Chapter 11
Raze it to the Ground pt2.
A group of three Leaf ninja snuck as close as they dared to the outpost in Tsuchi no Kuni, being that it was only forty-five kilometers from the main forward base of the Iwa battalion in this part of Tsuchi no Kuni. They didn't need anyone running in that direction. Yet. The trio consisted of Naruto Uzumaki, Hiro Uzumaki and Neji Hyuga. Neji looked towards the Jounin and pointed at his eyes. Hiro Uzumaki nodded and the Hyuga activated his clan's vaunted bloodline. The veins around Neji's eyes became distended and the outline of his pupil was visible. He took a look at the outpost's wall, searching for a weakness. He found several spots the two others in his group would not be attacking. He relayed this information via Konoha's shinobi sign language. The younger of the two Uzumaki placed a large scroll on the ground. He opened it and took out three strips of blank sealing paper. Sealing paper was double the width of a normal piece of paper, but that's not what made it special. No, this paper was very chakra conducive. It was specifically made for the purpose of Fuinjutsu.
Hiro had Neji keep looking for any weakness in the walls that was easily exploited. Neji only found two. One was on the eastern side of the outpost, about twenty meters from that side's entrance. The other was on the northern side facing them. The spot was near the corner and to Neji looked like the wall was hollow, the empty space was maybe the size of a medium sized dog. He relayed this information to the group leader. Hiro's face gained a thoughtful expression, He then nodded and had them move closer. Moving carefully as to not tip off any within the wall of the place they were about to attack, suppressing their noise and chakra they moved to a distance of one-half kilometer from the outpost. Neji through sign language informed them that the walls were heavily manned by regular soldiers with no ninjas. Still even regular soldiers were enough to find them out if they weren't careful.
Naruto took the sealing paper he had taken from the scroll earlier and placed it on the ground, after taking out an inkwell and calligraphy brush, he started to transcribe a seal from memory upon them. The process took over fifteen minutes. Hiro could've done it faster, but he elected to be on guard using his honed senses to keep watch. Naruto tapped the ground twice to signal he'd finished the seals. To Neji, who had very little Fuinjutsu knowledge they looked highly complex and were un-readable. But the sole Jounin in their group grinned and gave Naruto a thumbs up so they must at least be somewhat good. Neji signed 'I don't know seals. How do these help our mission?' Hiro looked at Neji with a small smile. He then responded in kind 'With a miniscule application of chakra these will render us nigh invisible to their senses. In essence this hides us in plain view, any noise we make is muffled to the absolute minimum. This makes our job far easier. We still must be careful though, a skilled sensor will still feel us or at least know something isn't right.' Hiro finished his non-spoken explanation. Neji allowed himself a small smile. This was good. Naruto looked at Hiro, asking for permission to begin the sealing process in earnest. Hiro nodded once more. Naruto having received the go ahead began the long string of hand-seals necessary for this bit of Fuinjutsu. He ended the hand-seals on hitsuji.
"Fuin: Akai Omo Sasayaki" Naruto whispered, taking the smallest amount of chakra he could from his reserves. Neji strained his Byakugan to see if anyone in the outpost had noticed. Two ninja had and they were racing to the wall. 'Two ninja noticed it! We have fifteen seconds till they are at the top of the wall!' He informed the others. Hiro signed quickly 'Both of you suppress your chakra as much as you can and touch a seal NOW!' Naruto and Neji did as ordered, the two's chakra signature nearly disappearing. Neji having followed the two ninja with his eyes saw them come into sight over the top of the wall. He concentrated on suppressing his chakra as much as possible. Hiro waited… for what seemed like an eternity. The two Iwa-nin were searching for the chakra they'd sensed. Hiro knew that moving in the next twenty minutes was most likely a pipe dream, when the two surprised him. The two Iwa-nin left. Neji let him know they were heading back to their previous positions near what he could only describe as a large, shadowed building. This outpost had a skilled enough Fuinjutsu user, that they were able to block the Byakugan's sight. Well to some degree, Neji let him know he could still see the chakra signatures of those inside the building.
Hiro grabbed one of the seals Naruto had made and with ninja wire fastened it to his arm. Wrapping it on his bare skin. The two with him followed suit. Hiro then had them start moving closer at a slow but steady pace. When they reached the wall, after twenty-nine minutes, Hiro put a primed but un-activated explosive tag on the weak spot. Neji and Naruto took notice that the tag was different from the issued ones they possessed. Hiro informed them that the tags he was using were Uzumaki explosive tags and would have a far larger yield. Naruto, even on this very stressing mission gained a starry-eyed expression. Neji shook his head. Hiro then signed 'follow me'. Hiro began walking up the wall very slowly, stopping every few seconds to see if anyone noticed their presence. So far nothing. Upon reaching the top, the three Leaf-nin climbed on to the battlement carefully. A group of six regular soldiers talked amongst themselves, maybe two meters away. "Hideki and Takamura racing up here! Then demanding if I'd seen anything. What's going on I ask, and after five or so minutes they just turn around and leave? The nerve. What a bunch of assholes." One remarked.
Hiro looked at Neji and Naruto 'Kill two each. Be silent' he ordered. Naruto drew his ninjato with practiced ease as he snuck behind his two targets. He then beheaded both in a single swing. Neji killed his two targets with jyuken strikes the top of the c-spine liquifying their brains inside of their skulls. Hiro slit the throats of his targets simultaneously. The six soldiers were dead before their bodies would've fallen. The three Leaf-nin caught the corpse's and bringing them to the edge dropped them off the wall. Six small thuds could be heard, well eight Naruto had to throw two heads over as well. Hiro looked towards the outside of the outpost. A minuscule blue flash could be seen from the west. Sasuke, Sakura, Lee and Tenten were in position. He looked towards the east. A small red flash was seen by him signaling that Kakashi and Guy were in position as well.
"We 'go loud' soon. Neji are there any Iwa-nin on the battlements?" Hiro asked in a hushed tone. Neji scanned the battlements with his Byakugan. "No, the nearest ninja to the walls is on the east side drinking in what looks like a make-shift tavern. There is only 'regular' soldiers on the battlements. I count a total of… Thirty-two."
Naruto sighed. Thirty-two was a lot to kill without being noticed. He could probably kill fifteen without being seen but thirty-two, that was a stretch. "Fine then. We kill all only the soldiers on the eastern side. I'll signal the others to wait. Once we go loud they'll make their entrance. We are now on the clock you two." Hiro finished, face grim. He turned and signaled the two other teams to wait for his group to 'go loud'. The trio of ninja turned eastward and with Neji's guidance managed to kill all twenty soldiers on the eastern side. "We're going to 'go loud' now. Naruto use your highest ranked Fuuton ninjutsu. Neji run down and start creating as much havoc as possible when me and Naruto launch our jutsu." Hiro commanded joyless, killing enemy ninja was one thing sure, killing regular soldiers though? Academy students could do that. The Hokage would never send Academy students to front lines though.
Naruto and Hiro flashed the required hand-seals for their jutsu, Naruto pulled on his chakra letting the grind of it against itself happen naturally. He could feel Hiro's chakra becoming hot like an inferno. "Fuuton: Aka Omo Hageshi Toboe!" Naruto spat out twenty balls of vacuum pocketed wind that on contact exploded forward with wind blades cutting through regular soldier and a few ninja unlucky enough to be close. "Katon: Utsukushi Hakai!" Hiro muttered out as he shot fifty Goukakyu sized fireballs that upon impact shot multiple smaller balls of fire that exploded when they impacted. Hiro's jutsu killed no less than eighteen soldiers, their screams echoing as they died.
"Next time go with Mekyakyu. They die faster." Naruto stated lamely. He dodged to the left avoiding a axe-kick from a Iwa-shinobi, Naruto's ninjato became an arc of silver the man couldn't completely evade. It cost the Iwa-nin his right arm. A literal shower of blood painted the ground where Naruto once stood, for he was now behind the soon-to-be-dead shinobi, already swinging his sword at the mans neck. The man was dead before the scream ever tore itself from his throat. Hiro was laying waste to the soldiers who attacked him. His tanto coated in sharp wind chakra. It sliced through armor and bone just as well as a knife slices through warm butter, he was a whirlwind of death that the soldiers had no answer for.
Kakashi heard the fighting begin, he and Guy blitzed forward towards the place Hiro had placed the explosive tag. Kakashi put two fingers on it and direct a tiny portion of his chakra into it. The sealing matrix lit up and glowed blood red before numbers that appeared in the matrix started to count down. Twenty…Nineteen… Was all Kakashi needed to see, he and Guy ran up the wall. Guy stopped for a couple a couple of seconds on the battlement. His face became one of extreme focus. "Kaimon: Kai, Kyumon: Kai, Seimon: Kai!" Guy roared as he activated three of the Eight Gates. His sweat began to evaporate mixing with the chakra that saturated the air, becoming a green color not unlike spring leaves. Kakashi lifted his head band exposing Obito's final gift to him. He flashed through the four hands-seals needed for his original jutsu. Raikiri.
Hiro stood on the battlements and saw Sasuke putting the five surrendering Iwa-nin in prisoner transport scrolls. He stood over the remains of the outpost they'd had attacked four hours prior. "Naruto, Sasuke! After all prisoners are secure get the explosive notes ready the Hokage wants this place flattened." Kakashi called out from Hiro's left. Hiro lit a cigarette and took a long drawl. Sasuke Shunshined next to him in a gout a flame. He had a cigarette in his hand. His was already lit and as he took a puff, he gave a simple sitrep. "All prisoners are accounted for. We have set the two hundred explosive notes around the outpost fortifications. Give the order and this place will be a smoking crater in a short time." Hiro looked at Guy. "Get your team back to the check point. We need to find out where the other teams that were supposed to help us went." He told Guy, not an order more of a request which Guy followed. The Green Beast of Konoha didn't want to be caught in an Uzumaki explosive tag explosion. Team Seven had brought two hundred of the tags. Well when the Hokage wants a place wiped off the map…. But seriously two hundred?!
Naruto and his team were blitzing back to the check point when Sasuke activated the tags. He won the honor of that in a coin toss. The shockwave slammed against their backs. Naruto turned to see a massive mushroom cloud reaching it's way into the sky.
Holy shit! Hiro didn't play when it came to explosions.
Authors Note: Chapter 11! Thank you everybody. Don't worry We'll see more from Sasuke and Sakura in the forthcoming chapters. I'm just trying to focus on the Uzumaki's development and how this conflict is effecting and going to effect them. Trust and Believe the Chunin of Team Seven are going to be doing some badass fighting and some more training soon. More out-of-village and in-village character development soon as well just trying to figure out how to make it all mesh. If you got weed smoke it, you got beer drink it. If you got someone who lets you clap their cheeks or vice versa go do some of that as well. JGOOD23 OUT!