"Darkness Purview: Shadow Bodies," Naruto intoned as he summoned several silhouettes of himself. Two of them didn't last long enough to receive orders as Gaara/Apophis's tails slashed through them. The orders dodged around, attempting to throw knives at the creature, but it was doing way too little to be called useful.
"Hey, Sasuke, not that I need your help, but do ya got a plan?"
Sasuke was too busy thinking about how to get Sakura out of Gaara/Apophis's jaws without harming her to answer the question, just like he was spending too much time thinking about the threat in front of him to respond to the apparent Mummy that random civilian girl had noticed behind him.
--
Fuu had noted both the Seelie and Unseelie King vanishing from existence. They didn't fall asleep like the rest of the Village did, but seemed to warp and fade, presumably getting trapped in some sort of alternate realm.
It made sense. Whoever was attacking the Village Hidden in Legends only wanted to wage war on the Scions, and decided to keep the leaders of the other Villages out of harm's way. It was a little embarrassing on the part of those leaders that they were trapped by whatever ritual that had been performed, but she was perfectly fine with those two being embarrassed.
Now, she needed to figure out what in the Winter she was supposed to be doing. Supporting the…Mummies?…who were attacking was obviously out of the question. Hiding was probably the smartest option, but it didn't sit right. Fighting alongside the Scions…maybe.
She got along with the people of this Village. She definitely wasn't part of it, and many back home would have a conniption if she put herself at risk for the benefit of foreigners (which in of itself was a reason to try, she mused), but she had been happy here. Far better than back home.
Maybe, she should find some of the friends she made and…an enormous, overly muscled horse stormed past her, an even more enormous controlled torrent of water floating in the air above it.
"Attention ladies, if you need any help from aggressive Osirans or nasty Sacrifice rejects, then Jiraiya is your man!"
In spite of her last memory with the old man involving him simulating the experience of drowning for her, Jiraiya was adjacent to one of her friends.
"Hey, pervy sage, over here!"
--
Jiraiya probably wouldn't have come back to the Village if he heard about it being attacked while away, but now that he was here he was not about to let his home fall to these freaks. On some level, he suspected that this part of the old man's reason for keeping him here. His desire to defend his home was not intended to extend to the denizens of the other Villages that happened to be here right now, but Crom Cruach's little Gatekeeper was not about to leave him alone.
Sighing, he called out, "that's not my title!" before heading her way.
"Do you want to help the Village, little girl? I'd be happy to bring you where Crom's power would be at its most strategic, but honestly I'd much rather prefer to find out where Naruto went. The kid's kinda important for a lot of reasons, ya know?"
"I thought you were looking for the ladies?" She asked with an innocent expression on her face.
"I can multitask!" He objected.
"Then you can multitask by helping me and looking for Naruto!" She counteroffered.
This girl is good, he fretted internally.
"Fine. So, I have to admit, I wasn't watching the Exams themselves once Naruto's was over. Do ya know what happened to the kid?"
"He chased after Apophis," she casually noted, before frowning and looking down at her stomach. "Crom really does not like that snake. Even less than he likes Mikaboshi."
Jiraiya was too busy internally panicking about the fact that Minato's legacy was apparently even stupider and more reckless than his father to respond to the latter part of that sentence.
"Well, do you want to come save him with me?"
Before she could respond, a massive Effigy of an oversized alligator smashed through the walls of a nearby building, being desperately wrestled into submission by some Pesedjet Scion Jiraiya barely recognized as Ibiki. Ordering the unnaturally strong horse beneath him to charge forward and slam its hooves into the creature, smashing its head off and severing the Sekhem keeping it alive in a single blow, Jiraiya was just about to go and get her answer when Ibiki shouted at him, "you're one of the Sankami, aren't you? We need you out there!"
The Gatekeeper needs me, he groaned, but outwards he simply agreed. "Fuu, I know this is a bit to ask, but can you look after Naruto for me?"
"Aye aye, sir!" She saluted before running off in the direction of a surprisingly large path of smashed trees.
Fuu wasn't 100% certain why she agreed to go after Apophis without Jiraiya's aide, but ultimately decided it was a clear direction on what to do and moved on.
--
The leader of the Village Hidden in Legends and the leader of the Village Hidden in Sacrifice continued their little roof-top dance for a time period neither would be able to recount later. It simultaneously felt like a few seconds had passed and as if hours had passed before Orochimaru pulled back, realizing that only his final hidden surprise could possible be enough to resolve this.
Directing the Underworld portal he had created, calling upon the one secret tract of Mictlan he had managed to hide away for himself, he released the two treasures that he had managed to keep safe there.
--
While on a practical level, Sarutobi had no intention of waiting to see what Orochimaru planned to bring out, he found himself unable to get there in time to stop him from dropping two corpses, both familiar except for the Mummy tattoos…
"the past Great Gods-on-Earth? But how? Hashirama ascended, and Tobirama went out of his way to ensure his body's destruction…"
"When one doesn't concern one's self with merely studying the gifts of one's own kind, one can discover all sorts of fascinating things. For example, even a Minor God who specializes in the Death Purview could only ever bring them back as somewhat intelligent zombies, still too busy hungering for flesh and human emotion to properly embody what they stood for in life, but a Major God, one Osiris, already found a better way to create undead, and he shared it with the Village Hidden in Hekau's forebears."
"What are you saying? You're turning them into Mummies?"
Orochimary tsked. "Oh now, Mummies have far too much free will, and as impressive as they can be they still have nothing on a God's power. Still, with their bodies, and a little bit of experimentation, well, why don't we stop talking and see? Death Purview: Ghost Control!"
Sarutobi watched in horror as the body of Tobirama "Vishnu" Deva twitched and warped, standing up to face his old student. It was disturbing, and far above what any master of the Death Purview had been capable of in the past, but at least it fit in with what little was known about that Boon. Orochimaru could use the mementos of Tobirama's past to control his deceased spirit, even putting it into a corpse temporarily, though it should have been some savage monster with only a fraction of the real being's intellect.
What violated everything Sarutobi, and indeed every scholar of Scion techniques in history, understood was what happened with Hashirama "Brahmin" Deva's body. It was the same thing, but that should have been impossible. Hashirama wasn't dead, he was a Minor God ruling over a small section of the Hindu Overworld. He didn't have a deceased spirit to control, but when the current Great God-on-Earth looked at the body of this previous title holder, he could tell that, warped by Orochimaru's commands as he was, this was him.
"Unfortunately, your ideals and mine aren't aligned enough to operate at your full intellect, but you still have your power," Orochimaru let his new pet Gods know.
Tobirama acted quickly. "Water Purview: Liquid Form. Water Purview: Water Mastery," the younger of the two former Great Gods-on-Earth shouted before his entire body shifted into a translucent liquid that proved directly under his own telekinetic control. It lashed itself through the air toward Sarutobi, who pulled his lava tentacle away from the false Quetzalcoatl (who was horrifically injured but still not totally worthless) to barely slam it into the rapidly approaching mass of water.
Some of it was converted to steam, and even as a transparent blob one could tell that Tobirama was truly hurt, but then he intoned "Samsara Purview: Pratavye!" The monstrous, rock-covered body of the Great God-on-Earth was seared with the heat and force of molten lava, no, even worse, it was seared with the heat that lava might present to a being with water's evaporation point.
Gritting his teeth at the pain, Sarutobi noted that he would have to take them both out quickly; even if that Boon used up a lot of Ichor, it would be a pain to deal with, if he could do anything back…no, thinking back on how Clan Deva used to work, Pratavye could only return the effects of Supernatural attacks. Leaping forward with his clawed, demonic hands, he attempted to rip into the liquid form of Tobirama.
One would think that ripping into a mass of water would be fruitless, and one would mostly be right, but the current Great God-on-Earth saw that, as reduced as it was, he was making progress in tearing the form apart…
"Sun Purview: Bleach!" Hashirama called out, finally entering the fight with a burst of blinding white light that burned into Sarutobi's already somewhat burnt skin, dried out the nearby trees, and even evaporated more of Tobirama's liquid form.
Dammit, Orochimaru thought as he also felt the pain from that attack. I really did keep their intelligence too low..
In addition to hurting his companions, he had actually taken down what was left of the false Quetzalcoatl construct, who was at that very moment about to sneak up on Sarutobi and get in some more strikes while the supposed 'Great God-on-Earth' was distracted by his forbears, but no, it was now down for the count, whereas the damn ox was still up, kicking, and ready to join its master in the fight.
--
"Fire Purview: Blazing Weapons," Sasuke intoned before striking at where the mortal girl had pointed out the Mummy to him.
He had no delusions that pulling off the same trick he had tried against the Gatekeeper from Hekau in the arena would do anything against this enormous snake thing, but maybe he could utilize the flint surrounding them to strike up a flame and take this girl out. Clicking his lighter over the edge of his naginata, he let the weapon absorb some of the flame into himself before charging at her.
"Celestial Hekau: Sahu-Ra!" She shouted in response, creating light from her back.
"You would trick me with more of your pathetic light!" Gaara/Apophis screamed, striking down at where he saw Temari's light issue forth.
Sasuke, focusing on the Mummy girl, wasn't able to dodge out of the way as this particular swing of the tail sent him tumbling to the ground, bleeding from the back of his head and fighting for consciousness.
--
The flint-scaled serpent is acting freely. You'll need me to stop it, Crom let Fuu know as she travelled in the general direction of the carnage Jiraiya had asked her to help out with.
"I…" she tried to come up with some reason as to why that wasn't true, but found herself utterly and completely lost. "If you ask to be freed, I'm heading back to Dreams and letting Naruto get eaten," she responded, not certain how serious she actually was.
Crom was clearly unconvinced, but for once decided to play her game. Allow me enough of your will to take the firm of the maggot on the surface. You need it, snd you can pull back from that.
She really didn't know whether she could pull back or not when allowing Crom Cruach enough power to take the form of the 'maggot on the surface,' as if not letting him recreate the underground caverns of his domain in the Middle World was some great compromise, but he had been absolutely right when he noted that she had no real way of taking down Apophis without risking control.
Even when risking control, her only chance was to force Gaara back into commanding the Titan Lord and not the other way around, and Fuu was not absolutely certain about how to do that, but keeping Naruto alive required something.
"Okay, Crom, just this once."
--
Naruto, seeing Sasuke go down, was more determined than ever to defeat this thing. He was also less certain than before that he stood a chance at doing so. Oh well, if he was prone to quit just because times got hard then he would have done so a long time ago.
Gaara/Apophis roared when Sasuke was knocked to the side, continuing its incoherent ranting about 'fake people,' and ripped open the ground in several spots. Naruto was about to jump away when the ground beneath him formed a crater, but then thought better on the matter.
Thanks to Jiraiya-sensei finally showing him that he could use the Earth Purview, he realized that these little earthquakes couldn't hurt him, and so he let himself slide down and be subsumed so that he would have time to think.
"Earth Purview: Safely Interred," he mumbled as he channeled his Ichor, then thought about what he would need to do not only to beat this guy, but maybe, just maybe, get through to him.
Just as with Haku, Naruto felt an uncomfortable familiarity with this boy. With the outcast Angel, that had ultimately meant nothing; offering peace to Haku had only resulted in him taking a sword to the neck to save a Demon. Maybe this time could be different.
He fought Neji on similar grounds, hadn't he, striving to make a point not just about who could win but how his opponent's philosophy was self-destructive and beatable?
Regardless, he couldn't settle the matter until he had a way to survive this fight, nonetheless win it, and he was just as out of ideas about that as he was about changing Gaara's mind.
--
Looking out at the battlefield, what fraction of Apophis's conscious was still free felt simultaneous ecstasy and disappointment over the fact that it had won so quickly. All of the Scions were taken down, so now it seemed the only logical course of action would be to eat them and then move on to the Village nearby, but he still felt something wrong about.
It was if the silly blonde one in the ridiculous orange outfit who smelled all wrong, was it Mikaboshi?, was still alive and ready to go, but he fell into an earth eruption, so that was silly. His inability to shake the absurd thought off still kept both boy and Titan distracted, long enough that some strange being appeared in the edge of his vision…it was solely Apophis who reacted to this new enemy.
"Why are you here, White Maggot? This is my world to destroy!"
Naruto risked propping his head up to see that Apophis had stopped rampaging randomly and instead turned to focus on…some sort of enormous maggot thing, this one with several smaller maggots growing out of its side like arms, a huge mass of earth covered in dead, rotting plant life over its back, and putrid, filthy snow streaming down off of it wherever it moved.
"Naruto!" Some parody of Fuu's voice called out. "It's not really Apophis. Gaara is still the medium holding him back. If you can reach Gaara and take him down, then Apophis's power will be drawn back through the gate!"
"Yeah!" Naruto shouted, glad to actually have a plan…until he realized that he, in fact, still had no plan.
"How do I do that?" He shouted.
"Get close to him, find him on Apophis's body, and speak to him. Say something that will rile him up, not the Serpent!"
Fuu's attempts to get Naruto ready for his confrontation were immediately interrupted by four of Apophis's heads biting into Crom Cruach's flesh, which in turn led to the various enormous maggot heads growing off Crom Cruach's side spitting frost onto Apophis's scales. Heat radiated off of said scales, causing torrents of meltwater to splash onto the ground below.
Mares of Diomeded, I could really use your help right now, Naruto thought as he called on the power of the Animal Scroll and three of them, all but Xanthos, appeared before him.
Our sister was hurt serving you, one whinnied in a terrible voice. But you looked after her,another noted.
"There is no time to argue about that!" Naruto shouted as he jumped out of the way of another glob of steaming water. "She was about to be ripped apart by a wolf, so I sent her back. Now I really need you to help me get to Apophis!"
The three all looked up at the enormous serpent as it did battle with the similarly enormous maggot. They then looked at Naruto as if he were insane.
Very well. You have earned our respect.
One then gripped him by the scruff of his neck, swung him over onto her saddleback (which bore no saddle, but he'd have to deal with that), and the three of them rode.
--
Danzo sat underground, and waited. His arm twitched, perhaps the strongest hint of emotion he had displayed in a long time, as he thought of the damage the Village would be suffering at the hands of its enemies right now. All because Sarutobi refused to act. His weakness would condemn them all.
Are you doing any better? A voice asked, but he dismissed it.
To those fools who examined things on a surface level, it would look like Sarutobi was fighting for the Village while Danzo remained in the shadows, skulking and hiding when he should be aiding his people. Idiots who only looked on the surface were why people like Sarutobi held power.
In truth, Danzo had long foreseen this day, and prepared for it accordingly. Steps were being taken to counteract Orochimaru's little ritual, to awaken the sleeping Scions. It was thanks to Danzo "Shiva" Deva that Legends' current greatest weakness would be resolved, not that anyone would thank him for it. Luckily, he knew that only egotistical fools demanded thanks. Things were, in fact, already prepared, but he wanted to wait for the right moment.
Most Scions feared prophecies, but he knew that they were simply a double-edged sword to be used carefully, and he had successfully groomed Sai "Sarasvati" to be one of the sharpest-honed.
Normally, one of the biggest problems with Prophecies was that the Scion who invoked them saw quick, fading flashes of the future and had to rely on his or her own quickly fading memory to make sense of it, but due to Sai's unique birthright and particular divine enhancements to mundane skills, he could paint a perfect still image of the visions he saw as he was seeing them, giving the astrologers and students of Fate far more to work with.
Danzo had seen, through his protege, that Legends would win this battle, but Sarutobi would give his life in the process. Knowing that victory was possible even without his aid, he was uninclined to give it until Fate had taken care of the biggest obstacle to his own vision for the world, even if said obstacle was once a close and dear friend.
Did he have regrets about letting such an honorable, even if foolish and bad for the Village, man die? Did he wonder about how this followed his own clan's philosophy, about freeing humanity from Samsara by denying Fate? Yes, but just as he taught his pupils such feelings needed to be suppressed if the future they envisioned was to come to pass.
--
The Great God-on-Earth was fully aware that the current situation was untenable unless something changed. While Hashirama and Tobirama were both stuck being far tactically inferior to their greater, living forms, they still had enough raw power that he couldn't rely on that forever, so he asked something foolish of his lifelong companion.
"I am going to need you to keep them distracted for five minutes while I try something difficult," he informed the Ox that had fought beside him since his Visitation.
"Very well," it replied, knowing full well that these enemies were beyond it yet not hesitating for a second.
As it charged the sort-of-Mummies Orochimaru had created, he channeled his Ichor into a Boon he had known for a while now yet never had a need to pull off before.
"Taiyi Purview: Grand Unity Transformation," he intoned, shifting his Ichor within, imbuing it with his own understanding of how everything worked on a conceptual level, allowing it to shift and reshape itself until it gained the ability to shape the world around itself as easily as he could transform it within himself.
--
One of the mares rushed around the threat, letting out a harsh night and trying to bring attention to itself wherever it went, so that if either of the fractional Titan Lords above tried to take out the small creatures below they wouldn't target Naruto himself. Another gathered the unconscious bodies of Sasuke, the strange mortal girl, and Sakura, so that they could be evacuated to safety. The third carried Naruto, weaving around the thrashing snake-tails, jutting bits of earth, and scattered signs of winter turned to missiles that scattered themselves about the surrounding landscape.
When Fuu managed to grapple and knock Gaara down to the ground, Naruto led his steed to leap onto the fallen serpent's back in a feat that he deeply regretted no one else being able to see, and had his mare continue up the steep, ever dangerous mass of scales until he could find somewhere that he was certain Gaara could hear him.
"Hey you! Do you remember what you told me that one time, about how everyone besides you was fake because they could die while you controlled death? Well, it seems that you don't control death after all! In fact, it looks to me like Apophis is the one in charge. What does that make you, according to your own philosophy? Sounds pretty 'fake' to me!"
The serpent shivered as one of its head swiveled to turn in Naruto's direction, distracting Gaara/Apophis for long enough Fuu/Crom Cruach got in a nasty hit.
"Not that I think your philosophy makes any sense at all. Relying on others doesn't make you fake, in fact, it's one of the realest things there is. What I feel when my friends are there for me, that's real. That's power. That's strength."
Hisses and roars filled the air in response, but somehow, beneath all of it, Naruto could barely make out 'yooouuu'reee wrrrongggg.' In spite of the hellish situation surrounding him, the Scion of Izanami still felt pity for his enemy.
"You know, I understand you better than you think. You were alone. You were made into a monster against your will, and then punished for it. Everyone abandoned you. Is that about it?"
Gaara/Apophis slammed its own fangs into its back, trying to strike at where Naruto and his steed just were, as his only response, but Mikaboshi's Gatekeeper chose to interpret this as hitting a nerve with Apophis'.
"The same thing happened to me. And you know what? It didn't make me strong. It was Iruka-sensei that made me strong, and Kakashi-sensei, and the friends I've made that treated me differently, that made me see the true way to find strength, what actually makes you a 'real person,' whatever that's supposed to mean to you. And I bet that, deep down, you know it too."
He was really impressed by these horses he had befriended; the violent shaking overcoming the flint-scaled serpent's body was worse than any of the earthquakes it had created earlier, but she managed to keep her balance while galloping out of the way of any threats that popped up from the surrounding Titan clash with little issue.
"We were stopped on our way to pursue you by two Mummies who wouldn't let us take out the other of the Hemnetjitepiewhatsit's apprentices. Those two gave a damn about you. Do you think that they're fake people?"
--
On some level, Naruto was telling Gaara nothing that he hadn't heard before. People had tried to argue him out of his worldview in the past, using a lot of the same wording that this frustrating Scion that refused to die was, but this time felt different. When he said that he understood, Gaara thought he was right.
Then, he asked what Gaara thought about Kankuro and Temari. That…was something Apophis's Gatekeeper hadn't considered in a long time. He'd threatened to kill them multiple times, and was relatively certain that he'd meant it each time, but, well, obviously he hadn't gone through with it. They did stay by him all these years. If someone had brought that up even an hour ago, Gaara would have simply said the Hem-Netjer-Tepi made them as a condition for maintaining the prestige of being his apprentices. But…was it true?
Something about what this Naruto kid said made him rethink things. About how, though they were clearly scared of him, they had always stood by him when no one else would. They were his Affiliation members. Did they make him weaker, or stronger? What did mean for him? Was he a fake person after all? Or, was everyone else real all this time, including all those people he killed just to feel alive and show that he was better than death…Gaara screamed in pain one more time that day, though this time it wasn't a pain that was new to him. It was, in fact, one of the most common sensations of his childhood; emotional pain.
So much so, in fact, that it was overwhelming the seal that kept Apophis within, making it so he would either have to release the Serpent fully, killing himself in the process, or pull the Serpent back into its prison. His old self was too afraid of not controlling death. His…new self? could one be created in such a short time?...felt that he had things to live for still.
The flint-scaled serpent shrank, until it resembled a boy once more. With a colossal effort, the great white maggot was also forced back into itself, until it once more was held within the body of a teenage girl. All three Gatekeepers, after staring at one another for a few seconds, collapsed from exhaustion.
--
Temari thought that Gaara might have killed her, which would have been bad. Even a death with a mostly intact body could take a day to restore. However, he had just left her so horrifically injured that it took every bit of Sekhem left within her to keep her standing.
Rather than waste time trying to fight in such a state, she instead saw that Gaara had somehow been forced back into his human-ish form and was now surrounded by enemies that were barely conscious. She couldn't fight, but she could get her fellow apprentice out of there.
As she did so, evading what practically non-existent resistance the Scions (and was that a Fae?) offered, she was shocked when a sickly, tired Gaara uttered a phrase she would never have expected from him.
"Temari, I'm sorry."
--
Techniques used:
Death Purview: Ghost Control-gives the user near-complete control over a ghost or undead, depending on a lot of factors
Water Purview: Liquid Form-the user turns into a sentient mass of water
Water Purview: Water Mastery-similar to 'Control Water,' but works far more quickly
Samsara Purview: Privatye-forces an immediate karmic debt on one who uses a supernatural attack against the user, usually recreating the attack
Taiyi Purview: Grand Unity Transformation-after five straight minutes of concentration, one can shape the immediately surrounding area to their whims with a lot of specific restrictions
Sun Purview: Bleach-creates a burst of lights that superheats and dries out the surrounding area