Yo, what's up?

Hope you're doing great.

Shout out to everyone that's been with this story since the beginning. I can't possibly appreciate you all enough for how you've been encouraging me to finish this. Thank you all so much!

I'll be switching between fights, so it might be a bit hectic. That said, I'll make sure to stamp the locations at the top. Also, Zetsu's observation in the last chapter about Mikoto not being able to battle Nagato and Konoha was his opinion. From her other fights, you guys know that Mikoto's painfully stubborn.

I'll be writing a homage to an event during the Fourth War in canon Naruto that I've always wanted to include in at least one of my stories. You'll know when you see it XD

Finally, I know that Madara can make wood clones and he can "activate" his rinnegan. It's a small spoiler for the next chapter.

Warning: this chapter contains a character's death.

CHAPTER 28

Naruto and Rin blitzed through the forest, running so quickly they were scarcely seen or perceived, until the twins stopped abruptly at the entrance of a glade, where a wide stream cut through the large, splitting the glade in half. Naruto's brow twitched and his sharingan eyes flickered ahead, widening and shooting a look to his sister, who looked just as shocked.

Then they bolted behind a tree.

A split second later, the trees on the other side of the glade noisily collapsed and a person wearing a cloak of reddish-orange chakra skidded to a halt in the glade, holding a large adamantium staff in his right hand and calmly sweeping his eyes to the other side of the glade.

Behind the tree, Rin stealthily dropped into a squat and peered around, while Naruto remained upright and looked around the other side of the tree.

A cloud of wordless cloud of communication passed between the two as they spied on the person, easily identifying him from the pictures in the Hokage's office and their father's study at the family house.

Hiruzen Sarutobi, Third Hokage of the Hidden Leaf village.

Naruto especially remembered the man's sacrifice on the day the Kyuubi attacked the village, using the Reaper Death seal to contain half of the Nine-Tails inside himself and the other half inside their youngest sister, Mikoto.

The curse of his sharingan didn't permit Naruto to forget.

It was the day Naruto's eyes evolved.

Hiruzen slammed his staff into the ground, creating a brief rippling thud to pass around the clearing. He released hold of the staff, with it remaining vertical, and groaned as he stretched his back.

"At least heal my bad back," he groused irritably to who the twins assumed was the Kyuubi. Hiruzen recoiled and winced, wiggling a finger into his right ear and hissing. "I get it already. So noisy."

The intensity of the red-orange cloak on the Third Hokage's form increased, redefining the man's armour; his dark grey jumpsuit shifted to black and the armoured hood on his head turned dark red-orange, with the two long straps that trailed on the ground flickering red-orange. The forehead protector on the temple of the helmet briefly shone. His goatee shimmered red and the deep age grooves on his face smoothed over a little, creating an image of when the man was at his prime.

Hiruzen closed his eyes, then he opened them.

They were red and vulpine.

"Looking good, gramps," Rin said with a whistle, projecting her voice to the Third Hokage's left side, and the man snapped his stare in that direction. An invisible, yet tangible wave of killer intent raced off his form and splintered the trees in that general direction, flattening the grass and shrubs. Rin tittered with laughter and Naruto rolled his eyes.

"Bringing you back was desperate," Naruto added as his eyes narrowed, screwing his lips to the side. His projected voice hovered somewhere close to the wooded devastation caused by Hiruzen's killer intent.

"Mom's right; Yagura's scared." Rin hummed. She glanced over her shoulder to her brother, and Naruto nodded.

The two parted ways, Rin to the left and Naruto to the right, speeding to other covers. Hiruzen's red eyes caught the slight blip of chakra parting on the other side of the stream before they disappeared.

"Do you remember us, gramps?" Rin questioned, crouched low on a branch, hidden in the darkness. Her light footing and position didn't so much as disturb a leaf on the tree. Her eyes glowed, resembling a creature coiled to attack from the treetops.

Hiruzen scoffed, crossing his arms. "Kushina's twins." He half-smiled and exhaled, looking to the sky. "You two have gotten faster. Better. Seems you took more from your father than your mother."

"It was out of our control." Naruto lingered inside a tall bush, readying himself for what was going to happen.

He shot a look to his sister and a quick cycle of mental communication ensued.

This isn't Lord Second's reincarnation jutsu. Gramps is really, one hundred percent alive. Naruto thought. And he's got the Nine-Tails.

Rin proposed, Yagura's still controlling him though.

Naruto rolled his tongue in his mouth, thinking, Hold him back for as long as possible.

Aye, aye. Rin saluted. Her vague form in the trees shimmered in a mist of dull yellow lights and she reappeared before the Third Hokage, sending a flying kick to his face but having it blocked by the man's adamantium staff. Hurry!

Rin kicked off the staff into a backflip and landed on her feet. She grunted as she cushioned her fall with chakra at her feet and knees, but the pain from the reopened wound on her stomach prickled. Hiruzen hadn't so much as taken a step back, holding his large staff across his form and settling into a fighting stance, just in time for Rin to leap back at him in a shower of light and strike at his face again with a blow, that was deflected by the staff. She stepped away from a fiery sweep for her feet, padding her arms and legs in her bright chakra to oppose the heat ebbing off the Hokage's form, returning with a knee to his midsection that was again blocked by the staff.

She vanished in a huff, frustrated, and came back with Samehada, unravelled from its bandages. The sword was feral.

The girl brought her hefty sword down on the Hokage and it was again blocked by the staff, but this time the man visibly strained for his knees not to buckle as the sword began inhaling whatever Kyuubi chakra touched it.

Rin's broad grin showed her joy.

Naruto was long gone, zigzagging through the forest in a deafening hum of red mist, bypassing trees and launching over foliage. His body had disintegrated and was now in the form of a cloud of red mist with a pointed front, scarcely touching the ground and meandering the obstacles.

Above him, Naruto heard a crackle and the thrum of static. The Hokage spared a look to the sky, keeping half of his mind on the road ahead, and he saw the dome-shaped barrier that covered the island was flickering on and off.

He smiled a little; his mother had succeeded in finding the source of the barrier. Kushina had spent her early childhood in Whirlpool country, so it was truly impressive how she could quickly remember key places like the Grotto, where the barrier would most likely be activated.

He whipped out his two-way radio, still hurtling through the forest at breakneck speed, and he was pleased not to hear an empty static. He barked into the radio, "Itachi, what's the situation in Konoha?"

A moment passed with no answer, and Naruto made to repeat his question, but his Uchiha cousin answered, "Mikoto's destroyed the meteor. She's currently in combat with the unknown assailants. The village seems to be fine, nothing that can't be rebuilt. I haven't heard about any loss of life in the ordeal." Itachi paused in his report, and the quiet drone of static on his side made Naruto worry that the Uchiha was holding back information, then his friend said, "Naruto, please advise."

Naruto smirked.

Itachi was itching to return to the village to help.

"Swing by the island and recover our casualties, leave a few of your shinobi, then return to the village to support Mikoto."

He could hear Itachi's smile in his answer. "Yes, Lord Hokage."

The barrier splintered and burst, sounding like shattering glass as it completely deactivated. Naruto tucked the radio back into a pocket of his jounin vest, and his sharingan stare turned to his far left when he heard several trees noisily collapse under the weight of a red ball of righteous fury charging through the forest and rumbling to the same destination Naruto was heading toward. Kushina barrelled into trees and bushes indiscriminately and without regard for anything else in her path.

He felt the jarring thud of blows and strikes behind him from Rin's fight with the Third Hokage.

Mother and son burst into the graveyard at the same time from opposite sides of the hallowed resting place and at the same time Hashirama and Madara dove at them.

Madara swiped at Naruto with his Gunbai, and the Red Demon yanked out his tanto from the sheath at his lower back, and the two pairs of sharingan clashed violently as their weapons crossed.

A spark passed between both red eyes and, in unison, they evolved.

Naruto's face hardened into a focused snarl, and a gradual smirk slithered up a corner of Madara's lips.

" Good." The man breathed, all too calmly for the ripples of chakra exuding from them. The ground trembled and trees leaned away. A sheen of red chakra ebbed from Naruto's form and purple chakra cloaked Madara's. The Uchiha's elation only increased all the more; the harsh clamour of chakra chains against wood release trees dissolved from their hearing, until Madara said in a serene, yet deep, voice, "But for a Hokage, you're pathetic."

He quickly pulled away, and Naruto blinked in amazement at the sudden movement, falling forward until he caught himself by fixing his right foot forward, only for Madara to plant his foot under Naruto's chin. The kick lifted Naruto off the ground by half an inch, long enough time for Madara to spin on his heel and send another kick into Naruto's diaphragm.

The Red Demon blasted backwards, limp, crashing violently into several trees back-first until he smacked into a rockface, then his eyes jolted back open.

He blinked, shaking the cobwebs out of his head and peeling himself out of the rock he was embedded inside. He fell to a knee and rubbed the back of his head, bringing his fingers in front of his eyes.

He saw red.

Literally and figuratively.

He got to his feet, his face scrunched up at his bruised ribs, and he spat a mouthful of blood down to the ground, twirling his sword in his left hand once and watching as the infamous Mad Uchiha casually walked out from the wreckage of mangled trees Naruto had just broken through, gaily swinging his Gunbai.

"Your mastery of the sharingan is commendable, I will admit," Madara said in a deep drone, stopping beside a fallen tree and standing with his feet a little bit apart. He set his weapon on his shoulder. "But not even your speed is anything special." His eyes darkened and his sharingan whirled in his stare, smirking wider at Naruto as the Hokage got into a stance. "I've killed many Namikaze far more impressive and many Uzumaki far stronger than you, boy."

Naruto narrowed his eyes and channelled chakra to coat his sword. "You talk too much."

His body vibrated and Madara quirked up an eyebrow, intrigued that the outlines of Naruto's form were becoming blurred. Then the original Naruto split into two, then the two split into four, and the four split into eight, and so on until there was a flash mob of red-eyed Namikaze standing in fighting stances and glaring irritably at the Uchiha man.

Their features were sharp and clear and, using his sharingan, Madara's eyes widened into hysterical glee; they were all the original Naruto, all connected by a nearly invisible thread made from molten fire and lightning.

Naruto hadn't used this technique in years, and he had refined it to the extent that the deafening buzz of movement was reduced to a windy howl. He pushed his body and his bloodline to the very limit to get to this point. This also wasn't the five copies of himself he could only make when he was nine years old; this was fifty perfect copies of the same person, all standing in different aggressive positions and ready to charge as if they were separate individuals in the same army.

Ghost clone technique.

"Yes!" Madara yelled, holding out his Gunbai in a ready stance. "Make this worth my time, boy!"

The perfect copies of the Fifth Hokage mobbed Madara Uchiha as one.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

In Konoha

Mikoto, levitating in the Kyuubi's head, turned around and yelled, "Temari!"

"I'm here!" the girl called back, soaring in a blaze of speed on her battle fan. Kankuro wasn't with her, as she had left him with the Konoha medics who were taking care of Gaara. Fortunately, she hadn't stayed but rather went back onto the battlefield to see if her services were still needed, and apparently, they still were. The Kyuubi disintegrated as Mikoto clambered out of the beast's ethereal head, leaping off and catching Temari's arm as the girl leaned down to help. Mikoto grunted her thanks as the sister of her best friend's killer helped her onto the fan, zipping high into the air. "Mikoto!" Temari yelled over the deafening howl of the wind as it whipped past their faces, shooting for the pair of flying attackers. The one with wings dove down to attack and the one with purple eyes stayed back. "I can't fight these people! You've seen what they can do!"

"It's alright!"

Mikoto clapped her hands together, fastening her feet to the fan and setting her legs in a ready stance. The intensity of the Kyuubi chakra, Otsutsuki chakra, and Mikoto's chakra cloaking her form increased, and then she flicked her hands into the ram seal, and the chakra transferred to Temari.

Not just her, though.

Like honeyed dew a perfect balance of beast, Otsutuski, and her chakra rained over all of Konoha, lighting everyone's body and chakra on fire. Every ninja aboveground was pushing away the near-constant rain of building debris that was falling on the village.

It reached Kakashi, Yugao, Asuma, Gai, Tsume, and Team Inuzuka, as the four limp-ran as fast as they could to the safety of Konoha's underground facilities.

For Temari, it was like receiving several stabs of adrenaline to the heart all at once, but not nearly as dangerous as that. The scuffs, sprains, and cuts on her body from her battle with Deidara sealed up and healed and her vision became clearer.

The orange cloak on Temari's form and everyone's forms in Konoha revitalised their efforts. Glancing down to the ground, Temari saw bright orange lights in their hundreds, burning like candles in the pitch blackness of night.

"What about you?!" Temari called, her body glowed with power and healing. Transferring so much of her chakra, not only to Temari but to the large population of Konoha ninjas that weren't hunkered underground should be putting a monumental amount of strain on Mikoto's body.

Mikoto gave her a sharp smirk from over her shoulder and dropped the seal. "Don't worry about me!" she turned back ahead, just in time to catch the winged attacker drawing closer. "Right now, I need you at your best!"

Mikoto weaved through a different set of hand seals, narrowing her eyes at the winged attacker, and holding up the last seal under her chin.

"Fire release: Art of the Phoenix Flower!"

Her cheeks puffed out and she spat out a volley of fireballs at the winged woman, who manoeuvred away from them and flew to the right. Mikoto kept exhaling balls of fire at the woman until Temari saw an opening and pulled out a pair of smaller fans from her sash, flicking them open and calling out a jutsu.

"Summoning jutsu: Quick Beheading Dance!"

A short plume of white smoke burst on her left shoulder revealing a weasel wearing an eyepatch, carrying a sickle that was as large as it.

On cue and without needing to be prompted, the weasel grits its teeth and wildly swung its sickle, creating volleys of sharp wind that covered the entire area the winged attacker had flown to, smashing into the woman as she futilely used her paper wings to shield her head and body. The thousands of sharp winds cut into the paper, shredding it beyond recognition, and pushed the woman away and down, colliding with the earth in a rumbling thud of loose explosions.

Teams of Konoha ninjas bore down on her immediately, like sentient candles swarming on a single spot.

Mikoto smirked and held out her fist to Temari, just as the weasel vanished in a burst of chakra. "Nice."

Temari looked at the offered fist, then at the Kyuubi holder, and her pale face washed with a mix of remorse and relief. Remorse for what she and her brothers had done to Hinata, and relief that Mikoto was willing to, at least for now, not hold any anger towards her.

The Suna girl smiled and bumped Mikoto's fist. "Thanks."

The two girls faced the levitating man ahead, who wore a neutral expression even after what had just happened to his partner.

Mikoto drew her claymore, holding it in her right hand, and Temari readied herself with her fans.

The Kyuubi holder's expression became more beastly and she summoned two clones on her left side, briefly shaking the soaring from the added weight, and the two clones quickly began forming and controlling the chakra Mikoto was pushing to her palms.

A Rasengan entirely made from Otsutsuki chakra.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

In Whirlpool Country

Madara slashed the sharp edge of his Gunbai and it phased through two Naruto's, but the sword strokes five more clones swiped at the Uchiha nearly removing his right arm if not for the man swiftly using his Gunbai to block the blows.

More Naruto copies fell on the man.

Madara soon realised why and how blows passed through each copy, while every copy was still the original Naruto; the boy ran at such speeds that he was able to replicate himself perfectly, making his features well-defined and faultless, and his evolved sharingan came in handy in anticipating even Madara's fastest attacks, warning the boy and letting him leave an empty afterimage of himself for the split second the attack reached, returning afterwards and countering Madara's attack.

The Fifth Hokage's ghost clone technique followed the same philosophy as an Uzumaki using the shadow clone technique.

Overwhelm the target using numbers and sheer aggression and exhaust them to the point of collapsing.

However, this meant that Naruto had to focus on constantly moving, and couldn't spare even a quarter of a second to use another jutsu.

It was also an extremely taxing technique, Madara assumed, grinding his teeth after receiving a right hook to his face that ran into a hard knee, which in turn knocked the man into a spinning kick that chained into a strong kick to the back of his knees which toppled him to the ground, and a few dozen swords cutting off his Gunbai wielding hand, but the man quickly caught his weapon with his other hand and swung it, blasting a tidal wave of wind to wrench off the Naruto clones clinging onto him.

The boy wasn't showing any signs of getting tired.

Madara heaved raggedly, getting to his feet and wildly swinging his Gunbai again.

"Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!" he bit through his teeth. The wind tore the earth apart, uprooting trees and shredding the large pieces of rock in the area they were fighting in. The man poured chakra into the technique, far from caring about its repercussions and only wanting the stubborn boy as far away from him as possible.

The Naruto copies clung to the ground with their chakra, powering against the waves of wind that bombarded them.

But this was only a distraction.

About five hands shot out from the ground under Madara, and the Uchiha looked down at them with wide, horrified red eyes that the boy's speed had bypassed his senses, suddenly ending the wind tsunamis as the man was dragged into the ground.

Madara sank to his waist when the man roared in rage. His chakra exploded from his pores and a purple Susanno skeleton torso shot up from his previous position, and the ethereal skeleton reared its right hand back and blasted a hard blow down on the clones at its base, swinging its arms around and throwing off the Naruto clones that clambered onto it.

The clones landed on their feet, teeming with dark smiles and speaking in a daring chorus, "Am I still pathetic?!"

Before Madara could growl a reply, four clones inside Susanno sprung into action; one caught the Uchiha in a tight headlock, winding its legs around Madara's torso as two secured the man's legs and the fourth ripped out a roll of exploding seal tags from his jounin vest.

The clones laughed, hysterically. "Am I?!"

The bombs went off and the world turned white.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Rin wished she had properly trained with Samehada for longer; that way, she would have been able to use some of the techniques the sword was capable of while it was with Kisame. Rather, for the two weeks she had with the sword, she had only been able to learn how to handle the weight and the wild centre of gravity the sentient sword had, which was a double-edged sword.

The weight and odd centre of gravity made it lethal when swung or used for blocking, but it put a strain on Rin's body and ate at her nearly bottomless stamina and endurance.

Getting accidentally shredded by the purple scales wasn't even a factor, since the sword liked its new handler.

That didn't mean Rin didn't understand the basic mechanics of the sword and the most optimal ways of wielding it; Samehada had made sure to instruct her extensively on that.

Rin swung her sword horizontally, forcing Hiruzen to cross his staff over his midsection to block the blow, diverting the brunt of the blow downward only for Rin to whip around using the momentum to nail a kick into the man's temple, stepping off before the Kyuubi chakra could burn her sandals and rolling with Samehada when the Third Hokage reached for her ankle.

She rose to her feet and swiped Samehada up, countering a downward smash when her blade elongated and enlarged. Her purple sword opened its horrific maw to grip the staff in its teeth, thrashing madly until Rin forcefully yanked her sword down, pulling the staff and Hiruzen onto the ground with a heavy thud. Rocks and soil exploded on impact and Rin pulled again, and her elongated sword whistled out of the dust cloud with the bow staff in its teeth, which was promptly swallowed; this wasn't the Third's monkey summons transformed into a staff but a false reflection of the original, like the reincarnated Kushina's swords.

Rin's upper arms and her core burned from exertion and she panted through her teeth, shaking her head at the teeming chatter of Samehada's teeth.

"I'm just a bit winded. Don't worry."

The scales of the sword rattled, clicking against its bulbous purple body, and Samehada shrunk a little, much to Rin's relief.

"When we get out of this, I'll feed you all the whale meat you can eat." She smiled a little at the chirping chatter of her sword. "Don't push your luck; I'm not giving you people meat." Samehada purred, both still raptly watching the ominously still cloud of dust and rocky debris. "Enemy ninjas, maybe, but no promises." She used both of her hands to hold Samehada forward, trying to suppress the shaking in her arms and gritting her teeth. " Shh, something's happening."

The ground rumbled, and Rin spotted a few trees topple to the side as the person tunnelling made a beeline for her, before it could reach Rin, she leapt out of the way as a giant white snake exploded from the ground. As she jumped out of the way, though, she also spun around with her sword, decapitating the frenzied snake and bringing its wild hiss to a sudden stop.

Rin landed with a gruff huff and gnashed her teeth, tiredly letting the tip of her heavy sword touch the ground, but that wasn't the end of her problems.

The snake's cut-off head that hadn't yet fallen to the ground and its mangled torso that had flopped to the earth divided itself into thousands of feral snakes, raining down from the sky and slithering quickly on the ground to the weary girl. A guttural-sounding laughter ebbed in the glade.

"Damn it, Orochi. Not now," she hissed. The size of her sword shrank even more to something she could carry with one hand, and with the other she flipped through one-handed seals, summoning her chakra and forcing out her bloodline. Her eyes changed from purple to bright yellow, shimmering with power.

A pair of angelic wings sprouted from her back and she took off into the sky in a blinding blaze of yellow light, resembling a golden meteor propelling into the atmosphere. Yellow lights covered her form, incinerating any snake that touched her and Samehada writhed around her form, snapping down on any venomous reptile that managed to pass through her defences. She reached the clouds in the sky and still ascended.

She needed some breathing room—

From the dust cloud Rin had formed by smashing Hiruzen into, a horrendous bellow resonated an orange-red chakra shook the earth as it blasted upwards, shaping itself into a fully manifested Nine-Tails, wreathed in fiery chakra and the Third Hokage's armour. Its nine tails flailed, setting fire to sections of the island.

It reached its right arm up, stretching fast and opening its hand, catching Rin inside its fist. The girl's wings reflexively shrouded her and Samehada, expanding in the form of a sphere with the girl and her sword at its core to the extent that Hiruzen Sarutobi's Kyuubi had to grasp the growing ball of yellow light with both hands, preventing it from further shooting into space.

The light from Rin's bloodline illuminated the entire island, and the sight of the Nine-Tails holding onto the sphere of light looked like something out of a fantasy novel.

A great number of people on the island, from the Uzumaki people hiding in caves away from the combat, to Itachi and the other Konoha ninjas on the beach tending to the injured, and even to the crowd of Naruto's overwhelming Madara Uchiha stopped and looked up at the sun-like ball of light being held to the planet by the Nine-Tails.

Then all of a sudden, Rin's chakra and strength ran out.

The ball of light abruptly flicked off and the Kyuubi, bearing a gnashed grin, clapped its hands together, crushing the girl and the sword between its palms, swinging its arms down and bringing Rin down to the earth in a meteoric trail of dim light.

Authors note

I'll see you when I see you.

Foy.