tagged Naruto with previously. He could've detected Naruto earlier, but the conversation with his teammates had distracted him.
Kiba sniffed the air and, detecting a familiar smell that was suspiciously similar to that of ramen, nodded to Shino. "Yeah, that's him for sure. And 'bout damn time!"
"B-but you were just as late yesterday, Kiba-kun," Hinata reminded, doing her best to keep her features as neutral as possible.
"Because of him," Kiba growled, frowning as he remembered the trouble that he went through because of Naruto's clumsiness. Hinata had no counterargument for that.
Like Shino said, it didn't take long for Naruto to catch up to the group.
"Hey...!" The boy waved at them once he was close enough to see them, as if his clothing wasn't enough to grab everyone's attention. "Whew... Sorry for being late, guys."
"You are an embarrassment to ninja everywhere."
"Shut up, Kakashi-sensei! I don't want to hear that from you of all people!" Naruto angrily pointed at the silver-haired man, who was in the process of pocketing his book.
"While I do agree with you, Naruto," Kurenai said, glaring a bit at Kakashi before shifting her eyes to meet the blond's. "You better have a good reason for not being on time like we asked you to."
Naruto smiled nervously at the kunoichi. "I was trying to find the landlady of my apartment building. I needed to find someone to take care of my plants while I was gone, you know?"
"You could have just left a Shadow Clone to search in your stead," Shino remarked dryly, annoyed by the fact that Naruto wasted his time because of mere bug food.
"Clones dispel way too easily for me to trust them with something so important," Naruto disagreed, mentally kicking himself for not thinking about using some to help him with his search. If it took twenty minutes with only one Naruto, that meant he could've done it in a single minute if he made twenty clones.
Meanwhile, Hinata was mentally going over what she had just heard. 'So his plants are important to him? This... this is wonderful! Perhaps he might be interested in flowers and herbs too? I absolutely must remember to bring this up in a future conversation!' Talking to Naruto might not be so hard if the subject was one of her hobbies after all. 'Though... I am surprised that someone as energetic and impatient as Naruto-kun likes this kind of activity.'
"Are you serious, Kurenai-sensei?!" Naruto's loud voice snapped Hinata out of her musings.
"I am," Kurenai sighed. "Did you truly not notice the memories?"
"From what I observed during yesterday's fights, Naruto's clones always act in conjunction with the original. Thus, the memories wouldn't stand out to him because they would match his actual experience." Shino stated.
"Makes sense," Naruto agreed, scratching his chin in a pensive manner before dropping the pose for an excited fox-like grin. "Heh, I thought it was impossible, but the Shadow Clone Jutsu just got even more awesome than before! Sweet!"
As Naruto laughed satisfactorily from the discovery, Tazuna found his headache getting worse... and not just because of the blond's loudness. "Now that the orange brat is finally here and finally learned how to actually use his fancy ninjutsu, can we get going already? I'd like to get home before lunch tomorrow."
"We will be off soon, Tazuna-san," Kurenai assured, "but we still have a few things to do before moving out so that our trip will be safer."
The old man scowled. "Couldn't you have done them while we were waiting for the brat to show up?"
"Naruto is the key to those extra safety measures, so no, we couldn't," Kakashi answered, offering the man one of his eye-smiles, with the actual smile beneath his mask only growing larger when he saw the annoyance in Tazuna's face and the dumbfounded expression Naruto had.
"Wait, me?"
Kakashi and Kurenai then proceeded to explain to a confused Naruto and the rest of the group about the plan that they came up with after leaving Tazuna inside the hotel yesterday:
First, Naruto was to create five kage bunshin, and four of them would then transform into the remaining members of Team 7 as well as Tazuna. These clones would be travelling ahead of the main group and would act as decoys in case enemies appeared. A few of Shino's bugs would be stealthily accompanying them from the security of the forests that surrounded the road they would be using for the better part of the trip.
Hinata would then need to activate her Byakugan and watch the clones until they were but a few meters away from the edge of her extended field of vision. At that point, the group would then begin their journey and, from five-to-five minutes, she would be activating her dojutsu again to briefly scan the whole area around the clones and the main group.
Shino's bugs would be the decoy group's fixed scouts, checking the area directly around them (and ahead of them, beyond Hinata's range) at all times to warn Shino if there was an enemy approaching. The insects would also have another job: undermining any possible enemies in case the clones are ambushed. Of course, in such an evnet, the clones would also send their memories back to Naruto once they have been "killed". Between that and the fact that Hinata would be watching the fight once Shino detects any enemies, Teams 7 and 8 would be able to acquire intel on their foes and thus, would be better prepared to deal with the incoming threat.
"Isn't this a bit too much just to avoid some bandits? I mean, I could always just track them by smell before they even get the chance to approach if we even find some," Kiba suggested, a bit hurt to have been left out of the plan. It was almost as if Naruto was in Team 8 over him, which greatly bothered him.
"Like I said to Team 7 yesterday, one can never be too prepared for a mission. Anything can happen, and if we have the means to better protect our client and ourselves, then we should make use of them," Kurenai lectured.
She knew, however, that they weren't doing all that they could to reinforce Tazuna's safety, but both she and Kakashi decided that using her bigger invisibility illusions and Kakashi's summoned dogs would be a waste of chakra if they entered a fight, not to mention that it would tip off the kids that something really was wrong with the mission. 'If Kiba is already suspicious, the others must be as well,' she noted, observing the other genin as Naruto's clones were transforming into the people they were meant to impersonate.
Sasuke and Shino looked as stoic as ever, but both were starting to suspect that something was off about the operation already. Hinata was a bit on the edge as the reality that she was directly responsible for Tazuna's life started to sink in, while Naruto was focusing most of his energies on gushing over the awesomeness of his favorite jutsu, much to the bridge builder's chagrin. That didn't mean he wasn't a bit nervous, but you'd never be able to tell it just by looking at his face.
Sakura, however, was the one that worried Kurenai, since the pink-haired girl was starting to become visibly scared of the situation she was in, as well as of the potential ways the mission could go wrong. Most of the scenarios Sakura could imagine were only repeats of the thoughts that kept her awake for almost two hours after her nightmare ended.
Those were the same thoughts that Sakura's imagination unwillingly crafted for the girl for the next three hours of their journey, which at the very least kept her drowsiness at bay.
As the group walked through the forested road that separated Konoha from a small beach from where one of Tazuna's friends would be waiting for them with a boat, she tried to think about other topics, but eventually her mind always ended up going back to the mission and how things could get worse from there. Another thing that tormented her was the fact that she'd likely not be very useful to her team in any those cases.
The girl released a silent sigh, shaking her head. 'This is driving me crazy! I need to talk with someone... maybe that will finally distract me.' She then looked at Hinata again, and not only the girl was currently focused on scanning the area around them with her Byakugan, but the topics she wanted to talk about with the shy Hyuuga would be impossible to broach with everyone else nearby.
"So, er, Tazuna-san?" Kiba started talking, much to Sakura's relief. "Why didn't you hire ninja from your own country?"
"Yeah! I mean, sure, we are the best ninja you could've ever hired," Naruto boasted, "but Konoha's kinda stingy with the prices for missions."
Sakura snorted. 'Oh, Naruto, Kiba... god bless your sweet, ignorant souls,' she snarked happily.
"Tch, our country is far too small to need a ninja village, boys." Tazuna scoffed, wondering if Gatou would've even tried to go to the Land of Waves if they had ninja to fall back on.
"What do you mean?" both boys asked in unison.
"Hidden villages are part of a given country's military," Kurenai explained, "and they are unique from other villages because the Daimyos actually help to fund them instead of leaving them to grow on their own. They take a good amount of money to fund and maintain and are not worth the cost if the country is small and is in relatively little danger of going to war. For example..."
The Genjutsu Mistress continued to share her knowledge about the geopolitical and economical aspects of the Land of Fire and other countries of the continent. Her lecture was engaging enough to hold everyone's interest throughout the entire explanation, especially when it eventually touched the topic of wars and, consequently, the exploit of the various Kage during those conflicts.
Sakura made sure to pay attention to everything that was being said, and surely enough, it managed to make her paranoia go away, even if only for an hour. The girl was actually surprised that Kurenai knew so many details that weren't covered in the shinobi history classes that she had at the academy, despite the actual topics being things she was very familiar with already.
Roughly an hour after the lecture started, Sakura's curiosity won over and she was just about to ask Kurenai about how she knew so much... when her fears started to truly become reality.
"My bugs detected four signatures of chakra on the side of the road, just twenty minutes ahead of the clones," Shino reported, making the entire group stop in their tracks immediately. "One of the signatures is from some sort of Water Release technique that is concentrated on the ground, and it is... somehow engulfing the signatures of three other humans."
'And so it begins...' Kakashi though, sharing a meaningful glance with Kurenai. " Excellent work, Shino. Naruto, make a shadow clone," the man said with the same firm tone that he used when giving orders to his subordinates when he was an ANBU captain, which was enough to make Naruto swallow the question that was forming on his mouth and simply do as he was told to.
"There are enemies ahead," Kakashi spoke to the clone. "Stay where you are and fake a conversation between yourselves. We will send more information about what you have to do later. Do not try to engage."
The clone was a bit taken aback by Kakashi's words, but his confusion was short-lived as he was struck by Kakashi's fist almost immediately after he nodded, surprising Tazuna and the kids. "This will send the message to the decoys," the silver-haired man clarified.
"I believe that the enemy is using the Mizugakure no Jutsu to conceal themselves within a puddle of water," Kurenai shook her head. "How stupid of them. It hasn't rained in quite a while, so this disguise is pretty pathetic."
Kakashi nodded in agreement. "This means we are probably dealing with a squad of chunin, since a jonin wouldn't make this kind of amateurish mistake, and genin would never get an assassination mission like this..."
"Hey, hey, hey! Wait a sec, an assassination mission?!" Kiba's incredulous voice made everyone turn their eyes at him. "Aren't we going too fast here? I mean, why would ninja even be after this smelly old geezer?"
"Smelly?! Why, you little br—"
"We are assuming the worst-case scenario for now, Kiba. They might also be after us instead of Tazuna-san, but worry about the details later. Hopefully after we get past those ninja and they don't do anything to us." Kurenai knew that the chances were low, but they could always be in another kind of mission that didn't involve their own fake C-rank mission. "Regardless, if they do attack us, we will keep them alive for interrogation purposes, so the answers will come soon. Also, refrain from insulting our client."
The Inuzuka recoiled after being glared at and wisely kept his mouth shut afterwards. Much to his curiosity, Tazuna suddenly seemed even more nervous than usual rather than looking pleased to see him being scolded by Kurenai like Kiba thought he would have been.
"So, what's our plan, Kakashi-sensei?" Sasuke asked.
"Before we let the decoy bunshin approach them, we need to decide who will be engaging the enemies." Kakashi then turned to Kurenai. "We should be able to take them out with ease, but if they are chunin specialized in assassination, then they likely shouldn't be too hard to deal with without the element of surprise. What do you think about leaving the fight to our squads?"
Kurenai scowled. "There's no need to endanger the kids, Kakashi."
"Yeah, I agree," Tazuna nodded. "If you two can deal with it, then it's better to keep the kids safe."
"But if these ninja are indeed hostile, then it's likely to get worse from here on out. It will be good for them to get experience while we could still reliably save them if something goes wrong," Kakashi argued. "And they are not just kids, they are ninja. Sooner or later they will have to face this kind of situation, and from what I saw yesterday, I think we can trust them to deal with this."
Both Kurenai and Tazuna begrudgingly backed off, well aware that the situation was indeed not going to get much better as the mission continued. If the genin could get first-hand experience with dangerous situations before Gatou sent jonin-level ninja after them, that was to their advantage.
"In that case, I believe that we should split up in pairs," Shino suggested to the other genin. It seemed logical, considering their numeric advantage.
"I want Sakura as my partner," Sasuke stated immediately, much to everyone's surprise. "She is the only one that I can fight with without worrying about burning something important with my jutsu, and I will definitely need the literal firepower if we are fighting a chunin," he elaborated, approaching the girl afterwards once Kakashi accepted his logic.
There was no lie in Sasuke's words: Naruto, Kiba and Hinata focused on taijutsu, and his Great Fireball was a bad idea if they wanted Shino to remain useful. Sakura, on the other hand, didn't lose much by hanging back and supporting him by throwing kunai and using genjutsu. However, the true reasons for him to want Sakura by his side in the coming battle came from what she had shared with him earlier, before Naruto arrived. He had glanced at her a few times during the course of the trip and seen how the pink-haired girl was always scanning the area around them, despite having a Byakugan user in the group, and her hand had been resting suspiciously close to her kunai pouch the whole time. It was almost as if she was expecting something to happen.
People don't change drastically overnight, so he still thought that Sakura wasn't very useful as far as combat went. As such, the Uchiha concluded that he needed to be with her as he was the most capable of the other five genin and would be better able to deal with the enemy with poor backup... but there was also another part of him that knew that she would be in grave danger if she went to battle as nervous as she was, and that he'd have the best shot at protecting her from harm during a fight.
Just like before, he had no idea of how to deal with Sakura, but Sasuke hoped that by simply partnering up with her, she would feel safer, and perhaps it would encourage her to do her best in the coming fight. But, just in case his actions weren't enough, he had one more card to pull.
"I'm counting on you," he nodded firmly at the girl, drawing an unopened fuuma shuriken from his backpack as he did so.
It took Sakura a couple seconds to process what Sasuke was doing, but soon enough she returned the nod, her face's color almost matching her own hair's. "I-I-I won't let you down, Sasuke-kun," she promised, feeling a little silly for stuttering but also feeling happy for earning her crush's attention. She repressed said happiness, carefully hiding them behind a partial mask of determination. 'I need to focus! I can always do my happy dance later... Sasuke-kun is depending on me to help him!'
Hinata watched the interaction with some amusement, wondering if she looked as cute as Sakura did when blushing and stuttering. The tables were soon turned on her, not only by her conclusion that she probably looked stupid at those times, but by what Shino suggested afterwards.
"In that case, I believe the best way to divide us, for now, would be me with Kiba, and Hinata with Naruto."
"...W-w-what?! M-me and... and...?!" Contrary to her usual reaction to situations involving the blond Uzumaki, Hinata's face only became paler than usual. Being forced to fight people that would be aiming to kill her was bad enough already, but risking pissing off her crush thanks to her uselessness was something she didn't want to add to her pile of worries at that moment.
"As long as I don't have to fight with the mutt again, I'm fine with anyone," Naruto grumbled, which immediately sparked a small argument between him and Kiba.
Hinata made use of the opportunity and approached her remaining teammate. "Shino-kun, d-don't you think it would be better f-for me to be with Kiba-kun? Y-you can't see through his smokescreen a-and—"
"Perhaps so, but I think that hiding yourself among Naruto's clones by using the Transformation Jutsu would provide you a better chance of striking the enemy than attacking from within a smokescreen while dodging Kiba's own attacks," the Aburame explained, knowing that Hinata had little problem with evading Naruto's attacks. "Besides, neither I nor Naruto have the capacity to end the fight as quickly as you and Kiba, so the teams would be better balanced with the groups I proposed. Don't you agree?"
Shino felt a little bad for using Hinata's fear of underperforming against her, but he knew that he and Naruto would be in danger if their enemy focused on speed—which was practically guaranteed if they were assassination specialists.
Sighing, Hinata begrudgingly resigned herself to her fate and dropped the subject, hesitantly moving towards Naruto. Both the blond and the Inuzuka were separated already, silently dealing with the pain from the aftermath of Kakashi's ear flicks while avoiding the disapproving glare Kurenai was sending their way.
After sharing Shino's plan with her new partner, Naruto broke into a grin. "Hey, I think that can work! Let's kick some ass!" the blond affirmed, smiling confidently. That's not to say Naruto wasn't feeling scared about the upcoming fight, but after Itachi, he figured that being scared at this point was rather silly. It did little to calm his beating heart, but at least it allowed him to keep his mask on more smoothly.
Soon, a small army of roughly two dozen Narutos appeared in the right half of the road, with some of them actually appearing in the grassy area on the roadside due to a lack of space. All of them were sporting the same excited expression that the original had before using the Kage Bunshin no Jutsu, with the single exception of one blond that was a bit further from the orange mob, fidgeting and looking at the ground.
"I, um... l-let's do our best!" Hinata said, her new blue eyes avoiding contact with one of the many pairs of similarly colored eyes that were currently looking at her. Not that she wasn't aware of what Naruto and his clones were doing; thanks to her Byakugan being already activated from underneath her chakra-based disguise, she saw their nods, smiles and thumbs-ups. Hinata, however, had already lost track of the original Naruto.
"Make one more clone for us, Naruto." Nodding in acknowledgment of Kurenai's order, one of the blonds then made the clone hand sign to add one more to their numbers.
"Alright," Kakashi approached the newest clone, "It's time for the decoy squad to move out, but make sure to act as if you don't know that you are about to be ambushed," he said before dispelling the clone with a fist that came faster than the chakra construct could even perceive. Turning to the one that he knew that was actually a blue-haired Hyuuga, he added another order: "Keep your eyes on the decoys, because we will also need you to report what is going on when they get ambushed." The girl nodded uneasily and focused on the fake Team 7.
'Hmm... I guess they are receiving the new memories,' Hinata mused, noting how the clones suddenly spaced out before continuing to walk.
"Let's keep moving so that we don't miss anything," Kurenai ordered, watching as Akamaru consumed a soldier pill. "And Naruto, make sure to concentrate—your report will also be key to figuring out how to deal with this situation."
Hinata's Byakugan eventually detected a bright blue gleam on a small part of the road just ahead of the clones, and soon after the decoy squad passed them, three figures emerged from what she imagined to be the puddle Kurenai previously mentioned.
Doing her best efforts to control her nervous stutter, Hinata proceeded to report to everyone what she had just seen. The enemies were all ninja from Kirigakure, dressed in brown military-style camouflage clothing and wearing black rebreather masks. One of them was completely bald and wore two gauntlets with long, kunai-length claws attached to the top of his hand.
The other two had brown hair long enough to reach their shoulders, with one having a wild and shaggy hairstyle that contrasted with the straight and seemingly combed hair of the second man, who also wore a grey poncho that was tattered around its edges. What was particularly notable about the pair was that each wore a single clawed gauntlet, connected to each other via a big, shuriken-styled chain. Their claws were significantly smaller than the one belonging to their bald companion, being only about 1,5 inches long, and were placed where their nails were supposed to be. None of the three had any kunai or shuriken with them, surprisingly enough.
Hinata refrained from describing their appearance and pretty much just told them about their weapons and the village they came from in the little time she had between the trio of Mist ninja getting out of the water puddle and their ambush starting.
The chained pair immediately made their move on the Kakashi clone, wrapping him with the chain and pulling it to "kill" him. The bald man with the long claws trusted his companions to deal with the jonin and quickly went after Tazuna instead of the genin. All three of the Mist chunin were caught off-guard by the small smoke clouds that formed after Kakashi and Tazuna were "killed", but the bald man regained his composure fast and quickly slew the clones of the three genin with a single, wide sweep of his right claw.
The three assassins, confused, started to talk to each other to try and make sense of what had happened to them. Likewise, Tazuna's escorts made use the opportunity to discuss their intel and how they would proceed from there.
"Wow... it's just as Hinata said," Naruto confirmed, awed by seeing the experience through the eye of his clones. "The only thing I would add is that the guy with the big claws is almost as fast as Kiba when he's all doggy. Not to say the other two aren't fast, but..." Naruto trailed off, with the disguised Hinata offering two tiny nods to reinforce his point to the others.
"...I'm afraid that Kiba might be the only one of us who is able to engage him, in that case. I believe that I, or anyone else, would just get in the way," Shino said, with some regret.
"Well... in that case, let's alter your plan a little. I was originally going to leave Tazuna with you guys—"
"You were what?!" Tazuna interrupted Kakashi.
"No harm would fall to you, Tazuna-san," Kurenai assured him. "If their speed is as Naruto says, then we should be able to stop them before anyone gets hurt."
Kakashi audibly cleaned his throat. "Continuing, I think those ninja might be suspicious if they don't see Tazuna among you. I'm somewhat infamous in the ninja world, so they will already think something is off if they don't see me... but between Hinata hiding as one of Naruto's clones and Shino posing as Tazuna, you all could reasonably pass for a squad of chunin that might be using my disguise just as an intimidation tactic and they won't find my absence to be strange."
The Aburame carefully considered the change of plans as the people that would indeed be fighting prepared themselves for it. Kakashi's logic was sound; however, there was no guarantee that the enemies would act as intended and that they wouldn't flee and try to ambush Tazuna later if they noted the jonin's absence.
He was a bit bothered by the idea of possibly not directly contributing to the fight, but a few of his bugs were already draining a small amount of chakra from the enemies and—most importantly—he managed to warn the entire group about the ambush before it could happen. That, he figured, was more than enough for his part. But the fact that he would leave Kiba to deal with the one who was seemingly the leader of the trio all by himself was also worrying him. Not that he thought Kiba was incompetent, but his enemy was likely more experienced than he was. But as much as he didn't want to abandon his teammate, the Aburame knew that he was the slowest of the six genin, being able to outspeed Naruto for only a minute or two before the blond's stamina gave him an edge—a fact that he had the pleasure to deal with during their spar on the day before.
Subconsciously, Shino's head turned towards his teammate, who happened to note that the Aburame was looking at him. "Hey, you could always send your bugs to help me after the smoke clears out if you are worried," Kiba suggested, standing beside a clone of his that was definitely Akamaru in a disguise.
"That's... acceptable, I suppose," the bespectacled boy concurred, knowing that his bugs had problems maneuvering within Kiba's smoke clouds. "But do not take unnecessary risks."
Kiba rolled his eyes. "Yes, mom. Trust me, he won't even see what hit him."
"Um... I t-think they want to fight us head-on, from what I can see of their gestures..." Naruto's voice rang out, but it's owner obviously wasn't the young Uzumaki.
"If that's the case, then I believe that you guys can handle the rest. If anything bad is about to happen. we will intervene," Kakashi assured, eye-smiling at them for a second before glaring at the six genin. "However, if the enemy does get to "Tazuna" or if we have to step in before you guys get hurt... let's just say that the training I'll put you through will make you wish that I had let them kill you instead."
With his empty threat hanging in the air, he grabbed Tazuna's arm and body flickered to a nearby tree branch before the old man could even know what was going on. Kurenai followed after him almost immediately afterwards, casting a small invisibility genjutsu over their hiding spot. It would wear off if they needed to move beyond a single meter away from where it had been casted, but considering that the fight would be over at the moment they chose to act, that wasn't much of a problem.
The remaining genin looked at each other uneasily for a few seconds.
"So... we just need to wait for those guys to come over here to have their asses kicked, right?" one of the Narutos asked, this one definitely not being the shy Hyuuga that was hiding somewhere within the orange-colored mob.
"No... we still need to find a way to separate them," Sakura disagreed. "It will be kinda pointless to split up in groups if the three fight together anyways."
"I have a plan for dealing with that. Don't worry." Sasuke said, looking at Sakura, who smiled appreciatively at him in return. The Uchiha nodded and went to talk with Kiba, leaving the pinkette to her thoughts.
While they briefly discussed their battle plans, Sakura noticed that Sasuke seemed aware that she had worried and nervous the whole day. He had been a bit awkward about it, but the pinkette could see that he was trying to get her to feel better, in his own way.
But while Sakura did feel happy that she was receiving her crush's attention, she also knew that Sasuke didn't trust her to perform well enough during the battle in her current state of mind. Despite she herself agreeing with that logic, it hurt to know that he considered her as a burden to her team.
And that's why she resolved to prove Sasuke wrong in the coming battle. Both for his sake... and for herself.
"Gouzu, Meizu, it's decided! We are going after them!"
"Yes, aniki!"
And with that declaration, the trio of shinobi known as the Demon Brothers took off, intent on making the Konoha ninja regret trying to fool them with a bunch of shadow clones.
The bald man, true to Naruto's observations, was faster than his younger twin brothers and had a lead of a few meters over the other two as they ran. It took only a little less than a minute for them to find their opponents... which were just a bunch of kids standing in front of an old man—their target.
Notably, one of the kids had a clone standing just beside him, while another was surrounded by roughly two dozens of clones. As the man wondered which one of the two had been behind the shadow clones from earlier, he felt himself passing over a small, thin obstacle a few inches above the ground.
'Ninja wire?'
He then heard the familiar sound of kunai and shuriken being launched and realized what his distraction had cost him. Still, thanks to his good reflexes, he managed to jump back in time to avoid the flurry of kunai that struck the area where he was just about to run into, but it was not enough to avoid the explosion of the smoke bomb that was strapped to one of the kunai...
"Guys, I smell poison on them," Kiba warned, already under the effects of the Four-legs Technique. "Don't get hit!" And with that, both the Inuzuka and his partner bolted to engage the leader of the trio inside the smokescreen.
"Sasuke-san, two of them are trying to jump over the smoke," Hinata reported, making the real Naruto and most of his clones frown from hearing the sound of his voice addressing Sasuke with an honorific. It did not sound right at all.
"Hn. Just as planned..." Sasuke then opened his fuuma shuriken and prepared to toss it as if it were a throwing axe—with the blade positioned vertically. As soon as Gouzu and Meizu appeared, Sasuke calculated their trajectory, jumped, and threw his weapon.
The twins were momentarily startled by Sasuke's incoming attack, but they relaxed once they saw that the shuriken would miss them completely. As such, when they landed on the ground, neither of them were prepared to feel the yank of the chain that connected both of them together as the fuuma shuriken struck it.
The force of the massive shuriken connecting with the chain wasn't enough to break it in half, but it put stress on the more fragile links deep inside the brothers's gauntlets and knocked the pair out of their balance, making them fall ungracefully to the ground.
Both of the Mist chunin looked backwards on instinct, which allowed them to see that their chain was now stuck to the ground thanks to the shuriken. Immediately, the two brothers got up from the ground as they pressed a hidden button inside their gauntlets, freeing it from the chain and allowing them to move independently. Gouzu and Meizu recovered fast enough to avoid the various shuriken that Sakura launched at them, carefully aimed so that both would need to dodge sideways and be further separated from each other.
In Gouzu's case, "avoid" only meant he wasn't harmed by the projectiles, because one of them actually managed to cut through part of his poncho. Luckily for him, both of the kids responsible for attacking them from afar seemed to choose him as their opponent, giving him the opportunity to make them regret ruining his favorite clothing article.
Leaving his brother to deal with the orange army that was approaching, Gouzu ran at Sasuke and Sakura immediately. 'So the boy fights up close and the girl at a distance, eh?' Gouzu concluded, noticing how Sasuke rushed to meet him in combat while Sakura hung back. 'Let's see how they fight and who needs to be taken down first,' he thought, seeing the black-haired boy draw a single kunai from his weapons pouch
As he clashed with Gouzu, Sasuke displeasedly realized that despite being only a bit slower than Kiba as far as running went, the enemy ninja's strikes were both faster and stronger than the young Inuzuka's. That, coupled with how the man's steel gauntlets had thick metal rings that he used to fend off Sasuke's kunai attacks, made the Uchiha briefly consider that he might be in trouble if he didn't find an opening soon.
Much like in his fight against Hinata, counterstriking was not an option. Kiba hadn't been sure of where exactly these guys had poison, but Sasuke imagined that getting hit by the man's claws would bring more than just a scratch.
Despite all of this, the Uchiha wasn't in a complete disadvantage. Unlike Gouzu, his strikes were carefully calculated to be strong, but not too strong to leave him vulnerable after misses and parries. Gouzu's strikes didn't leave him open enough for Sasuke to truly get a good hit on him, but they were enough for him to keep up with the man for a few seconds.
In the midst of taking a step back to avoid a stab from Sasuke, Gouzu saw three copies of Sakura ready to shoot their kunai at him: two coming from each of the Uchiha's sides, while the last one chose to jump high to attack him from behind her teammate.
Gouzu converted his dodge into backwards leap just in time to witness the three dagger-like weapons intercepting each other, disrupting the illusion and revealing that only the kunai that was now to his right was real. 'So the girl on the left is the real one... heh.'
Sakura had aimed so that her kunai would strike the man's chest, but she hadn't bothered to calculate where the kunai would've ended up if she had missed. That proved to be a mistake, because the blade ended up slightly buried in the ground only inches away from Gouzu's reach.
Not one to pass up such an opportunity, the man quickly grabbed the weapon and tossed it back at its owner. He didn't have time to react to the girl using a Substitution without even making a single hand sign, because Sasuke also capitalized on the opening to throw his own kunai at him.
"I got you!" Sasuke grinned. Knowing that the man would have no time to dodge the weapon, Sasuke ran at him, drawing another kunai as he approached his foe.
"Oh, is that so?" the man taunted, grabbing the kunai mid-flight inches away from his head; his gauntlet protecting from the cuts that would've normally resulted from such a move. Passing the blade to his other hand, he twirled the kunai to hold it in a reverse grip. It was not a very efficient for attacking—especially not with his non-dominant hand—but it was the best choice for what he had planned for the Uchiha.
Making use of the shock clearly evident on the boy's face, Gouzu rushed at him, wearing a wide predatory smirk that went completely unseen thanks to his rebreather mask. Just as he predicted, Sasuke reacted without thinking and tried to swing at him instead of dodging.
'Dammit!' With the clang of steel hitting steel and the fact that his strike was parried by what had once been his own kunai, Sasuke realized that he had been put in check, and the finishing move was just about to come as Gouzu prepared to slit the boy's throat with his claws...
That is, until Sakura chose that moment to introduce Gouzu's face to her foot with a flying kick. The man was knocked backwards and crashed to the floor a few meters away from where Sakura landed. A few leaves were stuck to the girl's long hair, evidence of where she had appeared after her substitution.
"Sasuke-kun, are you alright?!" she asked, eyes focused on her enemy as she got up from the ground. 'Ouch, that hurt...!' the girl thought, resisting the urge to rub her backside to alleviate the pain from the bad landing.
"Thanks to you. Now get out of the way," was all that Sasuke said as he started to run through a few hand signs, and Sakura did as she was told to, moving to the side of the Uchiha.
Gouzu, who was now sprawled at the floor, managed to recover from his dizziness and look up fast enough to see the boy taking a deep breath and subsequently releasing a stream of fire, aimed straight at him.
"Great Fireball Jutsu!"
Sasuke knew that they didn't need all three of the ninja alive, and while he wasn't very sure if he would cope well with his first kill, he decided to deal with that later. But unlike him, Sakura managed to see the Mist ninja making a single hand sign before his body started liquefying. Sasuke wasn't considering that his target would be just a puddle of water, so his projectile passed right above Gouzu's "body".
After two seconds, Gouzu realized that his gambit paid off and that he hadn't burst into flames, so he immediately emerged from the jutsu... only to find the ball of fire just inches away from his face.
"What the hell?!"
The shock had been enough to make him lose his balance and fall backwards... and then he noticed that the fireball was floating in the air, completely frozen mid-flight.
'What... the hell?!'
Had he been given a few more seconds he would've realized that he was hit by a genjutsu, but before he had the chance, Sakura dropkicked him from behind, the impact to his head being strong enough to knock him out before the floating fireball disappeared as his body crashed into it and, subsequently, the ground.
Thanks to her rather daring choice of attack, Sakura had also landed on the ground. Learning from her mistakes, she positioned herself so that her left leg would bear the brunt of her weight, saving herself from more pain. Sakura saw Sasuke approaching the man, holding a kunai and ready to take him down if he was still moving.
Once it became clear to the duo that he was unconscious, Sakura relaxed, sprawling herself right in the middle of the road. "I did it... we are alive...!" Sakura said in a barely audible tone, between deep breaths.
"Whoa there, Sakura-chan!" Naruto approached the girl and offered a hand to her. Removing her own from over her heart, which was still beating furiously, Sakura accepted the help and got up from the ground. "That was a pretty awesome move, but we were kinda meant to not kill them, you know?"
Despite the blond's playful tone and smirk, Sakura gasped and covered her mouth with her hand, completely missing his joke.
"Um... his heart is still beating," Hinata offered meekly, making Team 7's genin turn towards her and note that she had dropped her disguise. "B-b-but he won't be moving anytime soon," she concluded her diagnosis, averting her gaze when she caught Naruto looking right at her. Her lavender eyes fell to the fallen form of Meizu, who had been floored by Naruto and his clones after being paralyzed by her own Jyuuken strikes.
"Impressive showings," Shino complimented, also back to his true form. "With the exception of a few of Naruto's clones, you even managed to defeat them without taking damage."
"Heh, you know it! Team 7 rocks!" Naruto exclaimed, beaming at the Aburame and purposefully ignoring the boy's comments about his clones.
"Aren't you forgetting someone?" Sakura suggested, staring sharply at him.
Naruto looked at her in confusion for about three seconds, until Sakura subtly glanced at Hinata and then back at him. "Ah, I guess there was Hinata too! Great job!" The blond offered the bluenette a high-five, and while Sakura wanted to keep watching to see how the shy Hyuuga would react, Sasuke had other plans in mind.
"I... I believe I said this before," the Uchiha began, looking uncomfortable once Sakura turned to him, "but... thanks for helping me out there."
"O-oh... don't mention it. That's what teammates are for, right?" Sakura smiled bashfully at him, doing her best to remain firmly rooted to where she was instead of succumbing to the voice inside her head that suggested tackling him into a hug and declaring her undying love to him instead.
"I suppose..." he trailed off, not really knowing what else to say. He found himself unable to maintain eye contact with Sakura's emerald eyes and looked away, catching a glimpse of Shino trying to remove the kunai that had gotten stuck in the log his teammate had substituted herself with.
Sakura also had no idea of how to salvage their conversation, but in the midst of subconsciously playing her hair, a single leaf dislodged itself from her pink tresses, slowly falling to the ground as the pinkette watched it.
Knowing that Sasuke wasn't looking at her at that moment, she let a devious smile form on her lips before suppressing it completely seconds later. Doing her best to look somewhere between embarrassed and annoyed, she started to pass her hand through her hair again.
"Um, Sasuke-kun? I think I've got some leaves stuck in my hair... do you mind removing them for me?" Sakura asked innocently, keeping up her pleading stare as the Uchiha considered his answer. "Like, I can't see behind my back so..."
"...Fine." Sasuke had half a mind to deny her once he recognized what she was trying to do, but he had promised himself that he would make an effort to be more friendly to Naruto and Sakura and... well, saying "do it yourself" and walking away probably wasn't very friendly. He started to move towards the girl, when a voice rang out from somewhere ahead of him.
"Hey, can anyone help me out here? This guy is heavy!" In the midst of the dissipating smoke cloud, they could see Kiba dragging the limp figure of the bald ninja.
"Um... I'm coming!" Naruto answered, rushing to assist the Inuzuka and leaving a flustered Hinata behind him.
"Ah, one of those rare moments where Kiba has a good idea..." Shino said, approaching the other members of team 7 and giving a kunai to Sasuke. "Do you mind helping me to bring the man you defeated near that tree so that we can tie him down for our sensei to interrogate them?"
Sasuke looked back at Sakura, who shot a strained smile at him. "D-don't mind me... go help Shino, hehe..." The Uchiha merely nodded and made his way towards Gouzu.
If the Aburame had the ability to read minds or sense negative emotions, perhaps he wouldn't have dared to give Sakura's kunai back to her at that moment. Turning around to follow Sasuke, the bug-user completely missed the scornful glare Sakura sent his way. The girl then remembered who the true guilty party was and shifted her smoldering gaze to Kiba, who was now obliviously instructing Naruto on how to help him carry the Mist chunin he had defeated inside the smoke cloud.
'Dammit, I was so close!' Sakura thought, doing her best to keep her outburst purely internal. A frustrated sigh coming from somewhere to her right caught her attention. Looking at the source of that sound, she saw a depressed-looking Hinata.
The girl's shoulders were slumped and she was shaking her head slightly. 'Way to go, Hinata. If he didn't think I was a weirdo before, he surely thinks it now. And to think I was doing so well yesterday, too...'
"You alright there, Hinata...?" Sakura asked tentatively, walking towards the girl and prompting the Hyuuga to look at her.
"I... I tried to t-talk to him, b-but... I started stuttering n-nonsense and then I just... froze," Hinata admitted, shame building up until she couldn't maintain eye contact any longer.
"Hey," the pinkette placed her hands on Hinata's shoulder, "don't worry too much about it, alright? We will be together for more than a week, so you can always try again later. No need to rush anything," Sakura said, hoping to comfort not only Hinata, but herself as well.
"Thank you, Sakura-san." Hinata gave out a soft smile that Sakura returned with one of her own.
"Now come on, we can talk more about that later. We can't let the boys do all the work now, can we?" the pinkette asked, motioning at the knocked out Meizu.
Meanwhile, as the girls were chatting, Naruto and Kiba were also engaged in a conversation as they dragged the leader of the Demon Brothers.
"Seriously? He thought that Akamaru was a shadow clone of you?" Naruto asked as he grabbed the ankles of the unconscious Mist chunin to assist Kiba, who had been dragging the man by the legs until then. The Inuzuka was now walking backwards, holding the man by his shoulders as Naruto helped him with extra arms and a pair of eyes.
"Yeah, I guess he got confused when he heard Akamaru's transformation wearing out after he landed a kick on him." Kiba answered, glancing at his partner who was resting comfortably atop his head. 'Guess the pup is not hurt. Thank goodness...'
"And... how did you even break his claws?" The blond turned his head to look at the shattered remains of the weapon that had killed most of his decoy clones. "Careful with the chain, by the way," he pointed at the ground with his chin once he looked back at the road in front of him.
Kiba nodded. "Relax, I can smell the stink of poison on it. Anyways, I broke his claws—and his hands—because he thought that he'd be able to counter my Tsuuga by using that puddle jutsu while leaving his claws out to hit me as I passed through. The guy then started to spout some nonsense about how he got his claws from his father and such." Kiba snorted, rolling his eyes. "As if I cared about his backstory. And how was your fight? Is Hinata alright?"
"I dunno, she looked fine, but she left me hanging after the fight," Naruto frowned. He wasn't keen on respecting others, but refusing a high-five was beyond rude. "I asked her why, but I didn't understand a word of what she said. And then she just stopped talking entirely."
"Heh... don't worry, Hinata can be weird like that sometimes," Kiba assured him with a playful smirk.
"If you say so..." Naruto shrugged, hoping that the Hyuuga wouldn't confuse him the next time they interacted. "Anyways, she just hung back and attacked him two or three times while he was busy with my clones. I don't think he even noticed what happened, since he was taking it easy before I knocked him out." The man had been much faster than Naruto, but when he saw how slow the boy and his clones were, he started to attack in flashy ways, clearly enjoying himself because of how easy the fight was... until his arms suddenly stopped working, which allowed the clones a chance to gang up on him.
"It was kinda boring, actually," Naruto shrugged nonchalantly. In truth, he was quite upset about being completely outclassed by Meizu during their fight, despite being indeed happy that he came out victorious. It didn't help that, from what he could see, nobody else really struggled with their respective opponents. After all, his own teammates and Kiba had no wounds to speak of, but some of his clones were casualties during the fight.
"You shouldn't be worried about getting entertainment out of this, you idiot!" Sakura scolded Naruto, glaring angrily at him as she and Hinata dropped Meizu for Sasuke and Shino to deal with. "I'd rather be safe and sound after an easy fight than almost dead after winning against a tough opponent."
"Sakura is right," Kurenai agreed, approaching the genin from the forest with Kakashi and Tazuna walking in tow. "You are all alive and that's what's more important."
"Didn't think you brats had it in you, but I guess I was proven wrong, eh?" the bridge builder commented, looking at Naruto as he and Kiba also dropped their own cargo for the other male genin to tie up using their own poisoned chain.
"Well, I can see room for improvement, but overall you all did a great job," Kakashi praised them, eye-smiling at the kids for a few seconds before his expression turned serious again. "But now... we need to have a talk about this mission... don't we, Tazuna-san?"
"...What are you talking about?" the older man asked warily, playing dumb despite knowing that it was futile to do so. He already had a suspicion that the old Hokage knew about it, since giving him two teams for the price of one made little sense for a seemingly simple mission like the one he had paid for (of course, Tazuna wasn't aware of how Sarutobi was using his educational experiment to justify that choice), and now it looked like the other two knew what he was hiding, too.
"He is talking about how those three handled the decoy squad," Kurenai answered, crouched near the tree with the captured ninja from the Mist. The woman checked their bindings and, concluding that Sasuke and Shino had tied them up correctly, casted a quick genjutsu to keep them unconscious if they woke up and, finally, got up to stare at Tazuna. "If you'd remember Hinata's report, she said that two of them went after the Kakashi clone first. This is natural regardless of their objective, since he'd be the bigger threat to them. However, the third man went after your clone instead of the genin's."
"In other words, these three weren't here to kill Leaf shinobi—you were their target from the beginning. And protecting you against ninja attacks isn't part of our mission." Kakashi stated. Of course, he and Kurenai both already knew the truth behind the ambush and Tazuna's lie long ago, but they couldn't allow the genin to find out about that detail, for obvious reasons.
"Indeed. Hokage-sama told us that the only dangers in this mission would be bandits, and that wasn't even a certainty," Shino stated. "But if those men were hired to kill you, then surely, someone must have a good reason to want you dead."
"You can either tell us right now or wait for me to interrogate them," Kakashi suggested, and admitting defeat, Tazuna sighed and started to share his story.
"...You are right, these men were indeed trying to kill me. And it's all because of the bridge that I'm trying to build, which is also why I requested for you to keep protecting me until I'm done building it."
"Wait, what?!" Sakura interrupted him. "So you knew they would send ninja to kill you? To kill us?!"
"As revolting as it is," Shino spoke up in a flat tone that contrasted with his words, "a more important question would be: why would anyone want your head merely because of a bridge?"
"It's not just a mere bridge anymore," the old man frowned. "Have any of you brats heard of a man named Gatou?"
"Y-y-you mean... Gatou Company's president?" Tazuna nodded at Hinata, who became even more pale than usual. Thanks to her position in her clan, she knew a thing or three about important figures of the world outside of the Land of Fire. As such, Hinata was aware that Gatou was one of the richest men in the world, and could definitely hire much more than just three random chunin if he truly wished.
Shino also knew of the man, since he too was a clan heir. Noticing the confused looks on the faces of the remaining genin, he decided to be helpful and explain the situation for them. "Gatou is a highly-successful businessman who deals with the production, importation and exportation of various goods, from iron ore to food to clothes. There are even rumors that he also deals with drugs and illegally sells weapons, but..."
"Those rumors are all true, I've seen it myself," Tazuna confirmed. "That man arrived in our country two years ago and bought every single port in the island. Because of that, he is the only one selling things to us, and the only one that can buy our own products."
"That... that means he has full control of your country's economy..." Sasuke muttered, finding the notion hard to believe.
"Why doesn't your Daimyo do anything!? I mean... it's his country, right?" Naruto asked, clearly upset. "What kind of leader abandons his country like that?!"
The bridge builder only shook his head forlornly. "The kind of leader that puts his family in first place. Daimyo's daughter has a rare illness and requires many kinds of medicine to survive... and Gatou is the only one capable of selling them to him right now. The Daimyo is supposed to serve the country, but... I don't blame him. If it was my daughter or my grandson, I'd have done the same," Tazuna admitted.
"And... since the Daimyo can't do anything to stop him, Gatou uses your country to work with his illegal stuff, right?" Sakura asked, eyes narrowed. 'What a scumbag!'
"Yeah, that's exactly what he does. His fortune grows by the day, while we on the Land of Waves just get poorer and poorer." Tazuna shook his head in disgust, and then looked at everyone. "Do you see now why the bridge I am building is so important? Our whole country depends on me being alive to finish that project so that we can stop being Gatou's hostages! But... no one, not even the Daimyo, has enough money to pay for an A-rank mission. C-rank is all that our country could afford."
Much to everyone's surprise, Tazuna bowed to them. "I am sorry for putting you all in danger like that, but I hope you understand just why I did it."
"Look, Tazuna-san," Kiba began, uneasily. "I... I get your situation, but we are only genin. I mean, I just took down a chunin on my own but that's because he did some stupid shit. If this Gatou guy is that loaded... well, he can definitely pay for a jonin, and there's no way we will be taking down a jonin."
"Guys, Kiba is right," Sakura said. "This mission just got way too dangerous for us; we need to turn back!"
Kurenai and Kakashi shared a glance. They knew that, considering all that the Hokage had said to them two days ago, turning back wouldn't be an option... still, they silently agreed to let things play out and see how their genin would react to this.
"Turning back is indeed the most logical choice... but is it the right one?" Shino questioned. "Tazuna-san has no money for a higher-ranked mission after all."
"Also," Sasuke added, "while we wouldn't last against a jonin, we could focus on protecting our client and leave the jonin to jonin," he concluded, looking at Kurenai and Kakashi.
"Well, I dunno..." Kuba muttered, scratching the back of his head uneasily.
Seeing that Kiba and Sakura looked unconvinced, Naruto decided to share his opinion. "Argh, come on, guys! You heard what that Gatou guy is doing, didn't you? Are you really okay with abandoning those people and leaving them to deal with that bastard by themselves?! This... this isn't right!" he added, remembering Shino's earlier question. "Even if we can't do much, we should at least try to do something for them, because nobody else will! Are you two truly going to give up?!"
Hearing those words and in particular the last two sentences, Hinata couldn't help but smile at the blond, making use of the fact that he had his back turned to her. 'Naruto-kun is right, I can't give up here! Those people can't do anything to improve their situation so even if I can only do a little... I must try to help them!'
"Eh... when you put it that way, I'd feel like an ass if I just left like that." Kiba said, scratching the back of his head sheepishly.
Naruto then engaged in a brief staring contest with Sakura, who faltered after a good ten seconds of intense visual combat. "Ugh, fine! I... I suppose if we don't actually involve ourselves in fights then it should be okay... " Sakura mumbled, looking away. She still thought it was a bad idea, but she knew she would have felt guilty about leaving the citizens of the Land of Waves to save her own hide.
"Awesome!" Naruto smiled brightly, and then remembered that someone had yet to say anything.
'Naruto-kun truly will be a great Hokage one day—'
Said blond chose that moment to turn around and face Hinata. "What about you?"
The girl's eyes widened immediately and her smile disappeared.
"M-me? I... I-I can't g-gi—um, I mean, yes! I'll go! " she blurted out nervously, defensively waving her hands in front of herself, much to the blond's bemusement
"I guess that's we have no other choice then," Kurenai sighed, drawing Naruto's attention towards her much to Hinata's relief. The Hyuuga then pouted at Kiba, who was snickering at her from behind Naruto. Thanks to her blush, it had the complete opposite effect on the Inuzuka, though he stopped when Sakura discreetly elbowed him.
"Considering their performance so far, I think they can handle Tazuna while we deal with enemies," Kakashi said. Maybe he would've been more reluctant if he wasn't aware of the true dangers of this mission from the get-go, but that wasn't the case here. Looking over at the genin, he gave them an eye-smile. "You all did a great job, especially you two." he pointed at Sakura and Sasuke, who responded with a wide smile and a smirk respectively.
"And.. what about me...? And Hinata?" Naruto asked, frowning. The girl might be confusing, but it wasn't right to not credit her for the battle like he almost did.
"There were a few problems with how you worked with her, because you just attacked the opponent without actually trying to create openings for Hinata to exploit," Kurenai answered truthfully, before smiling at the blond. "But considering that you had no way to discern Hinata from your own clones, I'd say you did a great job at being her support."
That last word made Naruto remember what the Genjutsu Mistress had told Sakura yesterday about how supporting one's teammates could be more important than being the only doing the heavy lifting... which in turn, made his frown turn upside-down. "Heh... it doesn't matter if I'm supporting or if I'm attacking, I'm always awesome! Believe it!"
"I suppose you two don't have anything to say about my fight, right? Considering the smokescreen and all," Kiba said, mostly in an attempt to stop Naruto before he started to gloat too much.
"Well, normally you'd be right, but I have my ways..." Kakashi answered cryptically, much to Kiba's surprise. "Let's save the more detailed reviews of the fights for later, though. Right now, me and Kurenai need to interrogate those three to see if we can't learn anything useful."
Sadly for the Konoha ninja, the Demon Brothers didn't have any useful intel to share with the group. Seeing that, Kakashi summoned a dog with the Summoning Jutsu and asked it to deliver a message to the Hokage about the three Mist chunin so that the ANBU could apprehend them. He could've sent a message directly to the ANBU headquarters, but he didn't want to risk any ninja with an allegiance to Danzo—who was a member of Konoha's council—finding out about their mission. Despite ROOT being disbanded, Kakashi doubted that all of its members stopped working for the old war hawk.
"Not that I want you to do that or anything, but why not kill them?" Kiba asked, noting with interest that Kakashi had summoned a greyhound, which was the fastest dog breed that he knew of.
"Because they are missing-nin. I recognize them from my Bingo Book: they are known as the Demon Brothers. If they were from Konoha, depending on who they were, I might have just killed them," Kakashi admitted in a bored tone, making the genin and Tazuna feel unsettled. "But since they are from another nation, it's up to the Hokage to decide what to do with them."
The group departed not too soon afterwards, only not doing so immediately because they agreed on setting up another decoy squad as well sending Shino's bugs to scout ahead of them again. Gatou, to whom the Demon Brother admitted to work with after being interrogated, would likely need at least one day to realize that his assassins were defeated and would not be reporting back. Despite that, the group decided to not take any risks for now.
And so they continued to walk towards the Land of Waves. After two more hours of walking, the group briefly stopped to get some ration bars from the backpacks. Though Naruto protested, wanting to have a "real lunch, instead of this shitty-tasting bar"... the jonin, though, insisted that it would be better to eat something small, portable and energetic during lunch and promised the boy that dinner would be more elaborate than that.
Thanks to that, the blond had been obliged to eat his not-as-good-as-ramen ration bar, all while watching enviously as Tazuna enjoyed a delicious sandwich. But eventually, the day started to end and the group decided to find a good spot inside the nearby forest for them to set up camp and rest for the night...
A/N:
Well... we are done here, I suppose. I wanted to put two more events in this chapter before ending the day, but I decided to stick with my original plans and save them for the next chapter (as the Zabuza fight will take CONSIDERABLY less time in my story when compared to the original tale). In case anyone still remembers that, one of the events will deal with the Hinata vs Hanabi thingy I touched upon in chapters 2 and 3. Trying to explain that here backfired on me.
I hope people aren't too mad at me for leaving Naruhina to the sidelines during this chapter, but trust me: Sakura and Sasuke won't have a lot of screen time without Naruto acting as a third wheel in the future, so I need to make use of this arc while it's still here. Naruhina will become more frequent in a direct manner as this arc progresses, so don't worry too much about that.
I didn't write the Naruhina fight, nor the Kiba fight, because... in my honest opinion, I didn't feel like they were necessary or interesting to read (let alone write), given the strategies employed by the genin during those fights. What I needed to accomplish from them didn't need the entire thing written down, unlike the Sasusaku fight (which will get more exploration next chapter).
And about my first OC, the "bald man"... I left him unnamed because I did not find a good name to match Gouzu and Meizu's etymologically speaking. And, as an individual, he was not important enough to be named, too. I mean, if I need to, I'll just refer to all of them at once as "the Demon Brothers" or something. Sorry for that.
But I hope you all liked today's fight scene. I tried to do something a little more fast-paced and, uh, emotionally detached than the previous fights.
Also, can I ask a personal favor out of you, my readers? Between December 10th and 18th, this site completely STOPPED to track views and visitors to my fic. I am the only one that can actually see the fic's view count, but I'd like for it to be as accurate as possible, so do you guys mind visiting any chapters you might have read during that time period? I'd really like that!
I mean, there's a huge drop of views between chapter 4 and 5, and chapter 6 actually has more views than 5 because it got posted later that week... it feels really awkward. Also, that week likely had the highest influx of views so far, since I updated twice in a short time-period, so I really wanted to have a decent grasp on how many people have tried to read my works and how many kept reading til the end so far.
This matters a lot to me, so please... even if you read all 6 of the chapters, it would take less than a minute as long as your internet isn't too slow, so... consider brightening my day a little? Thanks!
In other news, there will be a Boruto manga coming out this year. I hope it gives me good ideas for Part 4 stuff! Or perhaps stuff from previous parts, too... hmm. Hinata likely will stay as a side-character, so my hopes aren't very high. It will be probably be just as useless to me as Naruto Gaiden was.
Anyways, that's all I had for you guys!
Not to be arrogant/cocky/I dunno, but I'm pretty sure I'll hit 50 reviews/100 favorites with this upload so... really, thanks for that! See ya, and remember what I asked of you...
Changelog:
1.0 to 1.0.1 (11/16/2015)
Fixed one awkward sentence. Thank gio08 for warning me of it. Sashu, nightwind83 and a guest have also contributed!
1.0.1 to 2.0 (07/16/2016)
Fixed typos, grammar, added some small details here and there... nothing too special. But I'd like to add that I'm sad most readers didn't bother helping me out, given that Chapter 4 and 5 have lower view counts than the following chapters...