Attack on the Clones

Naruto: Tales of Ashihara

Kakumei – Arc 2: The Curse of Time

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Chapter 50 - Attack on the clones

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In Shin no Kuni, in the village of Hikari, Sojobo is, as usual since he came back to life, sitting on the throne and hiding in the main castle. In front of him, Minoka, one of Suto's assistants, is explaining the progress that they made these last days in their research to make the body enhancing solution again.

They've been working on the Daitengu's request for 4 days now, and in this time, they managed to recover the formula and to synthesize it again. After dozens of tests and updates, they finally got a version of the product that works on any host and isn't lethal to anyone. Before that, the first version developed by Suto alone was especially made for Isami only, and required many doses to enter in effect.

Right now, Minoka stands in front of the Daitengu, accompanied by a clone of Suto.

"So… now that we have a proper version of the product, we suggest that it's time for a real test with a tengu seed." says the clone. "Don't you think, Lord Sojobo?"

"Of course… But we need a human subject for this." answers the Daitengu. "You should have brought one with you."

"Well we did." answers Suto, pointing at his own self. "There is the subject, that we've injected with the correct dose of formula."

"… So you're expecting me to use you as one of my 3 new yamabushi?" Sojobo interrogates.

"I'm just here for the test, and am only one of many me." explains Suto. "You won't have to keep me alive after the test, and won't have to take me as a host either. Although I know of people that make good candidates for new yamabushi."

"And they are?" asks Sojobo.

"Killin' Kiss and the Ripper." responds Suto. "The two mercenaries that were here with me and my assistants the other day. They'd like to serve you, and keep your powers safe."

"I'll choose the hosts of my children myself, when the time comes." says the Daitengu as he stands up and gets closer to the scientist and his student. "For now, let's see if you're right to be as confident as you are about this formula."

He now stands right in front of Suto and slightly raises his hand to catch the man by the chest. Suto peacefully lets it happen, full of confidence. Behind him, Minoka looks worried, not as sure as her master. Sojobo's long and pointy fingers get surrounded by a dark chakra and dip through Suto's skin, into his torso.

Tengu Tensei

Within the heart of the test subject, the Daitengu lays a newly made seed of Tenshi, the messenger of the skies. He puts his youngest daughter's chakra in a living host again and,… surprisingly, doesn't see the subject die of poisoning. Suto grins at Sojobo, satisfied. Minoka feels relieved and smiles too. To them, it looks like a convincing result, but not to the Daitengu. With the Mangekyo Sharingan that lies on his forehead, Sojobo stares into the subject's eyes for a short moment of silence… and sighs.

Meiton – Black Hole

With his hand still dipped in Suto's chest, he creates a black hole that quickly sucks in the body of the scientist and makes it implode, completely erasing him in only a second. Minoka looks shocked and anguished by the sight of this scene, as her master didn't even have the time to let out just a glimpse of a cry of pain. Sojobo now only has the seed he just implanted, still intact in his hand.

From just the anger and disappointment that the Daitengu leaves out through his chakra, Minoka is pushed back and falls on her butt.

"Looks like the power of science can't even withstand a tiny piece of mine…" says Sojobo.

"Wh-Why? It… It was working!" asks the girl, shaken and afraid.

"It wasn't." promptly says Sojobo. "He did survive the implant of the seed, but he would have died at some point during Tenshi's growth, when she'd become too much for him. Your formula doesn't work. If I hadn't killed him now and retrieved the seed immediately, I would have lost it, and would have had to wait even longer before being able to create a new one."

Minoka doesn't say anything, and just stares agape at the giant figure before her. She's now alone in the room with this, and doesn't feel safe anymore. The creature comes closer to her and bends over to speak right to her face.

"Go tell your master that it didn't work, that he needs to consider the length of a hatching process and the density of one's chakra." orders Sojobo, pissed off by the result of this test.

"Im-Impossible!" yells the young girl. "I-I'm sorry, Lord Daitengu, bu-but we can't make any further progress soon. Master's body was already upgraded with many other products that made him far more likely to survive than any average human. Now that we've failed, we don't have enough clues about new improvement possibilities. Moreover, we only have one working lab. All the other active labs didn't give any update these last 4 days."

"But your master is still confident, isn't he?" adds Sojobo, who offers his hand to help her stand up.

Minoka doesn't say anything and just watches, unsettled, as the menacing Daitengu kindly proposes to bring her back to standing on her feet. She shyly grabs the monster's hand and gets gently pulled back up. Having gotten rid of his anger, Sojobo speaks honestly to the young scientist.

"Listen, young girl… What is your name?" he asks.

"Mi-Minoka." she answers, still unsettled.

"Listen, Minoka, I like your honesty and lack of optimism, and I have no reason to be angry at you right now," he explains. "But you see… I really want my family back, and your master promised that he could help me with this. Unlike you, he's really confident and optimistic. So, I don't care how many of your labs are dead, destroyed or working, or what possibilities you have… I want you to go back to your master, and explain to him that I have no reason and intention to be as kind with him as I am with you."

After these words, Sojobo turns around and goes back to sit on his undersized throne. Minoka just stands there, for a few seconds, thinking, before turning around and heading to leave the castle.

On her way out, just behind the door of the throne room, she crosses paths with a young brown haired boy, with long and messy hair on top of his head, but very short hair on the edge. This boy was leaning against the wall just next to the door until she came out. Intrigued, she looks at him as he comes a bit closer and introduces himself.

"Hello, I'm Kawaki. One of Kiss's boys." he says. "She probably introduced us to you like that, didn't she?"

"Oh, Killin' Kiss? Her boys? Yes, I see. Nice to meet you, I'm Minoka." she answers, trying to find comfort in this new face.

"I know, I heard your conversation with the Daitengu." adds Kawaki before going silent.

"Oh…" Minoka says, feeling bad for her sensei's failure. "So you heard…"

"… your old creep's labs have been destroyed." he completes. "What about that?"

"Oh… It's just our second hand labs." explains Minoka. "The clones of my master that work at our other labs stopped giving updates. But the main lab is fine."

"What happened to them? Are they dead? The other clones I mean." questions Kawaki.

"I… I don't know… Why? Is something happening?" says Minoka, uneasy about these possibilities.

"Oshio told me that a certain someone may be on the move currently," he explains. "It may have something to do with this."

"Who's that certain someone?" asks the girl. "Uh… and Oshio? Who's he?"

"… You'll see." Kawaki says, while thinking. "You should come with me. We'll get you back to your lab."

He turns around and leaves by the hallway, going for the stairs and down. Minoka, a bit confused, looks at him leaving, before getting startled and hurrying to follow.

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At the same time, in Otogakure, the village that Orochimaru founded in the land of Sound and where he installed his main lab after the 4th war, the snake person and Jugo are standing on the highest roof of the village. They both look to the sky where the perfect form of Susanoo suddenly showed up. While the winged armor still flies above the land, Sasuke Uchiha appears right in front of them. Orochimaru sees the Susanoo who just now starts to fade away, and looks down to see the wanderer slowly walking toward him.

"Are you done already?" asks the scientist.

"Yet, it has only been 4 days…" remarks Jugo, astonished by the Uchiha's early return.

"I was delayed." says Sasuke. "I couldn't resist the urge to test my new sword by myself."

"Delayed, you say?" exclaims Orochimaru, enjoyed by this inconsistent answer. "Hahaha! As expected from you, Sasuke. So the only remaining lab is the main one now?"

"It is. All the others have been turned to ashes with their occupants." answers the Uchiha. "So, I'm back to you, as you asked."

"Hm! Good, then let's proceed to the main lab." starts the former terrorist. "It is an underground facility, way bigger than the others, lying just 30 kilometers away from the ocean in the south continent. Of course, a bigger place means bigger occupation. All the remaining clones are there, and this is approximately a third of their total number."

"… There were 2 or 3 clones in each of the 43 labs…" thinks Sasuke aloud. "So it makes around 40 others."

"That's it." continues Orochimaru. "We'll get in through the ceiling, but shall be careful inside. My goal is to keep all the needed material and paper works intact. We'll kill all of the clones, and will leave with my spy."

"What about the original?" asks Sasuke, unsettled by the absence of mention of any source being.

"Um… You killed the original Suto 9 years ago." Orochimaru answers, a bit confused by the question.

"… Right." the Uchiha says, not recalling having done this at all.

"… I heard that there is also an S-rank mercenary in there." the snake continues, going unbothered by Sasuke's interruption. "We'll also take care of him. Whether he lives or dies isn't important. What matters is only that the scientist dies for good and that we get his research."

"Is that all?" asks Sasuke, eager to end this story.

"One last important thing for you." adds Orochimaru to conclude. "According to my inner agent, the notes and papers don't contain everything to know about the cloning process. This means that Suto must keep an important part of it only in his mind. So I need a way to collect his knowledge. Do you know how this could be done?"

"… I could harvest their souls with Ningendo, and later have Tsubai use Kyoku Kyuin to transfer all the useful memories from my mind to yours." suggests Sasuke, after a few seconds of thinking about it.

"Tsubai, the yamabushi from Kiri, is that so…" says the snake person.

"Will he really accept helping Orochimaru?" asks Jugo.

"He'll do it if I'm the one asking, no worries." Sasuke answers.

"Well, if your plan is as easy as it sounds, we're ready to go." Orochimaru exclaims. "Seems like now is finally the time for me to have the chance to walk through one of your space gates, Sasuke."

Sasuke looks at Jugo and waits for his approval. The tall red-haired man just lightly nods to indicate his agreement. The Uchiha wanderer turns his back to them and widely opens his left eye, hidden under the hair strand that covers half of his face.

Chimatakami

He opens a black portal that leads directly to the location that is marked by a cross on the map that Orochimaru gave him. He goes first through the rift, and is immediately followed by his former companion and his former master.

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Meanwhile, back in the lands of Heart, a few tens of kilometers away from the sea, over 40 clones of Suto are working together in their principal workplace. With them in the laboratory are Gentsuchi, the mad scientist's second assistant, and Guroi, the mercenary known as Ripper. While most of the clones are busy on their chemistry shelves, all in the same large room, one single of them sits on a bench in the back of the lab, worrying about their current concerns.

He thinks about his clone and Minoka who went to test the body enhancing solution with the Daitengu. He also thinks about all his other labs that didn't give any new updates for over half a week, when they used to do it daily. Alone in his worries so the others of his clones don't have to be distracted from their work, he's joined by Gentsuchi who comes to ask about him.

"How you doin', master?" she says.

"Bad, as always." answers the man of science. "Damn, what the hell are the clones from the other labs doing?" he adds, yelling and complaining.

"You think something bad happened?" suggests Gentsuchi. "Or maybe it's just your comm device that doesn't work… Yeah, that would explain the whole thing easily!"

"Bullshit!" shouts Guroi, who was resting next to them. "Something happened to them."

"What do you think it is, Ripper?" asks Suto.

"You're working for the Daitengu now." answers Guroi. "And have you seen those boys that Killin' Kiss spoke about? They have some connection with whatever god was occupying this nation this last month. I don't think there's hundreds of possibilities for what happened to your clones."

"So?" insists Suto.

"So what? Who could it be except fucking Sasuke Uchiha?" yells Guroi.

Just as he says these words, they hear the soil of the forest above them tremble. All the Suto's stop working and raise their heads to see the ceiling about to collapse. Guroi lifts his sword up and gets ready to fight as the last Suto next to him stands up and rushes to the other end of the lab.

"Well… Speak of the devil…" jokingly says Gentsuchi who stands back to back with the mercenary.

"What?" yells Guroi.

At this moment, the ground above them falls down, but Guroi reacts quickly enough and grabs the young girl by her shoulder before leaping away. Together, the two of them then run to join the Suto who's running between all the working clones.

Suddenly, a large skeleton arm of Susanoo punches through the ceiling and crushes onto the running Suto who reached the front of the room. Guroi and Gentsuchi stop in the middle of the lab and look at three silhouettes that jump down the hole punched in the ceiling. As the dust lifted by the sudden attack slowly settles, all the Suto's leave their desks.

"Master!" exclaims Gentsuchi.

"Stay back, brat!" yells Guroi to the girl, thinking that she's talking about Suto.

"… Uh! Orochimaru!" scream all the Suto's together when they finally see who the three people who entered the lab are.

Jugo, Orochimaru and Sasuke step forward together and look around. The Uchiha takes the lead and stops, a few meters away from the scientist crowd.

"So I need to harvest their souls, you say?" he asks his former master.

"Yes, go ahead." promptly says Orochimaru.

"Stay back." calmly adds Sasuke, as a Susanoo arm appears by his side again and gets covered by a purple chakra layer.

Ningendo

Sasuke swings his arm forward and dashes through the crowd of Suto's. It phases through them but rips out all of their souls by the way, causing them all to die immediately. He carefully limited his attack's range to avoid touching Guroi and Gentsuchi, eliminating all the clones that stood before them. The Ripper, who feels like he's just been spared, just now makes the link between this and Gentsuchi's words from earlier.

When she yelled "Master" earlier, she wasn't referring to Suto. When she denied the possibility of something bad happening to the other labs, she wasn't just being silly. And right now, Sasuke purposefully limited his attack to not kill her. It all makes sense. This young girl's master is actually the snake, not Suto.

"You Brat!" he screams in anger. "Fucking traitor bitch!"

He turns around and prepares to slice Gentsuchi's head off with his blade, but is stopped by a robust skin barrier.

Senninka

Jugo used his clan's unique ability to reshape his arm into a shield and cover the young girl from the blade. Seeing his attempt failed, the Ripper makes a quick series of hand signs to activate the special jutsu of his sword, but Jugo interrupts him before he can finish it.

Piston Fist – Style One

Jugo changes the shape of his arm again and, with his fist against the blade, pushes it and its wielder up against the wall with jet boosters. He forces him against and through the wall, landing in another large hall that is on the other side of it.

Sasuke, who was still processing all the knowledge he got from the dozens of Suto souls he just absorbed, focuses back on reality and turns around to see Orochimaru again.

"This will be enough for the souls," he says.

"So you have all the knowledge needed." notes Orochimaru. "All that's left to do is kill the remaining clones and get the papers."

"Master!" yells Gentsuchi who jumps to bite on one of the Suto's nape with her sharp teeth and rip it off. "The files are in the cellar behind you!"

The Suto whose nape is being bitten off shakes and trembles, surprised by the sharpness and strength of the young traitor's teeth. His skin is supposed to be stronger than any other man's, and even resistant to blades like those of kunais, but it still got torn like paper by these tooth-blades. Orochimaru sees all the other Suto's pull out anything they can use as a weapon and come toward him. He gently grins and prepares.

"Sasuke, please, go to collect all the notes that Gentsuchi indicates to you." he says as he throws a large empty scroll that Sasuke catches. "In the meantime, I'll take care of these clowns."

Mokuton – Daisoju

With his two hands against the floor, Orochimaru summons multiple spikes of wood that emerge from the ground and stab through all the clones that stand on a line between him and Gentsuchi, clearing the way for her. The young girl hurries forward and joins Sasuke's side. The Uchiha turns around and rapidly slices through the wall behind him with his sword and lightning to completely open it.

He and Gentsuchi leave to look for the needed papers and material, while Orochimaru stays alone with the few remaining Suto's. He steps forward, stretches his body and leaps to the ground to crawl toward the opponents like a snake. In this sea of enemies, he dances with his new young female body and fights off the scientist's clones with ease.

Suto sees all his incarnations fall one after another. As he's getting brought to an inevitable end, trapped in an ambush with no way out, he finds it funny how extreme this epilogue is. To come to his death, it took an alliance of two of the most formidable human beings in the world: The great snake sage, the greatest ninja scientist Orochimaru, and the last of the Uchiha, the man with the Rinnegan Sasuke Uchiha.

The betrayal of Gentsuchi doesn't even anger him, since it was planned by such an elevated mind. At least, he thinks, Minoka is absent, making it possible for his knowledge and achievements to live on through her.

While Orochimaru's having his fun slaughtering all the bodies that get in the way of his elongated arms, Jugo struggles to fight against the Ripper who finally succeeded to activate his blade's jutsu and can now slice through anything without causing any harm.

Angered by his struggle, Jugo transforms his whole body and activates his sage mode.

Taren Fujizuho

He turns his two joined arms into jet boosters again and gathers natural energy in them, preparing to fire all of it together in one single powerful, inevitable attack that will annihilate everything in its way. Unfortunately, the Ripper, who has a very bad feeling about what is coming, leaps forward and swings his sword vertically through Jugo's whole body while he's immobilized. Before he can fire any chakra blast, his body falls into two separate pieces, but both are still living.

Surprised by his opponent's unexpected swiftness, his sage transformation wears off and his two halves fall to the ground like dead.

"So this is the ability of your sword, the Murasame." remarks Jugo, calming down, forced out of his anger by this attack.

Guroi now makes the same hand signs as to activate his blade's space-time jutsu but reversed, to undo it. He raises the sword up, ready to let it fall down on one of Jugo's half body's face and fatally injure his brain.

"Yeah, Whatever… Go to hell, you creep." he says, out of breath after this short fight against this unpredictable opponent that's even taller than him.

Before he can lower his sword, he's surprised by an odd feeling in his shoulder… Orochimaru, who quickly finished off all the remaining Suto's and ended the mad scientist's lives effortlessly, hurried to help his bodyguard in his battle. He sneaked behind the Ripper's back by sliding on the ground and elongated his neck to reach for the mercenary's shoulder with his head. There, he posed a cursed seal to paralyze the Ripper and stop him from ending Jugo's life.

Orochimaru now grabs the two separate parts of his bodyguard and slides away. Guroi, confused and in pain because of the seal, falls to his knees. He starts to scream as he tries his best to resist the effect of the curse. Orochimaru looks at Jugo and evaluates his condition. He quickly guesses how he could undo the effect of Murasame's jutsu and looks back at the fainting Ripper.

Suddenly, coming from above again, a spectral arm pierces through the ceiling, and a small silhouette falls down in the hole, standing in front of Guroi as to cover him from his opponents. The silhouette, that looks like that of a 10 year old boy, crouches next to the mercenary, holds its hand against the cursed seal freshly posed on the Ripper's shoulder, and completely absorbs it.

Orochimaru looks surprised at the kid who just suppressed his cursed mark from a body with ease. The boy steps out of the dust and stares at the snake scientist silently. Orochimaru and Jugo look at each other, then back at the kid: A young boy with dark pink hair and whiter skin. What is most intriguing about him is his only open right eye: A Mangekyo Sharingan with a pattern resembling a mitsudomoe symbol.

The kid closes his eye and moves his head around as if he sensed something particular and is trying to figure out what it is.

"This… enormous chakra I feel… Is it…?" he asks.

"Yes." answers Orochimaru before the boy can finish his sentence, already knoing what he means. "It is that of the Uchiha wanderer. Sasuke Uchiha in the flesh. He's present here to help me in my quest. And you kid, who are you?"

"Me?…" asks the boy, peering at the snake's face. "My name is Oshio. Oshio Uchiha… This Sasuke Uchiha… must be my father." adds the boy who now has his two eyes open.

He finally shows his left eye, revealing a purple Rinnegan, identical to Sasuke's but without any tomoe. Jugo stares agape, shocked by the two revelations, of the eye and of this supposed parenting connection. Orochimaru, however, is not as easy minded.

"His son?" he asks. "Isn't your name Izuna?"

"Izuna? Who's that?" Oshio asks back, unaware of the existence of Sasuke's legitimate children.

The snake scientist is as surprised as his bodyguard but doesn't show it. Instead, he stands dull for a few seconds… and starts to laugh uncontrollably. Openly, with no restraint, he loudly mocks the absurdity of what this kid is telling.

"The son of Sasuke? You wish you were!" he exclaims to the kid's face.

Annoyed by the snake's lack of respect, Oshio lets a wave of black chakra leak out and shapes it.

Susanoo

In the blink of an eye, a black chakra rib cage takes form around him with a skeleton arm and muscle fibers appearing on it. Orochimaru forcefully stops his voluntary laughter and watches at the colossal fist in which an ethereal sword now appears. Dashing through the room and crushing everything in its way from the left wall to the right, the Susanoo limb attempts to strike Orochimaru and Jugo down at once. Fortunately, before the spectral blade reaches its target, another sword gets in the way.

With just his weapon covered with his black flames, Sasuke effortlessly cuts off the hand of this spectral arm and stops the Susanoo blade from hitting anything. He and Gentsuchi, holding on his back, look confusedly as the black flames seem to be slowly absorbed by the black Susanoo's sword before it disappears.

After this, Sasuke lets the young girl get off his shoulders and go back to Orochimaru's side. The Uchiha wanderer steps back to get closer to the trio and stands before them, to cover them. He looks forward and sees who just used a jutsu that appeared so similar to his.

When he sees the kid, Sasuke gulps, and trembles for a moment. Orochimaru who was smiling, relieved by Sasuke's arrival and still amused by the kid's introduction, sees his former student's visible stress and starts hesitating. Gentsuchi, who feels the silence in the room, looks over to see the kid, and meets his gaze. In fear, she doesn't even manage to make any sound that breaks the silence, and just feels hypnotized by the pair of dojutsu she just gazed upon.

As no one speaks, Oshio slightly turns around to see how Guroi is doing. He's passed out, but he lives. Relieved, he looks back to the snake person, the sage colossus, the young girl, and the Uchiha wanderer. He stares specifically at the last person, with an oddly shy look. After a short silence, he takes a deep breath in and gathers his courage.

"He-Hello,… father." he says, staring at Sasuke right in the eyes.

Feeling cold sweat run down his back, Sasuke doesn't waste a single second here.

Chimatakami

With no warning, he makes a black space rift that swallows him along with his three allies and immediately transports them all back to Otogakure. As soon as they've been engulfed by the portal and brought back, he hurries to close the gate, to make sure nothing follows them through.

Orochimaru looks at him confusingly, unable to understand this fearful reaction.

"What was that Sasuke? Why did you bring us back so quickly?" he asks. "We're not even sure to be done there. Don't tell me you were afraid! Not you!"

The Uchiha doesn't answer, focused on the sight of the young boy's face he just had.

"Did you hear that kid? Did you see how absurd he sounded? Your son? Seriously?" Orochimaru keeps complaining.

But Sasuke stays silent, and shivers as he recalls Momoshiki's last words in his mind again and again. "Sure, you will destroy my body and force my soul out of the living world, but it's just a matter of time before you discover how much more I've taken from you, from your family, from your life. Eventually we'll come to meet again, and you'll have to pay the price for this crime." These words resonate in his mind, spoken by the Otsutsuki's voice.

"Sasuke?" insists Orochimaru. "What's the problem? This wasn't Izuna right? Who was he then?"

"I… I'd rather not know this…" Sasuke says, lacking any idea for even just a hypothesis about who Oshio Uchiha could really be.

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End of Chapter 50 – Next Chapter: The 5's promise