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.
This is the second chapter posted today. If you have jumped here, go back one (unless this is your second visit...)
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Chapter Seventy-Three
Escalation
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Pein stood atop the hill, his six Paths in a circle around him, slightly lower so that they did not block the view of his own eyes even while their eyes provided him with a full view of everything around him. By his side, Konan stood almost motionless, her cloak and paper wings the only things moving in the light breeze.
"Another line to break." Pein stated as he watched a multi-source katon jutsu take down a squad of Zetsu clones on the right. "They cannot hold, but yet they try."
"They know that they cannot win." Konan said quietly. "So the question is, is this bravery or simple desperation?"
A massive stone slab rose from the ground on the left and toppled towards a company of Ame shinobi, only for several well-placed jutsus to shatter it, allowing the ninja to deflect the smaller boulders and avoid the larger ones.
"If not for the need to divert a portion of our forces against Kumo, we would have reached Konoha by now." Pein mused.
"I do not see their armored warriors." Konan noted and Pein nodded.
"They are doing as we are, keeping our most powerful away from the front lines, ready to deploy should they be needed to turn the tables. As long as they do not believe that they are truly losing they will keep their weapons sheathed lest we reply in kind. They do not know that even now, our greatest weapon is being forged by Madara…"
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The tree that had once sheltered and housed the village of Takigakure seemed to bend and twist, its branches slowly being pulled into the giant statue that had been summoned atop it and promptly dropped through the branches, coming to rest at an angle. The ground started to ripple and shatter as the roots of the tree were pulled out from the earth, slowly following the branches and trunk into the statue, vanishing like a blade into a pool of molten lead with no sign that they had ever existed.
The statue itself twitched, then began to warp and stretch. Madara laughed with glee as an eye opened in the middle of its forehead. The blood-red orb glistened before the lids closed and re-opened revealing that the eye now boasted rings like that of the rin'negan and with six tomoe, three on the innermost ring and three on the next one out. The third ring was thinner, but had three small bulges which gave the appearance of being proto-tomoe.
"It worked!" Madara screamed in triumph as the wooden surface of the statue began to turn into midnight-black flesh."Soon, the power of the Juubi will be mine to command!"
The former statue unleashed a roar that echoed to the horizon.
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"…and that is all I know." Temujin finished, slumping in his chair and giving a pleading look at his audience of three. "I managed to find a raw Gelel Stone at the bottom of the cliff and I brought it with me in the hope that it would allow you to access its powers somehow."
Naruto rose from his own chair and walked over to the head-sized blue-veined rock that was on the table at the side of the room. Reaching out, he touched it.
"Odd, this feels…" He began, then suddenly a sphere of energy surrounded him, causing Temujin to scramble away, his eyes wide. Kakashi and Hiruzen rose out of their own chairs and stepped back as the energy vanished, leaving the armored form of Naruto standing in the wreckage of what had been the table and the wall next to it.
There was no sign of the stone.
"Naruto, what happened?" Kakashi half-shouted.
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Kurama stared in shock as the red-and-blue spheroid suddenly started pulsing, stretching and cracking. Pale red and gold threads were occasionally visible through the disintegrating shell and the two control metals broke free from their surrounding plating. Kurama had just enough time to see that the metals were set into the foreheads of a pair of faces before the ovoid seemed to explode in a coruscating light.
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Naruto staggered back with a cry of pain as his chest-plates swung open by themselves. The lenses seemed to glow and coruscate before emitting two fields of light that cast harsh shadows before coalescing into a pair of armored figures that stood tall for a moment before collapsing onto the ground, followed quickly by Naruto himself, his armor vanishing once more.
"Get Tsunade! Now!" Hiruzen commanded Kakashi as he limped across to check on his favorite orphan, sparing only a brief glance at the blue-armoured blond and the red-armored red-head that were lying on the floor…
Wait…
"Why don't they have helmets?" Hiruzen mused in curiosity as one of the new people groaned.
"What just happened?" Temujin gasped from the far corner.
"Not a clue." Kurama replied as he materialised beside Naruto, one hand-paw already checking Naruto's pulse. "My host seems to be out cold and I think it was the breaking sphere that did it. Who are those two?"
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"They are Namikaze Minato and Uzumaki Kushina." Tsunade reported, her expression reflecting her disbelief. "Of course, their bodies are rather different, they seem to be composed of that armor-thing of yours, the fibres, not the plates. They can summon the plates whenever they want and without them, they look human, but their internal organs are completely different while those odd metal discs are permanently embedded in their foreheads. But it's them."
"Two of our greatest legends have returned." Itachi said in shock. "How?"
"The Gelel stone must have been the trigger." Hiruzen stated. "And on a related note, I've had Asuma adopt Temujin into our clan as his son and I've assigned him to team eight as an additional member. Now, Minato and Kushina?"
"They're still adjusting, I've got Shizune overseeing them." Tsunade added. "How did it happen?"
"Somehow, the Gelel stone…" Hiruzen began, only for Naruto to interrupt.
"Dad says that he and mom both put part of themselves into the seal in order to help me when it was time for me to try and take control of Kurama's power. My Guyver must have extracted them from the seal and then rebuilt them."
A long silence followed as everyone stared at the blond Jonin, then Itachi broke the pause.
"You're talking to him? Now?"
"Sure." Naruto shrugged. "It's one of the things the Guyver lets us do. We can mentally talk over almost any distance and since dad has a… what?"
The others in the office exchanged glances and Naruto's eyes widened.
"Uh… ummm… Shizune just discovered something when she compared mom and Hinata… it seems that my parents aren't using Guyvers like the rest of us Uzumakis, they… they are Guyvers!"
"What?"
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"Your physical forms are those of Guyvers." Shizune said, meeting the shocked stares of two of the greatest heroes in recent history. "There are differences, I don't think that you can bond to people like the original Guyver did to Naruto, your strength levels are half again what they should be for your apparent musculature although it increases dramatically when you armor up, your senses seem to be incredibly enhanced and you lack certain things that the full armors have, notably the head sensors and weapons, but those differences are minor. Oh, and Kushina, I'm afraid that your body won't let you have any more children. On the other hand, I have doubts as to whether you'll age now given how much regenerative power the Guyver units apparently have, so chances are that you're immortal… as long as you don't take an attack to the forehead."
Both Minato and Kushina reached up to rub the metallic discs set into their foreheads, discs partially covered by their hair.
"Thank goodness." Shizune added. "We'll need you both to get ready as soon as possible. Once you've finished adjusting, you'll be heading out into the field. Konoha needs you."
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Onoki growled as he watched the attacking samurai slice through his own shinobi on the plain below in a manner disturbingly reminiscent of the Yondaime Hokage during the Third Shinobi War. Raising his telescope, he focused on the lead group, headed by Mifune himself.
Mifune was fighting in his normal armor, making him easily recognizable, while the style of the two warriors flanking him were obviously those of his long-term attendants, Okisuke and Urakaku, the three of them fighting in total harmony, each covering each other with the ease of decades of practice.
The group to Mifune's left was composed of normal samurai, their blade-projected weapons fending off the shinobi counterattacks, but the group to Mifune's right caught Onoki's attention. The lead samurai was moving in perfect synchronization with three others in a manner that reminded Onoki of the now-defunct Puppet Corps of Suna, an impression heightened by the fact that two of the synchronized samurai had been impaled by kunai, but no blood was dripping from the holes.
One of the other Samurai, a female judging from the slight swells of her armor, was utilizing a pair of steel-reinforced hand-fans, using chakra to fire off wind blades and air shields. One slower move caused Onoki to raise an appreciative eyebrow as a skeletal samurai made of wind appeared and flew forwards, its sword slicing through three shinobi before it dissipated.
Although the fan-user should have been a priority target because of her ranged attacks, the threat level that she represented was eclipsed by the last samurai. He strode forth fearlessly, armor plates floating in the air around him while a dozen orbiting swords, encased in wind chakra, slashed at anyone who tried to approach too closely.
"Sir, should I engage?" Roshi asked from behind him and Onoki shook his head.
"They've already defeated Han and judging from their attacks, I know who that group is. The Sand Siblings."
Roshi blinked. "I heard that Suna had lost their Biju…"
"They did, the Ichibi is in Uzu now." Onoki confirmed. "No, he's using Magnet Release combined with futon enhancement of his blades… that's an S-rank right there. Send the signal to fall back, we're losing too many of our ninja and not doing enough damage."
Roshi nodded, then took a deep breath before sending a huge fireball into the sky. The shinobi below promptly disengaged and retreated, the doton-users amongst them throwing up walls and barricades to slow the Samurai advance.
"I hope that the damned Akatsuki finish off Konoha soon, otherwise they'll find themselves flanked." Onoki grumbled as he rose into the air. "We need reinforcements. Roshi, try to hold the cliffs."
"Hai!" Roshi saluted as Onoki flew off, then he turned to look at the samurai assaulting the impromptu fortifications.
"Dammit." He grumbled. "That old fart went and left me with a battle I have no damned clue how to fight. I may have to call on the shit-flinger's power for this."
Inside his seal, the four-tailed ape growled with anger at its host's disparaging name for it.
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The symbols surrounding Madara glowed and flickered with the chakra lashing through them as the form of the Juubi wavered within the fuuinjutsu restraints that held it. Madara's hands flickered through another blurred sequence of seals and the Juubi screeched as it was pulled into Madara's torso, warping and fading as it was absorbed into the resurrected ninja.
A sheath of chakra briefly engulfed Madara, fading to reveal that his red armor was gone, replaced by a robe of solidified white chakra with six magatamas inset just below the collar. A black staff was held loosely in his right hand as half a dozen balls of black energy circled behind him.
"At last!" Madara exulted. "The power of the Juubi is mine to control, mine to command! And when the full moon rises in six days time, I shall use it to complete my plan and cast the Infinite Tsukiyomi!"
As Madara laughed, the wind picked up and for a moment, his robe billowed in the breeze, then space warped around him and he vanished, leaving only some scorch-marks on the ground as a sign that he had ever been there.