Author's note – Kishimoto Masashi owns Naruto while Guyver is written by Yoshiki Takaya.
I make no claim to either, I am merely playing in their sandboxes.
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Chapter Fifty-One
Counterstrike
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A massive roar echoed across Konoha as a giant sand Tanuki ripped its way towards the hospital, only to stumble as an axe-blade sheared through its leg, leaving a massive wound. Although the wound healed within seconds, it was enough to temporarily halt the monster as it looked down, trying to find what had hurt it.
Toraku spun his polearm, the spikes shredding the surface of the leg, then he leapt to one side as a giant sandy fist slammed down where he had been standing. Rolling, he flickered through a series of hand-seals that no other country used and an angular line of chakra travelled down the plates of his armour, ending in a cluster of six tags. In instant later, a vortex formed in front of him, blasting out a stream of water that carved into the Tanuki's side.
"RrrRRAAAWWWWGH!"
The cry of rage echoed across Konoha as Toraku prepared to launch another attack.
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"Going somewhere?"
Rasa blinked at the figure hovering just in front of him and blocking his way into the tower.
"Dad! That's Naruto!" Kankuro hissed, then suddenly a pair of senbon slammed into the ground between them, the bells on the end jingling. Taking advantage of the opportunity, Rasa retreated with his two children.
"Who does the bell ring for?" A female voice mocked. "It rings for you!"
"Genjutsu cannot work against me." Naruto said as he turned and rose to reach the rooftop where the Konoichi was standing. She slowly retreated as Naruto approached, her face twisting into a scowl. "I can sense and counter the chakra waves you are using."
"Counter this!" A man shouted and Naruto turned to the speaker just in time to receive a sonic blast that would have shredded a normal person. The man who had delivered it stared, his single eye wide and Naruto tilted his head slightly.
"Counter what?"
Another air-blast hit him from behind with no effect, then he heard the unmistakable sound of the raijin and a familiar figure stepped out of the shadows.
"I had hoped that their skills would work against you." Aoi said with a shrug. "But it seems that the armour you wear is more advanced than we thought. Shame about its weakness, though."
Naruto lunged forwards and Aoi laughed as he interposed the lightning blade between himself and Naruto's arm-blade. The two weapons collided…
…and Naruto used his superior strength to push Aoi back.
"No!" The traitorous Jonin gasped, his face paling. "No! The weakness!"
"Did you truly expect me to not find a way to protect myself from that blade of yours?" Naruto asked as he grabbed the lightning sword with his left hand. Tendrils of lightning arced from the sword, but didn't do more than illuminate Naruto's armour. As Aoi strained to hold his ground, Naruto raised his fist and backhanded the kunoichi attempting to stab him, sending her flying into one of the shade-pillars that ringed the rooftop.
"You're on your own!" Dosu shouted as he and Abumi Zaku fled. Aoi growled and Naruto laughed.
"How does it feel to be on the other side of betrayal… sensei?"
Aoi tried to pull the blade out of Naruto's gauntlet, then stopped channeling chakra to it. As the blade dissipated, Naruto's fist shot out and struck Aoi directly on his hitai-ate, breaking it in half and sending the jonin pinwheeling across the roof to where he landed at the feet of Kakashi, who promptly used a low-powered raiton move on him.
"Nice trick." He said, lowering his Hitai-ate back down over his eye. "But you realize that it leaves you very vulnerable to katon jutsu?"
"Yes, but everyone knows that my weakness is lightning." Naruto said as he shed his armour and began making clones, sending them off into the village. "So when someone uses something like that and it does nothing…"
Kakashi eye-smiled at him even as he unrolled a prisoner-storage scroll and kicked Aoi onto it. "Very clever, Naruto-kohai. I think that you've proven yourself ready for Special Jonin."
Naruto blinked. "Really?"
"Really." Kakashi confirmed. "Now… what the…?"
Orochimaru dashed past them at a speed normally linked to shunshin, followed by an armoured quadruped with nine tails. Kakashi gaped at the sight, then slowly turned to look at Naruto.
"Naruto… What… was… that?"
Naruto tried to look innocent.
"Naruto?"
"Fine." Naruto sighed. "It was an idea that Kurama came up with and I helped, he performs a Biju Kage Bunshin through my Armour while I use my chest-blasters to focus his youki into an external clone. We still haven't worked out why he has the armour as well, but I think it's to do with how it interacts with the seal that holds him in me."
"Just wait until Jiraiya finds out about this." Kakashi sighed.
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Jiraiya smirked as he summoned Gamahiro atop the last of the snakes trying to destroy Konoha. The giant toad blinked a few times before vanishing and Jiraiya turned his attention to the group of Oto ninja who were running across the roofs.
"Damn invaders." He grumbled as he launched himself into the air.
"Kebari Senbon!"
The Oto ninja didn't even have enough time to scream as the barrage of chakra-enhanced hair needles sliced through them, killing them all virtually instantly. Without sparing them a second glance, Jiraiya leapt away in search of new enemies to destroy.
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"Damn, that was close." Haruno Kizashi said as the last of the Ame shinobi collapsed with a kunai thrust through his heart. "Dear, you alright?"
Mebuki nodded from where she was standing with a frying pan held firmly in one hand. Although the rim of the pan was dented and several holes had been punched into it, the utensil had still allowed her to defeat two of the chunin that had attacked them.
"I wonder where Sakura is?" She mused, glancing round, then her gaze firmed as three figures landed in front of them. "Who are you?"
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Rasa growled as a pair of shinobi disguised as civilians moved to intercept him. Reacting instantly, he used his gold dust to form a barrage of spears that impaled them, then he pulled the dust back to him, letting the corpses drop onto the packed-earth road.
"We need to get out of here." He decided.
"What about Gaara?" Temari asked, then she flinched as Shukaku screamed in pain again in the distance.
"He will do as much damage as he can," Rasa stated, "But look around you. Konoha is rallying. The shinobi striking from above has been slain. The summoned snakes have all been dispatched and our allies are retreating, unable to continue as the plan demands. No, we must retreat to the desert once more to regroup and prepare for Konoha's vengeance."
Another roar sounded and Temari glanced back worriedly, then followed her father up to the rooftops, leaving only a pair of corpses as proof that they had ever been there.
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Terumi spat out a glob of lava that struck her opponant in the chest, burning straight through him. Wiping her lips, she looked round for any other enemies. Movement caught her eye and she prepared herself once more, only to relax as she recognised the lead figure.
With a smile, she resumed scanning the area for threats.
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"Friendlies approaching." Ao stated. "The Hokage, the Uzukage and reinforcements. You can drop the shield."
The chains serving as the struts of the barrier over the arena shivered, then retracted just in time to let an armoured figure drop in.
"Honoka-san, Hinata-sama sent Fu to ask for your help, the Ichibi is on the rampage and your sealing skills would be useful."
"Let's go." Honoka said and Fu wrapped her arms around the Uzushiogakure kunoichi before launching herself into the air on blurring wings.
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"Damn, he's hard to stop." Ino groused as she sent a gravitational sphere through the left leg of the sand monster.
"Toraku's safe." Hinata announced as she used her arm-blade to slice off the right paw of the monster, only for the limb to re-form and swing round, barely missing Ino.
"Die, little bugs!" Shukaku roared, then it froze with a surprised whimper as a cluster of chakra chains burst out of its chest and wrapped around its torso.
"…the hell?" Ino managed as she circled the sandy behemoth to get a better view. "Hey! It's Honoka!"
Honoka nodded slightly, then she frowned in concentration. The chains extending from her sleeves glowed brightly, then suddenly the blue glow took on a golden tint around the Ichibi, a tint that extended back towards Honoka.
"NOOOOOooooooooooooooo…"
Shukaku's scream faded away as his sand-body collapsed and Honoka shattered her chains before dropping to one knee. As Ino flew down to check on her, Hinata pulled out the sleeping red-head from the sand.
"What do we do with him?"
"Whatever you want." Honoka whispered as she sagged against Ino. "He's no longer a Jinchuuriki."
Hinata shed her armour and stared at Honoka. "What?"
"His seal… was not right." Honoka explained as she stood up. "I was able to invert it and expel the Ichibi from him, something I couldn't have done had the person making that… abomination actually known what they were doing. I then bound the Ichibi into myself, much like my grand-aunt Uzumaki Mito did to the Kyuubi."
"…you're the new Jinchuuriki of the Ichibi?" Hinata gasped and Honoka nodded.
"I am. And I am in control."
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Orochimaru collapsed as he dropped out of the odd spiralling vortex that Tobi had pulled him into just before the Kyuubi could finish him off. Concentrating, he gathered his chakra, shedding his old skin and standing up in a new, healed body.
"Well." He said in an overly-calm voice. "That was an interesting situation."
Tobi didn't bother to reply, simply vanishing in another swirl and Orochimaru shrugged.
"Oh well, at least Konoha took some serious damage today, even if I couldn't get my hands on one of those amazing armors. And now, I can check my archive once more."
Unslinging the scroll, Orochimaru walked into a room that he had ordered prepared, one exactly the same size and shape as the library from which he had retrieved the scroll. Unrolling the scroll, he applied chakra to it and the contents appeared in a cloud of chakra smoke.
"What… the… FUCK!?"
Before him was a long table almost completely covered in large bowls of hot, steaming ramen.
"NOOOOOOOOOooooooooo!"
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"My eternal rival!" Gai called out as he jogged towards the group gathered on the edge of the giant crater that had once been the Uzumaki clan-house. "I believe I have won the competition as I killed fifty-two of those most unyouthful enemy shinobi!"
"Hmmm, did you say something?" Kakashi asked, turning to face Gai as he lowered his Hitai-ate back down over his Sharingan. "Oh! The contest. I killed fifty-nine enemy-shinobi."
"Curse you and your hip attitude, Kakashi!" Gai laughed, then he sobered as he looked at the crater. "Naruto-kun, Should you need it, I can offer you and your fiancees my spare bedroom…"
"I've got this." Naruto said as a burst of chakra showed that he had created and dispelled a clone. A moment passed, then the crater rippled and vanished, showing the house totally unscathed and a clone waving at them from the door.
"I found the self-destruct seal mentioned in one of the records, so me and my clones hunted it down." Naruto explained. "The hard part was replacing the implosion array with a genjutsu array designed to make it seem as if the seal had worked the way it was originally designed to. Of course, that bastard managed to escape with my most important belongings."
"The library?" Kakashi asked and Naruto shook his head.
"My celebratory ramen scroll, containing the first ramen feast that Teuchi-san and I worked together to make." He growled. "I was going to use it as part of the congratulations feast I had planned for Hinata-hime when she was promoted!"
Kakashi doubled up with laughter.
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Author's Afternote – As the technique was rushed, the Kurama-avatar has only a tiny fraction of his normal power and his armor lacks the blasters. Nevertheless, he's still enough to send Orochimaru scurrying…