Chapter 50: Lost and Found

A few days had passed since the teams had left for Suna, the village had been a little tense with the Chunin exams being hosted in Suna. More than a few Shinobi were suspicious of Suna, remembering their attempted invasion last time.

Everything had been set up to ensure that if something, Konoha would be ready to respond. The Hospitals were fully staffed and ready to treat the wounded while several teams, including Anko and myself were ready to be transported to Suna once we got the signal.

"Can the Akatsuki hurry up and attack already," Anko complained from her spot opposite me. "How much longer are they going to take? I'm sick of all this waiting."

Unfortunately, that did mean that we were stuck waiting for something to happen. It wasn't all bad. I had more than enough time on my hands to work on Tsunade's variant of the Curse Mark and had even ended up finishing it.

From what Tsunade had told me about her experience when she'd repaired the damage done to her body, she'd gone through an adjustment period where she had to get used to her new body. The process had taken a few hours, so we decided to hold off on applying the seal to my body until after the Chunin exams.

The last thing we needed to happen was for the Akatsuki to attack while I was in the process of applying Tsunade's seal to my body.

"It could be another few days," I replied. "It takes about… three days to reach Suna on foot and if their second exam is anything like ours, they'll have another five days, then there's the…"

"So we might be waiting here for another week?!" Anko complained. "I almost regret not being able to continue investigating those missing villagers with the Aburame."

It was actually a little less than a week. The Genin teams had already been gone for a few days now. They'd probably already begun the second exam by now, meaning that they should have about five days counting today… The Akatsuki will likely make their move before the exams end.

"That's what happens when you become as strong as you are now," I muttered. "Your presence becomes invaluable in times like these. The same thing happened to me when I was promoted to Jonin… I couldn't continue taking missions with my old team because I was needed elsewhere."

"Yeah, I remember. Shizune even said so herself back then," Anko sighed, before a smirk came to her face. "But then you got to team up with me and that worked out for the best… Come to think of it, the last time we dealt with the Akatsuki, they put me out of commission almost immediately. I think I owe them a little payback for that."

"Sure, why not?" I chuckled.

Only Anko would think about getting payback on a group of some of the deadliest Shinobi in the world, although she had mastered Sage mode, which put her on a whole other level. Very few Shinobi ever reached that level of power and even fewer were able to exceed it.

Feeling my stomach rumble, I glanced out at the busy street outside. "Let's get some…"

"Dango," Anko interrupted, smirking.

"I was going to say Ramen," I deadpanned. "We had Dango yesterday."

"And we can have it again today," Anko replied.

"Or we could get both," I suggested. "That way we could even try dipping some of your Dango in my Ra…" I suddenly stopped myself from completing that sentence, realizing how wrong that sounded just as I'd said it.

"Oh," Anko hummed with a shit eating grin. "Do you maybe want to finish what you were saying?"

"Nope, I was wrong, let's just get Dango instead."

"If you're sure," Anko said, looking far too amused. "It just seemed that you wanted me to shove something up your…"

I made my escape by diving out the window, ignoring the fox that was laughing inside my head. The being that had once been brimming with hatred now proved to be corrupted by my memories of the internet.

I leaned on my hand, lost in thought with a half eaten plate of Dango sitting on the table in front of me. The missing villages had me concerned. During times of war, it wasn't unusual for some hidden villages to kill off an entire village in order to gain a foothold. Both Kusa and Kiri had been known to employ such tactics in the past.

The problem was the lack of bodies. Sure Anko's team had managed to bring three back, but there hadn't been much to learn from them other than the time of death, which had been about two weeks prior to the exams.

An entire village of people didn't just disappear. Whoever was behind this was using them for something. What that something was, I couldn't say for sure.

"Oi," Anko said, snapping her fingers in front of my face. "Are you still with me?"

"Yeah," I hummed. "Were you saying something?"

"I'm just making sure that you're alright," Anko replied. "Seriously, you looked really worried for a moment there. What's bugging you?"

"I'm… just thinking why someone would ransack the smaller villages and abduct the people that live there," I explained.

The fact that whoever was behind this was burning the villages down with everything valuable left behind showed that they were exclusively doing it to abduct the villagers.

"Yeah, I've been thinking about that one myself," Anko admitted. "And I'm struggling to figure out why anyone would abduct a bunch of civilians… I mean, they're not that strong, so they can't fight and they don't have a lot of Chakra… unless they're distantly related to the Senju clan."

The only reason I could think of was that someone was using the civilians to further their own experimentation. It seemed like something Orochimaru would have done. It might be one of his leftover scientists that managed to escape Konoha's raids.

"If I were you, I'd put it out of my head for now. We're already working on figuring it out, so there's no need to drive yourself mad thinking about it," Anko said. "Besides, there's a ton of other things to be thinking about, other than a few missing villages."

I nodded, letting out a tired sigh. She was right. This wasn't helping at all. Whatever was happening with the lost villages would have to wait for later, when I had time to look into it.

Looking down at my empty plate, I shot a look towards Anko who was happily munching on my last Dango.

"What?" Anko asked, her words muffled by Dango. "I gave you some advice that seems to have made you feel better, I think I'm entitled to a little reward for doing that."

"Man, that really hit the spot," Anko hummed in content, patting her stomach with a self satisfied smile while we walked down the street. "There's just something about eating a stolen Dango that makes it taste better, you know what I mean?"

"Sure," I replied, rolling my eyes at her smugness.

"So you never mentioned how you managed to learn Sage mode," Anko said. "I mean, it was a pretty stressful process learning it from the Snakes. They summoned me to their cave, put me through a few trials and then the White Snake Sage bit me which forced my body to adapt to the Natural Energy."

I listened intently as Anko recounted her time at Ryuchi cave. From what I remembered, Orochimaru was aware of it, but his body wasn't strong enough to master Sage mode. Kabuto on the other hand would have eventually learned there and become a Sage if I hadn't ended up killing him, that is.

"You learned from the Toads, right? What did you have to do in order to learn Sage mode from them?"

"Are you sure you want to know? Learning Sage mode from the Toads had been nothing short of brutal," I lied. Anko nodded eagerly, leaning in. "Well… I began learning the second step to Sage mode first and learned how to sit still… Then, once I had a free weekend, I decided to visit Mt. Myoboku and have Pa teach me how to absorb Natural Energy and mold Sage Chakra through use of a special oil, which took about a day. After that, we sparred and he taught me how to use the Frog Kata."

Anko blinked dumbly, before her eye began to twitch madly.

"That's it? You learned Sage mode from a Toad called Pa?!" She asked incredulously. "There were no trials? No close calls or anything?"

"Nope," I smirked. "The Toads are great teachers of Sage mode, after all, the entirety of the Toad Clan are capable of using Natural Energy to some degree. Their methods of teaching it are almost completely safe… The only time it's dangerous is if Pa isn't around to knock the Natural Energy out of you."

"That's just so… lame," Anko muttered. "Here I was expecting you to have gone through some great journey to learn Sage mode only to find out that you just learned it over a weekend. I don't know what I was expecting, but what I do know is that it wasn't that."

It was a lot tamer compared to how she had learned Sage mode, but that's just the way the Toads were. They didn't needlessly put their summoner in danger by throwing them in a sink or swim situation like the snakes.

I wonder how the Slug Clan taught Sage mode to Tsunade… Questions for another day, I suppose.

"Seriously, the…"

"Naruto!"Kurama warned.

'I know!'

A Kunai slipped into my hand as I spun around, aiming to imbed it into the head of the person behind me. Anko, who had also sensed the danger, grabbed her Kusanagi and extended it through her jacket, piercing through the person behind us.

"Wah, scary!"

A Black cloak with red clouds fluttered as the Shinobi jumped back. My eyes were immediately locked on to the orange spiral mask. The Akatsuki had finally made their move, but it seemed that they had chosen Konoha instead.

I hadn't really been considering it, but it made sense. All eyes were currently on the Chunin exams in Suna… Hell, several of Konoha's most powerful Jonin were an entire nation away, leaving the village less defended. This would be the perfect opportunity for them to make a move and they'd used one of their most powerful and tricky Shinobi too.

Uchiha Obito.

'Kurama, can you sense any other Akatsuki members nearby?'

"Just Obito,"Kurama replied.

That was odd. This would be the perfect time to launch a full blown invasion, but he'd chosen to confront us by himself.

While I didn't think that highly of Obito, I knew he wasn't a complete idiot. He had to have realized that there were easier ways to go about this, taking on the entirety of Konoha wouldn't be a smart idea for him, regardless of how many Jonin were currently in Suna.

He was here for something more than a fight. If I had to guess, that something was currently in a jar placed on a desk in Tsunade's secret laboratory.

The only question was why he decided to make his presence known when he could have easily just avoided us and slipped into Tsunade's lab nearly completely undetected… Unless he realized that I might be able to sense him and decided to not take any risks… I was able to sense Zetsu's presence after all.

"So this is what an Akatsuki member looks like?" Anko hummed while her sword retracted. "I have to say… I expected something a little more… intimidating."

"Don't underestimate him," I warned. "I briefly faced him back in Taki. He's a lot more powerful than he appears."

Seeing the impending fight, most of the civilians began to evacuate, while a few of the dumber ones opted to stay behind and watch what was going on, not realizing the danger they were putting themselves in.

"Wowie, thanks for the vote of confidence," Obito called out in a cheerful tone of voice, keeping up his Tobi façade. "Hey, check this out," He said, gesturing towards his cloak. "I'm officially a member of the Akatsuki now and I have you to thank for it… after all you opened a few spots and even believed in me when no one else would."

"…Are you sure this guy is an actual threat?" Anko asked, shooting me a disbelieving look. "He seems kind of… dumb."

"Thank you," Tobi nodded happily.

"He's definitely a bit of an idiot," I said, thinking of how Obito planned to put the world into an endless dream using the Infinite Tsukuyomi. "But that doesn't make him any less dangerous. He managed to come out of our attacks unscathed after all."

"Good point," Anko muttered as she readied to extend her blade once more.

"Alright, now that I've got you right where I want you, why don't you hand over the Kyuubi?" Tobi asked, holding his hand out expectantly. "Unless you want to do this the difficult way, I could do that" He said, nodding while he reached into his cloak.

Tobi let out a shriek as he dodged to the side, narrowly avoiding Anko's extended blade. Turning around, he darted down the street as Anko gave chase.

Following closely behind, my eyes narrowed as Obito suddenly came to a stop. Standing right in front of a regular man who was by no means a Shinobi he slowly turned around. "Jeez, you two sure are slow."

"Annoying little prick," Anko muttered under her breath, rapidly extending her blade.

Seeing what was going to happen, I slipped my hand under Anko's blade and redirected it upwards where it collided with the nearby roof of a shop, tearing off a sizable portion of it.

"What… Naruto, the hell was that for? I had him that time," Anko blurted out. "It's not like that civilian behind him was in any trouble, I was gonna stop once I hit that bastard."

"He can make his body intangible," I said, not taking my eyes off Obito. "Your sword would have slipped straight through him along with anything else you might want to throw his way."

"Shit," Anko cursed. "How the hell do you beat something like that?"

"You two do realize I can hear everything you're saying, right?" Tobi asked. Crossing his arms he took on a pouting tone. "People say that it's not nice when others talk behind their backs, but it's even worse when someone talks about you right in front of your face."

"I've got a few ideas," I said.

Outside of having Kakashi help, there were a few ways to get around Obito's use of Kamui. Wait for him to reach his limit of 5 minutes, or catch him off guard.

Creating a few clones, I had them evacuate the street while one immediately flashed to the Hokage's office in order to tell Tsunade what was happening.

"If you two are done, then maybe…" Tobi trailed off, before pointing behind us. "What the heck is that thing behind you?!"

I was content to ignore him, only for a wave of pressure to wash over us as the ground shook from an explosive device going off.

I was hit with the memories of the clone that had been talking to Tsunade. Turning, I caught sight of the Hokage tower. A large chunk of it had been blown off, revealing the crumbling interior.

Switching to Sage mode, I immediately stepped to the side. I lashed out with a Rasengan as part of Obito's body phased through my own.

"Um… Whoops," Tobi chuckled as he came to a stop. "This is awkward… I was supposed to catch you off guard with that surprise attack."

Letting my Rasengan fade, I extended my senses and found Tsunade's Chakra, still as powerful and full as life as ever. It seemed the surprise attack had little effect on her.

There was something else, however. Hundreds of Chakra signatures were approaching Konoha from the sky, a few of which were already flying over the village. How had we missed that?

"Something is seriously wrong here, and it's not those flying contraptions," Kurama commented, sounding a little put off. "None of these invaders are giving off any negativity."

'Does that mean that Zetsu and Obito have finally realized how we were sensing them?'

"No… Even if they did, there wouldn't be much that they could do about it,"Kurama replied. "Everything living gives off some amount of negative emotions… Even babies give off a small amount. If I hadn't felt their Chakra alongside you, I would have simply believed that these invaders were either some form of clones or puppets."

The ground trembled as more explosives went off in the distance.

"What the hell is going on?" Anko muttered to herself.

"It would be for the best if you help protect the village while I deal with this Akatsuki member here," I said.

"…Tch, fine," Anko sighed, realizing that there wasn't any time to argue. "Hurry up and kill this asshole, alright."

"Yeah," I nodded, slipping a Kunai into my hand as Anko off into the distance.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Tobi asked. "Not to brag or anything, but I'm a pretty big deal… I'm a part of the Akatsuki after all."

Remaining silent, I threw my marked Kunai towards him and rushed forward with a Rasengan in my hand, mimicking Obito's fight with Minato years ago.

Obito rushed forward to meet me. The Kunai phased through his head as he brought his hand up to grab a hold of me once the Kunai exited his body.

To the rest of the world, we appeared as a blur, but for us, time hung on as we neared each other. Just as Obito prepared to grab a hold of me, I teleported to the Kunai and swung my Rasengan down, aiming to take his head off, only for him to contort his body, twisting it out of the way all the while kicking my arm to the side.

Throwing a punch, Obito managed to divert my fist and catch my wrist. His Kamui activated and I felt a strong tugging sensation as my body was slowly being pulled into his pocket dimension. He'd learned from his confrontation with Minato years ago… unfortunately for him, so had I.

Obito's head snapped backwards and he was sent tumbling backward. Crashing through a nearby building and out the back, into the street on the other side, his mask shattered under the full force of an attack only visible to Sages.

Following after him, I plunged my Rasengan into his downed body only for it to slip through, kicking up a cloud of dust.

Covering his bloodied face with his hand, Obito glared at me as he slowly stood up, his Mangekyou Sharingan and spare Sharingan both spun madly.

"Uzumaki!" He growled.

Dispelling my Rasengan, I stepped back and shot him a confident smirk. "Yes Tobi… or should I call you something else?" I asked, staring directly into his eyes.

"You can call me by the same name your father called me… right before I killed him," Obito said, his voice no longer sounding like that of his Tobi persona. "Uchiha Madara."

"Right… Uchiha Madara," I said mockingly. "What part of that was supposed to throw me off? The part where you're Madara, the part where you supposedly killed my dad, or could it be that you were the one behind the Kyuubi's attack to begin with?"

"You knew?"

"Enough to realize that everything that comes out of your mouth is bullshit," I replied. "I've got the Kyuubi sealed inside of me, do you really think we wouldn't have a few conversations here and there. By the way, he really hates you… It's given us something to bond over."

Obito let out a deep hum as he slowly began sinking into the ground. "It seems that I've underestimated you… A mistake I won't make twice. The next time we meet will be your last."

Placing my hands on the ground, the immediate area surrounding us slowly began to sink at the same rate as Obito, preventing him from being able to escape through the ground.

"Where do you think you're going?" I asked, giving him a viscous smirk. "I told you back in Taki that there would be consequences for your actions. You've brought a war to my home, don't think that you can get away unscathed."

It was hard to see with all the blood dripping from his face, but there appeared to be a moment where Obito looked genuinely stressed before quickly being replaced by a stoic facade.

"With what you've said, do you really think you could afford to fight me while your village is being invaded?"

"I already have a few clones running around, helping out," I pointed out. From the single clone that had been dispelled, I saw that they weren't that tough either and most of them went down after a single hit.

Obito wouldn't be able to keep this up for long. If he wanted to use his Kamui to escape, he would have to stop using his intangibility.

Reaching into his pocket with his free hand, he suddenly threw a handful of Shuriken my way as he jumped backwards, the air distorted around his body as he began to sink into his pocket dimension.

Jumping forward, the Kunai bounced off my skin harmlessly, barely leaving a scratch. I formed a massive Rasengan and slammed it into his disappearing form, managing to land a glancing blow before he managed to escape.

"Damnit."

A Rasengan that size would prove to be fatal to most Shinobi, even if it made contact for only a second, but Obito had sacrificed his artificial arm in order to take the brunt of the attack.

"There will be other opportunities to kill him,"Kurama noted. "Right now we need to prioritize this invasion."

"Right," I muttered.

My clones were already hard at work, protecting the villagers and helping coordinate a counter attack. Now that Obito had managed to escape, I could turn my full attention to the invasion.

Crouching down, I waited for a few moments, before jumping. The ground rapidly disappeared beneath me and I found myself face to face with one of the invaders. Grabbing the metal wings, I tore them off, holding onto the Shinobi as we fell.

Much like Kurama had said, the Shinobi didn't show any fear, surprise… Or any emotions at all. The man simply tried to kill me as we fell. I would have thought the man was a puppet if I didn't know any better.

Landing, I tore the man's mask off. "Alright, who are… What the hell?"

A completely shaved head and face with blank, lifeless eyes stared back at me, with the most shocking part being the seals that were plastered across the man's head, stretching underneath his clothes.

"Juinjutsu," I muttered softly as I looked over the various patterns.

It wasn't complex… in fact, it seemed to be a little too simplistic and almost sloppily put together. The Shinobi wouldn't be alive for much longer, maybe another week, two at the most before he died.

Kurama hadn't been able to sense any Negative emotions from him and the rest of the invading army, because they didn't have the capacity to feel such things. They were little more than living puppets.

The markings pulsed and lit up. Realizing what was happening, I jumped back and formed a wall just as the man's body detonated.

I clenched my fists tightly as I put everything together. It seemed that we had found the missing villagers and, sadly, there was nothing we could do for them.

Creating a clone, I sent it to inform Tsunade of what I'd discovered before turning my attention towards the several sets of airships that had just sailed in. Jumping upward, I used the gliding Shinobi as springboards and leapt between them, heading towards the airships.

Landing on the deck, I made short work of the crew, before turning towards my sights to the others. We were all currently high enough that I didn't have to worry about accidentally killing anyone and getting rid of them as soon as possible would be for the best.

The air began to vibrate as a Rasenshuriken spun to life in my hand, the intense ringing sound washing over Konoha. Throwing it towards the nearest airship, the technique expanded on contact, engulfing the ship in a sphere of pressurized air for a few moments, before contracting, leaving nothing behind.

In the distance, I could see a small portion of the sky light up as a large wave of fire consumed the attacking Shinobi.

A stream of what looked like water pierced through the hull of another airship, it looked mostly undamaged, only for it to suddenly start melting.

"I thought that I would find you here," Tsunade commented, quietly landing on the deck.

"Acid Style?" I asked, watching as the airship slowly fell apart. "Isn't that a bloodline that's native to Kiri?"

"One of the perks of being able to summon Katsuyu," Tsunade explained. "I came to help end this little invasion. What happened to the Akatsuki member?"

"He lost an arm escaping," I sighed. "You got my message about…"

"Yes," Tsunade nodded, glancing over the last of the airships that were being attacked by Konoha Shinobi. "It's… not ideal, but worse things have happened in the past. Orochimaru is a testament to that."

That much was true. This was a pretty messed up situation. The best we could do now was finish everything up and find the ones responsible. Obito was likely behind a lot of this, but there were limits to what he could do on his own. At least one other person was involved in this… probably a few people.

"I should probably go check in on the Chunin exams then," I began, looking off into the distance. There had been a large spike of negativity, but so far it seemed that everyone was still alive and well. "I just want to see what's hap…"

I stopped and we both turned to look off into the distance. There had been a massive flare of Chakra comparable to a Biju. It didn't feel anywhere as potent or caustic, but it had felt darker oddly enough.

Golden Chakra exploded into life around my body. Launching myself off the airship, I raced towards the side of the village that the Chakra was heading towards and found myself face to face with a massive wall of destructive energy, yellow lightning arcing off of it.

Chakra poured off my body in waves as Kurama's avatar formed around me, just as the wall of destructive energy made contact with us. Gritting my teeth as the technique pushed us back, I impaled the ground with several of Kurama's tails in order to get some leverage.

The technique soon died down, revealing a pathway of destruction that lead off to its location. Taking a breath, I turned to make sure that the village was still there. That had been close, I didn't want to think about what would have happened if I'd arrived a second later.

"Naruto," Kurama growled. "That Chakra… something about it really pisses me off."

Taking control of the Avatar, a massive Bijuudama began to form in front of his head, aimed directly down the path of destruction towards the origin of the technique.

Holding my hand out to the Bijuudama, I added my own Chakra to the mix, forming a disk of wind not dissimilar to my Rasenshuriken's, around the orb.

Launching the ball of highly volatile Chakra, it tore up the ground as it followed along the path of the technique that had been aimed to destroy Konoha, racing across the horizon before finally disappearing from sight.

Turning my attention to Konoha, I felt a wave of apprehension, fear and some terror hit me as the Konoha Shinobi prepared themselves to fight off the being that had nearly destroyed their home once before.

Ignoring the frightened Konoha Shinobi, I instead focused on the invaders that were still alive and attacking the village. This form was entirely too large and powerful to use anywhere near Konoha without potentially destroying it, but I would make an exception this time.

I briefly glanced towards the direction Suna was in. They seemed to be on top of things there.

"This invasion ends now," I muttered.

Focusing on the Yang Chakra that made up the majority of Kurama's avatar, I sharpened its claws, before lashing out towards the few airships that hadn't been downed yet, cleanly cutting through them.

That's chapter 50.

Obito makes a quick appearance for... something specific... and gets an unexpected invisible fist to the face while another movie plotline is jumpstarted and the missing villagers are found... Sorta.

Anyways, I'm up to chapter 57 on the spooky P word website,

P
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I go by the name of ThatKircguy. Just copy the name and paste it in the Patty Rio On search bar. It'd help me out immensely, but don't worry if that's not your style. I will be uploading weekly, so it's not going to be stuck there permanently.

Also, I post my original stuff there as well. It's nothing much, just two short stories for now, but I'll post more as I write them.

The next chapter will be posted on the 13th of December.
See you all then dudes and dudettes.
Have an awesome day.