Here's the new chapter. A couple more chapters and we'll have the timeskip.
He frowned as he stared at the mission report Jiraiya had sent in. The mission was generally a success, but Orochimaru was still an active threat. And from what Jiraiya had said, Orochimaru had developed some jutsu to jump from one body to another. He didn't want to risk letting him collect an obscene amount of power through that method. So the best solution was to strike at Orochimaru right away. This was a problem he'd have to deal with personally. The problem was, he'd need an effective bait to draw the snake out. He would be part of it, but that might not be enough. He sighed, as he thought about the best candidate he could think of. As far he he knew, Orochimaru still covered the boy's power, but he wasn't sure about risking such a valuable asset and more importantly, a boy who'd already gone through far too much. After thinking for a while, he made his decision as he called for Team 10.
The mission was simple enough. Team 10 would accompany the Hokage to a meeting with the leader of Takigakure. Of course, the real mission was to draw out Orochimaru, who was supposed to be hiding somewhere close by. They wouldn't be very careful about concealing their trails, leaving enough to reveal their location to Orochimaru. They also leaked information about who would be going on the mission, though some information was left out.
He wasn't sure if such an obvious bait would work, but according to Jiraiya and the Hokage, he would take it while knowing that they were there as bait. He was, as Jiraiya put it, "An arrogant bastard."
And as they expected, Orochimaru sauntered in with four other Shinobi following him, all wearing the Otogakure headbands.
"My my, sensei. Did you really think that you could take me down with this group ? You really have gone senile. And you brought that brat of yours with you as well. Looks like father and son will be dying today."
The snake then paused, looked at him, and with a vicious smirk and a lick of his lips, said "Ah, Sasuke, my little Uchiha. How sad that you quest for revenge will be ending so soon. But you can take comfort in the fact that your body won't go to waste. I do want to study the famous Uchiha body. And after I'm done, I'll take those eyes of yours and kill Itachi. So you can rest easy. Once I have those eyes, I will be the one true immortal, with the ability to learn the truth of everything under the sun."
he Hokage just calmly said, "Your flaws have always been your arrogance and ego, Orochimaru. In search of grand knowledge, you miss simple truths. And today, it will be the death of you." Just then, a frog burst out of the bush it was hiding in, and opened it's mouth, allowing the Toad Sage to step into the fight.
Soon after Jiraiya's arrival, Multiple fights erupted. He was taking on the large sound shinobi who was using earth style jutsu. Sensei as a jonin, had to go up against both the multi-armed guy and the foul-mouthed girl. Hinata and Shino took on the last lipstick wearing Oto nin. And of course, the Hokage and Jiraiya were taking on Orochimaru.
There was actually another Shinobi there who he didn't notice, be ause she'd been hiding from the beginning. She didn't seem to have any interest in joining the fight, so he let her be.
He had to focus on his opponent anyway. While this guy was big and strong, he wasn't very quick. So he was able to beat him back with taijutsu alone for a while. But once this Jirobo activated his curse seal, some massive earth style attacks were being thrown around. While Jirobo lacked finesse, he certainly had power. After barely dodging the massive dumpling shaped boulder thrown at him, he blew back the follow up attack with a sweep of his leg, a powerful wall of flame flowing and rising with his attack. He'd been practicing fire style jutsu extensively, to the point that he could now effortlessly use fire style jutsu without hand seals. Fire was an Uchiha trademark, and with it he'd bring about justice for the death of his clan.
But Jirobo was able to barely block the attack with a wall of earth. Hm. This guy seems to be a pain for as long as he was close to the ground. Let's get him up. With that plan, he blew a massive fireball at Jirobo, and with it as a distraction created a shadow clone. He had the clone hold Jirobo's attention while he went underground. By the time the clone was dispersed, he was in place. He burst out of the ground and quickly launched a powerful kick,m while supporting himself up with his hands. He'd have to thank Lee for this move. "Lion's Barrage!" he shouted, as he followed in Jirobo's shadow, using the counterattacks to launch him even higher, and finally brought Jirobo crashing to the ground with a hell kick enhanced with Fire style. Well that wasn't too difficult. If the others were at the same level his teammates would be just fine.
She and Shino had quickly realized that they were actually up against two Shinobi sharing a body. They called themselves Sakon and Ukon. While realizing that was tricky and they'd gotten a couple of hit on her, after she and Shino realized what was happening they quickly adapted. Since close combat wasn't much of an option, Shino was doing most of the work. She switched to weapons combat.
At some point, it seemed like they'd gotten to Shino, but it turned out to be an Insect Clone. They'd tried to do some merging thing, but it backfired horribly on them. Sakon was quickly swarmed and trapped by kikaichu, but Ukon managed to get away, splitting away from his brother. However, she managed to close in before he could properly react and take him out with her Gentle fist. That had gone well enough. The matchups was pretty favorable to them, so there wasn't much of a struggle. Just then Sasuke sauntered in, looked at the situation and said "Looks like you beat them easily enough. Let's check in on sensei, though I doubt he needs help."
He had to admit, the kids before him had talent. Unfortunately for Konoha and for them, they were tainted with Orochimaru's poison. And so, they had to die. As he was thinking about this, assessed the situation. The multi-armed kid had hidden himself somewhere and was launching arrows at him. The accuracy was impressive, and the power wasn't bad either, but they weren't fast enough to properly hit him. The other girl was manipulating some kind of demon like figures. They weren't particularly tough as he'd already cut them up multiple times. But the worm-like spirits that shaved away his physical energy on contact were a little dangerous. So a long range fighter and a mid range fighter. The best thing to do was to take out the long range fighter first. Problem was, spider boy over there was hidden well, and he wasn't a tracker by any means.
The best way to deal with this kind of opponent was to draw them in. So he started to use the demons as shelter from the arrows as he closed in on the girl. And then, probably out of frustration, the archer fired an arrow with thread attached. Amateur. Sure it wasn't a terrible idea as it helped avoid one issue, but it gave away the only advantage the kid had. He used wind style to slow down the arrow, grabbed it, and used the thread to pull the kid up into air. He then used a Body Flicker to close in. Spider boy fired some webs, but they were cut by his Flying Swallow jutsu, and the golden armor he used wasn't enough to stop his multi-eyed head from being cut off.
The girl yelled in rage and activated her cursed seal as he landed on the ground. She dispelled the demons she'd summoned and launched into a different tune. Suddenly, he felt he himself being bound up, with his flesh slowly melting of his bones as hse approached. Not bad, but unfortunately for her he had a Genjutsu master for a girlfriend. Like an idiot, she closed in on him, and once she was right in front, he released his Ash Pile Burning Jutsu, thus reducing her, as the name suggested, into ashes. He headed off to find his students, and found them already having won and joined together. After checking in on them, his thoughts wandered to his dad. He knew what his old man had planned, and so with a heavy heart had his students stand by with him.
There was no way he was going to lose here. Not to a senile old man and his pathetic student. He would get through them with the power of his current host. Or at least, that was how it was supposed to go. After summoning the Senju Brothers, the teachers of his own sensei, he wasn't expecting to have any trouble. His former sensei was old and far from his prime. Moreover, he could likely get away. And even if he was somehow beaten, he had various escape plans in mind.
But Jiraiya, that goddamn loser, had apparently gone and mastered Sage mode. It seemed totally unfair for Jiraiya to succeed where he had failed. But no matter. He had a version of it himself. While the curse seal that imitated Jugo wasn't quite as powerful as the real Sage mode, it would still be enough. And with his current host, he would be able to truly master Sage mode himself soon enough.
His sensei then said, "Jiraiya take care of my predecessors. Orochimaru is my responsibility." Well wasn't that just perfect. The more dangerous opponent was out of the way. And killing the old man was one of his main goals in coming here anyway.
He started with wind Gale jutsu to warm up. It was blocked with a mud wall, and he quickly summoned snakes to go around the wall to strike. Those were dodged and battered away by the adamantine staff. Damn monkey. No matter, he quickly fired multiple bullets of bone. Those were barely dodged, but now Hiruzen was in the air. He slammed his hands on the ground, and massive spikes made of bone rose up. Unfortunately, they were blocked by an adamantine cage. Hiruzen quickly jumped up while reverting it back to a staff. After landing on the ground, the old man threw a smoke bomb.
A couple of shuriken flew out of the smoke. He dodged those, but before they reached him they multiplied en masse. He had to leap up to dodge those while blasting some away with a burst of wind, but Hiruzen had come up behind to smack him with the staff. "Nice try" he cackled as he had the sword of Kusanagi block the blow. He'd taken the sword out while the smoke was up. He then extended multiple blades of bone from his body, skewering his former sensei. Unfortunately, the body dissipated into smoke. Hiruzen the rose up from the ground.
He taunted the old man, by saying "Using clones, eh sensei. Not a good idea at you age."
A calm reply of "Let's see how smug you'll be after I hit you with a jutsu you've never seen before." came. Well that was intriguing. He doubted the old man could beat him, but perhaps he could see some interesting tricks. But it looked like Jiraiya was close to finishing the fight over there, so he decided to finish this one quickly. He pulled out his spine to create a powerful bone whip. He then charged at the old man, swinging the whip ferociously while manipulating the sword of Kusanagi. Instead of showing whatever fancy jutsu he had, the old man just charged in a straightforward manner, barely deflecting some blows while taking some non fatal hits. What a desperate attempt, he thought as the old man managed to close in with a substitution, and then kicking the log with an explosion rage attached at him. He wrapped his whip around Hiruzen, but the old man just grabbed his shoulders. And then, he saw it. The specter hovering above his former sensei. The being he'd been running from his whole life. The god of death itself. "So you see it now. Excellent" What kind of jutsu was this ? He yelled "What's this you goddamn old man. You never taught me about anything like this !" Hiruzen just chuckled and said, "Of course not, you were a fool who was afraid of death even then. Why would I bother telling you about a self sacrificial jutsu."
He could feel his strength, his chakra, no his very being getting weaker, as it was pulled away. He scrambled his mind for a solution. He pulled the sword of Kusanagi from behind to stab the old man, but Jiraiya stopped it. He looked for the Hokage he'd summoned and found them reduced to pieces. This could not be happening. Then, as his soul was being sealed, he chose to use his last resort.
He remembered the curse seal on his neck burning and remembered collapsing from the strain as his teammates called for him, but he remembered nothing else. A few minutes later, he woke up as though nothing had happened here. Jiraiya had arrived by this point, though the Sandaime was still missing. Just when he thought everything was fine, he heard "Hello Sasuke. Looks like you've gotten stronger. What an excellent host you would have been."
That voice chilled him. Why wouldn't it ,? It was the voice of someone who should be dead, the voice of Orochimaru.
After he told Jiraiya about it in private, he learnt that Orochimaru had forcefully activated his remaining chakra and essence in Sasuke's seal. That resulted in a fragment of the snake's personality coming out. However, it could only interact with him when he was low on chakra, and couldn't affect his body in any way. The idea of having the snake whisper to him was annoying, but it didn't affect him that much, so he relaxed. He was sad that the Sandaime had died, but the end result wasn't totally terrible.
A/N
I hope you enjoyed that. Before you call bullshit on the ending, it's basically what Minato did with the seal to bring out his and Kushina's personality out when Naruto needed it. Only difference is, it isn't nearly as noble in terms of intentions. I tried the bold text to indicate the nature of the person speaking. I was thinking of doing the same with the Bijuu. If you'd prefer to just have normal text, let me know. Next chapter is basically the Epilogue of part 1. So far, the end results have been better than it was in canon, but I just don't want to waste certain characters early on. Don't want to spoil too much, but I can tell you that the 4th Shinobi World War will be different and won't just be the entire world vs Tobi, Kabuto and a bunch of resurrected Shinobi. I almost forgot, but I have to mention that Edo tensei here has been heavily nerfed. There is no revenge bullshit, and they disappear when the summoner is killed. Another limit I've added is that the chakra available to any of the Shinobi cannot exceed the chakra of the summoner, or the chakra their soul originally possessed. So hashirama and Tobirama can only use as much chakra as Orochimaru currently has.
Orochimaru
Ninjutsu: 6
Taijutsu: 5
Genjutsu: 4
Intelligence: 5.5
Strength: 3
Speed: 4.5
Stamina: 4.5
Hand Seals: 5
Total: 37.5
Kidomaru
Ninjutsu: 4
Taijutsu: 2.5
Genjutsu: 1.5
Intelligence: 4
Strength: 2
Speed: 3
Stamina: 4
Hand Seals: 4
Total: 25
Jirobo
Ninjutsu: 3
Taijutsu: 4
Genjutsu: 1
Intelligence: 2.5
Strength: 5
Speed: 2
Stamina: 4
Hand Seals: 2
Total: 23.5
Tayuya
Ninjutsu: 3
Taijutsu: 2
Genjutsu: 5
Intelligence: 3.5
Strength: 1
Speed: 3
Stamina: 3
Hand Seals: 4
Total: 24.5
Sakon
Ninjutsu: 4
Taijutsu: 3
Genjutsu: 1
Intelligence: 2.5
Strength: 3.5
Speed: 3
Stamina: 4
Hand Seals: 4
Total: 25
Ukon
Ninjutsu: 5
Taijutsu: 3
Genjutsu: 1
Intelligence: 3.5
Strength: 3
Speed: 3
Stamina: 2
Hand Seals: 4
Total: 24.5
