End Of An Empire

Ten days had already gone by since team seven arrived in Nami no Kuni. He was told to keep a watch on Tazuna on the bridge for the first day and everyone else would take turns. But Hiroki decided that he would keep watch everyday. He really didn't mind it and he liked having his clones helping the bridge builder and his workers. In these past nine days, Gato had sent his men every time to scare Tazuna's workers, but Hiroki did quick work with them and would always leave one unhurt to take the other back together with a warning to Gato. Every time, Hiroki would say that Gato's days would decrease for every time he sent his men. The day before, there were a total of ten men and Hiroki's clones beat nine of them and left only one untouched. He told the grunt to tell Gato that he would be coming for him. Today was the day.

'Today is the day that Zabuza will attack the bridge. I'll have to tell Kakashi that I'll be staying in the house for today and he and Sakura should go to the bridge and keep a watch.' Hiroki thought as he woke up. He then left the bed, put on his clothes and went down. When he arrived, the others were sitting down.

"Hiroki-san, good timing. I just finished preparing breakfast. Sit down and eat." Tsunami said as she smiled.

Hiroki sat down and ate as Tsunami handed everyone their breakfast. After eating, everyone got ready to leave to do their usual routine. Before either one of them left, Hiroki spoke up.

"Kakashi, I won't take watch today at the bridge and Tazuna. You and Sakura should go. Naruto and Sasuke should be here in the house and I'll be doing some training myself." Hiroki said.

Everyone stopped on their tracks as they heard him.

"I see. That's fine by me. You've been watching over Tazuna and the bridge workers for nine days. You more than deserve some training time. Alright then. Sakura, come with me. Sasuke and Naruto, you two stay back and watch over Tsunami and Inari." Kakashi said before walking out the door.

Naruto looked at Hiroki as he wondered what his friend was going to train.

"What are you going to train on? Any supercool jutsu?" Naruto asked enthusiastically.

"Not really. I'm going to work on my taijutsu and kenjutsu." Hiroki said and then smiled at Naruto. He then looked at Sasuke for a bit.

"Sasuke, have you awakened your Sharingan?"

"No." Sasuke said curtly. He then thought about it and rephrased his sentence.

"I did once, but I was too young. I was never able to do it after that." He said.

"Okay. I might have a way to help you out. When you find yourself in a dangerous situation, try to infuse chakra into your optical nerves and eyes." Hiroki said as he gave Sasuke a hint. Usually, to awaken the sharingan, an Uchiha would need to suffer a trauma or something like that. Once they did, it would be easier to activate their sharingan later on. Sasuke didn't know how to do it because he had fainted right after when Itachi put him under Inifinite Tsukuyomi. His family died and he didn't have anyone to teach him how to activate it. Kakashi wasn't able because his sharingan was a borrowed one and he wasn't an Uchiha.

Sasuke heard what Hiroki said, but didn't say anything. He was only thinking about it.

"I'll be leaving now. See you guys later." Hiroki said as he shunshined.

"Hey, Sasuke." Naruto said.

"What?" Sasuke asked.

"Doesn't Hiroki seem a little bit strange today?"

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. He feels different. I feel that he's angry and in a hurry."

"It might just be your stupid brain." Sasuke said.

"Yeah... HEY!" Naruto said as only later he understood what Sasuke said.

———

"Alright, playtime is over." Hiroki said as he spread his senses out and found that there wasn't anyone nearby. He then directly teleported to the outside of Gato's mansion. When he arrived, there were two guards in front of the gates. It took a few seconds, but they noticed a young boy walking their way. They had a smirk on their faces seeing the young boy.

"Hey, kid. Where do you think you're going? Turn around before things gets ugly." One of them said. His warning didn't have any effect as Hiroki continued walking towards them. The two then unsheathed their swords and yelled at Hiroki.

"I'm not going to say it again. If you come any closer, we'll make your life miserable."

Hiroki continued walking towards the guards and then they noticed the metal plate on the boys forehead.

"He's a shinobi from Konoha. What the hell is he doing here? The others said that Konoha shinobi were only looking after the old man and his family."

Hiroki closed his eyes as he continued walking towards the gates and put his right hand behind his back.

"Kill him." One of the guards said as the two pounced at him while stinging their swords at Hiroki. Hiroki opened his eyes and they became red as the tomoes spun slowly. The two guards were already in front of Hiroki when he opened his eyes, but he had a calm face all the way. One guard swung from Hiroki's right shoulder. Hiroki continued walking past with tranquility and the second guard swung his sword towards Hiroki's neck. Hiroki didn't take his eyes out from the gate as he continued walking slowly. The swings of both guards missed and they his the floor. Hiroki then pulled out his tanto in a flash and sheathed it back in less than one second. The two guards stayed motionless and only after Hiroki crossed the gates did their heads fall down to the ground and blood gushed everywhere.

"Two down. A couple dozen more to go." Hiroki said as he continued walking slowly inside Gato's compound. A few other men that were doing their guarding duty, saw Hiroki and they became hostile instantly. The came running towards Hiroki with knives, machetes and swords.

"Katon: Goukakyu no jutsu." Hiroki said as he breathed a fireball that had ten meters of hight. Once the guards saw the fire ball, they became desperate as they tried running away, but it was futile. Once the fireball cem in contact with them, it trembled half of the compound as it exploded.

"What the hell is going on? Who dares to mess with my property?" Gato said as he was in his office. His office and bedroom was right in the middle of the compound and it was hard to reach since there were guards around it all day, everyday.

One of the guards came running as he was panting and sweating.

"Gato-sama. A Shinobi from Konoha is attacking the compound." The guard said as he slammed the door of Gato's office open.

"What? Which one is it?" Gato asked.

"It's the kid that kept threatening you."

"Huh? A kid? Go take care of that brat. Slice him up and feed him to my dogs."

"Gato-sama, he's already killed over twenty of our men. He is young, but he's very powerful."

"Haha. What a joke. Go back and deal with the brat. And don't dare bother me again." Gato said as he kicked the guard outside his office and slammed the door shut.

———

On the compound, Hiroki was swinging his tanto left and right. Each swing reaped the life of one of Gato's men. The other guards seeing that, shook in their places. They looked at Hiroki's eyes and all they saw was red. They didn't see any emotion. This was what made them more afraid.

"Ruuuuuuun!" The guards yelled as they threw their weapons on the ground and ran away from Hiroki.

"Trying to run? Not today." Hiroki said as he threw a kunai towards them. The kunai hit the ground in front of them and Hiroki already appeared at the spot as his right hand had lightning and birds cried. Three seconds later, all their bodies fell on the ground as each one had a hole through their body. Hiroki sensed that there were around thirty more men on the compound. He made three clones and had them go take care of them as he himself went towards where Gato was while jumping over the roof of the compound. Hiroki quickly arrived in front of the door of Gato's office.

*knock, knock, knock*

"I told you not to bother me, damn it!" Gato said angrily as he stood up from his chair and stomped his way to the door. When he touched the door knob, he pulled it and slammed the door open. He then saw a tall young boy in black clothes staring down on him. When he noticed the hitai-ate on the boy's forehead, he started to panic.

"Wha, what do you want?"

"I told you. Your days were counted..." Hiroki said as he kicked Gato on the stomach. Hiroki didn't put a lot of strength on the kick. It was only powerful enough to send the midget back to the wall.

"...and today I came to collect it." Hiroki finished saying as his eyes changed shape. It was his mangekyo.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah." Gato screamed as he looked at those eyes and fainted.

"Wow. It's many times stronger against a normal person." Hiroki said as he thought about the genjutsu he put Gato under. It was a powerful genjutsu that would torture the person with their worst fear. As one second went by on the outside, it felt like one day went by inside of the genjutsu.

"Time to finish this off." Hiroki said as he went closer to Gato and started asking him questions. Hiroki leaned everything about Gato. His business dealings, where he kept his money and also who worked for him. Hiroki saw the carpet on the floor and smirked. He pulled it and saw a metal door under it.

"Not bad." He said as he pulled the metal door and saw some stairs going down.

"Hehehe. This guy sure is crazy about his money. This is a huge safe." Hiroki said as walked down the stairs and saw a large safe that was as tall as the underground bunker. He put the key into the hole and opened the door of the large safe. He was surprised to see large amounts of bills and some precisou stones and jewelry and also tablets of gold and silver. He then took out one scroll from his pouch and started sealing everything inside it. He then saw a contract that intrigued him.

'The contract to kill Tazuna. Gato would pay Zabuza ten million ryos for killing Tazuna and destroying the bridge. No wonder Zabuza himself was so adamant to get the job done.' Hiroki thought as he sealed the contract together with a different scroll and ten million ryos.

As Hiroki finished sealing everything inside his scrolls, the memories of the three clones returned to him, signaling that everything was taken care of.

"Alright. Since everything is almost done, I'll just need to finish it." Hiroki said as he stored the scrolls and walked back to Gato. He then pulled out his tanto and swung it, cutting Gato's head clean. The man still had a frightened expression even after his head was detached from his body. Hiroki took Gato's head and walked slowly outside of the compound. He then turned around and threw a few shuriken and made shadow clones of it. The thousands of shuriken hit everywhere in the compound and no place was left untouched. Hiroki made a singled handed seal after that as he walked towards the bridge leisurely.

"Katsu."

*boooom, booooom, BOOOOOOOOOM!~*

Loud sounds of many explosions rang as the compound exploded into pieces and nothing was left as it was before Hiroki came. He didn't need more than half an hour to do that amount of damage. The most unrealistic thing was that he didn't even need more than a third of the total time he took to take care of this, but chose to do things slowly and calmly.

"Time to put a stop into that fight." He said as he continued walking without a hurry and held Gato's head by his hair. A trail of blood dripping was following him as he walked.

Ten minutes later, Hiroki arrived at the usual spot he stayed when watching over Tazuna and his workers. From up there, he saw Sasuke on the ground inside the ice mirrors dome and Naruto fighting against Haku as he leapt from one spot to another as the kyubii's chakra flared. Not long after, Naruto punched Haku straight on her face as she flew out of the ice mirror dome and crashed on the ground and flopped a few times. With great effort, she stood up limping as her mask was falling off. Naruto dashed towards her with crazy speed while throwing a punch, but once the mask fell and he saw her face, he stopped his punching motion. After that, it was all the same emotional dialogue in the show.

After the dialogue, they heard birds chirping and blue lightning crackling where Kakashi and Zabuza were fighting. Zabuza was motionless as Kakashi's hounds had bit him and stuck him in place. He then started to dash towards Zabuza with his Chidori. Haku saw that and she dashed towards it without any question as she wanted to sacrifice herself for her savior. It was then that Hiroki threw Gato's head right in between Kakashi and Zabuza. The head hit the ground and made a "ploc" sound.

"Huh?" Kakashi said as he stopped and looked at the head on the ground. He wondered who it belonged to. He then looked towards where it came from and saw Hiroki. Haku arrived in front of Zabuza as she opened her arms in front of him, blocking Kakashi.

Hiroki shunshined in front of Kakashi and the Jounin was surprised as he saw the red eyes on the genin's face.

"Hiroki, what is the meaning of this?" Kakashi asked.

"The mission is finished. This is Gato." Hiroki said as he pointed to the head. He then looked towards Haku and Zabuza.

"He's dead and there's now no need for you to stop Zabuza since Zabuza doesn't have anyone to pay him for killing Tazuna."

"Why did you do this? Our mission was to protect Tazuna and that's it. You could have lost your life." Kakashi reprimanded.

"I don't know why you are like this. The mission was only to escort Tazuna to Nami no Kuni, but it was changed once we found out what was really happening. We were supposed to protect him until the bridge was finished. I took out the one that put the bounty on his head. Problem solved. There are more ways to complete a mission than just one. Not only that, this guy had an easy death for all the crimes he committed. Drug selling, organ trafficking and slavery of minors." Hiroki said as his eyes never shook as he had extreme conviction of what he was doing.

"Anyways, you two. This is for you." Hiroki said as he threw a scroll towards Haku and Zabuza.

Zabuza wasn't able to move since the hounds were still biting him, so Haku caught it. She looked at Hiroki with a questioning gaze.

"If you're wondering, that is the money Gato promised to give you. Take it and use it to help your cause." Hiroki said as he looked at Zabuza. Zabuza only stared at Hiroki, not understanding him.

"What is the meaning of this, brat?" Zabuza asked with a little bit of difficulty.

"I know what cause you took this mission for. You were considered a missing nin after trying to establish a coup against Yagura, the Mizukage. It's a noble effort, but you should have considered the life of others since you want to save the lives of your most village. All lives have values and the lives of these people aren't less valuable than the ones from your village. I hope you've learned from this." Hiroki said. He then looked at Kakashi and asked him to let the two go.

"I'll let them go, but you'll have some explaining to do, Hiroki. Let's first take care of Sasuke. He was badly injured." Kakashi said.

"Yeah. Alright." Hiroki said.

———

On the next day, Sasuke had already recovered and was only feeling some soreness in some places on his body. Today was the day that the bridge was finished and also the day that team seven would be returning to Konoha. Tazuna and the bridge workers all had a party together with the people of Nami no Kuni. They were finally free from Gato's grasps. The man was killed and his empire had already fallen before the bridge was one hundred percent finished. It was already enough reason to celebrate and now that the bridge was finished, the real celebration started. Team seven took part in the celebration, but after lunch, they decided to head back to Konoha.