48 Ch.48

-Zach POV-

Standing there watching the glorious freedom that was given to Orochimaru, all I could do was grin stupidly. Looking over to Jiraiya I could see he was slack-jawed, so I reached my gauntleted hand over and closed his mouth.

Zach: "Pretty cool huh?"

It took Jiraiya a second to come back to reality.

Jiraiya: "YOU MADE ME CARRY AROUND THAT?! ARE YOU INSANE?!"

Zach: "Woah, Woah, Woah. They were deactivated and you were totally safe!"

Jiraiya: "That might have killed Orochimaru! I was able to plant it ON the base!"

That shut me up quickly and made me start sweating. The whole reason I did all this was to capture Orochimaru. If I had killed him it would most likely mean Kabuto was dead too. That would mean that I'd need to find another subj-

-Rumble rumble-

Zach: "What?"

-Rumble rumble rumble-

Jiraiya: "Did you delay a couple of bombs?"

-Rumble rumble rumble rumble-

Cortana: "Sounds like Naruto's stomach before getting ramen."

Zach: "How the hell do you know-"

Before I could finish the sentence a giant snake appeared out of the rubble. Watching it rise into the air I could see 2 bloody people on the top of its head. One looked like a cockroach, and the other was pasty white. As I was turning to Jiraiya to have him summon Gamabunta I saw he was already in the process of doing it. Turning back to the three stooges I planted my spear into the ground and conjured a more generic one in my hand. Planting my feet apart cocked my arm back that I was holding the spear while aiming with my other arm extended.

As Gamabunta appeared and the giant ass snake turned to face its new foe I threw the spear as hard as I could. When the spear left my hand I heard a large bang as it broke the sound barrier, and the next thing I saw was the cockroach was missing its head. Smiling, I grabbed my spear and ran, catching up to Jiraiya and Gamabunta who were bounding towards the snake and Pedomaru, I mean Orochimaru.

Jiraiya: "ZACH YOU TOOK MY KILL! OROCHIMARU IS MINE NOW!"

I could only grumble at that because he was right and slowed down for him and Gamabunta to take charge in the fight. As they got closer Jiraiya transformed into his sage mode and squatted down ready to take off in an instant and Gamabunta unsheathed his sword.

Gamabunta: "MANDA! This time I will have my snake stew!"

Manda: "Ssss-No it's toad steak tonight."

Jiraiya: "PEDOCHIMARU YOUR TIME IS THROUGH!"

Orochimaru: "Oh really Jiraiya? We both know you can never win against me!"

With the obligatory opening dialogue out of the way the four clashed. Immediately Orochimaru was pushed back as Jiraiya was literally opening a can of whoop-ass on him. Letting his righteous anger out for all the shit Orochimaru has done to him, and his friends in the dark. Gamabunta unfortunately was slowly losing in the exchange with Manda, that's where I'll be needed.

Zach: "Cortana, actively monitor Jiraiya's fight, and make sure I'm not going to be danger close to any of that shit."

Cortana: "Got it chief."

Picking up speed I readied my spear to my side and ran past Gamabunta and halfway down Manda's body before I leaped high into the air. Angling my spear down I made my center of gravity where the Spear was pointed and activated the boosters in my boots. What followed was deep penetration of the spear, a loud Snake cry, and laughter from a toad.

Not to lose the initiative I grabbed the spear with both hands and started to drag it down Manda's body. It was grueling and slower than I expected due to his thick scales and thrashing body, if it wasn't for the armors additional grip on the spear I would have been flung off. After making a couple of meter gash into Manda's skin I jumped off, not wanting to push my luck and get smashed.

-Shink click-

As I was landing I looked back at the sound and saw Gamabunta sheathing his sword. Looking up to Manda I could see a shocked face filled with disbelief. That face remained as his head started to slide off his body and crashed onto the ground causing a mini-earthquake. Turning to the toad I gave him a thumbs-up, to which he replied with a harumph and spit on the severed head of Manda.

Gamabunta: "Never wound a snake; kill it."

Zach: "Wise words Gamabunta, but we can't kill the snake that Jiraiya was fighting."

-BOOM-

Zach: "Speak of the devil."

Orochimaru had just crashed right next to me, courtesy of Fed-J. Without missing a beat I brought my spear up, heated it, and chopped off his hands. He was already a bloody mess and knocked out, but we're not taking any chances. With the nubbs of his forearms cauterized I created a knife and heated it up, pulled out his tongue, and cut that off too. By that time Jiraiya had arrived next to me, looking over at him I could see he was still wanting to kill the man. Gamabunta finished with his job just reversed summoned, but not before grabbing Manda's body and leaving his head.

Zach: "It'll be over soon. Go take a breather and clean up, I need Nawaki to see a familiar face."

After securing Orochimaru I dragged the pedo to our basecamp to complete the Pure World Reincarnation. Didn't want Nawaki's first site to be of a decapitated head of a big ass snake. Upon arriving I found Jiraiya there cleaned up and nursing a bottle of booze, can't blame him for that.

Zach: "Hey Jiraiya, want to be a bit mischievous?"

He took a swig and looked at me curiously.

Jiraiya: "What do you have in mind?"

Zach: "We don't tell Nawaki who I am! Be funny to see Tsunade flounder a bit."

That got a chuckle out of him and brightened his mood quite a bit.

It was time to get this show on the road. I brought Orochimaru to a clearing and was followed by Jiraiya still drinking. Tossing the pedo a couple of feet away from me I started to take things out of my storage ring. First I brought out Nawaki's coffin to the side, and then brought out one of the Reincarnation scrolls I had made. Then I brought out a bunch of bottles of liquor, not knowing how much energy this would take, and didn't want to take a chance on screwing this up. Looking over at Jiraiya I pointed to what looked like a cylinder port on the side of my mask.

Zach: "I'll let you know if I need booze, place the opening of the bottle here and I'll be able to drink it. Other than that, don't do anything."

Jiraiya nodded his head and grabbed one of the bottles, ready to do his part in this life-altering event. With a sigh, I turned to Nawaki's coffin and slowly slid it open revealing Nawaki's body. With a sigh I reached in and broke off one of his fingers, then I closed the coffin back up and stored it again. Man, so many things we've done today would freak this kid out, it's a good thing I'm still sober or I wouldn't have thought about hiding his own corpse from himself.

Walking over to the scroll I knelt down and unrolled it revealing a myriad of symbols with an empty circle in the middle. I placed the severed finger in the middle of the circle and placed my hands on either side of it. With a deep breath, I started to channel my divine essence into the scroll. It was a slow draw at first, which started to pick up in speed steadily. Golden symbols started to spread out from the scroll and surrounded Orochimaru in 10 meters of symbols. As it closed in and connected to the pedo's body my essence started to drain rapidly.

Zach: "Jiraiya, keep feeding alcohol!"

Without hesitation, Jiraiya locked a bottle into the slot and I started to drink, and he kept switching out the bottles. By the end of the second bottle half of Orochimaru had been covered in the golden light, and you could hear his agonizing screams. We didn't have time to pay attention to him concentrating on our own tasks. When I had finished the 4th bottle I told Jiraiya to stop because Orochimaru's body had been completely covered by the divine essence and the drain on me had stopped.

I stood up and stared at what was happening, Nawaki's finger disappeared into golden lights as what looked like a golden egg surrounded Orochimaru. Jiraiya came and stood next to me with tears slowly forming in his eyes, and clenching his fists with hope. We waited there for an hour watching the egg emit every color of light you could imagine and it was captivating.

Before we knew it the egg started to dissolve from the bottom up, slowly revealing a young boy in baggy clothes. Within seconds the egg disappeared and what was left was a confused looking young boy. But that didn't last long as Jiraiya was there in seconds, scooping up the boy and hugging him tightly while crying.

Nawaki: "Jiraiya-Aniki what's wrong?"

Jiraiya didn't answer as he fell to his knees holding the boy and still cried. Nawaki just started patting his back and then finally noticed me. Once he noticed a giant metal man he froze in fright, not knowing what I was. That caused an instinctual reaction from Jiraiya to shield him and look at what he saw. Catching that he was looking at me, Jiraiya relaxed and Nawaki felt it, causing him to relax himself.

Jiraiya: "It's ok Nawaki, that's Zach. He's a good friend that helped bring you back."

Nawaki: "Bring me back?"

Jiraiya: "Yes, Orochimaru betrayed the village and killed you. We just took revenge and were able to bring you back."

Nawaki: "H-h-how long?"

Jiraiya: "37 years."

Everyone was quiet at that, Jiraiya was still hugging the boy not wanting to let him go. We gave him time to process that. The silence lasted about 5 minutes before he decided to ask more questions.

Nawaki: "Why now?"

Zach: "Because there is something so important that we wanted you to be a part of."

He finally looked at me again, still a little scared of my armor but just nodded in acknowledgment.

Nawaki: "Where is Onee-san?"

Jiraiya: "She is now Hokage, and couldn't come with us.

His eyes went wide at that.

Nawaki: "NO WAY! She would never want to do that!"

That got chuckles out of both of us.

Zach: "Jiraiya, fill him in on what he needs to know, I'll break down camp and we'll head home."

Jiraiya: "Will do Zach. So Nawaki, it all happened…"

I had walked away to give the two some alone time. I slowly started to pack up camp giving Jiraiya enough time to give him the bare-bones history lesson. When I arrived back I saw that Nawaki now had new clothes that fit him. Unfortunately, it was a shoot-me-first orange jumpsuit that was commonly seen on a whisker-faced blonde.

Zach: "First chance we get we're buying him new clothes. We just got Naruto to stop wearing that, no way we're going to give him any hint that it's 'cool'."

Nawaki: "But it is cool!"

Jiraiya: " It's all that I had! I didn't even think about clothes for him when we set out."

With a sigh, I shook my head, but I couldn't fault him.

Zach: "Well let's head out, we don't want to keep the grumpy lady waiting."

(A/N: I figured that with Jiraiya being on Tsunade's team he'd be more like an older brother to Nawaki. I'm gonna have it that Jiraiya had a more prevalent role when he was young. Hoped ya'll like it, I do love comments. <3 btw I haven't advertised my discord in a couple chapters. Discord: https://discord.gg/Eph2esQ)