Chapter 33

"That's one hell of show those two are putting on," said A appreciatively as he watched Neji and Lee fight tooth and nail against one another.

Onoki clicked his tongue in annoyance. "You're right it's one hell of a show. But a show is all it is. Tree-huggers are probably flirting with each other while they pretend to fight."

"Wow," whistled Jiraiya. "I knew you were getting old Onoki but I didn't think the senility had already set in."

Onoki growled. "Congratulations, your bounty just doubled."

"I'm honored," said Jiraiya. "That's more money for me for each head I take and turn in for their bounties. Hopefully some of those fuckers in Akatsuki will be stupid enough to come after me."

Onoki had to be held in place by A. "That's enough, both of you. Onoki, act your age. Jiraiya, stop taunting him or you can go sit with the rest of the riffraff down there."

"He started it," pouted Jiraiya.

"What? I did not!" shouted Onoki.

"I said enough, both of you," said A forcefully.

Onoki continued grumbling but stopped arguing.

Jiraiya just smirked like the cat that ate the canary.

BREAK

Neji's increase in speed combined with his eyes' ability to see Lee no matter where he was made it nearly impossible to hit Neji without getting a few tenketsu closed in the process. In fact, Lee was finally starting to slow down.

"I guess I have no choice," said Lee, the frown on his face was unnatural to the boy.

Neji smirked momentarily thinking victory was within his grasp now. He watch Lee cross his arms in front of himself defensively. Then he noticed the sweat on his skin start to float into the air unnaturally. Finally, his byakugan saw a massive influx of chakra in Lee causing the little bit of moisture in the air to evaporate instantly.

"Keimon: kai (gate of view: release)!" shouted Lee, vanishing once again from Neji's view. "Asa kujaku (morning peacock)!"

Unexpectedly, Neji felt a massive kick to his stomach launching him skyward, a bit of vomit left his mouth from the sheer power of the hit. Lee appeared in front of him in the air and punched him leaving a burn mark where he was hit. Lee continued after him, punching rapidly as they went. Burns left behind wherever Lee hit until eventually the punches themselves were on fire.

Neji finally hit the wall of the stadium with Lee on top of him punching repeatedly, searing his skin and burning his clothes. He knew then that he had lost to Lee even as he felt his consciousness slipping away.

When Neji's eyes finally closed and his body sagged, Lee jumped away from him. With the onslaught ended, Neji fell heavily to the arena floor. His clothes in taters and covered in burns.

"Winner, Rock Lee!" announced the proctor.

This time Lee was greeted with nothing but cheers from the audience even as he fell backwards in horrible, agonizing pain as the gates finally closed.

The arena was filled with iryonin trying to patch up both of the participants.

Sakura immediately began work on Lee while Gai stood over her shoulder.

"Well done, Lee-kun," said Gai somewhat softly, a tear at the corner of his eye.

"I beat him Gai-sensei," uttered Lee. "I finally did it."

"You did, now it's time to rest. You've got one more fight to go," said Gai.

"No he doesn't," said Sakura shortly, her focus entirely on healing and keeping his heart beating. "His heartbeat is erratic and at risk of stopping all together. Until that stabilizes he's not fighting anyone and the rest of the muscle damage won't be healed until then either. He's done in this exam."

"I can still fi–" Lee began to protest before a very strong sedative Sakura injected knocked him out.

"Stretcher!" ordered Sakura to the other iryonin. Two iryonin rushed over with a stretcher. Together they rolled Lee on his side then back onto the stretcher then rushed off with him, Sakura monitoring him the whole way.

Gai checked quickly on Neji to find out he'd be fine in a few weeks, the burns would heal soon enough as would the concussion and broken bones, and fortunately there was no internal damage.

BREAK

"Well that's the end of Konoha's shitty genin," said Onoki, more than a little pleased.

"It is an annoyance," said A. "With both of them out now we don't have a final round."

"You've still got the chuunin fight," said Jiraiya. "Why not have them fight now and use the next fight as the final?"

"That should be fine," said A, giving the nod to the box where Darui, C, Akatsuchi, and Kurotsuchi all waited. "And where is your boy?" asked A.

Jiraiya smiled. "He likes to make an entrance."

"I won't stand for any nonsense. If he's not here in thirty seconds he's disqualified," said A.

"I'd disqualify him anyway," said Onoki. "He should have been here like the rest of the competitors. It's rude not support your village shinobi's in such an important endeavor."

Jiraiya watched the four competitors jump down to the arena from their waiting box. "I suppose I should get him here."

"Yes you should," said A. "Ten seconds!"

Jiraiya sighed and sent a small prayer that this worked. Reaching inside his coat he pull out a kunai and quickly tossed it into the arena.

The gasp from Onoki next to him brought a grin to his face, now if it only it works.

Naruto appeared in an instant a moment later in the arena, Jiraiya's thrown kunai in hand. An instant hush fell over the assembled crowd.

"No," gasped Kurotsuchi, her eyes wide with shock and surprise.

"Sorry I'm late, I got lost on the road of life," said Naruto in a manner similar to Kakashi. Naruto could hear Onoki up in the kage's booth screaming profanities at Jiraiya while the pervert just laughed. "So, are we ready to get this shindig started?" asked Naruto as he made a big show of stretching.

"So the rumors were true, that fucker the yondaime hokage had a kid," sneered Kurotsuchi.

"What's your point?" asked Naruto, feigning boredom. Kurotsuchi earned his ire in the process despite what he was showing them.

"I don't care if it costs me my life or the life of everyone in this stadium or even another war. I'm going to kill you," said Kurotsuchi, rage boiling just below the surface.

"Well aren't you just the chipper one?" asked Naruto sarcastically. "Tell you what, I'll beat you last so that you can watch your teammates fall, one after the other." Naruto didn't care for this kind of head game but he had to admit if the roles were reversed he'd be even more pissed off and probably charge in without a second thought otherwise.

"Proctor, start this already," said Kurotsuchi, eyes narrowed and glaring at Naruto.

"So hasty," joked Naruto. "No need to rush this, it'll be over soon enough anyway. I'll try not to leave permanent damage. You're kind of cute after all."

Kurotsuchi roared angrily and began to charge in except for Akatsuchi wrapping his arms around her waist and lifting her off the ground.

Naruto couldn't hide his smirk at their surprise. He was pleased his plan worked so well and that his training hadn't been a complete waste of time.

Flashback: an hour earlier

Naruto sat silently meditating in a training field he'd borrowed from Bee. All around him were kunai stuck in the ground. His focus was on feeling the beacons that each kunai represented, including the kunai in Jiraiya's pocket.

Ever since Naruto met his father, almost all of his training efforts had been focused on understanding and learning the hiraishin. Since he'd come to Kumo he hadn't really been able to work on anything but the hiraishin since he didn't have regular access to a training ground until the past week and that was kept very secret thanks to Bee.

As for his progress with the hiraishin, he'd managed to recreate the seal with his chakra and blood. He'd managed to successfully teleport to a kunai that acted as a lightning rod. His current problem was identifying the kunai to which he was teleporting. As such, he was meditating to get used to the feel of the lightning rods so he'd more easily be able to distinguish one from another.

Opening his eyes he surveyed the field for his final personal test. He would teleport to each kunai and collect it. The trick was to teleport just to the kunai he wanted to collect.

"Okay, so here goes nothing," mumbled Naruto to himself.

"One," said Naruto, reaching his first targeted kunai. It gave him an instant confidence booster to hit his first target.

"Two, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, fucking shit, three, shit, fuck, ass, bitch, shit, four, five, shit, double shit, six, son of bitch, shit, shit, seven, shit, crap, shit, poo, eight, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck fuck, nine, mother fucker, shit, fuck, crap, shit, ten, shit, shit, shit, shit, eleven," he continued counting each successful lightning strike and while cursing each failure.

"Twenty," he said finally collecting the last kunai. "Okay, so that was still terrible, I'm never going to get this in time for the fight." He rapidly tossed all of the kunai again spreading them around. "Okay, let's do it again."

An hour later Naruto was still cursing the technique from hell. If it was just one kunai he'd get there but when he had to be exact... well... he was fucked.

Just then he felt the pulse of the kunai he'd given Jiraiya.

"Okay, let's do this," said Naruto. "At least I can make an entrance, it will be a good bluff right?" No answer came, not that he expected one as he was standing alone.

End Flashback

"That idiot," groaned Yugito. "How much of a dumbass could he be to make an entrance like that?"

"Style and flow, mister nine-o," complimented Bee from his seat next to Yugito.

Yugito socked him in the jaw again, hearing the satisfying crunch of Bee's jaw breaking and shutting him up for a while brought a small smile to her face. She knew that Gyuuki would heal his jaw soon enough but in the mean time Matatabi was providing a distraction that prevented Gyuuki from doing so.

"Ah, silence... pure, golden silence," said Yugito. All around her, the audience was cheering loudly for the announcement of the start of the fight.

She liked Naruto, he was a good kid and definitely almost a friend, even if he was an obnoxious brat that was also a damned tree-hugger. Still, she would enjoy watching him get his ass kicked, especially after making such a foolish entrance.

Next to her Bee was holding his jaw in pain, tears leaking from behind his sunglasses.

BREAK

Naruto was instantly on the defensive as all four of his opponents attacked.

C dropped back, providing ranged support with kunai and shuriken to drive him towards a specific location where he hoped to snag him in a genjutsu.

Darui opened up with several quick lightning jutsu trying to help drive him, to help C's plan.

Unfortunately, their efforts were for naught as Kurotsuchi started out by spewing lava at him and then using the fact that Darui and C were trying to drive him somewhere to attack ahead of him and push him in a completely different direction.

"Shoot," lightly cursed C, seeing his plan voided.

Akatsuchi charged ahead and attacked with taijutsu and close-range doton jutsu.

"Well aren't I popular," said Naruto, dodging a quickly as he was able. He knew he was being driven but under the circumstance he didn't have much choice. He was thankful when C cursed because he knew whatever their plan was had been foiled, most likely by their allies in the endeavor to take him out first.

Naruto quickly ducked under a wide and overpowered right-handed round house punch from Akatsuchi and shot forward under it and jabbed a right-handed spear hand strike into Akatsuchi's armpit causing the large man to suddenly clench up in pain. Naruto used the opportunity to spin and bring his left foot in a round house kick across the left side of Akatsuchi's face from behind knocking him down painfully. He was unable to knock him out of the fight entirely as he was once again on the run from his attackers.

Kurotsuchi cursed as she saw Akatsuchi drop to the ground hard, groaning in pain. She threw a brace of shuriken to drive Naruto away from her partner to give him a chance to recover.

"Raiton: raikochu (lightning: flash of lightning)," spoke C softly.

Naruto covered his eyes in quick reaction to the bright flash of light. A moment later he felt an enormous amount of electrical current start coursing through his body.

Darui smirked slightly seeing C's genjutsu take effect. "Raiton: gian (lightning: false darkness)." He felt satisfied hearing Naruto scream in pain. Ending his attack he watched Naruto fall.

"So much for that," said Kurotsuchi confidently. She frowned when she heard a slight crumbling sound a moment later. Looking at Naruto again she saw his body crumble into a fine white dust-like substance.

"Fuuton: tatsumaki (wind: tornado)," said a muffled voice. Suddenly the entire arena floor exploded in a giant vortex of wind.

Kurotsuchi used a lot of chakra to keep herself stuck to the arena wall but C, Darui and Akatsuchi weren't so lucky as they got sucked into the tornado along with several large chunks of rock that used to be the arena floor.

She watched as a particularly large piece of rock traveled rapidly inside the tornado with a collision course with Akatsuchi. "Akatsuchi, look out," she shouted.

Akatsuchi tried to see what she was pointing at and saw the large rock headed right for him. He cocked back one of his massive fists and punched the boulder causing it to shatter. However, from with in the rock shards Naruto appeared with a swirling ball of energy in hand.

"Rasengan!" Naruto shouted, wanting make sure everyone knew what he used even if he was holding back so as not to kill the guy.

Kurotsuchi watched in horror as the swirling mass of chakra was driven into her partner's gut. Akatsuchi shot through the tornado as if it wasn't even there, spinning through until he impacted the arena wall with a heavy thud.

Akatsuchi groaned painfully when he finally hit the ground and fell over.

Kurotsuchi couldn't help the slight sigh of relief when she saw he was still breathing.

Suddenly several light beams cut through the tornado, not affecting it in the slightest but causing all kinds of havoc.

"Ranton: reiza sakasu (storm: laser circus)," said Darui, spraying beams of light in every direction as he spun through the tornado.

Naruto dropped the tornado in order to avoid the light beams that were cutting through everything around him, boulders and wall alike. He had to put a stop to it now before someone in the audience got hurt by it.

With the air settled and Darui back on the ground he ended his technique only to see he'd hurt C pretty badly in the process.

C was down on one knee holding his right arm with had several smoking holes in it that weren't there before.

"Shit," said Darui as he began to rush to C's side. "I'm sorry, I didn't think you'd get hit."

"It's okay," said C. "I know you didn't mean to hit me." He grimaced in pain then the ground under him gave way and he fell into a pit hitting the ground at the bottom of it painfully and lighting up a seal that glowed blue then spewed several black chains binding him inside of it.

"Two down," said Naruto, rising from the ground near the arena wall, forming a triangle with Kurotsuchi and Darui. "Two to go."

BREAK

"Naruto seems to be having fun down there," said Jiraiya, putting the screws to Onoki.

"That was a tsuchi bunshin, wasn't it?" asked A, transfixed on the fight.

"Not sure," said Jiraiya. "The coloring isn't quite right but it could have been."

"Are you both going to ignore the fact that he used an assassination technique on my shinobi?" Onoki finally asked, more than a little annoyed.

"Your shinobi is still alive," said A. "And from the look of it he'll recover just fine."

"At least my own shinobi didn't take out his own partner," snipped Onoki.

"Shit happens," said Jiraiya. "That technique could have easily killed all four of them."

"Looks like round two is about to start," said A, seeing movement in the arena starting again.

BREAK

"I'll kill you," said Kurotsuchi again.

"Will that seal kill him?" asked Darui.

"No, just a stasis bind. It'll hold him until I release it for the iryonin when this is over," said Naruto.

"Thank you for that," said Darui calmly.

Naruto shrugged, it really wasn't a big deal to him. He was told no killing so he was going to follow orders.

"Don't thank him, don't you dare thank him," said Kurotsuchi angrily. "Look what he's done to our partners already."

"They are both alive, he could have easily killed them both already. I have no animosity towards him," said Darui. "It's been a good fight," he added smiling slightly.

Naruto had a feral grin on his face at that acknowledgment. "Yeah it is!" He knew for sure that when this fight was done Darui would be a friend or possibly another rival.

"Fine, I'll kill you too," said Kurotsuchi, shifting slightly to be able to attack either Darui or Naruto.

"Oh, looks like we have a real three way fight now," said Naruto, observing the shift which was mimicked by Darui.

Darui nodded once, a small upturn at the corners of his mouth.

"Well, I think you both have had enough of a breather," said Naruto. "Shall we continue."

"Yoton: kazan (lava: volcano)," said Kurotsuchi, rapidly finishing a series of hand seals and slamming her hands on the ground.

Naruto steadied himself on the now shaky ground. He felt several of his underground clones burst after feeling intense heat.

In the center of the arena floor a small mound of earth began to push upwards then exploded in a shower of lava.

"Doton shoheki no jutsu," said Naruto urgently, completing his technique. Having seen the wave of lava and rock coming his way. A barrier of yellow energy formed a wedge in front of him pushing the lava out around him and causing the lava to solidify upon making contact with his barrier. The rest of the lava rapidly solidified starting from the point it hit Naruto's barrier.

Darui stuck to the arena wall to completely avoid the lava that was now solidifying rapidly.

Kurotsuchi cursed again, now breathing very heavily. Her chakra barely holding her to the wall. She had hoped her technique wouldn't have been extinguished so easily. She cursed Naruto for knowing a technique like that. She had seen the doton shoheki a few times in Iwagakure. It was designed to change such that whatever hit it would turn to stone, mud, dirt, dust, or any other solid. It was very useful against water users and shockingly useful against lava users.

"I hate you," gasped Kurotsuchi between breathes.

Naruto frowned at the girl. "That could have hurt a lot of people. Are you really so reckless with the lives of others?"

"Go to hell," she spat angrily.

"You first," said a calm voice above her.

She didn't get a chance to look up before she was knocked unconscious.

"Aw, I wanted to knock her out last," pouted Naruto.

"She was endangering the audience. It was better to remove her now," explained Darui calmly.

"Yeah, I get it," said Naruto, letting his barrier fade now that the volcano had ended.

Two Naruto clones had set Akatsuchi back on the now solid but hot ground while another Naruto clone did the same with C, binding seal still active.

"Think we can get the kage to remove these three so they don't get caught in more crossfire?"

Darui looked up to the kage's booth.

BREAK

"What do you think?" asked Jiraiya.

A waved a hand allowing the iryonin to collect the downed shinobi.

"While we wait for them to be removed, what the hell was that shit, Onoki?" demanded Jiraiya. "Your idiot shinobi could have killed everyone in this arena including her partner with that stunt."

"I don't see a problem. No one died," said Onoki dismissively.

Jiraiya grumbled indignantly but knew any further argument would be pointless. Still he couldn't help slipping in a comment, "at least my student knows how to follow the rules."

"What was that?" asked Onoki sharply.

"You hearing things now?" asked Jiraiya. "You know, they say that's the first sign of dementia and at your age... well, it wouldn't surprise me."

A sighed, a hint of annoyance in it.

BREAK

Naruto shook his head sadly as they carted Kurotsuchi off the field with chakra exhaustion. "Know your limits, you know what I mean, Darui."

"It was foolish of her to use such a chakra-intensive technique if she had inadequate reserves to do so," said Darui.

"I get the feeling you wouldn't make the same mistake," said Naruto.

"No, I wouldn't."

"Man, nothing ruffles you does it?"

"Not usually." Darui smirked slightly, seeing that his being unflappable was ruffling Naruto slightly.

Naruto sighed. "I'm gonna have to fight you seriously now, aren't it?"

Darui pulled his sword which began sparking with electricity even as he left the sheath. "It would be recommended."

Naruto closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He opened them to see Darui's blade coming down on him rapidly only to clang loudly a few inches from his face.

Darui frowned confused as he sword was held in place strongly. Releasing one hand from the blade he quickly punched Naruto in the throat only to have his hand get sucked in up to the shoulder.

The deformed Naruto smiled before he turned gray from head to toe.

Darui, realizing what Naruto was, tried to pull his arm free only for Naruto to deform even further into a ball covering his entire arm then turn harder than rock.

Darui was surprised when he felt a punch to his face spinning him around slightly before the boulder that was encompassing his arm pull him to the ground. He lost his remaining grip on his sword as he fell. When he looked up again his sword was still suspended in midair before it was suddenly thrown at the arena wall hard enough for it to sink up to the hilt.

A moment later he took a number of punches to the gut from an unseen enemy. "Kai!" he shouted trying to break whatever genjutsu was affecting him. He saw a slight waver of the air but nothing was revealed.

Darui channeled some lightning flow into the boulder trapping his arm causing it to crumble into a dust-like substance that created a cloud when it hit the ground.

Naruto frowned when the dust stuck to him creating a silhouette of his body wrapped in thin genjutsu chains. "Shit," he cursed quietly dispersing his chains and reforming new thicker chains that were plainly visible with their metallic red hue.

Darui was shocked to see the dust from the stone that previously trapped his arm now revealed a completely invisible Naruto wrapped in some kind of chains which then vanished and reformed larger and deadlier looking. Not taking any chances he attacked, "ranton: reiza sakasu."

Naruto frowned as he was now on the defense, rapidly dodging the unpredictable light beams that snaked through the air and chased after him.

Darui heard a slight crumbling of dirt just in time to roll out of the way as one of Naruto's chains burst through the ground where Darui had previously been standing.

Naruto began his own attack on Darui. His chains working in perfect harmony to attack Darui.

Darui moved just slightly out of the path of one of the chains and grabbed it firmly then tried to use it to pull Naruto in.

Naruto felt the tug on one of his chains so he dispelled it and reformed it within moments.

Darui stumbled when the chain he'd grabbed vanished. He had to move fast to dodge the six chains trying to take advantage of his stumble. He completely avoided the first three, the fourth sliced into his thigh pretty deeply, he dodged the fifth and the six gashed his shoulder. When he was finally clear of the chains, he found he could barely put weight on the injured leg.

Naruto, seeing the injured Darui, attacked with more ferocity than before. "Fuuton: renkudan."

Darui saw the ball of air coming and tried to move out of the path of it. He found he couldn't jump clear of it so he tried to roll only to catch a lot of the backlash from the technique hitting the ground he'd previously occupied.

Naruto anticipated the inability to jump so when Darui rolled and got caught in the backlash pushing him further it was a net of Naruto's chains that caught and secured Darui effectively ending the match.

"Winner, Uzumaki Naruto!" announced the proctor from the safety of his booth on the wall of the arena.

BREAK

"Chuunin my wrinkled old ass," said Onoki. "I call bullshit."

"Yeah, and the two you put in were just chuunin?" asked Jiraiya.

"They'll be genin when I get done with them," said Onoki. "Such an embarrassment."

"I did warn you," said Jiraiya.

"You knew he was jounin level," said A, matter-of-fact.

"I knew he was close," said Jiraiya. "I'd bet on his promotion when we get home, he's only been chuunin for a year."

"Fucking Namikaze bullshit," complained Onoki. "Hiding a weapon like that then waiting for the opportunity to embarrass the other nations like this. I can assure you, there will be repercussions."

Jiraiya snorted. "This was the repercussion of you using Akatsuki. You're lucky we haven't already declared war. Especially now that we've allied with your former jinchuuriki. The two you sold out."

Onoki turned red in anger. "War, I'll crush you all."

Jiraiya turned suddenly serious. "No, you won't. We'd be happy to crush you if war is really what you want. I mean, the first kiroi senkou obliterated hundreds of your shinobi. Why wouldn't his son do the same?"

Onoki growled, turning almost purple in the face. "You'll pay for this," he ground out before standing and storming away.

Jiraiya remained in his seat and quiet as he waited for the next fight to start as there was still one more fight left in the chuunin exams.

"That boy will be something special," said A, breaking the long silence.

"He already is," said Jiraiya. "Give him a few years and even us old timers won't be able to keep up."

"I pity Akatsuki when we finally go after them," said A.

"We?" asked Jiraiya.

"We," said A firmly.

"Good," added Jiraiya, more than a little pleased with himself.

BREAK

"How in the seven hells is that fucking nut job still alive?" asked Tsunade, taking a long pull on a bottle of sake.

"I do not know," said Mei, sipping from her saucer of sake.

"How would any of us fucking know?" asked Roshi, taking several large gulps of sake from a jug.

"And you still haven't told us why the fuck you're here?" demanded Tsunade, pointing her bottle at Roshi.

"Han thought Mizu no Kuni would have good hot springs in which to hide," answered Roshi. "We'd been here for almost two months when out of nowhere both Son Goku and Kokuo start yelling about Isobu being in trouble and we had to run our asses off to get here to save her. Then we do and the pricks don't even say thank you. Damn shit flinger."

"And why were you hiding in my country?" asked Mei.

"Akatsuki caught up to me and Han in Yugakure and we had to find somewhere to hide out. And no, neither of us is willing to become shinobi for you or let you kill us and take the bijuu so you can forget that idea right now," said Roshi.

"You're more valuable to us alive and working against Akatsuki," said Mei. "As for joining my village, I don't need the war with Iwa right now. However, I can offer you a quiet, secret asylum here under the condition that if Akatsuki does cause trouble, you help us deal with them."

"I'll talk to Han about it," said Roshi, drinking once more from his sake jug.

"Back to Madara, how the fuck is he still around?" asked Tsunade.

"Who knows, he did say he was immortal," said Mei. "Maybe he really is."

"If he was immortal then Han and I couldn't have hurt him as badly as we did," said Roshi. "He's a fake. That's the only explanation."

"That would mean there was another survivor other than Itachi from the Uchiha massacre," said Tsunade.

"Or someone that was thought dead in combat and the body never recovered," said Mei.

"Shit, more paperwork," said Tsunade with a growl. "I'll have to requisition the records, then actually go through the records. It'll be a colossal pain in the ass."

Mei smiled slightly. "Better you than me."

Tsunade grumbled as she kept drinking.

Outside the room three other sat almost silent.

"Are you sure we shouldn't go in there?" asked Shizune.

"You can if you want, I'm not," said Han gruffly.

"Just be patient woman, I'm sure if they want us for anything they'll let us know," said Ao.

"But they are drinking in there," said Shizune. "It's not safe for Tsunade-sama to have alcohol when she's in a bad mood. Bad things happen."

"And it's a good idea for Mei-sama?" asked Ao. "She's melted a man's balls off when she was drunk like that before. I won't go in unless they require it."

"Tsunade-sama has turned a man sterile, amplified their pain receptors then liquified a man's testicles when she was drunk like that. It's not safe," explained Shizune. "Han, shouldn't we get Roshi out of there at least?"

Han shrugged. "The 'shit flinger' will regrow them if that happens."

Just as he finished saying that a loud howl of excruciating pain cried out from the room.

BREAK

Deep in an ancient and well hidden bunker, Tobi seethed in unadulterated rage. All of Madara's plans were crashing down around him. The bijuu were teaming up or going back to their villages begging protection. The villages were aware of his activities and had named Akatsuki as the number one threat in the shinobi world, everyone was on edge now and more of his operatives were starting to question the plan. Even Pein had expressed some doubts.

The biggest thorn in his side was their knowledge of the juubi, something that no one should know about except for the bijuu themselves and they weren't likely to tell their enslavers.

"You will be fully healed soon, master," whispered Zetsu in his mind.

"How?" asked Tobi aloud. "How did the four tails sense me? How did he even sneak up on me in the first place?"

"The chakra was strange, master. I've never sensed the like before," answered Zetsu. "I'm sorry I failed to inform you."

"You are not to blame, Zetsu. They will pay for this insult to us," said Tobi coldly. "Call for Pein, I have a mission for him."