Naruto's Weakening Seal and the Darkness Shinobi :

Part I of the Darkness Chronicles

Written by Entei Artist, Devdog47, and Senacku

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Notes: In order to contact Devdog47 or Senacku, please send your message through my profile page, Entei Artist. I will be sure to forward it to them.

This story is written in three perspectives. Kyoka is written by Devdog47, Natari is written by Senacku, and Mikomi is written by Entei Artist. Chapters will have different writing styles because of the variation of authors.

Disclaimer: We do not own Naruto, nor its characters, places, etc., etc.

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Chapter 5

Told by Natari Roo

We ran back to the entrance to Konoha.

"Hey, do you guys think Kyoka'll be okay?" I asked when we stopped for a rest.

"I don't know…," Eureka said.

"She'll probably be fine. She's pretty strong," Mikomi said, but she looked worried. Eureka groaned and let Naruto slide to the ground.

"Okay, either we go slower or someone else is carrying Naruto," he said.

"We could drag him," I joked. Mikomi frowned.

"This isn't the time for jokes! We're all pretty anxious and not in the mood for feeble attempts at humor, Natari!" she said.

"Fine, fine… Hey! My jokes aren't feeble!" I yell.

Eureka sighed. "Who's gonna carry Naruto?" he said, changing the subject before we could start fighting.

Mikomi smiled, "Why, you, of course."

"Well, as long as we go slower," Eureka said wearily. And we were on our way back to the Darkness Village.

We set up camp at about 10:00 PM. (I could tell the time by the moon's position in the sky. Yeah, I'm cool like that.) Anyway, we were heating up dinner over a fire Mikomi made. We would have eaten soldier pills or something, but Kyoka had been carrying all of the soldier pills. And Kyoka was… well, I dunno. I hoped that she was catching up to us or something. I was at least glad we didn't have to eat those crappy soldier pills. They taste like CRAP! I wanted to eat what I'd brought in my backpack, anyway… "Dinner" happened to be ramen, one of my favorites. I love all noodley foods!

"…-sniff sniff-…is that…-sniff sniff-…RAMEN!" Naruto suddenly exclaimed. It surprised our entire little group.

"Hey! He woke up!" I smiled.

"No duh, Natari," Mikomi smirked.

"Where…Where am I?" Naruto asked, looking at us across the campfire.

"You died. We're taking you to heaven," I said with a mock-serious expression on my face. Maybe TOO mock-serious.

"WHAT! I CAN'T die! I have to become Hokage!" the blonde shouted.

"Well, he's as loud as you, Natari. I'm sure you'll be great friends," Mikomi winced at the volume of his yelling.

"Don't mind them. You're not dead. My name is Eureka. That's Natari, and that's Mikomi," Eureka introduced us by pointing at us as he said our names.

"Where's Jiraiya? Did he tell y'all to take me somewhere?" Naruto said suspiciously.

"Isn't Jiraiya the guy Kyoka was talking about? Another Sannin?" I asked Mikomi and Eureka.

"HEY! Answer my question!" Naruto said loudly.

"Um, of course Jiraiya let us take you-," Mikomi started.

"Nope, we pretty much kidnapped you," I interrupted with a smile.

Mikomi slapped her forehead. "You IDIOT, if we'd told him Jiraiya had given us permission, he would've believed us!" she hissed at me. I frowned. "Oooooh…my bad," I said, then grinned sheepishly.

"You guys kidnapped me? Fine then! I'll beat the crap out of all of you! Then I'll beat the crap out of Jiraiya for him letting you guys kidnap me!" Naruto shouted while standing up. I stood up too.

"Yeah, right! We're Darkness ninjas! We could beat the CRAP out of you! AND you're outnumbered!" I shouted right back at him. He hesitated. "Darkness ninjas? You mean, like, you're evil or something?" he asked.

"No, we're from the Darkness Village! You probably wouldn't know about it, though, it's kinda new…," I said.

"NEW! The last "new" village tried to wage war on Konoha and killed old man Hokage!" Naruto screamed.

"If you two don't shut up, I'm gonna use the Silence Jutsu, and Kyoka isn't around to make me release it like last time," Mikomi sighed wearily.

"And why are you so CALM, you just kidnapped me and you're acting like it's nothing!" Naruto screamed at Mikomi. Mikomi sneered. I could tell Naruto was starting to get on her nerves. "We kidnapped you to HELP you, you little brat!" she snapped. "The seal that seals the Kyuubi in you is flawed, and we are taking you to the Darkness Village so that it can be fixed!"

"You mean… you didn't kidnap me to kill me or anything?" Naruto asked suspiciously.

"If we were gonna kill you, don't you think that our village would have sent more experienced people?" Mikomi asked. "And we'd have killed you by now, anyway!"

"No way", Naruto said. "I want more proof than that!" So, as we waited for the ramen to cook, we all explained to him the situation and our mission, which he gradually began to accept as the truth.

"So you're gonna take me to the Darkness Village, fix my seal, then escort me back to Konoha?" Naruto asked when we finished our explanation.

"Yep!" I smiled.

"And if you aren't gonna come peacefully, then I'll just knock you out and carry you with us like we did earlier," Mikomi said.

"I guess I believe you guys... but you better not be tricking me," Naruto said slowly.

"We aren't. Hey, the ramen's ready. Who wants some?" Eureka asked.

"I DO!" Naruto and I shouted at the same time. Mikomi groaned.

"Great. Another ramen lover," she said. "I guess I'll eat some. I wish you'd brought other food, though, Natari."

"Duh! What else would I stuff my backpack with other than ramen? Chicken?" I asked her through a mouthful of instant ramen.

"I wish," she said, then hesitantly started eating the ramen.

We finished eating, and then went to sleep. (Naruto slept on an extra sleeping bag we'd brought.)

I woke up before the sun had come up. I groaned, knowing I wouldn't get back to sleep anytime soon. I sat up and looked at my friends and Naruto. Naruto was snoring. So was Eureka. Mikomi was sleeping like an actual human being. I looked around the dark forest and decided to find some water. So I wondered off into the forest. Before long, I heard a stream and decided to go investigate. I stumbled sleepily through the trees until I'd found the source of the noise. It was a big river, and the sunlight was reflecting off of it. Wait a minute- SUNLIGHT! CRAP! I hadn't noticed the sun had risen and was now halfway peeking above the horizon. The others were probably looking for me! I quickly looked around the area and memorized it's features so I could come back later with my friends and replenish our water supply. I started running back toward the direction I THOUGHT was the way back to camp. But I have a crappy sense of direction, and I ended up getting even deeper in the forest. I came across a large cave, and was about to turn around and run in the opposite direction (hopefully the RIGHT direction) when I noticed grey, fast shapes bolting out of the cave and surrounding me. "Ninjas?", I thought, panicked (but now fully awake, on the upside). The wolf in me spoke to me. "No," it grinned happily. "Friends." I was surrounded by a wolf family! 7 wolves! I thought all the wolves had been killed! The last wolf, the boss wolf, had been sealed inside me!

"What are you doing in OUR forest, human trash?" a wolf asked. It looked to be the leader of the family.

"Can I kill it, dad?" A smaller wolf grinned nastily, baring its teeth.

"Yes. Kill it. Save some meat for your brothers, though," the leader wolf said.

"W-wait! I'm kinda a wolf, too!" I said quickly. I REALLY didn't want to get eaten by wolves. True, I was a ninja, and true, I could take out a couple, but they were strong, fast, and looked to be hungry. Hungry animals are dangerous animals.

"How DARE you even SUGGEST being part wolf, stupid human! You don't even have claws!" the leader wolf snarled.

"But I'm sealed with the wolf spirit!" I said, showing them my seal. They backed off immediately.

"Please forgive us, Boss Wolf. We were only hungry," the leader said, hanging its head in forgiveness.

"Uh…" I paused. I wasn't actually the "Boss Wolf." The "Boss Wolf" was just trapped inside me. I doubted that these wolves were stupid enough to call a human the "Boss Wolf"… The "Boss Wolf" couldn't answer them. Not until the next full moon. And I was suspicious at their sudden mood swing from "KILL HUMAN" mode to "BEG HUMAN FOR FORGIVNESS" mode. Was this a trick? I knew the wolf inside me was certainly tricky… was it a trait of the wolf species? Like how they can speak our language?

"They are trying to trick you. They do not believe I still exist. I shall kill them when I next have a chance," the wolf inside me growled.

"We do not have much food to offer, but we could give you all we have. Please, come into our cave, O Boss Wolf," the leader wolf said. How many travelers had they killed with tricks like this? And more importantly, how could I escape this? Then it came to me! My new jutsu! As quickly as I could, I formed the seals of dragon, rat, tiger, ox, horse, sheep, tiger, monkey, dog, serpent, and then tiger again.

"Ninjutsu: Darkness Uprising!" I yelled, and then the entire clearing was smothered in heavy darkness.

"NO!" I heard the leader wolf snarl. And I was outta there, and jumping through the trees faster then I think I've ever gone. And before I knew it, I was jumping into the clearing we'd camped in. This was a major navigational victory for me. Mikomi and Eureka jumped, and Naruto yelped.

"There you are! We were just about to leave without you!" Mikomi frowned. "We've been looking for you for about 30 minutes and- hey, you look pale. Are you okay? You'd better not be sick too, we don't want Naruto getting ill," she continued.

"Yeah, once, I got the stomach virus. Man, that stomach virus SUCKED!" Naruto said. "Then, I ate ramen noodles. Let me tell ya, NEVER eat ramen when you have the stomach virus! It can get pretty disgusting…" he finished.

"I'm fine! Just a little tired, I guess. Let's go," I frowned.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Eureka asked.

"Yeah! Of course. I was just finding a stream and I got a little lost. I'll show you where the stream is really quick!" I grinned. I couldn't tell them about the wolves; they all knew wolves didn't exist anymore! They'd think I was insane!

"Oookay…as long as you say you're okay…"Mikomi glanced suspiciously at me. She probably knew I was hiding something…But she didn't ask. So we started our journey again, heading first toward the river (which I successfully found again!) and then toward the road…