Like most things that Team Seven took part in, reaching the valley's opening quickly became a challenge between Naruto and Sasuke to see who could reach it first.

As much as Sakura had trained over the month and week since they became a team, it was still all she could do to keep them in her sights without pushing herself to the point where she'd be too tired for the mission. Naruto was the first to make it, but the fact that they were on a mission must've affected him because he only cheered briefly before Sasuke came to a stop in front of him. Sakura was the last to arrive, and as soon as she did, she started looking around to form a plan.

The valley's opening was wider than she'd anticipated up close. The mountains on either side were steep, enough to need the tree walking technique to scale them, but she had a hard time picturing how they would block the gap so no animals could get through. It looked like it was at least thirty meters across, so she wasn't sure…

"Oh, this'll be easy!" Naruto exclaimed. When she looked over at him, he was looking back and forth between the mountains with a wide grin on his face, then turned to Sasuke and Sakura and started shooing them back. "You don't wanna get caught in the wall."

While he usually probably would've put up resistance to Naruto just ordering him around, Sasuke just turned around and walked a few meters back, so Sakura decided it was in her best interests to follow his lead. As soon as they were out of the way, Sakura watched Naruto run through a series of hand seals: Tiger, Boar, Dog, and lastly Snake.

"Doton: Mud Wall!" Naruto called out, slamming both of his hands against the ground.

The ground rumbled beneath their feet. Sakura knew she needed to stop underestimating her teammates, but she still stumbled back a few steps when a massive wall sprang from the ground and rose dozens of meters into the air. It wasn't just huge: the wall was detailed, layered like a man-made wooden wall turned to dirt and mud.

When he was done, Naruto just turned around and clapped his hands, smiling happily like he'd just cooked a cup of instant ramen. "Alright, that was easy! Just gotta make sure I remember to take it down before we leave."

"How far are the animals?" Sasuke asked. He hadn't moved a muscle while Naruto raised the wall, and he barely even acknowledged it now that it was raised. "You said ten minutes when we were at the inn, so it should be another five or so, right?"

Naruto pressed his hand against the mud wall and nodded. "Mm, yeah. Probably about that." His brow furrowed. "Huh, can't sense Kakashi-sensei at all. The other two ninja are still going at it though."

"He's probably watching them," Sakura suggested, finally just shaking her head and moving on. "Kakashi-sensei doesn't seem like the type to jump into a fight until he's prepared, right? And if he can hide himself from your sensing abilities, it's probably a tactic he's used a lot."

"He may not decide to intervene at all," Sasuke added. "If neither of them have any affiliation to Konoha, good or bad, he has no reason to involve himself in a fight between powerful ninja."

Naruto's face screwed up. "I mean, I guess." He shrugged. "Not getting involved sounds pretty lame though."

Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Of course you think so." Shaking his head, he walked over to the wall with his hands in his pocket and started walking up to the top of it. "Come on, we should at least watch out for when the animals show up."

It was still a little surreal to so casually defy gravity, but it was already second nature to Sakura as she and Naruto followed Sasuke up the wall.

Since Naruto made the mud wall so thick, there was enough room up at the top for all of them to lay down if they wanted to, but Sakura walked over to sit on the edge with her legs hanging off the ledge. With the towering mountains in all directions, sitting atop the wall didn't feel all that high, and she was confident she would be able to catch herself if she somehow fell.

The view made the slight risk worth it. It was a clear night, the waning moon seeming to take up a large portion of the sky. It lit up the thin forest-covered mountains before them, reflecting off of a few streams she could see flowing through the thin forests and down the mountains in all directions. At the foot of the mud wall, there were only a few trees, their branches waving in the wind.

After a minute, Naruto sat down next to her, swinging his legs over the ledge. "Y'know, Sakura, there's something I've been meaning to bring up."

Sakura looked over at him. "Hm?"

"Do you wanna train Doton jutsu with me?" Naruto tapped his hand on the mud wall between them. "It's my least developed affinity, actually. Mokuton's my favorite, obviously, and I use Suiton the most. Training with someone who has a Doton affinity is the perfect way to start developing mine!"

Blinking slowly at him for a few seconds, Sakura asked, "I have a Doton affinity?"

"If he says you do, you probably do," Sasuke said before Naruto could respond, standing above them with his hands still in his pockets. "His sensory abilities are strong."

"I sensed his Raiton affinity before he even knew about it," Naruto bragged.

"You sensed it, but had no idea what it was," Sasuke corrected. "You didn't even know what chakra paper was for. Or what a nature was."

Naruto jumped up to his feet to stare at Sasuke. "Yeah, well, you said I'd have less affinities than you and look how that turned out!" He crossed his arms stubbornly. "You didn't know everything either."

"Still knew more than you did, and I still do."

"Just 'cause you can copy-" Naruto's head jerked to the side, and then he reached down and pressed his fingers against the mud wall. "Woah, Kakashi-sensei joined the fight!" He looked off to the east, eyes wide like he could watch the fight in person. "He just destroyed one of the ninja's Katon affinity somehow!"

"How do you destroy someone's affinity?" Sakura asked.

"Beats me," Naruto admitted. "The one with the Suiton affinity seems pretty hurt… and Kakashi-sensei's burning chakra fast, for some reason." He groaned, lifting his fingers and falling back onto his butt. "I wanna watch Sensei fight!"

Sasuke grunted in agreement. Sakura was a little more skeptical about the idea of being around high level ninja in the middle of a fight, but honestly her desire to see Kakashi-sensei fighting at full strength outweighed her worry at the potential dangers. Still, they couldn't just leave their mission to go watch Kakashi-sensei fight, as enticing as the idea might've been.

"Also, the animals are almost here," Naruto added as an afterthought. "They're not gonna make it past the wall, though."

As if on cue, animals started to appear in the distance, running between the trees in a panic. There were dozens of them, some large enough to knock over a few of the trees they ran into and others small enough to leap from tree to tree. There wasn't a single type: wolverines, bears, mountain lions, and even snakes and boars. Sakura's eyes had a hard time making out many of them at first, but before long they appeared at the foot of the wall, a few crashing into it as they failed to halt their run.

Naruto laughed, leaning over the wall to stare down at them. "Plan Mud Wall is a success!" He waved down at the animals. "Actually, this is pretty boring." Looking back over at Sakura, he asked, "Anyways, do you wanna train Doton? I can, like, teach you the jutsu I know, then when you're caught up we can get Kakashi-sensei to teach us stuff!"

Again, Sakura just blinked at him, but after a few seconds she nodded. "Yeah! I've been meaning to learn more jutsu." Something told her she would never use Doton the way Naruto did, but if it was her affinity then she would still master it as best she could.

"Oh, and I think Sasuke should help you with genjutsu," Naruto added, standing back up and dramatically stretching his back. "Anyways, let's-!"

At once, Naruto and Sasuke's eyes snapped to the east, Sasuke's bleeding red as tomoe spun to life in his eyes. When Sakura followed their gaze, she saw a plume of what looked like smoke in the distance, but it was too far away for her to see clearly.

"Some kind of Raiton and Suiton jutsu," Sasuke said, his eyes narrowed. "A powerful one."

"That was Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto had his hand pressed against the mud wall again, but he was still looking off into the distance. A few seconds later, his excited face faded away, a look of concern replacing it. "He's used, like, nearly half his chakra though… And whoever he's fighting has a lot more than him."

Sakura looked at him in concern. "Really?"

Naruto nodded, face tight. "Wait… Now there's three! It's like the one with Doton split off his other affinities somehow."

Sakura followed his gaze into the distance, anxiety starting to build in her stomach. "Does he… need help? Should we send for reinforcements somehow?"

"They'd never arrive in time," Sasuke said bluntly. "If Kakashi's already used up half of his chakra since the fight started, we're the only people who could possibly make it to him in time to help."

The words sat heavily in the air. None of them actually knew how the fight was going, or who Kakashi-sensei was even fighting, but there was a sinking feeling in Sakura's stomach from what little they did know. She trusted Naruto's senses, and they painted a difficult picture of the fight in her mind. Kakashi-sensei used some sort of large move visible kilometers away, but it used a large chunk of his chakra, and now he was facing two more enemies than before.

"We should go and check the situation out," Naruto said without looking away from the distance. "If we get there and he's doing fine, we can just leave him alone and make sure whoever he's fighting doesn't notice us, but if he's losing then we can jump in and help!"

Sakura looked down at the ground. Most of the animals had simply given up and ran off in another direction, and the few who remained weren't even trying to get past the massive wall. They'd come expecting to fight the animals, but clearly it was a lot simpler than they'd anticipated, unless they included the fighting ninja as the cause of the rampaging animals and considered it to be part of the mission. In that case, she could see the argument for at least checking on Kakashi-sensei…

"Let's go." Sasuke didn't wait for either of them to respond, leaping off the wall without another word.

A second later, Naruto followed him off the ledge, and they both landed on separate trees before jumping off and breaking into a run as soon as they hit the ground. That was when Sakura finally kicked into action, leaping to a tree before chasing after her teammates again.

Sasuke reached a site where part of the fight had obviously taken place before Sakura or Naruto could, coming to a stop in a clearing with more destroyed trees than even he left over after a fight with Naruto. A short ways away, he saw the crater the attack from earlier had formed, but Kakashi and whoever he was fighting had clearly moved on.

A few seconds later, Naruto came to a stop beside him, looking around and taking in the destroyed clearing. "Wow… They're strong, huh?"

"Obviously." Sasuke activated his Sharingan and looked around. Most of the chakra from the fight had already faded entirely in the short time it'd taken for them to reach the clearing, but his eyes fell on an earthen dome with chakra still flowing through it. He elbowed Naruto in the side, gesturing at the dome before he could say anything. "Do you sense anything from that?"

Naruto followed his gaze over to the dome and said, "Chakra." Before Sasuke could tell him duh, he added, "Wait… I think the ninja with the Suiton affinity is in there!"

While Naruto bounded over to the earthen dome, Sakura came to a stop in the clearing, breathing only a little heavily. She quickly caught her breath and came to a stop next to Sasuke, looking curiously at Naruto approaching the dome. "Uh… What exactly is he doing?" she asked.

"He says the ninja with the Suiton affinity is in there," Sasuke explained, not looking away from the dome while Naruto stopped in front of it. "He's probably going to free him."

"… is that a good idea?"

Sasuke shrugged. Naruto had told them the other ninja had a powerful Doton affinity, so it was likely him who'd trapped the Suiton ninja, not Kakashi. If Kakashi was in the midst of fighting the Doton ninja, then the Suiton ninja could very well be an ally. Even if they weren't, they'd been weakened enough to get trapped in an earth prison so they couldn't be too dangerous.

Finally taking his eyes off the dome while Naruto seemed to inspect it, Sasuke took another look around the clearing with his Sharingan. His attention caught on the wreckage of kicked up dirt and destroyed trees a little ways away from the dome, what looked to be the hilt of a sword sticking out of it. It was faint, but he could see a trace of chakra where the hilt stuck out from.

"I'm gonna- What're you doing Sasuke?" Naruto asked as Sasuke walked past, stopping next to the wreckage. Before Sasuke could point it out, Naruto exclaimed, "Oh, nice catch! I didn't see that sword hilt."

Ignoring him, Sasuke grabbed the sword with one hand and yanked it out of the rubble.

It was the oddest looking sword he'd ever seen. The blade was wide and flat, larger than Sasuke's torso, with two curves near the base that made it look like a flounder. Something about it gave him the impression that it was only part of a larger weapon, but he wasn't really sure what. The faint trace of chakra he'd seen before came from the blade of the weapon, like it was stored within.

"Woah, what a weird sword!" Naruto called out.

Sasuke looked over at him and raised a finger to his lips, carrying the sword back to the dome. "Don't yell. Kakashi and the Doton user are still somewhere nearby."

"Nah, they covered a lot of ground, it's fine," Naruto said, waving his concern off as Sakura joined them. "They're like a kilometer south now. Kakashi-sensei seems to be leading them on a chase."

"Uh, Naruto, you said you felt a powerful Suiton affinity, right?" Sakura asked, eyeing the sword in Sasuke's hand with a nervous look in her eye. "Because, um, with that sword… Is it possible they're one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist?"

Sasuke looked over at her in surprise, raising an eyebrow, and then back down at the sword. He hadn't thought about it, but… "You might be right." While he didn't know much about Kirigakure, the unique shape of the sword and its ability to store chakra fit what he did know of the Seven Swordsmen.

"The who?" Naruto asked.

Sasuke sighed. "The Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Hidden Mist." At this point, Naruto's random ignorance really couldn't surprise him. "Seven of Kirigakure's most skilled ninja, with seven unique swords. This could be one of them."

"Sounds cool." Naruto refocused on the earthen dome, forming the Snake seal with his hands as chakra gathered in them. "Let's see what they're like!"

"Wait, that might not be a good-"

Before Sakura could finish, Naruto slammed his hands against the ground. Chakra surged from his hands and into the dome, briefly rumbling the ground beneath their feet. When it reached the dome, Naruto's chakra overpowered the chakra left behind to hold the jutsu, destabilizing it in seconds. The dome nearly crumbled in on itself once the chakra holding the jutsu was snuffed out completely, but Naruto's chakra grabbed hold of it, receding the entire thing into the ground.

That was when Sasuke allowed the chakra flow to his eyes to dissipate, just as the ninja trapped inside the dome came into view.

The first thing he noticed was the faint electricity crackling along the ninja's body. It made him want to reactivate his Sharingan and see what the jutsu was, but the ninja was staring back at them, so Sasuke couldn't reveal his kekkei genkai. The ninja looked to be a teenager years older than them, nearly an adult, with featureless purple eyes and shoulder-length white hair. He was wearing a sleeveless black shirt, with bandages around his neck, and on his forehead, he wore the forehead protector of Kirigakure, all but confirming Sakura's guess.

"… huh," the Kiri ninja said, breaking the silence as all three genin just stared at him. "By those Konoha forehead protectors, I'm guessing you're Kakashi Hatake's team? Or here with him in some way?"

"Who are you?" Sasuke asked.

The Kiri ninja gave him an amused grin, showing off shark-like pointed teeth. "Yeah, I guess that's fair." He used a sword identical to the one Sasuke was holding to push himself to his feet, holding out his other hand to Sasuke. "I'll give you my name if you give me back the other half of my sword."

"How about you give us your name first?" Naruto challenged, stubbornly crossing his arms. "I just freed you, y'know."

The Kiri ninja let out an easy laugh. Before Sasuke could react, even seemingly slowed down by the lightning as he was, the Kiri ninja wrested the other half of his weapon from Sasuke's hand and casually reattached it to the half in his hand. "Mangetsu Hozuki," he answered, setting the tip of the sword on the ground and resting his hands on the hilt. "I am grateful for the save, though. It was pretty cramped in there. Now, are you gonna keep asking me questions, or are you gonna let me go and help your sensei against that weirdo tentacle freak?"

All three of them paused at that, Naruto and Sakura making disturbed faces. "Weirdo tentacle freak?" Sakura asked.

"Kakuzu, weirdo tentacle freak, creepy tendril guy, whatever, " Mangetsu shrugged. "I've dismembered the guy, like, at least fifty times by now, but he just keeps reattaching his limbs with gross tendrils." A look of dawning realization spread across his face. "Ohhh, he's been giving me a taste of my own medicine for weeks. I'm really just now realizing it?"

"I have no idea what that means," Naruto said bluntly.

"I do my best." Mangetsu reached out and ruffled Naruto's hair like Kakashi, and Naruto seemed so baffled that he just let it happen until Mangetsu picked up his sword and suddenly turned south. "Well, I'm off to either go help your teacher put down an S-rank or watch him put one down." He started flexing his legs, muttered, "This lightning is such a pain," and then leapt into the trees and quickly disappeared from sight.

"… That was weird," Naruto said, breaking the silence that fell over them when Mangetsu left.

Sasuke reactivated his Sharingan now that Mangetsu was gone, looking off in the direction he left. "Mangetsu Hozuki… His name sounds familiar, but I can't quite remember where I heard it." It was like an itch in the back of his brain. He was obviously one of Kirigakure's Seven Swordsmen, though he seemed young, as young as…

Right. Sasuke remembered overhearing his father mentioning a Hozuki one time, a ninja from Kirigakure the same age as Itachi. He'd become a chunin as young as Itachi had, and then went on to become a jonin and one of the Seven Swordsmen only a few years later. While Sasuke doubted he was as powerful as Itachi, Mangetsu was one of the few who were cut from the same cloth, at least according to his father. If that was true, and judging by the way he'd effortlessly retrieved his weapon, he had to be powerful.

Who was he fighting that he'd been saved by Kakashi?

"You look like you remembered," Sakura probed.

Sasuke nodded seriously. "You were right." In the distance, he thought he could make out Mangetsu's rapidly retreating chakra, but the further he got the more trees obscured him from sight. "He is one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, and he was barely older than we are now when he became one."

"That's cool and all," Naruto said, "but shouldn't we, like, go help Kakashi-sensei now?"

"He might not need our help if he has someone so powerful helping him," Sakura pointed out, though when Sasuke finally lost sight of Mangetsu's chakra completely and turned back to her, she was looking off in the direction he'd left. "I don't know much about the strength of ninja in other villages, but I've still heard about the Seven Swordsmen."

"I don't think Sharkteeth is at his best." Like Sakura, Naruto was looking off to the south, but his face was uncharacteristically serious. "That lightning feels like it's interfering with his Suiton affinity somehow."

"Interfering?" Sasuke echoed. "How?"

Naruto shrugged. "I'm not sure, but I really think they might still need our help." He reached down, pressing two fingers against the ground, and a frown tugged on his face. "The… weirdo tentacle freak or whatever is still really strong."

"Then…" Sakura's expression flickered with uncertainty, before hardening with resolve. "We should go check the fight out and follow our original plan of only getting involved if it looks like he needs help."

Sasuke nodded shortly. "If nothing else, watching the fight will be a valuable learning experience if he doesn't."

Without waiting for a response from either of his teammates, he followed Mangetsu's lead and leapt into the trees.

He was immediately reminded of why he'd decided to just run to the first battle site when he saw how far apart the trees were, but his Sharingan were still active and gave him the clarity to easily adjust. It was faster than running, and in seconds he came across another clearing where Kakashi and… Kakuzu, he recalled, must have had another skirmish. Large chunks were blown out of the side of a mountain and destroyed trees were scattered in every direction, but there was no sign of anyone in direct sight. With barely a second glance, Sasuke sailed past it, searching the distance for any sign of chakra.

"Hey, Sasuke!" Naruto called out from behind, though admittedly not as far as Sasuke had expected him to be. "East!"

Landing on the next tree, Sasuke made a sharp turn to the left. A small bit of his chakra natures seeped into his steps when he did, shattering the branch beneath his feet and overshooting him for the next tree. Behind him, Naruto swore, but Sasuke didn't pay him any mind and sprung off the ground to make it back to the trees.

"Hey, you did that on purpose!" Somehow, Naruto caught up to Sasuke, which made sense when Sasuke looked to the side and saw his hands in the Snake seal.

"No, I didn't." This time, it was intentional when Sasuke let a small bit of his chakra natures seep into his step, though it was still hard to fully control the slight burst of speed the fire and lightning gave him.

His landing on the next tree was shaky, even with his Sharingan to help calculate. It definitely wasn't something he could pull off consecutively, but a small smirk still grew on his face at the new mobility trick. A short distance later, he attempted it again, careful not to use so much that it would explode through the soles of his shoes.

That was when he finally caught sight of chakra in the distance.

He came to a sudden stop at the top of a tall tree, gaze locked on a mountain a kilometer away. Even without his Sharingan, he would've noticed the flashes of lightning and explosions moving along the side of the mountain. With it, his vision was clear enough to watch Kakashi defending against three enemies with a fluidity Sasuke hadn't seen from anyone since before his Sharingan developed.

One of the three opponents was a man covered in stitches, or maybe threads, and he seemed to be the strongest of the bunch. He locked Kakashi in a round of taijutsu, occasionally disappearing into the ground to leave openings for the other two to attack.

The other two were… not humans, and not any sort of summon Sasuke had seen before. They were made up of some sort of dark chakra-filled threads, one of them four-legged with bug-like wings and the other a tall, deformed two-legged monster. Whenever there was an opening, the bug-like one attacked Kakashi with some sort of intensely compressed tornado, while the tall one launched beams of lightning powerful enough to tear through the side of the mountain.

And yet, with just a kunai, Kakashi held them off.

Naruto came to a stop on the tree next to him, and a short while later Sakura did the same, but Sasuke didn't pay them any mind. He couldn't look away from the fight.

It was clear that Kakashi was on the back hand, but even then, it was an impressive display. Though none of them were particularly powerful or flashy, he used jutsu of all five elements, hands flashing through seals so fast Sasuke doubted he could've followed it up close without his Sharingan. When the bug-like monster tried to attack him with its wind jutsu, Kakashi added a fireball to the attack and sent it at the tall one. To avoid the spears of lightning from the tall one, he sank into the ground and let them sail overhead, creating a cloud of dust to obscure himself.

"Uh… How's he fairing?" Sakura asked.

"He doesn't have the advantage, but he's holding on," Sasuke said. "It's hard to say definitively that he doesn't have a chance."

Naruto shook his head. "I can't see the fight like you can Sasuke," he admitted, and when Sasuke glanced away from the fight there was a grim look on Naruto's face, "but Kakashi-sensei doesn't have the stamina to keep up whatever he's doing. Even though I can tell he's trying not to use too much chakra in his jutsu… it's like there's something else using it up. I might not have the best understanding of other people's chakra, but I think it's just a matter of time before he's running low, even if he doesn't use any big jutsu."

That was when Sasuke noticed it.

"He's fighting with his left eye uncovered." Even with his Sharingan, he couldn't see Kakashi's face that clearly from over a kilometer away, not when Kakashi was moving as much as he was, but he could make out that much. "Could he… have some sort of dojutsu?"

"The chakra drain I feel from you with your Sharingan active is basically nothing," Naruto argued. "Kakashi-sensei feels like something is actively using up a lot of his chakra. Plus, why would he cover it if he has a dojutsu? You and Hinata don't."

A frown pulled on Sasuke's face. "It could be a type that doesn't deactivate." Or it could be implanted… "Konoha's Sharingan and Byakugan are two of the Three Great Dojutsu, but there are other dojutsu in existence. He could have one of them."

Naruto scratched the back of his head, one hand still pressed against the trunk of the tree they were standing on. "What's the third?"

"The Rinnegan," Sakura answered before Sauske could. "But most people think it's just a myth, since the only person ever known to have it is the Sage of Six Paths."

"Ooo, it'd be awesome if Kakashi-sensei had that!" Naruto exclaimed. "Maybe he covers it 'cause it's just so cool that he can't let people know he has it!"

"Sure," Sasuke said drily, refocusing on the fight in the distance. The situation hadn't changed as far as he could see: Kakashi dodged another compressed tornado, scored a hit on Kakuzu, and evaded even more lightning, but the attack he landed didn't seem to do much. "Did Mangetsu lie about assisting Kakashi?"

"I don't think so. He's been watching for- Oh, he's moving."

Right on cue, Mangetsu rushed into the fight. The lightning was still crackling along his body, but it seemed weaker than before, and he appeared from almost nowhere, slamming Kakuzu with a shroud of hammer-shaped chakra that surrounded his sword. As soon as the hammer hit and Kakuzu went flying, Mangetsu split it into two, waving each at one of the chakra monsters and firing off a dozen knife-like crystals that stabbed through both.

"He is good," Sasuke said, as Kakashi and Mangetsu started to communicate and stood back to back as the three enemies recovered. "I wish I had the chance to see what he can do without whatever that lightning is…"

"I'm tired of just sensing from here," Naruto declared, suddenly leaping off of the tree. "I'm gonna get closer in case they need help!"

"Do they look like they need help?" Sakura asked. "If we get close and they don't… we could just make things worse."

"To me, they seem to be doing fine now, but I don't have much clue of any of their conditions," Sasuke admitted. "If Naruto says they might need help, though, we should trust him." With that, part of his focus lingering on the fighting jonin in the distance, he followed Naruto's lead and leapt off the tree, moving closer to the fight.

Hyper-compressed wind with enough pressure that even Minato-sensei might have been impressed sailed over Kakashi's head, shearing the very ends of his hair, as he simultaneously deflected a blow from Kakuzu, countering by slicing his kunai across Kakuzu's stomach. The blade hit, tearing his stomach open like a fishmonger gutting a fish, but rather than spilling out his guts, tendrils merely extended from underneath his skin and stitched the wound back together.

Only grunting lightly in response to the pain, Kakuzu kicked off him hard enough to leap back and send Kakashi stumbling, opening the distance between them back up. Sharingan catching a trace of chakra coming from his right, he reacted on instinct and let himself fall backwards into a handspring, and a beam of lightning appeared where his chest was only moments before while he flipped midair to land back on his feet.

A second later, he had to break into a run as the beam of lightning followed him, jumping over another shot of compressed air along the way. He could sense Kakuzu to his right preparing another attack, but then his eye caught on a flash of Suiton chakra to his left.

Mangetsu appeared on the mountainside, Hiramekarei shaped into a massive hammer he used to send Kakuzu flying hard enough to form a crater in the ground. With the grace of a swordsman who'd proven himself worthy of joining the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist, he split his weapon in two, using each side to fire off a round of knife-like crystals into both of Kakuzu's monsters.

Grateful for another chance to catch his breath, Kakashi came to a stop when Mangetsu tried to approach him, and they quickly took positions at each other's backs to keep an eye on all three opponents.

"When we finally put this organ thieving creep down, I'll sponsor a vacation for you and your genin as thanks for the saves," Mangetsu said conversationally, though not loudly.

Kakashi's blood ran cold. "Don't tell me…"

"Yep, they freed me from my jail, made me laugh, and I left them there to come help you, but they don't strike me as the types to just wait there for us to finish this guy off," Mangetsu confirmed. "I knew there was no chance they'd listen to a stranger if I tried to tell them not to follow so I just didn't bother." He laughed lightly. "My team certainly wouldn't, and that whiskered blond reminds me a bit of my brother."

"Of course." Kakashi let out a tired sigh, his eye flickering to the north. In the distance, he caught sight of Sasuke, Sakura, and Naruto standing at the top of a tree, Sasuke in the midst of watching the fight with his one-tomoe Sharingan. Judging by the lack of reaction, his view wasn't clear enough to see Kakashi's eye from so far away, but it really was only a matter of time, wasn't it? "I should've bet on the fact that this mission would go poorly."

"Teams first C-rank?" Mangetsu shook his head. "Don't think there's a jonin on earth who would bet that a first mission goes well." Kakuzu and his two monsters started to warily approach the two jonin, so Mangetsu raised his swords and Kakashi his kunai. "Hey, maybe we'll be lucky and it'll turn out all of this guy's tentacles are about to turn on him so he's dead before your team can even try to involve themselves?"

"You talk more than I expected," Kakashi admitted.

"My energetic personality doesn't precede me?"

"Just your murderous reputation, same as mine, I'm sure."

"Ah, well." The Fūton monster fired off another shot of hyper-compressed wind, but Mangetsu easily batted away with the flat of one of his swords, forcing the Raiton monster to dodge it. "Guess I'll have to try harder in the future."

The hyper-compressed wind broke the stalemate that had fallen when Mangetsu made his appearance and the mountainside broke into movement. Kakuzu went straight for Kakashi, clearly still intent on finishing him off first because Mangetsu would be a pain to kill, but Kakashi flashed through hand seals and fired off Katon: Dragon Fire Jutsu.

Eyes tightened in frustration, Kakuzu was forced to abandon his attempt at attacking Kakashi to dodge the flames, only to end up in the path of a massive dragon made of water. His defense technique activated and hardened his skin to armor just before the dragon could smash into him, but it didn't protect him from the force of the blow. Sent flying, Kakuzu crashed into a clump of trees, tearing roots and dirt up in every direction until he finally skidded to a stop.

"Oh, yeah, that felt good," Mangetsu said, voice laced with satisfaction. "Nothing better than-"

Before he could finish, a hyper-compressed shot of wind slammed into him from behind. His body rippled like a water balloon someone punched, but he didn't pop like one, the compressed wind stretching out his chest for just a second before snapping back like an elastic. The wind launched back at the Fūton monster it came from, forcing it to dodge, and slammed into a tree behind it, blowing the trunk to pieces.

"That was unpleasant." By the mildly disturbed look on Mangetsu's face, it hadn't been an intentional counterattack. "Never felt my body liquify without breaking apart before…" He shuddered. "This lightning can't fade away fast enough."

That answered a few of Kakashi's questions, but there was no time to get into a conversation with Mangetsu over it.

Dodging underneath a series of lightning beams, Kakashi ran through hand seals, slamming his hands against the ground to raise an earth wall. Another shot of compressed wind slammed against the earth, blowing the hasty wall to pieces, and Kakashi ran through the opening at top speed. When another compressed shot of air flew towards Kakashi, he pulled an explosive tag out of his pocket, channeling a current of chakra into it and throwing it at the wind jutsu.

The explosive tag ignited just before it could be torn apart by the wind. The heat from the blast deflected the jutsu upwards and Kakashi ran straight through the fire left behind, ignoring the way the heat bit at the open skin around his eyes, and out the other end with Raikiri flaring to life on his hand. His vision locked onto the Fūton monster the instant he was free of the smoke, hunting for the location of its heart.

Another beam of lightning fired through where he'd been only moments ago, but the monsters couldn't keep up with Raikiri's speed. He appeared in front of the four-legged monster, eye locked onto an area in its torso where the concentration of chakra was densest, and leapt onto its back, lightning-shrouded hand tearing into the dark threads like butter and destroying its heart.

"NO!" Kakuzu roared.

While Kakashi pulled his hand out and leapt off the back of the monster, it crumbled to pieces, the chakra powering it abruptly cut off. After that third Raikiri and the multitude of other jutsu he'd used, Kakashi was down to under a fourth of his total chakra left, but what mattered was that he made the Raikiri count.

"Nice job, Kakashi!" Mangetsu cheered, flipping away from beams of lightning while he fired more crystals at the Raiton monster. "Not to be ungrateful or anything, but wouldja mind taking this one off my hands?" He hastily raised both halves of Hiramekarei to block an especially powerful beam of lightning when he hit the ground. "Still a little extra sensitive to lightning right now!"

Before Kakashi could reply, still catching his breath, Kakuzu ran over to the Raiton monster at top speed and slammed his hand into it. Gruesomely, the threads that composed the monster's body surged back into Kakuzu's, spreading his skin open and reattaching the mask to his back. But the sutures didn't close back up when the monster disappeared entirely.

"Ah, shit." Mangetsu quickly leapt over to stand to Kakashi's right, breathing just as heavily as he was. "I wouldn't say he's all that much stronger when he does this… but it's definitely more of a pain to destroy his hearts, even if he only has two left."

Kakashi didn't get the chance to question what he meant. The sutures holding Kakuzu's body together began to come undone, lengthening his arms unnaturally with thick, gray threads. The same threads erupted from the loosened sutures all across his back, forming into a huge, writhing, tentacle-like mass. His mask came undone, even more threads streaming from his mouth, and he trained an icy glare on the two jonin.

"Three hearts…" Somehow, Kakuzu spoke through the threads streaming from his mouth, voice thick with unveiled anger. "This hasn't happened to me in a while."

"Get r-"

Before Mangetsu could even finish his warning, threads shot out of the ground at both their feet, wrapping themselves around Kakashi and Mangetsu without giving either of them the opportunity to react. Kakashi's Sharingan went wide, hand tightening around his kunai in an attempt to cut himself free, but the threads were too strong, locking him and Mangetsu firmly in place.

A misshapen smile formed on Kakuzu's face around the threads. "Now-"

Suddenly, shuriken appeared from both the left and right, cutting Kakuzu off. From the left, a dozen shuriken came flying in, each one covered in flames and crackling with lightning. With precision that jonin would find hard to match, each shuriken sliced through the threads holding Kakashi, freeing him to jump away. From the right, countless shuriken made of water tore through the threads holding Mangetsu with sheer numbers, chopping them into endless tiny pieces as he leapt away.

"Gross, I see why you called him a weirdo tentacle freak!" Naruto yelled as he, Sasuke, and Sakura all landed in front of where Mangetsu and Kakashi retreated to, the boys coming from the same direction as the volleys of shuriken. Wisely, none of them took their eyes off of Kakuzu even to check on Kakashi, but Naruto did give an exaggerated look of disgust. "This guy's gross looking."

"Well, that makes it twice in one day that I've been freed by a genin." Mangetsu grinned at Naruto, walking forward to stand in line with the trio, next to Naruto. "That was an impressive use of Suiton, Whiskers. I've met chunin who struggle to control even a fourth of the water you just used."

Naruto punched his fist, his grin obvious even without seeing his face. "I'm just getting started, believe it!"

Kakashi let out a sigh. "You three shouldn't have intervened," he admonished pointlessly, walking up to stand to Sasuke's left. He didn't let his Sharingan drift from Kakuzu, but Kakuzu seemed content to watch them from a distance for the time being. After losing three hearts, he was wary, even of kids. "But there's no point in saying that now, so I expect you three to listen to my every word."

Kakashi didn't leave any room for argument in his voice. If any of them were inclined to try, he silenced them with a look to his right. The sight of his left eye earned him three looks of disbelief. In the middle of the line of ninja, Sakura's face quickly shifted to understanding, but the same couldn't be said for the other two. Next to her, Naruto gaped at him openly, eyes flickering widely between Kakashi, Sasuke, and their opponent. And directly to Kakashi's right, one-tomoe Sharingan spun to life in Sasuke's wide eyes, his face frozen in shock.

"I'll explain when this is over," Kakashi said, meeting one of Sasuke's Sharingan with his own, and then refocused entirely on Kakuzu. "But only if you follow my every direction in this fight. This is an S-rank shinobi. A mistake could mean death. Only attack from a distance and don't get close, and… use whatever ability you need to to survive."

It wasn't ideal to let Mangetsu see Sasuke's Sharingan and Naruto's Mokuton, but survival took priority over everything.

"Understood?"

"Yes, Sensei," all three genin agreed.

"All those Konoha forehead protectors you're wearing…" As Kakuzu slowly started walking towards the group of ninja, both Kakashi and Mangetsu took steps forward, putting themselves in front of the genin. "They're really starting to remind me of the very first leaf shinobi I ever faced off against." His threads writhed all over, and Kakashi made sure to keep part of his attention on the ground at Kakuzu's feet. "The Shodai Hokage."

A/N:

And of course, would it really be Team 7 if they didn't involve themselves in the fight way above their pay grade?

Thank you all for the responses on the "Bakashi" thing! I'll follow the suggestions of using it sparingly, mainly when Naruto's specifically annoyed at Kakashi. I definitely see how it could get annoying in hindsight (I usually have characters mentally refer to other characters the way they do verbally, but I held off here because it being that common was also annoying lol). It's Naruto, so there will definitely be other nicknames I end up using for characters, so please just lmk if they turn out annoying in the future too.

Thank you for all the reviews, follows, and favorites!

Edit February 10th:

Posting got messed up somehow? I tried just deleting the chapter and reposting it, so hopefully this works. Originally posted on Friday but the chapter wouldn't show up half the time