Chapter 42

I felt the wind rush through my air as we free fell down the sky, I resisted the urge to scream in exhilaration as we covered the distance so quickly, there was some sort of joy that came with falling. That breathless feeling from being unable to inhale any meaningful breaths of air. It was something else. When I judged the distance to be close enough, I released a pulse of chakra that activated the seals on the backpacks I'd had them all put on. They beeped twice and then activated. Ropes and cloth shooting out from the either before being caught by the wind and slowing down all their descents.

"Don't forget your goals" I told them as I used my wind release to release even more wind behind me, accelerating towards the ground. The pulse of chakra could not have gone entirely undetected, so virtually every sensor in the village was going to know something was up, that was why I was making double time to achieving my own goal in this attack. _Distraction._The best way for me to get the Tsuchikage off the board was to get him to come to me. My fuinjutsu skills were excellent but only an idiot would face a Kage right at the seat of their power. Instead, I'd move the battle here. Right in the centre of Iwagakure's population centre.

As I got closer to the ground, I could see more and more things become visible and distinct. The first was that my aim was a bit off and I was going to end up landing a bit farther from the Kage tower than I'd intended, but in the end of the day, it was going to prove to be advantageous since I was going to be landing right on top what our maps indicated was the Ninja residency area. Good, I wouldn't 't be killing innocents today.

I flipped in mid air as I got closer to the ground to bleed off a bit of my momentum before I braced for landing, and slammed into the ground immediately after I turned my lower limbs into sand. The landing was perfectly cushioned and my sand began to burrow into the ground, eating through it and creating more sand for my use. This was going to be a marathon, not a sprint so I had to make sure I was prepared for that. Now, where were they.

It took 42 seconds, much longer than it should have, for me to get confronted by anyone even though I'd been basically blasting my chakra into the air to attract attention. They were a team of three, their vests marked them as chunin. None on the bingo book so as they jumped forwards while yelling at me to surrender, I just breathed in, filling my lungs with air before emptying my lungs of said air and multiplying it as it passed the tenketsu on my throat. When I breathe out, it was a storm of cutting winds that sliced through the three ninja with ease. If this was what Iwa had to offer, then this was going to be a very disappointing attack.

I allowed the man who snuck up on me to stab the blade into my chest before holding tightly on to it with the sand that said chest had been transformed into right before he made contact. He was quick enough to let go of his weapon and jump backwards but not quick enough to avoid being tapped by one of my fingers as he retreated. His retreat ended instantly as he collapsed to the ground after having his right spontaneously multiplied a hundredfold. I'd still not been forced to move from my position.

In the time it had taken me to take care of my first four assailants, I'd been surrounded. Now, by Jounin. A cursory glance told me there were at least a dozen of them here. Wasteful, I thought to myself with a tisk. I was supposed to be a distraction for the Kage and their strongest ninja, allowing the rest of the team to move with impetus, but I didn't actually want to slaughter my way through the entire village. If I left them too weak, Danzo would taken Iwa as a whole with no resistance and would be in a position to fight a war on two fronts with us.

A bold ninja tried to take control of the ground before me to impale me with spikes but I crushed the pitiful attempt with my chakra before I slammed my foot into the ground. If they wanted earth release, I'd show them earth release. Spikes taller than me, at least as tall as a few of the bungalows around us rose from the ground with no warning. Dozens of spikes, but only three of them ended up catching any of their targets. The rest of them had dodged out of the way the second I'd made contact.

I felt it then, a strong chakra signature. Strong enough that even my shit chakra senses were able to identify it with ease. The man walked forwards, stepping around my spikes to meet me face to face. Or face to chest rather. I was tall for my age, but the man dwarfed me with ease. Kitsuchi, Godaime Tsuchikage of Iwagakure.

"Finally. I'd thought I'd go through puberty standing here and waiting for you" I said with a sharp smile on my face. This was going to be fun.

"Kuro was right. Your arrogance does indeed know no bounds. I would have sought you out in time, removed your skin from your bones to avenge my father's death but you've done me the favour of presenting yourself before me. Prepare to die, boy" He said, tone calm and bellying the words he spoke.

Just like his father, Kitsuchi embodied the will of stone. He'd break before he bent, and even more likely, he'd break you before you managed to make him do either. I could feel it standing in front of him. There was no fear on his face. This was a man who had been a ninja for even longer than I'd roamed this word. He's been killing and almost getting killed for decades. Of course, he wasn't scared. Wary, maybe. But not scared. I was sure Kurotsuchi had told him exactly how I killed Onoki and he was underestimating me for it. He thought he was my better.

I'd see how long he managed to hold on to that delusion before despair sunk in. I smiled at him before slamming both my hands together, clapping and holding the position as if I was offering a prayer to some god. The apartment buildings around us, massive things with hundreds of shinobi within them scrambling to equip themselves to reinforce their village under attack suddenly began to sink.

Their foundations turned to sand as my newest jutsu came into effect. "Hidden Jutsu: Primitive return to nothingness" I said the grandiose name as my chakra enhance the ability of my sand to weather down stone. Now, my sand ate stone to become sand, and that same sand did the same over and over, _ad infinitum_ as it spread through the sinking buildings, capturing and burying hundreds alive.

I leaned backwards from a punch that threatened to pulverise my skull and spread my brains over the floor beneath us. "I'm going to make you regret that" I heard him say as I backpedaled from the punch's natural follow-up. I led him in a dance as he struggled to hit me while I acted like the wind of the desert, impossible to catch or even pin down. Eventually, he left and opening that I took advantage of ruthlessly. He punched at me, and as I leaned backwards, I lifted one of my feet and slammed it into his midsection in a brutal spartan kick. A spartan kick that my opponent took with only a grunt to show his discomfort. He didn't even move backwards.

This was one strong motherfucker, I thought to myself. And then my senses screamed at me to move before I died. I jumped backwards, hurling myself through the air at speed to avoid the flaming missile that landed right where I'd been standing only a second earlier. It was difficult to make out the person through the aura of flames, but there was only one person who that could be. Roshi, Jinchuriki of Son-Goku, S-rank ninja of Iwa. Where he had landed, all the sand had been instantly glassed. What the fuck was that? It was an almost instant reminder of who I'd be facing now, a true Jinchuriki. Not one like me with only a granted ability and no other benefits. This one could use his tailed beast's chakra with abandon. Said chakra choked the air around us with miasma. I could see why the tailed beasts and the jinchuriki that housed them were looked upon as demons now. When I looked at Roshi, all I saw was death.

"You thought Iwa would be easy pickings?" Kitsuchi said with a scoff. "The second I was named as Tsuchikage, I reached out to my old friends Roshi and Han from the war. Thank you for coming. I trust Han is still on his way" His last sentence was not addressed at me, but I got the very strong feeling that it still was. The threat was unmistakable. I have one jinchuriki here, and another is on its way. You have one tail, we have a combined nine on our side, I was sure he said mentally. If all I was was a jinchuriki, I'd even be frightened.

"Hmmm. Maybe the three of you working together will manage to give me the fight your father failed to" I said with a savage smile. i was going to be delayed here, so there was no chance of me accomplishing any secondary goals. I just hoped the others made the best use of this distraction. First things first, I dispelled the clone I had back in Suna, returning my chakra back to me. It was necessary for the safety of the village for the most part, but my life was more important.

While I did that, I passed along instructions to my clone posing as the Daimyo to retire for an early rest and find a way to dispel himself. I'd need every drop of chakra I could get if I wanted to stand a chance here. Roshi and I moved at once. He blurred at me while I gestured towards him, palm outstretched. Physical gestures made my sand move even faster, responding even more readily to my will, and that was why it was just barely fast enough to slam into the Jinchuriki of the four tails with all the force of a train before he could reach me. Even more sand piled on, pushing him backwards and attempting to bury him in its weight. I lifted both hands, commanding all the sand that surrounded us to rush towards him before I was suddenly tossed off my feet from the force of a shockwave.

Transforming and reforming in seconds, I found my feet. Now, Roshi stood atop a mountain of sand, most of it being actively melted into liquid glass with his chakra choking up the air around us even more. Behind him, I could make out two tails that looked to me made of pure lava. Fuck. I guess it was too much to hope for a quick conclusion here. He widened his stance while snarling at me. In the span of a few seconds, he spat out several balls made out of pure lava. Lava release was really fucking annoying, I thought to myself before instantly cooling every single ball into dry earth in one breath with wind release, allowing them to fall to the ground after failing to reach their target. I allowed my head turn into sand as a fist wreathed in stone punched right through it. I couldn't see, but I could feel my surroundings with the sand that made up my essence. I took advantage of the position of Kitsuchi's fist to surround his arm with sand before crushing down on it with a quick application of will. Blood dripped down on my sand as I felt him rush backwards. I couldn't hear anything, but I knew he didn't scream. I was intimately aware of what the posture of a screaming person was.

Trying to force my sand to flow up his body was useless as he pushed it away by flaring his chakra. I reformed my head to see a flying comet heading for me, Roshi. I breathed in before breathing out a massive gale of hurricane force winds. I expected the wind to toss him backwards but the man planted his feet on the ground, and braced himself. He did not move, even as I fed the jutsu a shit ton of chakra. Even as the winds continued behind him to level buildings and kill ninja that weren't even targets of the jutsu. I ran out of air before he ran out of endurance. He tanked the entire attack with nothing to show that he'd even been hit.

This time when he ran at me, I had the good sense to retreat again. Once again the space I'd occupied was now filled with glass. I wasn't in much danger of running out of sand but the fact that he kept glassing up so much of the essential resource was nothing short of annoying. I had three elemental affinities, wind, earth and fire. Considering he was literally made out of Lava, fire was a bust. If I somehow managed to burn him in that state, I'd shave myself bald and join the wind temple as an acolyte. That left wind and earth. I had nothing in my earth release arsenal that would stand a chance of hurting him unless I massively weakened him first. Wind could either blow or cut, and blowing had done a good deal of nothing, so let's see how this aura of his would do at preventing him from being turned into mincemeat.

Rotation, power, containment, wind, I recited to myself as I formed the wind release: rasengan in less time than it took him to cover the distance between us, and this time instead of leaping backwards, I ran right at him.

XXXXXXX- ROSHI OF IWA

It was all he could do to keep the damn Monkey out of my way as he fought off the Ichibi Brat. "Shukaku" the Monkey shouted in his head, almost upset at his choice of words. Roshi shoved the Monkey's voice down for the tenth time in as many minutes with a blast of irritation and continued to run at the brat.

This time, instead of retreating, he was running forwards. A stupid move, I could already tell. He'd spent all his time fighting against humans, and that was where his mistake lay. He thought that by beating a few humans over the years that he'd be able to call himself Roshi's equal with a weaker beast in his stomach and less chakra in his whole body than Roshi could have had in a finger. While running at him, he began forming a jutsu in his hand. His left hand. Tch. He still fought like one of them, Roshi thought to himself, using jutsu and ninja techniques. He thought he was human like they were. Limited. It was a pity that he would die ignorant of what he truly was and his true potential.

When they were about to clash with each other, Roshi smiled as he knew what the brat was planning but had an even better idea up his sleeves. He screamed, tapping into the consciousness and mind of the Yonbi, "Son Goku" it shouted in his head. The scream was a trick that he'd learned from Han. And just like it did when Han had used it against him, it sent the boy reeling. He stumbled, faltering in his approach and struggling to move forwards. The boy almost dropped to his knees, but didn't get the opportunity as Roshi ran forwards and punched him with a lava sheathed fist, sending the boy flying at least a mile away, chest caved in.

He could hear the supposed Tsuchikage, Kitsuchi, let out a breath of relief at that, clearly beleiving the boy had been taken out. Foolish. That hit would have killed any man, Roshi knew. He'd been killing men since the day he was born, but the Ichibi brat, "Shukaku", was no man. That was a demon, just like him and he knew that something like that wouldn't get anywhere close to killing him.

He was proven right a few seconds later when sand rose up from the ground and attempted to rush right at him. Foolishness was doing the same thing over and over again while expecting the same result. We are monsters, not idiots, Roshi thought to himself with suspicion, wondering wha the brat was up to. He pulled at the beast in his stomach and increased his chakra flow, turning all the same around him to glass in a second. He was the worst possible matchup for the Ichibi brat. Maybe his hair-brained attack on a Hidden Village would have gone better if he wasn't around, and Han wasn't on his way. By the time Han got here, he'd be dissappointed to see him still fighting against a brat with three less tails, Roshi thought to himself.

When the brat revealed himself again, he was unharmed, only the blood dripping off his clothes showed that he'd even taken any damage. That was even faster than his own healing, Roshi thought to himself before noticing a slight green aura around the boy's hand that was placed on his slide. Medical ninjutsu. With an aura that faint, it was either he was a complete novice with it or he was so good that he was only using precisely as much chakra as he needed to and so was wasting little of it in that aura. The latter was more likely, but that meant he was still fighting like a human. Trying to conserve chakra, Roshi scoffed to himself.

"Pull on that beast in your belly, boy. If you want to have any chance of taking me on" Roshi shouted across the space separating them that was littered with molten glass and sand. Much of the Iwa city center was being torn apart in their battle. The brat had done most of the damage before he'd even arrived, but Roshi already knew he'd get a good portion of the blame. Humans liked to think of themselves as logical creatures, common sense and all that. But when it really got to it, they were beasts just like he, Han, and the brat. They just showed their beastial natures in different ways. In the way they'd treated him when he was a child. In he way they somehow managed to find a way to blame him for everything that went wrong. He wasn't the only one to lose to the damn Yellow Flash, but he was the one who got the blame for losing the war. Even the Ninetails had lost to the bastard, what did they expect him to do with his lowly four.

"Oh, you have no fucking idea" The brat shouted back at him before jumping right at him this time with a blade held in his left hand. A sword, Roshi nearly guffawed. He was still fighting like one of them. He allowed the boy close the distance, not even bothering to dodge out of the way of the blade, preferring to catch it in his palm like the toy it was, but then something went wrong. The blade cut through the Yonbi's chakra and began to cut into his skin. What? He shouted in his head before pulling his hand back, noticing that the exposure to his lava clad form had done nothing to the blade where most other weapons would be nothing but slag at this point. He backpedaled, dodging out of the way of the blade as it came lashing for his neck.

The boy was skilled, that went without saying. So it was almost expected that with an advantage like that sword, he'd be able to keep him on the backfoot. Not for long though. The Yellow Flash was the only human Roshi would ever lose to, and until he pulled on his tailed beast, this brat would remain a human in his eyes. That was why he released a scream as he increased his chakra pull from the beast again. He was knocking on the door of entering the second version of the tailed beast cloak where he actually became too dangerous for anyone to fight. Han would never let him live it down if he let a brat push him that far.

The next time the blade came, he let out another scream laden with tailed beast chakra, but this time there was no reaction from the boy, beyond a smirk as he tried to take advantage of Roshi's seeming distraction to skewer him with the sword. Roshi just smiled and ramped up his speed before kicking the boy in the chest. The boy's body collapsed in sand before reforming with the sword still clutched in his left hand and aiming for Roshi's neck with a lunge. Roshi spat, a concentrated ball of nothing but lava that forced the boy to retreat as Roshi released even more, bigger, lava balls that tore chunks out of the battlefield and ruined much of the sand around them. Might as well get rid of the brat's pesky ammunition and keep him running, Roshi thought as he spat out more and more lava, watching the boy run across the field like a headless chicken before one brat suddenly became two. One kept running, the other scattered in the winds.

He kept a careful eye on the clone as it ran to the other end, miles away and began to run through handseals while the original remained god-knows-where. "Don't let him use Jutsu" The accursed Tsuchikage shouted at him, still clutching the crushed remnants of his hand. Roshi would have killed him where he stood for his presumption that he was in any danger from Human techniques but Onoki's son had made promises, and Roshi would be damned if he didn't hold him to them. He'd give him no excuse or reason not to keep up with his end of the deal, and so that was why Roshi jumped in the air after bending his knees a tiny bit to increase the strength in his jump.

He covered miles in seconds, crossing the distance between him and the clone in less time than it would have taken any human except the Yellow Flash before lifting his hands to the sky and bringing them down with him as he landed on the clone, destroying it. No, he amended. The clone wasn't destroyed, just turned into sand like the original and scattered into the wind. Fucking coward, he thought to himself. Before the ground all around him began to glow as invisible seals etched in the stone itself began to light up.

"You see, you're powerful as fuck. Strong, but you fight stupid. It was easy to lure you here with some bullshit handsets while my clone, invisible to you etched these seals into the very ground around you. Stand tall, Roshi of Iwa. For this is your burial ground." The brat had suddenly appeared art the edge of the glowing seals, looking smug. Roshi almost laughed. Fuinjutsu. He thought he could seal him? The foolishness of the young merged with the arrogance of humanity was not a good combination at all. Roshi covered the distance between them in less time than it would have taken him to blink, tailed beast chakra increasing and swelling within him.

He slammed against the purple barrier with all his strength, expecting it to budge, only for it to hold strong. "This is something I prepared months ago for in case I ever had to face off against a rampaging Nine Tails Jinchuriki. I expect that it will be more than enough for you." The brat said with a smirk.

Roshi wanted to scream in frustration as he punched at it, slamming hit after hit into it with no effect. There was no give. He increased his draw on the tailed beast chakra, bearing the pain with a grunt as he felt his skin being burnt to ash and healed again by the corrosive heat of the Yonbi's, "Son Goku" the beast screamed once again, chakra. He felt a skeleton form above his own as he tapped into the very limit he could approach. Only one human had forced him this far, and it was the damned yellow flash. Instead of the boy to be justifiably frightened or scared at the transformation, he only looked amused. Roshi was still being mocked. Not for long, he thought as he walked backwards.

He retreated to the very edge of the barrier, before running forwards, half on his legs, and half on his hands. He felt the world blur around him until he slammed into the barrier. Roshi felt true despair for the first time when the barrier still did not move. "Won't work" His ears could barely make out the boy's words over the sound of him hitting the barrier over and over again. It still didn't move.

He was beginning to feel light headed. he swayed on his feet for a second or two before he caught himself and kept still.

"You're feeling it now, ey? There's no air in that barrier. By exerting yourself like you just did you just made sure you won't even have more than a minute left before you run out of oxygen" The boy's smirk was infuriating. He wanted to march forwards and smash the barrier to nothing, but that was exactly what the boy wanted. It would achieve nothing. Nothing beyond shortening his time. He was beaten, and he was going to die, Roshi thought to himself.

"Yonbi" He finally said internally when he felt his grip on consciousness beginning to slip. He'd lost, but this brat was going to pay for his insults one way or another.

"If you want my help, you will say my name" The Great Ape said within him, voice stern as ever.

"If I die, you die with me" He said, trying to appease the beast with logic.

"I will reform again, free of shackles. What is a few years to one such as I" It said.

"Fine", Roshi conceded, losing against the Beast within in a battle of wills.

"Son Goku" He shouted within himself, and he felt his body become flooded with chakra. His skin gained a red tinge as it began to swell. He felt his will be supplanted as the Great Ape took charge, and the tails at his back turned from lava to flesh.

His point of view changed as he rose higher and higher, standing taller than even the tallest buildings. "I am free" The Yonbi's voice was not within his head this time; it spread across the world as the Great Ape screamed its victory.