Chapter Twenty Nine

Pre-chapter A/N; Happy Holidays Everyone. Here's this week's chapter right on time for your enjoyment. The next three chapters are up on Patreon (www.patreon.com/Oghenevwogaga) as always. There's a handy little December discount on both monthly and annual plans. If you just want to read complete chapters and not my work in real-time then feel free to purchase this story as a collection on my patreon page- nice way to support this story, and me while you're at it. Enjoy! 

XXXXXXXX- 

Water continually poured onto the battlefield from above them. There was no pause in the flow, and I reached out with my chakra, feeling at the water and taking note of the flow in my mind. Some of it had gotten absorbed in the ground immediately, but the water was flowing too quickly for that to happen. It was beginning to pile up now, even as it flowed through the floor and across it and on it. Sinking an island was far from an easy feat, and that was what it seemed like Jinpei was about to do. 

I watched Kubo Yatsuki jump into the treeline to avoid standing in the water, and both the Iwa and Kumo contingents followed suit immediately. I could see him weaving seals at a rapid pace. It would be a powerful lightning release jutsu, I knew. I could see it in the way his chakra coiled in on itself. I grimaced and activated my wind armour again. A constant drain from all my tenketsu at the same time was a risk with my reserves as they presently stood, but it was one worth taking. The wind armour would grant me protection against lightning release. 

"Let's see who the better fighter is, Jinpei" I said with a smile and jumped right at the S-rank Kumo Jounin. If I had expected my jump to draw his attention and make me the chosen target, then I would have been disappointed when he ignored me almost entirely and sent a powerful blast of lightning that took on the shape of a dragon right at Jinpei. Of course, if he expected the jutsu to have any effect on the massive whale then he was even more disappointed than I would have been when the jutsu struck and did nothing. The lightning struck Jinpei and just washed along his skin. He had a thick layer of Blubber right beneath his skin that seemed to take the electricity and negate it. 

Whatever Kubo was going to do next came too late, and I was upon him. His kunai flashed into his grip so fast that it was like a blur, and I was forced to shove myself to the side with a blast of wind as that same Kunai almost nailed me right in the forehead. The water falling onto the battlefield began to take on a life of its own. Every drop ran with Jinpei's chakra, as the water was his in the end. Massive tendrils began slapping shinobi around almost casually. A mini tsunami rose from the ground and snuffed out a plume of blue flames before it could do anything beyond light up the clearing. I landed on the tree next to Kubo's and pushed off it to jump at him again. 

This time, I got my arm up in time and deflected the kunai he sent with a snap of his fist. He leaned backwards, walking up the tree with his face to me. I landed below him on the vertical surface, but stuck to the tree as we were, it might have been the ground itself we were standing atop. He moved first, punch lashing out for my head. I slapped the fist away with an almost contemptuous wave and reached out with grasping fingers to strike at his tenketsu. 

He took a half step back that transitioned into a full one forward in less than a second and two hands rose in a series of jabs that I could just keep ahead of. I leaned backwards to avoid the third punch and blocked the fourth from his wrist with my forearm. My fingers lashed out again. He pulled back, just managing to stay ahead of me. I pursued him, stepping up the tree as we continued to fight. He sent a roundhouse kick that I blocked with only a single arm. He strained against me, but I refused to move, and as a result, I did not. That was the kind of bullshit chakra enhancement I'd spent the last six months on. The Whales had to use chakra enhancement to haul about their massive forms, so they were the perfect people to learn from. 

The technique I'd just used to keep my feet in the face of the power from his legs was one such addition from the whale. They taught it to the young ones in their clan when they finally began swimming with the older whales whose very passing could cause massive disturbances in the water. It was the only way to keep them from being blown far and wide whenever they found themselves near an older one's form. He abandoned the kick and twirled to return that leg to the ground from whence it had come while his second leg came up instantly. It was like a pulley system. One leg came down, and the other went up. I backed up, and then he followed the second kick with another. Instead of completing the motion for the third kick that I ducked underneath, his leg stopped halfway and then dropped right upon like me a hammer. 

I crossed both hands and lifted them to block the kick. Bark beneath me splintered from the force of the kick and I pushed back, forcing him to take a step back or lose his balance. His legs went back to the tree and I took the initiative now. Two grasping fingers for his left shoulder forced him to tilt his body to the side to avoid them. Sloppy, I thought with a grimace as I stomped down on his foot that he hadn't managed to move in time. He grunted in pain but showed little other reaction. A kunai had appeared in his hand and he struck out with it in a wild slash. An attempt to gain distance, I decided. So I did the opposite. I stepped into his space and allowed his arm stop against my neck even as I struck him twice in the midsection. So little space meant little space for my strikes to gather force, but that mattered little when one used the gentle fist. 

He backpedaled so quickly that a lesser shinobi would have left some sort of opening in their retreat. Of course, that didn't matter in the face of the gentle fist. I struck at his guard and tore it apart and right as I stepped in further to deliver the strike to his diaphragm that I knew would have ended the fight, I was forced to jump to the next tree as the one I'd been standing on exploded in flames. I tilted my head at Jinpei who was now commanding several watery tendrils at the same time and was handily dealing with the Jounin. He seemed to have let one miss his notice, as I spied the Yonbi girl a few trees into the treeline and staring at me with a savage glare. 

I jumped right at her, even as I could see Kubo jumping at me from the other side. It didn't matter. In a race like this, I could allow my wind armour carry me through the distance. As expected, the Yonbi jinchuriki saw the missile heading for her and decided to get the hell our of dodge, I smashed right through the tree she'd just been standing on, flipped in midair to place my feet against the one behind it and then pushed off to catch her in midair. "Lariat" I proclaimed to the world, using my stolen jutsu with aplomb. Of course, the body I'd been chasing erupted in wood. I'd seen the substitution jutsu take hold a second before I struck, but I allowed myself to finish the strike either way because I knew exactly what the distraction would cause. 

The puff of chakra smoke and displaced wood acted to obscure their attacks from me. Or at least it would have if I had a regular byakugan and not one that could perceive the flow of chakra down to an atomic level. Multiple lances of blue flame forced me to dodge deeper into the treeline, but I could tell they were hemming me in a particular direction. Of course, it didn't take a genius to know what was waiting for me in that direction. I sped up, rushing at him even as I could see him beginning to slow down. 

He was on his third hand seal when I reached him and whatever he'd been planning dried up in favour of staving off my relentless attack. I swept into his guard, almost bullying him with my slightly taller frame. He had elk on his side, but I'd grown up with Tsunade Senju. I knew what true strength looked like, and he did not have anything even close to it. I didn't have her chakra enhanced strength down pat, but I was no slouch when it came to using my chakra to bridge the gap of physicality. He stepped backwards, moving along the branch with sure feet. He did a good job of pretending like he wasn't leading me by the nose to a part of the forest that was surrounded by explosive tags. My guess? He was going to use some sort of high speed movement technique to make his way out of there. Of course, all it would take was me adding my own element to the thing to create a fitting burial ground for one of Kumo's S-rankers. 

I sent a jab at his head that he backpedaled from. He jumped backwards to a different tree, and just like the hot headed shinobi he expected, I jumped after him but not before placing a hand on the tree trunk to increase the force I used and place a seal behind. In midair, I waited for him to take his eyes off me for an instant to take another step and I used that opportunity to form a clone that instantly cloaked itself in the chameleon jutsu and began skirting the boundary of the trap I was being led into. 

I spotted a salvo of shurinken from Kubo's position even as I maintained pursuit. I did not react, only flexing my chakra in preparation. They caught on my wind armor for a few seconds before returning where they'd come from at double the speed. Of course, that was not enough to catch the S-ranker lacking, and he made short work of blocking them before retreating even deeper. I pursued, almost heedless of the possible dangers. At least, that was what I was trying to sell to them. With my byakugan, I noted that the Yonbi girl was also skirting the very boundary of the trap. 

I followed him deeper into the forest, and then he suddenly stood his ground. I could see it. So many explosive tags. This entire section was going to go sky high if my math was correct. They were also chained not to activate at the same time. There were multiple sets of tags set to detonate at some fixed interval. Probably a measure to deal with the defence posed by the revolving heaven. I had to applaud whoever had set this trap and done it in so little time. It was impressive for sure, and also fantastic for my ego. It meant they were coming up with countermeasures specifically designed for me. I couldn't find more because reading seals through earth and stone with my byakugan wasn't exactly something I'd trained for and since the seals themselves were drawn with chakra ink, I had to deal with the effect that had on my vision. Still, it meant my plan still had space to work. 

I met him in the middle of the clearing he'd stopped at. He kicked out first, and I jumped over the foot and rolled along the ground for a second before backflipping again to avoid a kunai he'd sent sailing at where my head had been. I enjoyed the look of surprise on his face when our eyes met, and I pushed off off the air again to change the angle once I was slightly less than halfway through the flip, turning my body into a missile aimed right at him. He twirled around my flying form, and my outstretched knife hand widened to a full palm that I used to slow myself down by pushing against the ground with wind release. I landed on that same hand and then was back on my feet in a second. 

We clashed in the next second. His kunai did nothing as I pushed his arm upwards and tagged two of his tenketsu with my fingers. He dropped the kunai and came in from the left with a second one that had been hidden in his sleeves. I caught his kunai midair and used it to block the kunai that had been about to stab into my neck. The next second, I felt the Yonbi girl's chakra reach out for him. 

As he felt her chakra lock in, he flashed his, and I saw the explosive tags light up. In that same second, my barrier slammed into place and I formed the snake seal, hoping the jutsu would activate in time. 

"Whale Secret Art: Blubber shield" I aid, feeling my skin shift and change as it erupted to grow several thick layers of fat over itself that kept on growing more and more. My entire body was more than covered in the thick fat by the time the explosive tags went off. I also got to enjoy the sight of Kubo Yatsuki panicking as he realised the substitution jutsu that was supposed to take a hold of him did not work. To his credit, the panic had not even lasted up to a second, and he was already moving to cross the space by foot. Of course, it was a trap designed to catch me of all people. His top speed meant he lost a leg in the explosion before he collapsed on the floor and had his body reduced to pieces and ash, but nothing more than that. 

When the bombs had had their way, I shivered as I deactivated the whale jutsu. The blubber fell from my body in one single piece. The sound echoed through the forest, the effect of so much mass dropping at much. I tried to ignore the disgusting mass of fat and flesh as I jumped over it, seeking my prey. I landed on the first tree branch with ease, but had to abort my jump to the next one as I felt myself involuntarily double over. I coughed into my hand, not needing to look at it to know that it would come away red. I still hadn't perfected the jutsu, I figured. Oh, Tsunade would be such a pain once I got back to the village. 

I jumped to the next branch and chased down the young Jinchuriki. Credit where it belongs, the second she had felt her substitution fail, she began to high tail it out of there. She almost made it to the Island's edge when I jumped to land right in front of her. I smiled at the way her eyes instantly began to look for a means of escape. She was smart. I'd seen her measure when I fought both she and Kubo together. She was powerful when it came to chakra alone. She would probably give an average jounin a run for his money, but the rest of her skills were too lacking for her to be more than that for the moment. And sadly, she would never get to see that potential of hers come to fruition. 

It was the way of shinobi in the end. Now that I was older, I had begun to understand just exactly what Tobirama had done for me. His death had come with a disappearance of my bounty in the bingo book. At least that was until Konoha publicly assigned credit for the Raikage's death to me and Cloud placed a bounty of their own. That was another fact that brought me no small amount of displeasure. Kagami was dead, and the credit would not have done him any good, but it still itched to take credit for what he had done. I'd told Hiruzen so, but the man's logic was impeccable as always. Konoha lost their Kage. We had to show that we gave as good as we got and had the potential to do even more damage. We had to show that we'd lost one Senju, but had two more to take his place. That was why Tsunade had been the one given the credit of taking down the Six tails even if it had been a team effort that had cost Kagami Uchiha his life-part of me could see how the Uchiha would build enough resentment to contemplate a coup. Tobirama had received the most accolades in the end, the eight tails, the Mizukage, and several Kumo Jounin were placed under his kill count. 

But that was beside the point. He had shielded me from missions because this could have been me in any single one of those missions. All I had to do was run into someone truly dangerous. Even a year ago, and Kubo Yatsuki would have been a death sentence for me. He was the one who had placed the bounty that he'd used as an excuse to sideline me for the better part of a year, and I could not even judge him for it. 

The girl seemed to come to an internal decision as her fingers came together. She'd fight. Of course, she would. Blade over heart. My wind armour pushed me out of the way of her blue fire lance. The next two weren't even close to hitting, and she was forced into a coughing fit as I appeared in front of her and slammed my knee into her stomach. She dropped to her knees. Pitiful. I saw the acting for what it was. She rose in a body flicker, kunai aimed at my throat. I caught her hand in midair before it even got close to its intended target. She pushed against me, but failed to achieve anything. I twisted the arm sharply, breaking it. 

"You're quite a bit out of your depth here, kid" I said, almost sad about it before I kicked her in the midsection again. My hand holding on to hers kept her in place. She was already teetering at the edge of consciousness. My fingers lashed out next, plugging the tenketsu around the seal that held the Yonbi within her. All the defiance within her seemed to dry up at that. 

I began to search my pockets for a kunai, trying to give her a clean end before I saw a familiar chakra signature come into my range. The time between him entering my range and being next to me was barely even two seconds. Guess that's the white fang for you. 

"We're leaving now" he said, hand on my shoulder. I looked down at our feet and noticed that we'd been submerged up to our knees. Jinpei really had no intention of leaving an island behind. 

"Now?" 

"The Gold and Silver brothers are on the other island. Orochimaru and I weren't enough to deal with them along with the Tsuchikage's son and a team of Jounin from both villages. Orochimaru's hurt, and Danzo-" He said. 

"Okay then. Let me just handle this" I said, turning to the struggling child in my grip. 

"No." He grabbed a hold of the hand I was about to scramble her brains with. 

"What?" 

"They have Danzo. He tried sneaking towards us but ended up caught by one of the Kumo shinobi, a sensor". 

"So what are you doing here then? Go rescue him" I said, even as I felt Jinpei use another powerful jutsu that made the island beneath our feet quake. 

"Orochimaru was on that, but now we don't have to bother risking a rescue plan." The look he gave the Jinchuriki was full of insinuation. 

A/N; Progress, yah? We get Sakumo making a decision that I strongly feel would be within his character. Save a child (an enemy) while also trying to save one of his comrades, and phasing everything as a trade. It's a win-win (in his head). The next three chapters are up on patreon as always. There's a handy little December discount on both monthly and annual plans. If you just want to read complete chapters and not my work in real-time then feel free to purchase this story as a collection on my Patreon page (www.patreon.com/Oghenevwogaga)- nice way to support this story, and me while you're at it. Enjoy!