I don't own anything related to the Naruto franchise
Chapter 13 - The Real Ninja Exam
Author's Note: 1:
I called Sakura's mom Sharon Haruno in the second chapter. I have since edited her name to be accurate. Her name is Mebuki in the cannon story.
Author's note 2:
A ninja must be able to see underneath the underneath - Kakashi Hatake
Inoichi Yamanaka wasn't a fan of what he was about to do... He completely hated it, and yet he knew it had to be done.
In just a few minute's time, Inoichi was going to defend Naruto Uzumaki from the accusations that the Civilian Council were inevitably going to level against him. He was going to do so to the very best of his ability, using every tool of his trade, because despite what his actions earlier in the day might have indicated; he wasn't actually a visibly corrupt scumbag who routinely abused his position…
That didn't mean that he had to like it, which was good because he didn't.
What Inoichi wanted to do right now was throw Uzumaki into one of the cells back at the Intelligence Division and show the boy how an interrogation REALLY works.
Sigh…
Even going that far would probably be a waste of time... Naruto already revealed exactly what he thought of Inoichi's demand that he stay away from his daughter, and he did so in an explosively disrespectful fashion... The major problem with that outcome was the fact that the boy had felt every single second of Inoichi's intrusion upon his mind, which meant that his angry response was actually pretty understandable. Naruto clearly focused his entire mind upon his growing anger and indignation in order to protect his thoughts from Inoichi's manipulation, which in turn had the unintended side-effect of making him lose his temper.
And yet, knowing all of that hadn't made the past eleven hours any easier to bear.
Ino was barricaded in her room behind an unbelievably durable Fuinjutsu barrier, and she wasn't coming out for anything at all. He'd tried every method he could think of to get his daughter out of her room and talking to him again, including begging and bribery, but nothing was working. It was becoming increasingly obvious to Inoichi that he'd underestimated both his daughter's attachment to Naruto and her growing Ninjutsu skills. That Henge she'd been performing was quite literally perfect…
Very suddenly, Inoichi's thoughts screamed to a halt, as two distinctly different and yet inextricably linked thoughts entered into his mind.
Thought number one: Ino's Henge illusion of Naruto was absolutely flawless. It was an exact duplicate of the boy's facial features and skin tone, as well as his hair color, shape and texture. More importantly, she had the boy's physique and musculature memorized down to the smallest and most inconsequential little details…
Thought Number two: Naruto Uzumaki needed to die…
After shaking off a split-second moment of homicidal rage, Inoichi drew in a very deep breath and then cracked both of his knuckles. He reminded himself that what he really needed to do right now was think of the bigger picture. As both a Genin ninja on loan to the Intelligence Division and a Jinchuriki, Naruto was about to live an exceedingly dangerous life. Hell, it was pretty damned likely the boy wouldn't even live long enough to see full maturity. The one objective Inoichi needed to keep in mind was that Ino must never be able to link the boy's untimely demise back to him. Due to his behavior earlier in the day, Ino would suspect him of engineering the boy's death if she ever found even the smallest link to him in the details.
When you also factored in the fact that Inoichi wasn't actually a sociopathic monster (unfortunately), then it became clear that cold blooded murder simply wasn't a viable solution to his problem.
What Inoichi could do was champion Naruto's skills, so that the boy would be sent on a never ending tide of dangerous and high ranked missions... It was a plan that would accomplish multiple objectives, the most important of which being that Naruto would end up far, far away from his daughter…
It was perfect!
With a newly happy smile on his face and a spring in his step, Inoichi bounced into the Council room, where he took his seat with the rest of the Ninja Clan heads.
Civilian Counselor Mebuki Haruno was a very unhappy and anxious woman at the moment, but you wouldn't know it simply by looking at her. No… Rather than concerned, Mebuki looked completely outraged as she sat in her Council seat… A facade that came easy after nearly twelve whole years of constant practice.
Back in the beginning, back when the Kyuubi was first sealed inside of infant Naruto Uzumaki, the Civilian Council legitimately hated the boy, saw him as a monster, and wanted him dead, just like everyone else in the village.
But only in the beginning…
The members of the Civilian Council are not morons who are incapable of understanding how sealing works. They're also nowhere near as irrational as their actions towards the boy would lend you to believe. The Civilian Council is made up of merchants, which is why their real motive should come as no surprise…
Profits.
The Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, was extraordinarily soft on Naruto Uzumaki, even after taking into consideration the fact that the boy was an essential military asset. He doted on Naruto, he was unable to completely hide the fact that he cared about him, and in that failure lay an opportunity.
The number of times that the Third Hokage compromised or acceded to the Civilian Council's desires when he initially intended to straight up refuse them was countless… the reason…
Naruto Uzumaki.
All it took for the Civilian Council to get a complicated and costly business transaction approved or a beneficial piece of legislation passed by the Third, was that they begin making absurd demands regarding the village's Jinchuuriki. Every single time they did so, the Third Hokage was put on his back foot, and while the man was smart enough to recognize that fact, there was very little that he could actually do about it. The Merchant caste of this village couldn't simply be wiped out, after all, and their demands were fully supported by the village's most misguided but vocal population.
Long story short, the very last people in all of Konoha that wanted to see Naruto dead was the Civilian Council. They most certainly did not hire Zan to kill the boy…
But they did hire Zan to fail the boy, which was the reason why Mebuki was feeling anxious.
Zan was being interrogated by military intelligence at the moment, and no civilian, even the Councilors, were allowed to know what the Intelligence group was finding out from the man… So far as attempted murder goes, the Civilian Council legitimately had nothing to do with it, and needn't worry about anything at all… but that didn't mean they were innocent.
No… Mebuki wasn't worried about being charged with attempted murder… What she was worried about was Zan admitting that he was paid by the Civilian Council to fail Naruto…
Now, the only recourse that Mebuki had during the soon to occur emergency meeting was to remind everyone just how evil, worthless and despised Naruto Uzumaki really was… She needed to demand the boy's death to diminish the Hokage's authority, both because she needed to sideline any corruption charges that might be leveled in her direction, and because the Civilian Council needed Naruto to remain a civilian.
Naruto Uzumaki was the very best thing that ever happened to the Konoha Civilian Council, and they would not let him escape from their authority…
In a moment of convenient timing, the Third Hokage walked into the Council Hall just as Mebuki finished mustering up her determination, where he slid into his decorative seat, and then drew in a very deep breath. "Momentarily, I will begin an emergency meeting of the Konoha Village Council. This emergency meeting has been called by Senior Councillor Haruno of the Civilian Council, who I trust, will enlighten us as to why we are here… but first, Intelligence Leader Yamanaka has a briefing to give me, and I've been assured that it's of vital importance… Now then, I hereby begin the meeting…"
"Kill Naruto Uzumaki, now! He's become too unpredictable, too evil and violent to be countenanced," Mebuki immediately yelled out, along with a ten strong chorus from every other Civilian in the room… The words, monstrous, monster, evil, filthy, unworthy, vile, disgusting, creature, imprison and kill, echoed all throughout the council chamber in a chaotic jumble, as the Civilian Council made their voices heard.
For several moments following the Civilian Council's outraged screaming, the Hokage merely stared at them all as if they were rabid animals foaming at the mouth… Then he abruptly flooded the entire chamber with a killing intent so strong even the clan heads sitting around the room flinched and gritted their teeth. He poured out a wave of concentrated lethality so powerful, if it was directed at a single civilian they'd likely suffer a heart attack… As it was, with his animosity spread out in every direction, Mebuki still found herself unable to breathe, as if she was a gerbil being cornered by a mountain lion.
Finally, a whole ten seconds after he started unleashing his killer intent, Sarutobi Hiruizen drew every scrap of his chakra back into his body, and then steepled his hands atop the boardroom table in front of himself. "Today's meeting is an emergency meeting, which means that we are going to be operating under emergency measures. Today, I will direct you when to speak, how long to speak, and when to stop speaking… If any of you disobey, I have authorized my Intelligence Leader to… silence you…"
With his message delivered, the Third Hokage abruptly turned towards Inoichi Yamanaka and then gestured for the man to speak.
Rising to his feet with a notebook full of neat and tidy writing in his hands, Inoichi turned towards the rest of the Council and then speared the civilians with his eyes... "The information that I'm about to relay to the Hokage are the results of Zan's interrogation, which I personally gathered in my official capacity as the Intelligence Leader of this village. If anyone in the room so much as makes a squeak before my briefing is complete, I will rip their ability to speak directly out of their minds, rendering them mute… I - am - not - joking… You have been warned…"
All around the room the various clan heads nodded their ready acceptance (with trace amounts of carefully concealed amusement on their faces), while several of the civilians gulped and started sweating.
For several more seconds, Inoichi scanned the amassed Civilian Counselors, making eye contact with every single one of them again, before returning his attention to his notes… "In my official capacity as the Intelligence Leader of Konoha Ninja Village, I have determined that the Civilian Council is guilty of treason, as they've actively and repeatedly attempted to sabotage Konoha's military strength…"
Even as the Civilian Council members in the room gaped, gasped, flushed red, and shook in their desperate attempts to restrain themselves, Six Anbu members filed into the room, proving that Inoichi's words weren't simply for the sake of dramatic effect.
"Explain your findings," The Hokage demanded, unable to keep a bloodthirsty smile from appearing upon his face.
With a nod, Inoichi looked back down at his notes, shuffling them in his hands for dramatic effect before he began to say his piece. "After infiltrating Zan's mind, and the minds of the other proctors who were removed from yesterday's ninja exam, we have found that the Civilian Council paid a large sum of money to each and every one of them, with the express purpose of having them sabotage one Naruto Uzumaki's exams."
"Did they pay Zan to murder the boy," the Hokage immediately asked with a hostile glint in his eyes.
"No, but if they'd succeeded in preventing Naruto Uzumaki from becoming a ninja, they would've deprived this village of a priceless and irreplaceable talent, and I'm not only referring to the boy's 'secret' when I say that," Inoichi replied.
"Please explain." By this point, the Hokage's eyes were scanning the Civilian Council as if he was deciding just who it was that would lose their head first.
"Naruto Uzumaki is an intelligence gathering prodigy the likes of which I have never seen in my whole entire career," Inoichi revealed with unfeigned sincerity in his voice. "The boy's skill-set and powers allow him to infiltrate any village, of any strength, blend in with the locals, gather information and even disrupt enemy security, all without ever risking capture or interrogation."
"What method allows the boy to be so effective as a spy," the Third Hokage asked with a thoughtful look on his face.
"Not spy, sir, spies… nearly a hundred of them," Inoichi corrected. "A quarter of a year ago, Naruto accidentally made contact with an Anbu practicing the Kage Shadow Clone jutsu, and since that time, he's learned to use the jutsu to an extraordinary extent. Naruto Uzumaki can become a one man disposable army, and he can do so in a heartbeat."
"A disposable army that can Henge illusion," The Third mused, as if to himself."
"Exactly, sir," Inoichi agreed. "In fact, as we speak, I have Naruto performing a mission for me, one that is perfectly suited to his particular skill-set."
"What is this mission," the Hokage asked, his elbows on the table in front of him in apparent interest.
"The boy just finished infiltrating your office in the tower, where he allowed himself to be seen stealing a fake forbidden jutsu scroll, and he's meeting a turncoat out in one of the training fields," Inoichi explained. "By the end of the night, Naruto Uzumaki will have routed out not just one hole in our internal security… but several…"
Along with his words, Inoichi and the Third turned back towards the Civilian Council again, and a bead of sweat dripped off of Mebuki's forehead.
From his spot within a fridge-sized compartment hidden behind training field number thirty-one's waterfall, Mizuki watched the training field itself and waited for Naruto's arrival… At this point, Mizuki was confident that his plan was going off without a hitch for the following reasons.
-he never saw Naruto seek out the Hokage or any other internal security group
-he saw Naruto create chaos on a grand scale all throughout the village, and he saw the Anbu try their level best to eliminate him
-he saw the boy emerge from the Hokage's tower, saw the alarms go off, saw the village ninja's sortie to catch the boy, and saw him get away by using a wide array of smoke and pepper bombs
Most importantly, Mizuki could see Naruto now, running into the clearing with a newly panicked expression upon his face. It appeared the villagers were seriously trying to kill the boy now, and he was starting to suspect that he'd been tricked.
It also appeared that the ninjas that were tracking Naruto down were of every level of skill from Genin to Jonin, as the squad that caught up to Naruto not long after his arrival were a Genin squad that graduated from the academy just a single year earlier. Aoi Yoshida, Haru Sasaki and Emiko Miura were talented ninja, at least so far as civilian raised kids go, but they were also well known for being uncommonly thoughtful and kind.
Mizuki felt a sick smile blooming across his face as Naruto threw the forbidden scroll that he was carrying in a nearby copse of bushes, and then waved his hands in front of his body in a vain attempt to dissuade the attacking ninja… "Wait! It's as I said before, I'm no traitor. Stealing this scroll was a test that was assigned to me!"
With a growl of disgust, and a series of hand-signs, Aoi sent his two teammates into the trees on the right and the left, seeking to hem Naruto in so that he could no longer run away. Only then did he deign to respond to Naruto's words. "You're a traitorous swine, and you'd say anything to save your own skin. I should've listened to my parents and treated you like the monster that you are!"
A full belt of Kunai flew at Naruto from the left and a fan-shaped Shuriken flew at him from the right, causing him to cartwheel through the air, dive forward in a roll, and then bounce back up into an awkward looking crouch. At the same time, Emiko dashed in Naruto's direction from the trees on the left, and Aoi started forming a chakra based attack…
Naruto's hands blurred through a rapid triplet of hand signs.
Poof, poofpoof X a lot!
As a massive white smokescreen billowed upward and away from the clearing, twenty-five shadow clones of Naruto were revealed, standing with their hands up and at the ready.
"Don't make me do this," Naruto prime breathed out in a tortured sounding voice. "You three have always been decent to me. Don't make me hurt you…"
"Delusional fool," Aoi screamed, as he finished forming his jutsu, slammed his hands down into the ground, and unleashed a carpet of rock spikes that stabbed up towards the Shadow Clones arrayed across the clearing.
Upwards of six Naruto's instantly popped out of existence as their lower bodies were impaled upon countless spikes, but this caused the clones that did manage to dodge the attack to take the situation seriously, and they launched into a counterattack. All of the sudden, six Naruto clones were sprinting towards Emiko, seven were leaping up into the tree that Haru was crouching in, and six clones plus Naruto himself were dashing in Aoi's direction.
Despite the fact that he hated Konoha and everyone in it, Mizuki would have to admit that he was impressed with the fight that followed. He didn't get to see Naruto's so-called 'spar' with Zan earlier in the day, but he'd heard that the boy was at least a Chunin level Taijutsu fighter…
Well now he knew for sure.
With just his clones and his strong Taijutsu, Naruto Uzumaki managed to take on a well-trained and ninjutsu-proficient Genin squad that was scheduled to take the Chunin exams later in the year, and despite the fact that Naruto was a piss poor practitioner of ninjutsu himself, the fight was actually even…
Of course, Mizuki found himself rooting for the underdog, if only because it was convenient for his plans… Hell, if he played his cards right, he wouldn't even need to signal for the backup that he had waiting deeper in the forest.
Aoi was the strongest fighter in his squad, which is the reason why Naruto prime joined the group that was attacking him. The boy could create multiple pillars of rock out of the earth with just a pair of one-handed hand-signs, which meant that countless spears and defensive walls popped up out of the ground every time Naruto tried to close the distance. In Aoi's other hand was a katana, which the boy made excellent use of.
Two Naruto clones popped out of existence, as they attempted to back away from a blisteringly fast sword swing only to find a brand-new rock wall hemming them in from behind. In return, Naruto prime swept a kick at the boy's back that he managed to turn into a glancing blow by moving forward in a roll. In a rapid flurry of movements, Naruto and Aoi chipped away at each other, Naruto losing clones, as Aoi took bruises and cuts. It seemed the two boys were fighting at a stalemate for the moment, as Aoi kept an eye on Naruto prime as the most dangerous element of his attack. The clones were fragile after all, and would always back off whenever his sword was swung in their direction.
After erecting yet another pillar of rock in an attempt to stab Naruto prime through the heart, Aoi swept his sword at a clone that was approaching him from the right, causing it to cartwheel away, and then did the exact same thing towards a clone attacking him from behind.
At which point Mizuki smiled.
What Aoi missed in the split second that Naruto prime was concealed behind his rock spire attack was the moment Naruto completed a Kawarimi jutsu on the clone behind his back, swapping places with it and then moving in for the kill. With a growl of feral effort, Naruto prime deflected Aoi's far too casual sword sweep using a Kunai that he just pulled out of his belt pouch, and then stabbed the throwing knife in between Aoi's ribs, releasing a spray of blood that dripped out all over his feet.
Such a simple but effective ruse, Mizuki thought to himself with a begrudging nod of respect. Naruto allowed Aoi to drive away his clones over and over again, implanting an assumption into his head, a false belief. Naruto allowed Aoi to believe that his clones always retreated from sword attacks because they were fragile. Then, when the time finally came, he switched places with one of his clones on the sly, took advantage of Aoi dropping his guard, and delivered a particularly brutal death to the boy in the form of a knife thrust to the pancreas.
With a pain filled grunt, Aoi immediately dropped to his knees, and Naruto kicked him in the head sending him sprawled unconscious on the grass. One look at the newly pained expression upon Naruto's face, and Mizuki knew that he rendered the boy unconscious mostly to prevent him from suffering.
One look at Naruto's face, and Mizuki knew that the boy was in the thick of it…
Apparently, Naruto Uzumaki was nowhere near as monstrous as the villagers thought he was, because the boy was falling apart with guilt over killing someone, even in self-defense... In fact, Naruto just stood there staring at Aoi's body for several seconds in a row, as a newly enraged Haru and Emiko tore a chunk out of his clone army…
Finally, when only seven Naruto clones remained, Naruto prime released a tortured sounding growl, and then advanced on his two remaining enemies with the desperation of a fox in a bear trap. He launched towards Haru first, dodging the boy's various poison projectile attacks and losing another three of his clones, before ripping the boy down from the foliage level of the trees, slamming him face first into the ground with a hand threaded through his hair, and then stabbing the same Kunai into his kidneys with yet another spray of dark red blood.
Then Naruto was facing off against a nearly maddened Emiko with just four more clones remaining, and the woman was finalizing a powerful jutsu with wild and feverish eyes.
"Electric Pyre no jutsu," Emiko screamed at the top of her lungs, her head back, her arms splayed out at her sides, her body shaking as her chakra was ripped from her core.
Boom, snap, crackle… carrump!
Emiko's electric attack started from within her body, as if she was harnessing the electrical impulses that moved her nervous system. As a result, the bright blue arcs of electricity she released fanned out from her body in a massive expanding cone, and Naruto's clones reacted accordingly.
All four of Naruto's remaining clones lined up in front of Naruto prime, absorbing the attack and then popping out of existence one after another, allowing Naruto prime to leap backwards and out of range.
With a ululating scream, Emiko attempted to make the jutsu last longer, to reach Naruto prime, to burn the boy to death, but she couldn't, and she didn't, and she dropped to a knee, her entire body covered in Lichtenberg figure burns. Apparently, her attack was too high a level for her, but she'd been desperate to take Naruto out.
Well she'd failed, and Mizuki smiled like a loon, as the sole remaining Naruto stalked in her direction.
"You should've just listened to me," Naruto whispered to Emiko, his voice raw with emotion.
"You should've been killed at birth," Emiko snapped back as she dropped to her side in the grass, her body giving up on her.
After dropping to his knees at Emiko's side, Naruto slammed the heel of his palm into her neck knocking her out, and then he raised his kunai up above his head with lethal intent.
At which point a kunai with a tag attached sank into the back of Naruto's right shoulder, a bright Fuinjutsu pattern flared upon the tag, and Naruto passed out atop Emiko's body as if he was protecting her from harm.
Mizuki couldn't even believe his luck, as he strolled across the clearing, tied the forbidden scroll to his back, and then moved back to Naruto and Emiko's side… It suited Mizuki for Emiko to survive tonight's battle, to act as proof that Naruto was indeed the villain. For that reason and that reason only, the girl would get to live…
So far as the village was going to know, Naruto Uzumaki, the villain, got away with the scroll.
Mizuki would make sure of it.
After placing a storage tag on the ground next to Naruto's body, Mizuki channeled his chakra into its runes, releasing the item stored within.
Poof… When the white smoke drifted away, a clay jug large enough to contain a human was sitting in the grass.
With care not to remove the sleep paralysis Kunai embedded in Naruto's shoulder (a gift from his new benefactor), Mizuki dumped Naruto's body into the jug, closed the lid, activated the containment runes, and then slung the heavy device up atop his back with the scroll. It would be quite the hike through the forest to his contacts, but the jug would prevent the Kyuubi from reviving Naruto too early.
Truth be told, Mizuki didn't know if his new boss would have any interest in Naruto Uzumaki… but considering how curious the man was about basically everything imaginable, he figured it couldn't hurt.
With his prize and bonus prize strapped to his back, Mizuki started hoofing it through the forest away from the village.
For about a minute after Mizuki dashed out of the clearing, Aoi, Haru, and Emiko lay where they were left, dead or near dead and left behind to be found.
Then Emiko suddenly sat up, cast a quick glance around the area, and whistled like a bird.
Aoi and Haru sat up next, before rising to their feet, dropping newly stabbed-open blood-filled bladders to the ground, and then trotting to Emiko's side.
"Passing grades from me," Emiko announced with a satisfied nod of her head. "By hiding in the trees, you managed to make it look like your Earth clone created all of those Shadow Clones, and while we almost got screwed over when Mizuki decided to abduct you, that jar will prevent him from seeing the jutsu fall apart…" At the tail end of her words, Emiko's body was suddenly concealed within a puff of white smoke, and Cat emerged in her stead, complete with Anbu uniform and mask.
"You revealed far too much cunning while fighting me though," Aoi pointed out next, before ending his Henge illusion and resuming his identity as Dog. "When you're in the process of tricking an enemy, don't SHOWCASE your ability to trick your enemies…"
"Need I remind you that the clone Mizuki just abducted had limited options," Haru countered with a sigh, before a puff of smoke revealed him to be one Naruto Uzumaki. "I needed a relatively cost-efficient way to defeat Aoi that wouldn't reveal my true strength and speed, and I only know like four jutsus at the moment."
"Well, fine, but I still haven't passed you yet," Dog allowed as he pointed in the direction that Mizuki just ran off in. "The third phase of the plan. Tracking and infiltration. Let's get to it."
"The plan the plan the plan," Naruto breathed to himself, as he unfurled a complex Fuinjutsu tag that was wrapped around his arm, and then channeled some chakra into the relevant areas. "A ninja is at his best when he sticks to the plan…"
~~~~Flashback scene~~~~
Two and a half hours earlier… Immediately after Naruto left the Hokage Tower with the Forbidden Scroll….
While a version of Naruto did, in fact, run around the village making an ass of himself with smoke and pepper bombs while running away from the tower, the REAL version of Naruto quickly sealed away the forbidden scroll within a containment tag, Henge illusioned himself to look like a nondescript ninja, and then moved to the relay point that he and Dog chose in advance.
Within ten minutes of his infiltration of the Hokage's Tower, Naruto met Cat and Dog near the memorial to lost ninja, and then walked deeper into the woods for the required privacy.
"Passing grades from me," Cat pointed out with a throwaway gesture of her hand. "I mean, who else could steal from the Hokage's office without tearing down half the tower in the process."
"Did you leave any physical evidence behind," Dog asked in a tone that demanded a truthful response.
"Some blood on a wall," Naruto admitted under the weight of Dog's masked stare.
"I can't pass you yet then. That blood could be used in half a dozen tracking and identification jutsus," Dog pointed out with a quick, dismissive, shake of his head. "Let's begin laying out the second phase of the plan, misdirection and subterfuge."
"One moment please," Naruto interjected, as he unrolled the scroll with his name on it that the Hokage left for him back in his office.
On the scroll were the hand-signs, words and chakra signatures required to perform a variant of the Shadow Clone jutsu…
Tsuchi Kage Bunshin no Jutsu - The Earth Shadow Clone Jutsu…
"Considering the fact that you need to take a dive to convince Mizuki that he's achieved his objective, that jutsu's actually perfect," Dog commented after leaning in over Naruto's shoulder.
"What does it do," Naruto asked without looking away from the hand-signs on the scroll.
"It's superficially similar to a normal Shadow Clone, except that it's made of dirt instead of chakra, thus it can reform itself when it takes damage," Dog explained while demonstrating how the hand-signs flow together. "This jutsu does have cons though. It's extremely costly to create, requiring one and a half times more chakra than a normal Shadow Clone, and unlike Shadow Clones that don't require further chakra after creation, this one needs to be fueled with additional power on a continual basis... Because of this requirement, an Earth Shadow Clone will fall apart immediately after it leaves your presence, and it shouldn't be used in large numbers."
"Is this jutsu elementally aligned with Earth," Naruto asked, as he didn't know what his element affinity was yet. A process that wasn't available to be performed by academy aged trainees.
"No, technically this jutsu can be used by anybody… but only if they have Jonin level chakra reserves, and a desire to tire themselves out," Dog replied with a sigh. "Personally, I never use it. I have trouble channeling chakra into offensive jutsus while also feeding an Earth Shadow Clone the power it requires to continue existing. It's too much chakra too fast, and maintaining the clone splits your focus away from what you're actually doing."
Off behind Dog, Cat nodded her head in agreement.
"I can see why the Hokage has given me this scroll though," Naruto pointed out, as he continued to practice the hand motions. "If I'm supposed to let Mizuki betray and kill me, I'd prefer not to actually take a kunai in the back…"
"Actually, if you learn this jutsu in time and are any good at acting, the three of us plus an Earth Clone can put on a performance that'll do most of Mizuki's work for him," Dog pointed out. "Mizuki knows that you can create clones so he'll likely have backup waiting on standby. If we do this right, we can convince him that the scroll is the real deal and we can prevent him from getting them involved."
"At least, not until he rejoins them thinking that he's free as a bird," Cat corrected.
~~~~ Flashback End~~~
Conscious of the fact that Mizuki was moving further away with every single moment that passed, Naruto made quick work of channeling his chakra into the elaborate Fuinjutsu tag that he was holding, at which point, a calligraphic arrow made of swirling ink appeared on the tag and pointed off into the distance.
"So that arrow is pointing towards," Cat began…
"The forbidden scroll that Mizuki's carrying," Dog finished.
"Correct. This tag is paired with another tag that I penned into the fake forbidden scroll, and it'll point in its direction up to a distance of about fifty Kilometers," Naruto replied with a satisfied smile.
"Well, there's no benefit to giving Mizuki that long a leash, so I suggest we start moving ASAP," Dog pointed out, before Cat could spoil the boy with additional praise.
With a pair of simple nods in reply to Dog's words, Naruto, Cat and Dog began tree hopping through the woods.
At the same time, back in the Emergency Council Session…
"But, how did Naruto infiltrate my office in the Hokage tower," Sarutobi Hiruzen asked Inoichi with a pair of newly furrowed eyebrows. "No amount of clones would make that possible, the security's far too tight."
"The security is Fuinjutsu based… and Naruto's a Journeyman Fuinjutsu practitioner," Inoichi replied.
"So let me get this straight," the Third growled out, his eyes glowing with smoldering rage. "Driven purely by their irrational and unending hatred for the Jinchuriki, the Civilian Council attempted to fail a prospective ninja that's mastered two of the most complex and versatile forms of chakra manipulation that this village has to offer. Furthermore, they're demanding that we kill him for seemingly no reason…."
"That's exactly what I'm saying, which is why I've concluded that they're treasonous," Inoichi confirmed. "A case can be made that they want to weaken this village, weaken the ninja faction, in order to strengthen themselves."
Mebuki felt a vein in her forehead throb, as she desperately held her breath, struggling with all her might not to speak and tempt Inoichi's wrath… For the entire duration of Inoichi's explanation, the various members of the Civilian Council had squirmed and shuddered in their seats as they desperately sought to keep from yelling out. Finally, off to Mebuki's right, a man by the name of Botan could no longer contain himself, and he yelled out at the top of his lungs. "We weren't trying to weaken the village because we had no idea that Naruto was so useful! The only crime that we're truly guilty of is corruption, and that charge isn't a capital offense!"
At the tail end of Botan's words, Inoichi locked eyes with the man, and he immediately started sputtering soundlessly, his voice sealed away. Later on, it would be discovered that this sealing was just a temporary Genjutsu, but none of the Civilian Council knew that and none of the Ninja class said a word.
"You're right Botan. Corruption isn't a capital offense… but it is an offense that justifies the replacement of the Councilor involved," the Third Hokage ground out in a murderous sounding growl. "The thing is, if the rest of you don't admit to corruption, right here, right now, I'll be forced to assume that this is a treasonous attempt to weaken the village, and I'll be… forced… to react accordingly."
The Anbu standing around the perimeter of the room suddenly stepped away from the walls, moving in the direction of the councilors.
In that moment, Mebuki knew two things without a doubt in her mind. She knew that her career as a Civilian Counselor was over, and she knew exactly who was responsible for her ruination…
Naruto Uzumaki.
Most academy graduated Genin know the rudiments of tracking, which is why very few ninja in all of Konoha would fail to follow Mizuki's footsteps through the woods. With that being the case, the reason why Naruto's tracking tag was such a convenient tool was for the following reasons.
Reason number one: Very few trackers in all of the ninja world are gifted enough to actually catch up to enemy ninja that are moving away through a forest. Having to locate the footsteps and disturbed leaves that the enemy ninja leave behind is an interruption that costs time, which is why the Inazuka clan's advanced senses are so invaluable to the village.
Reason number two: Due to the fact that Naruto's tag would always point towards Mizuki's stolen goods, he, Dog and Cat didn't actually need to follow in Mizuki's footsteps. They could follow the man from another angle of approach, which would prevent them from falling into any traps or ambushes that were left behind, while maximizing the element of surprise when they arrived.
Truth be told, Naruto's desire to use the tracking tag wrapped around his forearm was the real reason for all of the theatrics back in training field thirty-one. In order to convince Mizuki that the fake scroll that he was carrying was the real deal and to lull him into a false sense of security, it had to look like the village was prepared to kill (or at least maim) Naruto in the act of retrieving it.
And judging by the man's abduction of Naruto's Earth Clone, paired with his failure to actually inspect the scroll, it was safe to say their plan was going off without a hitch. The only holdup, if you could call it that, was the fact that night was falling, which made quietly navigating the forest a little bit trickier.
At Dog's direction, Naruto and Cat paused atop the sturdy branch of a nearby tree, where Naruto immediately pressurized an intense amount of chakra within his body and then released it all at once. The phenomenon didn't make a noise, nor did it rustle leaves or anything, but both Dog and Cat felt Naruto's chakra flow through them in a wave as it expanded outwards in every direction. Thankfully for the three of them, the feeling caused by Naruto's sensory ability decreases rapidly with distance, and after six meters becomes completely undetectable.
"I feel them within my chakra ping," Naruto breathed out, while pointing to the West. "Mizuki is closer. He hasn't met up with them yet. But there's a pair of ninja about a kilometer ahead."
"What can you tell us about them," Dog asked while checking the state of his weaponry.
"One Jonin chakra level, one Chunin level fighter, and Mizuki who also feels like a Chunin," Naruto began. "There also appear to be two dozen low-level summons patrolling the woods surrounding their meeting place… and I think they're all snakes."
With the word snakes, Cat, Dog and Naruto all grew next-level serious. Snakes were a very rare variety of summon animal, and they were utilized by an extremely famous rogue nin… One that Naruto was far more familiar with than most people would believe…
"It's a good thing it's just a clone of me in that jug," Naruto whispered as if to himself.
Dog and Cat immediately nodded their heads, as ending up one of Orochimaru's experiments almost always led to a fate worse than death.
"These snakes are going to complicate our surprise attack, which might make it harder to spare one of their lives, but I still expect to achieve the objective," Dog voiced, before his hands suddenly started blurring through a series of hand-signs.
Naruto nodded even as he unrolled a storage tag from a well-hidden pocket in his shirtsleeve and then emptied out its contents one after another. Four shuriken pouches attached to leather bands were tightly secured around his upper-thighs and arms, a long span of ninja wire was coiled around his left forearm, and then a line of rock kunai was hung below his belt.
"Why are you overburdening yourself with all of tha…" In the end, Cat didn't finish her question. She'd already figured it out.
Naruto smiled at the feline Anbu's cleverness as he finished sorting himself out and then turned to look at Dog. As he'd thought would be the case, the man was whispering a series of commands to a pair of ninja dogs that he'd just summoned. A meeting that ended when the dogs suddenly dashed off in the direction of Konoha, the Anbu man's attention returned towards his teammates, and he leapt to the branch that the two of them were sharing. "Okay then… Let's review the plan…"
Mizuki knew right away when he arrived at the relay point where he was meeting his brand-new comrades, because there was a sentry line made up of twelve-foot-long orange and purple snakes that peered up at him with completely unveiled disgust in their thinly lidded eyes.
Ignoring a split-second impulse to bury a series of kunai into the frustrating creatures, Mizuki forced himself to look on the bright side. The variety of snake that he was looking at, the Abyss Viper, had the ability to see into the infra-red spectrum of light (also known as thermal vision), which would allow them to see their enemies' body-heat as orange and red silhouette's even if they were hiding behind trees or bushes. The snakes really were an effective form of late-night security… even if they were arrogant and egotistical little brats, riding on their master's achievements as if they were their own…
Well… No matter…
While the snakes recognized Mizuki and allowed him to enter the perimeter that they were maintaining, that outcome didn't mean that he could simply tree hop into the camp itself without a care in the world. With a long indrawn breath, Mizuki began releasing a series of discordant notes from his mouth that didn't sound like anything of this earth and required that he perform a jutsu on his throat to almost double its range. The Village Hidden in Sound, or simply the Village of Sound had many specialties, but they seemed to focus on sound-based techniques in most of their security practices. With that in mind, it took Mizuki several weeks to learn this discordant melody and how to recreate it with any consistency. Thankfully, this time he did manage to perform the notes without a hitch, and he wasn't filled with a solid wall of flying kunai when he landed in the camp.
Instead, Mizuki immediately found himself flanked by two imposing looking ninja with completely blank forehead protectors and equally inscrutable expressions upon their faces.
The taller of the two ninja, standing directly in front of Mizuki, was named Junichiro, and he was the Jonin ninja that Mizuki was coordinating with. The man was a blank slate outside of battle, quietly, menacingly going about his missions with an unemotional efficiency that might've made you think he's dull… But he wasn't… Not in the slightest… Junichiro was sharp, unbelievably so in fact, and his repertoire of very spiky jutsu were a representation of that.
"I have accomplished the objective, and I've also collected something extra that the Otokage will likely take an interest in," Mizuki explained as he threw the forbidden scroll to the ground in their midst, and then did the same with the jug strapped to his back.
"What, pray tell, is this oh so special thing that you've brought, and why was it worth complicating your mission," Junichiro asked with an impossible to pin down menace in his voice and facial features.
"No complications, just an extra prize I managed to win because of my excellent planning," Mizuki smoothly defended. "Konoha's Jinchuriki was attacked by a squad of Genin when he arrived at training field number thirty-one, but he overpowered them all and was in the midst of killing them when I interfered. I paralyzed the boy before he could finish the last Genin off, assuring that he will be the only culprit of the scroll theft, and then I brought him along with me…"
"You're telling me that the nine tails Jinchuriki is contained within that stasis-seal jug," Junichiro asked with a newly thoughtful expression upon his face.
"Exactly, paralyzed and sealed in a stasis seal of our leader's design," Mizuki assured while gesturing at the jug.
"These tools, the paralysis tag and stasis-seal, they aren't designed to contend against the vitality and regenerative abilities that Naruto Uzumaki has to offer," Shin'ya, Junichiro's apprentice, suddenly pointed out. "According to the intel that you gave us, Mizuki, Uzumaki has literally been lynch mobbed and set on fire, and yet he was back on his feet within a week."
"I think we need to crack open the seal for a moment, cut off one of Uzumaki's hands, and then immediately re-seal it," Junichiro suggested as if he was talking about the weather. "We need to give the nine-tails something far more pressing to deal with than resisting the seals."
Everyone in the clearing nodded their ready agreement, as the last thing they wanted to do was stand guard over a jug while they traveled.
After encircling the jug sitting in the grass, Junichiro pulled out a pair of Kunai, Shin'ya brandished a short sword, and Mizuki pulled out his large, fan-shaped shuriken, transformed into its more compact, stiletto knife form.
"I'll do the honors," Mizuki offered as he leaned down towards the jug, took a hold of the velvet ropes symbolizing its sealing mechanism, and then tugged them free to end the seal.
Pop! Fwoosh!... Along with the end of the seal, a pressure differential caused an inrush of air to enter the jug, and then a swirling column of dust blew back out of its lid. At the exact same time that Mizuki raised his knife to maim the boy within, he saw the human shaped lump of clay within the jug and then he leapt away from the clearing with every ounce of strength that he contained.
"It's a trap, evade," Mizuki yelled back to his brand-new comrades, only to realize it was already too late, and that the trap was being sprung, when every single storage tag that he possessed suddenly started releasing all of its contents all at once…. Even as a expanding mass of shuriken erupted out of Mizuki's pockets, sending him falling to the earth with newly shredded thighs, Mizuki saw all of the storage scrolls that everyone else was wearing discharging all of their contents in an explosive mass of extremely sharp objects, and he saw the forbidden scroll releasing several high-pressure streams of vibrant green gas.
In the split second following the sudden and catastrophic failure of his storage seals, Shin'ya was knocked off of his feet by the stockpile of bladed weapons, kunai and ninja wire that he possessed, as it violently expanded outwards from within his cargo pant pockets. Then, without ever even managing to recognize that it was happening, he took the explosively expanding gas cloud point blank to the face, immediately rendering him unconscious.
Thankfully for Mizuki, Junichiro's absurd reaction speed allowed the man to crush the storage scrolls within his pockets, stemming the outflow of shuriken and kunai in its tracks. Then the man activated the cursed mark on his neck, which in turn blew away the massive cloud of gas that was careening towards him with an explosive amount of newly released chakra. On the other hand, Mizuki had literally no idea how to convince this Jonin level ninja that he wasn't a double agent, and the exceptionally dangerous man was staring violent death at him as his body began to transform.
"I'm on your side, I promise," Mizuki called out as he landed on the far edge of the clearing. "I promise I haven't betrayed you!"
"Enemies are approaching from every direction," yelled out the summoned snake that was acting as a relay at the far edge of the clearing.
"Once a traitor, always a traitor," Junichiro called back to Mizuki, even as his eyes scanned the woods in every direction. "Your jug is full of dust and rocks, your scroll is full of traps, and not seconds after your arrival, we're completely surrounded by enemies. Give me one reason to trust you! Give me one reason not to remove your fucking head."
A series of popping sounds could be heard out in the forest, as every sentry snake surrounding the camp was destroyed almost simultaneously.
"I'll… I'll inject every last ounce of the newest formula, all at once," Mizuki offered with a pale face and a large lump in his throat. "I'll act as a guinea pig to prove my loyalty, just so long as you take me with you and find me a healer!"
After blinking at Mizuki several times, the very first genuine emotion that Junichiro ever revealed within Mizuki's presence warped the stone slab that was his face…
Junichiro was amused.
Two minutes Earlier…
There was a reason why Naruto Uzumaki strung an extremely bulky amount of projectile weapons upon his body, when he could've just kept them all in storage tags, rendering them weightless. When Naruto created clones of himself, his chakra also formed his clothing and his weapons, but it couldn't recreate the functionality of any Fuinjutsu tags that he was wearing. For that reason, if Naruto wanted to create an army stocked to the brim with cloned kunai and shuriken, he needed to be wearing these weapons when he utilized the jutsu.
And that's exactly what he did.
Poof, poof, poofpoof X a lot!
With just a half kilometer to spare between their group and the enemy, Naruto created himself a projectile throwing force to be reckoned with, stored away all of his own weapons, and then sent out yet another chakra wave to check the enemy's formation.
It was time.
"The enemy's standing in a circle around the scroll and jug, so I'm going to release a powerful chakra wave as my clones finish encircling their camp," Naruto informed Dog and Cat. Then the two Anbu plus Naruto were dashing through the woods at a full sprint, a foot-thick wave of chakra was flying ahead of them towards the enemy, and all hell was breaking loose within their camp.
"The narcotic gas scroll activated as planned when my chakra made contact with it," Naruto explained as his army of projectile-throwing Naruto's dashed both right and left to encircle the enemy camp. "As a side-bonus, my chakra also set off every storage-tag contained within the clearing, causing them to release all their contents all at once…" At the tail end of those words, when the timing was just right, Naruto patted the arm of one of the closest clones, it ended its own existence, and every other Naruto surrounding the clearing knew that it was time.
Five, four, three, two, one… Now!
With impeccable coordination, every single one of the Naruto clones encircling the enemy camp threw at least thirty Kunai and Shuriken at the sentry line of snakes, rendering them into a pulpy mass of angry cuts before their summons finally deactivated.
And back next to Dog and Cat, Naruto released a sigh of relief, as something that he'd only theorized was confirmed in live combat…
Kunai or shuriken created by chakra don't have the durability of a normal metal one, thus they almost always explode into white smoke after impacting their target, but oddly enough, the fact that these projectiles disappear isn't really a detractor from their use. It may seem contradictory, but if you get a Kunai impaled in your shoulder or stomach, the very last thing you want to do is rip the weapon out (at least, not without a healer on hand). The weapon that is embedded in your body is acting as a plug at that point, preventing the blood and viscera within your body from leaking out.
Naruto's chakra projectiles on the other hand, they almost always disappear immediately after piercing into the enemy's body, and while they don't cut as deep as a normal throwing weapon would, they leave gaping open wounds that can quickly bleed out the unwary.
Long explanation short, the barrage of Kunai, shuriken, and stone kunai that Naruto's army threw at the snakes, cut them to ribbons before exploding out of existence, and then the snakes followed suit almost immediately after.
"With the exception of a lone snake within the enemy's camp, the sentry is gone," Naruto reported to Dog after performing another chakra ping to sense the state of their enemies. "One ninja is unconscious, Mizuki leapt away, and the Jonin successfully beat back the gas."
"Okay, with Naruto's clones taking out Mizuki we have the clear advantage in terms of strength, so it's time for some shock and awe. Naruto, we're moving in. Be ready for surprises." A split second after delivering those orders, Dog's body exploded into motion with Cat moving at his side.
Turning to his right, Naruto nodded his head at yet another Naruto that would act as messenger.
With a nod in return, the clone immediately ended its existence, and then the rest of his clones knew that it was time. All around the clearing, Naruto clones Henged themselves to look like Anbu operatives, what looked like an impossibly powerful force made up of every animal known to man. Then Naruto and his Anbu force moved like a bat out of hell to catch up to Dog and Cat, tightening the circle that they'd formed around the enemy.
But that was the moment that Naruto started feeling something… ominous… and all without making use of his sensory abilities, and he knew the situation was about to get… complicated.
Mizuki and the unknown Jonin ninja, their chakra levels were explosively climbing with every single second that passed, and the malevolence that they were giving off was enough to make Naruto's skin crawl. By the time he landed within the clearing four meters to the left of Dog and Cat, billowing waves of impossibly thick killer intent were radiating outwards from within the two enemy ninja.
But that wasn't all…
Mizuki and the unnamed Jonin barely looked human at this point, as their dark gray skin was covered in swirling black curse marks from their heads to their toes, and their bodies were stretched unnaturally into dozens of Orochimaru-style body modifications.
The tall Jonin on the right looked superficially human, but his legs were bent backwards at his knees like a horse only much brawnier, he had a series of sacs protruding from his back near his shoulders leading to a pair of protrusions on his chest just beneath his armpits, his veins looked thick and throbbing, and his arms were half again as long as a normal human beings.
Mizuki… Well… The 'man' looked like some of the most catastrophic failures that Naruto ever had the misfortune of witnessing back in Orochimaru's lab, only supercharged with excessive amounts of outpouring chakra, and prepared to raise all hell… The man's dull gray hair looked like rotten bark, his eyes were bobbing up and down at the end of foot long tentacles, his skin was translucent in places, revealing the throbbing organs within, his body was nearly twice as tall as normal but so severely hunched over his height was basically the same, his legs were almost twice as thick and were glistening wetly, a big burly arm was protruding from the base of his spine where it acted like a third leg, and his normal arms came complete with four foot-long boney blades that protruded out just above his wrists.
Mizuki's body was monstrous, it was changing and growing more and more with time, and the process was inflicting torturous pain on the person taking part in it.
Rrrrrraaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!
Mizuki screamed towards the sky through a set of vocal cords that twisted his voice into a basso raspy growl, and he carved deep furrows into the earth while slamming his cinder-block sized fists into the ground over and over. At exactly the same time, Mizuki was still inside of the creature, which was made clear by the words that spilled from his far too hideous mouth.
"KONOHAAA," Mizuki grunt/growled in a guttural tone full of hatred, scorn, and limitless hostility. "You - and your tricks… You did - this - to - MEEEEEE!"
After releasing yet another chakra sensory ping, Naruto glanced aside at Dog and then pointed at Mizuki's rapidly swelling body. "The Jonin is channeling near Kage level amounts of chakra at this point, but Mizuki trumps the man by a significant margin…"
After glancing at Mizuki, and then returning his attention back to the far more composed looking Jonin, Dog nodded his understanding but performed a hand sign that meant the words 'plan unchanged'... Then, in a surprising change from the norm, he quietly explained the rationale behind his decision… "I suspect Mizuki is still the least dangerous of our enemies, as he was never a talented ninja and now he has compromised intelligence. This unknown ninja on the other hand, he knows exactly how to use the transformation that he's completed, and he hasn't given up even though he thinks he's surrounded by Anbu."
Nodding his head, Naruto squared up in Might Guy's Strong Fist taijutsu technique, and then waited for the shit to hit the fan…
"You are vastly outnumbered by Konoha's elite," Dog called out to the Jonin ninja in the lackadaisical, not quite lazy tone that he tends to use in these situations. "Submit yourself for imprisonment and questioning, and we won't kill you outright."
"Cut the crap Anbu," the Jonin called back with an unexplainable perversity in his completely expressionless face. "The chakra that I'm sensing is all from one specific ninja, and there's only one ninja I know of that can duplicate himself to such an absurd extent…"
With the failure of their ruse, Dog nodded at Naruto and all of the Shadow Clones standing around the clearing immediately dropped their Henge illusions for one specific reason. The Henge illusion that they were maintaining was covering all of the projectile weapons that they were carrying, and now they were accessible again. Naruto prime, on the other hand, didn't drop his Henge illusion just yet, because he wanted to remain a deterrent for as long as he possibly could.
"Naaaarrruuuuutooooo," Mizuki immediately growled, as more and more grotesque and slimy tentacle-eyes grew out of his head to stare hatefully at the boy that was surrounding him on every side. "You - tricked - me…. you - destroyed - me… You need to die. You need to suffer. You are the Dem…"
With eyes widening in sudden alarm, Dog immediately exploded into motion, flying towards Mizuki at full unrestrained Jonin speeds, body flickering his way across the forest clearing in a way that Naruto had no idea how to recreate. At his back, Cat was a blur of unrestrained speed, with twin katana held at her hips where they were angled outwards like fins.
But then, both Dog and Cat were forced to stop and leap aside as a high-pressure beam of filmy water raked across the ground in their path, and then an impossibly huge wall of razor-sharp icicles exploded out of the newly dampened earth.
"Now, now," the unnamed Jonin called out as he body flickered directly in front of his newly created ice wall, bile and blood-stained water leaking from the two protrusions in his chest. "Let's let the boy and Mizuki have a little… chat… shall we…"
Even as the Jonin said those words, he began launching seemingly endless amounts of dirty water from the protrusions in his chest, forcing both Dog and Cat to dodge a rapidly expanding mass of vaguely green ice-spears and icicles. It took at least another second spent getting unilaterally attacked by this Jonin for Dog and Cat to stop trying to force their way over towards Mizuki. For the moment, this Jonin needed their undivided attention.
But both Dog and Cat felt an impending sense of doom as Mizuki continued to scream that word off in the distance.
"Demon, demon, demon demon DEMON FOOOOOOOX," Mizuki screamed towards all of the Narutos that were surrounding him, his hands slamming down into the ground at his sides in what was unmistakably an infantile temper tantrum. "You are the Kyuubi that destroyed Konoha twelve years ago! You are the nine tails demon fox! You're a monster, just like everyone's always said you are! Your very existence is an affront to the village that raised you. Your very presence causes pain and resentment to grow like a cancer!"
Neither Dog or Cat could spare the time to turn to Naruto in either consolation or defense, as their entire attention was currently focused on closing the distance with the unknown Jonin while avoiding his endless-ice-beam ability. They simply had to hope that the boy could handle the truth after receiving it in such a devastating fashion… Then they started hearing it from all over the clearing, coming from over eighty mouths at exactly the same time, like a laugh track in a surround system…
The Narutos, all of the Narutos... They were laughing, chuckling as if at some joke they were told, except their laughter sounded sadder, more remote, much more emotional… The slow, singular bouts of laughter carried hints of revelation, frustration, loneliness, pride, anger, and a dozen other emotions warring to emerge supreme only to be drowned out in the mass…
Until the laughter abruptly stopped, and all of the Naruto's turned their attention towards their leader.
"I… I see… So as it turns out, I do know the difference between a kunai and a sealing scroll," a noticeably strained but resolute looking Naruto prime remarked, as the anbu Henge that he'd been holding ceased to exist, he performed a Kawarimi with one of the Narutos on the far side of the clearing, and then he started marching towards Mizuki with a pair of kunais twirling in his hands. "Tell me something, Mizuki… Do you know the difference between someone like me, who's containing a monster, and someone like you, who's actively becoming a monster?..."
"Wait, what, I'm not a monster," Mizuki immediately argued before all of his tentacle-eyes suddenly swerved inwards to take in his hideously awful form and the grotesque mutations that were happening inside of him even as he looked at himself.
"The difference between you and I," Naruto called out loud enough to break through Mizuki's new panic fueled thrashing and moaning. "Is that I did more good for the people of Konoha by the time I was a one-year-old, than a wretch like you will ever do for anyone in your whole entire life… Oh sure, I'm dangerous… extremely dangerous in fact… I can see that now… but I'm also absolutely necessary… You on the other hand, Mizuki… You're nothing but a sad, sorry little traitor, and your outsides are starting to look like your insides…"
"You… You dare judge me," Mizuki screech/wailed towards the sky after turning his eyes away from himself as if the sight of his own body was burning his retinas. "No! Never! Die! You need to die, so that I can liiiive."
With a deafening screeching growling mixture that shook the entire clearing, Mizuki's body exploded outwards in dozens of different directions, bizarre protrusions casting out an endless mass of vaguely arm and leg shaped biomass that started flying through the air in Naruto prime's direction. As if that wasn't bad enough, almost all of these extensions on Mizuki's body were either sharp or dripping what appeared to be some variety of acid.
And every Shadow Clone that was surrounding the clearing followed the plan that they'd been intending to follow all along… with the knowledge that doing so likely wasn't going to bring an end to the matter…. Every single clone that had line of sight with Mizuki pulled out the line of ninja-wire they were holding, connected it to a kunai, threw their kunai around a section of Mizuki's limbs as close to the main body as they could, and then they started running either to the right or the left depending on the movements of their neighbor. By the time the Naruto's on Dog and Cat's side of the fight circle-strafed through the trees to the other side of the clearing, Mizuki's various mutation limbs were being yanked back around his body by over forty segments of metal wire, and Naruto prime was releasing the restraint seals that were in place upon his body…
Why had Naruto put the seals back on his body before he arrived in the clearing to meet Mizuki, and why were they still on now when the boy was taking part in a life-or-death mission? Because Naruto completely sucked at controlling his strength when he removed all of the seals, which would've made his earlier act quite a bit more difficult, and moving with any variety of stealth was an all but impossible task.
But no longer. Now that Naruto was in the thick of it, he bent down, deactivated the seals on his ankles, did the same to the seals on his wrists, and then rose back to his feet with a crackling sense of unleashed potential radiating out of his body. The boy seemed taller without being taller and brawnier without gaining mass. He was an inexplicable variety of… more, now that he'd released the seals, and if it weren't for the explosion of chakra that was erupting from Mizuki's body, the traitorous Chunin would have felt it in his bones.
Then again, Mizuki was too angry, too wracked with pain to see anything but the wires tightening around his body.
Boom!
In a single, explosively powerful exertion of chakra fueled power, Mizuki forced all of his extra limbs, all of his extra biomass, free from within the circle of wire that was trapping it, dispelling the cloned wire that was restraining him, while yanking the clones that were holding the wire inwards towards his body.
Very suddenly, almost forty of Naruto's clones were flying through the air towards a spiky mass of arm and leg shaped tentacles covered in green tipped spikes that were hissing in the air. A normal ninja would try to evade somehow, try to Kawarimi to safety, but these clones only had the chakra remaining to perform relatively simple jutsus, so that's what they were expected to do.
Almost all academy trainee ninjas know how to perform a wide array of very small but useful jutsus, such as the air freshening jutsu which is a minor air channeling jutsu, or the utensil sharpening jutsu which uses a small amount of gritty sand to polish away irregularities in metal, or the battery charging jutsu which converts a small amount of chakra into electricity from the tip of your finger (a popular prank jutsu among children as it feels like a static shock). Well Naruto Uzumaki had never been able to pull off any of these completely inconsequential jutsus because whenever he tried to perform them they tended to blow him off his feet or gouge a whole in a nearby rock or leave his hair standing up straight in the air…
But not anymore…
Over the last three months, with eighty-plus Shadow Clones to help him train, Naruto had focused almost all of his attention on mastering the very basics of chakra manipulation, until finally, finally, he learned how to perform most of the village's more useful utility jutsu.
And among these minor jutsu was one that was a staple in every ninja camp across the whole entire world…
"Red-hot coal creation jutsu," forty Shadow Clones yelled all at once, as their bodies were slammed into by Mizuki's violently churning limbs with both of their palms outstretched in front of their chests.
Under normal circumstances, when the red-hot coal creation jutsu is cast on a block of wood, the wood is slowly compressed within a small shell of fire until it becomes a small burning piece of coal. Due to the diminutive amounts of chakra involved, the jutsu takes about fifteen seconds to work, the piece of wood must be small, and it has to be relatively dry.
These restraints do not apply to one Naruto Uzumaki however… Due to the fact that Naruto channels waaay too much chakra into every jutsu that he completes, by the time he managed to perform it perfectly as intended, he'd also learned how to perform it very, very wrong…
"Grunt, groan, what are you, RRRRRAAAAH!," Mizuki screamed as the thirty-something Naruto's that weren't immediately dispelled on impact with his tentacle arms started burning skull-sized holes full of red-hot coals into the limbs that they were being squeezed within, leaving behind pits of fire that continued to burn their surroundings.
Pop, pop X thirty.
Unsurprisingly, none of the Shadow Clones caught in Mizuki's mass of tentacles survived for longer than a few moments, but the damage that they left behind had Mizuki curling his various limbs in towards his body as if he was a child cradling a burned hand. At least half of the limbs that he attempted to pull in towards himself dropped away instead, as the blackened flesh left behind couldn't carry the weight of its own biomass.
And within a small awkwardly located area on Mizuki's increasingly deformed left hip, an opening was formed where several limbs had dropped away.
Naruto prime moved…
With an eruption of rock and soil that would've made Rock Lee jealous, Naruto exploded across the clearing at full, fully unrestrained speeds, and while he didn't yet know how to body-flicker like Dog and Cat could, years of training under Might Guy assured that he moved faster than the civilian eye could track. Within a single instant, he'd approached the opening in Mizuki's limbs, where his hand dropped to a storage tag attached to his hip. Then he was leaping into the small, violently disgusting opening of rapidly throbbing flesh, and he was pulling a katana from an invisible sheathe to perform a Laijutsu (unsheathing sword attack) upon Mizuki's left side.
With a growl of supreme effort, Naruto released his sword in an incredibly fluid upwards arc that cut away a dozen tentacles before lopping off the man's left-leg in a spray of boiling black blood. A spray of blood that coated Naruto's right forearm, where his skin immediately started bubbling as it melted and dropped away from his body.
Naruto didn't even notice the damage that he was taking… He was far too busy preparing for his next attack to even notice the fact that the muscles of his right arm were being revealed to open air. But then, the free space that Naruto had managed to carve out for himself rapidly started squeezing in upon his body, as Mizuki's screams shook the world and every limb that he possessed pressed inwards to crush him into paste, and Naruto threw a very special Kunai through a small gap in the man's rapidly closing limbs.
"Dispel, Kawarimi!"
Pop! Pop!
Crack!
After dispelling the Henge that he'd been maintaining on the Kunai he threw, returning it to its original log form, Naruto instantly Kawarimi'd his body to swap places with the log just in time for it to be crushed into sawdust within Mizuki's clutches.
"The Log be praised," Naruto grunted, as he crashed to the earth at the speed that the Kunai was thrown, rolled several times, and then lifted his uninjured hand up in front of his face.
In the single moment that it took for Naruto to win freedom from Mizuki's clutches, the man's missing leg regrew into a catastrophically disgusting series of lopsided limbs, and the man started scrambling towards Naruto like a sea urchin made up of claws and talon hooked legs.
There was nothing human remaining about Mizuki anymore… He wasn't screaming abuse. He wasn't cursing Naruto as a demon. He was a howling monstrosity now, a beast, an anger fueled blob of flesh that reached out to tear and sting.
"Shaking his head, Naruto molded his chakra within himself, and then released it all at once in a wave. Then he said it purely because it needed saying… "Boom…"
BOOM!
Every single explosive tag that Naruto managed to slap down against Mizuki's core body across his hips, lower back and spine, exploded all at once, launching burning flesh outwards in every direction like a watermelon smashed with a mallet made of dynamite.
Smoke and dust filled the area, but Naruto didn't wait to see the results of his attack. He leapt back towards the epicenter of his explosion, and he coughed, hacked and bore with the tears in his eyes as he studied what remained.
Mizuki's head, neck, and right shoulder was in the midst of trying to regrow exactly like before, and it needed to be stopped.
"Clone, sealing jug, now," Naruto screamed at one of his remaining clones before he heard it pop out of existence to alert the rest of them to his need… In the meantime, Naruto used his sword to hack off the limbs that started growing from within Mizuki's spinal column over and over again, with a desperate need that finally revealed just how freaked out he actually was.
Finally, a pair of Shadow Clones arrived with the sealing jug from earlier in hand, Naruto skewered Mizuki on his sword and then he slammed the wriggling mass that the man had become down into the jug.
"Seal," a trio of Shadow Clones instantly yelled out, all of their hands held out in front of their bodies, just inches from the jug.
As the seals on the jug reactivated, the lid closed, the velvet ropes retightened, and the Fuinjutsu on its side briefly lit up… The stasis seal on the jug was reinitialized. Mizuki would be frozen in place, at least for now…
And in the split second of peace that followed, Naruto hissed as he performed a small jutsu to pour clean water on his acid burned arm, and then molded himself a sterile mud-cast that would decrease the pain he experienced while he healed. Even for someone as familiar with pain as Naruto, having your muscles exposed to open air is a uniquely unpleasant experience, and it wasn't one that Naruto wanted to tolerate… At exactly the same time, he cursed himself for his lack of battlefield awareness, because he'd lost track of Dog, Cat and the enemy Jonin while he was submerged within Mizuki's clutches.
Off in the distance, a battlefield that made Naruto's look like child's play was arrayed before him, as the enemy Jonin unleashed literally endless ice barriers and tracks, only to be pushed back by Cat and Dog's flawless teamwork.
Even as he hand-signed for his remaining clones, approximately twenty of them, to line up at his sides, Naruto marveled at the lightning, fire, earth, air and water that Dog and Cat were unleashing even as they body flickered within the Jonin's defenses and tore into his rapidly regenerating body. A part of Naruto wanted to gloat over the prowess of his handlers, but Dog and Cat represented the best of the best within his village and the curse mark that this enemy ninja was using was allowing a single Jonin to fight them alone.
"This curse mark looked like trouble on the horizon, as it was a huge step up from what Naruto read about back in the lab…
In the moments following this realization, Naruto hefted the stasis seal jug atop his shoulder, moved to guard the fallen enemy Chunin, handed explosive tags to all of his remaining clones, and then told them to do everything that they could to assist Dog and Cat.
But then, as it turns out, the fight was coming to an end, and not because of anything that Dog or Cat was doing.
The ninja pitbull and husky that Dog sent off back in the woods had returned, and the cavalry was arriving right alongside them…
One by one, and then almost a score all at once, Anbu started dropping into the clearing, both at Dog's side and at Naruto's… Unlike before, these were real Anbu, flaring real killer intent at the enemy Jonin… and the man slowed to a stop as he took in his newly arrived adversaries.
"Well now… This isn't sporting at all," The enemy Jonin called out as he stood there in the middle of the clearing, calm as can be, the sentry snake from earlier sitting at his feet.
"I'll say it again," Dog called out, a world weariness in his tone that hadn't been there before. "Submit or die."
"My name is Junichiro," the newly named Jonin called out as he turned to look where Naruto was standing over both the jug and his apprentice. "I won't give the loser's speech about repaying this debt, but my Master will hear of this, and he'll react… accordingly…"
At the tail end of Junichiro's words, several different Jonin, including Dog and Cat started sprinting towards the man, but as it turns out, they were too little, too late. The snake resting at Junichiro's feet regurgitated a carpet sized scroll that unfurled in just a split second, and then the man was crouching atop it with the snake in his hands.
Poof!
"Dammit, that was a return summoning seal for the snake domain," Dog called out as his kunai cut through the smoke the man's departure left behind. "He's gone. He's in another domain entirely."
"If anyone has any sealing gear, we need to get this enemy Chunin under stasis ASAP," Naruto called out to the Anbu at his sides. Then he froze, as they all froze, and then regarded him with an electrically charged form of expressionless intensity.
For a single moment in time, Naruto was cowed. He was paralyzed in place by the Anbu that were surrounding him, and he was acutely aware that they'd all been trying to hunt him down all afternoon. Then he snapped out of it and he filled his lungs with air. "Look, I'm being completely serious right now! You will stasis seal this ninja NOW or you will regret your failure later!"
And to Naruto's surprise, a nearby Anbu suddenly pulled out a roll of Fuinjutsu tags, inside of which he produced a stasis seal carpet that he rolled up the enemy Chunin in.
"Uhhh, Naruto," Dog whispered after arriving at the boy's side and laying a hand atop his shoulder. "I think… that you think… the Anbu are staring at you because they're angry at you… which I suppose makes sense… but they're not… They just don't act on orders from a lowly Genin, no matter how notorious… A brief explanation would've helped."
"I uhh, I'm sorry, I… understand. The curse marks on these ninja's necks, they're Orochimaru's work, and by manipulating them, he can kill them from over great distances. If we're not careful, the Chunin we've caught might be silenced in the time leading up to his interrogation," Naruto haltingly explained, his face burning a bright red.
With that additional bit of info, a pair of nearby Anbu added yet another layer of stasis seals to the rolled up carpet surrounding the enemy Chunin's body, and then he, along with what remained of Mizuki was carted off through the trees.
"We need to talk," Dog pointed out, even as Cat moved up to Naruto's side, removed the mud-cast on his right forearm, and began assisting his own rapid regeneration. "To start, I want you to tell me what you know."
Naruto wasn't surprised that Dog wasn't full of flowery compliments, it just wasn't his way, but he hadn't expected an immediate interrogation. He floundered for several seconds to form a response as their forest clearing emptied out around them, the rest of the Anbu leaving to patrol the area. Then, after drawing in a full lungful of air, and letting it out very very slowly, he turned towards Dog, and he brainstormed out loud. "I am aware that the historical origins of Fuinjutsu are not to seal kunai or shuriken or for any of the other uses that it's put to now… At first, Fuinjutsu was a semi-religious sealing art, meant to trap and contain demons both big and small. This was its original purpose, so I've always wondered why I haven't been taught how that branch of Fuinjutsu works. Up until now, I've always believed that demonic sealing was a Master level art, and Alsea always encouraged that misconception… Now I know I was wrong. I am the seal, I am the tag, and it was in everyone's best interests that I not know about it…"
"Including yours," Dog pointed out.
"I… I see," Naruto breathed out, a bead of sweat forming on his scalp.
"Naruto," Dog began, a concerned edge to his voice.
"I'm not fully human," Naruto interrupted.
"You are," Dog argued.
"No, I mean, I can't be," Naruto continued. "No sealing vessel lasts forever, which is why they're kept in temples, where they're fussed over by priests and priestesses. These vessels take damage over time, some more than others based on the strength of the demon contained… and the priests, they call this damage… corruption… I'm… I must be… corrupted…"
"For Jinchuriki, such as yourself, that manage to survive through infancy without mutating or going mad, tailed beast corruption tends to present as a new bloodline limit in your family," Dog explained in a dismissive sounding voice. "I'll take that variety of corruption any day, and you do well with that regeneration of yours."
"I suppose you're right, but… Dog… I'm tired… and … and I have a lot to think about," Naruto breathed out, while gently withdrawing his completely healed arm from Cat's increasingly powerful grip… Then he paused and he turned back towards his handlers. "Am I going to be arrested as soon as I return to the village?"
"No," Dog immediately replied with a shake of his head and a scroll in his hand. "This mission, and your actions were brought up during an Emergency Council meeting that happened over the last several hours, during which time, your actions were explained and the newly retired Counselors that you pranked were ordered to keep the secret with the threat of lifelong imprisonment if they fail... No one else knows that the orange ninjas were you, and it is not in Anbu's best interests that they find out."
It was a testament to Naruto's state of mind that he didn't even notice Dog's use of the words newly retired in reference to the Civilian Council. The boy merely nodded and turned around, only to be stopped when Dog placed his hand on his shoulder from behind.
"You passed, Naruto," Dog quietly conveyed, his voice almost but not quite warm. "Both your exams and this test have proven to me that you're a ninja, a real ninja, by old wartime standards, and I have no basis to complain… which I would… and we both know that…"
Both Naruto and Cat nodded as, yes, they did know that. Then Cat moved up to Naruto's side, silently offering to return to the village with him, and the boy nodded his acceptance. It had been a long day, and Cat's silent acceptance would do him a lot of good as he tree hopped through the woods.
Author's Note:
I wrote Orochimaru's Kage name in the Otogakure village as being the 'Otokage,' because after looking online for the real word that's supposed to represent the position of Kage in his village, I never found an answer.
To Be Continued
Author's Note:
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