Naruto : Uchiha : Chapter 98

Blonde hair, a bit danker than Tsunade's own, the man was wearing a weird hat on his head and the lower half of his face was obscured by a strange helmet-like respirator mask. His headband had four vertical lines embossed on it.

Whoever the hell it was, he was no ally.

No Rain shinobi was an ally to the Leaf.

...

Mifune and the rest of their party rallied by the two genin, while some more Rain ninjas rallied behind the masked men.

"I-It's Hanzo." stammered a shook samurai behind Mifune.

"Hanzo?!" exclaimed another in shock, "You don't mean of the Salamander, do you?!" he gasped in terror. Naruto certainly had no idea who the hell this Hanzo was, but whoever the hell it was, this guy was certainly strong. His presence alone was rivaling Sasuke's when the man was serious, and that in itself was a testament to his strength.

Raring ahead in a blur of gold, Naruto expertly circled his knees on the ground and got behind Hanzo's back.

The man in question tightened the chain of his Kusarigama to block his kick. Sticking both his palms to the ground, Naruto hopped up to force both his heels on Hanzo's neck and snap his neck like a twig.

The man had enough honed instincts to effortlessly jump back and avoid the lethal maneuver while making it look easy, "That's some speed you've got." he complimented the blonde.

Naruto took it with a pinch of salt and jumped back by Tsunade's side, who had already had enough by this point. "What the hell do you want?" she snapped.

"I have no business with you Leaf ninjas, it's the samurai I want." he told her, "Leave and don't look back. Live to see another day, there are no allies among shinobi."

Tsunade hesitated, she knew from the opening attack Naruto had just made that they were no match for him. Even if Naruto could rally toe to toe with him, the experience in his eyes alone would crush him.

"That's not going to happen."

Looking at Naruto as if he was stupid, she was about to burst his bubble to turn back and get their sensei until Mifune held them back when;

"We were assigned to escort Mifune to his home, alive. I'm not about to fail that mission, take my word for it." Naruto pressed on.

"W-We should get Hiruzen-sama here!" one samurai stammered.

"Certainly, we are no match for him!"

Before Mifune could so much as utter a word of defiance and courage to encourage them, his men were running away from him like headless chickens. Naruto couldn't help but send an amused look at the seething man, "Those are some 'warriors' you've got." he mocked.

It stung, even Tsunade saw the hurt flash in his eyes. To think his men had scurried away like the cowards they were while the mutinous ninjas were sticking by his side, all for the sake of a mission they could abort any second without any repercussions did shame Mifune to no ends.

There were no witnesses among the dead, even if they left him here to die, they could surely say he fell in battle and go on to take full payment of their mission back home, "Why would you stay?" he asked.

Clicking his teeth, "Don't count your fortunes yet old man. The moment I see fit, we are abandoning fort. But until then, I'll fight by your side." Naruto said, his tone cocky. Something in his gut told Mifune the boy wasn't one to abandon an ally.

As loose as the term was, given the circumstances, he would take him over death.

"AHH!"

Snapping his head back with a start, Mifune watched in horror as the flesh of his comrades was melted off their bones by some weird purple-looking mist. Tsunade grimaced seeing the huge salamander, possibly a summon, swallow the corpses whole before burrowing itself underground. "Poison cloud." she told him ruefully.

Nodding, Mifune would have teared up in sorrow had he not been experiencing the rage he was feeling right now. Coward or not, they were - no, had been his kin, "Hanzo-dono, allow me to challenge you to battle." he issued the challenge.

Looking amused, "So you're Mifune, eh?" asked Hanzo, "Why do you ally with shinobi?" taken aback by his question, Mifune could do nothing more than look at him with a numb gaze.

Pressing on even harder, "It's out of character for all the time you samurai have spent holding onto your stupid old ways, why contract villages with arms when you resent violence so much?" Hanzo asked again.

"The oh-so honorable and master-less samurai have finally sold their souls, their loyalties - and joined with shinobi for some throwaway nickles and dimes, huh?" he mocked him.

"Yet, you still dare to call yourselves samurai?!"

Taking a step back in hesitance from Hanzo's furious roar, Mifune's eyes traveled down in shame in a rare moment of weakness. That was all the time Hanzo needed to prowl on him like the predator he was, but he was certainly not expecting what happened next.

Meeting his blade with a clang, experienced black eyes met furious crimson ones for a moment too long before he jumped back to avoid the over reaching slash of Naruto's black blade, "Get your heart together, old man. This is no time to fall for such subtle manipulation tactics!" reprimanded Naruto.

Hanzo was clearly not pleased with the unsolicited interruption, "You talk big for a kid your size, let's see if you can back it up!" roared Hanzo, circling the weighted end of his Kusarigama and flinging it at Tsunade's feet to take off her balance.

Not being prepared for such a skilled high speed attack, Tsunade watched in shock as Naruto's form protectively jumped in front of her before he buried the chain into the ground with the tip of his sword.

The corner of his eyes warning him of the imminent danger as they saw the slight movement the links to the Kusarigama's chain made, Naruto flicked out a kunai and brought it overhead to block the sickle from embedding it's tip right into his skull.

"For a brat your age, you're not half bad." commented Hanzo.

Scoffing, Naruto cleaved his chain in half when the man tried to yank his sword away from him. "Preposterous!" shouted Hanzo, furious at the state his beloved weapon was in right now. No sword had ever been able to match his in straight combat, to think he had cleaved it without so much as an effort.

Hanzo eyed the black blade in Naruto's hands avariciously, "What sword is that?!" he questioned in intrigue.

"Nothing you need to concern yourself about."

Staring down at him in utter disdain, "Cheeky little brat, that." muttered Hanzo.

Both taking a step towards each other, Naruto twisted his blade to allow the light to gleam off his sword. "Tsunade, stay back." he whispered and finally caught Hanzo's eyes with the shine his sword was gleaming with.

Repulsing in pain, Hanzo blinked off his momentary blindness and instinctively brought his blade up to protect his neck from being slit in two, "No matter how dirty you fight." he hissed and kicked Naruto in the chest.

Taking the breath away from his lungs, Naruto was launched back like a rag doll before his back harshly met the bark of a tree. "The difference in skill is too much, brat." he taunted blithely.

Spitting a glob of blood and spit aside, Naruto stood up with furious defiance shining proudly in his eyes. Mirroring Hanzo's slow steps towards him, "We'll just see about that." he said, right before both broke into a sprint towards one another.

As soon as he reached withing arms' length to him, Hanzo spread his feet apart and circled himself in a fully circular arc - his blade aiming straight for Naruto's torso. Not one for being upped so quickly, Naruto hopped on his heels and in a sudden twist of events, landed on Hanzo's flat blade like a monkey.

Going forth to swing his sword once more for his target's neck, Naruto's eyes barely caught the weighted chain of Hanzo's Kusarigama in his peripheral vision before it wrapped itself around his arms.

Swirling him around in circles, Hanzo flung Naruto right back where he came from with the same outcome, just a tad bit harsher, as the last time. Coughing blood this time, Naruto instinctively rolled aside to avoid Hanzo's kick to his chest, a kick that made a small crater on contact.

He certainly didn't want to be struck by one of those.

Flinging his body up from the waist down, he placed his palms on the ground over his head and started acrobatically back flipping for dear life to avoid Hanzo's relentless slashes.

Getting a hold of his feet for a split second, he ran up a tree with the agility of a squirrel, with the enemy in tow and started hopping away from him, branch to branch, with the agility akin to that of a cat.

Skillfully dodging all the shurikens being flung at his back, he ran for dear life while Hanzo's ominous shadow started looming over him like a reaper. Twisting his body in mid air, he blocked Hanzo's blade with his own when his eyes caught Hanzo's subtle smirk.

"You're done, brat." pushing all his weight and brute strength onto him, Naruto barely had time to crane his neck back when the ground beneath them cracked open.

A wide mouthed Salamander had it's mouth open with bubbling purple poison gurgling in it's mouth, the creature waiting to gobble him up like candy any moment now.

Breaking free his blade, Hanzo forced both his soles onto Naruto's feet and jumped back with all his strength. Effectively sending Naruto tumbling right into the Salamander's mouth, that is, he would have had it not been for the white blur that caught him mid air and ran off into the distance.

"You can run brat, but you can't hide!"

With that furious roar, Hanzo jumped onto his summon and followed the trail of that weird white streak, the same size as that brat that was running with that brat he had a bone to pick with.

Mifune and that girl could wait and play with his minions for now, he would have them later. For, he was feeling a strange new sensation slithering away in his heart, a sensation he had'nt felt in a long time now.

This weird Uchiha was stroking his blood lust in all the wrong ways.

...

If you like the story so far, please throw some power stones.

======================

If you want to read ahead of the public release on p atreon.

p @treon Link :

 p atreon.com/sybife

 |● sybife