A little earlier. The Chunin Exams arena.
Fights were breaking out everywhere.
Two figures in animal masks and beige cloaks spun at a frenzied pace. Short tantō flashed in a duel where neither could gain the upper hand for a single minute. Strike, block, strike, block, a feint, and a blade flew toward the chest of a real Konoha ANBU.
But a kunai hurled from afar by a blond shinobi changed everything: it knocked the blade aside, sending it slicing through nothing but air. An instant later, the Sound shinobi hiding beneath a Leaf mask clutched at his torn throat; his opponent hadn't dozed off and seized the opening in time.
Fresh blood painted the stands.
A hundred meters away, a cloaked shinobi charging toward a genin with a black ponytail froze mid-stride. The shadow beneath his feet swelled with darkness, and within seconds he crumpled, bristling with weapons.
"…And me?" a blond girl in a purple top and shorts blurted out, bewildered, her palms locked in a clan seal.
"Work faster," a young kunoichi nearby scoffed with satisfaction. Chinese-style clothes, brown buns, a scroll in her hand.
The guy beside her, in a tall cloak, silently adjusted his black glasses. He and his bugs hadn't managed to contribute either.
In another section of the stands, a scene was unfolding that the more impressionable genin would've called bloody hell.
A shinobi clad in dark garb, with black markings spreading across his skin, billowing clouds of dark energy, inspired dread by his mere presence.
A weakling from Sound threw himself at him in desperation and froze under the weight of the Sharingan's gaze. All so that one overpowered roundhouse kick would tear him clean in two. Blood and chunks of guts sprayed everywhere, splattering the sleeping spectators. But being under genjutsu, they were far removed from the spreading horror. For now.
Another Sound shinobi who'd seen it tried rushing the Uchiha too. But catching a brutal blow to the chest, he only went flying down into the arena.
As far as Sasuke was concerned, things were just getting started. With hatred veiling his eyes, he could've done plenty more. But at the same time, he failed to notice how the aggressive senjutsu chakra had nearly devoured all his own energy, and soon he'd be running on empty.
Nearby, two Konoha ANBU finished off their enemies. One had a shuriken driven into his opponent's mask, creating a convenient opening to strike. The second opponent of the Konoha-nin caught one in the ass, providing an equally good opening.
Exchanging a glance, they looked toward the blond who'd thrown the iron, and then all three of them turned their gaze to Sasuke, who was baring his teeth at the Sound-nin he'd just hurled off the stands.
If the ANBU simply made a mental note that approaching the Uchiha right now was inadvisable, Uzumaki shook his head with clear disapproval.
Burning through resources left and right.
Not that he had much time to dwell on it. A pair of Sand shinobi turned out to be too much for two other Konoha operatives, which meant those Sand-nin needed a kunai somewhere more interesting.
Meanwhile, Sasuke was oddly training his dōjutsu on an ANBU off to the side, one who'd run through several hand seals and sent chakra toward the dark-haired boy without getting any result. But that was enough for the Uchiha. Without wasting another second, he closed ten meters in a single leap and engaged in hand-to-hand.
That pair of ANBU, driven by a bad feeling, did reconsider and turned back toward the Uchiha and the other operative.
But the fight was over in a flash: Sasuke ripped off the mask, revealing gray hair and round glasses. But before the dark-haired boy could seize the shinobi in front of him and tear his flesh apart with his own hands, the seal on the Uchiha's neck flared white on its own. The world around them went dark as the cursed chakra was expelled to protect his exhausted body from petrification. Then his body went limp in mid-air, immediately caught by the gray-haired man.
The two pursuers closed in from the flanks. A quick exchange of glances, and they were certain: their gut feeling hadn't let them down.
The gray-haired shinobi spotted them incoming and quickly decided not to risk it. All so he could hurl the limp body at one and bolt from the other across the rooftops, toward the edge of the stands. The chase was on. But whether the shadow that disappeared behind the buildings and into the woods would be caught by another was unknown.
At that same time, on the roof of the main central stands, events no less riveting were unfolding!
Two figures burst from the smoke. The "Kazekage" held the Hokage in a lock, a kunai pressed to his throat.
At the same time, a great number of Konoha shinobi in ANBU masks were fighting to reach their leader, cutting through the Sand-nin blocking their way.
But before they could break through, the Kazekage's cold order rang out across the roof:
"Begin!"
And immediately, four shinobi who had appeared at the corners of the roof moments earlier exhaled in unison, slamming their palms forward.
"Ha-a-a-a!" (×4)
And nearly the entire upper roof of the central stands was sealed beneath a purple barrier.
The Konoha ANBU who'd won their skirmishes were left with nothing to do but sit on the roof off to the side and watch.
"Four Violet Flames Formation," Hiruzen noted, observing as a pair of shinobi who collided with the barrier immediately went up in flames, burning alive. "So. Sand has betrayed the Leaf."
"Treaties exist only to lull the opponent into complacency," the Kazekage replied without missing a beat. "I'm tired of these stupid battles. It's time to change history."
"You want to start a war?" Hiruzen asked.
"Precisely."
"Force has never led to anything good. We still have a chance to reach an understanding, Kazekage-dono…"
"Hah. Why is it that in old age, everyone clings so desperately to a peaceful life? Care to explain, Sarutobi-sensei?"
Still holding the Hokage with one arm, the Sand ruler grabbed his own face with the other, the one with the kunai, and literally tore off his skin, revealing the familiar serpentine face beneath.
"…Orochimaru!!!" Hiruzen finally recognized his student.
The two were about to continue their exchange when they were interrupted. Right before their eyes, the enormous figure of the One-Tail rose above the stands!
Hiruzen's body went rigid with fear. Not for himself, but for the people of his village, right in the middle of which an entire, goddamn, bijuu had just appeared!
Orochimaru's eyes, his identity now revealed, narrowed in a smile.
"This is only the beginning, Sensei…" he murmured, as the sound of rattling chains was swallowed by the air.
One second, then another, and the tailed beast that should have contributed a hefty share to the village's destruction was simply relocated by a space-time technique.
"…So the One-Tail won't be helping us," Orochimaru observed, his face showing nothing.
"Heh." Hiruzen relaxed and let out a pleased chuckle. "Don't be upset."
One of the Sannin shot his teacher a look dripping with irritation.
"Your stupidity has been the Leaf's downfall. Regardless, I've already won."
"You fight until the very end. I taught you that myself."
Sarutobi's expression conveyed something along the lines of: Fine, he'd entertain the possibility that the snake actually had some chance of winning. Yes, that same snake whose forces were at a staggering numerical disadvantage, since the enemy could hardly have moved too many troops undetected. Hard to estimate precisely, but Hiruzen did the mental math, in part so as not to crush his student's spirits too much.
"I always knew this day would come," the old man sighed. "But I won't be easy to kill."
"I warned you back then… You should've chosen the Fifth Hokage sooner." Orochimaru's long tongue slid from his mouth and ran along the kunai still in his hand. He drew a sharp breath and continued: "Because… you die today, Third. And I—kh…"
Speaking with bated breath, tears welled at the corners of Orochimaru's eyes. Perhaps today, the thing he had wanted for a very, very long time would finally come to pass.
"That happy about it?" Hiruzen asked. "Or…"
His question was cut off by the movement of the kunai at his throat.
Blood flowed.
But only because the moving blade had been stopped by Orochimaru himself, with his other hand, the steel punching clean through his own palm.
"Yawned. That's all."
"Heh, that's what I figured," Sarutobi remarked, after which his student yanked back with a sharp motion and stepped away. "I know you. You're not the kind of man who acts purely out of revenge. You have no principles, no goals."
"I do have a goal. I love life in motion," Orochimaru corrected, adjusting the Kazekage's hat with the hand still skewered by the kunai, blood streaming down his wrist. All so he could toss the article of clothing aside afterward. "It's dull when everything grinds to a halt, right? No one watches a mill that's stopped turning… And yet, sometimes even that kind of scene is interesting. It breeds impatience… Today, I'll set this mill turning again. And the dying Leaf will be the wind in its blades."
"Is that so?" The Hokage grabbed his own hat and flung it off. "Yeah. You haven't changed a bit."
White ceremonial robes fell from both of them, leaving Hiruzen in a black outfit with guard plates hanging below his neck from the bandana in the back, plus protection for his right arm. Orochimaru remained in his usual getup of black, a white coat, and a thick braided violet sash.
"I see you came prepared for your last day… Hard to believe I'm fighting my teacher again," Orochimaru noted his sensei's battle gear.
At the same moment, the quartet finished reinforcing the barrier with another unified "Ha-a-a!", sealing them in from the roof side as well.
"So I can't leave?"
"Were you planning to? I'd say you're thrilled that no one can interfere."
Killing intent erupted from Orochimaru at that, announcing the fight was about to begin. Hiruzen matched it without flinching, releasing his own chakra pressure.
In an instant, the air felt like it had ignited, shimmering and rippling. The roof tiles beneath them split with cracks, and fragments began rising into the air.
"Is this… a battle between Kage-level shinobi?" one of the pair of ANBU on the roof said with a tremor in his voice. They'd been left to observe the barrier and intervene if it fell.
"Apparently," the other replied with less emotion, shrugging his shoulders and glancing back behind him, toward where Sasuke had been dishing out carnage. His own shoulders gave an involuntary shudder. "Where do monsters like these even come from? Their killing intent isn't that far apart."
A moment later, Orochimaru lunged forward. Hiruzen flung a shuriken ahead and charged to meet him.
Their hands blurred as they wove through hand seals.
"Shadow Shuriken Replication!"
Hiruzen cried, and the single shuriken ahead of him turned into an entire cloud of steel!
"Summoning: Impure World Reincarnation!" Clapping his palms and skidding to a halt, right in front of Orochimaru, the first coffin erupted from a gap in the roof, the character for "First" inscribed on its lid.
A second, with the corresponding character.
A third began to emerge but didn't make it all the way up, as Hiruzen, clasping his hands in a seal, abruptly disrupted the technique.
The shurikens buried themselves into the two fully risen coffins and the third, partially risen one. After which the last one sank back down into the rift in space from which the others had appeared.
Nearby, a clone of Uzumaki Naruto, casting a glance at the roof, looked toward where his original was.
Need to hurry. Even if I didn't pick up many changes in the technique, analyzing the residual chakra up close wouldn't hurt.
He sent a corresponding signal through the chakra link.
The coffin lids, bristling with embedded shurikens, slid aside and steam billowed out. The heavy wood slammed against the tiles with a loud crash, heralding something terrible…
The steam cleared, revealing two figures.
In the coffin marked "First," a dark-skinned man with long black hair straightened up, having been standing slightly hunched. He was dressed, like Hiruzen, in a black bodysuit, but with far more armor on top. Dark crimson plates covered nearly his entire torso and thighs. The moment the smoke cleared, he stepped forward, and his dark eyes immediately found the Third.
"You've aged, Saru—"
"Hiruzen, is that you…?" the second resurrected figure squinted, red eyes narrowing.
That was the Second Hokage, brother of the First. A pale-skinned, light-haired man with red markings under his eyes and on his chin. His forehead and cheeks down to the lower part of his head were partially protected by a metal plate, a happuri in local terms. He too wore a black bodysuit with plate armor, but unlike the shinobi beside him, his was blue, covered his groin instead of his thighs at the bottom, and had white fur on the collar.
"That can't be… Who are they?" came the whispering from that same pair of ANBU.
The more expressive one had asked the question, at which his partner turned his head toward him sharply. Through the slits in his mask, his eyes conveyed a staggering amount. But instead of calling his partner an idiot, he simply pointed at the cliff face where the faces of all the Hokage were carved.
"Ohhh…" the first one got it.
"How did they even let you in?" the second asked no one in particular, shaking his head.
Meanwhile, inside the barrier…
"I never imagined I'd have to fight you," Hiruzen said with bitterness. "But the victory will be mine."
"The impure world again. War again," Hashirama sighed. "Time moves on, the world changes. But battles will always remain in it."
The Second was about to say something too, when a sound interrupted them. A distant, thin shriek, growing steadily louder, closing fast.
Everyone looked up.
"YA-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A!!!" the One-Tail's scream tore through the sky.
"Still screams the same as always," Hashirama observed with his usual deadpan.
"YA-A-A-a-a-a-a-a!!!"
BOOM! The landing of the tailed beast's massive body resounded from beyond Konoha's walls.
Orochimaru turned a baffled look toward Hiruzen. Hiruzen responded with a steady nod, wearing the expression of an enlightened monk.
"Yes. That's the blond kid's doing."
"…So this boy behind us summoned us? Impressive," Tobirama, watching the scene of the flying bijuu with the eyes of a man who understood how this life worked, decided to change the subject. He turned back toward Orochimaru, who was at that moment shoving the coffins aside. "Even so, this execution… You understand that in this form, we can't release even a fifth of our full power?"
The albino pointed out that they'd been resurrected severely weakened.
"You've been playing with time and disturbing the dead, Orochimaru. Nothing good will come of this," Hiruzen added.
"Everything has its purpose," Orochimaru replied with a snake's smile, then drove seal-marked kunai into the two figures before him. And rightly so. At their full power, he wouldn't have been able to control shinobi of this caliber. "But you old-timers just love to run your mouths. Get to work already… I don't like this."
With the seals in place, the snake could finally give orders to the resurrected, and they could no longer disobey, resist, or simply stand still.
But before they could move, a new, yet familiar face appeared.
A short while earlier. Uzumaki Naruto.
Holding Gaara's body at arm's length, I watched through my Mangekyō as nearly all of Shukaku's chakra flowed into a thick black line that materialized on my arm, like a bracelet.
Leaving just a sliver of the bijuu's energy in the red-haired kid so he wouldn't die, I fused it with a hastily-built construct modeled after the kind found in the Sons of Hagoromo. All so the sliver wouldn't dissipate and would remain self-sustaining.
From this moment, I had an additional tailed beast available for study. And when I eventually got around to it, it could prove very useful.
Gaara would live. For once, I decided to show some mercy.
I figured without the tailed beast's voice in his head, he could become more well-adjusted.
Dropping the teenager onto the grass, I moved on to the next order of business.
According to my clone's report, the two Hokage had already been resurrected. And per my plans, I wanted to extract something from them.
I had at least a rough understanding of who I'd be dealing with. Particularly noteworthy was the info on Tobirama: he was a sensor, and he had no love for Uchiha. Almost all of them. So…
My fingers pressed against my own eye sockets, then drove inward sharply.
A sickening wet squelch as I carefully but quickly extracted the Sharingan, then sealed them securely into the bracer.
I wasn't sure I could conceal my dōjutsu at close range. And dealing with uncomfortable questions would've been pointless.
Then my hands returned to my head, lighting up with the green glow of a healing technique.
"Tch. Primping like I'm going on a date," I muttered, then drew moisture directly from my hands to wash the blood off my face.
My eyelids lifted again, but this time, the eyes beneath held no dōjutsu.
Slinging Gaara over my shoulder, I teleported to the roof, landing right beside the pair of ANBU.
"Catch." I dropped my cargo, which one of them caught with a look of surprise. Then my gaze shifted to the barrier. "Oh, new faces. And they even waited for me. How nice…"
Every eye inside the barrier turned toward me as I flowed smoothly into a stance with one arm extended.
An instant, and the air filled with a low growl as a red dragon's head formed around me in under a second! Wind kicked up almost to a storm, nearly blowing the pair of ANBU with Gaara clean off the roof.
My arms tensed harder, and the dragon's eyes only blazed brighter.
I was about to strike when I noticed Hiruzen. He looked like he was having a fit. Gone pale in an instant, waving his arms frantically, he was screaming, judging by the movement of his lips, for me to stop the technique.
A glance at Orochimaru showed he'd turned even paler and was now looking around as if calculating the fastest possible way to get the hell out of here right this second.
The two resurrected Hokage: the First had seemingly come alive, staring at me with deep alarm. The Second, though… he'd folded his arms, and the expression on his face conveyed something like: "Well, nothing lasts forever. God knows I didn't want to see someone destroy Konoha. But what can you do."
Behind the barrier, they couldn't properly sense or evaluate what kind of technique they were seeing. But Hiruzen's reaction was vivid enough.
I rolled my eyes. At my command, the wind died down, and the red surge flowed back into my body.
Teleportation, and my body, already inside the barrier, exploded into motion faster than the speed of sound.
My hands drove forward… into the bodies of the two Hokage. The reincarnated ones. I grabbed the seal-marked kunai lodged inside them and sent those into spatial storage. Then chakra immediately poured from my hands, rapidly restructuring the resurrected, strengthening the bond to the bodies and lifting the restrictions. All similar to how it was in the original execution of the technique.
"Apologies," I said in the tone of a proctologist who'd barged into a ward and gone elbow-deep in two patients at once. "And yeah, that technique was concentrated. I was just going to punch a hole in the barrier and overload it. After that—"
"Naruto!"
Hiruzen's voice from one side, while from the other a Kusanagi blade came at me at insane speed!
But I just, having finished at exactly that moment, pulled my hand out of Tobirama and caught the sword barehanded right in front of my face. My fingers wrapped around the blade, bleeding freely, gripping it like steel.
"Interrupting is rude," I noted, then pulled my hand out of Hashirama as well. "But credit where it's due. You think fast instead of standing there with a dumb look on your face like some of my sparring partners the moment they see something unexpected."
I offered the compliment to Orochimaru, meeting his serpentine gaze. Those eyes, set in a pale face, narrowed to even thinner slits.
"But that's not enough…" Orange markings appeared across my face.
I squeezed my hand and simply crushed the impossibly hard blade. A blade harder than diamond.
"A Sage?!" the snake hissed in shock, then dropped the sword as cracks spiderwebbed through what remained.
"Two," came Hashirama's grim voice, and then a massively powerful, threatening chakra radiated from him. A green mantle formed over the shinobi, drawing my attention… and making the air hum, while the entire building below began to shake.
You could see he didn't want to destroy the structure beneath us, which was why he was holding back. And he'd dropped into his Sage Mode fast, that Sage Mode of his I found so interesting.
"Brat… Using my own technique on me and my brother…" A displeased Tobirama released his own chakra too. His blue mantle was clearly a tier below Hashirama's, but his power was still enormous! He alone would have been enough to bury Orochimaru here, and there were more of us.
"Right. So. Punch through the barrier and bury him under a dogpile. That's the plan," I concluded my earlier thought, jabbing a finger at one of the Sannin.
Orochimaru, eyes darting between the three of us and Hiruzen behind us, was running calculations. And whatever those calculations were producing, based on his face, he really, really didn't like the result. His skin, paler than ever (and where could it even go?), only confirmed those conclusions.
"I think we can handle this," Hashirama said.
After my intervention, his whole body looked somehow more alive, same as his brother's. But cracks still covered them. I'd restored them somewhat better than Tobirama himself could have, supplementing the technique with my own knowledge. They could unleash their full power! But their life was still far from complete.
"Think I'll try solo first," I shrugged. "Back me up if needed."
I told them, and without waiting for an answer, teleported.
By then, Orochimaru had decided the smart move was to leave via reverse summoning. So I materialized right in front of him before his hands could clap together, and grabbed them with mine!
A slight squeeze, and I felt the bones in his frail limbs crumble under my fingers. Then I kicked him in the chest, caving it inward, and watched as his arms stayed in my grip while the rest of him rocketed into the purple barrier.
Only at the last moment did he manage to use his Shedding Skin technique, launching himself forward onto the roof while his old body ignited behind him and crumpled onto the tiles.
This time, Orochimaru had a serpent's tail instead of legs, and he worked it frantically, trying to slither away and complete the reverse summoning.
He bit through his tongue, smeared the blood across his palm, and was about to clap when I stopped him again:
"Too slow." I halted every movement of his by crushing Orochimaru's hands in my own, cutting him off with a cold tone, looking him straight in the eyes.
Under the next round of cracking bones, I saw growing despair and terror in his pupils.
But one of the Sannin had no intention of surrendering.
His mouth opened unnaturally wide, and from it, hundreds of tiny white snakes erupted upward like a fountain. But I just plucked out the one that mattered and let the rest scatter, slithering off into the corners of the barrier on the roof.
Fear. Boundless terror. And a searing hatred directed at me. All of it readable in the little snake's eyes. Those same eyes that Orochimaru had, because this was him, operating through his Body Replacement technique.
A pulse of chakra, and the man before me reverted to his human form with my hand on his forehead. From my palm, black fūin lines spread across him, locking down his ability to move.
"I'll leave his fate to you," I said, releasing my hand and turning to the three Hokage, looking at Hiruzen.
I walked toward them.
"That was… something," Hiruzen said.
"The new generation is impressive," Hashirama added with a hm, and for the first time, a smile.
"You could've dealt with him immediately. There was no need to free us," Tobirama said flatly.
"Insurance," I spread my hands, and the man in blue armor gave a reluctant nod. "Strange seeing the dead in person. I imagine being here isn't exactly pleasant for you. But would you mind a brief… call it an enlightenment session?"
"Naruto…" Hiruzen began with a wavering voice. You could see he couldn't decide whether to scold me for disrespecting the dead (keeping pure souls in this dirty world with my request) or to thank me for putting down the two biggest threats to Konoha at once.
"It's all good!" Hashirama declared simply, then clapped me on the back. With my intervention, they'd become much more lively. Somewhere around what they'd been during the Fourth Great War in the manga's events. "I think my brother and I can find the time."
He turned to Tobirama, and we got a grim nod. It might have been my imagination, his reaction was that miniscule, but it seemed he didn't like how warmly his brother addressed what was, essentially, a stranger. But, again only maybe, having observed Hiruzen's reactions to me, the younger Senju accepted it.
"Great." I broke into a happy grin. Only for it to turn ice cold. "But first…"
"Right…" Tobirama caught my shift in tone.
"Indeed…" Hiruzen echoed.
"Yeah…"
Hashirama, his expression darkening in an instant, turned seriously toward the arena. Stepping forward, an ocean of chakra erupted inside him!
"HA-A-A-a-a-a-a!" He clapped his palms and roared, and the building beneath us lurched.
Four massive tree branches, about ten meters in diameter, burst from the roof and slammed into the barrier. It didn't last a second before it popped, burning away in midair.
"Ha-a-a-a!" Hashirama called again, steering the trunks downward, driving them into the ground beyond the building's footprint so the structure wouldn't collapse under their weight.
Honestly, looking at him, I wouldn't say the First had broken much of a sweat with that… Maybe he just liked screaming?
Meanwhile, I released the Shadow Clones I'd prepared. Transforming into fūin, they paralyzed all four shinobi who'd made the barrier.
Then, taking a deep breath, the First walked to the highest point on the roof so that as many shinobi as possible in the stands could see us, and we followed behind him.
Sweeping his gaze across the stands, Hashirama noted that the fighting had stopped. The barrier's destruction had forced that much. And the appearance of a legendary figure, met with exclamations from those who knew who he was, ensured nobody was in a hurry to resume the fight, staying alert instead.
"Shinobi of the Sand and—!" the First Hokage thundered, then faltered at the unfamiliar headband. "…Notes?"
"Sound," Hiruzen supplied.
"And shinobi of Sound! We will not allow you to destroy Konoha! Lay down your weapons immediately! Otherwise your fate will be terrible!"
With those words, Hashirama unleashed his chakra pressure and killing intent in full! A resounding boom filled the air as the light around them seemed to dim.
And then from me came something even more powerful! The world bled red as the sound of thousands of phantom voices, screaming as they died in terrible agony, flooded every ear. The ENTIRE arena with its stands beneath us shook.
I stepped forward too, catching the surprised gaze of every Hokage.
"You'd better listen to him." My steady, not loud voice cut through the noise, reaching deep into everyone present.
Down below, goosebumps crawled over every shinobi's body as the air turned unbearably cold. They had no choice left…
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