Yo!
Thank you for all of your wicked awesome reviews, they are very much appreciated XD
My school has started another semester so my updates will be few and far between. Just in case I don't update for like a month after this or after my next chapter, it means I am super busy being a student. Wish me luck!
To '777torn777': yeah, I know! Shit hasn't even hit the fan yet. We still have…y'know what? Read to find out :P
To 'VtrCst': as always your reviews help make my day a little better, thank you for that. And I fully agree with you, the situation did get batshit. Stay awesome bud :)
There are going to be multiple, abrupt changes of scenes. I separated them as best as possible, but it's just a warning: be prepared.
CHAPTER 18
Most that watched Daku completely reduce all of his weight seals would say it was like witnessing the calm before the storm; the soil around Daku vibrated, then it began to swirl around him, first calm and slow, and then it whirred around his legs like a tornado.
Rai chuckled at something Itachi mumbled, so she was barely able to brace for impact as Daku shoulder tackled her, making it look like she had disappeared in a small crackle of lightning.
"Where the fuck did she go?! Did she fucking run out on us?!" Kakuzu slapped the back of Hidan's head. "The fuck was that for?!"
"She's busy, idiot." The other Akatsuki members were forced to separate as more of Naruto's inner circle members came after them.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
With Rai and Daku
Rai grit her teeth and begins dealing out lightning-coated punches to Daku's back.
From the speed they were going both of their feet weren't touching the ground and they were carving down the trees they touched, leaving a path of destruction in their wake. Daku grunted with each blow and Rai huffed as her back continued meeting and breaking through trees and rocks. Until she charged up her massive gauntlet fists covered blow and brought it down in an axe blow on her fast adversary's back. This succeeded in stopping him but as she stumbled back to catch her breath Daku stood up again and went after her.
They engaged in a blazingly fast nin-taijutsu fight; Rai, with lightning in her eyes and fire in Daku's, caught a fist in her iron grasp but had to release it as a knee went for her stomach, she spun quickly on her metal boots but Daku countered with his own raised leg.
Blow for blow, kick for kick, they matched up with each other, going faster and faster but neither showed signs of slowing down anytime soon. Arcs of lightning coated her body as Rai roared and blood-red fire ignited around Daku, their blows kept on meeting and being countered and those were being blocked.
Rai correctly anticipated a snap kick and swept Daku's legs from under him, the fire-coated shadow creation flipped but a lightning-coated gauntlet slammed into his chest as he got to his feet. He careened across the grove in the ground but regained his footing in time to dash back and smash forearms with Rai.
"You are much faster than I thought," the white-haired woman said, glaring at her fire-coated opponent.
"Or is it that you are slower than before."
"It will take a lot more than that to get to me." She bent under a right hook, smashed her fists together and lightning exploded around her. Daku hopped backwards away from the tendrils as they touched just before his feet. The dark shadow flipped through a few hand seals.
"Fire Release: Mystical Dragon Fire." He took in a deep breath and blew out a storm of fire out of his turban-covered mouth. The blazing chakra creature roared after her.
The woman flipped away from the inferno twice but the third time Daku exploded from the mouth of the dragon and smashed his fist against her unprotected chest, burning her Akatsuki cloak down to her undershirt. The blow flashed her far across the clearing and Daku diligently went after her.
The woman smirked, impressed at his plan and twirled to her feet, spinning over the dark shadow narrowly as his fiery punch flew under her, barely grazing her frizzy hair. She landed on her hands and spun with her legs open, creating a vortex of lightning that moved to Daku. The quick-moving attack washed over the dark creation and spat him out through the top.
The tornado of crackling energy flickered to a stop to reveal the confidently standing woman; she frowned when Daku flipped upright before he smashed into the ground. As one they began flowing through a set of hand seals, yelling out their attacks simultaneously.
"Fire Release: Mystic Fire Dragon!"
"Lightning Release: Mystic Lightning Dragon!"
Their elemental dragons warped out of them and roared at each other.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Itachi stared at Mole stoically, she stared back at his chin, "What shall I call you?" Itachi droned, Kisame had been separated from him by a knee kick from Zabuza, the demon of the mist ran after his fellow swordsman.
"My master calls me…Mole."
"Nice name," he said in a rare show of sarcasm.
"It comes with the reputation," she replied immediately.
"And that is?"
She lifted her mole mask off her face slowly and dropped it to the ground, she then removed her Wave forehead protector from her kunai pouch and tied it around her eyes, unsheathing her tanto from her left thigh. "I can fight without my eyes."
She took a stance; crouched on the ground like a tiger but her tanto was held in a reverse grip in her right hand,
"Brave words. Do you know who I am?" Itachi took a loose Uchiha taijutsu stance.
She clenched her weapon tightly and responded, "The real question is," the small hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, ready to warn her, "Do you know who I am?"
She launched forward like a missile and Itachi hopped aside, bringing his leg down for a quick axe kick to her neck to end the fight but she used the flat side of her weapon to block the strong attack and wrapped her legs around his leg, scampering over his body and bringing his head back to meet the ground. The Itachi exploded into chakra smoke; her neck hair twitched to the left and she slid out of the way from another Itachi shadow clone that exploded out of the ground, still in her strong tiger-like stance. She donkey-kicked the clone's chest and felt a rough kick meet her side; she skidded on the ground and rolled away from a fist that struck the ground.
Mole held up the ram hand seal and slashed in the general direction of three Itachi clones, her ribs throbbing from the effort, and a sharp water blade shot out and zipped at them. The clones leapt over the strike and Mole jumped to meet them. She threw a fist at a clone but it was dodged. She used the momentum to smash her heel against the clone's forehead, dispelling it. The kunoichi landed on the ground and stabbed the ground before another clone could ambush her, dispelling it. Her palm felt the ground and she sent out a short, fast pulse throughout, smirking invisibly when she got what she was looking for. The last clone ran at her and she ran as well, a fist went to her chin but she leaned away in time for the blow to just swing above her head and she darted forward, away from the clone. Mole then shoulder tackled a tree and Itachi blurred to life, his sharingan eyes wide in shock.
The S rank jounin kneed her stomach and drove an elbow into her neck but she crumbled into the water after the blow. Ominous mist covered them and Itachi cursed quietly. He caught sight of her perched on the tree above him as the mist covered them from sight.
The fight between Zabuza and Kisame was getting more and more hectic, it seemed.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
"Get me out of this, heathen fuck!" Hidan yelled as the ice slowly crept up his torso, freezing him in place. Haku used his toe to poke the tri-pronged scythe on the ground and dropped as soon as he had cast a freezing jutsu on the Jashin priest. The man roared out his outrage and wiggled his neck around to give him some breathing room but the ice was now far up his chin, "Jashin will punish you all! When I get out of this, I am going to slit your—" the ice-covered his mouth.
"Neat trick kid," Kakuzu said with his arms crossed; Haku took out half of the zombie brothers with a single attack. 'An ice release user. Haven't beaten one of those guys before. I heard that they were extinct.'
He threw a look at Hidan and winced a bit.
It wasn't that the boy simply froze Hidan; it was cold and ice that turned Hidan's skin blue, freezing him down to his bone marrow.
Brisk, neat and tidy.
"Thank you," Haku said politely. He adjusted his hunter ninja mask as Hidan completely froze over. His mouth was wide open in a maniacal laugh. The demon brothers took a stance behind the ice-release user with their barbed chain connected between them, still unused so far.
"What do you three hope to do against me? I am above you in every conceivable way."
"To protect Master Naruto," Haku replied as an ice spike formed on his palm and a light mist covered them, not enough to completely block Kakuzu from sight but enough to make Kakuzu. Haku was Zabuza's apprentice, a well-known fact, and the demon brothers were the swordsman's allies, so they were well-versed in fighting with limited visibility.
Kakuzu loosened his crossed arms a little.
The mist thickened and the man took a loose stance, straining his ears to hear the quietest of whispers. He squinted and slowly looked around, moving in a tight circle. Just then he hopped back away from a barrage of ice senbon that rained out of the mist. He flipped through a set of hand seals. "Wind Release: Great Breakthrough."
He blew out a massive gust of wind from his mouth and the mist cleared…
Only to reveal that he was trapped in a dome of ice with hundreds of Haku and demon brothers looking down at him.
"Shit…" he cursed and threw off his Akatsuki robe just as the ice senbon rain and poisoned kunai began raining down on him.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Naruto swerved to the right away from a flock of exploding clay birds. "You want a taste of my art, un? Eat it!" Deidarayelled from his flapping clay dragon as he forced more clay into his hand mouths and spat out more birds. Naruto grit his teeth and rolled in a tight circle as a tail clanged against his iron bubble. He had managed to lead the duo far away from Wave but still within the alarm barrier, which meant that they were fighting above water.
He spun around on his seal board and opened his left palm toward the exploding birds, flicking through four one-handed seals. "Whirlpool Style: Final World Seal." A vortex of wind warped out of a large seal in the centre of his palm and sucked in the incoming birds. "You like bombs? Eat it!" he threw his left hand to the flying duo and fired paper bombs flew out. "Unseal."
The clay bombs mixed with the paper bombs, cutting Diedara's control away from him. The mad bomber grinned at the attack and cackled as the attack flew down to him.
"Get us out of the way," Sasori grunted from inside his Hiruko armour, Deidaracomplied and commanded his dragon to fly as fast as it could, away from the mutated bird bombs. "Hurry." The Suna missing ninja said this eerily calmly.
"It's going as fast as it can, Sasori." The bombs stubbornly followed no matter how many times he manoeuvred the dragon until Sasori got tired of this and leapt at Naruto.
The blonde seal master looked at the puppet master as he ran up the hordes of exploding birds, the birds blowing up a little after contact but far away enough for Sasori to not be affected too much. The older man threw his tail at Naruto and the boy raised his rectangular armour to defend against this. He cut off the connection from his bombs but before this, he tied all of the wires connected to the paper-clay birds to each other and pushed them to Diedara. The mad bomber looked back in surprise at what his superior had done so he was met with the full brunt of a combination of attacks.
As Hiruko began plummeting into the water Naruto dived after on his board.
The puppet armour opened its mouth and began firing poison senbon after senbon at the seal master but the boy moved out of the way and thrust his palm down at Sasori. "Wind Release: Gale Palm."
The wind attack smashed against the puppet's armour and the man hit the water heavily, much faster than he was initially falling. Naruto hovered over the splash zone, keeping his guard up so he wouldn't be ambushed by Deidara if he had managed to survive the explosion. He backflipped off his seal board as a puppet shot out of the water and smashed through the seal board with sharp, black sand, destroying it.
Naruto landed on the water smoothly, not rippling the surface in the slightest. "So the reports were right; you do have the third Kazekage."
Sasori rose from the water and stood on it as well. "He is one of my proudest creations."
Naruto remained calm and quiet for a minute, staring at the iron sand user. "Can I assume you have more human puppets?"
"Hundreds."
Naruto tapped the side of his glasses and a full chakra frame of the Kazekage as well as Sasori appeared to him. He noticed that there was a central place where Sasori was feeding his chakra into the iron sand using a puppet. He leapt backwards as iron sand erupted from out of the water in front of him. Two shadow clones exploded into life beside him in bursts of chakra.
"Don't forget about me!" Deidarayelled as he too landed on the water from the sky. His Akatsuki robes were seared from the torso but his combat clothes were relatively unharmed. The iron sand puppet surged forward as the bomber fed his mouth palms with clay from his pouches.
The three Naruto's ran forward fearlessly and as iron sand covered one the other leaped high into the air and yelled, "Water Release: Great Water Typhoon."
Iron sand protectively covered both of them as harsh water smashed down on them, destabilizing the water and throwing Deidara's concentration off.
"Keep it steady, will ya?" he grunted as he began crafting something massive from his clay. The iron sand rose into the air and opened up till it was a platform for Sasori and his partner to stand on. The real Naruto, on the surface of the water, was busy dodging and meeting his shield against iron sand shooting from the Kazekage's mouth.
Sharp spikes kept on shooting after Naruto as he ran full tilt toward the man, four more clones burst to life beside him as he was hit with the memory of the clone fighting Sasori and Deidara being expelled.
Two clones increased the flow of chakra to their legs and they rocketed high into the air and landed on the flying black iron platform, distracting the bomber from forming whatever he was forming, though it was already beginning to take shape.
An idea came to Naruto, he ran under a sharp metal attack that would have cut his head off and charged up his chakra beam seal. As he skidded on his knees, he skimmed his fingers into the water, muttering, "Water Release: Chakra Beam."
Water latched onto his biceps and he opened his palms.
Directly under the iron sand puppet a sharp drill erupted from the water and rocketed after it. The attack bent and moved away from the metal sand, reforming immediately after it had been cut in half until the puppet covered his whole body with iron sand.
"Got you," Naruto mumbled and charged up a seal on his pinkie finger, and a piece of paper passed through the attacking water beam that still hadn't dented the defence. The paper stuck onto the side of the armour and as soon as this happened a hazy blue bubble formed around the puppet; it plummeted from the sky.
Naruto hadn't been idle when he had received reports on the duo's abilities; he had gone to his library in the leader's tower when he found the time to and started forming seals on ways to counter a puppet master.
The seal he had used was to cut the connection away from the puppet master, creating a blue bubble of his chakra to cover the puppet. The Kazekage puppet was now completely out of Sasori's control; it splashed into the water and sunk to the very bottom. Naruto's hazy blue seal still covers it.
Naruto had used a level ten containment steel and fortified it by adding a barrier seal, to create a division from the puppet master and a broken-up version of a blood seal. The feeling for Sasori was like trying to find a signal underground and having limited if not outright failed to do so.
He felt his clones being dispelled and watched as the floating iron sand began falling around him, Deidara and Sasori landed on the water. "Strange that I lost control of my puppet." He observed that Naruto had water coated on his arm, his palm open in the ready. "How I wish I could kill you."
He threw off his robe to reveal his bare torso as well as the cylindrical section in his chest that had the kanji for heart.
He raised his palms and jets of water shot out to Naruto. The boy ran lengthwise away from the attacks,
"I've got you!" Naruto grunted as a giant bird with a prominent forehead and three horns smashed against his rectangular shield. More flooded after his airborne body and Naruto struggled to dodge the unusual flying clay bombs; they looked like massive eagles but without feathers, with bull horns and a rectangular forehead. A small blue dome covered Naruto's legs as he bounced over one, the water on his arm still connected to the sea, and threw out his free left hand to a clay beast; shards of exploding paper detonated it and Naruto was caught in the blast range.
The water that trailed after him fell back into the water limply.
There was silence all around as they saw a figure fall from the blast zone. Sasori lifted off the water with his fan-like wings and flew to catch the jinchuriki. He forced the tubes that shot out water back into the holes as he caught Naruto, but his eyes widened slowly.
Kaboom!
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Zabuza and Kisame flew through the mist and smashed their weapons against each other, leaping away and running back again. Kisame and his former comrade entered into a fast-paced kenjutsu fight, and they were momentarily destabilized by a ground-shaking explosion. The shark man smirked at Zabuza and the other grinned and, as one, they both kicked each other away.
Haku flipped over a fire jutsu from a fire mask and used the heavy mist around him to summon a rain of ice senbon, doing so without speaking. The attack flew to the mask but the earth mask came in time to erect a mud wall. The ice release user twirled a pike of ice in his fingers and ran to the dome, meanwhile, the demon brothers made optimum use of their admirable teamwork to tag team against Kakuzu, who was without any masks.
Black strings erupted from the ground to stab a brother but a brother drew a kunai and spun it by its ring, channelling water chakra into it so the tendrils shredded on contact. The other brother hefted up his half of the barbed chain and yelled, "Poison Darts!"
The barbs shot out and honed at the maskless shinobi, forcing him to withdraw his black tendrils in favour of dodging. He cursed when he felt his water mask die; he ran to where he sensed the death and the demon brothers followed after.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Itachi hissed and held his hand up to his left eye, using a kunai to fight against his surprisingly capable female opponent.
Mole was mercilessly hacking and stabbing him, defying his expectations of a quick win. When his eyes spun again to try and predict her next move, he hissed, feeling like hot oil was pouring into his eyes.
Mole had activated Naruto's still highly experimental death sharingan seal, but was met with limited success; Itachi was not able to use his pinwheel eyes to predict, copy or put her under a sharingan-based genjutsu. If Itachi tried to spin his sharingan, he would be subjected to an unbearable pain targeted to his eyes.
Mole wasn't unharmed; she had scorch marks on her exposed arm and her left trouser leg from the knee had been cut off. She had a long, thin, bloody cut from the bottom of her covered right eye, over her cheek and to her chin. She turned on her heels and Itachi ducked the blow, jamming his kunai into her thigh. She grunted and jumped away from him.
Itachi went through a sequence of hand seals. "Fire Release: Great Fireball."
She tore the weapon out of her leg and as she scampered under the attack. As she charged back to Itachi, she threw her tanto and just as he caught the weapon in his hands she threw her palm out directly in front of him, a seal flared to life.
"Unseal."
Frog shot out of the seal and nailed the Uchiha on his cheek with a ground-shaking punch.
Soon, both black ops members disappeared into the mist after their opponent.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Daku used his forearms to catch Rai's shin but was subsequently electrocuted. The fire around him flared even higher and was visibly fighting against her lightning. She took her leg back and both nailed each other with right hooks. They flipped sideways and zipped back to each other tirelessly, just as Zabuza and Kisame flew past them and back into the darkness of the mist. Daku slipped under a rough left hook and nailed her chin with a savage uppercut, the blow lifted her off the ground but as she landed on her feet the lightning increased. Her robe melted off her body to reveal her usual combat uniform; a short-sleeved reinforced white shirt, long-sleeved mesh armour undershirt, and tight white shinobi pants. Her metal silver metal gauntlet gloves and boots were still in place and glinting in the limited sunlight that passed through the mist. Rai and Daku began charging up their bodies; the lightning coating her body now merged with her skin and her very body turned into lightning, while the fire around Daku merged with him and turned him into fire incarnate. The fighters roared and flashed to each other.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Sasori's broken puppet body began to reform while Naruto was busy jumping from deformed clay bird to deformed clay bird with a blue bubble coated on his feet, closing in on Deidara.
The blonde boy flickered to the mad bomber and both engaged in a short hand-to-hand fight. Naruto glanced over his shoulder and saw that the birds were returning to their summoner. He held down a savage uppercut with his left hand and drove a knee into the older blonde's chest. In Deidara's shock at how his blow was caught and having the wind driven out of him he felt Naruto slap his back; silver snake ropes exploded out of his sleeves and tied the gasping man up, sucking out whatever chakra he had and making him sink into the water like a stone.
Naruto didn't care about Diedara's fate; after his last action, his iron bubble protected his back from a particularly angry blast of fire. He clenched his teeth as he struggled to stay in place but Sasori wasn't done.
"Red Secret Technique: Performance of a Hundred Puppets!" the Suna missing ninja yelled as hundreds of flying red-cloaked puppets surrounded Naruto. The boy took his armadillo fighting stance. The water connected to his right arm slithered back into the chakra beam seal and a four and a half foot long sword made completely out of water came out. It wasn't intricately formed but there was a distinct-looking lizard at the hilt. The blonde boy bent into a basic kenjutsu stance. The sword points down with both of his hands holding the hilt. "Give up, child. I have used this technique to subdue a country. What hope do you have against it?"
Naruto was panting, his eyes were fixed on his main opponent but his senses were also aware of the flying puppets around him. "I have surpassed all expectations anyone had for me. I have been told that I am weak, that I would never be a ninja," his blonde hair covered his eyes as he continued, "I have gone through hell for everything I have gotten, and no one," he growled, "is going to undermine me. Never. Again."
"So be it." Sasori didn't care anymore; Naruto was going to die.
And with those last words, the red-cloaked puppets rained down on Blonde the seal master.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Frog grabbed Mole's outstretched hand as Itachi used an earth jutsu to open up a chasm; the deputy black ops ninja was pulled out from harm's way and summarily thrown to the desperate Uchiha. Both of his eyes were heavily bleeding from the intense pain he was constantly subjected to whenever he tried to use his sharingan. The man was heaving in deep breaths until Mole smashed her knee into the middle of his head and he crumbled to the ground, too tired to stand up anymore.
The woman quickly slapped a restrain seal on him and silver ropes wrapped around Itachi, the man merely closed his eyes and succumbed to the darkness, and pain of having his chakra leave him forcefully.
The duo could feel the air thicken, a sign that Haku was about to use his chakra high seal.
Kakuzu kicked Haku's shoulder, slammed his follow-up elbow against his head and had to slide back as the demon brothers, very much worse for wear, dropped beside him. The fighting zone was a disaster; broken masks and twitching black threads littered around them. The trio had destroyed the man's entire elemental mask collection but they were still up against an enraged S rank ninja. Kakuzu spat out some black threads from his mouth and they zipped to a woozy Haku, but a demon brother pulled him out of the way in time.
"Don't you think it's time to use it?" The man grunted to Haku.
"Yes, it is."
The boy hunched his shoulders over as he held the monkey hand seal. The air around him thickened and a ghostly image appeared behind him from the mist. It was like what one would think the Shinigami resembled, with the horrific-looking mask and everything, but the phantom solidified slowly, ice cracked and creaked around it until it physically manifested.
Meanwhile, Haku smiled serenely, standing in front of the ice monster that towered three times taller than him. It carried a short-bladed knife in its right hand and its left hand, or its left pointer finger, was on Haku's shoulder. The mask's mouth creaked open and ice snakes shot out to Kakuzu. The S rank ninja had been summoning black threads out of every opening in his body in anticipation.
The snakes leapt at Kakuzu and on contact the threads turned to ice, he broke the threads off and ran to Haku.
The ice-release user smiled wider, at peace with the world around him, and thrust his right palm to his opponent. And more ice snakes formed out of the very mist around the man. He was forced to keep breaking off his threads as more and more snakes froze it over. The worst part was that every time he struck the snakes he would feel his body freezing over.
He flipped through a set of hand seals. "Fire Release: Drilling Fire Bullets."
The attack shattered the incoming snakes on contact but with each one down more came from the mist.
In his distraction, he didn't see the phantom ice monster behind Haku stretch forward with his short knife and stabbed it down at Kakuzu. The ninja looked up in time and grabbed the edge of the knife before it reached him. He growled as the ice slowly crept down his arms and solidified around him.
Haku commanded the hand to pull back a bit and he cleanly cleaved the man's head off with the short knife.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
Naruto was in a frenzy.
He hacked, slashed, cut, sliced, diced and destroyed the puppets that moved down to him. He spun around in a tight circle with his blade outstretched and the water reacted to this by spiking up and forming a sharp dome. He roared and pushed the dome away, throwing many puppets away with it. He sprinted full speed to Sasori and jammed his sword through a puppet that had wanted to ambush him from the water. He pulled his weapon out and hopped over two short scythe-carrying puppets. He yelled and brought his weapon down on them. Instinctively he raised his left forearm for his rectangular shield to catch a mallet to his head. He summoned up as much strength into his sword hand and used his right fist to punch the inside of his shield. Violent vibrations rocked through the attacking puppet and it exploded into shards of wood and metal, he puffed out some air from his nose and punched his shield again, more harsh vibrations reverberated through a hoard of incoming puppets, stunning them enough for him to make a slashing motion toward them; a wave of water washed over them and forced them under the water, the pressure crushed them.
The boy panted and looked around until an idea came to him.
He pointed his water blade to Sasori and it shot out of his palm. The puppet master deflected his blade with a blade that came out of his puppet arm. Naruto though was busy flashing through some hand seals.
"Ninja Art: Fuinjutsu: Sea of Paper Chaos." Both of his arms flew out and hundreds of thousands of paper fluttered out, revolving around him before they expanded and hovered in the air, frozen in time.
Sasori looked on curiously at what the boy was about to do; he still had about fifty of his puppets left and he was still at full strength.
Naruto kept his arms outstretched and his palms open, his fingers twitched and the smoke issue ninja wire forced the paper to expand around them and cover Sasori as well. The man looked around and was about to hop out of the paper range but his back met with a hazy blue force field; he quickly substituted himself with a puppet when he felt foreign chakra enter his wooden body.
Naruto dropped his arms and his chakra beam seal flickered. Lightning surged out of it and he pointed it at the puppet master. "You're in my world, Sasori."
The paper seals hummed with energy at what he said and the chakra strings connecting to the puppets wavered and went off. The puppets plopped into the water around them. The situation suddenly turned dire for Sasori. He unsealed two more puppets from his arm and sent them over to Naruto. The boy ran to them as well and whipped his lightning-coated arm at them.
A lightning whip lashed at the duo and control left Sasori once again.
The blonde kept on running to the older man but stopped halfway and jammed his arm into the water.
The S-rank puppet master lost control of his limbs when arcs and tendrils of lightning smashed him into the hazy seal wall behind him. Naruto flickered in front of him and jammed his now water-coated arm through the heart seal.
Sasori's eyes widened slowly in realization of what had just happened. Naruto made sure to stare straight into the shocked man's eyes calmly.
The tense air around them calmed down and the seals remained in the air. The redhead painfully slumped onto Naruto's arm and whispered, "I have some information that will greatly benefit you." He muttered, "Orochimaru has created a shinobi with the sole purpose of destroying you and everything around you." His voice was getting quieter. "My source says there is going to be another attack on Wave…with Iwa…in a year…" he was barely even heard anymore. "For what it's worth…good luck…Naruto…"
The Wave leader nodded in acknowledgement.
He pulled his arm out of the dead puppet master's heart and allowed the man to sink into the water. Sasori smiled peacefully at him, despite his wooden face, as he sank in his watery grave.
Death found him.
Naruto closed his eyes and looked up, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly.
He had just defeated two S-rank missing ninjas.
Then his mind went to what the last man he had killed said; Orochimaru still held a grudge against him for assisting his teammates in forcing him to flee. Naruto didn't know why it was him in particular that the snake Sannin was targeting and not his Sannin teammates, but he would be ready for him.
OOOOOOOOOOOOO
"Naruto-sensei!" Naruto looked to where his name had been called and smiled when he saw that it was Yakumo. Hinata and Sasuke were running behind her; news of the invasion had reached Konoha and the other villages allied to Wave late.
Yakumo ran up to his side and looked him over with critical eyes but he waved her concerns away. "I'm fine."
They watched as DARK ninjas carted an enraged Hidan away, chopped them to pieces and trapped them in several breathless containers.
Itachi followed after in a chakra cage that was very similar to Hidan's, and then Deidara's unconscious body was carried in on a stretcher with restraint seals dotted all over. Lastly, Sasori's dead puppet body and Kakuzu's headless corpse (and head) were carried on a stretcher as well. He had already sealed up all of Sasori's puppets and was planning on giving them to the Kazekage's brother, Kankuro, the only puppet master he was familiar with. But Kisame and Rai were nowhere to be found, though they were carting Zabuza in on a stretcher; worse for wear but he still had a huge grin stretched on his bandage-covered mouth, Naruto smirked at that.
"Sorry, we couldn't get here on time, sensei," Hinata mumbled.
"There's nothing to be sorry about." He walked to where the barrier seals in outer Wave were located, near the main gate, and observed it. He nodded to himself when he saw that it was now fully back online.
"Hey there, kid," Jiraiya exclaimed but Tsunade smashed her fist on the man's head. "I-I mean Master Naruto." He rubbed his sore head and pouted.
"How's it going, Naruto? You look like shit," the blonde woman said with a smirk. Naruto returned the smirk slowly and looked over his body. His blue jounin vest had jagged slashes and soot all over it, his sleeves had been torn off by something he couldn't even remember, he was missing half of his left sandal, part of his hair was black with soot, there was a purple bruise on his cheek from something else he couldn't even bother to remember, the only fully intact thing was his black ninja pants.
"Why thank you, Tsunade. You look particularly old today," he responded sarcastically and Mole leaped down to his side and whispered something into his ear. He shook his head and whispered back. She saluted and flickered away.
"I'll get you back, Naruto," Tsunade grinned. She furrowed her eyebrows as Naruto was handed a clipboard by a chunin Hoshi gatekeeper. "Something wrong?" The citizens that were in the bunker were now creeping out and returning to their everyday lives.
He hummed and bit the end of his pen. "Kisame and Rai escaped, heavily injured but somehow still alive. Also, my alarm seals detected two more hidden watchers. There is no description but I can guess what they were wearing. Right now, though, I'm thinking of putting Hidan under a deep, irreversible stasis and executing Itachi Uchiha for attempting to invade a sovereign country. What do you think?"
"Yeah…about Itachi…we need to talk," she whispered this to Naruto so Sasuke wouldn't hear, but as far as they knew Sasuke was busy watching his older brother being carted away in a seal cage like a criminal. Naruto looked at him for a minute before he clasped his hand on Sasuke's shoulder.
"Why don't you guys go and wait in my office? I'm sure Tsunami will have some cinnamon rolls ready." Hinata unconsciously licked her lips and silently dragged the boy and the younger girl with her to the leader's tower. "Now, what do you want to tell me about Uchiha Itachi…?"
Authors note
Jutsu list
Ninja Art: Sea of Paper Chaos: this is Naruto's alteration of Kushina's custom-made jutsu 'Child of Paper Chaos'.
He had changed the jutsu specifically if he was to fight Sasori one-on-one. It works by spreading paper seals similar to the one he put on the Kazekage around him, held up by extra thin smoke issue ninja wire two were held together by his chakra, and covering Sasori so it would be him and Naruto in the ball. The seals create a static charge chakra energy that would destabilize the puppet master's chakra control. This was the reason he couldn't hold up his remaining puppets to fight for too long any more, or if he could they wouldn't be too effective against Naruto, as seen with the final two puppets.
If anyone besides Naruto is to step within the field, his/her chakra control would be shot to hell and there would be a constant buzzing in his/her head. The limit to this jutsu is range (not more than half a mile from Naruto), the density of the target's chakra, the physical strength of the target and Naruto's current strength to hold up his 'world'. If the target is to touch the barrier set up then the user's chakra would begin to take over the person's body; low-powered substitutions cannot work to escape. This jutsu is classified as S rank because it would take a lot of training to effectively use this.
In that 'world', Naruto is both literally and figuratively the strongest.
Whirlpool Style: Final World Seal-Unseal: is an A-rank Fuin-ninjutsu that was created by one of the Second Uzukage's younger brothers. This jutsu takes a storage seal and maximises it so much so that it would be able to suck in anything thrown at the user despite the speed, size or velocity of the projectile and spit it back out as a personal attack.
Only a person with high chakra capacity and expertise in fuinjutsu can do this because the chakra requirement to seal up anything going fast or that is incredibly heavy is very high. The jutsu cannot seal living people, tailed beast balls or tailed beasts. This jutsu though needs thirty minutes to recharge despite the user's chakra levels, so it is best used wisely.
Done
So? What do you all think?
Mole and Frog won against Itachi without their chakra high seals because they are a good tag team and they made use of Naruto's still highly experimental death-sharing seal. The seal didn't destroy Itachi's sharingan but it locked the pinwheels in place, preventing him from copying jutsu, predicting attacks, and casting sharingan-based genjutsu as well as putting him in tremendous amounts of pain. Mole wore him down in the beginning with her unique sensory abilities (she is a sort of touch/contact sensor, which means she can sense people but only when she touches the ground, like Tobirama and Minato) so Itachi couldn't hide in a genjutsu while sending clones at her. She summoned Frog to surprise and jar him, which it did. Did I surprise you guys? I sure hope so.
It seems a conspiracy about Orochimaru has come to light and Iwa allying with Sound for the attack. Then there's Pein…
Yeah, well…
Shit's about to go down. Hope you stick around to read about it. Don't forget to drop a review, please.
See you when I see you.
Foy.