The sun rose on the morning of the 10th day of Team sevens „forced holiday" in Tsunamis house, it was a slightly foggy morning, but free of clouds and hence promised to be the first really sunny day of their stay. In short it seemed to be a really pleasant day in the making. Which once again demonstrated that the weather gods (if they existed at all) had a sick sense of humor.
During the breakfast one of Konohas messenger hawks glided through the open window, landing deftly on the table without even touching any of the foodstuff, which caused Kakashi to lift his brow. He swiftly took the small scroll fastened to the hawks left leg, and continued to read it in silence. No amount of questioning looks (or in Narutos case frowning) led to any reaction. Until he "huh"ed, and put the scroll away. Silence stretched. Sasuke was just about to ask, as their Sensei started: "Well, it seems the collection of the Demon Brothers went smoothly. My question regarding any bounties on our other prisoner brought nothing up though. Obviously he was able to keep a very low profile, Mist wasn't even aware of the fact that Zabuza had him as support, much less of any real wrongdoings on his part. They still would like to get their hands on him, but as they are not paying any ransom, I think we will take him with us. Provided we survive." The last part was underscored by his "eye-smile". It still made Sasuke feel …. less than thrilled. While their training had gone rather well so far, and their teamwork improved, facing a A-S Class Nukenin with unknown support was still pretty far down his wishlist. Though, if he thought about it, above facing this worlds Itachi, for one. You had to be grateful for the little things, he supposed. "Well, as we are expecting our ….. unwelcome guests any moment now, we will not continue training today. You will instead patrol the area between Tsunamis house and the coast to the north, while I will take the other side. Do not, under any circumstances, overexert yourselves." He did not add "because that would be stupid", and actually didn't need to. Even Naruto got it. Enemies expected, be at your best and be vigilant!
Which they got to a few minutes (and consumed ricerolls) later.
Kakashi watched his students go, and was worried. What he had not told them was that the scroll had contained 2 other, more troubling, pieces of information. Following that data, all over the elemental countries secluded (but still under surveillance by the 5 Great Villages Anbu-equivalents) living Ninja had managed to disappear from the radar of Konohas, and if their spies were correct, the other villages too. Most had been "found" again rather quickly, and while troubling due to the inability to know what they had done while "out of sight", they did not worry Konoha much. However, a list of 4 A(+) Class Ninja without village association had managed to disappear completely within the last 3 weeks. 2 of them had been affiliated with cloud one time or the other, and seeing Konohas ….. enmity was too soft a word but still, with them that worried his superiors a lot. And him being the former Anbu Captain, they obviously thought he had to worry about that first hand. Damn, sometimes he really envied Gai and his attitude. At least none of them were former Mist Ninja, still, while it was unlikely that they would support Zabuza (not in the least because they were too far away to get here in time or had disappeared long before his clash with the "Demon") it always payed to be prepared. So Kakashi executed the Summoning Jutsu, and ordered Pakku and 4 other of "his" dogs to patrol the area for "foreign" smells and Chakra.
The other information the scroll had told him was that the Chunin Exam would be held in Konoha this year, and pretty soon as well, which meant lots of foreign Ninja loitering around. Damn. That would mean lots of extra work, not even counting Sasukes …... situation and the low but existent probability for someone of the visitors being able to find out about it (or even being responsible for the event!). Ah well, no sense in getting crazy about it now, maybe Zabuza would kill them all...
Yeah, right mindset, Kakashi, he said to himself and got to work.
Many many miles away, Zabuza had just begun his first major test with his new armor. While he had been training with it for 2 days straight, getting used to the weight and testing how much Chakra was needed to trigger its strength improvement abilities, today Hohiro had arrived. And being able to go all out against his former teacher, and probably the best swordsman Zabuza had ever met, was something else entirely. He was especially interested in its rumored ability to shed most mono-elemental Jutsu below a certain amount of Chakra (like, for example, Water Dragons) like the proverbial water. If that really worked like the rumors/notes said it would render 80% of Kakashis Jutsu useless, and hence guarantee his victory over the otherwise dangerously competent Ninja. If it did not, he would have to deal with the Ninja of a Thousand Jutsu differently.
Hohiro stood roughly 15m away, his extremely long but only slightly more than a hand wide blade, known as the Mountaincutter, over his right shoulder. With the usual frown on his face, his bushy brows almost fusing into one, his beard wobbling in the wind, he waited for Zabuzas first move.
Zabuza opened up with a quick water bullet, which he followed up by quickly dashing towards his opponent, channeling chakra into his legs, sword and his Shoulder guard. As he was just reaching attack range, he barely managed to dodge Hohiros thrust to the left, just to run into a quickly summoned earthwall, through which he promptly broke (and with much less resistance than expected, nice!) without slowing down much. He spun with full force, and Hohiro had to block this time. Their blades met, Zabuzas Kobikiri Honcho ringing, Hohiros Mountaincutter sparkling with Raiton chakra, their respective strengths seemingly equal. Zabuza loved it. Hohiro had always been stronger than him by a fair margin (and he was already considered insanely strong for the usually far more speed oriented Ninja) but the armor did what it was supposed to do and leveled that advantage rather nicely.
Swords clashed and rang, Jutsu were executed, creating torrents of water, bolts of lightning and rocks galore, and were evaded, countered and broken, it was glorious! This was what he lived for!
After about 5 minutes Hohiro jumped out of range, digging the tip of his sword deeply into the ground, and shook his slightly sweated beard. He commented with a silent but deep voice: "Hmm, that thing seems to give you quite the edge, my pupil." His brow furrowed. "But don't get too full of yourself, I am still holding back my real heavy hitters." Which Zabuza believed him. While never one for "soft" training, Hohiro hated to waste potential. And he HAD said potential. So he grinned and removed the bandages covering half of his face, which made the wide grin visible. He would show the world what he was capable of, and stop hiding under that garment.
"Then we are ready. Lets rest for an hour or 2 and then we will teach Kakashi what it means to clash with 2 of the top 3 Swordsmen of the world at once." Hohiro smirked back. "I hoped you would say that. And I have a little surprise for you as well..." With that he drew 2 obviously freshly made headbands sewn to blue-black cloth out of his back pocket...
The patrol had gone well (translation: event-less) so far, the day become as beatiful as it ahd promised to, and it was time for their noon break. Which they decided to hold on some smooth rocks with a good view to the sea.
Naruto had just gotten back from retrieving fresh water from the nearby rivulet when Sasukes Sharingan, which he had kept active all the time, picked up something. Something insanely fast, coming directly at him from out of the rocks over there. He knew exactly where he had to be to evade it, but as much as he strained to follow his Eyes "suggestions", and he strained a lot, he was far too slow. He just managed to see a …. curtain? Of lightning coming at him before it hit him fully on the upper body. The pain was excruciating, his vision seemed to be overloaded with light (which was impossible! His subconscious insisted) just to go black exactly as the pain subsided enough for him to realize that he was flying through the air. Again. He tried to roll in the air and land on his feet, but not being able to see was...detrimental to his efforts. He was just about to scream his frustration, as he landed. With a short "thud" blackness claimed him.
Naruto and Sakura frantically tried to get below Sasukes flying body, but he flew through the air almost as fast as the attack, which they had not even seen before it hit their teammate, had done. Sasuke landed with a thud, and seemed out. One of Narutos clones got close enough to see that Sasukes eyes were bleeding, before a large, heavily muscled man with a sword over 2m long appeared out of the earth, grabbed Sasukes body, and vanished into the earth again just as the clone reached the spot where their friend had fallen.
A few hundred meters away Kakashi was not so surprised, his Dogs had told him of Zabuzas imminent arrival just about 20 seconds ago, by a large sword flying over his head, as he easily dodged it. What did surprise him was that the Nukenin, who once again appeared on his swords handle, seemed to have changed his style of clothing. Gone was the bandage over his (smirking) lower face, as well as the ridiculous arm warmers. Instead he wore a rather blocky looking copperish shoulder guard over the left shoulder, sturdy looking forearm protectors and a headband...Kakashi had never seen in his life on his forehead. It showed something alike a rather big, straight sword over a stylized wave. Strange...
He was just about to initiate the expected taunting contest, when Zabuza launched himself from the sword, gripped it and started a charge towards him. He did not have enough time to uncover his Sharingan and react appropriately, so he instead executed a quick Hosenká and jumped back, quickly opening his sealed eye. Just to be shocked by Zabuza not even trying to evade but … plunging through the fireballs, obviously unscathed. And his Sharingan picked up that there were some sort of gloving runes on that shoulder guard. Dammit. He kept evading and firing smaller Jutsu of various sorts at the swordsmen, but aside from slowing him they did not show any effect. And he did not want to exhaust himself with "big" Jutsu until he knew who and what the Nukenin had sent after his pupils.
Just as he had made up his mind to break the engagement for now and look after them, someone rose out of the earth next to Zabuza, Sasukes limp body on his shoulder. The second Ninja was old, balding and bearded, yet still very muscular and broad shouldered, and wore the same headband Zabuza did, in addition to Sasuke he had a sword with an even longer, yet far slimmer, blade than Kobikiri Honcho on his shoulder. Shit.
Zabuza stopped his advance and smirked. "Well Kakashi, it seems you have 2 choices now. Fight and watch your pupils getting killed, starting with the little Uchiha here, followed by dying yourself at our blades, or to surrender to our terms and leave Wave." His voice was more restrained, and confident in an almost cultured way, than Kakashi had expected, and even if it would cost him his status, there was no real choice here. Only trash aborts a mission, but those who leave their friends to die are far worse than trash. He slumped a bit, covered his Sharingan again, and said: "A very well executed plan. You have me beat, I surrender under the condition that you do not harm my pupils."
The man next to Zabuza smirked. "See, told ya." His old but strong voice commented. Zabuza simply nodded towards him. Hohiro had a better grasp on the formalities, so he would let him handle the rest. And if Kakashi should attack, well...
"Now then, lets get to it. Aside from giving us Haku back (At that Zabuza smiled a true smile of happiness, his pupil was alive!), what we want from you is to serve as a witness to the Lesser Village Charta. Articles 4 and 6 to be precise. You being a Elite Jounin of Konoha that should be no problem legally speaking. After that you will leave Wave as quickly as possible." Kakashi frowned, and drew out his regulation book, quickly skimming it. He had never been one to memorize all the regulations. Hohiro waited politely. Or at least without obvious scowling. Kakashi kept reading, and was …. surprised to say the least.
Article 4 covered the "legal" founding of a new Lesser Village by at least 2 Jounin intend on founding it and one foreign Jounin or higher as witness, Article 6 covered the official acknowledgment of a newly founded Lesser Village by one of the 5 Great Villages, which granted it rather more legitimacy than simply founding one and hoping for the best, and needed 2 Jounin of said Greater Village, or one Elite Jounin or Kage. Zabuza and this …. other guy intended to found their own village! So that was why he had never even heard of their headband symbols. His brow rose.
"So, it seems you brought yourself up to speed. Good." Hohiros voice then got more … official.
"I, Hohiro Yamamoto hereby declare that I am willing to join and co-found the newly founded village of Tsurugigakure no Sato (Village Hidden in the Sword) and serve under the first Namikage, and primary founder, Zabuza Momoshi. Will you, Kakashi Hatake of Konohagakure no Sato bear witness to this and agree to full acknowledgment and a peaceful opening of relations between Konohagakure no Sato and our village in Konohas name?"
Zabuza smirked at Hohiro declaring him the First Namikage. Granted, it would still be a lot of work until "his" village was a village in more than its name, but it would be his alone. And Gateaus scum would prove both a good method to get the locals on his side and provide him with much needed funds.
Kakashi paled a little, but still answered. "Yes, in the name of Konoha, I bear witness to all this and agree to acknowledge your village."
And just like that, the "Village of the Sword" was founded.
Kakashi had collected the very worried (and a bit ashamed) Naruto and Sakura after making sure Sasuke was alive and, aside from bleeding eyes (with, as it seemed, still active Sharingan...) and unconsciousness out of which he would not wake, well, and left as soon as he could, with a scroll of the "Namikage" for the Third in his pocket. Who would have expected that? Not only had Zabuza "drawn" another Jounin (or better) Ninja out of his pocket when he needed to, no his newly founded village was now officially acknowledged by Konoha, which made Nami no Kuni their domain legally speaking, and had another High Chunin to Jounin member, with a Kekkai Genkai no less, in Haku. Great. He was sure he would never hear the end of it that all of this had happened under his nose (and with his consent!). Still, priority was to get Sasuke to a Medic, and fast. So he continued top speed towards Konoha, the worried eyes of his students on Sasuke...
AN: And the first "major" divergence is here. A new village, with our beloved "Demon" as Kage. I hope you like it.
This more or less ends the first "arc" of the story, next we will have the (immediate) ramifications of the new Village, and what exactly is "off" with Sasuke. Followed soon by the Chunin Exam Arc.
Please review! I really like feedback, you know? And the more the better!