In Naruto: Reborn With Talent

by Little Merger

A soul was transmigrated into Narutoverse but was refused to be given any sort of insta-OP power, instead, he could choose from three talents. Follow him and his loved ones on their journey to become strong as they pave their own path through the battle-filled world of Naruto. Will they be villains? For some, surely. Will they be heroes? For others, maybe. But anything they do is d

14. 417

In Naruto: Reborn With Talent #Chapter 417 Ch417. Trap? - Read In Naruto: Reborn With Talent Chapter 417 Ch417. Trap? Online - All Page - NOVEL NEXT

Orochimaru stared at Tsunade, weighing his options. He could put some trust in her, do what she wants and go with her or he could send her to hell because this was such an obvious trap it was pathetic.

The problem was... it was working on him.

For so long he wanted nothing but to show Sarutobi up. He didn't really hate Konoha in general. He hated Sarutobi and hurting Konoha was the most direct way of revenge for forcing him to defect.

Were his experiments over the top? Sure, he could admit that much. If he had succeeded, it would have set Konoha's might apart from every other nation. Just imagining an army full of Wood Release wielders...

Konoha would have been able to conquer the continent.

But these experiments were not all that different from what Sarutobi and Danzo had him doing for years up till that point.

In fact, every village had something like that. They were ninja villages and contrary to the perfect picture they portrayed for their gullible clients, being a ninja was a dirty business full of cruelty, ruthlessness, blood, and gore.

Sarutobi knew that.

Danzo knew that.

Heck, even Jiraiyia was fully aware of that fact despite his mind not being able to compute anything that didn't have to do with perversion. Orochimaru would know. He saw how Sarutobi baited Jiraiya into learning sealing arts by showing him spying seals.

Another thing that utterly pissed Orochimaru and forever soured his feelings towards Konoha was when Minato became Hokage instead of him.

Was him being completely left out of consideration for the Hokage seat reasonable? Orochimaru did not think so. He was perfect Hokage material. Maybe he was a bit ruthless and cold but he could make the village stronger and capable of protecting itself while advancing.

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But Sarutobi chose Minato over him just because Minato was all about puppy-eyed sunshine that did not have a capacity of thinking beyond serving his village.

Did Minato's service in the third ninja war bring a lot of benefit to the village? Sure. But did him winning one battle in a very flashy manner outweighed decades of service, scientific advancements, and being a very skilled commander in two wars, never letting the enemy cross into Konoha territory despite being horribly outnumbered all the time?

Orochimaru would like to think that was not the case and Sarutobi was simply biased against him.

He had tons of other small reasons why he disliked Sarutobi too, and that was why this obvious bait worked so well on him.

"You know me too well." Orochimaru whispered under his nose, showering Tsunade with searching looks. In the end, he sighed and raised his tone so his former teammate would hear him, "Okay, what do you mean by that?"

Tsunade smirked at that. She deliberately worded it in a way that would appeal to Orochimaru's more paranoid side, making him definitely think this was a trap. She simply wanted to see what he would do if she dangled in front of his nose something he wanted for so long.

And he indeed did not disappoint. After only brief consideration, he jumped after this offered opportunity.

Oh, he might not seem eager and his eyes held a lot of caution but Tsunade knew him far too well. If he wasn't immensely interested, he would have never asked her to clarify. If he thought there was zero chance for this to be a genuine proposal, he would not even consider it.

"It's simple, really. I just offer you what I offered Sarutobi." Tsunade chuckled, "A way to resolve this feud between you. A deathmatch basically." She shrugged.

To be fair, this was a very crafty way to gain benefit no matter in which way the situation would proceed. If Sarutobi died, she would lose one of the biggest opposing voices in Konoha and if Orochimaru died, Konoha would lose one of its more revenge-driven enemies that would simply not let go of their grudge just because Sarutobi was no longer in the office.

In the end, she didn't really care which one of them would survive. She could take care of the remaining one at some other time. She mostly organized this for her own entertainment.

"And Sensei agreed to that?" Orochimaru asked in utter shock.

Tsunade shrugged, "He thinks it is high time to correct a few of his mistakes."

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Orochimaru understood what Tsunade meant by that. Sarutobi apparently wanted to kill Orochimaru as he blamed himself for his defection and turn towards the dark path.

That... wasn't entirely correct. Sarutobi was only responsible for putting Orochimaru under Danzo's command and the old war hawk showed him the ropes of the darker underbelly of Konoha but that was beside the point.

This turn of events made Orochimaru creepily chuckle at the irony, "Hehehe. How very expected of our teacher, don't you agree, Tsunade?"

"Indeed, how very hypocritical." She snorted and rolled her eyes, "But who cares. Are you in or not?"

Orochimaru pursed his lips while seemingly pondering his options. It wouldn't have been like him to instantly agree so he had to put up a bit of show. He had a reputation to uphold, after all.

In the end, however, his choice was obvious. "Fine. Lead the way." He eventually said in his usual manner.

Tsunade didn't deem that with an answer, she just turned around, fully showing him her back as if baiting him, and walked towards the door leading out of the Kage Box.

Orochimaru amusedly watched, wondering if she expected him to attack her, before he started following after her.

As they walked, he realized they were heading towards the rooftops, where he ironically firstly planned to trap Sarutobi with the help of the Sound Four after baiting him there by kidnapping his grandson, Orochimaru wondered how could Tsunade be calm when the ninjas of Kumo, Iwa, and Oto were currently fighting Konoha's forces all around.

She was the Daimyo of Konoha, yet, she seemed to have no care in the world during a stroll through the battlefield turned arena as if it didn't even matter.

He supposed her reasons were similar to his. Explosions, screams, and cries resounded in the background, all noises they were both far too familiar with from their long service in Konoha's ranks.

But still, he expected more worry for the village from Tsunade.

Her body language basically betrayed that she didn't care and that baffled Orochimaru.

Their walk was silent as neither started a conversation. Whatever reason Tsunade had, Orochimaru didn't care but he was glad for it. He had a lot of planning to do in his head. Facing Sarutobi, even in his old age, would be a hurdle. He knew that much.

They eventually reached the rooftops and when he saw a lone Sarutobi already waiting for them, Orochimaru's worries fell.

This... was actually not a trap!

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Upon seeing Tsunade and Orochimaru, Sarutobi, already geared up in his battle armor and holding transformed Enma, narrowed his eyes, and gravely spoke towards Orochimaru. "So you have agreed, Orochimaru. I didn't expect you to have a shred of honor left but here you are."

"Honor... No, sensei. That's something a ninja doesn't need. I agreed because this is simply the most efficient way to accomplish my goals." Orochimaru gleefully rebuked, enjoying how angry his words made Sarutobi.

"If that's the case, why attack Konoha!? Why cause so much death and suffering in your home village!?" Sarutobi cried out, balling his fists in anger.

He still had a hard time believing his student actually did this. Didn't he do a good job as a teacher to instill the love for Konoha in Orochimaru? Defected or not... Sarutobi never thought Orochimaru would ever attack Konoha directly. Not like this.

Orochimaru, clearly enjoying Hiruzen's anger, just shrugged, "It seemed fun."

That made Sarutobi grit his teeth and turn to Tsunade as he hissed out, "Let's start the fight."

Tsunade, a bit bored of the drama between them, just shrugged. "If you are done talking." She beckoned them towards the central part of the roof that was surrounded by seals, leaving only a big area inside of them.

Sarutobi confidently moved inside while Orochimaru gave an apprehensive and cautious glance at the seals. The only comforting thing was that Sarutobi was not bothered by them so... Tsunade would not place a kill switch into the seals with Sarutobi still inside of them just to kill him, would she?

Orochimaru was uneasy but he believed she was too sentimental and soft for that. No matter how disrespectful she seemed, Orochimaru thought she still valued Sarutobi as her teacher.

When they both got inside, Tsunade kneeled down on the edge of the sealing circle and put her palm onto a marked area. The seals instantly flared into life, glowing red before a barrier rose into the air, creating a massive restricted area where nobody could get in or out. Not unless they got through Tsunade first.

The entire barrier was made by the example of the Four Violet Flames Formation that made a similar barrier but needed four people to power it up and keep it standing. Unlike that one, this barrier Jutsu needed only one anchor and power bank, which was Tsunade, and despite her being that, she could still move around and fight, as long as she didn't leave the range of the chakra transmission between the seals on her palm and the sealing barrier.

There would be no ANBU getting in to help Sarutobi nor would there be any unforeseen get-away chance for Orochimaru. Rei went so far to ascertain that, he even added an anti-space feature so not even reverse summoning would work.

Both Orochimaru and Sarutobi couldn't help but admire the barrier that sprang up around them. They were ninjas and adept at sealing for long enough time to recognize the danger of the barrier and partially unveil its functions with just a glance.

They both instantly recognized its origin was from the Uzumaki Sealing Arts. The same as the Chakra Barrier around Konoha and the Four Violet Flames Formation.

And while Orochimaru wondered when Konoha got stuff like this and how to steal it, Sarutobi wondered when Tsunade got stuff like this and how to... er, politically privatize it for his clan.

Only when their eyes coincidentally met did they realize they were here to fight to the death, and not admire a new Jutsu. That's how big Ninjutsu nerds they both were.

The atmosphere turned awkward for a second before both Sarutobi and Orochimaru wordlessly sprang forward at the same time, both trying to take advantage of the awkwardness of the other.

Enma in his staff form met Kusanagi blade, sending sparks all around as Orochimaru and Sarutobi entered the contest of strength. Despite his age, Sarutobi still had an edge though.

"You were again slacking in training your body, old boy." He teasingly pointed out while trying to put more of his weight into his weapon, "All those chemicals can not be good for your health. You gotta be more youthful."

Orochimaru inwardly cringed at that reference, imagining himself in green spandex and with a bowl haircut.

Of course, Sarutobi instantly capitalized on that slight distraction and his leg shot up... only narrowly missing Orochimaru's crotch because he noticed it at the last moment and managed to shift his body to the left.

"That was cheap!" Orochimaru exclaimed as he let Sarutobi win the weapon clash all the while he leaned to the left with his entire body, letting Sarutobi's staff harmlessly pass him as his Kusanagi sword slashed downward, aiming to get a good chunk out of Sarutobi's leg.

To Orochimaru's surprise, he managed to land a hit and cut off Sarutobi's leg right under his knee...

Only for Sarutobi to burst out of existence with a puff of smoke.

Orochimaru's eyes widened as he felt heat abruptly rising from behind him. He didn't have enough time to look at it. Sarutobi was too expert of a caster for that. Orochimaru quickly spun on his heel, his hands blurring in hand signs mid-spin, and when he was finally facing the source of the heat and realized it was not just a fireball but actually a boiling sea of mud...

He released the Water Wall Jutsu he was preparing to counter a fireball only for the water to be instantly suppressed by the far heavier mud while also being partly vaporized with a hiss due to the heat.

Sarutobi watched as Orochimaru was engulfed by his boiling mud but he didn't drop his guard. Orochimaru was a far too tricky opponent to do that.

This time, it wasn't needed as Orochimaru did not intend to attack. He simply rose from the ground on the opposite side of the arena from Sarutobi and started talking while cleaning the dust from his shoulders, "That was a good one. You almost got me. Using a shadow clone for distraction. I don't think I have ever seen you do that, sensei. And here I thought an old dog could not be taught new tricks."

Sarutobi didn't expect to defeat Orochimaru with that move but seeing him completely unharmed even though he managed to catch him off-guard was a bit disheartening. Contrary to his feelings, his tone was grandfatherly and light, "I was learning new tricks from Naruto, you see."

Orochimaru felt his ego sting a bit when he heard he was almost hit by tactics made by that orange-clad fool. It definitely showed on his face as Sarutobi chuckled at him, causing him to blank out his expression.

Mirth shining in his eyes, Sarutobi decided to verbally unbalance his opponent even more. "But you are starting to monologue. Does that mean the warm-up round is done and you are finally prepared to unleash your trump card?"

Orochimaru almost stumbled and Sarutobi smirked.

The brat was a hundred years too early to try winning a trash talk match against him. He probably already forgot who taught him all his psychological tricks.

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"Indeed, it is time to stop with these small tricks." Orochimaru tried to appear nonchalant but it was obvious he was not exactly comfortable.

Sarutobi chuckled at his foolish disciple and his incessant need to always be in control of the situation.

"Then show me... what kind of sick technique is your trump card." He shouted with determination to defeat whatever it was. If only because he felt responsible and obligated to.

Hearing that, Orochimaru's lips stretched in a nasty smile. He applauded his teacher's determination but he also doubted Sarutobi had any idea what kind of trump card he had. If he knew, he would never wish for him to use it.

Alas... Sarutobi's feelings were unimportant. In a way, Orochimaru learned this technique and picked his 'summoned' targets mostly to spite Sarutobi.

"Very well, Sarutobi-sensei. I'll happily grant your request." Orochimaru playfully quipped with an undertone of excitement in his tone.

His hands blurred in a set of hand seals... hand seals Sarutobi instantly recognized and his eyes widened in dread just as Orochimaru finished the necessary signs and proceeded to slam his palm onto the ground.

"Edo Tensei!" Orochimaru exclaimed and Sarutobi's stomach sank.

Sarutobi was one of the very few people who were old enough and close to the second Hokage to actually see the effect of this Jutsu in the hands of its creator.

Tobirama might not have been called the God of Shinobi like his brother but his power... especially when he used Edo Tensei... could not be disregarded. The scene of Iwa and Kumo ninjas being brought back to life only to be sent to fight their reluctant and horrified colleagues, friends, and family, slaughtering them without being able to control their bodies, only capable of weeping at their actions...

It was a war then and Sarutobi understood the need for such cruelty even when he was young. But that sight was also the reason why he marked Edo Tensei as a forbidden technique.

If he had used it, the Second and Third Ninja War would have been much easier for Konoha, and a lot fewer Konoha ninjas would have died but Sarutobi always thought their sacrifice was not in vain. He would rather let them die all over again than for this technique to see the light of the day.

That's why...

"What have you done..." Sarutobi whispered in horror as three coffins started rising from the ground, marked by numbers one, two, and four. It didn't take a genius to know what those numbers meant.

Despite his utter disgust and profound disappointment, Sarutobi knew he could not let Orochimaru finish his technique. But he couldn't stop all three coffins.

The decision of which one to stop came to him fairly easily. Contrary to popular belief, it was not the first God of Shinobi, Hashirama Senju, who Sarutobi feared to be summoned the most.

No... it was Minato Namikaze and that's why Sarutobi quickly ran through the sequence of hand seals for counter summoning Tobirama taught him during one of his private lessons, putting his full focus on stopping the Fourth Hokage's coffin from emerging.

The reason for this was very simple. Tobirama was the creator of this technique and Hashirama was both too powerful to be controlled and brother of Tobirama. Meaning, there was no way for Orochimaru to summon them in their full power unless he wanted to lose control. Sarutobi theorized Orochimaru would at best be able to bring them back with around low S-rank prowess.

If he went for anything higher, Sarutobi would be overjoyed because that would mean both the First and the Second Hokage would break free from his control and would be supremely pissed at his attempt to use them against Konoha like this.

Minato, however, would be utterly at Orochimaru's mercy.

'I have to stop that at all costs!' Sarutobi desperately thought.

Just the idea of a man capable of slaughtering an army of thousand high-ranking ninjas on his own wreaking havoc inside of his beloved village made Sarutobi frantically despair at the possibility. He might be able to fight Minato, and surely even win in the end, but he was very aware there was no chance to do that before serious damage was done. And Sarutobi did not doubt even for a second that Orochimaru would order Minato to do exactly that.

To destroy Konoha.

After all, seeing his village demolished right in front of his eyes while being unable to do anything to stop it... that would make Sarutobi feel a lot of despair.

When Tsunade saw what Orochimaru was attempting to do, her eyes twitched in irritation. But when she saw how Sarutobi reacted, she couldn't help but facepalm.

Wasn't he supposed to know what using the Dead Demon Consuming Seal meant for the user? There was no way Minato, who is still trapped in Shinigami's belly to be summoned and yet the old coot is trying to prevent it?

'I swear the old monkey gets more and more senile the older he gets...' Tsunade inwardly sighed and despondently watched her teacher waste his chakra like an idiot. 'And they call him Professor.' She shook her head in exasperation.

After a long struggle, Orochimaru lost the battle of wills and Sarutobi managed to prevent Minato's summoning, blissfully unaware that whether he succeeded or not, there would be no Minato showing up for this fight.

In the meantime, however, both Tobirama and Hashirama stepped out of their coffins, looking around but unable to move as the chakra they had available was just a tad bit lower than what they would have needed to get free of the caster's control.

Tsunade was using Senjutsu so she could feel that and found it both hilarious and exasperating. Orochimaru definitely did not calculate how much chakra he could give them to retain control so this entire situation going in his favor was one massive coincidence.

'No wonder I never won a gamble against him. He is practically shitting luck!' She inwardly grumbled.

Seeing the two summoned Hokages, Orochimaru smirked at Sarutobi who was completely mortified he didn't prevent this disturbance to their eternal rest.

No way was Orochimaru wasting this golden opportunity to taunt him.

"Kukuku, what a touching reunion, isn't it, sensei?" He gleefully said as he walked towards the unmoving Hokages, taking out a kunai with a control seal from his sleeve. Every move of his was deliberately slow in order to prolong Sarutobi's agony but also fast enough so there was no chance for his opponent to interrupt him.

As he reached the two Hokages and was about to put the control seal into them, his elation reached the peak. This was it! The moment he waited for so long! The moment when he would make Sarutobi suffer as he watched the two biggest heroes of Konoha turned into his faithful puppets!

'It could have been much better if he didn't prevent Minato's resurrection but oh well, two Hokages are better than none.' Orochimaru nonchalantly thought, glee filling him.

But just as the kunai were about to enter the two Senju ancestors... they suddenly got teleported outside of the arena before it could reach them.

Both Sarutobi and Orochimaru's heads whipped in Tsunade's direction, only to find the last Senju glaring at them as if they just killed her puppy.

Orochimaru gulped as he realized he totally forgot about the fact that the person with control over the seals around the arena was also a Senju.

As for Sarutobi... he had no idea why he was being glared at. Tsunade grew increasingly more unreasonable by the year so he assumed this was just yet another show of that.

No way he did something wrong... right?

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"I told you this will be a deathmatch between you two. As in one versus one, Orochimaru. I know such a concept is hard for your treacherous mind but I don't intend to let you break the rules I set." Tsunade spoke calmly with just a slight but obvious annoyance in her tone.

Inwardly though...

Where did the shitstain gain the guts to summon Hashirama and Tobirama with Edo Tensei right in front of her!?

She wanted to step in and pull his innards out of his stomach, enwrap them around his neck and strangle him with them!

But this was Sarutobi's great moment so she held herself back and just decided that Orochimaru was not walking alive out of here even if he won. Previously, she would have let him go while just secretly putting a tracking seal inside of him. The second he summoned her ancestors though... his life was forfeit.

With her piece said, Tsunade turned around with an audible 'hmph' and left Orochimaru and Sarutobi dully staring at her back as she approached the still disoriented Tobirama and Hashirama.

The atmosphere in the makeshift arena turned awkward as both Orochimaru and Sarutobi exchanged a sympathetic look full of understanding before they could stop themselves.

Both instantly shook in disgust as they realized what they had just done and the awkwardness turned to the more natural hostility and killing intent. Orochimaru might have lost his trump card but he was not giving up now.

'If I can't use the Hokages to kill Sarutobi, I will just have to use my own hands!' He spitefully thought.

After all, he didn't summon the Hokages because he thought he needed them to defeat Sarutobi. He summoned them because he thought it would bring Sarutobi anguish. Just because they were taken away didn't mean Orochimaru would be unable to go blow for blow with such an old senile coot as Sarutobi.

Neither was Sarutobi giving up. Instead of dropping his guard due to his perceived advantage, he became even more cautious. He knew how devious Orochimaru was and doubted the boy had no other trump card stored up in his ass.

Both again drew their weapons and rushed at each other before Enma met Kusanagi in yet another struggle for dominance. This time, a much more cautious one as neither Orochimaru nor Sarutobi dared to go all out in fear of being outplayed by their opponent.

A long battle of attrition and stamina started as medium and low ranked techniques flew left and right throughout the arena, devastating the surroundings within the sealing circle encompassing it.

...

While Orochimaru and Sarutobi were having their fun, Tsunade arrived near the two still immobile Hokages.

When Tobirama and Hashirama saw Tsunade...

"Oi, brother, doesn't that hot blond chick remind you of Mito? Why not try to flirt with her?" Hashirama spoke, thinking he was being quiet and from Tobirama's face, it was ever so obvious that if he could, he would have facepalmed.

God of Shinobi indeed...

Tsunade's fond smile suddenly froze for a second. She would have never thought they would not recognize her but... it was a few decades after all. Nevertheless, her left eye twitched in annoyance and her lips stretched wider, getting past fond and entering the territory of nasty and devious as she grinned at the two, her eyes gleaming the same way when she caught Jiraiya trying to peek on her.

'Uh-oh!' Tobirama and Hashirama thought as their eyes widened when they spotted Tsunade pulling her arm back in preparation for a punch. Their instincts told them to dodge and they definitely tried but...

They realized they couldn't move as they were still bound by the Edo Tensei and their expressions became dumb-struck as the world entered a slow motion for the two reanimated corpses and they could with a great reluctance clearly see Tsunade's first getting closer and closer, coated in a very concentrated chakra that became almost visible to the naked eye due to the sheer intensity of energy it contained.

The punch seemed to be extremely slow from their perspective but in reality, it was very fast. Before the two even managed to utter a sound, Tsunade's fist impacted the ground in front of them...

The entire Konoha could witness and more importantly, hear the resulting explosion as a dust cloud rose into the air above the Konoha's arena before instantly dispersing due to the shockwave that followed shortly after the first impact.

This was accompanied by such a loud crash it stopped half of the fights going on throughout the village. Even Orochimaru and Sarutobi momentarily stopped and looked towards Tsunade... only to see half of the roof missing.

Neither paid much attention to it though. Both knew Tsunade and this was nothing new. Violent tendencies and low self-control followed by property damage were her everyday modus operandi.

Since there was nothing out of ordinary, the two just shrugged and continued their fight.

Tsunade, with a self-righteous satisfaction, noted that both her grandfather and granduncle were disintegrated just as she aimed for.

Because their bodies were made by the Edo Tensei technique, the two started to be quickly reconstructed in front of Tsunade.

"Definitely reminds me of Mito... Ahahahaha!" Hashirama started to boisterously laugh, totally disregarding the fact he was disintegrated just a second ago.

"Hashirama... just shut up." Tobirama groaned. "Don't you see we have more pressing matters?"

"Huh? What could be more pressing than finally getting you a woman? Do you even realize you are already dead and still single? It's sad, Tobi!" Hashirama boisterously exclaimed and Tsunade had a hard time not chuckling. She could have sworn Tobirama actually blushed at that. But it was gone as quickly as it came.

Hearing Hashirama, Tobirama's face twitched. "I'll punch you."

"No, you won't. Neither of us can move. Tough luck." Hashirama grinned.

"Sage, just kill me again..." Tobirama muttered.

Just then the attention of the two men was attracted by the 'hot blond chick' who snorted at them, "Why, grandfather, I would have never thought you were into incest. To think you would offer your own granddaughter to your brother. Then again... it is a known fact that Senju and Uzumaki are related."

Tsunade chuckled, watching as the jaws of the two reanimated men dropped and both unconsciously gave her a once over. Not the kind of look a man gives a woman but rather, the type a grandparent gives their grandchild after not seeing him or her for a long time.

After a moment of stunned silence full of bewilderment, Hashirama was the first to regain himself. "Ts-Tsuna!? Is that you!? You grew up!" He eagerly exclaimed with wide eyes full of shining stars that made Tsunade want to take a step back.

"Oi, calm down! You are scaring her!" Tobirama rebuked, "Besides, she is right. You just offered her to me. Creep." He snarked in deadpan.

"Wha-?" Hashirama blinked before furrowing his eyebrows. His expression suddenly turned sharp, "Oh, no, no, no! You are not getting anywhere near my sweet Tsu-chan, Tobirama! Even if it would mean you dying a virgin, I forbid it!"

"I am already dead." Tobirama retorted, "And I am not a virgin..." But then he noticed Hashirama was too engrossed in observing Tsunade in fascination to listen to him, "and he is no longer listening to me. Typical." He tiredly sighed. If he could, he would have shaken his head at his brother's antics.

"As funny as this little conversation of yours is, I am already taken." Tsunade said and showed them the ring on her finger, knowing only something like this would stop them from bickering like children.

"..." Silence instantly fell onto the two of them as they looked at each other.

As the satisfied Tsunade was about to start talking again, the two spoke at the same time, threat gleaming in their determined eyes, "Who is the dead meat?"

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"I think we have much more important things to do than you giving my decade-long husband a shovel talk." Tsunade dryly deadpanned.

Inwardly though, she really wanted to deflect that particular topic. Having her grandfather and granduncle trying to intimidate Rei would be extremely embarrassing for her. It had to be avoided at all costs since it would give her sister-wives ammunition to laugh at her for months.

Speaking off which...

'I don't think neither of these two would appreciate the fact I am not Rei's only wife. I can already imagine grandfather being his hasty self and trying to beat some manners into Rei for being a womanizer while granduncle tries to stare him to death.' Tsunade sweatdropped and her determination to delay their meeting with Rei, preferably until... never, increased.

"She is right, Hashirama." Tobirama, bless his heart, decided to switch back into his serious self.

They were both extremely gifted sensors with loads of experience so there was no way the war raging in the middle of Konoha could escape their senses.

In fact, Tsunade noticed Tobirama's fingers slightly twitch while he joked around with Hashirama. He no doubt wanted nothing more than to go and defend the village. The only reason why he was still here was probably the hold Orochimaru's Edo Tensei had over him and his experience.

As an experienced ninja, he knew that leaping blindly into a fight was just asking for trouble. Tobirama hoped Tsunade would provide more information on what was going on. That's why he steered the topic back to the ongoing invasion.

Hearing him, Hashirama's face sank for a moment. His lifelong wish to prevent war by creating a village failed. This situation was the biggest proof of that.

It lasted only for a second though and before Tsunade could even blink, Hashirama's face hardened. Dreamer, he might have been but he was first and foremost a ninja. And no matter how childishly he acted at times, nobody gets called God of Shinobi by being kind to people. Especially not his enemies.

Seeing her ancestors being completely serious, Tsunade nodded in satisfaction before she started speaking, "Konoha was just invaded by Orochimaru's-"

"Wait! That pale skin and yellow eyes... Isn't that Orochimaru?" Hashirama interrupted, faintly remembering small, four-year-old Tsunade complaining about a genius in her class once or twice before he died, "Tsuna-chan, what is your first crush doing, invading Konoha?" He asked with genuine concern and curiosity shining in his eyes.

Tsunade groaned and facepalmed as Tobirama chuckled. He too could remember how annoyed little Tsunade was that she was not first on this or that academy test.

"He was NOT my crush!" Tsunade exclaimed, her embarrassment showing on her slightly pink cheeks as she glared at him.

Hashirama grinned at her reaction but refrained from teasing her further. Her glare reminded him far too much of Mito and that was one woman even the God of Shinobi did not want to piss off.

It really warmed his dead heart to see his granddaughter all grown up like this.

"Are you sure? I distinctly remember-" Tobirama didn't have the natural filter only men married to an Uzumaki woman acquired and so he decided to go for a slight tease at Tsunade's expense.

He didn't get far as before he could finish that sentence, Tsunade's fist impacted the center of his face at speeds even he could not see and his entire upper torso was blasted to smithereens.

"Yes! I am quite sure!" Tsunade irritably exclaimed and Hashirama winced. Yes, this was exactly the brutality of an 'Uzumaki' woman. He would know, having Mito as a wife.

Now that he thought about it, he actually pitied Tsunade's husband!

When Tobirama finally reformed, Tsunade was not in the mood for more jokes so she started explaining the situation.

"The invasion is not as bad as it might seem on the first look. In fact, it is merely a training exercise for our troops." Tsunade dismissively said and both Tobirama and Hashirama couldn't help but to gape at that statement.

Enemy ninjas were traversing the streets of Konoha and fighting was going on throughout the village... where exactly did she get the gall to call it just a 'training exercise'!?

'Did the common sense get screwed while I was dead?' Tobirama thought in shock.

'Mito... our granddaughter is not very smart. Sigh. I wonder whose genes spoiled her.' Hashirama wistfully sighed.

Tsunade could see on their faces that they thought something rude but considering what she had just told them, she couldn't really blame them. Instead of doing what her impulses were telling her to and punching the hell out of them, she opted to do the patient thing and try to explain more.

"Just... try to sense deeper, especially the chakra signature on each of the civilians. It should clear things up a bit." She said, knowing that at the very least her grandfather was skilled enough sensor to recognize what was going on if he really tried to sense deeper.

Hashirama indeed did as Tsunade asked, and when he noticed what Tsunade was trying to point out, his eyes widened.

"You must have an excellent seal master at your side... to think such incredible shielding seals could be deployed to each civilian. Mito would have been totally dumbfounded, hahaha!" He started to boisterously laugh.

His mood lightened and his worries eased. As somebody who had one of the best seal masters of his time as his wife, Hashirama could recognize seals just by the feeling of his sensory abilities. He could not perfectly tell what the seal did but various seals had various 'feels' and chakra had its potency.

That's why he could tell these seals on civilians were meant to protect them and what reassured him was the potency of the chakra infused into them.

At least, the civilians in Konoha were totally safe.

Tobirama didn't need an explanation. He was also a good sensor. He might not be on Hashirama's level but with a bit of context due to his brother's previous sentence, he realized what was going on and he found himself giving Tsunade an approving look.

Unlike Hashirama, Tobirama focused more on the readiness of Konoha's forces and he could feel them all not only sporting similar seals, if only a bit weaker, but also moving in a coordinated fashion to counter the enemies.

Konoha was clearly well prepared for this attack.

"My husband is the best seal maker in the world!" Tsunade smugly proclaimed, "As you can see, there is no need to worry about Konoha. You can go and help to fend off the invaders later if you want. Now..." She turned towards Tobirama with a sardonic smile, "I am sure you would like to see your student and talk about some of his... exploits."

Tobirama furrowed his eyebrows at her smile, not knowing what it meant but she had a point. Since Konoha's defense was not such a pressing matter, he surmised seeing the young monkey would be a good thing.

"One of which he is currently fighting." Tsunade added with a dose of sarcasm, gesturing at the place where Orochimaru and Sarutobi were exchanging ninjutsu for ninjutsu. The sealing barrier around them was quite strong, to contain their moves without disturbing Tsunade, Hashirama, and Tobirama who stood just a bit away from it.

Tobirama almost face-faulted hearing that. He realized what Tsunade meant... realized he was summoned by Hiruzen's student.

'That would explain how somebody set against Konoha could use Edo Tensei.' Tobirama thought and his eyes grew stormy. 'Hiruzen... just wait till I get my hands on you. I am gonna spank you till your butt cheeks fall off. I didn't entrust you with my worst and best Jutsu for you to let it fall in enemy's hands.'

Tobirama felt immensely disappointed.

At the same time, he was extremely surprised somebody actually managed to 'recreate' it. The version he entrusted to Hiruzen when he was begging him to be taught was incomplete.

Tobirama did teach him but he also knew Hiruzen was too dumb to finish the incomplete version. He always had a knack for nature manipulation but when it came to more esoteric ways of ninjutsu... like seals, space-time, and shadow clones... Hiruzen was average at best.

Tobirama felt safe entrusting the unfinished version to him with the instructions to never let anybody see it. If nothing else, he could trust Hiruzen to never show it to anyone until he mastered it himself.

Which was just not gonna happenâ

Seeing somebody capable of progressing the incomplete version to this degree was astonishing. Hearing that Hiruzen let a genius capable of doing this out of his sight, allowing him to defect the village, was downright outrageous. And seeing that this genius was not 'taken care of' before he could threaten the village like this was the last drop.

When he let Hiruzen become the Third Hokage, he expected competency!

Hashirama could see his brother's expression go blank and promptly took a step away from him. He knew his brother and somebody was in for a very rough beating.

Tsunade... just smirked. 'Heh, and he has no idea about all the problems with Konoha during Sarutobi's reign yet. Like... the extinction of the Senju line.' She deviously thought.

There was no way she would let go of this golden opportunity to make Sarutobi's life a bit harsher.

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"Well, then, let's go and take a look at Sarutobi's fight, shall we?" Tsunade innocently smiled, not giving away how satisfied with how the situation was progressing.

Unknown to her, Hashirama knew that smile very well from her younger days. He was both very impressed at how subtly she manipulated his brother and not impressed at all that she really did do it in this kind of manner.

But...

'Some things just never change, eh?' Hashirama inwardly chuckled, reminiscing about a similar, if a bit more innocent scene, between little Tsunade and Tobirama. She always knew how to blackmai-, ahem, justly acquire candies from her granduncle.

As for Tobirama... he didn't notice. He was far too preoccupied with his own thoughts about his protege turned Hokage.s

"Tsuna-chan, you do know we can't move our bodies, right?" Hashirama decided to point out the obvious flaw in her plan.

While they could speak and change expressions, maybe even do things like twitch fingers and such, the Edo Tensei restricted any bigger movements. After all, Tobirama usually used it on the village's zealous enemies so it had to have a feature to restrain them before the control seal could be implanted lest they attack the caster.

"Ah, that." Tsunade dismissively hummed before she flexed her chakra in a way that affected both Hashirama and Tobirama.

The two men instantly felt the restriction on them shatter, causing them to be astonished. Tobirama's mind even momentarily forgot his anger at the feat his grandniece just accomplished.

"How..." He quietly muttered under his nose in bewilderment.

Tsunade, thanks to her Senjutsu-enhanced senses, heard him and smirked, "I might or might not have studied Sharingan a lot." She threw him a bone.

Tobirama instantly froze when he heard her, his head snapping towards her and his eyes going wide.

"Oh..." Tobirama dumbly said with a dumbstruck expression on his face. "So you have realized that..." He trailed off. Nevertheless, his chest was swelling with pride at Tsunade being so knowledgeable in ninjutsu.

Tsunade saw that the conversation went over Hashirama's head and as a dutiful granddaughter, she decided to enlighten him.

Looking at him, she spoke. "There is a reason why Edo Tensei summons can not be put down normally. Tobirama used a lot of the concepts of Uchiha's Izanagi technique in his Edo Tensei."

Hearing Tsunade, Hashirama blinked and turned towards his brother, gaping at him. Didn't this dude hate the Uchihas the most? Why did he base his techniques on their bloodline!?

Tobirama just sheepishly smiled, not liking the awkward atmosphere surrounding him. This was exactly why he never confessed this fact to anybody...

While bloodlines could not be fully replicated, nobody said one could not observe how they worked and learn a lot from it. Most Tobirama-made Jutsu were on the esoteric side... yin side. The same as the Sharingan bloodline. He really believed to prevail over one's enemy, one had to study their prowess with impunity. This gave him a lot of insights into how Sharingan worked and gave him a lot of inspiration for Jutsus.

It was also because Tobirama studied Sharingan that he disliked the Uchiha clan. He simply understood their bloodline more than most Uchiha-born ninjas. And he didn't like the picture and the influence it had on the user. Not at all. That's why he always warned his brother about Uchiha's being a loose cannon!

"I gotta say, granduncle, you really are ingenious." Tsunade continued without a care in the world, "You not only managed to implement an Izanagi-like system into your technique but also bypass the only limitation of it. Since they are already dead and just chakra-constructs of a sort, there is no permanent blindness associated with reformation for the summoned." She wistfully sighed and dreamily put her hand on her cheek, "It almost reminds me of my research to evolve Mangekyo Sharingan to the next stage. Just a bit more simple."

Tobirama and Hashirama almost face-faulted when they heard her.

"Mang-!" They started at the same time, stopping when they realized it. Looking at each other, they came to a silent understanding... "Wha-!" They again started at the same time. Apparently, they both had their own understanding of who was allowed to ask first. Getting annoyed, they decided to just speak. Both raised their voices and loudly exclaimed in outrage. "Evolve Mangekyou Sharingan!? Are you mad, Tsunade Senju!?"

Surprisingly enough, it was Hashirama who was the louder one. While he didn't hold a grudge against the Uchiha clan and was quite accepting of them, he was, in the end, a Senju. He knew how dangerous that bloodline was and hearing of its final stage evolving... his world almost spun when he heard those words.

"Please tell me you failed!" Tobirama almost pleadingly asked. Even the ninjutsu nerd inside of him couldn't make him want to see such monstrosity!

"Sure," Tsunade shrugged, "I failed."

Both Tobirama and Hashirama sighed in relief at that...

"If hearing a lie can ease your mind, I'd gladly supply one." Tsunade grinned at them.

Both men looked at her in horror, but she didn't really care. Finally, someone listened to her bragging about her research and gave her a proper reaction! Whenever she talked about it to her sister-wives or Rei, they did listen but they were lackluster about it.

Evolving Sharingan was no big deal for a guy who created his own dimension. Nor did it matter to a woman who had Kekkei Tota and could create the biggest spy network, spanning the entire Elemental Nations, just with her paper abilities. Nor was the carefree, sweet Mei interested in hearing about anything icky like science. Nor did Ringo care since genetics was not sword-making or swinging.

The only person who listened to Tsunade gushing about her research was Pakura and even then she rolled her eyes at her more often than not before she returned to her paperwork or other administrative duty.

Tsunade lacked somebody who would give her a good reaction to her accomplishments!

"You... succeeded?" Hashirama swayed back. "W-who did you... who is the... whose Sharingan... I mean..."

Tobirama didn't even speak, he just looked deathly pale. Like a corpse.

"Ah, knock it off." Tsunade rolled her eyes at them, feeling smug to cause these two ninja idols to almost faint in front of her. "I only allowed one of my friends to have the evolution of Sharingan."

"Friend? With Uchiha?" Tobirama muttered in disbelief while inwardly musing, 'Did I fail to educate her?'

Hashirama, however, beamed at Tsunade, his worries forgotten. 'Looks like my granddaughter is walking in my footsteps!' He was delighted.

"The girl is a bit of a clutz but at worst, she will erase a mountain or two by coincidence. No biggie." Tsunade dismissively said.

And the worries of the two men came instantly back...

"Konoha sure got a lot stronger, huh?" Tobirama muttered, still not sure how to take such a powerful Uchiha being allowed to live. But he would give this... Uchiha 'clutz'... the benefit of the doubt. For Tsunade's sake.

"Eh? Konoha?" Tsunade furrowed her eyebrows at Tobirama who tilted his head at her reaction.

"Did I say something wrong?"

"Just... The Uchiha clan is no longer residing in Konoha, you know?" Tsunade started...

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"Just... The Uchiha clan is no longer residing in Konoha, you know?" Tsunade started...

Both Hashirama and Tobirama felt as if a bucket of cold water was just poured on them when they heard that. Both for different reasons.

Hashirama was bitter that this came to be. Konoha started with the Senju and the Uchiha clans and it should be continuing with them. He and his clan did so many sacrifices to keep it that way... to hear they were for naught was disheartening.

Tobirama felt elated but also conflicted.

On one hand, Uchiha-free Konoha was like a dream coming true for him. Finally, the ticking time bomb was away from his precious village! Whoever was responsible, Tobirama would love to congratulate them for being the biggest hero of Konoha!

On the other hand, he felt very conflicted because Uchihas were not all bad. He had a student, Kagami Uchiha, who was a nice lad. Tobirama did not dislike individuals. Rather, he didn't like the risks that particular clan was bringing to the table.

And in the end, the Uchiha clan was a part of Konoha's power. Losing them felt kind of sour for the Second Hokage despite his personal feelings. When he was the Hokage, he always strived to keep them 'controlled' but also to make them feel welcome in the village. He gave them the duty to police the village, after all. That was something every clan wanted and he relinquished it to Uchihas.

"What happened to them?" Tobirama asked with a grunt, not even bothering to contemplate the possibility that they could have gone extinct. No way that was the case. In his opinion, Uchiha's were like cockroaches.

Tsunade thought for a second if she should tell them the truth or not. She was not sure if she wanted them to spend more than a few hours in the land of the living or not. If they stuck around, the truth would eventually come out and if not, it wouldn't have mattered.

In the end, she just shrugged and decided to simply roll with it, "Danzo and Sarutobi drove them over the edge so the clan head and some of his most arrogant ponces wanted to stage a coup..." She purposefully trailed off, giving her flabbergasted ancestors time to think about her words.

Now even Hashirama was getting a bit angry but he kept it in, not outwardly showing it. He worked so much... did so much... sacrificed so much... even went against their clan's rules as clan head and made quite a few of his clansmen dissatisfied with him... all to bring the end to the Senju and Uchiha feud, and all of that was undone by his supposed successor? The Hokage?

What the hell!?

The knowledge that both of these men were Tobirama's students made it only worse.

"Sarutobi was his usual manipulative self and was purposefully pussy-footing around the issue, letting it grow bigger and bigger, building up the Uchiha's dissatisfaction with the village while Danzo flat out fed the flames behind the coup because he wanted some freshly harvested Sharingan and the supply was kinda low at that time." Tsunade lightheartedly continued.

Now... both Tobirama and Hashirama were battle-hardened veterans with kill count in hundreds, if not thousands, but their stomachs could not help but turn at how easily Tsunade was talking about harvesting parts of humans for their bloodline.

For a clan ninjas, such a thing was disgusting.

Tsunade was not disappointed and when she saw the twitches in her ancestors' expressions, she chuckled, "In the end, Danzo went behind Sarutobi's back and tricked one immensely talented but very naive Uchiha kid genius into killing off his own clan. Elderly, children, babies... it didn't matter. They were all supposed to die."

As talented and smart for his age as Itachi was... he was still a thirteen years old kid. Nobody could expect him to win in the manipulation department against old foxes like Sarutobi and Danzo. Still... Tsunade thought the notion that Konoha had to rely on one thirteen years old boy to deal with the Uchiha clan was ridiculous and she didn't understand why Itachi actually believed that.

He had options. He could have gone to another clan for help. Maybe that would have made him indebted to that clan but... clans like Nara, Yamanaka, or Akimichi, would definitely help him without asking an exorbitant price for it.

They simply were not dicks like Hyuugas.

At the very least, this way would have saved more Uchihas than just Itachi's brother.

But like a kid without much knowledge about how these things worked and what options he had to resolve such a bad situation, Itachi chose to be a good boy and do what Danzo was telling him.

It just shows that power is not really everything. Knowledge about your options is also a very important thing.

Tsunade was about to continue but, "So the Senju clan is the last remaining founding clan in Konoha, huh? That's kind of sad." Hashirama dejectedly said, his shoulders sagging in depression.

Since her grandfather interrupted her like this and brought up a quite important point, Tsunade decided to omit how the Uchiha clan survived and relocated to the village of her husband. It would need a lot of explanations and she was not in the mood for that.

She had no idea how accepting her ancestors would be of her decision to 'abandon' Konoha for Rei. Or about her usurping most of Hokage's privileges and becoming the Daimyo of Konoha. Or...

Well, there was a lot that could not be to their liking. She'd rather direct them straight at Sarutobi's ass rather than deal with all of that right now.

"Senju clan is extinct. I am the last one." Tsunade bluntly told them.

The things they were told up to now were shocking. But this was something that made them regret coming back to life. Something that hit them with enough force that if they had a working heart, they would get a heart attack.

Both of them were ninjas from the Warring States Era where the clan was above all. To hear said clan is extinct... Both Tobirama and Hashirama felt sick.

"B-But Nawaki! A-And the others? We intermarried a lot so..." Hashirama spluttered, trying to deny what Tsunade was telling him while Tobirama just stared at her, silently observing her expression and when he didn't find any form of mischief or falseness, bitter acceptance and anger started to rise in him.

"Nawaki died in the Second Ninja War, grandfather. Konoha sent him on a mission close to enemy lines despite him being the last male Senju." Tsunade bitterly spoke, still feeling resentment for that. "In hindsight, it should have been obvious to me. I only discovered what really happened decades later."

While Hashirama was having a small mental breakdown at the knowledge his line was all but culled out, Tobirama decided to retain his cold head and get some more information. "And the others? As my idiot brother already said, we intermarried a lot."

Despite mentioning that, he didn't have much hope. He didn't think Tsunade would disregard that fact.

"Checked blood tests," Tsunade shook her head, "Danzo was thorough enough to have every single person with Senju blood meet some unfortunate accident."

Tobirama's heart froze. "Danzo? You want to tell me my student is responsible for the demise of my clan?" He asked in an icy tone.

It has to be said, he did not just teach his students how to survive in the turbulent ninja world. He basically raised them as his own. He gave them access to resources they would never be privy to. Even Hiruzen, who was a member of the Sarutobi clan, would never get enough teaching material to learn all five chakra natures without access to the Senju library.

They were supposed to be far more than just 'students'. They were practically family. An honorary Senju. To hear this...

Tsunade sighed and nodded. As devious of her as this scene seemed, she was not really trying to manipulate them. This was something they had a right to know. As men who spent a massive part of their lives on bettering Konoha and serving their clan, they should be aware that their clan is considered extinct.

Keeping it secret would not be mercy. That would have been cruelty.

"Don't worry about it, I have already made him suffer a very cruel fate for someone like him." Tsunade snorted.

Both Hashirama and Tobirama wanted to protest but... they were dead. They guessed the future belonged to Tsunade now so they did not really have a justification to argue that point.

The atmosphere turned a bit gloomy because of the topic and Tsunade had one massive bomb to drop on them yet. With a sigh, she decided to rip it off like a band-aid. That was the best approach when dealing with ninjas.

"But you can have your way with the other culprit of our clan's demise. Sarutobi is still alive."

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Sarutobi is still alive."

"Sarutobi!?" Both Hashirama and Tobirama exclaimed in complete surprise.

"What do you mean by Sarutobi participating in..." Tobirama started, cutting himself off before finishing. Sarutobi was his successor whose role was to safeguard Konoha and its clans. To hear he had a part in the Senju clan extinction... Tobirama's mood darkened and he became sullenly contemplative.

'Did I choose my successor wrong?' Tobirama wondered as self-guilt started to flood his conscience. 'Should I have picked Kagami?'

Nobody would ever be able to answer that question for him.

While Tobirama was pondering about his life choices, Hashirama felt a rare twinge of anger seep on the surface. He was usually a very jovial man with a capacity to forgive a lot but this... this made him want to go and deal with the entire Sarutobi clan.

Such was the 'justice' and common sense of men raised in the Warring States era.

As he usually did when such a situation arose, Hashirama pushed this impulse down, knowing it would not solve anything. This time, however, he was not about to let it go. "What exactly was Sarutobi's part in that?"

"Honestly?" Tsunade wryly smiled, "From a certain standpoint, you can't really blame him nor his advisors, granduncle's other students. They had no direct involvement. They just knew about it and allowed it to happen. 'For the good of Konoha.' of course." She imitated Sarutobi's grave voice before snorting at the notion.

It was easy for her to talk about these things. Decades passed since her clan perished and her new family helped her to deal with it. She wasn't really even an adult when most of her clan members died so it had not that big of an impact on her. Yes, attending a funeral every other week was depressing but the biggest and most rememberable impact on her had Nawaki's death.

Unlike her, however, Tobirama and Hashirama died when the clan was still going strong. For them, it was like being taken from a time when everything was alright and put into a time when one of the most important things in their life was simply gone.

Tsunade's light-hearted manner of speaking and snarkiness did not carry the same humorous undertone for them as it did for her. In fact, it only fueled their anger.

That's why Tsunade was utterly surprised when the two men just walked towards the sealing barrier before turning towards her with an intense stare so similar to each other that there was no doubt they were brothers despite their ridiculously different hair coloring.

The purpose of their stare couldn't be more obvious. They were as if demanding for her to open a passage for them.

Sarutobi was almost a part of the family. To hear he just sat by and didn't even try to prevent the extinction of the Senju clan for his own selfish purposes...

He might not have killed them with his own hands or orders but in Tobirama's and Hashirama's opinions, what he did was bonafide betrayal regardless. They gave so much to the little shit and he couldn't even make sure their legacy would be preserved!?

It was such an outrageous thing they would normally question the truthfulness behind Tsunade's words. Alas, Hashirama's Senjutsu could discern between lies and truth quite well and his senses were telling him Tsunade was truthful to them. And since Hashirama looked so crushed, Tobirama also understood this was no distasteful joke.

His very own students turned out to be utter scumbags. The only good one was the Uchiha. The one he kept at arm's length.

What an irony...

Seeing their demanding determination, Tsunade inwardly chuckled as she opened a small passage through the barrier, letting the two previous Hokages enter the arena where Sarutobi and Orochimaru were still locked in an intense ninjutsu battle.

...

Orochimaru had a hard time. He was sweaty, panting, and under a lot of pressure as bullets of molten earth swished all around him.

He, however, refused to break his calm and collected facade in front of his former teacher.

The fact that Sarutobi was also heavily panting was the only highlight in his unpleasant situation for Orochimaru.

He tried everything. He fought Sarutobi in a weapon fight, clashing his extremely poisonous blade with his teacher's indestructible staff...

He only needed one goddamn cut to poison Sarutobi to death but apparently, the old monkey was prepared and eager to fight. Hence, Orochimaru could not land even one glancing blow. It was extremely infuriating and frustrating.

Orochimaru's ego actually wanted to sneer.

When the weapon-clashing led to nowhere, they started to use ninjutsu and the oldest trick in the book, deception. Orochimaru would love to think he returned as good as he received and Sarutobi's disheveled appearance would certainly be a good proof of that... but that was only because Orochimaru had to use his special life-saving skin-shedding four times already.

In short, a prepared Sarutobi was an exceedingly difficult opponent. If there was no sealing barrier around the arena, Orochimaru would have fled a long time ago.

As crafty as he was, matching Sarutobi's pure firepower was proving to be quite demanding.

Fortunately for him, the opening in the sealing barrier proved to be just enough distraction for Sarutobi to stop his onslaught of Jutsus. The old geezer still had more juice in the tank than his frail facade would suggest and Orochimaru found that the hard way.

Unfortunately for Orochimaru, he was not stupid enough to think he could use this opportunity to sneak attack Sarutobi. The opening Sarutobi showed as he slightly turned around was far too tempting and reeked of a newbie mistake. There was no way it was anything but bait.

As Orochimaru turned towards the opening, he suddenly saw two utterly pissed Senjus and instantly went deathly pale. He had enough problems with Sarutobi alone!

'Tsunade! You bitch! You said this was one on one!' Orochimaru seethed while sweat was pouring down his forehead.

He didn't want to die! He still had so many Jutsus to research! So many people to cut open! So many bloodline users to experiment on!

His journey for immortality could not end like this!

Orochimaru was desperately looking for a way to run away but... the more he looked, the more he realized just how tight the sealing barrier is. Not even the reverse summon seal responded and that scared him witless.

The last time he felt so powerless was when he fought against Hanzo the Salamander and he at least had his teammates with him there.

Unlike Orochimaru, Sarutobi felt relieved and smug. With Tobirama and Hashirama on his side, there was no way his slippery misbehaving student could run away!

He of course did not fully trust Tsunade's barrier Jutsu so Orochimaru getting away was a real concern for him.

But with two Hokages coming to help him...

'This will be your end, Orochimaru!' Sarutobi thought with determination, intent to wash off the biggest mistake of his life that was currently staring at the two Hokages with fright in his eyes.

Tobirama and Hashirama walked towards Sarutobi, intently staring at him.

"Hiruzen-" Tobirama started.

Sarutobi, however, did not want to give Orochimaru the time to prepare a counter-attack and escape plan!

"Tobirama-sensei, we can talk later." Sarutobi interrupted Tobirama with urgency in his tone as he didn't let his eyes wander off of Orochimaru's body. "Now we have to deal with my misguided student! You can't imagine what heinous deeds he-"

He didn't manage to finish his sentence. Tobirama had had enough and right in front of Orochimaru's eyes, a sight that made his jaw drop in utter bewilderment had just happened.

Tobirama grabbed Sarutobi's shoulder, instantly spreading restraining seals on him and immobilizing him. Sarutobi didn't even manage to widen his eyes in shock before he found himself bent over Tobirama's lap and then...

The chakra-enhanced spanking began and Sarutobi's painful howls were heard all around Konoha.

Orochimaru had to wince at every smack he witnessed and tighten his posterior when he saw how proficient and creative Tobirama was with the lighting chakra nature.

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While Sarutobi was getting spanked like a misbehaving unwanted child by pissed Tobirama, Orochimaru came face to face with an unamused Hashirama who had his arms crossed on his chest.

"You know..." Hashirama started, "I have no idea what problem you have with the foolish little monkey but attacking Konoha is going one step too far."

As he finished speaking, he unleashed the full brunt of his chakra's pressure upon Orochimaru, making his knees almost buckle. Only his long experience with life and death situations allowed Orochimaru to keep himself standing. His whole body, though, was slightly shivering from the passive killing intent Hashirama was releasing.

It was not full of hostility and ill intent like Orochimaru's was. Instead, it was somehow filled with disinterest and annoyance, only making Orochimaru that much more pissed. If he was reading Hashirama's killing intent right, the man didn't even consider him a warm-up!

Yet, whenever Orochimaru wanted to move, he would realize his body was fighting him.

'Is this the level of the first God of Ninjas? It is nothing like Sarutobi! They are totally in a different league!' Orochimaru was inwardly freaking out.

Unfortunately for Orochimaru, as Tsunade removed the restrictions on Hashirama and Tobirama, their Edo Tensei forms regained their full power. In front of Orochimaru was now standing Hashirama who could go one against one even with Kyuubi and easily have the upper hand.

Sweat poured from Orochimaru's forehead but the man still crazily smiled and playfully asked, "Why? Are you gonna spank me too?"

Hashirama's eyebrow twitched in a mild annoyance. "That... was gay."

Hearing that, Orochimaru's jaw dropped in speechlessness. He expected many types of responses but not that one. The worst part was that he was utterly unable to refute him since he recently possessed a female body.

It really made him wonder if there was no unexpected side-effect to his Possession Technique.

"Ah, whatever. Who am I to question your sexual orientation." Hashirama offhandedly shrugged and took a fighting stance.

Orochimaru would usually throw a hurtful remark back but with Hashirama focused on him, he could not let his concentration slip for some petty pre-fight trash talking.

It actually saved him too. In a blink of an eye, Hashirama was upon him, his fist razing its path towards Orochimaru's abdomen with bone-shattering force and Orochimaru only barely managed to twist out of its path thanks to how focused he was.

But...

He didn't get enough time to rejoice because a split of a second later, Hashirama's second fist found purchase on Orochimaru's jaw, causing his body to be catapulted back before it bounced on a floor a few times and stopped in an unmoving heap.

Hashirama definitely felt bones breaking upon his fist connecting but this was supposed to be one of Konoha's brightest and strongest. No way did the fight finish with just that. He knew he went down into history as a naive idiot, especially for giving other nations their bijuu... and he served his well-deserved no-Mito couch time for that... but he was not that naive.

Even his stunt with the bijuu was in hopes of preventing a senseless war. He might have miscalculated human nature there but it was not a decision made out of naivety.

"Cut the small tricks." He spoke towards the downed body of his opponent.

Orochimaru did not get up... instead, his body dissolved into the mud, causing Hashirama to lift his leg and stomp onto the ground with enough force that if the roof was not supported by the sealing barrier, it would have crumbled down.

Unfortunately for one Snake Sannin, that meant he was caught between the unmovable sealing barrier and the full brunt of Hashirama's stomp, reminding him of his academy history lesson where he learned that the First Hokage was the best sensor Konoha ever had. The force from the stomp pressed Orochimaru's body onto the barrier, squashing it so strongly blood flowed out of his mouth, eyes, and ears while multiple bones broke and muscles got mangled.

Hashirama watched as his opponent was turned into a gory pulp, inwardly sighing. Not everyone could be Madara and withstand his strength head-on. Not even Tobirama could match him in taijutsu.

But then something surprising happened. From the mouth of the mangled pulp, like a snake shedding its skin, another Orochimaru emerged and Hashirama had to prevent himself from retching.

The dude was completely covered in stinking saliva!

'Where does he go for ideas for these kinds of Jutsu! Did his teacher never teach him anything about propriety!?' Hashirama inwardly complained, taking a step back from the disgusting man. 'Somebody should have given him mental medical help a long time ago if this seems like a good technique to him.'

Tobirama, who was still inflicting untold atrocities upon Sarutobi's body by spanking him with various chakra natures, was actually quite impressed by the technique of Sarutobi's protege. Visuals aside... it was a masterpiece!

Alas, it was apparent the technique was not yet finished and even if it was, against his brother, it would be meaningless.

Just as the 'new' Orochimaru landed, he already had to swing his sword in order to prevent Hashirama from landing a blow on him...

Or so he attempted to do. Hashirama was a bit more experienced than Orochimaru accounted for, though. Instead of dodging the sword slash, Hashirama caught Orochimaru's wrist and broke it in one fluid twisting motion. With this motion, the sword's path also twisted, and before Orochimaru could even register the pain from his now broken wrist, his very own sword impaled him right through the center of his chest, causing his eyes to go wide in disbelief.

Hashirama relaxed his grip on Orochimaru's wrist, looking him straight into the eyes, "You are too slow." He said just as blood spurted out of Orochimaru's mouth, flowing down his chin.

The skin-shedding technique was no magic. It was a chakra technique and as such, needed preparation from its caster. It just so happened that Hashirama was much faster than Orochimaru's reaction time that Orochimaru did not manage to use his life-saving technique before the blow landed.

As the light was leaving Orochimaru's eyes and his eyelids started to drop, he lamented, 'I guess I will have to use my contingency measures. How... unfortunate.'

His soul left his body just as Hashirama sidestepped, letting it fall down onto the ground.

Outside of the arena, Tsunade watched the exchange and she had to admit, her grandfather was strong. No wonder people called him a legend.

She also relished Sarutobi's utter disbelief and hurt look when the sword entered Orochimaru's chest. The old monkey did not enjoy seeing his misguided student dying.

'Who knows... maybe I will be lucky and this will finally mentally break him enough to stop meddling in the politics of the village.' Tsunade wistfully thought, knowing it was just not to be. Sarutobi was getting very close to the 'need to get rid of with my own hands' category in Tsunade's books.

As she contemplated these things, she suddenly felt something peculiar and chuckled.

Orochimaru's soul did not dissipate as is natural for dead people. Instead, it was being pulled in a certain direction... only to be met with an impenetrable wall in the form of the sealing barrier.

'Heh, the sucker definitely did not think that an anti-spiritual barrier would be a thing.' Tsunade snorted as she manipulated the barrier, causing Orochimaru's soul to be stuffed into a vial she took out from her pocket.

She looked at the bluish wispy substance in the vial and cooed, "So you want to be immortal?" Her lips stretched into a massive smile before she giddily added, "You can be my immortal guinea pig, then!"

Just his luck that Tsunade was in a dire need of somebody she could kill and resurrect as many times as she wanted in order to progress with her current research.

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While Tsunade was dealing with Orochimaru and Sarutobi, Ringo faced off A and B who were clearly prepared for this attack.

'Cute. They actually spend time planning a strategy against me.' Ringo thought with an inward chuckle. 'I wonder if the musclehead joined Orochimaru only to have a go at me.'

It wasn't a coincidence that B was here, prepared to double-team Ringo with A. Kumo no longer had two bijuu, so having their biggest weapon outside of the borders of their village, much less their country, was something no Kage would allow. The second B appeared at the gates of Konoha, red alarms were instantly ringing in many heads.

Not that Ringo cared about that particular thing. But it was a nice way of provoking her enemy so...

"Tell me, Raikage, do you think your village would survive an attack with your biggest defensive tool out here?" Ringo smirked, clearly addressing B's presence.

"Heh, there is no need to worry about that." A dryly chuckled as he was standing up, his senses trained on Ringo. She totally caught him off guard with the last lighting beam attack and he just barely managed to dodge. If she hit his head with that, it would have been game over for him.

"Yeah! Bro is right, you underestimate Kumo's might! Kono-yaro, baka-yaro!" Killer B rapped before... "Wheeeee!"

Both Ringo and A looked at him with dull gazes, resisting their urges to facepalm.

With a twitching eyebrow, Ringo tried to continue as if she did not just see... that. "I have no idea where such confidence comes from." She mirthfully laughed but to A's ears, it was a cold and ruthless sound full of mockery. "With the village's defenses so weakened, some nefarious party might take advantage of the poor defenseless Kumo. Who knows if the next time you visit it will still be under your rule." She smugly stated.

A was visibly angry at that insinuation but he was doing a great job at keeping himself in line. "Empty words!" He scoffed in response. "You are just trying to rile me up, bitch. We both know Kiri does not have such resources. Especially not when their Kage is away."

Despite the insult, the smirk did not fall from Ringo's face. "Maybe I am just spouting hot air to provoke you, or maybe I am not and your village is indeed under siege as we speak. Does it even matter?" She licked her lips, knowing full well the second option was the correct answer. Not that she was obliged to tell Raikage that. "You are here to kill me. Give it your best shot."

It has to be said, Ringo did hold a grudge for her defeat at A's hands when she first fought him. It was humiliating and Rei had to save her which only increased her embarrassment. Not to mention her body was an utter wreck afterward.

And as a responsible Mizukage, she naturally had to think of her reputation and return such humiliation in full.

'Sigh. Being Kage is troublesome.' Ringo thought. 'But the occasional violence is sure making up for the dull parts!' With that, a blade appeared in her right hand, coming out of a storage seal tattooed on her wrist.

When A saw the blade, his eyes shook. "Are you mocking me?" He gritted his teeth.

The sword was a totally normal katana, not even made of chakra metal. It might as well be a wooden stick in front of someone like Raikage. Ringo intending to use it against him was clearly a very deep insult to his pride.

Ringo did not reply. She just smiled and... charged at both B and A.

After all, there was no need to give them more time to prepare by talking to them. As if Raikage really cared if she faced him with an iron katana or not. He was a ninja and in collective ninja books, anything that made the opponent easier to kill was an advantage. There was no way A would complain about the katana Ringo was using if he didn't need to stall for time.

Ringo's first slash was a wide arc aimed at both A and B since they stood quite close to each other. It was no wonder they both dodged it, but Ringo's aim was mostly to separate them, which she accomplished. A jumped back to the right while B to the left.

They didn't manage to even land and Ringo already spun on her heel before chasing after B, brandishing her sword with considerable force.

When A saw that, he inwardly cursed. Ringo clearly would not give them enough time to prepare a combo attack. She was also too strong to fight alone so he instantly leaped towards B, managing to spark his Lightning Chakra Armor back into existence from sheer desperation.

In the meantime, B whipped out one of his swords and blocked Ringo's slash... only to realize he severely underestimated the petite woman's strength as his body was sent sliding back on the ground while his entire arm vibrated from the impact.

While B was wrestling with the basics of physics, Ringo half-turned around, pointing at A who was halfway through the distance towards her and B, his face showing iron-clad determination as lightning danced around his body.

"Kirin!" Ringo intoned and lightning suddenly fell from the clear sky at invisible speeds, right on top of the charging A, stunning him into a halt.

Ringo's Kirin was so fast, even Lightning Armor wearing Raikage could not react fast enough to evade it. But for such a speed, potency had to be sacrificed. A was not hurt. His Lightning Armor tanked all of the damage, but Ringo's goal was accomplished.

Because of the clash of lightning energies right on top of his body, A was left considerably disoriented, giving her a few seconds of 'alone time' with B.

Knowing she really had just a bit of time, Ringo didn't dally and turned back towards B, who was just getting his balance back, and started waving her sword at him in slashes from various sides, forcing him to defend without break.

The difference between them was apparent from the first look.

While Kumo taught swordsmanship a lot, they seldom produced known master swordsmen. B was good but he was far from Ringo's level.

Finally, his arm could not handle the sword waving at Ringo's speeds and Ringo managed to smack the sword out of his hand... making B momentarily defenseless. Ringo's hand snapped forward...

B was about to enter the bijuu mode, Konoha be damned, since he didn't have enough time to take out another sword, but Ringo was much faster than he thought and her palm landed on his shoulder.

Before he could even register what had happened, he poofed out of existence.

It just so happened that A recovered his wits a few moments prior and witnessed the scene. "B!" He cried out.

Ringo turned towards him and rolled her eyes. "Don't worry, he was just sent to a place where a special opponent is waiting for him. Have no fear. Everything is according to the plan."

With those words, A's eyes grew wide as he realized just how prepared his enemies were for this attack. It was them who were supposed to stage an ambush and deal with most threats before they could realize they were being attacked. But apparently, the entire plan was a failure from the very start!

"Now then," Ringo smirked, "we can now fully enjoy some quality one on one time, no?" She said and released her bottled-up killing intent that was accumulating for over a decade, her smirk becoming colder. "I still owe you for messing up my face with that punch all those years ago!"

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Despite being a battle and sword maniac, Ringo was still a woman. Having her face messed up... and especially having Rei see her right after A landed that bone-shattering blow on it... Ringo slightly shuddered in self-pity. Her love saw her when her face was basically turned to a gory mush! She was already not the most womanly girl out there but this made her self-confidence take yet another hit.

In short, a grudge formed in her heart. It might not have been a grudge strong enough to make her trek into Kumogakure and trash it but it was a grudge nevertheless. Now that she had an opportunity to return it, there was no way she would pass up on it.

A nervously gulped when he felt the menacing aura all around the petite redhead in front of him but what could he do? There was nothing else for him than to try and fight.

Their respective Lightning Armors flared into existence around both combatants at the same time, sending screeching and chirping sounds all over the surroundings while cracking the ground under them from the force of their chakra.

Despite his nervousness, A was an easily riled-up man. Just the fact Ringo did not even deem it necessary to draw out her sword yet, made him feel insulted. The woman totally intended to fight him with just her fists!

Ringo quickly realized his thought process from the subtle shift in his expression and to push him over the edge, she knowingly grinned at him.

A's expression twisted even more as he huffed like a bull, and charged...

Ringo didn't move. She simply stood in her spot and waited for A. Thanks to her heightened reflexes and reaction speed, it was a child's play to react to the quick punch as he appeared in front of her.

Instead of blocking, a kunai fell into her hand from her sleeve, and with the flick of her wrist, she sent it on its way while imbuing it with her chakra...

Time as if stopped for A and his pupils dilated as he noticed the kunai coated with concentrated lightning chakra razing its path through the air towards his neck from below.

His punch was almost upon Ringo... and the batshit crazy woman was still looking into his eyes, smiling, not moving even an inch except throwing that kunai.

'She... She is testing me!?' A realized, causing him a big inward disturbance.

He realized Ringo wanted to see if he would get hit by her attack for the sake of landing that punch, or if he would abandon his attack in order to dodge. A was fine with being injured. Wounds were a part of his profession but this was something else! Whether his punch or that kunai... it could easily kill an average ninja thrice over! These were not the kind of techniques you just wait to be hit with.

'I knew it! She is a total whacko!' A inwardly screamed while using chakra to allow his momentum to shift as he quickly jumped away from Ringo, barely evading the thrown kunai.

Ringo's crimson hair wildly flailed in the burst of wind A's quick movements caused, but the curious smile on her face did not cease.

"You dodged... that was unexpected." She chuckled and tilted her head as her smile widened, her eyes slightly brightening while A felt uncomfortable with her looking at him as if she was studying him. "You will have to be faster if you want to hit me like that."

A prided himself in being one of the fastest ninjas so being told he was too slow was a direct hit to his pride. Snarling, he disappeared in a burst of lightning chakra as he fed more and more of his reserves into his lightning chakra armor.

Ringo's eyes slightly widened... and her hand shot up with lightning-fast reflexes, her fingers tightly curling around A's wrist and stopping his fist an inch from her face. "That's more like it." She whispered.

A tried to yank his hand away but Ringo's grip on his wrist was inhumanly tight for a woman of her stature. His sense of danger suddenly wildly flared...

From the perspective of the people outside the Kage Box, the entire Kage Box suddenly exploded with loud screeching and sparks of lightning wildly dancing all around it as a lightning strike fell from the sky once again straight in the middle of the Kage Box with a loud thunderclap, deafening those in the arena. For a brief moment, the surroundings were bathed in blinding blue.

After the attack passed, what was previously the Kage Box, was now mostly rubble and the air was full of dust clouds.

A coughed, breathing hard and feeling extremely sore all over his body. There would definitely be some bruises on his body comes tomorrow but he was still whole. That was all that mattered.

"Heeh~, I guess we are more similar than I thought." Ringo giggled from behind the dust cloud. A turned in the direction of the sound and could only see a dark outline of a person. "You seem like a total musclehead but your head is not totally empty, is it? To think you would stop the brunt of my attack by applying a counter explosion of lightning chakra in my direction... marvelous usage of our chakra nature." Ringo praised in an amused tone.

The dust in the air slowly cleared as the air breezed through the Kage Box, and A could now see Ringo's state.

"Are you mad?" He quietly muttered, barely audibly enough for Ringo to hear.

Ringo's clothing was reduced to scraps that barely covered her modesty... only a bra and shorts remained that curiously did not sport any signs of being damaged by the wild lightning chakra. Other clothing of hers was utterly shredded.

Her well-toned figure would otherwise be mouth-watering for most but right now, her whole body was littered in nasty dark purple bruises. A wondered how the woman could still stand, much less be so carelessly smiling.

"Am I?" Ringo burst out with laughter. "Hmm... you do not realize it? Just luck, then, I guess."

Ringo was inwardly shocked, to say the least. She thought her opponent finally found the weakness of her counter-move against his lightning armor but... apparently not.

The thing was... countering worked both ways. The frequencies of lightning simply countered and nullified each other. Ringo just came out on top because she was aware of that fact and could reapply her lightning in an instant. It was so fast that it seemed as if hers was not nullified.

"No matter." Ringo sighed and flooded her body with Crimson's chakra from within her, healing her body at a visible pace. 'I was careless. I did not use Senjutsu nor Crimson's chakra in my Lightning Armor so A was able to counter it.' She inwardly grimaced. 'Good that neither Konan nor Rei saw it or I would have been grounded.'

It was invisible outwardly but after her body was healed, Crimson's chakra seeped into Ringo's skin and muscles, toughening them considerably as a defensive measure.

A's jaw dropped when he saw the bruises on Ringo disappearing one by one, leaving only unblemished skin. He thought he could eventually wear her down and when he saw how damaged she already was, he was on cloud nine but...

'What a freak...' He bitterly thought.

The win condition has just gotten much harder for him.

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Seeing that A just stood in his place, staring at her with visible indignation, Ringo frowned.

"Well? What are you waiting for? Come at me!" She exclaimed in dissatisfaction. "You wanted revenge enough to drag your entire village into a war! What are you waiting for!? I stand right in front of you! Come on and attack!"

Those words were enough to get A out of his stupor and cause his determination to return.

"Yes, that's more like it." Ringo whispered when she saw the shift in A's expression, her tone full of dark glee as her lips widened into an excited smile and her brown eyes gleamed. "Come at me with the intent to kill. Don't stop now. Our fun is just starting!"

The two rushed at each other with a burst of speed, appearing in the middle of the Kage Box just a split of a second afterward...

Ringo was about to catch A's opening punch with her hand but A, knowing how powerful the deceptively frail woman was, instantly retracted his right arm and instead his left sprang forward, aiming at Ringo's outstretched hand with the intent to break it.

In response, Ringo just slightly swayed on her feet, causing A to miss by a slight margin, before she spun on her heel, using the momentum to get her previously outstretched arm away from A's reach, and also as a driving force behind her upcoming high kick.

Knowing what was coming, A raised his arms into a guarding position in front of his chest and caught Ringo's kick with his forearms as loud thunder-like sound resounded through the surroundings when lightning met lightning. A managed to tank the hit without being pushed back overly much thanks to the fact, he spread the force evenly over the surface of his lightning chakra armor.

Not even a moment passed, and both A and Ringo disappeared in a burst of speed, separating from each other...

Only to appear in the exact same spot a split of a second later, this time Ringo blocking A's attempt at Lariat with her left hand, sliding on the ground for a few meters due to the kinetic force of A's attack.

Powerful she may be but her frame was still less than half of his. Size mattered...

Ringo swung her free hand in a follow-up attack, aiming to deliver a gut-wrenching punch into A's abdomen but A disappeared with a blue flash before her punch could land.

A small frown appeared on Ringo's lips before she also disappeared from her spot, only for A to appear near it, seemingly punching an air... or rather, the same place where Ringo's head was just a moment ago.

A's eyes widened, and he promptly disappeared in a speed untrackable by the eyes of a normal human, only for Ringo to appear right above the place where he stood just a split of a second ago, and deliver a crushing heel kick onto the ground, cracking it throughout half of the Kage Box.

This kind of exchange continued, both combatants appearing and disappearing before an attack could land.

Occasionally, they locked their fists or an attack got blocked when one got slower or quicker and caught up to the other but a decisive blow was nowhere to be seen.

Because of that, A's confidence started to slowly increase.

He could do this! He was matching the mad lunatic blow for blow! All he needed was a good opportunity and he could take her out for good!

Just the idea of killing the red-haired woman responsible for the death of his fiance filled him with more determination and intent to kill.

The clash got fiercer and fiercer as shockwaves full of lightning started erupting every time their blows met, which started to become more frequent as time went on. A was getting faster, he could feel it! He was starting to match Ringo's pace!

'I can do this!' He thought with self-assurance. The woman who faced one on one against a bijuu was not so tough, after all! 'With her death, I will be again a step closer to the greatness of my father!'

He couldn't help but get giddy and his chakra showed it. The hum of his lightning armor became more frequent and energetic as A's battle intent soared and his speed increased yet again.

Ringo calmly blocked his last attack, putting her palm on his wrist and redirecting the punch before it could reach her.

She was not channeling too much of her chakra for this fight. Not at all. Instead of brute-forcing it, she simply used technique and reflexes to make sure A's punches would not reach her body.

A went ferociously on the offensive, showering Ringo with punch after punch, each more powerful and quicker than the last, going so far as to release lightning strikes with each punch from the sheer speed and concentration of lightning chakra behind them.

And yet... the crimson-haired woman stood her ground and with minimal movements, always pushed A's blows away from herself.

The room around them was no longer recognizable and even the rubble was getting destroyed at an increasing pace as A's lightning chakra struck wherever Ringo redirected it... which was basically all around her and sometimes even outside of the Kage Box.

Ringo was actually proud of herself! A might not have noticed yet but she did kill quite a few Konoha invaders by just redirecting A's lightning strike punches.

Some of which were Kumo ninjas.

But when A didn't notice even the third Kumo ninja getting roasted with a stray shot of his, Ringo started to get a bit annoyed. It was time for the muscle-head to notice.

Ringo actually found the perfect target for that too!

Seeing as A's next punch was quickly approaching, she prepared and a grin appeared on her face, causing A to realize that something was wrong...

But he was unable to stop his momentum before Ringo already redirected his punch.

This time, he was fully aware that Ringo had an ulterior motive so he actually checked where his punch was going to land and...

"Mabu-!" A cried out as he noticed the lightning strike from his punch heading towards the unguarded back of his secretary and lover who was fighting with one of Konoha's ninjas in the stands of the arena.

Unfortunately for A, this distraction was enough for Ringo to capitalize, and before he finished Mabui's name, Ringo's fist embedded itself into A's face, breaking his nose and some teeth and snapping his head back before his body caught up with the momentum of the punch and was sent flying a bit back, rolling on the ground until it was stopped by a small part of a wall that was not yet demolished.

Ringo looked at the downed A and... "That... was so satisfying!" She exclaimed before she sighed in utter content. "You have no idea how long I wanted to just sucker punch you like that, you bastard." She lightly added just as A started slowly standing up.

The second Ringo's eyes met A's, she could see an unbridled fury in them at her little scheme.

"Y-, You! Killing my fiance was not enough for you!? Now you need to attack my current lover too!?"

Ringo raised her eyebrow in amusement at that.

Well, sucks to be him. They were ninjas and exploiting one's weaknesses was a significant part of their profession. It wasn't as if A never did something similar.

But now that he mentioned it...

'That dark-skinned woman is his current lover, huh? I had no idea.' Ringo thought, her lips twitching in amusement at the coincidence.

But now that she knew... A plan started forming in Ringo's mind.

'Nice of him to inform me.' She inwardly chuckled.

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The only reason why A didn't explode in an impotent rage was that he noticed Samui pushing Mabui out of the trajectory of his deflected attack before she barely managed to evade it herself.

It was obvious the feat took a lot from the panting Samui. A was actually very flabbergasted that she managed to pull it out. She might have been a Kumo jonin but reacting to his top speed was a feat of its own.

Ringo curiously observed as Samui rescued the dark-skinned secretary of the Raikage, not reacting or trying to intervene at all. She was quite impressed with what she saw and a spark of curiosity was lit in her.

A saw Ringo's eyes linger in Mabui's direction and he didn't like it at all. A frown appeared on his face. He didn't like the red-haired bitch's attention on his lover! Nothing good could come from that!

He pushed himself back onto his feet, ignoring the sting coming from his nose and mouth, and clenched his fists in anger.

"I am here you bitch! Where are you looking!" A screamed and charged at the distracted Ringo.

Ringo used her small stature and ducked under A's swing, but she couldn't capitalize on his brief opening because A's left leg instantly sprang up, attempting to deliver a kick to her gut.

Ringo disappeared before the kick could land and reappeared a few feet away from A, her eyebrows furrowed as she wondered what got his panties in a twist.

A didn't even notice as he dashed at Ringo again, cracking the floor underneath him with every step.

This time, Ringo blocked the punch with her palm and sidestepped the following kick before she sent her own counter-kick which was promptly evaded by A and the two took a distance from each other again.

Not a split of a second later, the lightning armor's around them buzzed as they clashed once again, exchanging a blur of attacks before they separated.

This kind of exchange continued for a few rounds and it would go on for much longer if a distraction didn't interrupt them.

As A was about to rush at Ringo for the n-th time, frustrated that he still could not deliver a proper blow at Ringo but still confident because she didn't hit him either if he didn't count the earlier punch, he was suddenly stopped in his tracks when his ears recognized a familiar voice.

"Raikage-sama!/A-sama!" Two female voices exclaimed from what was previously the entrance to the Kage Box.

Both A and Ringo turned to the newcomers, A inwardly scared witless as his senses entered overdrive and zoomed on Ringo's action, while Ringo had cat-like half-lidded eyes and an amused smile on her lips.

She was happy they finally showed up.

In fact, she observed them with her sensory abilities while she fought A and knew they headed in this direction.

And to be frank, fighting A was getting a bit boring. She welcomed the distraction.

One of the two females was Mabui, Raikage's secretary, while the other was Samui, one of Raikage's guards.

Mabui clenched her fists. She seemed eager, maybe even desperate, to leap into the battle in order to help A, and only the fact she was too experienced to let her emotions rule her prevented her from rushing in.

Samui drew her sword upon seeing Ringo's attention on them... but her hands visibly trembled. She knew this battle was above her paygrade but sometimes, you simply are not afforded the luxury of picking your fights.

When Ringo saw how the pitiful girl reacted to a bit of her killing intent... okay, maybe that 'bit' was a bit too high for your everyday ninja... she was a bit disappointed. But the determination behind those clear blue eyes... now that piqued Ringo's interest further.

"You fools! What are you doing here!? Go away!" A loudly shouted, trying to make them take a hint without being too obvious so Ringo would not notice his feelings about the situation.

He really felt cornered right now.

Defending himself from Ringo? That much he could do.

Fighting her while defending his lover? He wasn't sure about that.

Funnily enough, the thought of defending Samui never crossed his mind. Nobody could really blame him for it, though. As grateful as he was for Samui saving Mabui earlier, he didn't have the leisure to be sure of his ability to protect his loved person so there was no need to contemplate his ability to choose the life and death of some unimportant guard in this battle.

As much as A tried to hide it, Ringo easily picked up on his unease but she did nothing. She simply enjoyed the emotional pressure her proximity to Mabui caused to A.

"We have come to help you, A-sama." Mabui spoke with conviction.

It had to be said, not just anyone could become the secretary of a Kage. Mabui was not some random chunin. She was actually one of the best jonins Kumo had to offer so even if she would not necessarily be able to win against Ringo in a fight, she was ready to lay down her life in order to help A.

Samui just nodded in agreement, her eyes not leaving Ringo. She was still slightly trembling but her body and mind were slowly getting used to the killing intent.

Ringo wondered about that and with a veiled smirk, she was slightly increasing the pressure. Not in a noticeable amount. Just enough that an experienced kunoichi like Samui would not just instantly get used to it while also making sure she would not notice.

She simply wanted to see how far she could push the girl before she crumbled. It was painfully obvious that from the three Kumo ninjas, the busty blonde was the least experienced.

Yet, most intriguing for Ringo.

A didn't like what he was hearing but there was no time to scream himself hoarse at them. He had a dangerous threat in front of him and even a small slip in his attention could prove fatal. As much as he hated it, there was no other way than to let them stay and fight by his side.

"Fine." He grumpily spoke, "Mabui, take care of the defense and long-range support, Samui, melee offense with me."

Of course, giving Mabui the safest job was totally intentional.

"Cool." Samui muttered, not really expecting any different. Her tone was even and dry with a smidge of emotionlessness but if one really tried, the underlying nervousness could still be heard in the woman's voice.

"Are you sure the girl can take the fight? Just look at her, she is trembling from fear." Ringo mockingly remarked while smugly grinning at A.

"She is a proud Kumo kunoichi! She will do her duty!" A bellowed.

Ringo opened her mouth in order to deliver another witty remark but she was interrupted as both A and Samui rushed at her.

They were clearly not interested in talking.

The first to enter the fight was A, simply because the man was far faster than Samui. He tried to deliver a punch at Ringo's chest, trying to distract her from Samui's attack. Just because he put the woman in a very risky position didn't mean he would not try to help ease the danger to her.

But A got a nasty surprise the second he engaged Ringo in combat.

Ringo was no longer interested in playing with A. Instead of humoring him and blocking his hits with pure technique and a bit of lightning chakra, this time she exerted a bit more of her expertise, power, and skill.

A barely saw as Ringo's body suddenly accelerated beyond his wildest imagination and Ringo's hand clutched around the wrist of his incredibly fast punching hand.

His pupils constricted but Ringo was too fast and before he could react, she already spun on her heels, using the momentum to force A's body off the ground and throwing him away.

The next thing A knew was that his body was flying through the air... before it was stopped by slamming into the wall, crumbling it on impact with a loud crash.

Unlike Ringo expected, Samui did not stop her attack just because her leader was defeated in one exchange of blows, which only made Ringo more curious about the expressionless blond.

After her throw of the Raikage, Ringo quickly drew one of her sheathed swords and quickly turned around before blocking a slash from Samui's katana, sparks flying around as the two blades ground against each other.

Ringo's lips stretched into a Cheshire grin as she measured the strength behind Samui's sword, "Don't disappoint me, Kumo girl." She whispered and that was the only warning Samui got before...

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While Ringo was amusing herself with A, B found himself in an unfamiliar place and instantly got on guard. He also tried to disrupt his chakra flow to mitigate any possible illusions but... nothing happened.

That told him this was not an illusion and he was indeed transported... somewhere.

This was stirring a strange feeling of deja-vu inside of him, one he didn't like at all so he decided the situation needed a few good rhymes to alleviate his nervousness.

"Oi, Hachibi, this feels like the work of the flash, we should prepare for a hard clash, yo!"

Despite the cheerfulness of his voice, beads of sweat started to appear on his forehead. He wasn't afraid for himself. He was the mighty Hachibi jinchuuriki and the best rapper under the sun, Killer Bee! Kono yaro, baka yaro!

No, he was afraid for the safety of his good brotha A. The thought of the Fifth Mizukage being capable of transporting him away with just a touch just like Yellow Flash... B didn't like the sound of that. He was not stupid. Just sometimes brash.

It was then he heard a soft giggle from behind him and abruptly turned around!

Only for his dark complexion to drastically pale as he spotted his opponent.

"Haa~, this is unfair." B dryly said, his shoulders slumping as he even forgot to make a rhyme out of his sentence.

Mei chuckled and, "Ah, grow a pair." She amusedly finished the rhyme for him with her hand on her hip in a completely relaxed way.

B's eyes sparkled at that and his uneasiness completely vanished. He whipped out his personal rhyme book and started writing the rhyme he just heard into it.

Seeing him, Mei's eyebrows momentarily furrowed as she wondered what that was about but then her eyes gleamed in the exact same way B's did when she suddenly had an idea.

'Oh, I see! He must really like rhymes as I like making harmless Jutsu!'

That made sense to her. She heard his peculiar predisposition for rapping but she didn't expect him to be so driven! If this was the case, he definitely must be as good in his hobby as she was in hers.

Mei could admire that kind of dedication and patiently waited for B to finish.

Needless to say, she was supremely glad neither Rei nor Konan observed her because letting her opponent have the time to make a proper strategy was the very first thing they had beaten out of her. But apparently, she needed remedial classes for that lesson.

The sweat on B's forehead increased. He expected an attack the second he started writing into his heavenly book of knowledge! Everybody got pissed at being ignored and instantly attacked him, giving him the upper hand of deciding how to counter-attack!

But his opponent didn't attack this time!

'As expected from the first SS-rank kunoichi! She is not falling for my scheme, she knows her stuff to the extreme!'

'B, I think you should focus.' The irked voice of Hachibi resounded through B's mind.

'Right-o, partner!' B replied and started to devise a battle strategy while pretending to write into his book. As taken off-guard by Mei's actions as he was, he was also still a ninja and could make use of the opportunity presented to him.

Of course, the previous rhyme was already written down. He would not let it be forgotten!

That's why when half a minute later he finally put the notebook back in his pocket and looked at Mei... their eyes barely met and red chakra instantly engulfed B as he started turning into Hachibi, releasing an oppressive pressure all around.

His transformation did not take even three seconds, which was impressive in itself, and at the end of it, there was only a crimson-haired girl facing a huge eight-tailed monster in a grassy clearing surrounded by trees.

Any other ninja in Mei's situation would be shitting their pants after being stared at by Hachibi but...

"Final form right from the start?" Mei asked with a calm smile, cocking her head to the side in interest.

"I am sorry but I can't hold back. You are a tad bit too strong for that. Let's roll, Hachibi! Wheee!"

B wasn't about to entertain Mei's childishness. He at the very least recognized this was a dangerous situation for him and acted as such.

Before Mei could even retort to his statement, she received a point-blank bijuudama straight in her face... or rather, at her position... causing the surrounding land to tremble from the powerful explosion that engulfed the entire clearing and created a massive crater while ripping multiple trees from the ground alongside their roots before the following shockwaves proceeded to throw them back and crush them into a powder midair.

The resounding earthquake and big angry red ball of doom caused by the explosion of the bijuudama were heard and seen even in Konoha despite the massive distance between the place and the village.

And then the red ball cracked, causing the heatwave to hit... evaporating everything in a three-kilometer radius, leaving the land barren of all life.

B waited with abated breath as the dust cloud started setting in the unnatural silence after the explosion.

Half of him refused to believe an SS-rank ninja would be felled so easily and another half wanted to desperately believe his attack worked.

His hopes were, however, completely dashed as a cheerful voice resounded through the area and the wind slightly picked up, revealing Mei patting the soot away from her shoulders.

"Hum, passable destructive capability." She nodded, still sporting her easy-going smile on her face.

"I knew it wouldn't be so simple. This is quite the pickle." B muttered in a disheartened tone under his nose but because of his Hachibi form, his voice could be heard kilometers away.

Mei giggled at that. "Of course, it won't, silly! We are just warming up! I always wanted to fight a bijuu but it just had to be that hag who got the first chance." She pouted.

Her face was so expressive, B almost started pitying her but he caught himself in time, suddenly having an internal turmoil. He wondered if this was some kind of genjutsu supposed to make him sympathize with his enemy but...

Once again, he didn't find any trace of foreign chakra in his system.

'This woman is weird.' B thought.

'More like touched in the head.' Hachibi snarkily replied before quietly murmuring Not that you of all people would recognize such a state.'

'Huh? You said something, partner?' B mentally tilted his head.

'No, B. Nothing important.' Hachibi deeply sighed, knowing this was a lost cause. No matter what he said, B would not correct his behavior. He tried. For years. And here they were... 'You better prepare. She is going to attack soon.'

Realizing the truth behind Hachibi's statement, B once again focused on the battle where Mei was just finishing complaining left and right about this or that small detail in her personal feud with Ringo.

"But have no fear! I finally got permission to fight you from hubby! He even told that hag to help you get to me! Hehehe!" Mei cheerfully chirped, almost bouncing in her spot with shining eyes.

For some reason, B had a bad premonition that-

"In my own final form, at that!" Mei added and chakra engulfed her, causing her to transform into a titanic form of nine-tailed of the same color as Mei's hair.

Needless to say, both Hachibi and B were stunned speechless, and rooted in their spots at the sight.

--

Author Note:

Sorry guys, I just needed a small break from Ringo's plotline since ideas were running a bit dry.

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"Don't disappoint me, Kumo girl." She whispered and that was the only warning Samui got before...

Ringo intended to go into the offensive for the first time but she was interrupted as a massive explosion rocked the entire village before an earthquake hit, causing most ninjas to lower their stability center in order to keep standing.

Many looked towards the place where the explosion occurred, only to see a massive big orange ball.

And while there were a lot of ninjas that had no idea what caused it, quite a lot of Kumo jonin were aware of Killer B's ability to transform into Hachibi. There were also a lot of Konoha's survivors of the Kyuubi attack and they witnessed a few similar balls in the past.

"Bijuudama..." Mabui muttered, inwardly wondering what could force B to transform and use his most dangerous attack. 'That would explain why he is not here, guarding A-sama as he should.'

'So they are already fighting. Hope the pipsqueak is satisfied with this and won't bother me in the foreseeable future.' Ringo inwardly mused, looking in the direction where the loud explosion came from.

Mei could be extremely annoying when she wanted something and that brought Ringo quite the headache before she relented and promised Mei to deliver Hachibi to her.

Samui was just as surprised as Mabui but she kept her cool and instead of gawking like a civilian, she noticed their opponent's attention slip from them... a kunai coated in lightning chakra instantly headed in Ringo's direction.

Alas, it was just wishful thinking and Samui inwardly cursed when Ringo, not even deeming to look in the direction of the attack, raised her hand and caught the fast kunai by its handle, not bothered in the least by the intense lightning chakra still crackling around it.

Ringo looked at the kunai with a raised eyebrow and a pleased smirk. "That... was really cold-hearted of you. To think you would be an honorless swine who attacked people's backs. As expected from a Kumo ninja." She quipped in a reproachful tone.

Inwardly though, Ringo snickered. 'Pot calling kettle black. Almost always works.'

Samui didn't reply but from the corner of her eye, Ringo could see the girl did not falter at her words at all. In fact, the girl actually got more on guard. Ringo's smirk slightly widened in satisfaction before she flicked her wrist and threw the kunai in Mabui's direction at speeds Samui could not intervene with.

The blond lass tried but before she even registered what was happening, the kunai was already halfway through its path...

Mabui's eyes widened and she tried to move out of the path but... her eyes were faster than her body and it was obvious she would not make it.

When the two women thought there was no chance... blue lightning appeared in front of Mabui just in time to deflect the kunai, revealing the form of A who was angrily frowning and glaring at Ringo. "Aren't you too an honorless swine? Attacking Mabui like this!?" He bellowed.

"Meh," Ringo casually shrugged. "I saw you preparing to launch an attack at my back. What better way to stop that than to force you to save your lover's life?"

A didn't have a retort to that so he just kept silently glaring at Ringo while Mabui was almost hyperventilating behind his back, coming to terms with her near brush with death.

Now she understood why A didn't want her to interfere. This was not a fight where she had a chance to survive if Ringo wasn't playing with them. Fortunately, she had A to protect her and was delegated to a long-range support role.

For a split of a second, a pity for Samui flashed through Mabui's head. The second their opponent decides to get rid of the blonde, there was no chance A could save her. Not when she was supposed to engage the Fifth Mizukage in melee combat.

But the pity was gone as fast as it came. This was Samui's role as Raikage's guard. Her duty was to lay down her life for the village and its leader and never surrender to their enemy.

The fight resumed when A decided to go on the offensive again, this time followed by Samui. A tried to use taijutsu to restrict Ringo's movements and create an opening but Ringo kept deflecting his blows with casual disregard.

Especially now that she had her blade drawn.

It was actually A who had to be extremely cautious and careful not to hit the sharp side of the lightning-coated sword because he was fully aware his fist would most likely be split in half if he tried to brute-force it.

Samui attacked too, not really trying to make use of openings. Instead, she tried to lock blades with Ringo and get her attention. She was fully focusing on trying to create an opening for her boss.

Ringo clashed with the girl in delight, always swatting one annoying buzzing fly away beforehand so she wouldn't be inconvenienced by a sneak attack before she blocked, hacked, or slashed at Samui's sword.

She always put just a bit more power behind her attack than what she received from the busty blonde, always interrupting Samui's sword technique midway by unbalancing her.

Whenever A got his bearings back, Ringo increased the power of her attack, causing Samui to backpedal as her sword and entire arm vibrated from the sheer power of the attack they just tanked.

In the meanwhile, Ringo turned her attention back to A, sidestepping his brash attack, punching him away with her free hand to gain herself a few seconds where she could play with the blonde girl some more.

As for Mabui's attacks... Ringo was fully encased in her own Lightning Armor. She didn't really have to pay attention to the dark-skinned secretary no matter what the woman threw at her. It was visibly frustrating the secretary and most likely made her feel useless but... meh, Ringo didn't care.

Turning back to Samui, the woman was already finished with calming her vibrating arm and prepared to go again, her cold blue eyes or stony expression not betraying any emotion at all. There was no frustration at failing her attacks nor any fear at facing an overwhelming foe.

It really endeared Ringo. She could see her younger self in the woman. Just... a much weaker version that didn't have the luck to meet Rei.

Samui tried to use an interesting move where she quickly slashed at Ringo, putting only half of her strength behind her slashes and depending more on speed... and Ringo humored her, matching her slash for slash, putting only as much power into it as Samui did behind her own slashes.

The swords of the two women blurred, releasing sparks all around every time they briefly met in a clash. Samui tried to angle her clashes in various ways, left, right, center, downward, upward, she tried everything in order to get her blade past Ringo's but it was futile.

The fight went on, Ringo continuing to battle with both A and Ringo, turning the two versus one into two separate one versus one through her sheer skill alone all the while judging Samui's performance.

She was not interested in the girl's current power. Instead, she was measuring her sword techniques and her improvisation. By now, Ringo was reasonably sure she pushed the blond girl to use every sword technique in her repertoire. She also occasionally stopped mid-attack, only to redirect her slash and force Samui to improvise to adjust to the sudden unpredictable change.

Admittedly, she almost killed the busty blonde a few times... but what would be a test without a few close brushes with the afterlife?

In the end, Ringo liked what she saw. The girl was not as good as Mist's Swordsmen but she was talented when it came to sword-wielding.

After her impromptu testing, her decision was only reinforced so...

"I have decided. You will be my apprentice, Kumo girl!" Ringo exclaimed with a pleased grin, dropping a staggering bomb at the three Kumo ninjas.

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Both Samui's and A's brains momentarily stopped in their tracks as they heard the outrageous thing Ringo said.

It took a second but eventually, A reacted, "You think I'd let you take her as an apprentice? Are you mad?" He growled, "I would rather kill her myself than allow something like that!"

While A was too worked up to notice, Ringo stood directly opposite him and Samui so she saw how Samui slightly flinched at that statement.

Alas, one thing that Rei... ahem, pounded... into Ringo's head quite early in her Kage career was that ninjas were people too. Not just tools.

Even the most seemingly emotionless and ruthless bastard still had at least some semblance of personal feelings.

This might not be all that important as most ninjas were raised to 'live for their village', but treating her ninjas like humans, at least outwardly, rather than just disposable pieces was better in the long term. Sarutobi Hiruzen certainly showcased it during his long reign.

It was mind-boggling how popular the old coot was despite being a scheming bastard.

Ringo smiled when she heard A, deciding to capitalize on the presented opportunity.

"Look, you overgrown monkey." She dryly rebuked. "I am dominating you in one versus two, the dark-skinned bimbo of yours doesn't even count as a proper obstacle. I think you are not in any position to complain. Her unconditional servitude to myself and acceptance of the apprenticeship for your miserable life. I reckon that's quite a good deal compared to the only alternative you have."

Not for a second did Ringo turn towards Samui during her speech. She was completely focused on Raikage to hide her intentions.

It worked too... if how shaken Samui's eyes seemed was any indication.

Since she became a Kage, Ringo came a long way from the sword-waving brute she was in the past. Now she actually knew how to manipulate people and that was exactly what she was doing right now.

She did not need to openly persuade the girl. Simply giving her a good reason why she should do what Ringo wanted and making accepting her offer seem beneficial while putting a slight doubt in her current position was enough. The rest would either solve by itself or Ringo would be forced to plan a kidnapping.

Eh, both were fine by her but the latter would take much more effort and time. Time she could instead use to do her hobby.

A didn't like what was said and it was obvious from how he was gritting his teeth and clenching his fists. He wanted nothing but to scream a rebuttal at Ringo but by now, even he realized what she said was true.

Not that he would give up as, in his opinion, there was still a chance at victory.

"You are too arrogant, bitch." A menacingly said while glaring at Ringo. "She is my kunoichi and you won't have he-"

He didn't manage to finish his sentence because something suddenly hit him, sending him into a wall that promptly crumbled upon impact. Normally, he would have shrugged such a blow like nothing since his lightning armor could soak up a lot of damage but... this time it didn't work and A took the brunt of the attack with his body, instead of his armor.

Both Samui's and Mabui's couldn't even see what happened, only registering that A no longer stood in front of them after they heard the crash of the crumbling wall. Their heads whipped towards it and their eyes widened in both bewilderment and fright when they spotted A... with his left leg and both arms broken.

While Mabui quickly ran towards A and started fussing over him, Samui shakily returned her gaze to Ringo, noticing the red-haired woman relocated back to... the surprisingly untouched seat for Mizukage... and sat down, her eyes excluding the feeling of boredom. The thing that made Samui uneasy, though, was the fact Ringo's eyes were directed at her.

"I wasn't asking, Kumo girl. I was informing you what will happen. You WILL be my apprentice. That's non-negotiable." Ringo boredly drawled.

As shaken from seeing her leader being literally one-shotted as Samui was, she quickly gathered herself, putting on an emotionless facade as she coolly asked, "Why me?"

Ringo chuckled, "Your level-headedness is admirable." She praised. "To be frank with you, I found your instincts and talent for swordsmanship quite good. I'd like to see to what degree you can develop them under my tutelage."

As someone taught by Rei and Konan, Ringo knew the threshold of how far one could go depended on their teacher unless they were monsters like Ringo's teachers. Sure, Ringo was talented and even if she was self-taught, she would have probably gone quite far. But since she lucked out with her teachers, she reached beyond what she thought possible.

Becoming the Mizukage? She didn't even dare to dream about that when she was a kid. Shooting for a spot in the Seven Swordsmen of Kiri was a long shot for an orphan like her.

And yet... here she was. Even if she wasn't exactly thrilled to get the unwanted position.

Ringo knew Samui could go just as far as her if she was taught by Rei. But Ringo wanted to see how well she could groom that talent of the busty blonde by herself.

Well... okay. She might have been a bit jealous.

Konan had that Uchiha girl, Pakura had Temari, Tsunade had the sadistic snake-lover who cussed like a sailor, and even the childish bother called Mei had Yugito who could be counted as her apprentice!

Ringo was never really interested in passing down her skills to someone. Not before seeing the battle between Karin and Temari, that is.

Karin might not be officially counted as Konan's apprentice but the young Uzumaki was taught by her enough to unofficially count.

And when Ringo saw them fight, she realized... 'There are some serious bragging rights with a strong apprentice!'

Of course, she has to procure her own pupil! If only to shut Mei up if she ever brought the topic up!

"I can not accept, Ameyuri-sama." Samui emotionlessly stated, her eyes resigned. "I am Kumo kunoichi."

Samui was fully prepared to die for those words. In her experience, saying no to someone as powerful as Ringo was never good for your health. In the end, it all came down to personal power and it just so happened that Samui was weaker.

And while becoming Ringo's apprentice would have made her stronger, she still had a brother in Kumo and...

"Damn, Kumo is indeed good at instilling loyalty, ain't it?" Ringo amusedly quipped, causing Samui to blink in surprise that she hadn't killed her yet for daring to refuse her offer. "And here I thought you would have at least pretended to accept only to stab me in the back at the first opportunity." Ringo sighed in mock-disappointment.

"I would do that if there was any chance it could have worked." Samui shared her opinion with blunt and brutal honesty.

"What a pessimistic attitude. You orphan too, eh?" Ringo idly asked, completely disregarding A and Mabui, fully focusing on Samui.

A was too injured to continue the fight and even if the bull-headed man refused to give up, she could simply break his remaining limb. No... for now, Ringo wanted to get to know her future apprentice. Even if the said girl had no idea her refusal was silently denied.

Samui did not answer, she just nodded before continuing to stare at Ringo while inwardly feeling weird. She didn't like the smug look of the crimson-haired woman. It gave her the impression Ringo already counted her as hers.

"I reckon your village also trained orphan girls for the unsavory kind of missions." Ringo gave Samui a knowing once-over, making the blonde woman's eyes slightly shake. "Don't be so surprised." Ringo chuckled, "Your attitude and bearings are practically screaming it. Just look at yourself. Miniskirt, showing off your thighs, big cleavage... I could go on." She shrugged, "I would have to be blind to not notice what your early training entailed."

Samui still stayed silent, not commenting.

Yes, she was trained to be a honey trap. Yes, she still used most of what she learned in that training. It wasn't easy to discard the habits she learned when she was a kid.

"Tell you what... I know how people with your training mentally operate." Ringo said, amusedly smiling at Samui. She knew it was all 'for the village' with kids trained in that kind of environment. After all, the very first thing instilled into these orphans was the will to sacrifice themselves for the village. And that played well in Ringo's ploy.

"You can just take it as doing a service to your village by becoming mine. In exchange, I can promise not to destroy Kumo." Ringo flippantly continued but the aura she gave off was quite menacing.

Well... promising not to destroy Kumo was not the same as promising not to invade it so all was fine. Wording actually mattered. Who would have thought, huh?

At any other moment, Samui would rebuke that was impossible but only a glance at the state of A told her Ringo was fully capable of such a feat. Yet, she still remained silent.

No matter what... she could not accept Ringo's offer without permission from her Kage. Which she knew would not be happening. Her fate was sealed. She hoped Ringo would get annoyed with her silence and kill her on spot. Quickly and painlessly. That seemed like the best outcome for Samui at the moment.

"Still no? Come on!" Ringo's eyebrow twitched and her smile became a bit more forced. "Don't make me kidnap you. You won't like it, girl."

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When Ringo saw that Samui was still not inclined to accept, she groaned in annoyance and stood up.

"Fine!" Ringo gruffly complained. "I'll get you your much-needed permission then."

Ringo naturally knew what was the problem with the girl. She came from a similar environment and for people like them, betraying their leaders was unthinkable. Simply put, the hidden villages were good at washing them... brains.

This wasn't all that bad, however. While Samui saw her stubborn and senseless loyalty as a reason why Ringo would most likely kill her, Ringo saw a massive value in it. All she had to do was to switch whom Samui considers her leader and she would have a loyal minion.

Ringo moved towards A and Mabui, and Samui wanted to intervene but when Ringo noticed, Samui suddenly froze and her eyes widened in fright as a wave of overpoweringly potent killing intent washed over her.

"You stay put!" Ringo pointed at Samui and ordered, giving the blonde a meaningful look.

'What the hell is this!?' Samui mentally freaked out, trying to move her body but it refused to budge no matter how much she mentally pushed.

As much as Samui was resolved to die for her village leader, the killing intent was too strong and took her by complete surprise, freezing even an experienced jonin like her. It evoked the same reaction a prey has when cornered by a predator it can't overcome.

Ringo casually walked towards A and when she was near them, Mabui stood up, placing herself in between A and Ringo with desperate determination shining in her eyes...

"Move." Ringo spoke in irritation, at the useless action.

Mabui was clearly shaking in her boots, deeply afraid and unwilling to even look Ringo in the eyes but Ringo had to admit, the woman really did love A. After all, she refused to step out of Ringo's path.

Unfortunately, this was not some sappy story where love prevails over all other evil beings that definitely do not feel love because that's reserved only for the main hero and heroine.

"I sa-" Ringo started again, this time her tone was pretty forceful, carrying a premonition of what would happen if she was not obeyed.

Her sentence was, however, interrupted by A who was sitting on the floor, leaning against a small part of a half-demolished wall, "Mabui... let her through."

From his tone, it was obvious the man knew the battle was over but his reluctance to just give up was obvious.

'Stubborn beyond reason.' Ringo mentally snorted. 'Let's see how far your stubbornness reaches.'

When Mabui stepped aside, Ringo smirked at the man with three of his limbs broken. Those were visible injuries but Ringo knew how and where she hit him. At the moment, he should have half of his ribs broken in several places and his pelvis cracked alongside with a quite nasty concussion.

It was not enough to kill him but definitely enough to get him out of a fighting condition for a long time.

"You know what I want. We were speaking loudly enough for you to hear and despite my belief in the stupid cliches and my utmost certainty that yes, you are a muscle-headed idiot, you are also the leader of an entire ninja village. I reckon you came to your own conclusions upon listening to my talk with Samui." Ringo boredly said.

"Do you really think I would let you have one of my ninjas?" A spoke in a low voice, his anger and battle intent surging up... yet his body was in no state to fight. In the end, he could only glare at Ringo and act tough, "I might have been defeated but I still have my pride as Raikage!"

The second he finished that sentence, he started coughing blood due to how his body shook from anger. Mabui quickly jumped close to him, concern written all over her face as she gently put her hand glowing with green medical Jutsu on his chest.

"Careful to not pop a vein, Rai-ka-ge." Ringo playfully teased with a smug smile. "You should not be so aggressive with all those broken ribs in your chest."

If the way A took a deep breath with an irritated whine to calm his anger down at that remark was any indication, Ringo's advice was taken to heart. She cheekily smiled with a satisfied nod, causing A to grit his teeth even more, before she put her hands on her hips, her petite form towering over the massive sitting man.

It made her oddly proud. Normally, she wouldn't have reached even up to his chest if they stood side by side.

"As for your pride..." Ringo hummed, "I wonder what is more precious to you. Your pride or that woman's life." She gestured with her chin towards Mabui who froze before pursing her lips and deciding to focus on treating A's injuries, pretending she did not hear a thing.

A scoffed at that, "As if you would let us live." He snarked.

The situation looked pretty hopeless, in his opinion. There was no snowball chance in hell for Samui and Mabui to beat Ringo and he was out of commission. It was game over.

Ringo rolled her eyes at him, "Unlike you, I don't have some profound grudge against you. If I can profit from letting you live, I will do that. It's called being responsible and giving priority to benefits over personal vengeance. You know... the stuff someone in your position should be aware of." She couldn't help but take a jab at him.

After all, the whole reason why Kumo joined in this invasion was that A held a grudge.

"So? Which is it? Samui's ownership... er, I mean your permission for her to become my apprentice." Ringo chuckled, "or Mabui's life? Which girl is more dear to your heart, I wonder?" She teasingly added.

A gritted his teeth and lowered his head before he quietly spoke, "-ui."

"What was that?" Ringo leaned closer, her smile widening, "I didn't hear you well."

"I said... Mabui." A let out through his gritted teeth, his face flushed red from shame.

"Oh? You want me to kill Mabui?" Ringo feigned a gasp as she exclaimed in mock surprise.

A's head snapped up before he hastily shouted, "No!"

"No?" Ringo repeated, tilting her head. "You sure are a confusing man. Thumbs up to the woman who can tolerate you."

Hearing her, A realized she was just having fun at his expense and his silent rage and shame deepened.

Inwardly, he swore he would have his revenge one day if she really let him and Mabui leave alive.

"You really won't attack Kumo if I relinquish her to you?" A doubtfully asked.

With this failure of an invasion, A knew he would have to spend several more years rebuilding Kumo's forces. He also knew how vulnerable his village would have been.

That didn't mean they were weak. Even with this loss, Kumo was still a top powerhouse in the world... or so he thought.

But as powerful as his village was, there were monsters like the Fifth Mizukage who could handle most of Kumo's high-ranking ninjas by herself. A really underestimated her. Now he saw she was on the same level as his late father and only a massive army could wear her down before she could be killed.

Alas, Kumo simply could not afford the kind of losses such a thing would require. Not now.

Having the Mizukage promise not to attack personally was a big boon. A was not afraid of Kirigakure. He believed Kumo could fend off any attack that wasn't led by the monster in front of him.

"And what use would Kumo be to me? I only care about my swords." Ringo deadpanned before shrugging. "I personally won't move a finger for Kumo so do go on. Say the words. We both know what has to be spoken."

A sighed, turning towards Samui who was looking at him in shock... It made him a bit sorry since the girl was one of his brother's students... and with a great distaste, he spoke, "Go with her and serve her well. For Kumo's sake."

He couldn't force himself to put it into a longer sentence. It still felt like a shit to throw the woman in the path of a kunai to save his own hide.

'For Kumo, my ass.' Samui coldly thought but outwardly, she just bowed, "As you wish, A-sama."

She was still somewhat shaken. She would have never imagined being handed to Ringo like this. The A she knew was a prideful man who would rather let her die than hand her ove-

'Ah...' Samui's mind suddenly halted as she came upon a realization that soured her mood. 'So I now have to watch out for Kumo assassins, don't I?'

As a ninja, she was prepared for the unexpected but this turned her whole life upside down. With just that one sentence, whether she accepted or not, changed her allegiance without needing her input on the matter.

"See? That didn't even hurt!" Ringo happily exclaimed while turning towards Samui, "I told you that you will be my apprentice, eh?"

"Yes..." Samui sourly spoke.

"Yes...?" Ringo expectantly trailed off, giving Samui a look.

"Yes... Master." Samui relented with a sigh. 'Might as well just go along with it.'

Just like that, Ringo obtained her first poke-... apprentice. She was already mentally calculating what kind of hellish training she would put the poor Samui through in order for her to catch up to the apprentices of her sister-wives.

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A loud explosion resounded through the surroundings and B in the form of Hachibi was forced to leap to the side, mowing several trees with his body as it unceremoniously landed on the ground and caused a small earthquake.

A larger and much more powerful earthquake followed shortly afterward when the attack B had just evaded reached its final stage and released the last and most powerful blast of energy as it ceased to exist.

The resounding shockwave was powerful enough to push even Hachibi's massive form a few tens of meters, creating a large trench in its wake. Needless to say, if the force of the shockwave could push even Hachibi, the nearby trees and nature had no chance. The final result was a large crater with no semblance of greenery anywhere in it.

"You are quite nimble for an octopus crossed with a bull!" Mei, in the form of her bijuu, Auburn, cheerfully but loudly exclaimed. Unfortunately for the local fauna, her booming chakra-enhanced voice generated another shockwave that erased everything living in a two hundred-meter radius around her. Not that Mei noticed.

"Do it again!" She childishly ordered before starting to charge another attack.

Hachibi's eyes widened as he saw the insane woman in front of him charging another attack similar to a bijuudama, yet so very different. A red ball similar to magma appeared in front of Auburn's maw, growing larger by the second and angrily pulsing as if whatever was inside wanted to break free...

Hachibi barely managed to propel himself away with his tentacles, before the ball shot from Auburn's maw and as if teleported to the place where he was just a moment ago.

For a second, the ball compressed... before exploding outward, releasing yet another loud explosion followed by shockwave after shockwave, leaving another deep crater in its wake once it finally ceased to exist.

Mei cheered, finding the way Hachibi moved around with its tentacles very funny.

He was just so fast! It was exciting! She just wanted to see it aga-

B and Hachibi saw the gleam in Auburn's eyes and before they even registered it, they were already charging a bijuudama in Mei's and Auburn's direction.

Subconsciously, they both realized that unless they attack, Mei would just continue shooting these balls of doom at them because she seemed to have a lot of fun doing so.

The bijuudama shot towards Auburn and Hachibi-clad B wondered why his opponent didn't charge a counter-attack... before Auburn just casually slapped the flying bijuudama away with her paw, causing the eight-tailed jinchuuriki to gape at her.

The deflected bijuudama flew through the air before it impacted a place a few hundred meters from Mei and B, generating another earthquake.

This finally woke B up from his bewilderment, only to notice that Hachibi took over for a second... perks of being so in tune with the beast... and he was already in the middle of changing position and charging another bijuudama at Auburn-clad Mei.

'Spacing out here can get us killed B.' Hachibi mentally said and B seriously nodded.

'She is too strong! We need to go more bonk-bonk!' B rapped, but his voice didn't hold his usual uncaring 'my-pace' tone.

Mei raised her eyebrow when she saw her opponent trying out yet another bijuudama.

Too curious about her opponent's plan, she didn't counter-attack or even move from her spot. She only stood her ground, deflecting the bijuudama once more.

This time, however, she didn't even manage to pull a smug look at her opponent before her eyebrows raised as she noticed another bijuudama already flying at her.

Auburn quickly swished one of her tails, smashing it against the bijuudama and sending it flying away to the distance as if it was just a ball.

Not a second passed, and another bijuudama already flew at her.

Auburn deflected that one in a similar manner.

And then the next one.

And the next one.

And another one...

Hachibi was charging and shooting bijuudamas and shooting them at Auburn like a machine gun, flabbergasting even B.

Despite their good relationship, B never gave Hachibi the freedom of just taking over and Hachibi never did it on his own. This was a special situation where B knew he stood no chance so he let Hachibi be in charge.

He could have never imagined Hachibi was capable of... that.

Just one bijuudama could level most of a hidden village with the ground and he could shoot them as often and as quickly as a jonin could throw a kunai?

B couldn't help but gain new-founded respect for the Third Raikage who faced the bijuu without getting even a scratch in return.

While B was having his enlightenment, Auburn was flicking her tails left and right, decimating the surrounding country with deflected bijuudamas, not letting even one hit her.

But it was getting a bit annoying and both Auburn and Mei decided to cut this short. Pulling one of her tails away from the defensive, they both focused and started mixing their chakra, creating a seemingly solidified ball of misty substance that visibly boiled.

This was one of Mei's specials.

'Time to have a steamed takoyaki!' Mei inwardly grinned as she threw the ball forward with Auburn's tail.

Hachibi was too preoccupied with trying to overpower his enemy with a sheer amount of bijuudamas to notice and that made him react too late to the misty boiling ball that flew at him.

The ball impacted the latest bijuudama Hachibi was charging, setting both itself and the bijuudama off right in front of Hachibi's mouth. The Eight-Tails didn't even manage to widen its eyes before it was engulfed by a short-lived explosion that was smothered by the boiling mist that wrapped around it and started compressing itself.

The world finally grew quiet, no more booming explosions from deflected bijuudamas, nor one earthquake after another plaguing the lands... the only indication it even occurred was the totally destroyed country all around. The only semblance of what was previously forest were a few remains of broken trees among the literal sea of deep craters.

When the mist finally dispersed, it revealed exactly what Mei expected. A steamed form of Hachibi. His skin was brown, his body was somewhat gaunt, and smoke was rising from it as even the last bits of water molecules were being evaporated directly from its body due to the extreme heat.

This boiling misty ball was Mei's first successful attempt at creating a non-world-destroying Jutsu with her own brand of Jutsu creation. Yes, it left her opponent a smoked husk even if it was a bijuu... but Mei thought it was a resounding success! She finally managed to tone down the damage of her self-made Jutsus to a manageable level! They no longer erased continents, now they only erased bijuu.

Before she could celebrate, Mei looked to the side and frowned.

"Do you really think you can escape me like that?" Auburn tilted its head.

No reply came for a few seconds, making Mei seem as if she was a lunatic talking to herself but then...

A small part of a cut-off tentacle, buried deep in one of the craters, stirred, its owner knowing he was found out. With a dejected sigh, Hachibi pushed his chakra into the tentacle, and instantly, his body regrew to its former glory as the smoked husk nearby crumbled down.

"Concentrating all of your chakra into a small part of yourself and then regrow your physical manifestation out of it... I guess you really are just a massive hulk of sentient chakra, aren't you?" Mei spoke as she observed what just happened in front of her.

The way Hachibi just regrew itself was mightily impressive in her opinion and most importantly, gave her new exciting ideas!

Hachibi scowled at her. It knew getting alive out of here was basically impossible. But its pride would not let him just give up. Moreover, he did have a few words for her!

"Are you mad!? Do you want to destroy Konoha? We are not that far away from there!" Hachibi bellowed.

It was a long shot but just maybe this would stop her?

"Ah, don't worry. My hubby gave me a barrier and I activated it when I turned into Auburn. Only our first attack could have been felt over there!"

Apparently not...

Hachibi dejectedly sighed. 'Sorry B. I think this is it for us.'

Well, it was it for B. Hachibi knew he would not stay dead for long. But still... he liked B and it was a bit disheartening to know the man would die here.

Before B could react, Mei suddenly groaned, attracting both Hachibi's and B's attention.

"Muu~, that old sword maniac is finished with your brother." Mei poutily said, causing B to stiffen at her words. Not paying it any attention, Mei carelessly continued, "She just has to ruin my fun! Couldn't she prolong his suffering a bit so I can enjoy myself playing with you? Stupid, stupid, stupid Ringo!" She complained and repeatedly stomped her leg on the ground, most likely forgetting she was in the form of Auburn so with every stomp, the ground shook.

Much to Hachibi's relief, Mei actually started shrinking, taking on her human form.

As careless as that was, Hachibi had no delusion he could win against her and forced B's body to revert back to its human form by draining his chakra from it. The red-head did not seem like she would kill B anymore so...

'Meh.' Hachibi shrugged and left B to the wolves before retreating back to his seal.

B could only uneasily look at Mei in front of him with utter shock, his mind still in the process of registering the fact his partner has just ended his transformation and left him alone to face...

"What are you doing! Your brother made a deal with Ringo. Don't stand and gape at me like an idiot! Come on, we are returning to Konoha." Mei huffed before she turned around and casually strolled through the destroyed landscape in the direction of Konoha.

B... was left speechless. 'What the heck just happened?'

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While Mei was dealing with B and Ringo was in the process of plummeting A while getting a new apprentice, Pakura faced off against the Third Tsuchikage, Onoki.

Though, to be honest, they were not really fighting, but chatting instead. After all, Onoki's back did get a little cracked up when Pakura counter-attacked his sneak attack.

The old midget had problems standing straight, much less fighting, and Pakura was juicing the situation for every possible nugget of humiliation she could get out of it.

She even sat at a nearby chair, giving Onoki a provoking look to which he scowled but whenever he wanted to attack, his back would once again remind him why abruptly moving was a bad thing.

Sure, he was a ninja and he could bear the pain but it was in no way pleasant.

So, since his opponent was giving him the opportunity to recover, Onoki took it and didn't progress the fight, even if it meant soaking up some humiliation in the process.

"Look at that. The proud and mighty shit-flinger of Iwa kneeling in front of me, the Kazekage." Pakura teasingly quipped, leaning her cheek onto her palm as she started to support her head with her arm in a show of boredom. "What would your subordinates think if they saw you now, I wonder?"

Onoki's eyes narrowed in contempt, "They would be proud I stand tall in front of you despite my injury!"

Pakura's eyebrows rose at that before she snorted as she inclined her head down to properly see him, "Stand tall, eh?"

"Shut up!" Onoki's cheeks reddened a bit when he realized he might not have used the best comparison. 'This bitch is totally looking down on me!' He gritted his teeth.

"Would you mind telling me why exactly you went along with the invasion of that brainless retard and pale pedophile freak?" Pakura drawled, "I know you are smarter than that, Onoki. Why join those social rejects? Or is it just you wanting to play with the cool kids?"

Onoki decided to ignore the jab at his appearance but the glare he directed at her only intensified, "As a fellow leader, you should know well I can't just ignore Konoha growing stronger." He grumbled. "What I don't understand is why you allow it to happen! Aren't you afraid of them breaking the shaky alliance between you and invading Suna? You know well that the best alliance between our kind doesn't mean shit in front of power!"

Pakura revealed a small nostalgic smile at his heated reasoning. He wasn't wrong. He was definitely not wrong. Hidden villages did not have lasting alliances. Whenever one signed an alliance with another, the countdown to one of them being eventually betrayed started.

That... was common sense.

Alas, it was also a thing of the past. Now that Rei's wives were holding their respective villages in a firm and unshakable grip...

The betrayal would not occur simply because, unlike the previous leaders, the villages were not the priority for them.

Yes, Pakura loved Suna and was doing her best to make it a better, stronger place. But in the end, the thing dearest to her heart was Rei and if he wanted her to abandon Suna, she would have done so.

Reluctantly and with profound sadness... but she would comply and return back to his side, sulking for a few weeks before she would get over it and be happy with her life.

"Betrayal, huh?" Pakura thoughtfully spoke, "You do know my past, don't you?" She didn't let him answer and continued, "You must know. I am a fellow Kage so investigating my origins and story is something no competent Kage would omit."

"Nukenin becoming a Kage. Yes, it is quite disgusting." Onoki sneered, inwardly happy that his back was starting to hurt less. 'Just a bit more and I will be able to fight without being handicapped.'

Naturally, he was a ninja and since he knew he had back problems, he did learn a bit of medical ninjutsu to help himself with it.

"I was never a nukenin." Pakura grumbled, really annoyed. "I was declared dead. There is a difference, you twat."

Was it so hard to get their facts straight? She was never designated as such! Whoever started that ridiculous rumor... once she got her hands on them, they could look forward to hellish torture.

Onoki smirked. Of course, he knew that. But he also knew the woman in front of him hated being called nukenin. Still...

"Being away from the village for years and serving some unknown nobody as his slut instead of your village." Onoki alluded to the man who appeared in Suna alongside Pakura when she fought the previous Kazekage.

Onoki indeed ordered an extensive information gathering on Pakura when she became the Kazekage out of nowhere and boy did he learn things. Pakura had a husband who was not from Suna. Some kind of unrecognizable nobody who was reported to not even be a ninja and seldom appeared outside of their house. This was the height of shamelessness!

The woman had a unique bloodline and if the previous Kage was not a fearful idiot, he would have never ordered her on a suicide mission. Her children would have been something that could really strengthen the village. If she had them with another strong ninja, their potential would have been incredible. Alas, she married a civilian. As a Kage, she failed in Onoki's eyes.

He wouldn't care if she had a harem of men made from her best ninjas. He wouldn't care if she included her civilian boy-toy into it... but not breeding with powerful shinobi that can give birth to very talented children when she had such an amazing bloodline was basically a betrayal to her own village.

Onoki continued his statement, "Now that pretty much screams nukenin for me. The only reason you were not declared as such when the Kazekage saw you are alive was that you had the support of the Daimyo."

Pakura wanted to rip the rude old man to shreds for what he just said. Not because he insulted her. That was fine. She didn't mind that.

But insulting Rei... even if he had no idea about who he was and what kind of strength he possessed... that was above Pakura's tolerance.

Fortunately for Onoki, Pakura had a plan and she loathed to derail from those. Hence, the only show of how much the insult affected her was a slight pursing of her lips in displeasure. Entirely too small of a reaction to bring Onoki any kind of satisfaction from provoking her.

It inwardly riled him up that his insults did not evoke any sort of angry reaction... but it was expected. Pakura was a Kage, after all. Still, his back was now almost painless and he deemed himself in a good condition to fight.

That's why... "Heh, are you gonna just sit there while I insult the male sex toy you brought from your gallivanting across the Elemental Nations while your village thought you dead and had economically a hard time?"

Well, despite Pakura's small reaction, there was no reason to not re-use the insult, in Onoki's opinion. In the end, it did produce some kind of reaction from her.

Pakura raised an eyebrow at his blatant provocation and smirked. "Me? Fight you?" She chuckled with a lot of condescension in her tone, "I see you must have some kind of misunderstanding. That would have been overkill. Instead of that, your opponent will be-"

Pakura's speech was interrupted as Temari landed nearby and knelt down, "Lady Pakura, you called?"

"Ah, yes, Temari," Pakura smiled while Onoki couldn't help but gape at the audacity of the woman who intended to pit her student, a genin, against him, a Kage. Not affected by the bewilderment of Tsuchikage, Pakura continued, "I found a new dummy for you."

Temari turned towards Onoki and her teal-colored eyes gleamed, "No idea if he will be any good for testing but he does seem kind of dumb."

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When the attack started, Rei and Konan were in the VIP area with several foreign Daimyos. Neither of which were affected by the sleep-inducing illusions because of the protective seals around that area.

Despite that, the second the illusion was unleashed, all chaos broke loose.

Guards of the respective Daimyos jumped towards them, some in an attempt to protect them... but some had malicious intentions.

The problem was, neither their employers nor their colleagues noticed.

Nevertheless, Rei's intent-based seals picked it up and promptly terminated them. Each of those who wished harm upon a Daimyo was either engulfed in searing hot crimson flames or torn to shreds by incredibly sharp paper strips.

While Rei's seals were subtle enough to not give away who the attacker was, the same could not be said about Konan's attack and the stupefied Daimyos only saw one of the VIPs killing their guards. It wasn't hard for them to come to their own conclusions.

The loyal guards around them, those that were not killed, were also wary, only making a protective circle around their charges, but their eyes betrayed they were aware they were no match for Konan from what they had just seen.

"Wha-!?" One of the dumber dignitaries exclaimed in shock just as the last body of the now-dead guards dropped onto the ground. He crossly looked at Rei and Konan and asked, "Why did you kill my guards!?"

Obviously, the other Daimyos were curious about that too but they were much smarter than to bother somebody who could kill them with just a casual thought. Most of them actually realized their ninja guards were no match for these two representatives of the Uzumaki clan.

'Earth Daimyo's representative, huh? Prideful and dumb as a rock. That fits.' Rei idly thought.

While the Earth Daimyo and the Lightning Daimyo did not show up, they still had their representatives here. That was a must to uphold a certain image of dignity.

Rei lazily pointed at the badge every guest was distributed upon entering Konoha, "I am a seal master and this has intent-based seals on it." He drawled, letting out just enough information to be taken seriously without giving away that it was him who created these seals. "Those dead guards wanted to attack you and most likely take you as hostages, that's why we prevented that. You are welcome and Uzushio would accept the monetary remuneration for saving your lives at a later time. We thank you very much."

While Rei's voice was bored, his eyes were sparkling with mirth. It wasn't every day one could be rude to so many Daimyos and actually have them be thankful for it.

"Intent-based seals?" The Lightning Daimyo's representative asked, probably thinking he was quiet enough but the whole room heard him, causing them to look at him. When he noticed, his cheeks slightly reddened as he turned his head to the side.

Rei smirked. The bastard clearly knew about the invasion. That's why he was surprised. After all, with these intent-based seals, the hostiles should theoretically not even be able to cross the border of the village without Konoha knowing that something was fishy.

His brain was most likely just now realizing the implications.

Looking at the Earth Daimyo's representative, Rei realized that this guy was not informed by Onoki about what would happen. Well, it was probably for the best.

But Rei was not the only one who was good at observing others.

"You bastard, you knew!" A voice resounded through the room, causing others to turn towards it only to see the Fire Daimyo glaring at the Lightning Daimyo's representative with clear hostility and anger.

If there was not a circle made of guards around the Lightning Daimyo's representative, the Fire Daimyo would most likely already initiated a fistfight or something. Or so his twisted expression was telling.

"We did know." The Lightning Daimyo's representative surprisingly confessed as he sighed and slumped his shoulders. "Unlike you, Kumo is more militaristic and independent from our Daimyo's rule. I was informed about the invasion to dodge any sort of unpleasantness but I was also told our Daimyo was not given any chance to forbid it." He tiredly shrugged in a 'what can you do' way.

That earned him and the Lightning Daimyo the sympathy of most of the Daimyos because they were experiencing something similar. Keeping the hidden villages in control was really hard for most of them. Only people like the Fire Daimyo, the Earth Daimyo, and the Wind Daimyo were in a fairly comfortable spot when it concerned their hidden villages.

Fire Daimyo officially didn't have one since Tsunade became the Daimyo herself so his worries in this matter were nonexistent.

Wind Daimyo couldn't really complain because Pakura did her duties superbly and he enjoyed an amicable relationship with her so she didn't try to screw him over every little detail like the previous Kazekage.

As for the Earth Daimyo... he wouldn't have been bothered if he was present because he would not have been told anything anyway. Onoki held a tight grip on the control over his village.

The Fire Daimyo was not satisfied with the answer of the Lightning Daimyo's representative but he knew there was nothing he could do. With a huff, he turned towards Rei and in a polite voice, he asked, "What about Konoha civilians? Do you know if they are safe? What about the foreign traders? It would be really bad for Konoha if something happened to them."

Rei blinked when he heard that. He didn't expect the Fire Daimyo to be concerned about Konoha's safety.

'The friendship between him and Tsunade must have been good if the man was so concerned for her people.' Rei inwardly hummed.

Yes, he saw the man was on good terms with Tsunade and thought her to be a friend but that could have been easily faked by someone who was a politician for his whole life.

Rei shrugged, "The badges also contain protective seals and paralyzation formula. Everybody is safe except those with hostile intent to Konoha and its residents. Those can be paralyzed anytime."

Of course, Rei would not reveal that stronger ninjas could counter the paralyzation formula with the intensity of their chakra. In the end that didn't matter.

"Then... why are the attackers not paralyzed yet?" The Fire Daimyo confusedly asked, looking outside the VIP area and seeing fighting going on everywhere.

Kumo, Iwa, and Sound ninjas were fighting against Konoha ninjas that were occasionally supported by Suna, Uzumaki, or Kiri ninjas. It was a mess, to be honest.

"Look closer. No civilian is getting injured during those fights. Moreover, nobody on 'our' side is getting lethally or permanently injured." Rei spoke, waiting until the Daimyos and their guards took a really careful and long look at what was really happening under the initial seemingly messy fighting that was going on in the arena, and when he saw their eyes gain a semblance of recognition, he continued. "In short, this is a good training exercise."

The Daimyos were flabbergasted when they heard that. The Fire one gaped like a fish, the Wind one didn't care and sat down on his chair before he started to enjoy the food again, and the Lightning Daimyo's representative grimaced.

His mumbling was quiet but Rei's hearing sense was sharp enough to hear a muffled and discontent, "I asked A not to do it."

Obviously, the word of a diplomat would not sway a Kage. That was wishful thinking. But at least the guy tried.

"The Konoha Daimyo and Hokage really allowed their own village to become a battle zone just for a training exercise?" The Earth Daimyo's representative spoke in bewilderment, "That's... insane!"

Rei blinked in shock at that. That was a pretty point-on description of how this would seem for somebody who didn't know all the details.

'Huh? Guess the Earth guy is not as dumb as he looks!'

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Rei wasn't interested in talking more with the Daimyos. He definitely was not gonna argue with them if this plan was stupid or not. They will see for themselves once everything is said and done.

After all, he already got a report through the telepathic connection he had with Kaguya that the invasion of Kumo and Iwa had already started.

Stupid? Pfft.

Nobody in Konoha was in any real danger. Rei was hundred percent sure of that. He had that much faith in his sealing skills. And in exchange for roughing up Konoha a bit, the last two major hidden villages not under his rule would be suppressed enough to never become a problem again. All that while everybody was fixated on what was going on in Konoha.

It was a nice strategic sleight of hand and if he didn't have the two biggest trading companies, Konan's perfect spying, many interesting seals that could conceal loads of important things, and thorough knowledge of how the information network of hidden villages worked, it would have never been possible to accomplish.

The only Daimyo he would not mind speaking with was the Fire one, and even that was because he seemed genuine in his appreciation of the friendship between him and Tsunade. While the Wind one had a similar relationship with Pakura... Rei couldn't find a guy with over fifty consorts and past desire for one of his women likable.

Call it pettiness if you will but...

Rei was barely managing to keep his girls happy. How could the dude do fifty!? Life was friggin unfair sometimes!

And no. He was definitely not pouting, huffing, nor was he cutely scowling no matter what Konan said as they were leaving the room.

He didn't see it so it can't be true. Period.

"So? What are we gonna do? Any plan or aim?" Konan asked, her voice slightly excited while her amber eyes sparkled expectantly as she looked at Rei.

She might not mind doing paperwork every day but she wouldn't say no to more... exciting ninja stuff.

Not even causing a massacre seemed all that bad after a few years of 'desk duty'. No wonder every Kage was a murderous bastard.

Rei questioningly raised his eyebrow at her, "How would you come to that conclusion? We are just tourists here." He innocently tilted his head, making Konan snort a laugh at his answer.

"Well, you usually have one of those during chaotic times like these." Konan offhandedly remarked after she stopped her brief laughing. Her tone suddenly flipped back to an excited one, "Remember how we first met Pakura? The entire Sunagakure could not calmly sleep for at least a month afterward! And how much chaos we caused when we were going around as Yozora, getting the samples of the bijuu chakra?" A content and nostalgic smile appeared on Konan's lips, "We plunged the entire Elemental Nations into chaos and made them chase ghosts so we could calmly focus on building up our hidden village. Ah, fun times."

Rei's lips twitched at that. While true, it was not his aim at that time. To be completely honest, causing chaos was fun. That's why he did it. Not because of some scheme with so many twists even Orochimaru with his special predisposition would not be able to wrap his head around it.

"Now that you mention it, we really do thrive during the chaos, don't we?" Rei idly spoke with an awkward smile. "But no. There is nothing to do in Konoha. No foe that would require our attention, no vault worth our time to steal from, and no person worthy to be kidnapped." He sighed and looked towards the horizon, seeing Konoha in all of its beauty, even if it was marred by lots of fighting on the streets and several houses burning.

'No need for such things as we already own this village.' Rei added in his head as he frowned, 'But damn if this plan won't cause the need for a lot of costly repairs. I wonder who will pay for that.' His eyes briefly wandered in Konan's direction as he knew Tsunade was too stingy to use her own pocket money.

After all, there was this thing called work-related expenses... 'And Konan will not be happy with her for that. Family drama is incoming. Oh, joy.' Rei mused.

Then again, those were always fun to watch. He would have to remember to make a lot of popcorn. Kaguya was an expensive rabbit to keep and feed. Especially when she was amused. No doubt would she demand some refreshments for the show.

Unfortunately for Rei, she learned the invincible puppy-dog eye technique and it worked damn well with her Byakugan eyes. Evil thing, that.

'And she just had to get interested in seduction techniques on top of picking Mei as her teacher. Talk about a recipe for a disaster.' Rei's awkward smile became a bit forced, 'At least I have the mental connection with her and can be certain she would only try to practice those techniques on me. I guess that's a plus.'

The men of Elemental Nations should thank him for that. Kaguya would sooner crush them to death in irritation than woo them.

'Now that's a funny mental picture. If she was not mine I would definitely want to see that.' Rei amusedly thought.

"I guess, we suffer from the exact same thing in these fancy fantasy scrolls, don't we?" Konan giggled. But when she saw Rei had no idea what she was talking about, she decided to explain a bit. It wasn't weird he didn't read it. He was a guy. Expecting a sense of art from him would be too much.

"The main characters in these stories usually make themselves so powerful and have so many capable subordinates that in the end, they have nothing to do." Konan explained.

Rei continued looking at her weirdly, 'Since when does Elemental Nations have fanfiction?' He inwardly thought in shock.

'More importantly, how come I don't know about it!? So much value for entertainment wasted!' Rei got excited and was about to ask where she read those stories when...

"Unfortunately, the fantasy scrolls are just fanciful kiddy scrabble compared to real life." Konan cluelessly continued with a sigh, "It was less interesting than the accounting books of the Biri-Biri company."

"You meant to use them as an excuse to slack off while still appearing like you're working." Rei deadpanned, knowing that technique from his past life. Having a book in front of you helped make you seem busy as long as people could not discover what exactly that book is.

Konan slightly blushed and turned her head away, "I have no idea what you are talking about. You must be mistaken. My work ethics are nothing but diligence incarnate. How could you accuse me of slacking off, I would never know." She huffed but Rei could clearly see the twitch of her lips.

She was totally lying.

Rei sighed and rubbed his forehead in frustration, "Just tell me this..." He hopefully pleaded in a quiet tone, "were those stories really that bad you rather did your work than read them?"

An awkward silence spread between them, and the only noise interrupting it was coming from all the fighting around them.

Rei was anxious for the answer. Getting entertainment from books was really hard for the current him. The ninja life spoiled most of the local fantasy genre because, in a way, he lived in a fantasy book. There was no reason to read about heroes with special abilities when you were a killer with special abilities.

Just... boring.

But fanfictions? That could actually be a bit interesting, no? These tended to go beyond common sense even if it meant sounding dumb as heck!

That's why he hoped for a no from Konan but fate is never really kind.

"Yes." Konan delivered the final judgment and Rei instantly knew he would not enjoy them.

If Konan preferred doing her least favorite part of being CEO rather than reading these things, they must have been exceptionally bad. Web level bad. Marvel fanfictions level bad. Or worse.

While Rei had already forgotten most of the fanfictions he had read in his past life, he still remembered these references.

It... was just not worth it.

--

Author Note:

Yeaaah, I am taking a jab at the fanfictions as of late.

Do you have the same problem as me? At the time I wrote this chapter, there seemed to be no good new fanfic. Nothing I could be excited to read about.

I have a few personal likes but... I simply feel that in the past, there was a bigger variety of interesting stories coming out.

Sad, really.

As Rei and Konan walked around without a care, being ignored by every enemy or allied ninja thanks to Rei's seals, Temari suddenly landed in front of them.

"Rei!" She lunged forward, engulfing Rei in a hug and making him raise an eyebrow at her.

Rei briefly glanced towards Konan but the woman just covered her mouth and went, "Ufufu," while giving Rei a knowing yet provocative look, 'you are starting to go down a dangerous path, husband.' Konan teased him through their mental connection, shrewdly looking at Temari. 'They are getting younger and younger by the year.'

Rei's eyebrow twitched, 'Hmph, don't be jealous.' He sent her the mental picture of him showing her his tongue.

Konan's smile widened at that. 'Jealous? Not at all, dear. Some things can be offered only by an experienced woman.' She lightly said, subtly licking her lips and winking at Rei. 'We both know you would never swap me for a younger model. Simply because there is no younger model better than me.'

'Arrogant much?' Rei quipped with an inward chuckle as he finally returned Temari's hug, rubbing her back a bit.

Konan just smugly but in jest replied, 'Not enough.'

Rei chuckled and inclined his head downward, looking at Temari, "Shouldn't you be helping Pakura?" He instantly felt the girl in his arms stiffen briefly before she once again relaxed.

'I guess that answers my question.' He mused.

"Lady Pakura 's fine." Temari reluctantly mumbled and looked up, her eyes full of innocence staring straight into Rei's amused gaze with conviction. "There is nobody who could pose a threat to her."

Rei's lips twitched upwards at that, "And you think I am in danger?" He raised an eyebrow at her in a questioning way. He was really interested in what answer would come out of her.

Temari pursed her lips at that, and her eyes wandered around as if trying to find a good answer to Rei's question. A moment of silence followed since finding an answer to that was clearly harder than Temari thought.

When Rei was about to think he would not get an answer, Temari suddenly turned back towards him and said, "I am not here to protect you. I am here to be protected by you!"

She said it with such a straight face that Rei got momentarily speechless while Konan burst out laughing at his slightly gaping expression.

But Temari was not done yet, "See all those wea-, uh... dangerous ninjas around? What could a genin like me do against them? I need my big tough protector!"

Konan was finding it hard to stop laughing at Rei's misfortune but she decided to add her own salt into the wound, "She got you there, mighty hero."

Rei closed his eyes and sighed as he rubbed his forehead, "You couldn't have thought up something less cringe? Or at least not say it in front of Konan? I will be teased for months for this."

"I know, but..." Temari shuffled a bit in Rei's arms, a guilty glint flashing through her eyes, "it was for the greater good!"

"What?" Rei furrowed his eyebrows as Temari pulled apart from him and took a few steps back.

"There. It's my win. He was totally surprised. I hope you will fulfill your part of the deal." Temari cutely narrowed her eyes at Konan.

"Sure," Konan offhandedly said, and just completely ignored Temari as she amusedly watched the realization start to register in Rei's brain.

"You already roped her into your schemes to embarrass me?" Rei turned towards Konan with apprehension.

This was not the first time he experienced something like this. Konan regularly roped his other wives into things like this. Frankly, Rei had a suspicion the woman loved his retaliation. After all, she had a small but well-hidden masochistic streak in her.

Seeing his expression, Konan giggled, "Well, you know what they say. The younger they start..." She unrepentantly shrugged.

Konan was too used to him and Rei realized no matter what he said, she wouldn't care much nor would he be able to make her feel guilty. That's why he turned towards Temari. "And you went with it?"

Temari embarrassedly fidgeted under his gaze and rubbed her hands together... but her voice held strong conviction and her eyes were steady and resolved, "The reward was too good to pass."

"Damn, you really know how to find them." Konan quipped, amused by the fact Temari was so straightforward. She was starting to like the girl more and more.

To be honest, Konan thought the girl would fit right in. Tsunade, Ringo, Mei, Pakura, and Kaguya... none of them were shy or reserved. They were all women who knew what they wanted in life. Now that Konan had a better look at Temari and how she acted, she could see why Rei was interested in her.

'So that's why he doesn't show any interest in my apprentices.' Konan inwardly frowned, imagining Izumi and her shy, awkward, and clumsy self...

Not that Konan didn't try to help the girl with it. But the end result was simply making Izumi innocently and cluelessly cruel during combat while her clumsiness outside of it didn't improve at all.

Konan was many things, at most of them she could brag to be the best in the world, but a psychologist she was not.

'So Rei likes his women more assertive, huh? I guess you learn something new every day.' Konan inwardly thought. After so many years, she noticed only now. It was wonderful how surprising life could still be.

To give her credit, these were the easily overlooked things... and then there was Mei.

Even if it didn't seem like Mei was assertive, that girl was the most devious and evil of them all. She was so devious, she hadn't even realized it yet.

Like... her hobby is creating world-ending Jutsu. Who does that!?

Then again, she was practically raised by Konan and Rei so... 'I'd better not go down that line of thoughts.' Konan hummed. 'Our parenting skills are depressing.'

"What did you even promise her for this?" Rei's exasperated voice pulled Konan from her thoughts.

Konan blinked and tried to reorient herself a bit, "Ah, I promised her an uninterrupted week with you." She said, still a bit distracted by random thoughts.

Rei frowned at that and glanced at Temari. "Without asking me first?" His question clearly made Temari a bit nervous but he grabbed her hand to calm her down and show her he wasn't against spending time with her. It was just that he still had quite a few projects to finish and the sooner he did that, the better.

"It's not like you can't do your stuff during that week. I haven't promised her anything concerning yourself. If she wants to get you in bed, she will have to seduce you herself." Konan shrugged, "The 'uninterrupted' part only applies to myself and my sisters." She explained further.

If it was like that then Rei guessed it was fine. Nothing different from normal for him. He built quite a bit of resistance to seduction attempts over the years. That was the sad consequence of having multiple loving wives all the while enjoying something as time-consuming as fuinjutsu research.

But still... he was curious. "How will you persuade my other girls to go with this? I don't think they will be happy about it." He didn't need a catfight in the house. Nor did he want to deal with pouty Mei or stabby Ringo.

"Oh, that." Konan deviously smiled. Naturally, she had it all thought out. "I won the bet."

"The bet?" Rei tilted his head for a bit before a realization struck him. But that shouldn't be... "But Uzushio did not win the finals." He confusedly stated and Konan smirked.

"Tsunade is not the only one who can cheat. You remember the seal you made for our bets that locks our choices so they can't be changed?" She asked and Rei nodded, "I just used the little you managed to pound into me about fuinjutsu to delay the locking mechanism and snuck in another choice of mine right before the seal closed. I chose the finals will be interrupted and nobody would win." She mirthfully giggled, "Not my problem Tsunade imitated my first choice."

Rei was surprised at her shrewdness but he had to admit, it was fair. It's not like she competed against civilians.

And while Rei was amusedly musing about the reactions of his other wives to the loss they had yet no idea about, Temari seemed to gain a newfound appreciation for Konan. While Lady Pakura would always be first for Temari, Konan seemed really cool too!

Of course, Konan did notice it and inwardly grinned. After all, it wouldn't do for a wife of Rei to not look up to her in some way.

'All according to the plan.' She thought in satisfaction.

--

Author Note:

For those who didn't understand as it can be a bit confusing, I guess... this happened before Temari was called by Pakura and I will make it clear in the next chapter.

Another thing... sorry guys, this is more of a slice of life without much action. When I started writing this chapter, I planned to write something filled with action, progress the plot, and all... but in the end, I wrote it like this because I felt like it.

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As the trio of Rei, Konan, and Temari, who once again, much to Konan's amusement, tried to meld with Rei's side in an affectionate hug, enjoyed their casual peaceful moment while chatting about unimportant things while ignoring what was going on around them, Temari suddenly stiffened... and pouted.

Rei chuckled, causing the blonde girl to raise her face towards him and when their eyes met, Temari instantly donned a pleading expression but Rei...

"Don't look at me like that." He calmly smiled at her, "I felt the subtle flaring of Pakura's chakra as well. Go. She is calling for you." He patted the girl's head while she reluctantly separated from him.

"Fine." Temari grumbled.

Before she rushed towards Pakura's position, however, she decided to be a bit mischievous and walked towards Rei before pecking him on the cheek. Her cheeks gained a pink dusting because of her action but before either Konan or Rei could start teasing her, Temari disappeared in a swirl of sand.

Rei, rubbing his cheek, was smiling in amusement, "That girl..." He helplessly shook his head.

...

Temari arrived at the place where she could feel Lady Pakura's chakra and noticed her leisurely sitting on a throne-like chair while talking with some midget...

'Did she really have to call me? She is one of the strongest ninjas in here. Why does she have to disturb me?' Temari inwardly complained at her time with Rei being cut short.

When she landed and greeted Lady Pakura, she was told she was supposed to face off against the midget who was apparently the Third Tsuchikage. Well, Lady Pakura created a nice way to provoke the prideful dwarf so Temari saw no harm in giving a follow-up.

"No idea if he will be any good for testing but he does seem kind of dumb." She said while looking at Onoki.

Onoki was obviously annoyed at the jab at his intelligence but unlike Pakura, he did not consider the young genin as someone on the same level as him. Her words did not have much of an effect on him.

Instead, he turned towards Pakura, "You really want me to face the girl first? Have you no shame?"

Pakura did not answer Onoki. She ignored him and turned towards Temari, donning a disbelieving expression, "Does he actually expect me to answer that? Did he not witness you fight in the arena?"

"Seems like it, Lady Pakura." Temari quipped with an easy-going smile, "One would expect the Tsuchikage to know what being a ninja means but who knows what else than his height is stunted."

From their interaction, Onoki understood verbal attacks had no effect and they would only keep mocking him.

"Very well. As you wish." Onoki's face darkened as he put his hands together, "I will quickly deal with the girl first before I deal with you, then."

His knees bent in preparation for recoil and a small white light started to gather in the middle of his joined thumbs and pointing fingers. The light was slowly growing bigger and bigger, being charged by Onoki's potent chakra...

It didn't even take two seconds for Onoki's attack to be ready and a white beam shot straight at Temari at breakneck speed.

The beam traveled through the air and the second Onoki finished firing it, he started turning toward Pakura, considering the blonde girl done for.

Yes, the show she gave in the arena against the Uzumaki girl was impressive and very fancy but Onoki would not dub her a Kage-level powerhouse. Not yet. He fully believed firing his bloodline jutsu at the girl was enough to get rid of her or at the very least lethally injure her.

That's why he was left surprised when Temari just whipped out her fan and... did the impossible. She deflected the beam upward with it, straight into the clear sky, until the chakra powering it was used up and the beam disappeared into thin air.

"Wha-!? How did you-!?" Onoki exclaimed, suddenly much warier about the 'genin' in front of him.

It had to be said, the Dust Release was one of the most destructive bloodlines in the world! It was also known to be able to get through any physical obstacle with the ease of a knife going through butter. The only reliable way to survive it was to dodge it but that was easier said than done since the Dust Release Jutsus were very fast too.

Just with this one bloodline, both the Second and the Third Tsuchikage were capable of becoming the best Iwa ninjas in their respective generations and secure the position of the Tsuchikage for themselves. They definitely had many more tricks up their sleeve but their bloodline played a very important role in their rise to power. There was simply no way to easily counter it.

And yet... Onoki just witnessed a kunoichi using a battle fan to deflect his Dust Release attack. It utterly baffled him.

"I used my fangirl powers." Temari smugly retorted, making Onoki's mind blank out for a second at the stupidity he just heard.

Before Onoki could regain his focus, Temari suddenly grabbed her fan with both of her hands and channeled a massive amount of wind-natured chakra into it, before swinging it at him.

A tornado full of kamaitachi whirlwinds burst forth, appearing out of nowhere and engulfing Onoki. It was so massive that everyone in Konoha could see it as the sky was seemingly connected with the ground through it.

Inside the tornado, the wind chakra ground against each other, creating a very efficient meat grinder capable of turning anything entering it into dust. It was no wonder that part of the arena was instantly disintegrated by it.

"There, that should do it." Temari nodded in satisfaction as she leaned on her now folded battle fan. She put quite a bit of her reserves into this attack as she wanted to quickly return to Rei. Turning back towards Pakura, Temari impatiently asked, "Can I go now?"

In response, Pakura just chuckled, "Firstly, you overdid it."

Temari unrepentantly grinned, "It worked, no? That's all that matters." She shrugged her shoulders.

Pakura's lips stretched into a teasing smile at that, "Secondly... you are underestimating your enemy."

Pakura timed her answer very well as the second it was out of her mouth, the tornado suddenly exploded in white light penetrating it in multiple places, collapsing the entire Jutsu with pure force, overpowering the wind chakra inside of it.

When the tornado full of razor-sharp winds dissipated, Onoki could be seen standing in his original spot, not even a scratch on him.

"It will take much more than that to put me down, kid." He glared at Temari, not amused with her assumption that defeating him was so easy.

Onoki was a prideful man. He could stomach being verbally mocked. Especially when his opponent used the jabs at his height. Everyone did that. He was used to it.

But having his ability questioned and being looked down upon by some wet behind the ears upstart?

Now that pissed him off.

Onoki put his hands together, much like when he shot the first beam at Temari, and his chakra flared around him as his killing intent fell on Temari's shoulders while he condescendingly shouted,

"You deflected one... can you do the same with ten!?"

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When Onoki broke out of Temari's tornado and revealed his unscathed form, it looked a bit like a magic trick.

After all, both Temari and Pakura fully knew there was no way for him to tank it with his own body without being turned into a meaty paste. Even if he used the variety of Earth Jutsu that hardened its user's skin, there still would have been deep gashes all over him.

Only when Pakura noticed the very small pebbles occasionally sprawled all around him did she understand how he did it.

'So he simply created a very dense Earth Dome, let it tank the attack while he was charging his own counter-attack. But then, why didn't he aim his counter-attack at Temari and shot it into the air?' Pakura inwardly mused, 'Wait.' She tilted her head as an idea struck her. 'He realized the weak point of the tornado? Tsk. He must be quite experienced with fighting against Wind users.'

When Pakura was finally done with her theory, she noticed Onoki charging his Dust release again, aiming at Temari. Pakura could feel the amount of chakra and...

Ten white rays split from Onoki's hands, razing their way through the air straight at Temari who was prepared to deflect them with her battle fan...

'Haa~, youth.' Pakura could only sigh.

Onoki's Dust Release rays met Temari's fan, but unlike the last time, they were not immediately deflected upwards. The Dust Release impacted the extremely durable high-quality chakra metal of the fan, the special chakra paper made by Konan and enhanced by Rei's fuinjutsu to match the durability of the chakra metal and be able to amplify the user's wind chakra, and on top of all that, was Temari's own special chakra coating technique where she mixed her Wind and Earth Natures in a similar yet different way than what her Sand Jutsus used and made her battle fan the best at deflecting and pushing attacks away from itself thanks to the 'magnetic' properties it gained. The usually fragile weapon such as a battle fan, could thanks to that be used as a Jutsu repulsive shield without the worry of it being damaged.

It was one of the creative ways of how to use her bloodline Rei taught her. After all, her bloodline was not Sand manipulation but Magnet Release.

But it seemed that Temari's chakra-enhanced battle fan had just met its match as Onoki's concentrated Dust Release was trying to drill through Temari's chakra coating on the fan, refusing to be deflected and disintegrating the coating bit by bit.

Temari's eyes slightly widened as she felt herself being pushed back despite already putting her full strength into her battle fan. She pushed more of her chakra into the coating, desperately trying to resist Onoki's technique while trying to push her fan upwards to make deflection easier but the pressure and momentum of Onoki's Dust Release were not letting her, instead, transforming the exchange into a straightforward clash between Temari's and Onoki's chakras.

When Temari was about to lose, her coating almost penetrated, and Onoki's technique was about to impact her now-unprotected battle fan...

Emerald-colored chakra suddenly bubbled from Temari's wrist, the same spot where Pakura marked her when she took her as her kunoichi. The emerald-colored chakra quickly spread all over the fan, easily pushing the Dust Release back, eroding it as if it was an effortless task.

Temari was about to sigh in relief that her precious battle fan was saved from destruction but her eyes widened once again when she noticed another white ray heading toward her.

Onoki definitely did not just wait until Temari's struggle with his attack ended. He was preparing for his next attack.

The white ray was too fast and already too close... Panic filled Temari as she knew she didn't have time to defend. Not only was this ray much more powerful than the previous ones but there was no time to concentrate the chakra-coating of her weapon enough to at least buy her time.

It was too late...

That's when Pakura suddenly appeared in between Temari and the white ray, her palm outstretched towards it. Not even a split of a second passed and the ray impacted Pakura's palm, the white chakra of the Dust Release smashing into emerald flame-like chakra in which Pakura's palm was engulfed.

And just like that, without any fanfare, when the full Dust Release ray gathered on Pakura's palm, she abruptly closed her hand into a fist, and the Dust Release was effortlessly squashed like a bug by the emerald chakra.

Onoki could only gape at... he had no idea what that even was! His bloodline is the most destructive out there and the woman in front of him just... caught it? His mind couldn't even start comprehending what he had just witnessed.

Onoki's astonished eyes met Pakura's gaze full of calm apathy, and for the first time in decades, he froze, his body locking up in irrational fear.

The last time he felt like this...!

His mind flashed back to his meeting with Uchiha Madara in his youth, to the time he locked eyes with the man's Sharingan and felt the sheer disinterested malice in those eyes...

While Onoki was having the shock of his life, Pakura slowly half-turned towards Temari, causing the girl's breath to hitch when she saw how Pakura's usually brown eyes were now shining in a striking emerald color surrounding cat-like slitted pupils.

The sheer intensity and feeling of danger those eyes held was something that mesmerized Temari.

Only Pakura's voice pulled Temari back to reality, "I called you here to fight a Kage. Stop underestimating him. He is far too experienced and his Jutsus are far too destructive for you to take it easy. You already experienced prosperity and became a monster. Now it's your time to experience proper adversity and finally grow up. I hope you won't disappoint me... again."

With that, Pakura disappeared into thin air, neither Onoki nor Temari capable of following her with their eyes as she reappeared on her chair, leisurely sitting and supporting her cheek with her palm while waiting for them to continue their fight.

Temari shook at Pakura's words, a feeling of shame dwelling in her. She was too cocky and self-assured. She thought fighting a Kage would be easy for her.

Her rise so far was in no way easy. The training Pakura and occasionally Rei gave her was in no way easy. But it made her stand above her peers, above other ninjas from her village. It made her better but she had never thought herself to be arrogant.

But... apparently, she grew complacent when she had no right to be.

When Temari finally realized where she went wrong, she raised her eyes back towards Onoki, but now they gleamed with an iron-clad resolve. The resolve to win.

Onoki's eyes followed Pakura with deep unease. He felt fear. It had been so long since he felt like this...

But he was a Kage. He was not one of those weak-willed wet behind their ears guys that couldn't face their fears. He understood long ago that facing their fears was something every person eventually had to do if they wanted to improve.

Even if Madara stood in front of him right now, he would fight. No matter how the man still scared him, even long after his death... Onoki would fight.

For he was a ninja, a Kage. The protector of his village and his people. Therefore he would fight even if it would cost him his life.

Despite his resolve, facing monsters like Madara was never easy. Hence, his uneasiness.

'Another one appeared in the world.' Onoki thought as he watched Pakura with apprehension, his stomach sinking. 'Why can't one pop up in my village?' He inwardly grumbled.

As an answer to his gaze, Pakura just kindly smiled and waved her free hand at them, "Don't mind me. My apprentice needs all the training she can get. Feel free to continue."

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'This bitch.' Onoki inwardly seethed at the carefree and casual way Pakura ordered him.

Alas, he could do nothing about it and it wasn't as if his opponent decided to not fight him if he declared his disinterest in fighting. Even if he didn't want to obey Pakura, he would be forced to act in accordance with her order simply because he couldn't do anything else in his situation.

Somehow... that made him even more incensed.

His eyes trailed over to Temari, and when he saw the determination in the girl's eyes, he snorted in contempt.

"Girl, the last time I underestimated a youngster was with the Namikaze brat and I regret it to this day. Don't think I will go easy on you just because you are at the age where you barely don't need to use diapers anymore." Onoki gruffly spoke and prepared for a fight.

But unlike what he just said, he didn't intend to fight Temari with the aim to kill her. Not even with the aim to defeat her.

No... Onoki simply wanted to wait for an opportunity to flee.

And for that, he had to go hard enough on the girl to push her back while not defeating or killing her. All in order to prolong their fight so the chances for such an opportunity to come would be increased.

"I... might have underestimated you, old midget." Temari's face scrunched as if she ate something disgusting. "But that won't happen again." She said in a barely audible voice.

Both Onoki and Temari were about to leap at each other when Pakura's voice suddenly interrupted them.

"Oh. You both can fly so either fight in the arena or go into the air." She turned towards Temari, her eyes holding a stern but warm look, "Konoha is now our ally, Temari, I don't want to see you destroying more of it than necessary." After saying that, Pakura's eyes shifted towards Onoki, her gaze turning cold. "As for you... better do what I say or it won't be my apprentice you will be facing but me."

Naturally, Pakura could completely see through Onoki's plan. She wasn't born strong. She was in his position quite a few times herself so she could imagine what he was feeling and what he hoped to accomplish.

Hearing her, Onoki grimaced but he could only give a curt nod in a defeated acceptance. At least Pakura didn't seem to try preventing his attempt at running away. If anything, she seemed amused and curious. He tried to console himself with that.

Both Onoki and Temari jumped down into the arena, neither really opting to fight in the air.

For Temari, it was because in the air, her Sand Manipulation would have been severely limited and she now knew she would have to use everything in her arsenal to fight Onoki.

For Onoki, it was because most of his defensive techniques relied on Earth Nature Manipulation, and it was infinitely easier to cast them near the ground. While he could make earth for his techniques mid-air, it was very draining, and right now, he needed to preserve his chakra as much as he could.

The two fighters soundlessly dropped onto the ground of the arena and looked at each other. The stare-off didn't last more than two seconds before the fight started.

No insults, grandstanding or boasting. They were past that stage of the fight and both now knew the other wouldn't be shaken by a simple insult.

Neither Onoki nor Temari wished to engage in close-range combat as it was not their main strength.

They abruptly stopped rushing at each other when they were just fifty feet apart, Temari sliding on the ground due to her momentum, using it to brandish her battle fan, while Onoki stopped seamlessly in his spot, allowed to do this due to his body floating slightly above the ground.

Running was for plebs anyway...

As Onoki stopped, his hands came together, charging another Dust Release ray... after all, why do something new when the old thing worked so far? He totally expected to overpower Temari with his next attack.

And if not, then he could simply deploy one of the many backup strategies that were brewing in his mind.

Unlike the previous times, when Temari was about to finish brandishing her battle fan and her Wind Jutsu was about to be shot towards Onoki, a spark suddenly came out of her mouth as she ground her teeth together. That was the only cue Onoki got before...

Temari suddenly spat a stream of fire in front of her, directly into the trajectory of her Wing Jutsu, causing a fiery inferno to roll in waves at the startled Onoki.

Knowing he had to react fast, Onoki stopped charging his attack and shot it in front of him, easily penetrating the fiery inferno and creating a massive hole in the middle of it.

Onoki's aim was impeccable and he shot it straight at his opponent. But when he saw his Dust Release ray pierce straight through Temari's fan and body... he instantly knew he was fooled even before Temari's form dissolved into sand.

He had other problems than pondering where his opponent was, though. Unlike his expectations, the inferno wasn't disrupted completely and still advanced toward him, sealing up with more raging flames as it got closer to his position.

Onoki was however too experienced and as the flaming inferno engulfed him, roasting him alive, his charred form suddenly crumbled, revealing it was just an Earth Clone.

It took ten whole seconds for the inferno to cease existing, devouring all the chakra funneling it and leaving behind only a massive black mark spanning through at least half of the arena.

Neither Onoki nor Temari could be seen inside the arena.

While the arena seemed completely peaceful, down below it, a vicious fight continued. Temari tried to ground as many rocks together as she could in order to make more sand for herself while Onoki was focusing on furiously solidifying the sand into rocks with his chakra. Both did this all the while trying to locate the position of the other.

Having their attention divided like this wasn't pleasant but they both knew stopping would mean giving the other the advantage and both were too stubborn to allow that.

Two minutes passed, rocks being ground to sand and then sand being solidified into rocks in an endless circle... by now the entirety of the ground under the arena went through this process and it became visible even on the surface in several places.

It looked like a disturbance on the water surface. Several places on the surface were turned to sand that was moving in waves like water, but it didn't last long and the sand was hardened, turning back to rock only for this exact phenomenon to repeat in different places in the arena. Again and again, and so it went.

No ninja had the guts to step into the arena during that time as they all knew the sign of danger.

If that wasn't enough, the sight of occasional kunai falling into the arena and impacting the ground... before it was either covered by sand that rose from the unsuspecting ground and crushed the kunai or two chakra-hardened rock plates appeared from the ground and squashed the kunai in between themselves before pulling in deep underground depending on who controlled the place where kunai landed at that moment.

Both Onoki and Temari were using their senses, rather than their sight, to fight so whoever got into the arena would be shit out of luck as they would assume them to be their opponent and go for attack no questions asked.

As this kind of fight continued, it was surprisingly Onoki who got lucky and got the first hint of Temari's location.

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Temari was growing more and more disgruntled the more she searched the underground of the arena. She was extremely good at locating enemies thanks to her innate talent and loads of hard work in both earth and wind manipulations.

After all, she wasn't like Gaara or her father who had their bloodlines right off the bat. Temari had to work hard to awaken hers. And since it did not awaken on its own, forcefully awakening it would have been impossible without mastering the natures needed for her bloodline.

At this point, Temari was the best at Earth Manipulation and only second to Lady Pakura in Wind. And she was damn proud of it too.

So... why couldn't she get even a hint of her opponent!?

'As expected, he knows his stuff as a Kage should.' Temari thought, feeling disheartened.

Temari's thoughts were interrupted as she felt her chakra sense catch something extremely unexpected.

As usual, the sandy ground was turning into rock but this time, it wasn't erratic and random. No, this time it headed straight towards her!

'He found me!? How!?' Temari inwardly freaked out.

Right at the start of their fight, she understood they both used the same way of locating each other. They both tried to send a sonar-like wave of earth-natured chakra into the ground, getting a clear picture of anything the wave passed.

The problem with that was simple. Her wave and Onoki's wave canceled each other out whenever they met, and as such, no wave ever reached either of their bodies.

As Temari frantically thought about how she was found out while fighting the rock-creation Jutsu of her opponent with her sand-making Jutsu, preventing it to get closer to her position, she suddenly felt her most recent wave of earth chakra cancel out Onoki's wave... but in her focused state, she for the first time felt a very subtle and weak wave of chakra come right after the main wave, passing through her.

Temari's eyes widened, 'So that's how! The cunning bastard!' She grumbled.

Alas, experience counted for something and it was obvious Onoki had the advantage in that...

Temari realized that fighting underground was no longer in her best interest. Not when her opponent was better at locating her.

Temari quickly stopped trying to fight Onoki's Jutsu and propelled herself upward, burrowing towards the surface. After reaching it, Temari did not stay on the ground. Instead, she flew into the sky, hovering around fifteen meters above the ground while channeling her chakra downward, focusing on turning more of the ground to sand.

It might have appeared that Temari had an advantage now that she wasn't underground. After all, she could affect a bigger surface of the ground, and by now, the entire surface of the arena was a well of moving sand.

Onoki seemed to be trapped. He was underground and above him was sand... Temari's domain.

Alas, there was a reason why neither Temari nor Onoki tried to get out of the underground at the start, trying to utilize this kind of tactic.

Temari abruptly jerked her body to the right, only barely evading a thick Dust Release beam that suddenly came out of the ground. Before she could relax, she had to move back, evading another beam... and another, and another...

Temari was flying from left to right, back and forth, evading Onoki's attacks by a slight margin.

This was why neither of them wanted to get out of the ground. Earth had more density, hence the sonar-like chakra location technique took time to return results. Air wasn't as dense, however, and as such, even when Onoki was underground and practically blind, he was still able to locate Temari with pinpoint precision and aim his Jutsu at her.

While she was frantically evading the vicious attacks, Temari was also slightly focused on preparing a counter-attack. She knew the only way to break out of being on the defensive was to go on the offensive, even if it was a bit risky and tricky to focus on two things at the same time.

Onoki was too focused on trying to hit Temari and that made sneaking an attack past his guard easier than it should have been.

Then again, nobody could blame him for that. His attacks were literally one-hit-kill.

Temari's sand almost reached him, and if not for his vast experience and quick reflexes... even if his back hurt from the sudden movement... he would have been squished into a paste.

Onoki barely dodged Temari's sand but he was forced to leave the safety of the ground and resurface. Knowing that staying on the ground was foolish when fighting against somebody capable of manipulating sand, he instantly floated into the air.

Temari was not happy that she didn't catch Onoki with her sneak attack. But she decided to take what she could get and be satisfied with it. Having him out of the ground and where she could see and attack him was good enough.

"That wasn't half bad. I guess you really know a bit about being a ninja." Onoki remarked in a tone that made it impossible to know if he was being sarcastic or not.

Temari looked at him, opened her mouth... and Onoki barely scrambled to the side as a Wind Slash almost bisected him, causing cold sweat to drench his hurting back.

'How careless of me.' He scolded himself. He expected the inexperienced teenager to be swept by the need to have the last word and when she opened her mouth, he got distracted for a second due to his expectations.

He really expected Temari to be bratty and too stubborn. Even adult ninjas sometimes fell for this pitfall and started having a verbal battle during a fight at the slightest verbal provocation. Too much unnecessary pride.

Onoki too was prideful and stubborn but he knew a battle was no place for these things.

"Tsk." Onoki clicked his tongue. 'The bitch actually used my experience against me!' He inwardly grumbled. 'Why can't she just drop dead? Bothersome brat.'

Temari's and Onoki's eyes met and their chakras surged up, pressure and killing intent spreading to the surroundings as the winds around Temari started to get sharper while Onoki's hands gained a slight white glow.

A silent second passed... before the two got into action, Temari sending one Wind Slash after another at Onoki while evading one Dust Release beam after another.

Onoki used his proficiency in gravity manipulation to evade Temari's Wind Slashes, frowning a bit when he noticed the large gashes these slashes left on the arena walls when they landed. There was enough power in them to split him in half if they hit.

Then again, with every evade of Temari, his beams were making holes in the opposite wall of the arena. These holes were big enough that Temari would lose a big chunk of her body if she was hit.

Onoki's expression darkened when he started to notice that Temari was a bit too fast at evading. That led him to pay more attention to her flying technique and when he did, he received the shock of his life. It was too similar to his own! He was supposed to be the only one in the world capable of doing that!

Temari was not really using the Wind Chakra to fly. She simply used the most advanced form of earth chakra manipulation, gravity manipulation, as well. Not even Hiruzen Sarutobi was capable of doing that and he was given the title of the God of Shinobi! Onoki was extremely proud of being the only man capable of such earth manipulation mastery.

And yet...

Onoki gritted his teeth in anger. 'Good! I will show you, trying to use gravity manipulation in front of me!' His attacks became even more vicious, faster, and deadlier but this time, he tried to affect Temari's flight technique with his own chakra.

Unfortunately for him, Temari just rolled her eyes when she felt it. Gravity manipulation was her trump card. It was what she was best at. As if some decrepit old geezer could control her own flight technique... She inwardly scoffed and let Onoki continue trying, if only to make him waste more of his chakra.

In this manner, the match between Temari and Onoki continued, both trying to score a hit on the other.

Despite that, there were no massive moves. No landscape devastating techniques were exchanged between them. Both were using basic but incredibly fast and deadly attacks in hopes to save chakra, both for different reasons, while trying to incapacitate their foe for good.

Alas, that was easier said than done in a fight between two long-ranged Kage-level fighters. Especially when both were reluctant to use their strongest techniques.

Their impasse would continue for a long time yet...

--

Author Note:

Uff... enough of Temari vs Onoki for now :D. I will finish the fight later, maybe showcase some of Temari's Gravity Techniques, but I have the urge to write more about Rei right now so that's why I ended this one so vaguely.

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When Temari left and Konan stopped snickering at Rei's embarrassment for being kissed on his cheek like a little boy, Rei cleared his throat and turned to Konan as if the previous situation did not happen.

"Ahem, so, where were we?" Rei rhetorically asked before he added, "Ah, yes. Using chaos to gain benefits, right?" A pleasant smile formed on his lips.

Konan instantly knew where this was going. 'As I thought, he DOES have a plan to use the situation to his benefit. And here I almost started to believe all this bullshit about not interfering.' Konan inwardly chuckled while outwardly an amused smile appeared on her lips.

Even if the enemy ninjas could see them right now, they would definitely avoid them at all costs. Two ninjas grinning like loons at each other in the middle of a bloody battlefield... well, that didn't speak well about their mental state.

After a few moments, when Rei was satisfied with observing the cute grinning face of his bluenette, "While there is nothing to be stolen and nobody to be killed in Konoha, there is one little matter that still needs to be dealt with for the Greater Good of all that is mine." Rei sagely uttered.

"Heeh~, how nice of you to think about our safety." Konan purred as she approached Rei and seductively melted into his side, not in a dissimilar fashion from what Temari did previously.

Rei instantly embraced her, pulling her even closer to him as their eyes fondly met, "Of course, I care." Rei put his forehead against Konan's, "You are my precious." He whispered, making Konan almost swoon with giddiness.

"Mhm." Konan happily giggled, "So? Who are we getting rid of for this fabled Greater Good of yours?"

She knew she could have redirected the topic or even try to further Rei's advances, and no doubt, they would have ended up doing a very heated bedroom training. She really wanted that too. She was burning with the need for Rei... but that could wait.

Rei was showing a great deal of trust in her by showing this kind of vulnerability at this time. Out of all of his girls, only Konan and Pakura were given this kind of trust. Both because they were not either childish dumb-dumbs or selfish bitches. Or so Konan liked to believe.

The failure in her parenting was not lost on her but... she would have never confessed this but she fulfilled what she wanted to teach both Mei and Ringo.

In the end, they did end up with Rei and infinitely more powerful and happier than what they could have been otherwise, no? Her 'kids' were happy with 'daddy'.

In her opinion, her form of upbringing was a smashing success.

If Rei knew her thinking process right now... Konan briefly shuddered. She knew well the inability to sit down for weeks from the spanking that would ensue would have been her smallest problem.

Then again, all she did was in order to make Rei happy. She would not regret that. Ever.

That's why this kind of special treatment was very nice to her. She knew there was no way Rei would give Tsunade, Ringo, or Mei, and sage forbid Kaguya, any sort of control over his actions. Especially when he was about to enact some kind of plan. They would instantly drag him to do something else in an attempt to monopolize his time.

Hence, Konan did the opposite and did not try to seduce him further. She enjoyed the warmth of his embrace, but she didn't push for more.

'More will come later.' She thought with satisfaction. Rei had never betrayed her expectations and her loyalty was rewarded with more trust and love. And Konan cherished that the most in the world.

She was his 'first'. She prided herself in knowing him most and being the most useful to him.

Of course, Rei was not testing her or anything. He would be hard-pressed to do that while he was enjoying her embrace. Especially when her, albeit modest, but extremely comfortable chest was pressing into his.

He did not immediately answer her question because of that, instead of waiting to see if she would press forward with her seduction. He didn't really care if she did, to be honest. The problem he was about to deal with could be finished off at any time now.

It was a bit funny for him. The woman who was supposed to be the biggest support pillar of Nagato was now clinging onto him with adoration in her eyes. Rei knew he should probably feel guilty about depriving Nagato...

But all he felt was smug satisfaction. And 'serves him right' feeling.

The redheaded bastard would just waste such a perfect and devoted flower like Konan in his inane quest for peace through such misguided means that it made Rei almost groan whenever he thought about it.

With all the advantages Nagato had, with all the godlike powers he was freely given... and the boy still couldn't use his own head to find his own path or even to get his head out of his ass.

So yes, Rei couldn't muster any pity for the boy who was used from an early age in Madara's schemes. The only one in Akatsuki who could stop Nagato if he went out of 'control' was Obito and while he would have been a dangerous opponent, Nagato possessed Rinnegan. He could have managed to defeat Obito if he was really driven to do so.

Zetsu was no threat whatsoever. Not to someone prepared for an attack from him.

The only thing in Akatsuki, Rei was a bit curious about, was the woman that took Konan's place beside Nagato but he never checked about her identity... and that told a lot about the level of his curiosity.

He was curious if Konan's replacement reached at least S-rank prowess because... It would have been pitiful otherwise.

In Rei's hands, Konan bloomed.

In his hands, she accomplished her full potential.

In his hands, she became something much more than just a stoic maid for a redheaded brainwashed waste.

In his hands, she managed to build the biggest information network the Elemental Nation had ever seen and nobody was aware of it.

In his hands, she led a company to become the richest in the Elemental Nations.

In his hands, she refined her bloodline to such a degree that fighting her was a massively irritating chore even for someone of Rei's prowess, much less defeating her.

And even if she had no idea what her life would have looked like without Rei... or maybe it was precisely because she could guess how she would end up without meeting him, after all, he did find her among homeless and prostitutes... not once did she stop showing her gratitude or try to improve herself.

Rei really found it endearing.

Konan was precious. His ever-loyal beautiful flower.

It wasn't a coincidence that she was accompanying him to the Chunin Exams. For it was time to visit their past home. Not as Yozora. Not as a Village Hidden on the Other Side. But as Konan and Rei. As... Downpour.

"Akatsuki. I am going to deal with their 'God'." Rei finally stated as he looked towards the clear sky while possessively snuggling with the surprised Konan, "It's time for Downpour to visit the nation where we came from."

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"So we are finally going to Amegakure?" Konan calmly asked, but her eyes betrayed the overwhelming excitement she felt.

She always wanted to return and check it out. It was the place where she was born, after all.

And while she could always just go alone, she never did. It wouldn't have felt right to do so without Rei. That's why Konan calmly awaited the day when Rei finally decided to pay Amegakure a visit.

And she was not disappointed. The time has finally arrived.

"Yes. Having Zetsu working for us is quite convenient, you know?" Rei spoke with a smirk, holding Konan close to his chest with his right arm, while with his left hand he showed Konan a tanto sword that had a sealing tag enwrapped around its hilt.

Konan's eyes widened, "Hira-" She didn't manage to finish her sentence as the Space around them shifted and she found herself in a dark room...

"Wha-!"

"Wha-?"

"Wha-."

Three confused voices exclaimed, one belonging to Konan who didn't expect Rei to shift their position so abruptly, the other two voices...

Konan barely managed to turn her head and look at the two utterly shocked people in front of them before the sword Rei was holding found purchase and slashed straight through the eyes of the redheaded man in front of them while his companion, a nondescript brown-haired woman could just watch, her blue eyes slowly widening in horror as her brain was slowly registering what was happening.

"Nagato!" The woman screamed in horror, drawing out a kunai from a pouch on her tight at praise-worthy speeds...

But before the woman could even raise her hand in front of her, her face abruptly met the floor, making her dizzy from the sudden impact as her brain rattled.

Konan appeared above the woman, one knee firmly planted on her back and holding her down, while her other foot was pressing the woman's outstretched main hand to the ground, all the while she was pressing a sharp slice of paper full of wind chakra to the woman's neck.

As confused as Konan was at the start, she quickly understood the situation and acted accordingly, disarming and subduing the only threat remaining in the room. She also subtly distributed a few of her paper slices into the dark corners of the room where they would not be noticed, just in case reinforcements show up.

It happened in a split of a second and Rei was just leisurely standing in his spot, in front of the man who was screaming in pain while pressing his hands onto his eyes as blood was gushing out from in between his fingers...

But Rei didn't really care. His eyes were firmly observing Konan. He couldn't help but lick his lips at how hot she currently was, kneeling on, and subduing the woman that took her 'fated' place in the world.

"Any explanation of why we attacked these people and who they are?" Konan raised her head towards Rei and asked.

Only then did she notice how his eyes trailed over her curves, making her blush a bit and show a slightly smug, and very satisfied smile full of happiness. She almost preened under Rei's attention, pushing her chest a bit out.

She knew the expression Rei had very well and it made her girlish excitement gush forth.

'Oh, yes... we are so having sex tonight.' She inwardly thought, happily shrieking in her mind.

At that moment, she could care less who was the woman under or the man Rei blinded. Her paper slice involuntarily approached the brunette's neck, drawing blood and causing her to try getting her neck away from it in fear...

"Konan, don't kill her."

Only Rei's words pulled Konan down from her elation, back into reality as she realized she almost slit her captive's throat while daydreaming.

Rei threw the disturbed brunette an apologetic smile, but for someone like Konan, someone who spent years with him, it was ever so easy to see the amusement behind his gaze.

"These two are Nagato and... er, I have no idea what's her name," Rei nodded in the direction of the frightened brunette who was slowly gathering her wits before shrugging. "Oh, well, the redhead boy is the leader of Akatsuki. Or so he would like to think."

"Akatsuki?" Konan blinked in bafflement. "As in the mercenary shits that try to imitate us? That Akatsuki?"

"Yup." Rei nonchalantly admitted.

"Oh..." Konan eloquently replied, not knowing how to react to that. Akatsuki was never a big threat. In fact, she sometimes used their mercenary services for the Biri-Biri Company. She had no idea why Rei wanted to kill their leader but... It didn't really matter to her.

"Who are you?" The brunette under Konan finally regained her mental state and looked at Rei with hatred.

Konan was about to grab her by the hair and smash her face into the floor at the disrespect the bitch was showing to Rei but when she tightly gripped her hair, Rei gestured for her to stop.

With a pout, Konan obliged, but not before she yanked the woman's head by her hair a bit, making her hiss from pain.

Rei could only wryly smile at Konan's vindictiveness. 'Better not tell her she could have easily been in the brunette's place.' He could already tell she would have thrown a Konan-style tantrum which would end up with the entire Akatsuki dead.

And that wasn't Rei's aim.

Rei looked at the defiant brunette and gave her a pleasant, but fake, smile. "We? We are Yozora."

The brunette's eyes widened a bit, clearly recognizing that name. Her surprise lasted only a split of a second before she gritted her teeth, "What are you going to do with us?"

Rei raised his eyebrow at that. The brunette was quite smart. She quickly realized them being still alive was for a reason. They were full at Rei and Konan's mercy and could have been killed any time they wanted.

Rei could also see her from time to time give a 'subtle' worried glance in Nagato's direction. The man was still gritting his teeth, trying to get through the pain and the shock from the sudden lights-out while clutching his ruined eyes and whimpering... which made the brunette quite distraught even though she tried to hide it. Obviously, she cared a lot for the redhead.

It really reminded him of Konan from canon. If a bit weaker.

Or maybe his perception was a bit screwed? Eh, it didn't matter...

The brunette would clearly do anything to ensure Nagato's survival. Rei could tell her to strip and she would do it, even if reluctantly and with hate. Not that he would do that. His women were enough for him, thank you very much!

He was not even going to utter that as a joke because Konan's hand would most likely slip and the brunette's head would roll before he could even finish such a joke.

Plus, he knew he had Konan in a good spot. She was hot and bothered, looking forward to having some nice intimate time this evening. As a gentleman, it was his duty to not sour that mood and enjoy her body to the fullest come evening.

Therefore, he decided to be serious instead of playful.

He kindly smiled at the unnamed brunette as he crouched in front of her and patted her head as if she was a misbehaving child he was about to lecture, "Would you believe me if I said I just didn't like his eyes so I decided to do him a favor and get rid of them for him?"

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"First of all, I think you should be grateful. I just saved his life." Rei self-righteously stated, making the still-unnamed brunette even madder.

Not that he cared how she viewed his depriving Nagato of his sight but he felt like explaining since they had time to waste until Obito finally showed up.

Someone extremely meticulous like him definitely had a way to notify him if his most important pawn was in danger. And even if not, Zetsu was on standby to do just that. After all, a play could not go on without its main actor, no?

"A-and wh-why?"

Surprisingly, it was not the brunette who responded but the still-suffering Nagato who managed to get that resentful question out through his gritted teeth and whimpering.

Rei turned towards him and put his hand on Nagato's shoulder in a friendly manner, "Look, mate, I get it. You think losing your special eyes is bad but to be honest, they were not even yours, to begin with."

Now that stopped the blind boy's seething almost instantly. He still tried to rudely shake off Rei's hand though...

Obviously, Nagato was not a complete fool. Nobody who could create and lead an organization like Akatsuki could be stupid. Arrogant and ignorant... yes. Stupid... no.

Rei counted on that fact and surmised that Nagato did his research on his eyes. It was only natural to be interested in why he had them and how he got them. Yet, not even some Kages knew about Rinnegan. It was so obscure and veiled in myths and legends that it might as well be fiction. Zetsu did his job well and the proper information about those eyes was very hard to get.

That's why Rei's sentence made Nagato still and tempted him no matter how it inwardly made him feel uncomfortable.

Seeing that, Rei smirked, "You didn't really think you are some kind of chosen one, did you?" He playfully rolled his eyes, "Well, in a manner of speaking, you are. You are Madara's chosen one. Those eyes I just ruined belong to Uchiha Madara. The real and dead one, not the ridiculous wannabe that was manipulating you for over the past decade." He nonchalantly dropped the bomb on them.

Nagato grew completely silent when he heard that, even his whimpering ceased. It was obvious he was still in pain from how tightly he clenched his fists but he was too focused on digesting the information.

Ninjas' minds worked a bit differently than civilian ones. They had to consider a lot of information on a daily basis, connecting patterns and deciding the truth from lies. It was a matter of life and death for them so Nagato would not just rashly believe whatever Rei told him without any basis behind it.

But that's where the trap laid. Rei didn't need to present proof. He knew Nagato spent over a decade in Tobi's presence and he definitely had his own misgivings. He just silently let Nagato mull over it for a bit and come to his own conclusions. No matter if they were right or wrong.

"How?" Nagato eventually asked in a quiet voice and Rei gestured for Konan to let the brunette go.

Konan pursed her lips but reluctantly obeyed, appearing next to Rei in a burst of speed, her eyes watching the brunette's every move.

The unimportant girl instantly stood up and worriedly limped towards Nagato, giving Rei a distrustful yet questioning glance.

"Tend to his wound." Rei dismissively said as he reassuringly rubbed Konan's lower back to make her relax a bit.

"Back to your question," He spoke towards Nagato, "I am sure you started learning the Outer Path: Samsara of Heavenly Life Technique, no?"

Nagato slowly nodded, hissing a bit as the brunette slowly pulled away his hands from his face, revealing his face with a horizontal gash going through his eyes and nose. It wasn't a pretty sight.

"And I guess it wasn't exactly your idea, right?" Rei led him to the conclusions he wanted him to arrive at, taking great pleasure at his minuscule reactions like scrunching of his face there, a twitch in his cheek here, or balling of his fists, as Nagato was slowly connecting the dots.

Rei didn't need an answer to his previous question. The thoughtful frown on Nagato's face told him what he needed to know. "Tobi no doubt reasoned it would have been a great boon to have a technique capable of reviving the Akatsuki members." He 'guessed', causing Nagato to flinch at how accurate Rei was.

Theoretically speaking, Nagato already had the King of Hell that could revive people but that only worked on recently deceased. Anybody who died more than just a few minutes before he was tossed as a munchie to the King of Hell's maw would not come back to life. That's where the sacrificial revive technique came to play.

Well, Rei did have Zetsu tell him precisely how Obito managed to persuade Nagato to learn a suicide Jutsu so it was less about guessing and more about simply being manipulative.

"What he didn't tell you is that you were just a pawn supposed to revive Uchiha Madara when it is time, sacrificing your own life in the process." Rei revealed decades of secret plans with one sentence, feeling extremely smug about that accomplishment.

While Nagato fell into silent contemplation, it was actually the brunette who gasped at the implications, "The technique was supposed to work without Nagato having to die." She exclaimed, reluctant to believe it.

"Sure, it does." Rei shrugged. He knew about that from Kaguya. She could do that easily depending on the strength of the revived person... not that she would waste her chakra for others like that. "But only if he had a more advanced form of Rinnegan. Unfortunately for him, he is an Uzumaki. He can wield the eyes to a very limited degree because of his ancestry but he would never be able to evolve it. Not naturally, at least."

Rei suddenly blinked as he finished explaining and his eyes gave the woman an inquisitive look, "By the way, what's your name? I think I forgot to ask."

That earned him a small nudge to the side from Konan and a prompt eye roll.

"I am Amagi Mika." The brunette said with a frown, her hands not stopping to tend to Nagato's wound.

When Rei heard her name... he shrugged her existence off. At first, he thought she was a canon character he was forgetting about but he had no recollection of a character with that name. As he thought, she simply was not important.

"You are quite skilled at medical ninjutsu." Konan quipped.

She was glad about that. Usually, it was her who kept the 'prisoners' alive. Mika being capable of healing enabled Konan to just relax and let Nagato's life in her hands. After all, the woman clearly cared more about his life than Konan ever would.

"Mhm." Mika neutrally hummed, not willing to start a conversation with the woman who almost killed her. She could still feel the painful tingle from the small cut on her neck.

"Rude." Konan frowned, causing Mika's cheek to twitch a bit.

The brunette wanted to scream that she was almost decapitated just a few moments ago by Konan so being rude was a mild response in her opinion but... she was smarter than that and kept quiet, focused on helping Nagato while glaring to nowhere.

While this was going on, Rei was screening the town with his senses, quite surprised at the instilled order and the improved quality of life of the inhabitants. Being under Akatsuki clearly helped this town a lot and he was a bit curious if other settlements in Ame were like this.

'Not all that villains do is bad, huh?' He thought. He doubted Akatsuki would be the villain from the perspective of the Ame people. Not after their lives were improved so much thanks to them.

And yet...

Rei looked at Nagato with a sigh. The redhead clearly knew only might makes right. That was the entire basis behind his 'gather the bijuu and threaten the other nations' plan. As stupid as it was, Rei could see it working.

Of course, as with everything, it would require some poor, ignorant, and arrogant sods to die so the others could see he was not joking but... in a world like theirs, the strongest could easily take the reins.

Nagato also obviously wanted to improve people's lives and Rei blamed Jiraiya for his naive outlook. The man was no true ninja. He might dress like one, and he might have a semblance of thinking of one instilled to him by Jiraiya butâ

He was just a misguided idiot with too much power to be healthy who was manipulated from his early childhood. Whether that manipulation was done by a white-haired peace-loving pervert or fake Madara, it didn't matter as it caused its fair share of damage.

Nagato could not think for himself. Even if something was clearly fishy with Tobi for years, he ignored it and blindly chased his stupid goal. Reiâ really couldn't understand the man.

'Speaking of fake Madaras.' Rei turned around, his hand snapping upward and catching the wrist of a person that appeared from a swirl.

Rei looked at the kunai that was supposed to end up in his back and raised his eyebrow at the new arrival. "Did you really think this would work?" He looked at the man with an orange swirl mask whose single Mangekyo Sharingan was glaring at Rei from behind it in utter rage.

"Do you have any idea what you have done?" The fake Madara menacingly growled.

Rei just pleasantly smiled at that, "Why don't you explain it to me as if I was five?"

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Tobi snarled at Rei's provocation, unable to control his feelings due to the realization that the Tsuki no Me plan was completely ruined.

Without Madara's Rinnegan, there was no way to bring Madara back to life or even summon the Gedo Mazo, nor to seal bijuu into it. Without Madara's Rinnegan, there was no way to go forward and every plan and machination became completely meaningless.

From Zetsu, Obito knew how Madara unlocked Rinnegan. One needed a very strong Uchiha with Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan to have the blood and flesh of a powerful Senju implanted into his body and then wait for the eyes to evolve.

But even with Madara taking in Hashirama's flesh, it still took considerable time.

The biggest problem was... the Uchiha and Senju clans were no longer in existence. As far as he knew, the only people capable of evolving Rinnegan were himself, Sasuke, and Itachi Uchiha. And even then, there were no sufficiently strong Senju around.

The last remaining Senju was Tsunade and Obito kinda doubted her strength. She was like a puffed-up peacock, full of pride and attitude... Yet, Obito knew she was supposed to be the weakest of the Sannin Trio. Compared to Hashirama, she kinda fell short, in his opinion.

That wouldn't have been a problem otherwise but Obito suspected the stronger a Senju is, the stronger his chakra is, the quicker the evolution process would go.

Yet, the same problem was with the Uchiha side. Between Itachi, Sasuke, and himself, the closest to Madara strength-wise was him and he knew well that he fell short of the man's prime by a large margin.

How long would it take for a new set of eyes to be evolved from the available components? Fifty years? Hundred years? More?

Obito didn't have an answer for that but he knew it wouldn't be anytime soon, if ever. Somehow, he doubted quantity would make up for quality, and compared to the legendary ninjas, Madara and Hashirama, the quality of this time fell short by a lot.

That's why Rei ruining Nagato's eyes put an instant stop to his and Madara's plans. It was over.

Obito's body fully materialized and the swirling around him stopped. He had no idea who the bastard in front of him was but he knew he was strong. If the interception of his sneak attack was not proof enough... And Obito prided himself in being able to sneak up on people with his Mangekyo... then the state Nagato was in was enough to convince Obito to take Rei seriously right off the bat.

The second his last use of his Mangekyo ceased, he instantly reactivated it, this time aiming directly at Rei's chest and causing the air there to swirl, sucking the middle of Rei's chest inside...

Obito wanted to prematurely close the portal, ripping Rei's chest into shreds and quickly ending him but to his surprise, he found himself unable to do it.

The swirling continued on and on... the portal between Obito's personal dimension and the place Obito targeted refused to be closed.

"What the heck is going on!?" Obito growled in frustration, trying in vain to forcefully interrupt his Jutsu. At this point, he would be glad even if Rei came out unscathed.

His Kamui usually did not use a lot of chakra as long as he opened a portal, hopped through it, and instantly closed it. He could use it constantly that way. Yes, the swirling teleporting took time but that was mostly for the shock effect and style, rather than because of necessity.

After all, in the middle of combat, he could relocate parts of his body to his dimension, making himself seem intangible to his opponent. If the technique took a lot of chakra, it would be unusable.

But... it had its own rules and disadvantages. Right now, his Kamui was trying to suck another being, which was a massive expenditure on chakra. That's why Obito tried to do it quickly, just open a portal and close it right after a part of Rei was sucked in.

Him being unable to close it sent alarms and panic through his head as his chakra was sucked out of him at a quick pace.

Rei watched the distraught Uchiha in front of him and chuckled, "You really are arrogant as the rest of your clan, aren't you?" He quipped with a smile, "Did you really think your Jutsu had no counter?" Rei shook his head, "All it took was using a Space-Sealing Seal right after you opened your little portal." He curtly explained and Obito's eyes widened in disbelief.

No wonder he could not close the portal! The entire space around them was locked in its previous state... which meant the portal would be maintained until the seal holds. Yet, the portal needed to be fueled by something and that something was Obito's chakra.

Obito's face paled at the implications and he frantically started to try forcefully closing the portal, not even realizing he was trying to jerk his wrist out of Rei's hold.

Rei, however, just tightly held his wrist and laughed in amusement at Obito's pitiful attempts.

He had many countermeasures against Obito but... why fight a prolonged battle when he could just cause the man to exhaust himself to death without even moving an inch?

Both Maki and Nagato could feel the quickly decreasing reserves of Obito and even though Nagato was blind, he had a clear picture of what was happening just by using his chakra sensing and hearing. Both of them were full of horrified awe at the ease with which their co-leader was defeated and realized they are lucky to be still alive. If these two intruders intended to kill them, then even if the initial ambush failed and Nagato had the time to mobilize his Paths, it wouldn't have mattered.

Konan also watched what was happening but unlike Nagato and Maki, she was just disappointed. Akatsuki was supposed to be strong and people in the know often compared them to Yozora with reverence.

Yet... the idiot got caught in such a simple trap!?

How friggin hard was it to understand that space locks are the biggest threat to him and prepare accordingly? And he had literally NOTHING to counter them? And this was supposed to be one of the best S-rank ninjas in the current Elemental Nations sans the Village on the Other Side?

Really?

Sure... Uzumaki were not back in business that long and they definitely did not sell these kinds of seals to their customers but back in their heyday, they were known for their ability to lock space. It would be prudent to prepare for the eventuality...

'I guess my worldview is a bit skewed due to Rei's views.' Konan wryly smiled.

It took barely three minutes and Obito's fierce thrashing started slowing down, until he totally stopped moving thirty seconds later, letting out a muffled wheeze before he powerlessly fell to his knees and inclined his head down as the swirling on Rei's chest slowly ceased.

Rei blinked and let Obito's wrist go, his arm instantly falling down, and then he put two fingers on Obito's forehead, giving him a gentle shove that caused his body to fall over on its back.

Rei pursed his lips, staring at the sprawled Obito on the ground, his sole Mangekyo Sharingan still staring at the ceiling from behind his mask...

"Yup, he is dead." Rei shrugged as he felt no chakra signature from the body in front of him, and turned back towards Nagato and Maki who nervously gulped at having his attention.

--

Author Note:

If you feel like it, feel free to leave your thoughts on how Obito was dealt with and if you think it is realistic or have some misgivings :D. I find myself curious about your opinion.

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"What are you planning to do with us?" Mika asked for the second time.

Now she realized she had been brushed away the first time she asked and much to her shame, her attention was redirected all too easily because of her worry for Nagato's life.

But seeing Rei dispatch Obito so easily, she was reminded she didn't get a proper answer to what will happen to them.

Rei dryly looked at Mika, giving her a long stare which made her feel nonexistent pressure, causing her to nervously fidget... before he simply uncaringly shrugged, "For all I care, now that the chosen-wannabe no longer possesses Rinnegan, you can go and do whatever. Whether you chose to be farmers or continue playing at hidden rulers of Ame, it doesn't concern me at all."

"That's it?" Mika uttered in disbelief.

He comes here out of nowhere, cripples Nagato, and now he says he doesn't care what happens to them? That was... hateful!

Mika gritted her teeth, trying to hold her feelings in.

"What? Did you expect something else or are you dissatisfied with being left alive?" Rei tilted his head when he saw how the girl was glaring at him.

Surprisingly, it was Nagato who saved the situation by butting in, "No, we are grateful for letting us go."

Rei redirected his gaze at him, feeling shocked from the bottom of his heart as one of the most delusional people in Elemental Nations actually did something that made sense.

Of course, Rei would not kill them. He already decided to let them go but that didn't mean he couldn't mess with them. At first, he thought it would be a bit too much since he had already crippled Nagato. But when Mika started to act out, he decided to have his fun at her expense.

Yet, Nagato ruined it for him.

'Should I cut off his tongue this time?' Rei offhandedly mused, his lips twitching in indignation.

"Can I ask what you plan to do with the rest of Akatsuki?" Nagato asked, from his tone it was obvious he really cared for his comrades. Or at least, for some of the saner ones.

"Some will die, others will be subdued and tried to be reasoned with. And if that won't work, they will be dealt with. I don't intend to do this kind of leg-work by myself though. Not all of it at least. So I can't tell you precisely who will and who won't survive." Rei nonchalantly shrugged, only too late realizing that Nagato couldn't see him.

"I see." Nagato clenched his fists in frustration.

There was nothing he could do. Most of his power came from Rinnegan and losing it meant he lost access to its abilities. Fighting Rei would be suicide so being polite to the bastard who blinded him was his only option if he wanted Mika to survive.

Not all was lost, though. As he slowly started to get used to being blind, he was managing to 'see' through his chakra sensing and he felt if he trained it enough, it would have been as if he had never lost his sight. He would just perceive the world a bit differently. That was a massive relief for him.

Nevertheless, this... was a really nasty reality check for him and his only goal for now was to survive. Survive to see another day and have time to train and...

"If you think about having revenge against me then forget it." Rei guessed what the redhead thought from his expression. "You would have a hard time even with Rinnegan. Without it..." Rei shook his head as if he found the notion ridiculous.

Nagato was used to using the Heaven Path for the negotiations and speaking with the Akatsuki members so he didn't have all that much self-control in his own body. The Heaven Path was expressionless by default so it didn't require all that much self-discipline to not show any reaction.

But Rei was speaking with Nagato's real body and the boy was no ninja. His expression completely betrayed his intentions.

Rei saw Nagato stiffen when he heard his words, no doubt feeling a surge of fear, which made Rei satisfied. He wouldn't kill the redhead simply because he was resentful. He had the right to be.

Rei gave Nagato a bit of leeway because he felt a bit sorry for him. Losing his eyesight and having some hard truths told to his face must have shaken his world from the ground up. Alas, it had to happen.

"What is going to happen with the Amegakure?" Konan asked, surprising Nagato and Maki that one of their assailants cared about such a thing.

Both of them were on the brink of despair, not knowing how they would hold the current peace and regime in Amegakure together with losing Nagato's prowess. While living on a farm somewhere far away was tempting, both Nagato and Mika knew it was not a life for them. They desired to bring peace to Amegakure and it was too ingrained in them for them to stop pursuing this dream.

Even if it cost them their lives.

"Naturally, we will occupy it." Rei said in an amused tone, watching how Mika's eyes widened and Nagato's expression tightened. Seeing their expressions shift at contemplating this or that disastrous scenario of Amegakure being occupied was fun but Rei decided to explain further to not cause a misunderstanding. Well, he did after he enjoyed their fright for a few moments. "I would feel bad if the people of Amegakure suffered because of my actions. So I guess we can simply take it as ours and protect it. After all, we do come from this country." He shrugged, dropping the verbal bomb on Mika and Nagato.

"You..." Nagato started but he was instantly cut off.

"Ah, so you want to claim Amegakure under the Biri-Biri and Uzushio protection. Yes, that would do it." Konan nodded in understanding, causing Nagato's head to whip towards where her voice was coming from, his expression hopeful.

"Yes, having a country in the center of the Elemental Nations as the Biri-Biri base would help business immensely." Rei hummed.

It was a great idea. Not only would his company profit from it, but Amegakure would grow wealthier and nobody would try any tricks on it for fear of losing Biri-Biri's services.

Nagato couldn't help but be happy about this and tears started to roll down his cheeks. When he was powerful, he naturally had grand dreams but becoming powerless was a shock enough to make him realize what was truly important to him.

It wasn't the world. No. What Nagato really longed for was that...

His country... would be safe.

Just like that, any thought of revenge was forgotten by him, instead, he felt grateful.

When Kaguya later informed Rei about Nagato's feelings regarding his person, even he would scratch the back of his head and wonder how he managed to make a man whom he crippled be so grateful to him.

Uzumakis were just too weird for his common sense.

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Author's Note:

If someone is too impatient to wait for updates, the story is already finished and depending on the pa treon tier, will be fully accessible there by the 10th or the end of June.

https/www.pa /kasicair

--

After they were done with Mika and Nagato, Rei decided to go and check the progress of his plans while Konan dutifully followed.

They teleported close to the Iwagakure, the same place where they hid before wreaking havoc in the village all these years ago. Rei turned toward Konan with an inquisitive look, "How is the situation?"

Every unit of Sunagakure ninjas was given a slice of paper connected to Konan so at all times, she had quite a good overview of what was going on. Nonchalantly managing such a massive influx of information while still acting as if nothing was happening made Rei a bit impressed but throughout the years, Konan became really good at that. With her spy network, she had to.

"The fighting is over. Suna lost two hundred and thirty-one ninjas while Iwa lost quadruple that before Suna took over the Kage Tower alongside defeating the enemy leader and Iwa forces mostly surrendered. Right now, the Suna troops are dealing with stragglers who barricaded themselves in a few buildings and refuse to give up before they are put down." Konan explained as they started to walk towards Iwagakure.

Since the battle was mostly over, there was no need to worry about being dragged into it. As easy as dealing with Iwa would have been for them, this was a training mission for Suna troops.

Yes, Rei and Konan were strong but they could not babysit people all the time. The entire reason why Rei aimed to unite the ninja villages was to put a stop to the foolish mentality where the villages tried to sabotage each other, going as far as starting wars just so their enemies do not have the opportunity to grow too strong.

Instead of trying to improve themselves, the villages put more effort into hindering each other before Rei's girls started to take control. It was pathetic.

So much talented young blood wasted... and for what? In the end, no matter what the decrepit old fools would like to believe, there was never a winner of ninja wars. Everyone lost. Some just lost a tad bit less than others.

"Mhm. Why not just blow them up alongside the buildings?" Rei casually shrugged, no longer caring. His patience for the villages grew thin and their attempt to join Orochimaru in order to invade Konoha was the last straw.

Rei might have been very calm about it but he certainly did not inwardly approve.

Of course, he would have invaded Iwa and Kumo anyway. That was just a question of time since he didn't really have anybody who could covertly take over the government and install themselves as Raikage or Tsuchikage.

But Rei's plans for the takeover were... mild. He certainly did not plan to kill over a thousand Iwa ninjas in the process as happened now.

The second these villages joined Orochimaru... all bets were off and Rei decided to fulfill Pakura's and Ringo's little wish of revenge.

During her younger age, Pakura fought in the Third Ninja War against Iwa. She was waddling through a river of blood belonging to her own comrades while trying to turn any Iwa-nin into ash. That kind of grudge doesn't disappear entirely.

The woman wanted to have this 'field exercise' against Iwa for quite a bit of time now but Rei always rejected the notion. That's mostly why Pakura was so forthcoming with Onoki right now and didn't instantly kill him. If Onoki's decision hadn't pissed off Rei, she wouldn't have been allowed to have her way with Iwa. She was grateful to the old midget.

As for Ringo... she had a grudge against A for messing up her face.

That was enough for her to sic her own village's best swordsmen against it, all the while making it a field test of her newly-made special swords.

What else to say? Kiri was full of nut-cases as always.

Not that Rei had any right to judge...

...

Rei and Konan arrived at the Iwagakure's Kage Tower, dropping their perception obscuring genjutsu and causing the two Suna jonins guarding the entrance to stiffen as their eyes went wide when two strangers suddenly appeared in front of them without their senses alerting them.

The perception obscuring genjutsu was quite an ingenious piece of ninjutsu made by Konan's apprentice, Izumi Uchiha. It didn't completely vanish a person, just redirected the attention of others to different things.

By all means, it should not have worked against trained ninjas who know well their life and death can depend on noticing a small detail. Yet, it seemed it was especially those ninjas who were the easiest to affect by this genjutsu. Izumi engineered the Jutsu to work better against people on guard.

For example, while Rei and Konan were walking throughout the village, the ninjas around them were far too busy and preoccupied with their own things. They had just survived a battle and were still in enemy territory so they were on alert but that was especially why their attention simply slid off the two harmless-looking passersby, no matter how bizarre it was to see a calmly strolling passersby in a war zone where martial law was established and civilians were told to stay in their homes.

Their minds simply subconsciously told them they had more important things to deal with.

To give them credit, the two guards almost instantly sprang into action, about to subdue Rei and Konan. It was rash and unprofessional to not even ask who they were but... well, ninjas were twitchy on what was de facto battlefield.

As the guards were about to reach them, both Rei and Konan simply released their killing intent, stopping them in their tracks and for a moment, rooting them in their places.

It didn't last, however. These two ninjas were Jonins so despite being bewildered due to the pressure of Rei's and Konan's intent, they quickly regathered their wits. And while they were leery of facing off against somebody who could produce such a strong killing intent, they also wouldn't be backing down.

But Rei and Konan released their intent for yet another purpose.

By the time the guards regained their wits, they were no longer the only ninjas facing Rei and Konan. Instead, the entire street was full of Suna ninjas, some standing on the ground, some on the rooftops, and some were crouching horizontally on the walls...

All of them were nervous but prepared to tackle Rei and Konan together, ready for a fight to break out at any time.

Only the words of their second in command stopped them from pouncing.

"You...?" Sasori spluttered as his eyes landed on Rei, the supposedly rich boy civilian he escorted from the Waterfall Village to Konoha... just remembering that nightmarish mission that tested his nerves to their limit made Sasori shudder.

The redhead puppeteer subconsciously looked around, looking if the blonde menace was also present but to his infinite relief, he didn't see Nadetsu Juusen anywhere.

That was the only reason why he, from sheer panic, didn't order an attack yet.

But Sasori was not the only high ranked ninja who came out. When Rika Shun spotted Rei, she pleasantly smiled, "Oh, Rei-sama. Nice to see you. I was expecting your arrival. Everything is prepared."

Sasori's head snapped to her, his lips frowning and his head having a hard time computing... 'What the hell!? The boy was not just Juusen's boytoy?'

Rika was his subordinate as far as the puppet corps jurisdiction went but outside of it, she outranked him as Pakura's right hand woman. That's why it was her who was given the command on this operation and Sasori didn't mind all that much.

"All of you, back to your jobs!" Rika barked an order at the bewildered Suna ninjas, causing them to scramble to obey, and before long the semi-half street was once again empty.

Sasori watched as Rika led Rei and Konan inside, barely capable of restraining himself from dropping his jaw to the ground, utterly confused by what just happened and why.

'I feel myself insufficiently informed and my common sense offended. Were two intruders just treated as if Lady Pakura herself descended on us?' He thought as he hurriedly followed, definitely intent on asking some pointed questions to Rika.

Poor Sasori... everybody forgot to inform him about vital stuff.

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