Chapter 16: Victors
Naruto had flown back quite a bit before he landed harshly on his right foot. Snap. Naruto winced at the pain he felt from his ankle snapping. Naruto had propped himself up with his forearms and tried not to wince from the pain. He looked up to see Haafu sprinting towards him, with Ino cautiously tailing him. Haafu brought his right foot down forcing Naruto to roll out of the way to avoid getting hit. He saw Haafu create a small crater with his foot which caused some pebbles to hit on Naruto. Haafu quickly pivoted his body and threw his left foot towards the blonde's face.
Ino saw Naruto get kicked in the face and get sent skidding across the floor. The thought of using her clan's jutsu crossed her mind, but with the jonin fighting Naruto and constantly moving, she wouldn't be able to land her technique. She needs the jonin to be immobile for her to use the Mind Body Swap jutsu. With that in mind, she ran towards Naruto to help him.
Naruto felt Kurama's chakra rushing towards his broken ankle, trying to repair it so he could have a better fighting chance. 'Kurama, do you mind giving me more chakra?'
"No, I don't mind at all." Naruto heard his fox companion reply. Somehow, Naruto could feel the smirk Kurama had on his face. After feeling the Kurama's chakra rush through his whole body, and his healing factor increased, he would now stand a chance. He stumbled on his feet when he saw the jonin appear right in front of him. He quickly crossed his arms across his face and was sent flying into a tree. Due to Kurama's chakra being pumped throughout his body, the blow and being slammed into a tree didn't hurt as badly. The chakra wasn't enough to gain a chakra cloak, or even to turn his eyes red and slitted. It was just enough to quickly heal any injuries he would gain. With that done, Kurama decided to close his eyes. If he was really needed, then he'd step in. Until then, whatever happened was on Naruto. 'He'll have to learn from his mistakes.'
His ankle wasn't fully healed yet so he needed to try and stall for time. "Uhh… Hey why are you guys attacking?" He asked awkwardly.
The jonin stared at him blankly, making Naruto feel uncomfortable and stupid for asking, before he delivered his answer. "For revenge." The Namikaze gave him a confused look before Haafu elaborated. "The Yellow Flash killed a thousand of our Iwa shinobis. Friends, and family alike were murdered by that man. We're here to avenge those that bastard had slain."
Naruto was now starting to get a little irritated. "Ok, well was it during peacetime or during war?"
The jonin scowled at the genin. "It doesn't matter-"
"Of course it does!" Naruto shouted from anger. "You expect him to just lay back and relax while his country was at war?! Of course not! You would've done the same if you could've you fucking dumbass! What makes Iwa so special that only they can get revenge?! Nothing!"
Haafu had enough of hearing the blonde's rant. He charged forward and pulled his fist back, and poured chakra into it turning that specific part into metal. He aimed the punch directly at Naruto's head, but the boy barely managed to dodge in time. After dodging a killing blow by a mere hair, Naruto jumped back to get distance between the two.
'This guy will absolutely kill me in taijutsu. That only leaves ninjutsu for me to use… dammit I need to learn genjutsu.' He moved his foot and rotated it to test his ankle. 'Looks like I'm all healed.'
Naruto lowered his arms and started to flash through hand signs. "Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!" Naruto blew out a large amount of wind chakra aimed towards Haafu. It cut off tree branches and would've cut through Haafu. If he hadn't activated his Iron Armor. Naruto saw Haafu brush off his attack like it had been child's play. 'Tch. How about this!' He created a clone and he flashed through different hand signs while the clone flashed through the previous hand signs.
"Fire Style: Great Fireball Jutsu!"
"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!"
Haafu saw the Namikaze throw out a fireball that was supported by another Great Breakthrough. He shook his head and once again activated his Iron Armor. 'No matter what you do, it's all pointless.' He was hit by the enlarged fireball and had to dig his feet into the ground to not be pushed back by the power the jutsu held. After the fire cleared, the two genin were left gawking at Haafu still alive and standing like nothing had happened. "While your attacks are pointless, I have to give you credit. That actually pushed me back a bit." He said as he deactivated his Iron Armor.
Naruto sneered at hearing and seeing the jonin just brush off his attacks once again. He clicked his tongue in irritation and crossed his fingers. After five clones poofed into existence, he sent them towards the jonin. Haafu rolled his eyes at the Namikaze's futile attempts to fight the jonin off. Once the first clone appeared right in front of him, Haafu pulled out a kunai and cut the clone across the face. Right before the clone poofed out of existence, an explosion threw Haafu back and made him skid across the floor a bit before he regained his bearings.
Haafu looked back up at the brat and saw that the rest of his clones were about to be on top of him. He quickly activated his armor once more and channeled chakra through the soles of his feet to prevent him from flying back. After the clones got close, they detonated in hopes of finishing off the jonin. After the dust cleared, Naruto let out a groan of anger and frustration. 'Just what the hell will it take for this guy to just stay down!' With one last idea, Naruto creates two shadow clones and then pulls out five shuriken while the clones start to build up chakra. He throws the shuriken and all three Naruto's flash through hand signs.
"Shuriken Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!"
The five shuriken multiplied into one hundred all the while being blasted from two Great Breakthroughs, increasing their speed and penetration tremendously. 'There! Now I got him!'
Haafu saw the incoming projectiles and actually had to quickly activate his Iron Armor to even stand a chance at surviving. Once activated, he had to slam his eyes shut so he wouldn't have his eyes damaged. Haafu felt each shuriken pang off him, he soon felt his Iron Armor about to give in and Haafu couldn't check to see if the storm of metal was almost over. After a couple more seconds, he felt the rain of metal seize and he dropped the Iron Armor with a heavy sigh. After taking a couple of deep breaths, the jonin gathered his bearings once again and faced the orange wearing genin.
Naruto had his mouth wide open and felt the frustration and anger in him reach a boiling point. 'Fine. Have it your way.' He let the anger in him build and build until he unconsciously drew upon Kurama's chakra. He drew up just enough to form a one tailed cloak. His body once again took more animalistic features as he crouched over to be on all fours. After his transformation was complete, he let a low growl pass his lips before launching at the jonin.
Ino had been hiding from a distance as to not be a hindrance to Naruto during his fight. She had wanted to help, no needs to help Naruto, but she couldn't find any opening for her to work with. The only openings she had were when Haafu stayed stationary just to brace himself for Naruto's attacks, and even then she saw the subtle signs that Haafu showed that Naruto's attacks were working. She knew her pain tolerance was low and she most likely would be down after having to withstand one of his attacks.
So she was only left to hide and wait for a chance to help Naruto against the jonin. While hiding from the battle, she was able to hear everything and witness all of Naruto's abilities against Haafu. She had been very surprised when Naruto was stated to be the Fourth Hokage's son, but she put that in the back of her mind for the time being. She was left shocked when Naruto was able to make five of his clones blow up. When she saw the Iwa jonin withstand an explosion to the face, she wanted to scream out from anger. No matter what Naruto threw at him, he just brushed off his attacks. She had thought and hoped that Naruto got him when he used the Shuriken Shadow Clone and Great Breakthrough in conjunction. But once again the annoying jonin managed to come out unscathed.
Ino felt herself almost scream in rage and frustration, until she saw Naruto. He was going through some weird transformation. She watched in confusion and interest as Naruto bent down and she saw his nails grow sharp and thin, his whisker marks grew erratic and unkempt, his canines grew longer and sharper. And then what she guessed was orange chakra bubbled out of him. Once it took on the shape of the fox, the chakra appeared to solidify. She heard him let out a growl before he lunged at the jonin.
'What the hell is going on?' She thought to herself in awe.
Naruto tackled the jonin to the ground and was about to grab his head before Haafu kicked the boy off of him. He jumped back while breathing heavily. If Ino didn't know better, she'd say that the jonin was now afraid. She stared harder at Haafu's demeanor and found all the signs. She saw him breathing erratically, his muscles were trembling, he was sweating a lot more and faster, and from the way his chest muscles near the heart were shaking she'd guess that his heart rate was high as well.
Crack
Ino turned around and saw Naruto hanging from a tree by having his tail wrap around a branch. The force was so strong that it caused the branch to crack under it's force. She watched him launch off of the tree and once again slam into Haafu with his iron armor activated. However this time the jonin didn't fall on his back from the force of Naruto landing on him. He grabbed Naruto by the neck and was about to snap it, but instead he dropped him and let out a cry of pain. She was confused as to what happened, until she caught sight of the jonin's hand. The skin on it was burnt.
Naruto jumped back to gain some distance. He didn't want to admit it but when Haafu grabbed his neck, he felt his windpipe about to be crushed. After taking a second to let Kurama's chakra heal his throat, Naruto tried to formulate a plan.
'Ok… taijutsu, ninjutsu, and genjutsu are now out of the question. I'm only keeping up thanks to Kurama's chakra… UGH! I don't have anything else..! Why am I so weak! I have to beat him! I have to help the others too! I MUST PROTECT THEM!'
Naruto started to pull on more of Kurama's chakra. He pulled enough chakra for a two tailed cloak. The chakra itself made some rocks and dirt levitate off the ground. Ino was left in awe at the power of the chakra that Naruto was using. Before she had any more time to think, he lunged at the jonin.
Hinata stared down Faito while in her gentle fist stance, Shikamaru was on one knee and had his hands in the ram sign. They were ready for whenever the jonin decided to engage. Faito eyed the two genin and snorted. "You really think that you two genin are a match for me?"
"Any Hyuga would be enough to take you down, a Hyuga with help from an ally would be a danger that no one would escape from." Hinata fired back, causing Faito to scowl at the blatant disrespect he received from the twelve year old girl.
"Listen little girl,"Hinata frowned at being called that. "Don't think I won't go all out just because you two are kids." He activated his Earth Spear technique after finishing his statement. No, his promise. Hinata activated her byakugan and had to hold back a gasp. She could see that he heavily layered earth chakra over his body, meaning that it'd be hard, if not impossible, to strike his chakra points. Regardless, Hinata slid further into her stance and prepared herself. She'll just have to hit hard as well as to hope and pray that her technique would be able to disable his chakra points.
With that done, the two engaged.
Shikamaru held back a curse when he saw the two engage. He had no doubt that Hinata had talent and skill, however they were going up against a jonin. One who's skills greatly surpassed their own. He knew that Hinata wouldn't win, he knew they wouldn't win. They just had to stall until Asuma and Kakashi finished their fights so they could help them. All they could do was weaken and tire out the jonin.
'But what about everyone else? Can they take on a jonin and come out alive?' He quickly scanned over the area, trying to see how his comrades were faring. He couldn't find them so he snapped his attention back to the fight. 'They'll be fine. I just need to make sure me and Hinata come out alive.'
With that in mind, Shikamaru sent out his shadow to try and connect with the Iwa jonin. Faito was smiling widely after he engaged in a taijutsu battle with Hinata. He had to admit that she was skilled, if she had more time to mature and grow then she would surely become a great taijutsu master. But Faito wouldn't let them live, that was the best mercy he could offer them. If he took either of them back, they would just be thrown into a cell and be forced to pump out kids for a new clan to be made in Iwa. Though he loved his nation, he knew it wasn't perfect. It had it's flaws and its dark actions but then again all villages had them. Faito pivoted out of the way from one of Hinata's strikes and sent a punch towards her head that she managed to dodge at the last second. He was about to follow up but then he froze up, unable to move. He mentally cursed because he had forgotten about the Nara and their shadow possession jutsus.
Shikamaru smirked. "Shadow Possession Complete." He held Faito long enough to let Hinata jump forward and deliver her clan's signature jutsu.
"Eight trigrams: 64 palms!" Hinata pulled her hand pack and launched it forward. Shikamaru managed to let go of Faito's shadow just a second before the first palm landed.
"2 Palms!"
"4 Palms!"
"8 Palms!"
Harder.
"16 Palms!"
Faster.
"32 Palms!"
Hinata increased her speed and striking power even further. "64 Palms!"
After finishing her onslaught on the jonin's chakra points, he slumped a bit which made Hinata let out a sigh of relief, but Shikamaru glared at the jonin suspiciously. It couldn't have been that easy. Just as he predicted, the jonin stood back up straight while wearing a big maniacal smile on his face.
"You think those little pokes would've been enough to stop me?! YOU WEAKLINGS WON'T BE ABLE TO STOP ME!" He charged towards Hinata with his Rock Armor up and harder than before, intending to take her out. Her eyes widened with surprise before she lightly growled.
She used her flexibility to her advantage and managed to avoid getting struck from a punch that the jonin threw her way. The jonin scowled and turned on his heels and once again tried to knock the Hyuga girl down. After a minute, any time he would get close to landing a blow the Nara boy would connect his shadow to Faito's and let go the second the Hyuga would use her gentle fist style. But he saw that the girl's hands were starting to hurt. It was like striking a rock wall with just her fingers, eventually if she kept it up, she would end up breaking her fingers. He glanced at the shadow user and saw his breath was starting to become labored.
'Good, he's getting tired. Now's my chance!' He sped towards Hinata, intending on finally ending her life. Hinata saw with her byakugan, but she was starting to tire. So she used what she had recently learned from her father. Her ace in the hole.
She started to spin.
Slowly at first, but quickly began to pick up speed. Faster and faster, all while pumping chakra out of her chakra points. A second later, there was a dome of spinning chakra.
"Eight Trigrams: Rotation!"
The rotating chakra sphere was a defense that repelled the force of an attack and doubled it in the process. Faito saw the chakra sphere and knew what it was. However he couldn't stop his momentum in time. The Iwa jonin smacked straight into the sphere, which sent him crashing into the ground, burying him in it in the process.
The two genin relaxed and let out a sigh of relief. Just as the two were about to turn around, they heard some movement from the spot where Faito was buried. Shikamaru's jaw dropped while Hinata just scowled at the Iwa jonin.
Kyua led Sasuke and Choji into a distant part of the forest. She glanced around the tree filled area and nodded to herself when she couldn't see anyone else. 'I guess this is far enough.' She came to a halt and heard the leaf genin stop as well not too far from her location. She turned around and gave the two boys a wide grin and started to shake her head.
"Honestly, I don't know what Faito was thinking." She looked up at the two and her wide grin turned into a malicious one. "I could've taken on the Sarutobi myself. But I'm left with taking care of the brats. The fatty and the arrogant Uchiha."
Sasuke scowled while Choji was ready to charge in blindly. Before he could, Sasuke replied to her taunting. "Hn. Big talk for someone who looks so weak."
Kyua frowned for a bit before the smirk returned even bigger. "I guess that's why I was assigned to fight you kiddies. You two are probably the weakest of the bunch."
Sasuke's scowl deepened further before he charged towards the jonin after pouring chakra into his legs to enhance his speed. When he got within arm's distance, Kyua gave a roundhouse kick to his face. The kick sent Sasuke rocketing back towards Choji, who caught the Uchiha. Kyua observed their reactions, but mainly the Uchiha's. After several seconds of observation, Kyua smirked.
'Guess he doesn't have the sharingan then. Oh well, bad luck on his part.'
After glaring at her with intense anger, he decided enough was enough and sent out a Great Fireball Jutsu towards his foe. Kyua countered the giant fireball by shooting a torrent of water out of her mouth. With the two jutsus cancelling the other out, there was now a cloud of steam that surrounded them. Sasuke looked around and couldn't find any trace of the woman until he heard her shout out a jutsu name.
"LIGHTNING RELEASE: SPIDER WEB!"
The lightning technique had sent a spider web of lightning that covered the surrounded clearing that the three were fighting in. Sasuke and Choji were caught up in the jutsu and got shocked from the surge of electricity that Kyua sent out. The two genin were on their knees and panting hard from nearly getting electrocuted by the attack. Kyua grinned and looked at the genin once more before she decided to rub salt in their wounds.
"Hmph. Is that all you Konoha genin have to offer? You genin are all so helpless." She laughed as she saw Choji and Sasuke try to move, only to fall back down. "How about this? I'll be a merciful person, just this once, and give you two a quick death. What do you two say?" Sasuke snarled while Choji just frowned at her insults and were wincing as they stood up. On their feet and ready for round two, the three engaged again.
Choji used his human boulder jutsu while Sasuke attacked by throwing fire bullets from a distance. Kyua had to be wary of her position thanks to their combined efforts. After having to dodge another fire bullet jutsu, she was blown off her feet thanks to Sasuke firing it closer to the ground than he had previously. With her footing disrupted, she was left vulnerable to Choji's human boulder jutsu. In an act of desperation and urgency, Kyua channeled chakra throughout her body and managed to get out of the Akimichi's path. Mostly.
Kyua managed to get out of the way, with only her foot getting partially hit from Choji's jutsu. Out of anger, she ran through hand signs and slammed her hands on the ground hard. "Earth Style: Mud Wave!" The results were strong waves of earth that were sent out towards the two genin. The mud waves caused Choji to be knocked out of his human boulder jutsu, and Sasuke to fall on his ass. With them now together and not prepared, Kyua ran through hand signs and once more slapped her hands on the ground. "Earth Style: Earth Flowing Spears!"
Sharp and jagged pieces of rock started to shoot out the ground, heading towards the two leaf genin's direction. Sasuke saw the upcoming spikes, he was about to jump out of the way when he heard Choji fall. His head snapped towards the Akimichi's direction and saw that Choji had not fully recovered his bearings. Thinking quickly, he kicked Choji out of the way while he saw the spikes coming towards him incredibly fast.
'No… It can't end like this! I can't die now!'
He unknowingly sent chakra to his eyes and started to see the spikes coming in slow motion. He quickly dodges the earth spikes through instincts more he moved, the slower and easier he could predict the spikes path. His vision slowly started to change. He was able to see the earth spikes take on a blue hue every time a spike was about to shoot out. Sasuke soon came to the conclusion that he had finally unlocked his sharingan. With this knowledge, he immediately made eye contact with Kyua and tried to cast a genjutsu on her, to briefly render her immobile.
Kyua was surprised to see the Uchiha push his teammate out of harm's way, and was even more surprised to see the brat dodged and avoided all of her earth spears. She was confused until she managed to see the Uchiha's pride in the boy's eyes.
"The Sharingan."She growled out. 'Fucking red eyed bastard.' She started to run towards the brat when he suddenly snapped his head over to face her direction. Kyua made the worst mistake she could possibly make when fighting a sharingan user.
She locked eyes with him.
The Iwa jonin felt her sense of balance suddenly snatched away from and instantly fell down. She struggled to get up or even to bring her hands together to make the ram hand sign to help cancel the genjutsu placed on her. Soon, Kyua had found out what the brat had done. 'Damn it. The brat gave me intoxicated symptoms. I'm too dizzy to stand up right, and I feel weak as fuck. I'd be impressed if I wasn't so mad.'
Sasuke's attempt had succeeded long enough for Choji to notice Kyua's predicament and started to use his human boulder technique to try and knock out Kyua. Choji was about to start spinning, until he thought back to what happened during his fight with Niton.
'So you chose to become a shinobi, in which the job is to literally hurt, cheat, and do anything in order to win, to make the mission a success, just so you can be kind.' Choji slammed his eyes tightly. 'It is a shinobi's literal job to hurt those against you.'
He learned not to hold back when fighting an enemy. He wants to knock her out before she could hurt Sasuke or someone else. And if he couldn't subdue her… he would be forced to kill her. 'No one hurts my friends!'
He starts to spin in place before he launches towards the dazed jonin. When he slams into Kyua, she is sent flying back and smacks into a tree, which cancels the genjutsu on her. After ending his jutsu, Choji and Sasuke warrily stare at the Iwas jonin. After a couple of seconds with no movement from the woman, besides breathing, they believe they won the fight. The two genin let out a sigh of relief and was about to relax. The sound of shuffling behind them makes the genin turn around and they freeze. They see Kyua right in front of them, wielding a kunai, about to stab out Sasuke's eye. Thanks to his sharingan still being active, he manages to tilt his head out of the way enough for her to barely cut his cheek.
Due to her momentum, she continues past Sasuke which he uses to his advantage. He jumps and delivers a roundhouse kick to her back to give him and Choji some breathing room. Sasuke realized that she hadn't been knocked out due to his inexperience with the Sharingan's capabilities.
'If I make it out of here, I'll ask Kakashi to teach me more about it.'
Haafu was punched away from the orange covered blonde and was sent flying back into a tree. The Iwa jonin's Iron Armor was getting weaker and weaker and he couldn't find out why. He wasn't low on chakra, he wasn't even half way empty. When he tried to activate his technique, it would flicker when the brat would attack him. It flickered and then deactivated. And Haafu couldn't find out why.
But Naruto could. And he gave a feral and a bloodlusted smile.
Haafu was getting scared.
He was panicking.
Fighting a jinchurikki was a stupid idea. The longer they fought, the angerier they would get, which resulted in more chakra from their tailed beast to their disposable. It didn't take Haafu long to figure out which tailed beast the boy held. The Ichibi was held by Suna, the Nibi and Hachibi were in Kumo, Kiri had the Sanbi and Rokubi, Iwa had the Yonbi and Gobi, a little village held the Nanabi. That left the Kyuubi in Konoha. The strongest of all bijuus.
And he was facing his container.
He had a right to panic.
Haafu took a deep breath to try and calm himself. It was illogical to panic when facing an enemy, even if that enemy happened to be a jinchuriki of the strongest tailed beast. He jumped back after Naruto sent a chakra cloak punch after him. He had to maneuver himself just right to make sure he would deliver a striking blow. He once again activated his Iron Armor to make sure he was durable enough to be hit at least a couple of times. Naruto threw another punch at the jonin, and as he was about to jump out of the way, a new chakra cloaked arm split off from the one he dodged. He wasn't prepared for this which led to him being caught. He was now being held above the blonde boy, who was wearing a feral smile.
Seeing that the Iwa jonin was now immobilized and not in any source of danger, from what she knows, Ino used her Mind Body Swap technique on Haafu. Once she took possession of his body, Ino looked down to face Naruto and gave a weak smile.
"Ok Naruto, it's Ino, I'm in control of his body thanks to my clan's jutsu. Let me go so I can make sure his body is tied up." Ino said with labored breaths and with a strained smile. She hadn't realized how tight Naruto was squeezing the jonin's body until now. Her smile dropped when the orange wearing genin's feral smile grew wider. She struggled to get free and started to shout out yells of protests, but her efforts were in vain as Naruto started to squeeze harder. Ino felt several of Haafu's rib break under the pressure. She quickly cut chakra off of the technique which shot her consciousness back into her own body.
For Naruto, he was struggling to stay in control and to keep his mind focused. He wasn't aware that Kurama's chakra was so negatively potent. He could feel the chakra wanting him to kill anyone and everyone around him. It didn't help that the chakra was giving him an excruciating headache, making his frustration with the situation grow. Resulting in anger. Which made the Kyuubi's chakra even more potent. He felt himself lose control over his emotions and instead get clouded by hate and anger. He saw the jonin talk, but he couldn't register what he was saying.
He ignored the muffled yells from his enemy and proceeded to squeeze the despicable jonin. He felt his body tense for a second before he seemed to snap out of whatever trance he briefly went through. His mind quickly replayed the last couple of seconds. A small part of him wondered if what he said was true and that it was Ino taking control, but he squashed that thought before he proceeded to squeeze harder. He saw Haafu activate his Iron Armor to give him greater durability.
'As if that'll stop me.'
Naruto exerted a greater force than he had before in an effort to pop the Iwa jonin like a pimple. However all that he managed to do was crush a few more bones in the jonin's body. Now angered at his inability to make the jonin burst, Naruto tossed the jonin into the woods. He was about to follow him, until he heard footsteps getting close to him. Naruto crouched down on all fours, prepared to strike whoever was there. Until he saw Ino.
Ino was surprised to see how different Naruto looked in this state. She still was unaware of what was wrong with Naruto, all she knew was that he had gotten a serious strength boost with… whatever this was. She shook her head, clearing out all her other thoughts and tried to focus on Naruto. She gave him another strained smile as she tried to talk. "Hey Naruto, looks like you beat him so let's go help the others."
Naruto stared at Ino. He was confused by all the emotions he was feeling. Relief, jealousy, happiness, anger, satisfaction, frustration. Naruto slammed his head on the ground to try and clear his thoughts but it didn't work. His vision was getting blurred. He wasn't able to tell friend from foe anymore. Naruto didn't know that Kurama's chakra would be so potent if the fox wasn't in control. The idea of letting Kurama take control passed through his mind, but he rejected that plan.
He didn't need help to finish this guy off. The only issue was the blind rage that now came with using Kurama's chakra. If he was in the right state of mind, he'd figure out that it was like that due to the seal being opened. There was no longer the filtering part of the seal, they had removed that part as well as the cage from his mindscape.
Naruto could now only see the outline of Ino and even that was blurred beyond recognition. He let out a low growl and started to slowly stalk towards her. Ino slowly started to step back, when suddenly the two genin heard the sound of Haafu stumbling back into the clearing. Naruto focused all of his attention on him and got ready to attack. Just as Naruto was about to jump at the Iwa nin, Ino jumped in front of him to prevent him from attacking blindly and getting himself killed in the process. Naruto's only response was to use a chakra cloak arm to swat Ino away and send her flying into a tree that knocked her unconscious, coincidentally saving her from a kunai that was thrown by Haafu. Unfortunately Naruto wasn't paying attention due to his blinding rage and the kunai sunk into Naruto's right eye.
Naruto let out a howl of pain while Haafu watched the genin with an evil grin on his face. He limped towards the genin who was now on his knees with both his hands covering his eye after he ripped the kunai out harshly. He kicked Naruto hard and started to gloat. "Is... Is this.. all you got?" He said between pants. He loathed to admit it, but the brat had done some damage to him. He saw the genin struggling to stand back up. He was about to throw another snide remark but had to quickly activate his Iron Armor technique.
Naruto struggled to get to his feet, but once he did, he flashed through hand signs and sent out a giant and dangerous gust of wind that sent the jonin flying back into the forest. With his target out of sight, he angrily turned his attention to face Ino. It was her fault that he got hurt, that he lost an eye. He slowly walked towards her unconscious body.
Kurama saw that his host was lost in anger and rage due to his chakra that Naruto so greedily pulled from him. The fox knows the reason, he wanted to quickly finish his fight to go and protect others. But his actions had consequences so Kurama let him be and would let him sort it out later. But now that he had his rage focused on his teammate, the bijuu decided now was the time to step in. The Nine Tailed Fox's consciousness slipped through the seal and forcibly took his chakra back. After doing so, he winced when he saw the damaged Naruto's chakra pathways had suffered. He wouldn't be able to lend Naruto his chakra in larger quantities anytime soon. It would take a while for his chakra to fix it due to the limited amount of chakra that could be sent through them. He shook his head and laid back down, watching how the rest of the fight would unravel.
With the sudden disappearance of bijuu chakra and with the strain said chakra did to his chakra system, Naruto felt incredibly weak. The blonde genin fell face first into the ground and closed his left eye in pain. He felt his consciousness start to drift off into sleep, until he heard heavy footsteps stepping close to him. He forced himself awake and tried to stand, but the most he got was to a kneeling position. He looked up to see Haafu's furious face approaching him with a limp.
Both fighters are now exhausted with their bodies taking a toll on them. Haafu slowly pulled out another kunai and threw it towards the blonde's other eye, putting more than enough force to penetrate his brain. Naruto stared at the incoming weapon with a glazed expression, not believing this is how he'd go out. Before he could think any longer, a masked person jumped in the way of the kunai. He took the kunai to the lung, not having enough time to block the weapon but just barely long enough to use himself as a human shield.
Naruto's eye focused on the downed masked individual. He was about to question his motive, but then the person turned his head to face him. He wore a mask like the one an ANBU would wear. This confused Naruto further until the ANBU spoke.
"Naruto U-Uzumaki, Lord Danzo wishes to speak with you." With the mission assigned to him done, the masked person dropped his head, dead from the wound he received. His body soon burst into flames, burning his whole body and everything on him until there was only ashes remaining.
Haafu snapped out of his shocked daze at seeing an ANBU member take a killing blow for the Namikaze brat. His facial expression took on a sneer and he faced the orange wearing boy. 'Guess that does mean Faito was right about his heritage.' He reached into his bag for another kunai, and pulled out the last kunai he had. He let out a sigh of relief at having one last kunai and started to run towards Naruto. He had enough of this brat and was planning to put an end to this game.
Naruto saw the Iwa nin running at him with a kunai drawn and knew that this was the final stand. He stood up and prepared himself. He let Haafu get within striking distance before he stuck his hand out, letting it get impaled by the kunai. With the kunai now embedded in his hand, Naruto channeled chakra into his hand as he clamped it down on Haafu's fist, preventing him from pulling it out of Naruto's grasp and jumping back.
Hinata let out a huff of frustration as she glared at Faito. "You're starting to anger me. Just stay down!" Hinata shouted, for once letting anger take over her calm and collected demeanor. She mentally planned to chide herself later for losing her cool and to take measures to make sure that it didn't happen again, but she filed that away for later. She gave her undivided attention to the durable and very infuriating jonin.
"Jeez man, why won't you just stay down?" Shikamaru muttered to himself, anger was also starting to seep into him. These Iwa nin split them up and were fighting against their friends, and this one guy was preventing them from helping the others. It wasn't difficult to know that his friends were having trouble fighting off their foes. He in fact had a hard time thinking of a way where everyone came out fine. He was especially afraid for Naruto and Ino. He might've not known the orange wearing blonde well or cared for him as much as his female teammate, but he knew Naruto was a good guy. He really needed to finish this fight early and go help them.
Faito pulled himself out of the crater and started to chuckle. His Rock Armour was down and he had a broken arm and a couple of ribs. 'Damn. That Ultimate Defense of the Hyuuga is no joke. That hurt badly.' His breathing was labored and he hated to admit it, but he was starting to struggle against these two kids. When he was fighting Asuma, all he did was go berserk on him. If he tried to do that now, the Hyuga could just use that dome of chakra and repel him again. 'What if I keep trying until she exhausts herself… no. I wouldn't be able to last that long. That shit hurt so much, I won't be able to do that again.' He took in a deep breath and let himself calm down. He opened his eyes and body flickered behind Hinata.
The sudden movement caught the two genin by surprise so they were unprepared when Faito body flickered behind Hinata, grabbed her arm and broke it. Shikamaru cursed his lack of reaction speed and used his shadow possession jutsu to try and grab a hold of the Iwa nin. Faito saw the shadow coming towards him and jumped back.
After breaking the Hyuga's arm, Faito was unable to press his advantage due to the Nara getting a control of his bearings. He leapt backwards to create distance between the two and to think and prepare for his next move. 'The Hyuuga now has an arm broken, and the Nara is about to drop from chakra exhaustion.' Faito had a smirk on his lips as he thought of a new plan.
Sasuke held his hands in the ram seal and tried to feel how much chakra he had left. He noticed that his chakra pool had now about a third left. 'Damn. I need to finish this fast.' He turned to face Choji before he spoke. "Choji, I need you to use your human boulder jutsu again. Don't ask why, just do it."
After seeing Choji's confused nod, Sasuke closed his eyes and tried to focus on molding his chakra into a fire nature condensed line. He heard Choji yell out his technique's name and the sound of him launching towards the jonin. He opened his eyes in time to see Choji miss once more with Kyua now coming after him, he quickly sent a prayer to whatever deity was there that his jutsu would work. He opened his mouth a bit before breathing out a short, wobbly line of compressed fire nature chakra.
The Iwa jonin was caught off guard at the, almost, precise and fine line of condensed fire chakra. Kyua had almost lost an arm due to the jutsu Sasuke used, but had managed to dodge in time but he had got her clothes on fire which was rapidly spreading across her clothing. Cursing, she substituted with a log and dropped her flack jacket and shirt to prevent even more of her clothes from being burnt. After removing those articles of clothing, she jumped back down to fight the two once more. The two boys had a blush from seeing her almost completely topless except for a bra covering her ample breast.
She smirked and pushed her arms together which made her breast pop out more. "Do you like what you see boys?" She taunted them which made them shake their heads to clear out such thoughts.
'And I call Naruto a pervert.' Sasuke mentally chided himself. He flashed through hand signs and breathed out a flame bullet that he sent towards Kyua. She substituted with a log that was behind Sasuke and kicked the two boys away with a roundhouse chakra enforced kick.
"Oh come on boys," She had a smirk on her face as she saw them struggling to get up. "Let's finish this, I'm getting bored of playing with you two."
Naruto popped a shadow clone into existence while he was holding onto the jonin's fist. The clone was spinning Naruto's chakra around until it formed a sphere of condensed blue chakra. With his task now done, the clone dispelled itself while Naruto glared at the jonin with his only eye remaining. "This is for my eye!" He shoved the glowing, swirling chakra sphere into the man's abdomen. "Rasengan!"
The jutsu immediately began to deal tremendous damage to the Iwa jonin. He could feel his liver, stomach, lungs, intestines, and finally his spine blow out of his back. He felt everything happen. He didn't have the fortune to die when his liver or stomach started to be ripped apart and start to spin. He didn't have the luck to pass out or die from oxygen deprivation after having his lungs torn at from the jutsu. He had the misfortune to be awake and conscious during everything. Before the rasengan could damage his heart, his vision was already fading and so he had one last thought before he finally departed from this world.
'Damn you… Uzumaki.'
Naruto watched in horror as his jutsu, his dad's original jutsu, carved into his opponent's body and proceeded to blast his guts outside his back. He felt Haafu's still warm blood drip onto his hand that had plunged into the man after his rasengan carved right through. He had witnessed his actions up close and saw how Haafu's body parts had reacted to having a rasengan shoved into them, and he was left petrified. He fell down on his knees and just stared at the results of his rasengan.
Had his father really used this jutsu against someone? Had he seen this much gore every time he used this? His face had gone pale, his stomach was churning, his head was spinning. He turned to face Kakashi and saw that he was still engaged in his fight. He looked down at the hand that had drilled the rasengan through the jonin. He gulped and quickly hardened himself for what he was about to do next.
'Kurama-'
"Of course kit. I'll take over."
'No… c-can you give me some chakra? I-I just need a bit.'
"Of course, though I won't be able to give much due to the damage your pathways endured… Are you sure you don't want me to take over?"
Instead of answering, Naruto just nodded his head. He got up on one knee and looked at where his sensei and teammates were fighting. He turned to face where Ino was currently laying on the ground completely knocked out. He stood up with and grimaced from the pain that his body had been through. He walked over and picked up Ino bridal style and gently laid her against a tree and made a shadow clone mainly consisting of enough Kurama's chakra to watch over her. Or at least enough that his body would allow it to use.
He turned around and scanned around his surroundings. After not spotting any enemies, he closed his left eye, quickly inhaled a deep breath, and exhaled slowly. He opened his eye and created 2 shadow clones to go and assist his teammates while he tried to assist his senseis.
After taking a couple of steps, Naruto stumbled and fell down on the ground, causing his two shadow clones to dispel. He tried to get up but his body was starting to strain and give up due to exhaustion. He looked at where Asuma and Kakashi were fighting once more and saw Kakashi plunge a chidori through the jonin's chest, sending blood flying everywhere.
He turned to see his teammates, to see how they were faring. He saw Sasuke and Choji trying to take down the jonin they went off to fight. All they had to do was stall until Kakashi or Asuma arrived to help. He turned to see how Hinata and Shikamaru were faring and he felt worry and dread building in his stomach. He saw Hinata cradling her left arm like it was broken. She was left with one arm to disable her opponents chakra points and if she could before, she was now left unable to use her bow. Shikamaru wasn't faring any better. He was left panting and sweating like crazy. The back of his shirt was damp from sweat, no doubt from using most of his chakra. The jonin they were fighting looked worse for wear, but overall not as bad as they were. He held out hope that Asuma or Kakashi would get there fast, before the Iwa jonin could do anything to his teammates. But as he looked back, the second jonin had plunged a lightning coated kunai into Asuma's shoulder and kicked him away harshly, making the leaf jonin let out a grunt of pain.
They were still fighting their opponents.
They wouldn't make it in time.
'GET UPPP!'
Naruto forced himself up and went as fast as he could to go help out Hinata and Shikamaru, but they were still ways away. Naruto's jogging speed wouldn't be enough to make it in time to save the two. Panic and hopelessness was quickly building inside of him. He desperately turned to face his sensei's one more time and saw that they were still preoccupied with the remaining Iwa jonin. He pumped as much chakra as he could into his legs and sprinted towards Hinata and Shikamaru.
Hinata and Shikamaru were on their last legs. Their chakra pool was now low and would faint from exhaustion at any point. However they wouldn't let the other faint because if they did, the jonin would immediately charge the remaining genin and strike them both down. Hinata pumped chakra through her broken arm to try and relieve the pain so she would be able to use it against the jonin they were fighting. She winced at having her chakra pathways in her broken arm being forcefully used. She slid into her gentle fist stance and tried to charge the jonin, but he charged her before she could reach him halfway and batted her hands away. With her guard wide open, the Iwa nin kicks her in the side which launches her away from Shikamaru before he could use his shadow possession jutsu to capture him again. With Hinata out of the way, Faito charged at the Nara with a kunai in his hand. However, just as he was about to plunge his kunai into the boy, a blonde kid slammed into him head first.
Naruto barely managed to stand up on his wobbly legs. He had used a lot of chakra and was now running on fumes. He gave the Iwa jonin the best glare he could muster, but in his state it didn't have it's desired effect. Faito broke out in laughter as he saw the state of the child.
"So, you took out Haafu. That's surprising but then again you are that Namikaze bastard's son. The Yellow Flash will see his son tonight, and I'll be your one way ticket to him!" Faito charged at Naruto with a gleeful, murderous look in his eyes. Naruto held his hand out and started to make his chakra swirl and rotate. Just as he had done with the assistance of a clone, Naruto had created a rasengan, however he could feel that the jutsu wasn't stable and that it was soon going to explode in his hand, and it would do so before Faito could reach him. Thinking quickly, Naruto channeled all of his remaining chakra into condensing it so the rasengan could have more power, sacrificing the rotation in the process.
A beam of condensed and powerful chakra shot out of the rasengan the second it destabilized. The beam was aimed directly at Faito and he didn't have enough time or fast enough reaction speed to avoid being hit. The beam instantly vaporized anything in its path, including Faito's chest. A hole that was 10 cm wide had been pulverized through the Iwa nin, who had died the second the jutsu had made contact. The beam had immediately vaporized a part of his liver, most of his pancreas, stomach, spleen, and the bottom part of his heart. Faito limply fell to the ground with blood starting to gush out of the hole through his body, quickly making a huge puddle of blood.
Naruto dropped to the ground with his hand now having a spiral engraved into it due to the rasengan destabilizing. He looked up to see Hinata struggling to get up due to her injuries and saw Shikamaru rush towards him as fast as his tired body could let him. His vision was starting to darken and was getting hazy. The last thing he could do before he let the darkness overtake him, was give his fellow genin a smile.
Kakashi was starting to run low on chakra. He knew Asuma wasn't having a better time either by the wound he had received when he tried to rush past them to help their students. He was about to look around to see how they were faring but the Iwa jonin had thrown a kunai towards him. He was about to catch it but before he could, his sharingan implant had caught the sight of an explosion note wrapped around the handle. He quickly pulled his own kunai out and threw it at it and jumped away so he could get further away from the blast radius. Once the kunai had cancelled each other out, the explosion note detonated which caused both parties to be blinded by a cloud of dust.
Kakashi was thankful for the cover and quickly turned around to scan for the genin. He quickly spotted Shikamaru and Hinata hovering and worrying over a downed Naruto, who was face down into the ground. He felt a pit of despair grow in his stomach at the sight but he had to make sure everyone was alright. He quickly scanned around his surroundings and spotted Ino who was almost completely hidden from view, and also Sasuke and Choji. They were surprisingly holding themselves against the jonin they were pitted against, but he knew that they wouldn't be able to hold out much longer. He closed his eye but all he could see was Naruto face down on the ground, struggling to breathe. He opened his eye and locked onto the Iwa jonin. With his sharingan eye narrowing, he charged as fast as he could, once again activating his chidori for the fifth time today. 'After this, I'll be out of chakra. I have to get him with this one!'
Daun was trying to capitalize on Asuma's lack of focus due to the pain he was in. He pulled out another kunai and channeled his chakra into it. He pulled it back, prepared to launch it with blinding speed. Right as he was about to launch it, he heard footsteps and then sounds of birds chirping following immediately after. He turned around and saw Kakashi, no less than five feet apart from him, thrust his hand towards him. His eyes soon glossed over and his body fell unceremoniously to the ground like a puppet having its strings cut.
With their enemy now out of commission, Kakashi felt the adrenaline quickly leaving his body and was being replaced by exhaustion. Before he dropped to the ground, he turned to face Asuma. "Go protect the genin." The last thing he saw before the sweet land of unconsciousness took him, was Asuma wincing as he nodded and he sprinted off to go help their students.
Sasuke and Choji were panting hard. Sasuke had activated his Sharingan in time to save Choji from a Rock Spear that would have no doubt killed the genin. He felt joy at finally having his Sharingan activated, but it was quickly draining his chakra. Uchiha or not, the Sharingan needed a lot of chakra to stay activated and to be able to correctly predict his enemies movements. In fact if it wasn't for Sasuke's sharingan, Sasuke had no doubt that he or Choji would have been heavily injured or worse by now.
The two Konoha genin had to jump apart due to the Iwa jonin used Earth Flow Spears. Sasuke mentally cursed as he saw Choji take a rough landing. The Iwa jonin would no doubt capitalize them being separated and take Choji out. With that in mind, Sasuke tried to maneuver his way to regroup with Choji. Hopefully the jonin doesn't reach him before Sasuke does.
Kyua frowned at the two genin avoided being skewered by her spears, but the frown quickly morphed into a murderous smile. The two genin had been separated and the chubby one had taken a rough landing. What made her smile grow wider was the fact that Choji was struggling to get up, no doubt due to exhaustion. 'The fat one is so tired, he's struggling to get up!' She maniacally cackled in her mind. She took off to end him before he could get up and try to stall the inevitable. She was only twenty feet away when he heard a sound that caught her attention. She whipped her head around and saw the blonde brat use the bastard's jutsu to kill her teammate. Her eyes widened when she saw the Namikaze use the rasengan, a close range jutsu, as a long range jutsu by making it shoot a beam of chakra through Faito.
With a scowl on her face, she backed off in time for Sasuke to see her. She stared at the two genin for some time before she decided to turn away. "Be lucky brats. You two are no longer my targets." After speaking she ran towards the woods where she hid and tried to spy more on the blonde brat, but after seeing that he wasn't going to get up anytime soon, she decided to leave. 'I'll just report this to the Tsuchikage. If he decides to kill me or not, it doesn't matter. I'm warning them of a second flash in the making. My duty to my village will be served.'
Sasuke watched her leave with his sharingan active to help track her movements. After seeing her completely leave, he crouched down to help Choji up. After taking a look around, he spotted Naruto face down on the ground with Hinata and Shikamaru hovering over him in worry and Asuma running towards them. When he reached them he scanned the surroundings, trying to find Kyua. After making sure that she was long gone, Asuma checked up on the genin that were currently concoinsious.
"Hey kiddos, how are you guys?" Asuma said as he looked over Choji and Sasuke, earning a scoof from the latter.
"We're fine. But only because she decided to leave. If I didn't awaken my sharingan, then we'd probably be dead. She was no joke. If Kakashi didn't train us, I don't know what would've happened." Sasuke answered truthfully.
"Well I'm glad you two are alright." He crouched down so he could give Choji a ride on his back. "Alright, come on. Let's go check on the others."
Ughhhh. This chapter was pretty hard to write. I had so many ideas coming at me that actually picking a few and writing them out was a lot harder than it needed to be. I'm not sure if I did my ideas justice, but that's what reviews are for. So let me know what you think, how I can improve, and if you're liking this story in the first place. And I'm sorry for taking a month to upload this, but I only write when I have the urge and inspiration to write now. Otherwise I feel like the quality of this fic won't be as good. :/
Till next update!