The Zero Tails Jinchuriki #35

Disclaimer - I don’t own anything. As the corporations say these days, you will own nothing & be happy. I don't, and have never claimed to, own Naruto or any of its characters. With that out of the way, let’s goooo!

Land of Fire

–Toru Akebane–

Okay, this was it. They were at the edge of the mountains right now, with only a stone’s throw away from the lush greenery that was synonymous with the territory of the Land of Fire. He was just waiting for a final confirmation from Ayame so they could blitz through whatever this was. 

They were given a couple of targets just in case they managed to get past the patrols in a reliable manner, and he couldn’t wait to hit the outposts that these Tree Huggers thought they’d hidden so well.

“Lucky bastards,” He heard one of the Chunins mutter behind him, whom he quickly silenced with a glare of his own. If it were up to him, he would have come here only with Ayame and Hoshiro. Three of them combined were enough to beat anyone in the village, save for the Raikge-sama, Killer B, Yugito, and Dodai. 

Darui, that brat was coming in close, but for now, his lack of experience meant their squad could trump him with ease. That would not be the case going forward, which is why he had to agree with Raikage-sama when it came to pushing Konoha right now, because their village was teeming with talents, whilst Konoha, famous for churning out prodigy after prodigy, was reeling right now, from deaths of both their strongest hitters and their rising talents.

The Chunins were just here to act as fodder if they needed to make a quick escape. It would have weighed on him to just treat his fellow shinobi as tools, but he knew that was not the case with these ones. 

It was an open secret within the higher ups of Kumo that a list was maintained by the village’s administration. A list of shinobi they had to take care of, with varying levels of urgency. The ones most urgent were taken care of by the hunter nin immediately but the ones who were not slated for immediate termination were then placed into a separate list.

The members on that list were then made available for missions with high chances of death, or capture. Also, in their case, these Chunins were made available to them so that they could be used as a distraction in case they needed to leave.

The Tree Huggers, bleeding hearts that they were, even for their enemies, were the perfect targets for these kinds of techniques because, for some inexplicable reason, the Tree Huggers were merciful, even to their enemies.

The glow around Ayame’s hands died down, revealing a frustrated expression on her face, “I still can’t find anything. This is almost certainly a trap.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get that,” Hoshiro said, “but a trap for who? Do you think they expected us? Last I heard, they only have a couple of Uchiha Jounin who were barely worth anything without their shiny eyes. I don’t think there is anything for us to worry about, especially since Ayame-chan here,” Ayame’s hands twitched at the casual reference, one of her hands reaching for her senbon, “can’t even detect a single chakra leak from Fuinjutsu.”

The fool blabbered on, unaware of the close call he had with Ayame’s senbon as he calmed her down, “I mean, we know they have Jiraiya but their other Fuinjutsu is just trash. So, the chances of a perfect trap of Fuinjutsu existing here are very low. Am I right or am I right?”

The Chunin, fools that they were, began fawning over Hoshiro, who immediately began basking in the praise, “Right? Right?”

He sighed, as his bulky hand hit Hoshiro’s head, sadly, downgrading his intelligence even further down as their lightning speed specialist went tumbling down.

He reigned in his emotions, trading looks with Ayame and a snot-nosed Hoshiro who was rubbing his head, “We go in last. You,” He pointed at the skittish Chunin, who had been leering at Ayame when he thought no one was looking, “You will go first.”

“M-Me? Alone?!” The coward pointed a trembling finger at himself.

He smiled at the trembling man, “Don’t worry. We’ll be right behind you.”

“Yeah!” Hoshiro, either understanding his intention or completely missing the point, clapped the man on his back, trying to encourage him, “Don’t you worry about us. We’ll be right behind you, ready to help you if anything happens. Just trust me.”

He watched, stunned, as the coward Chunin, slated for death, whose name he didn’t even bother learning, relaxed and smiled tearfully at Hoshiro’s encouragement, before climbing over the rocks with a shaky determination.

“So, you can be useful for something,” Ayame snidely remarked at Hoshiro who, once again, amazed him with how dense he could be. He wondered if all that lightning nature chakra training had fried some parts of his brain, at the cost of supercharging a few others. 

Hoshiro just thanked her with a thumbs up and a grin, as all three of them peeked over the rocks, as the Chunin, bless his traitorous heart, ran straight ahead, keeping a lightning sparked kunai in hand, ready to defend himself.

He was tense, eyes darting left and right, as he waited for the Chunin to fall into the trap, or for Konoha shinobi to come bursting out, armed and outnumbering them, but after a whole minute of the shinobi running through the unofficial boundary line separating the two villages, nothing happened.

Ayame immediately stepped down, closing her eyes as she focused on her sensory technique, her face creasing in focus as she exhaled once more, shaking her head at him, “Still nothing.”

He felt a hand impact his back as Hoshiro said, “See? What’d I tell you? Those Tree Huggers must have gotten exhausted after our tactics. Now, come on, leader, we have work to do!” Hoshiro then sent in the rest of the Chunin, who were now much more confident in crossing into Konoha territory.

He sighed, as he and Ayame both got out of the ditch they were in, and looked at the Chunin doing their job of securing a place, as Hoshiro began walking beside him, with his hands behind his head in a spectacular demonstration of poor frontline awareness.

They were in enemy territory, for Sage’s sake!

Ayame, ever the cautious of the trio, kept walking with her eyes closed, focused on her senses, trusting him to guide her.

He stopped immediately, foot mid air, as Ayame’s hand tensed and pulled at his clothes. He looked back to see her face twist into something akin to fear, before she pulled him back with all her might, his hands latching onto Hoshiro’s head as he did the same to him.

He was about to ask her what was wrong when he felt it, so did Hoshiro. Something unseen previously, completely hidden from their senses, appeared in front of them.

It was all so sudden, none save for Hoshiro could have perceived it, as a Tree Hugger, decimated the Chunin in front of him. One moment, they could see the four Chunin looking around, alert and ready to fight, and the next, all four of them were piled on top of each other, knocked out but alive.

He would have sneered at the weakness but at the moment, he could not say definitely who was the weaker one of them.

“He’s fast,” Hoshiro, seeing an enemy, snapped into focus, his voice completely serious as he saw the telltale signs of lightning chakra around his body, as Hoshiro prepared to immediately execute his most powerful technique, which was telling in and of itself, about the prowess of their enemy.

Which begged the question. Who was their enemy?

“Who are you? I’ve never heard of Konoha having someone as fast as you,” He shouted, trying to buy time or information, whatever he could get, as Ayame remained tense, ready to jump back because she was a long range fighter.

He was the brawler, capable of taking damage and dishing it out with equal intensity, with Hoshiro being the high speed distraction. Distracting their enemy or taking the final shot, Hoshiro could do both.

In a fight, their primary move was to make sure Ayame remained at a distance, and preferably, hidden from their enemy as she worked on getting a clean shot, with him and Hoshiro rushing ahead.

In this case, however, both of them remained in place, as Ayame worked on retreating into the caves behind them.

“Holy shit! He’s a Sage,” Hoshiro whispered after a while, as his eyes widened, gaze zeroing in on the Konoha shinobi’s face, the faint but distinct markings now visible to him, as he mirrored Hoshiro’s earlier words, “Shit!”

That explained the lack of a chakra signature from Ayame’s technique. They couldn’t run, not from a Sage. His hands tightened around the flare in his pocket as he prepared for the fight of his life.

Reinforcements were his only option. Even if he died here, the information of Konoha having a completely hidden Sage must reach the ears of Raikge-sama.

Despite the terror in his mind, his body trembled in excitement, so did Hoshiro’s, who gave him a shaky grin, excited yet terrified for the upcoming fight.

Hopefully, this wouldn’t be a total loss on their part.