A/N: Sorry about how long it took for me to post this slightly shorter chapter, I was kind of wallowing in self pity and some random other stuff :P. Anyways, I'd like to thank zigmas for reviewing. I am aware that many readers may be confused as to how the story is following the summary, but I guarantee all questions will be answered soon. The arc you see now is the introduction arc, as it is leading up to the major arcs, notably the ones with the "Enemies from Another Time". However, one of the "Enemies from Another Time" was hinted at in an earlier chapter. Now let's jump into this chapter:
Chapter 9: Flare
Naruto stood facing his two opponents with a unbreakable stern gaze, holding two short staves created from his gudo-dama. Shogai shifted slightly uncomfortably at his presence, while Hiiro pumped more chakra into her armour, causing the chakra flames to emit further from her body. "Hmph, the kids got some presence, no more playing around." Shogai stated, before he quickly sent out a flare of chakra opening his previously sealed chakra points, before realigning his shield.
The two parties observed each other, neither side making any movements until Hiiro slightly shifted her stance, resulting in yellow blur descending into the crater. Naruto swung the short staff in his right hand with incredible ferocity at Hiiro's head, the staff bending slightly due to the speed. Hiiro barely managing to react bent her body, narrowly avoiding the attack, but receiving a knee to the stomach knocking her back towards her partner. Naruto did not let up on his assault, quickly following up his previous attack with a charge before he brought the staff in his left hand above his head, about to smash into Hiiro's location before she quickly propelled herself off the ground, desperately trying to avoid the angered jinchuriki.
Hiiro landed behind her partner as the staff collided with the ground, effectively creating an additional crater within the crater they had been fighting in. Naruto quickly proceeded to fire two of his gudo-dama in their ball forms towards Hiiro's location, only to be met by Shogai's shield, creating a massive echo as the objects met. Shogai then attempted to absorb the gudo-dama to no success, as the seal on the shield began to lose its power as the chakra that had been used to create it was being negated by the balls. Shogai quickly pulled his shield away from the truth-seeking balls, before using it to block a scissor attack from Naruto's short staves.
Hiiro began to go through some hand signs as Naruto's attack connected, before Naruto proceeded to fire 3 gudo-dama from almost point blank range at Shogai from over his shield, while still pushing against the shield. Shogai was forced to abandon his shield, as he leapt away from it while barely avoiding a direct impact from the balls, but being launched back by their impact.
Hiiro jumped over his recovering comrade before shouting, "Fire Style: Dragon Flame Jutsu!" before firing a flaming dragon head towards Naruto. Naruto had a gudo-dama quickly shift in front of him before forming a rounded barrier between him and the flames, causing the flames to disperse on the barrier, leaving Naruto unharmed. Shogai picked himself up before applying chakra to the seal on his arm, releasing a single fuma shuriken, before he applied more chakra, releasing another. He then proceeded to pick up both shuriken by the holes in their centers, wielding them as one handed weapons as he awaited for Naruto to resume his attack.
"We're going on the offensive Shogai, we can't win this battle defensively." Hiiro ordered, only to receive a hesitant nod from the usually comment overusing man.
Naruto reformed the shield he had made into its original form, before jumping over Shogai's shield, letting it fall to the ground behind him as he stood again facing his opponents. However unlike the first scuffle, this time both parties charged towards each other. Hiiro met Naruto first due to her superior speed, going for a swift kick to his side as she dodged a side swing from the short staff in Naruto's right hand. Naruto swung the staff in his left hand downwards at the now sideways Hiiro, only to be blocked by a fuma shuriken.
Hiiro's kick connected with Naruto, sending him staggering back with a slight burn mark on his cloak, before he blocked a diagonal slash of Shogai's fuma shuriken aimed for his chest with his staff. The staff and shuriken battled for supremacy, the shuriken pushing the short staff downwards, before the shuriken abruptly broke, unable to handle the pressure exerted from Shogai. The fuma shuriken immediately banked towards, impaling itself into the ground, bringing Shogai downwards with it before he was hit in the side by Naruto's other short staff, sending him flying across the battlefield.
Hiiro landed next to her partner, aiding him in standing up before hearing him mutter, "Stupid low quality shuriken." Shogai then continued, "Where the hell were you?"
"I was getting a weapon." Hiiro stated as if it was the most obvious thing in the world while lifting her tanto in front of her and funneling some fire chakra into it.
"Fine, then give me a chance to get mine." Shogai grumbled before pulling his remaining fuma shuriken behind him before charging towards Naruto again, quickly followed by Hiiro. Shogai quickly threw the shuriken as he approached Naruto before he quickly made some hand signs and called out, "Shuriken Shadow Clone Jutsu!" before the fuma shuriken quickly multiplied. Hiiro seeing an opportunity to perform a large scale attack, went through a string of hand signs before shouting, "Fire Style: Great Phoenix Sage Fire!", sending a large barrage of giant fireballs alongside the shuriken shadow clones, some of the shuriken even being ignited by the fire jutsu.
Naruto observed the collaboration technique, before he held his staves in front of him before they began to expand into a sphere entirely surrounding him(A/N: Imagine it as something like what Gaara made during the Chunin exam finals). A few fireballs and flaming shuriken pelted the sphere, but they did not cause any damage to the sphere, leaving it perfectly intact.
Shogai took this opportunity to quickly pick up his shield before charging towards the sphere, as Hiiro stood idly in preparation outside of the sphere. The two members of Dusk had no idea what to expect as the sphere remained completely enclosed, but Shogai felt a pulse in his pocket. He took the opportunity in the fight to pull out the signal seal given by his leader which signified that they had clearance to begin their attack against Konoha.
"Hiiro, we can attack Konoha now, our leader is finally done." Shogai stated bluntly, placing a slightly disrespectful tone when saying the word leader.
Hiiro nodded, while ignoring Shogai's tone towards their leader before responding, "I'd suggest we take care of him first. He'll pose too much of a threat if we leave him alive."
"Alright, get ready." Shogai said before he jumped with his shield in hand, bringing his right hand back while enhancing it with a large amount of chakra.
Shogai fell towards the sphere Naruto was contained within while bringing his fist towards it, intending to destroy the shield with a single chakra-enhanced punch. The fist made contact with the black dome, before causing small fissures to appear in the dome, which quickly expanded outwards, before causing the dome to cave in. However, what Shogai was not expecting was a loud screeching sound which began to emit from within the collapsing dome. Shogai's eyes widened as he saw Naruto holding some kind of wind shuriken in each hand, before he quickly brought his shield in front of him in some attempt to protect himself against the technique.
"I'll never allow you bastards to attack my village!" Naruto shouted before throwing one of his Wind Style: Rasenshurikens at point blank range towards Shogai. Immediately following the first throw, he threw the other one directly at Hiiro. Shogai's shield was unable to absorb the rasenshuriken as a result of the techniques complexity and while preventing the rasenshuriken from hitting him, it didn't prevent the rasenshuriken from pushing Shogai, along with the shield he was holding, into the sky where it expanded. Shogai was protected from the deadly effects of the wind style attack, but he was blasted alongside his shield across the battlefield, crashing into the wall of the crater before slumping downwards unconscious.
Hiiro narrowly ducked under the rasenshuriken heading towards her, determined not to have a repetition of her first encounter with the technique. However, instead of delivering an axe kick to Hiiro, Naruto had a different plan as he quickly dashed behind his rasenshuriken with a single short staff in tow. Naruto lifted the short staff above his head before bringing it downwards with both hands towards Hiiro as she was still bent down from dodging the rasenshuriken. Hiiro quickly twisted her body to grab the short staff in defense before it could hit her, much to her downfall.
The ninjutsu cancelling abilities of the truth-seeking substance repelled the fire chakra from her hand giving her less strength in pushing against the staff. Naruto quickly saw an opportunity in Hiiro's mistake and quickly pulled the staff with Hiiro still on it, while he quickly spun in a circle before slamming Hiiro into the ground, leaving her bruised and injured within a crater.
"It's over." Naruto said, while staring down at Hiiro, "Give up on your hate, you are also an Uzumaki and I'm sure we'd be willing to help you in our village. I know how it feels to be alon-"
"Shut up. You don't understand, I had everything taken from me one-by-one so don't try to let your petty words get to me. Understand that this is a fight to the death, this is a matter between clans and you should never show sympathy to your opponents." Hiiro said while shifting and slightly picking herself from the crater.
Naruto frowned at this before saying, "I don't think you can go any further, so I'll drag you to the Leaf if I have to."
Hiiro stood fully, before letting the fire armour that surrounded her grow slightly larger as she funnelled more chakra into it. A smirked plastered itself on her face, before she started laughing, "Uzumaki, this is the end of your clan, the only thing that will be dragged around is your dead body!" she shouted almost maniacally.
"Kit, you can sense that chakra right? Be careful, somehow its getting a lot more powerful." Kurama stated, while Naruto stood looking at the red clad ninja in front of him.
Hiiro fell to one knee as the fire armour surrounding her grew to several feet. The chakra suddenly shrunk around her body changing to a very bright red hue, stabilizing around her body as her original flame armour had, only the chakra appearing much more thick, making it much less transparent. Hiiro shakily stood up, the flame armour burning intensely, Naruto feeling the heat from where he stood.
Naruto stood analyzing the new chakra shell surrounding his opponent before thinking 'What the hell is this power? Her chakra has a completely different feeling n-.'
Naruto couldn't even react as he received an incredibly fast punch to his stomach blasting him backwards, causing him to spit out blood before he tumbled upon the ground before struggling to stand up. The area of his stomach which the punch made contact with had severe scorch marks on it, causing Naruto some slight pain as he knew that beneath his cloak he had also been burnt on his skin. However, Naruto was not given a chance to properly recover as he was quickly grabbed by the throat and thrown into the ground, his gudo-dama quickly attempting to hit his attacker, but reaching the location way too late as said attacker had reappeared with a foot on Naruto pressing onto his chest causing him to cough up some more blood.
"I'm sure you are wondering how I became so strong." Hiiro began while pressing further on Naruto's chest, causing him to writhe in agony as the flames burnt his chest the longer it was in contact with it, "The power you are witnessing is the power of the Hono clan's blood line. The power that made us rivals to the famed Uzumaki sealing clan. The power you see here is known as 'Flare Style'" Hiiro paused while bending down closer to Naruto's face. "Flare Style is a unique kekkai genkai as instead of merging two different elements into a single element, it merges fire chakra with our very life force. The least that I can tell you is that it is very deadly, for both you and I." Hiiro finished.
Flashback
A 10 year old Hiiro stood across from her 15 year old brother on a grassy field. "Hiiro, I think its about time I taught you about our clan's special bloodline limit." Yakekoge stated while staring at his sister from behind the bandanna covering his mouth.
"Nii-san, I didn't know we had a kekkai genkai, why do I need to know it anyways?" Hiiro asked, slightly peaking her curiosity.
"Tou-san taught me our kekkai genkai so its only reasonable that I teach you. Also, I'm going to need your help the day we avenge our parents deaths." Yakekoge said.
Hiiro slightly perked up at hearing mention of her parents as Yakekoge had made it a bit of a taboo'd subject, but she responded anyways, "Teach me nii-san, I'll make them proud."
Yakekoge nodded before beginning his lesson, "First off, the name of our clan's kekkai genkai is Flare Style. Think of our technique as an amplified version of Fire Style."
"What makes it so special then?" Hiiro asked her older brother.
"Flare Style is a kekkai genkai because we have the ability to use our life force in conjunction with our fire jutsu to give any fire technique you know a drastically increased effect. Unfortunately it has a severe drawback." Yakekoge explained.
"What is that drawback?" Hiiro asked.
"The technique directly saps your life force, which means that the more you use it, the less life force you have, until…" Yakekoge trailed off.
"Until?" Hiiro asked.
"Until it kills you." Yakekoge answered, "The reason why I am teaching you this is because it is a last resort technique, a trump card if you'd like to call it that. I only want you to use this technique when it is a life or death situation and there is nothing else that you can do to survive."
End Flashback
"My Flare Style Armour is the last thing that you'll be seeing Uzumaki." Hiiro said while reaching to the tanto on her back.
'Crap I can't even move my gudo-dama, I don't know if there's anything else I can do.' Naruto thought, before he saw a yellow blur land in front of him as Hiiro jumped back to dodge the attack.
"Sorry I'm late boss!" Naruto's clone who carried Hinata away shouted, standing in front of the original as he struggled to get up.
"It's about time, be careful I'm not in that good condition." Naruto said as his gudo-dama formed in a halo behind him as he shakily stood up.
"Sure thing bo-" the clone replied before dispelling as it received a kick to the side of its head.
"Baka." Naruto stated as Hiiro stood in the clone's previous location, facing him.
Naruto moved one of the gudo-damas to his hand before turning it into a short staff before coughing up a bit of blood. Hiiro capitalized on this opportunity quickly charging towards Naruto with her tanto up, Naruto's gudo-damas refusing to respond properly as he fell to the ground in pain.
'Damn, this is bad, I think she might have caused internal damage.' Naruto thought as Hiiro thrust her tanto forward intending on finishing the fight.
Hiiro confidently smirked as she saw an undeterred end to her battle. She extended the tanto, only being a few feet from Naruto, before the tanto was knocked out of Hiiro's hand at the sound of metal hitting against metal. before Hiiro was forced to jump backwards to avoid an electrified sword only to stand face to face with the last Uchiha.
Land of Fire Forest:
A man quickly traversed through the forests of the Land of Fire, approaching his destination quickly. His two purple eyes observed his surroundings for a moment before he allowed his mind to drift to the different tasks he had pursued earlier that day. 'I think that I made a wise choice picking those two in addition to Kakashi and Obito.' the man thought to himself, recollecting his earlier 'inspection' of a few specific shinobi corpses.
Konoha:
Gai awoke in a hospital bed with Shizune looking at some reports beside it. "Gai, Tsunade-sama told you not to leave the hospital until you are fully recovered."
"Shizune, my flames of youth with always remain true to themselves, it would be most unyouthful if I did not visit the graves of my comrades." Gai paused at saying this before continuing, "Shizune, I need to talk to Hokage-sama about something which happened earlier."
"Gai, Tsunade-sama doesn't have time to deal with trivial matters." Shizune lectured before Gai raised his hand.
"Shizune, this is a matter of utmost importance, I need to talk to the Hokage immediately." explained Gai in a serious tone.
Upon seeing Gai in such a serious tone, she immediately proceeded to head to the Hokage's office and fetch Tsunade, before bringing her back to Gai's hospital room.
"Gai, what is so important that you needed to talk to me?" Tsunade asked as she barged into the room.
"Hokage-sama, while I was visiting Kakashi's grave I encountered an individual who was intent on defiling his grave. I attempted to stop him, but my flames of youth were not powerful enough. The more important fact was that he had two purple rinnegan, the last thing that I saw as I foolishly looked into his eyes." Gai explained.
Tsunade rested her hand on her chin thinking for a moment before responding, "Gai, the trauma you suffered from facing Madara was severe, so I have reason to believe that you were hallucinating. Sasuke is the only rinnegan user still around and he only has a single one. You disobeyed my orders and left the hospital, so it is likely that you passed out as a result of your current condition." Tsunade explained before continuing, "Additionally, we found no indicators that any bodies had been touched. Gai, I understand that you cared about your friends and comrades, but everything indicates that what you saw was just a sign of trauma."
Tsunade began to make her way out of the office alongside Shizune, preparing to leave Gai to recover. "Tsunade," Gai said with a serious face before continuing, "I understand where you are coming from, but I know I've never met this person before."
Tsunade paused at this statement, realizing Gai's complete seriousness behind the topic, before opening the door and leaving followed by Shizune, leaving Gai to ponder upon who or what he had possibly seen.
A/N: Well that concludes this chapter. What was the leader of Dusk doing in Konoha? Unfortunately that won't be revealed until at the very earliest after this fight, but feel free to guess. Sasuke has arrived as backup for Naruto, so next chapter you'll be seeing the fight reach its climax.
Also, before anyone goes around calling Hiiro overpowered, keep in mind that Flare Style has a severe drawback, think of it kind of like the Eighth Gate, except instead of fully killing you(except when Naruto's around :P), it gradually kills you the longer you use it. Additionally, Hiiro is not as fast as it may seem(AKA god level speeds), she just got the jump on(surprised) Naruto with how much faster she had become, but still that doesn't mean she isn't incredibly fast with her Flare Style Armour. Let me know what you thought of the chapter with a review, I'd really appreciate it.