Author's Note: Welcome back, everyone! As this is my first story I welcome constructive criticisms, flaming and trolling will be ignored.
Disclaimer: Naruto and Inuyasha belong to their respective owners.
Dialogue Legend:
"Unforgivable" – Normal dialogue
'Unforgivable' – character's thoughts/speaking to Inner Demon/Inner Spirit
"Unforgivable" – Jutsu name; Inner Demon/Inner Spirit/Supernatural Being speaking to someone on the physical plane.
'Unforgivable' – Inner Demon/Inner Spirit/Supernatural Being speaking to someone on or from within the mental or spiritual plane.
Chapter 27 – Kyuuten
Otogakure, 1 Week after Tenten's Conversion to a Warlock
"Orochimaru-sama, it took far longer than I'd have liked, but I've broken through the subterfuge of Jiraiya-san's spy network and discovered Tsunade-dono's true location." Kabuto announced after walking into his master's bedroom. The Snake Sannin had been confined to bed after being poisoned by Kurama. For the moment, the medication prescribed by Kabuto along with some very advanced Medical Ninjutsu was keeping the Youkai toxin contained to Orochimaru's arms, but Kabuto knew his measures had only delayed the inevitable. His treatments augmented the already immense regenerative properties of his master's body, but the poison still slowly progressed. The poison was paralytic in nature, and Kabuto did not want to think about what would happen once it spread to Orochimaru's torso.
"Excellent work, Kabuto." Orochimaru smirked. He was seething that it took so long for his subordinate to track Tsunade down but the delay was unavoidable given the efficacy of Jiraiya's spies. To breach their shroud of misinformation in less than a month after the failed invasion was commendable. With a herculean effort, Orochimaru rose out of bed.
Kabuto knew better than to argue. Excessive motion would likely accelerate the poison's rate of progression, but there was a very high chance that Jiraiya would reach Tsunade before he and Orochimaru could. "Before we leave, I must prepare more doses of your medicine to ensure you remain fit to travel, Orochimaru-sama."
"Fine!" Orochimaru hissed in frustration.
Hi no Kuni
"You continue to amaze, Sasuke-kun!" Jiraiya said in awe after Sasuke obliterated a rubber ball. Three days, that's how long it took for the Last Uchiha to master the Rasengan's second step. Even though he knew Sasuke would have an easier time of it than most due to already knowing Chidori, he was still shocked. 'It's not just because he's an Uchiha. The real reason is his drive to get stronger, not just to kill Itachi, but to protect all he holds dear.' Jiraiya hadn't spoken to Sasuke much during the trip aside from instructing him on how to master the Rasengan, but Sasuke had a habit of talking while he slept. His unconscious ramblings generally followed two trends: strategizing to kill his brother and reflecting on how blessed he was to have Naruto as a friend and both Ino and Sakura as lovers.
"It was hard, but rewarding." Sasuke grinned.
"If you thought the second stage was tough then you haven't seen anything yet. Get ready!" Jiraiya produced the final of the three storage scrolls he had prepared for Sasuke's training and summoned a balloon from it. He inflated the balloon and held it before Sasuke.
"Kami!" Sasuke whispered in shock as his Sharingan took in the marvel before him. The Rasengan in its full glory was raging within the balloon but its rubber confines were completely unaffected. Jiraiya maintained the Jutsu for nearly a minute before canceling it, then he looked expectedly at Sasuke.
"The Rasengan's third stage," Sasuke struggled to find his voice, "is a flawless combination of the first and second stages, which are both contained within a spherical shell of Chakra. With nowhere to go, the power becomes highly concentrated while spinning in place, becoming a miniature typhoon. It's a self-sustaining Jutsu!"
Jiraiya smiled in response to Sasuke's observations before wordlessly tossing him both the balloon and the scroll it came from. With his lesson complete, Jiraiya began walking towards Tanzaku-gai. Sasuke followed as quickly as he could while trying to master the third stage.
Toutousai's Home
"Is everyone ready?" Zabuza asked his team.
"Yes, Zabuza-sama." Haku answered while experimentally twirling one of her new senbon in her right hand.
"Yup!" Tenten responded after dumping most of the storage scrolls containing her weapons on the ground.
"My preparations are complete." Medusa replied solemnly as she tucked the storage scroll containing the components of the anti-Youkai field into her robe's sash.
While Toutousai had no first-hand knowledge of the lightning Daiyoukai's abilities, he was very knowledgeable of the general abilities wielded by most varieties of Youkai. When Zabuza asked him about the abilities lightning Youkai typically possess, the answer forced Team 9 to vastly alter the equipment they would bring to the fight. The Devil of the Hidden Mist had expected the first part of Toutousai's answer: Youkai capable of manipulating lightning often fire it from their hands or mouth, or channel it through any weapons they use; they can also form it into a barrier for defense. But when Toutousai told Zabuza that some lightning Youkai are capable of manipulating magnetism, the ex-Kiri Jonin's jaw hit the floor.
Kubikiribocho should be safe; the alloys used to forge most of Kiri's Seven Swords are highly resistant to most forms of external energy. Samehada is an exception because it devours the energy it's exposed to instead. As a precaution, Tenten applied one of her new Youkai spells to the massive blade, further increasing its resistance to Youki. The newly minted Warlock needed five days to fully recover from her conversion and had spent an additional two days mastering her new abilities. Despite no longer being fully human, her Chakra responded just as it always had, something Medusa attributed to the fact that magic and Chakra have a great deal in common. While Tenten worked on Kubikiribocho and Kumanekosou, Toutousai forged a large quantity of senbon for Haku out of Youkai bones. There was nothing that could be done for Medusa's golden wings and bronze claws. Ceto's daughter all but radiated divine power, so any Youkai spell applied to her would be either dispelled or heavily weakened. How fortunate, then, that she was unable to participate in the fight.
"One last time, Toutousai-san, are you certain that my Hyouton Jutsu will not ruin our quarry in the same way Medusa-san's attacks would?" Haku asked for the third time. "I am a demigod and Hyouton is derived from Kuraokami-sama's blood flowing in my veins."
"Positive," Toutousai grunted, "like Tenten-chan, your generation is so far removed from Kuraokami that the divinity flowing through you isn't enough to purify a Daiyoukai. Medusa's not only the daughter of a goddess but used to be a goddess herself. I don't know why she's stuck using Mana now but if she was at her peak then it's possible that her presence alone could purify most Youkai."
"If we're ready, then let's get this over with!" Zabuza said before removing his Hitai-ate and throwing it onto the heap of weapons and equipment that Team 9 could not bring into their next battle. Tenten, Haku, and Medusa followed suit. Hephaestus' crane departed Toutousai's home with the three human members of Team 9, trailed closely by Medusa. The automaton once again achieved supersonic speed, but there was no need to accelerate all the way to Mach 10 this time. The lightning Daiyoukai's location was roughly a thousand miles from Toutousai's home; Mach 2 was sufficient to get Team 9 there in under an hour. Though Medusa did not need nearly as much Mana to keep up with the automaton this time, her Mana was still restored by its mini-atmosphere.
While in transit, Zabuza and his two subordinates steeled themselves. Nothing they had experienced before would compare to this fight. Toutousai had told them that most Daiyoukai didn't come close to the power wielded by Sesshomaru. That knowledge was cold comfort though, since Toutousai also told them that the weakest Daiyoukai was orders of magnitude stronger than the most gifted human warrior. Zabuza chose to take that last statement with a grain of salt because he refused to believe that the weakest Daiyoukai was exponentially more powerful than the likes of Hashirama Senju or Madara Uchiha, but even so, he knew his new team was in for the fight of their lives.
All too soon, the crane reached its destination. A blood-red cumulonimbus hovered above a barren land that might have once been a forest or grassland. The desolation stretched for miles in all directions, and thousands of skeletons – many of which were almost completely buried in the lifeless dirt – were strewn throughout it. Black lightning tinged with crimson borders streaked through the cloud, which remained in place above the ruined land regardless of the wind's direction or speed.
A great roar emanated from the cloud as Team 9 landed, but no lightning rushed to meet them. Medusa summoned the anti-Youkai field's components from her scroll, and still the cloud did not respond.
"Our prey seems unworried about our preparations." Haku mused. "The Daiyoukai's arrogance is our advantage."
"Not arrogance, confidence." Medusa countered while pointing to a skeleton that was mostly above ground. Around its neck hung an ornate amulet. "That amulet bears traces of divine power. They are too weak for me to discern which god blessed it, but we are not the first to use divinity as a weapon against this Daiyoukai." With that grim remark, the Gorgon unfurled her scroll on the ground and sent a pulse of Mana through it to summon its contents.
The twelve purification stones provided by Hephaestus had each been fused to a twenty-foot-long silver rod with a sharpened point at the bottom. While not as physically powerful as her older sister Stheno, Medusa's strength was far beyond most humans and she had no trouble driving the first of the twelve rods into the earth. She stopped only when the rod was completely buried, leaving only the quartz stone fused to its top above ground. For the next few minutes, Medusa placed the remaining eleven rods into position. When she was done, they formed a circle with a 500-foot circumference. The circle's size was discussed with Zabuza a few days earlier. Since Tenten and Haku were primarily long-range fighters, Zabuza wanted to give them room to maneuver but also did not want to risk granting their target too much room since the lighting Daiyoukai likely also specialized in long-range combat. 500 feet seemed a reasonable compromise.
"The field is prepared; once I activate it, only success or death awaits us." Medusa warned after returning to the first rod she placed. Upon hearing this, Tenten drew Kumanekosou, Haku drew ten senbon and coated them in Hyouton, and Zabuza brandished Kubikiribocho. All three of them stepped into the circle. The crane retreated several dozen feet behind Medusa and shut itself down. It could only recharge Medusa's mana while flying, and its own reserves could not be recharged. If it aided Team 9 in their current endeavor, the crane would be unable to fly them home.
"We're as ready as we're ever going to be, activate the field!" Zabuza ordered. Medusa's face-eyes and hair eyes glowed with power and a sea-green aura containing one-fifth of her Mana flared around her. The sanguine thundercloud boomed in response, but no assault on Team 9 was made. Medusa's aura condensed into a near-blinding sphere of light no larger than a golf ball. "Queen-Mother, guide our steps to victory." Medusa prayed before dropping the ball of Mana onto the purification stone at her feet. Like a verdant raindrop, it seeped into the quartz without a sound.
A half-second later the stone radiated silver light, looking like a baseball-sized moon. The earth trembled slightly as a line of silver Mana shot from the stone in a clockwise direction to the next stone in the formation. Two seconds later, this stone also resembled a miniature moon and another Mana line streaked to the third stone. After twenty more seconds passed, all twelve stones were illuminated. In the next second, the stones' brightness doubled and yet another line of Mana blazed from the first stone to the sixth. From the sixth stone, a line of Mana surged to the eleventh stone. This process repeated itself ten more times.
Eleventh to fourth,
Fourth to ninth,
Ninth to second,
Second to seventh,
Seventh to twelfth,
Twelfth to fifth,
Fifth to tenth,
Tenth to third,
Third to eighth,
And eighth to first!
Once complete, the anti-Youkai field's form was a twelve-pointed star enclosed in a circle. The silver light's brightness increased by an order of magnitude and a silver beam erupted from the star's center into the heart of the thundercloud. A feminine voice screamed in rage as a huge mass of crimson lightning crashed into the circle. The lightning congealed into a giant blood-red tiger slightly larger than Gamabunta. Her stripes were pitch-black, and her mouth was filled with hundreds of fangs. As the lightning tiger struggled to stand, Medusa conjured another Mana aura containing one-third of her total reserves and channeled it into the purification stones. A transparent sea-green dome stretched two hundred feet into the air. Its outer wall was just in front of the purification stones.
"Your preparations are formidable, but do you truly think you're the first group of insects to use an anti-Youkai field against me?" The tiger bellowed before converting herself to crimson lightning and shrinking to a humanoid form.
Tenten and Haku gulped, and Zabuza – who was closest to the demon – began to sweat in fear.
The lightning Daiyoukai had a voluptuous figure, silver eyes and blood-red hair, snow-white skin, elven ears, and black bands on her arms similar to tiger stripes. A variant of said stripes adorned her face; one stripe flowed from the bottom of each eye diagonally down her cheeks and stopped just past her ear lobes. Her hands ended in clawed fingers. She wore a white shirt under a black kimono with matching hakama and black shoes with white trimming around the ankles, and graphite tabi socks. A leather cuirass coated with burgundy lacquer covered most of her upper torso, stopping just below her neck but leaving her midriff unhindered. Her forearms were covered in silk pads dyed red with blood that extended over the top of her hands. Garnet-colored pauldrons with silver, serrated edges protected her shoulders. These, along with the arm pads, were bound to her arms by thick graphite rings. A silver-colored waist sash hung down towards her knees and consisted of two shorter ends that hung away from the main knot and were tied to the back of the sash, forming a loop to the side of each leg, and two longer ends that hung straight down past the knees from the main knot. She also wore gold earrings that each consisted of double tassels linked to a small disk.
In a blur of movement that Tenten had difficulty following, the lightning Daiyoukai flashed to the purification stone farthest away from Team 9 and tried to pierce through the dome with her left claws. The dome cracked slightly but otherwise held firm despite several subsequent strikes.
"Tsk!" The Daiyoukai grunted and abandoned her assault. Almost instantly, the dome repaired itself. "Very impressive, worms! You've managed to suppress ninety-five percent of my power and physical might! This will be FAR more entertaining than the last batch of fools I killed. I am Kyuuten! Don't bother introducing yourselves." The air seemed to vibrate with killing intent. "After all, meals don't need names!" Kyuuten shot toward Zabuza who countered with a brutal two-handed slash. Demonic claws clashed with Kubikiribocho in a thunderous roar. While Kyuuten's charge was halted, the impact sent Zabuza skidding back several feet.
Haku's eyes bulged at Kyuuten's display of strength but she wasted no time in throwing the senbon she had drawn earlier. At first, Kyuuten remained expressionless as she emitted a pulse of Youki toward the projectiles but her eyes widened slightly when the magnetic field she generated failed to stop them! With a dancer's grace, she shifted her body to ensure that all ten senbon were blocked by her armor. The ice covering the needles shifted onto her armor and began to spread, but another pulse of Youki destroyed it in an instant.
"Ice manipulation is a rare gift among mortals; you are either a very accomplished mage or a demi-human." Kyuuten mused.
"Why didn't you dodge when you easily could've?" Tenten wondered.
"Is it not obvious?" Kyuuten retorted. "Avoiding your pathetic attacks implies that they are capable of harming me."
"Interesting theory, let's see how long it stays true!" Tenten launched Kumanekosou. Kyuuten again attempted to magnetically control the kunai and the wires attached to them, and her efforts failed once more. The five knives cleaved through the air, but to Kyuuten they almost seemed to be standing still. Seeing no harm in it, Kyuuten let Kumanekosou hit its marks. One of the kunai tried to pierce her neck but bounced off as if it hit a steel wall. Two more aimed at her legs met the same result. The final two kunai sought her midriff. One bounced off but the other was imbued with enough Chakra to make an ordinary kunai explode several times over. The empowered blade held just enough energy to overcome Kyuuten's natural durability a pierced her flesh only as far as was needed to draw blood.
After being wounded, Kyuuten's eyes narrowed in a combination of shock, rage, and respect. "I cannot remember the last time I was injured by an attack that wasn't endowed with either tremendous Youki or the power of the gods. What is your name, warrior?"
"Tenten." Kyuuten's assessment was technically right, so the young weapon master didn't feel the need to correct her. While she was a descendant of Hephaestus, her Chakra did not have divine properties constantly like Haku's did. Her Chakra's divine trait only manifested when utilized for Yin Release – the one element she had a natural affinity for.
"Well met, Tenten-san." Kyuuten smiled and grabbed the wire attached to the kunai embedded in her stomach. Lighting bolted down the wire toward its owner. The voltage was enough to dislodge the kunai from Kyuuten's chest and she let it fall to the ground.
'Shit!' Tenten mentally swore before throwing all of the wires attached to Kumanekosou to the ground and leaping away. As soon as Kyuuten grabbed the wire, Tenten knew what was coming. If she had been a fraction of a second later in her response, she would have been electrocuted.
"Excellent reflexes." Kyuuten applauded as Tenten picked up Kumanekosou. She was about to fire a bolt of lightning at the Genin but quickly changed targets to the blade of water rushing toward her!
A great deal of steam filled the air as Kyuuten's lightning bolt impacted Zabuza's attack. When Haku, and later Tenten, launched their attacks the Jonin took the opportunity to observe his enemy. But Kyuuten now knew her opponents could harm her, meaning that Zabuza could no longer afford to remain idle. After launching his attack, he Shunshined away from his position and flashed through a set of hand seals. Not a second later, Kyuuten impaled the space his body had just vacated. Just as she turned to face Zabuza, he finished his sequence of hand seals and wordlessly fired two pure-water dragons.
Kyuuten retaliated with a blast of lightning fired from her mouth. Contrary to her expectation, the electricity was not conducted through the aquatic constructs and took nearly five seconds to vaporize them. "Fascinating, your water spells defy the natural order of the world. May have your name as well?"
"Zabuza Momochi" The Devil of the Hidden Mist grunted and barely got Kubikiribocho into position in time to block another of Kyuuten's claw strikes! This time, he channeled Chakra through his feet to remain stuck to the ground and held firm against Kyuuten's attack. The pair exchanged over a hundred blows in the next ten seconds, Zabuza's skeleton rattled with each one. Growing tired of the stalemate, Kyuuten grabbed Kubikiribocho and channeled an immense amount of lightning through it. In that same instant, some of the water forming Zabuza's right arm flowed through the blade, increasing both its cutting power and resistance to electricity. The divine ice-water and Kyuuten's lightning were – for the moment – evenly matched, forcing a stalemate of a different kind. Before Kyuuten could overpower Zabuza's arm, a human-sized mass of water slammed into her and immediately froze into living ice!
Haku smirked as her Hyou Bushin strangled Kyuuten like a multi-headed anaconda. The ice construct formed several serrated tendrils around her neck and limbs, and Zabuza took the opportunity to pour over half his arm onto Kubikiribocho and delivered a vertical slash with all the force of a rampaging waterfall. Kyuuten destroyed the Hyou Bushin just in time to leap away from the baleful strike.
"You dodged." Haku smiled, but her grin did not reach her eyes. "Forgive my arrogance, but my name is Haku Yuki."
"An honor and a pleasure." Kyuuten replied with a half bow. "Despite my efforts, you have all survived long enough to prove yourself as warriors worthy of my full attention." Kyuuten's facial tiger stripes vanished and a blood-red lightning aura stormed around her. For a few moments, Kyuuten was invisible within the storm of her own power but the electric aura soon condensed into a thick, yet transparent, shroud of energy around her skin. The air grinded against itself under the pressure of Kyuuten's Youki, and micro-thunderstorms spontaneously flickered in and out of existence all over the anti-Youkai field.
"At present, I am restricted to five percent of my full power. Until now, however, I was only using two percent of it." Kyuuten took several moments to bask in Team 9's horror as they realized her might had more than doubled. "Please, do try to survive the next minute."
Without further warning, a lightning bolt aimed at Haku's head struck out from Kyuuten's aura. If the descendant of Kuraokami hadn't used to the interlude prepare an immense amount of Hyouton Chakra she would have died before she could create a pure-ice wall to defend herself. The wall's durability was comparable to the mirrors created by Makyou Hyoushou, but it shattered almost as soon as the lightning bolt dissipated, revealing a panting Haku.
"You took that well, but it clearly required a great deal of effo –" Kyuuten's critique was cut off when she was slammed into the ground by a pure-water dragon nearly as large as her bestial form.
Knowing that he needed to end this fight as quickly as possible, Zabuza threw caution to the wind and poured all his remaining Chakra into his new Jutsu, Ouja no Suiryuu.
"Relying on sheer brute force?" Kyuuten's indifferent words resonated throughout the anti-Youkai field. "How inelegant." Her aura condensed into a sphere of lightning and fired itself through the water dragon. The pure water greatly diluted the sphere's potency but it was still able to fully penetrate the serpentine construct faster than Zabuza could react. His body stiffened like a wooden board as he was struck by the demonic lightning. After he fell, his body twitched several times but did not rise.
"ZABUZA-SAMA!" Haku raced toward her master's side and conjured an ice chrysalis around him, just as she had when he first fought Team 7. She fully expected to be killed in the process, but Kyuuten busied herself by toying with Tenten. The lightning Daiyoukai fire bolt after bolt just slowly enough for Tenten to dodge. Though she evaded the lightning, the superheated air seared her flesh and the pain dulled her movements. After the fifteenth lightning strike, Tenten tripped and would have died from the sixteenth strike if Haku hadn't protected her with another ice wall. The barrier drained what remained of Haku's Chakra and she collapsed, barely able to stay conscious.
"And you are all alone, Tenten-san." Kyuuten purred. "The first of your comrades has one foot in the grave, the second is too exhausted to move, and the third will not be able to maintain the anti-Youkai field much longer."
Tenten risked a glance at Medusa and saw that Kyuuten was right. The barrage of lightning attacks had blown several holes in her defensive dome and struck three of the purification stones; the abused stones now shone only half as bright as their unaffected counterparts. Medusa had rerouted half of the Mana she was using to maintain the dome to purge the Youki from the three stones, but the effort was wreaking havoc on her reserves. Sweat was pouring down the Gorgon's face and her panting could be heard from Tenten's position.
"I estimate that you have two minutes, at best, before this accursed array implodes and I am restored to my full glory. From what I have seen, you are the most agile of your group but the least powerful. If you surrender now, I vow on my honor as a warrior to grant you and your comrades a painless death." Kyuuten slightly relaxed her aura, expecting Tenten to comply but wary of other possibilities.
"I can't do that." Tenten smiled through her pain and struggled to stand.
"And why not?" Kyuuten sighed. This part of the battle was normally filled with speeches of how humans couldn't possibly allow Youkai to live for any number of reasons.
"Because I'm not fighting just for me." Tenten pulled herself off the ground but was having immense difficulty maintaining her typical posture. One of her knees kissed the ground once more.
"Then tell me! WHY DO YOU PERSIST?!" Kyuuten roared. "Why do you willingly subject yourself to unknowable agony, why do you damn those who would mourn you to unbearable grief? Your preparations show that you knew what I am, knew what I was capable of. Why are you here? Why have you come, knowing you would die?" The Daiyoukai screamed her questions, but she was no longer facing Tenten. Instead, her gaze was turned to the heavens, as if she were interrogating someone no longer among the living.
Tenten's eyes blazed with defiance. She refused to die kneeling on the ground and commanded her body with every fiber of her being to fucking stand tall. Through sheer willpower, she rose to her full height. Her next words were spoken with all the calm of a hurricane's eye. "I am here, for those I love. My family, my friends, and the one I wish to spend the rest of my life with!" The Warlock cast one of the Youki spells that was seared into her mind by Toutousai and then weaved a series of hand seals.
"Fusa!" Tenten fired two Chakra chains at each of the three stricken purification stones. The chains struck their targets with great force and remained in contact for several seconds. Kyuuten watched in awe as her Youki was drawn out of the stones and sealed into the chains. The anti-Youki field stabilized instantly.
"A valiant effort but you merely delay the inevita – " Kyuuten's eyes nearly left their sockets when Tenten retracted the chains into her body. The Youkai spell she had cast on herself earlier allowed her to drain the Youki from anything she touched. Since she had fired them from her hands, the chains' tips came into contact with her hands when she reeled them in. Under normal circumstances, a Daiyoukai's Youki was far too powerful for any human to safely absorb, Warlock or not, but the purification stones and Medusa's Mana had greatly diluted Kyuuten's energy. Tenten's pain exploded by three orders of magnitude, but she survived the absorption and her Chakra reserves skyrocketed.
"The one you love, he is worth so much pain?" Kyuuten whispered just loud enough for Tenten to hear.
The young woman shook her head. "He doesn't know the depth of my feelings yet, but he's worth at least a thousand times more than this." Tenten hadn't realized that her feelings for Naruto had grown so quickly, but seeing the man who had done so much for Konoha, so much for her, lie all but lifeless in the hospital ignited an inferno in her heart. Perhaps things wouldn't work out between them, but she would never forgive herself if she didn't devote her entire being to ensuring that – once he recovered – he could fight his enemies with his entire arsenal. Her pride as a blacksmith, her honor as a Shinobi of Konoha, and her hammering heart all demanded it.
Tenten weaved a set of hand seals that seemed rudimentary, even primitive, compared to the ones Team 9 used earlier.
Kyuuten's jaw hit the floor. 'That spell, it cannot be!'
"Fuinjutsu: Kongou Fusa!" (Sealing Technique: Adamantine Sealing Chains) Twelve golden chains, fueled by a seemingly impossible combination of divine Chakra and Youki, ensnared Kyuuten and bound her limbs and torso. She could have dodged, could have hardened her aura to block, or she could have intercepted them with any of a hundred different lightning attacks, but she did none of those things. Only her head remained unbound. The chains felt like the icy hands of the Shinigami smothering her entire being, yet Kyuuten did not even try to resist.
All of the Chakra she could spare had been poured into her Jutsu, but Tenten wasn't done. She manipulated one of Kumanekosou's wires to grab one of the only two storage scrolls she had brought with her to this fight and threw it on the ground. The wire was then used to push the scroll open and Tenten channeled the Chakra she needed to live into the scroll. With a puff of smoke, her first weapon made from Youkai bones – a naginata – appeared. She then twitched her left forefinger, and one of the chains around Kyuuten's chest moved slightly out of place, exposing her heart. As black spots appeared in her vision, Tenten used everything she had left to hurl the naginata at the gap she had made. The blade struck true, but Tenten had underestimated the durability of Kyuuten's armor. The naginata pierced her cuirass and invaded her flesh, but it lacked the inertia to penetrate her heart.
'Damn, guess that's it for me.' Tenten's vision was fading to black, but she barely made out Kyuuten's form closing in on her. 'I'll see you on the other side, Naruto-kun.' Rather than the peaceful drift into oblivion she expected, Tenten was brutally forced into wakefulness. She tried to scream in pain but was shocked to discover that her mouth was gagged. Before she could even think to spit whatever was clogging her throat out, her vision returned and she saw that the offending substance was a fragment of one of her own golden chains! The Chakra construct dissolved in her mouth, and since it was technically retracted into her body when it dispersed the Chakra did not dissipate into the atmosphere but was instead returned to Tenten, saving her life.
"Foolish girl, your actions are an inversion my mistake!" Kyuuten wept. "If the man you love with all your being still lives, then don't you dare throw your life away until he acknowledges your feelings! Be it acceptance or rejection, do not leave this world until you have an answer!" Once Tenten's life was no longer in jeopardy, Kyuuten limped over to Zabuza's ice chrysalis and shattered it with one punch. She then placed her right hand over his heart and drained her electric Youki out of him. The leader of Team 9 flinched several times, but his breathing eventually assumed the pattern of a healthy – albeit exhausted – adult.
"Wh-What're you –"
"SILENCE!" Kyuuten cried. A few moments later, she wiped away her tears and began to speak in a tightly controlled voice. "More thousands of years ago than most would dare to count, I loved another Youkai. His name was Hiten, and he cared nothing for me – or any female for that matter. This I knew, but still my heart would not allow me to move on. One day Hiten and his brother were slain. It was an honorable death on the battlefield against a worthy foe, yet my heart screamed for vengeance."
Tenten gulped, fearing where this story would go. The Shinobi world was fraught with cycles of revenge.
"At the time, I was far weaker than Hiten, so one capable of killing him was beyond my reach. For the next hundred years, I put myself through Hell to increase my power and refine my skills. Then, I tracked my target down, though he proved easy to find."
"And you killed him?" Tenten guessed.
Kyuuten shook her head ruefully. "My power had increased so much that I was incomparable to myself from a century before, but the same held true for the one I sought to kill. He was too much. Inuyasha – the Hanyou child of the legendary Daiyoukai Toga – was too much. For a long time, I did not know why he spared my life. I thought it was weakness, a legacy of his human half, and I scorned him for it. For the next thousand years a cycle of bettering myself, challenging Inuyasha, and losing despite it all repeated itself without end. At the end of that dreadful millennium, everything changed."
Kyuuten stopped speaking for several moments and silently wept. When she collected herself enough to continue her voice was quivering. "My final confrontation with Inuyasha ended in his death, but I had not won. The ravages of time had accomplished what I constantly failed to achieve. On that day, Inuyasha was barely able to stand, his body crippled by age and disease. He was accompanied by his descendants, who bore witness to our duel. I shall never forget what his most recent granddaughter told me that day. She said 'Congratulations, you robbed a clan of its founder, a family of their great-grandfather, and a man who deserved a merciful end of a peaceful death. All for the sake of a monster that was incapable of returning your feelings.' I wasted my life, chained to a bond that was never meant to be, and in the end, I destroyed another's precious bonds."
Tenten was crying now too. "Did Inuyasha's clan seek revenge?"
"Worse," Kyuuten denied, "they inflicted upon me the greatest insult an enemy can suffer: to be ignored. They destroyed the cycle of revenge and left me alone to face what I had done. Since that day, all I have wished for is to die, but none have been strong enough. Youkai or humans, no matter their strength or skill, all have fallen before me. Until now."
Kyuuten had thrown Tenten's naginata aside when she rushed to save the young woman's life. Now she picked it up and aimed its blade at her heart. "Aside from your group, the only one who came close to killing me was a warrior wielding those same golden chains. Had he not relied exclusively upon them, he may well have claimed my head. No one has come as close to killing me as the four of you have. It is enough; I know not why you have come for me this day, but what you seek is now yours." Kyuuten slammed the blade into her heart and fell to the ground.
As the Daiyoukai started to breathe her last, Tenten asked one last question. "Is there anything special to you about this place?"
Kyuuten did her best to laugh, coughing up a large globe of blood in the process. "The very center of your anti-Youkai field, is the spot upon which Hiten was slain." After finishing her answer, Kyuuten died.
Medusa deactivated the anti-Youkai field, and the purification stones all shattered. Though only three of the stones had been directly affected by Kyuuten's Youki, the entire field suffered due to their exposure. Medusa's and Tenten's efforts allowed it to momentarily remain active, but Kyuuten's power ruined it for future use.
The blood-red cumulonimbus cloud became alive with crimson lightning. With a flash that illuminated the entire horizon, the cloud was converted entirely to lightning and absorbed into Kyuuten's body. The fallen Daiyoukai did not rise, but her corpse was restored to its bestial state. The hundreds of fangs in her mouth gleamed silver. Tenten's instincts as a blacksmith told her that these fangs would never decay. Before she could reflect further on what she'd just been through, the granddaughter of Hephaestus swooned and fell off her feet.
"Easy does it, Tenten." Medusa caught the Genin before she hit the ground and placed of vial filled with her right-sided blood to Tenten's mouth. The Gorgon had prepared six such vials before Team 9 left to kill Kyuuten. Once Tenten drank her two, Medusa flew to Zabuza's side. Unfortunately, Zabuza was still unconscious and Medusa's attempts to rouse him ended in failure.
"To Hades with it!" Medusa drank one of the vials and kissed Zabuza, forcing the contents down his throat. The Devil of the Hidden Mist was still unconscious, so Medusa repeated the process with the second vial allotted to him.
After drinking her own vials, Haku stared daggers into Medusa's head. She had been too drained to move, but she managed to stay conscious for the entire fight and its aftermath and saw what Medusa did.
The Gorgon was unimpressed by the last Yuki's murderous glare. "Cease acting like a child. My actions saved Zabuza's life and I highly doubt he has not known a woman before me."
"And you expect me to believe that what I just saw was strictly professional?" Haku's voice was as cold as her clan's namesake.
"And what would you do, if your suspicions were correct?" Medusa's voice was even, betraying nothing of her intentions. "Zabuza is his own person, what he chooses to make of what has transpired is his concern, not yours."
Haku seethed but averted her gaze, conceding the point. "Tenten-chan, how did you use those chains? To my knowledge, only the Uzumaki Clan is capable of producing them and they're all but extinct."
Tenten chuckled while returning her naginata to its scroll. "You're familiar with Tsunade-hime of the Sannin, right?"
Haku nodded; Zabuza had informed her of the most powerful Shinobi in each Elemental Nation in the event that they had to fight any of them.
"Well, I idolized her growing up." Tenten continued. "I wanted to be a Medical Ninja just like her, but I don't have the necessary Chakra control for it. What I do have is a very strong affinity for Fuinjutsu, something the Uzumaki were renowned for. Konoha and the Uzumaki Clans used to be very close allies. It took more than a little digging through the Academy library, but I found a book detailing some of their techniques. Even though I didn't – and still don't – have the Chakra to use them, I memorized all the hand seals. It gives me something to aspire to."
After finishing her explanation, Tenten grabbed the second of the two storage scrolls she had with her and walked to Kyuuten. With an immense amount of Chakra, Kyuuten's body was sealed into the scroll.
"W-Well, let's get back to Toutousai!" Tenten panted.
"Indeed." Medusa agreed as the crane reactivated itself. Tenten and Haku boarded the mechanical bird while Medusa unfurled her wings and hoisted Zabuza into a bridal carry.
Tenten grabbed Haku's shoulder before she could protest. "The alternatives are either waiting who knows how long until he wakes up or tying him to the crane."
Haku had no response to that.
The crane flew well below the speed of sound on the return trip to conserve its Mana for the ride back to Konoha. Consequently, the trip took nearly three hours instead of less than one.
Once they reached Toutousai's home, Zabuza was deposited in the Youkai blacksmith's bed.
"Survived did you? Very good!" Toutousai beamed. "Now, where are the fangs?" Tenten moved just beyond the "door" of Toutousai's home and released Kyuuten from her scroll.
"Magnificent, absolutely magnificent!" Toutousai marveled over the quality of Kyuuten's fangs. Once he regained his composure, he conjured a hammer and knocked one of the fangs out of Kyuuten's mouth. "Pay close attention, Tenten-chan. Like you said earlier, the way we'll restore Tokijin is to heat him to a near-molten state and add enough of the fang to him to replace what he's lost. Given the quality of this fang, I can do one better though!" Toutousai began walking toward his forge. "I'm going to bring the fang to a near-molten state as well and completely merge it with Tokijin! Most of the fang's Youki will be used to purge the blessing poisoning Tokijin, so this won't make him stronger, but it'll increase his resistance to divine weapons. You did good forging that naginata, but Tokijin's too powerful for you to work with at the moment, so stay by my side and learn!"
Chapter End
This was the first fight that I had absolutely zero canon context for. Kyuuten is an OC, and while her appearance and abilities were inspired by the Thunder Brothers, especially Hiten, the fight between her and Team 9 has almost nothing in common with Inuyasha's fight with the Thunder Brothers.
Kyuuten means "Vengeful Sky", a fitting name given her appearance and backstory. Her earrings are the same ones worn by Hiten. As much as she wished to die, her honor as a warrior forbade her from killing herself. She had to meet her end in battle. Tenten's last attack came very close to killing her and would have succeeded if not for her armor. If Tenten had more Chakra to pour into the attack, she would have succeeded. Kyuuten knew that, so she considered the fight her loss and finished what Tenten started.
Since this was their first mission, Team 9 hasn't had a chance to work on team tactics. Zabuza and Haku work well as a team by themselves, and they nearly succeeded at killing Kyuuten while she was using only 2 percent of her power, but once Kyuuten powered up to 5 percent, no tactic of Zabuza's and Haku's would have been enough to kill her.
Kongou Fusa is the Uzumaki Clan's signature Jutsu, and the Uzumaki Clan is one of the oldest clans in all of Naruto, so it makes sense that the hand seals used for Kongou Fusa would be more archaic than the ones used for modern Jutsu. Another fanfic I read gave Kongou Fusa the property of allowing the user to regain the Chakra used to create the chains after retracting them as long as they didn't break. It makes the Jutsu even more broken than it already is, but the Uzumaki are an incredibly OP clan to begin with so it fits right in.
We'll get back to Sasuke and Jiraiya next chapter, thank you for reading!