Rika-Chan24- Hey guys, here is the next chapter. I am sorry I didn't get to update sooner. I was sick and school started again for me. I have been really busy. I hope you guys like the chapter. :)
Thanks for all the Reviews, Fav's and Follows.
I don't own Naruto.
The group of nine genin looked up from the ground; standing in a tree was a female Grass-nin. None of the genin had sensed her presence at all. Who knew how long she had been there.
Killer instinct poured over the group, causing them to all freeze in place.
"What do you mean?" Neji managed to ask.
"Ku Ku Ku Ku, they are a little busy right now." The creepy Grass-nin said.
Shikamaru's brain was flowing with a million different scenarios at the moment. Who knows what could have happened with Team 7, but first they had to get out of here. This whole thing didn't make sense.
Shikamaru shared a glance with Neji and Shino, a few seconds later the killer instinct was pushed away from the genin.
"What did you do to them? And what do you want with us." Kiba asked as he patted Akumaru, who was shivering inside of his coat.
"Well you see the only way for me to get Sasuke-kun, is to kill all of you. My spy network gave me a lot of information about the twelve of you. I believe that the twelve of you will become a strong thorn in my side in the future. So I decided to get rid of you early." The girl said.
"Who are you?! And Sasuke isn't yours!" Ino replied.
"My identity is no importance, nor my reason for taking Sasuke away from Konoha." The girl answered.
"You're Orochimaru." Shino stated.
"Ku Ku, you are quite smart. How did you know?" Orochimaru asked.
"You are not the only one with a spy network. Why would getting rid of us, make it easier to get Sasuke?" Shikamaru asked. "This is getting way to troublesome for me; I can only stall for so long. They better get here fast; there is no way the nine of us can take out a Sannin, at least not as of right now."
(With Team 7)
Team 7 jumped into a clearing just as the Sounds team landed on the other side of the clearing.
"We finally found the three of you." Kin stated a second later.
"What do you want from us?" Sakura asked playing along, the three-time travelers knew exactly why they were here. Though for some reason they attacked too early.
"We just want to test out your guy's strength, you don't look very strong." Zaku replied.
"I guess you will have to find out." Sasuke smirked smugly.
"We need to hurry up, a clone of mine just popped. Orochimaru is attacking the others, they aren't doing so well. Ino, Choji, Tenten, Hinata are knocked out and injured. Everyone else is running out of chakra they won't be able to last much longer." Naruto explained quickly.
They couldn't lose anyone, especially this early. Fighting the Sound genin shouldn't take too long; after all the three members of Team 7 were the strongest out of the Konoha 12.
"Let's get this over with Konoha brats." Dosu called as he shot a strong gust of wind at them, right as Kin threw a cluster of kunai. Team 7 jumped apart and as soon as they landed back on the ground they attacked.
Sakura appeared in front of Kin a second later with her fist cocked back. Kin's eyes widened, she didn't have time to block Sakura. Sakura's punch made Kin fly back into the trees behind her.
Kin slowly got up from the ground. This was supposed to be easy, it didn't seem that way. She only heard of Tsunade of the Sannin with strength like that. She wasn't going to last against Sakura if she was going to get his like that.
Kin reached into her pouch before launching a multitude of senbon towards Sakura who was running at her again. Sakura who remembered fighting Kin from the first time around deflected and dodged every senbon that was being thrown at her. She knew about Kin's shadow senbon.
"I think it's time to get this over with." Sakura began as she flashed through hand signs. "Earth Style: Stone Spikes" Earth spikes around and underneath Kin. Kin tried to dodge as many as she could but she got hit by quite a few of them. She was already losing blood.
Sakura disappeared from view and a minute later Kin was being dragged into the ground. Her head was now the only thing that appeared above ground. "Damn it!" Kin cursed as Sakura appeared in front of her with her hand on her hip.
Sasuke appeared in front of Zaku, and entered a small Taijutsu match. Sasuke was a lot better than Zaku was. Zaku shot air from the tubes in his arms at Sasuke as he jumped away from the Uchiha.
Sasuke was pushed back from the high frequency of wind and sound. Sasuke decided it was time end this fight. They didn't have time to mess around they still had to fight off Orochimaru.
Sasuke rushed towards Zaku again, after kicking Zaku in the side and sending him flying Sasuke raced through hand signs.
"Lightning Release: Lightning ball" A ball of lightning gathered in Sasuke's hands before launching at Zaku at a fast pace. Zaku was just getting up from Sasuke's kick and he couldn't get away fast enough. A second later Zaku was knocked unconscious.
Naruto knew for sure they had to hurry, Sasuke and Sakura didn't see the memories of his clones. His clone had popped after being hit by Orochimaru himself.
Though it was also probably a trap, Orochimaru had to know they would be on their way. Naruto didn't know why all the plans were different on Orochimaru's end. Naruto didn't like not knowing.
Dosu was knocked out after a short taijutsu fight. He after all was fighting Naruto. The blond knew he had to get through Dosu to save and help his friends.
Nothing would get in his way; all of Naruto's friends knew this. Well anyone from the future would. Naruto would do anything to help his friends.
The three genin of team 7 shared a glance before they were on the move again. They were heading straight to the others; they had no time to lose.
Naruto made three Kage Bunshin and henged two of them into Sasuke and Sakura.
"What are you doing?" Sakura asked, curious of Naruto's actions.
"Kabuto's coming our way, I want to deal with Orochimaru first. He is currently fighting our friends. As much as I hate Kabuto, we don't have time to be at two different places." Naruto explained.
"Are you sure? Kabuto does cause a lot of problems in the future." Sasuke replied.
Naruto sighed, "I know he does, but Orochimaru is strong and we aren't strong enough to win against Orochimaru.
Splitting up would do worse damage on the person that goes after Orochimaru. If we were at our level from before we time traveled then we wouldn't have a problem." Naruto answered.
Sasuke nodded to him in agreement.
"If you think that is best." Sakura replied.
The three genin rushed through the trees of the Forest of Death. They were almost there.
A second later they stopped just before the clearing. The three-time travelers looked over the clearing. Almost every single one of their friends were sitting up or lying across the clearing breathing heavily.
Lee and Neji were the only two standing up. Though the two of them were breathing hard, and they were slightly shaking.
Orochimaru stood at the edge of the clearing chuckling. It was time Team 7 dropped in.
In a flash Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura appeared in front of their friends blocking Orochimaru's view of some of them.
"Kukukukuku Well, well glad you three could join the party, Kuku." Orochimaru chuckled. If he was surprised by their appearance he didn't show it.
"What are you doing here Orochimaru?" Naruto asked. He wanted to get over with this part of the exam already.
"Hmmm, straight to the point I see. I guess I will have to tell you then. I am here for Sasuke-kun."
"Well you can't have him." Sakura spoke up. Sakura really didn't want to have to lose Sasuke again.
"What do you mean?" Sasuke replied.
"I can give you power Sasuke-kun, way more than these pathetic friends of yours. Though all of you are above genin level which is certainly interesting. Friends will not help you kill your brother." Orochimaru tried to persuade Sasuke.
Before Sasuke could even reply, Naruto interrupted.
"You don't know Sasuke, do you? Power doesn't make you strong; protecting your precious people makes you strong." Naruto shouted.
"I don't want to kill my brother. Naruto is right, you don't know me at all." Sasuke added.
"Why did you go after our friends if you wanted Sasuke?" Sakura suddenly asked.
"I had to show Sasuke the true meaning of power. Friends don't do a thing to your strength. I had to get rid of you lot somehow, this kills two birds with one stone." Orochimaru explained.
"Now I am tired of all this talking, I am going to leave a little present behind." Orochimaru added.
The snake Sannin sent out snakes everywhere, all of the snake's were heading straight towards the genin.
Naruto gave a glance to Sasuke and Sakura before they all began to attack too.
"Wind style: Great Breakthrough." Naruto shouted, as a large gust of wind shot towards Orochimaru.
The snake Sannin didn't even flinch, instead he sent the same wind jutsu out towards the genin. Both wind jutsu's clashed and it seemed like Orochimaru's was over powering Naruto's own.
Sasuke appeared behind Orochimaru at that moment and attacked with taijutsu. Out of everyone, Sasuke knew who Orochimaru fought. The Sannin easily evaded or blocked the Uchiha. Sasuke was beginning to get frustrated with the Sannin.
A split second after Orochimaru blocked Sasuke for the thirtieth time, Sasuke shunshined out-of-the-way. Orochimaru wasn't really expecting Sakura to be right where Sasuke once was.
Sakura didn't hesitate, and punched the Sannin with all her strength. As soon as her fist made contact the Orochimaru she punched turned into mud.
"I wasn't expecting that at all, you remind me of my old teammate Tsunade." Orochimaru's voice called from behind her. A second later, Sakura was sent flying back towards the others. She hit the ground hard once she landed.
"Kage Bunshin no jutsu!" Naruto's voice called out, hundreds of Naruto's appeared around the clearing. Naruto didn't want to take any chances. Orochimaru needed to be dealt with.
"Ahh, yes the Kyuubi brat. I have heard a great deal about you." Orochimaru said from the edge of the clearing. Sasuke was now standing next to the real Naruto after the last attack. Both genin were looking quite serious, and seemed to be observing him quite closely.
The rest of the genin had all grouped together again. All of them on the other side of the clearing, away from the fight. Half of them still wanted to jump in the fight and help, while the other half were just too injured or exhausted to do so.
Sakura slowly stood up from the ground, her body ached all over from the force of the impact from the ground. They needed to deal with Orochimaru and quick.
The Naruto's all attacked a minute later, all of them charging towards Orochimaru, hoping to slow down Orochimaru, even a little.
The real Naruto and Sasuke were doing hand signs, for another combination attack. After all the two of them were always best with teamwork when they actually wanted to work together.
"Lightning Release: Electromagnetic Murder." Sasuke called out, as he created a lightning stream towards Orochimaru just a second later after Naruto's water jutsu was sent out.
"Water style: Water Shockwave" Naruto called out as a large volume of water appeared and was sent strait at Orochimaru.
That lightning and water combination was always quite deadly; they really didn't want to take any chances. Orochimaru had just finished taking out the last few Naruto clones when he heard the jutsu's being called out.
"They are definitely not genin, if they can pull out C-ranked Water and Lightning jutsu's." Orochimaru thought. The element attack was coming at him to fast, so Orochimaru couldn't get out-of-the-way in time. The attack sent him into a tree as well as shocking him.
"We can't hold him off much longer, he is a Sannin." Sasuke commented as he began to breathe hard from all the fighting.
"He isn't going to leave unless you get the curse seal." Naruto replied. "We can't just run either, were too big of a group."
"Sakura, go heal the others as much as you can. Sasuke and I will deal with Orochimaru. I think I have a plan."
"Alright, but be careful" Sakura replied before heading over to the other genin.
"Sasuke listen carefully, to pull this off we will have to work fast." Naruto began. Sasuke nodded in understanding, before Naruto hurriedly told him the plan.
Orochimaru climbed back to his feet a minute later, he wasn't injured very much from the attack.
"I am done with you brats, I am not going to play around anymore. I don't have much time, before I am spotted." Orochimaru said.
Orochimaru rapidly went through hand signs and sent out his thousand snake hands. Snakes were sent every which way towards the two genin.
Naruto nodded to Sasuke and the two split away from each other. Their plan was about to begin.
"Wind style: Cutting Whirlwind" Naruto called out as slicing wind was sent out from Naruto. Cutting up snakes left and right.
"Kage Bunshin no jutsu" Naruto made hundreds of clones again to attack Orochimaru. Naruto then slapped a seal to one of his clones and then the clone henged into Sasuke.
Naruto's henge always worked, his henge's had never been detected as of yet. The real Sasuke henged himself as one of the Naruto clones, hopefully they could fool Orochimaru with this plan.
The real Naruto and the clone Sasuke jumped in with the clones, all of them attacking Orochimaru in any way they can. The fight seemed to drag on for half an hour, with Naruto adding clones in when they were running low. By adding clones, Orochimaru wouldn't notice the difference.
Orochimaru had it with all the clones, and he seemed in luck, for 'Sasuke' was in close range. He was going to get Sasuke, no matter what. Orochimaru punched away the few clones that were attacking him at the moment, and then he finally took his chance.
"Temporary Paralysis Technique" Orochimaru called out, making 'Sasuke' freeze in his tracks.
Orochimaru stuck out his neck all towards 'Sasuke' and bit into his neck. 'Sasuke' cried out in pain.
"Sasuke!" Multiple voices cried out from around the area. Orochimaru drew back and chuckled to himself.
"You will seek me out Sasuke-kun; I can provide you with great power." Orochimaru said. Many Naruto clones raced towards Orochimaru and some headed to Sasuke.
"It seems I have over staid my welcome, I will deal with you lot in time." Orochimaru said to the genin as he sunk into the tree behind him. He couldn't let Sarutobi know he was here just yet, he had plans to finish.
The clearing grew quite once Orochimaru had fully disappeared. 'Sasuke' was now being checked out by Sakura.
"Don't worry about that Sakura, I am alright." The only Naruto clone left said to Sakura.
"What do you mean?" Sakura asked. Just as she finished her sentence the Sasuke she was holding poofed away. The Naruto clone next to the real Naruto was now Sasuke.
"What did you guys actually do?" Ino asked slightly confused.
"Troublesome, don't you see Ino, they tricked Orochimaru. Sasuke henged into Naruto, while one of Naruto's clones henged into Sasuke. With all the Naruto clones around, Orochimaru couldn't tell the difference." Shikamaru explained.
"Yep, that is pretty much it." Naruto began, "Except that I added a seal to it."
Sakura punched Naruto on the head. "How about you warn the rest of us next time. I was worried you know." Sakura replied.
"I know Sakura, I am sorry. It wouldn't have worked if all of you knew." Naruto answered.
"He isn't going to be very happy one he finds out." Sasuke commented.
"That's true, so did you guys get any scrolls? You guys took a long time to get here." Kiba asked. Akumaru barked in agreement with his master.
Naruto grinned and began to unload his pockets, as well as Sasuke and Sakura. In total they had 8 heaven scrolls and 7 earth scrolls.
"We didn't even get that many." Choji commented as he remembered that each of their team only had one extra of each scroll.
"I guess I went a little over board with the shadow clones." Naruto said as he scratched the back of his head. "Hey at least there won't be that many teams left. I think we should rest for the night, and work our way to the tower tomorrow." Naruto added.
"Good plan, it's already getting late." Neji replied as he looked up to the sky, stars were already beginning to come out.
"Yeah, and I could use a nap or something." Naruto added as he yawned, he was barely keeping himself up right. Making tons of shadow clones can do that to you.
"You aren't the only one." Sasuke replied, as he too was quite tired. The rest of the group looked like they could use a break too.
The next afternoon the twelve genin were almost to the tower. The one main good thing about traveling in a big group is that taking out enemies does not take very long.
It had been mostly quite in their travels, besides the few conversations going around, and the occasional attack on the group. Naruto decided to bring up something that he had been thinking about since the second exam started.
"Guys, I know this might sound odd right now, but I think maybe, one team should drop out of the exam when we get to the tower.
Before Naruto could begin to explain, everyone began talking at once.
"What! What do you mean, drop out?" Tenten asked.
"Why should we?" Kiba asked next.
"We are all quite strong, what is your reasoning?" Lee added in.
"Naruto, please explain what you mean." Shino's voice cut in.
Everyone looked to Naruto for his answer. No one really wanted to drop out now, they had gotten so far. It was their first exam too.
"What I mean is, if Orochimaru is going to attack sometime in the exam, wouldn't be wise to have one team at least to be at full strength? From what the third says, we are the trump card for the exam." Naruto began.
"That might be, but we shouldn't have that big of a problem. There is twelve of us you know." Sasuke replied.
"This is so troublesome. Naruto, we will all be fine. From what I gathered from my father, there is probably going to be a preliminary round before the third round. Everyone knows that a tournament is the last part of the exam. There are never over twelve people in the third round. We can't be the only teams to make it to the tower." Shikamaru explained.
"Shikamaru and Sasuke are correct Naruto. Since the third already suspects Orochimaru to attack, he probably has other shinobi preparing. We can't only part of the thirds plan." Shino added.
Naruto sighed, "I guess they are right, luckily there are more than three-time travelers in the group. I think I might have gone insane without them." Naruto thought.
"Alright, we are all going then. I want all of you to be alert at all times until after the exams are over. Orochimaru might try to attack again, we seem to have caught his interest." Naruto told the group.
Everyone nodded to confirmation at this. It didn't take them much longer to reach the tower at the end of the third day.
All twelve genin stood in front of the sign that was just inside the tower. Since six of the genin already present knew what to do, they took out their scrolls.
Since there were four teams all at once, there was a loud puff of smoke that appeared from the four sets of scrolls. Once the smoke dissipated, Iruka, Zabuza, Izumo and Kotetsu appeared in front of them.
"Ha, Izumo you owe me money. They all arrived at the same time." Kotetsu said as soon as he spotted the twelve genin.
"I didn't expect them to work together and get here at the same time." Izumo commented as he handed over the money.
"Good job Gaki's, now you have to wait until the five days are up." Zabuza explained before shunshining away.
"I am so proud of you guys, well I will show you to your rooms now, come along." Iruka said as he took charge of the group since Kotetsu and Izumo were still arguing about their bet.
"I am glad to see you Iruka-sensei, I missed you. Maybe we could go out for ramen after the exams." Naruto said as Iruka lead them through the tower. "I will even pay."
"I would be glad to Naruto." Iruka replied with a smile. "If everyone else would like to come they can. You guys can tell me all about your missions." Iruka added.
"It would be more fun that way, I don't mind." Naruto answered.
"Yeah! I will go." Choji replied, after all their isn't anything like free ramen.
After that everyone agreed to ago as well. It wasn't long until Iruka showed everyone to their rooms and wished them good luck on the rest of the exam.
Thanks for reading! I hope you guys liked the chapter. :)
I wanted to do something different with the Forest of Death. Since almost every single time travel story I have read either still gives Sasuke the curse seal, or Naruto ends up getting it by saving Sasuke.
Let me know if you spot errors or not so I can fix them. I don't always catch them when I look over it. :)
Please Review, I will try to update soon! :)