Capítulo 2668: 58
Two weeks of carefully monitoring Iwa hadn't netted much progress for peacefully resolving things. The Tsuchikage was still adamant that they could win a war at this point, but had simply flipped to making sure that their plans took into account that their intention to start a war was known. He trusted that nobody else was going to strike first and be seen as the aggressor, which was entirely correct from a 'strike openly' perspective. But not necessarily from a covert strike one, which was part of why he was so adamant about wiping out all infiltrators and ways into the village.
They'd found the two tunnels being used by others, but had missed both the ones to the hidden bunker and the one that Ino had cleaned up. Apparently she might've done too good a job of hiding it for their purposes, but they could always reveal it more directly later if deemed necessary. For now the Tsuchikage was happy with having found the other two and pinching off those access points to the village.
Interestingly, Deidara had shown up to warn Konoha about the impending potential attack as well, apparently unaware that they already knew. He hadn't seemed to care that Naruto wasn't present, or perhaps already knew that, but did end up buying a cookbook on his way back out. Sasori hadn't been with him, further lending credence to the theory that Naruto's lack of presence was known.
Daily meetings about the situation included updates from the Daimyo, who had reached out to Earth's Daimyo and gotten rebuffed. The current suspicion was that the Tsuchikage's claim that nobody else could stand up to dust release was being treated as correct and thus that conquering the continent was well within Iwa's capabilities right now.
Shikamaru looked over the new technique scrolls that had come about from talking with Yoko a couple weeks prior. What she and Naruto had discovered was an incredibly simple mistake, doing one step backwards from the way it was intended to be done. But the instructions provided weren't clear enough to spot that, building on chakra control techniques used by the clan and that hadn't been provided as part of the repayment. Every Nara knew the trick referred to by the instructions, and wouldn't normally consider that it could be done the wrong way.
But the wording of the scroll handed over implied it being done the opposite direction, resulting in an entirely different technique. Zero ability to connect to the chakra of others through shadows as required for almost all of the clan's techniques to function, nor to 'strengthen' shadows to the point of them having physical effects, but instead you could manipulate the shadows themselves in incredibly diverse ways.
Someone using Yoko's technique was completely immune to the clan's normal techniques as well, their shadow becoming impossible to target even when visible. It was mutually-exclusive with the 'correct' way of doing things too. But combining the two, one person or clone doing things Yoko's way and one doing things the 'correct' way, led to an incredible synergy. Her technique didn't stop the shadows from being 'free travel' areas for the rest of the clan's techniques, so one person could use her technique to reshape the shadows of the battlefield in order to allow the clan's more directly effective techniques to be far more versatile.
"Still debating how much to trust your teammates?" his father said as he entered the room.
"More wondering about how long this has been sitting in front of us, unseen," Shikamaru replied. "All she did was follow the instructions as written."
"I've done some digging in the clan's archives, and she isn't the first to manage this. But her use of the Yamanaka technique for sharing her memory of accomplishing it allowed you to spot how it was managed. Previously it was simply thought to be a side effect of being particularly unsuited to the techniques."
"Are you aware of how scary she is with actually controlling others with the proper technique?"
"...I was informed, yes, but she and Naruto are chakra powerhouses."
"She can fool her chakra into forcing an opponent to mimic one of her other personalities instead of herself."
"Which is exactly what the advanced techniques do, generally after a Yamanaka helps us form the mental splits needed to manage having a mental self acting out what you wish for your targets to do. I was fully expecting her and Naruto to jump straight to that because they've got a significantly more advanced version already in place. Otherwise the base technique is identical."
"...I need to stop putting off that appointment with Inoichi, don't I?"
"Technically he's been putting it off more than you have. Too many higher priorities right now."
"We need to seriously consider either removing Onoki's ability to use chakra or killing him," Shisui said near the end of the time allocated to the day's meeting. "As much as I don't want to do so in the stealthy manner needed to ensure it happens. Directly assaulting another Kage like that when they haven't officially started hostilities yet is crossing a line we try not to cross, but we've only got five days before Iwa starts moving."
"Despite having the support of the other three Kages and all four Daimyos?" Naruto asked, honestly curious about that detail. This was a level of political back-and-forth he'd not gotten a whole lot of exposure to and descriptions hadn't come up in the meetings themselves. He was expecting to get a lot more experience with it though, since he'd been informed that he was present both as the team leader handling Iwa and as a clan head.
"I have the tacit support of them to do what's needed to not have war break out. The other three villages have the same support from us, but have fewer options than we do. But using what would be considered to be an act of war before war breaks out, directly killing a sitting Kage or removing their ability to remain a sitting Kage, is crossing a line that would justify the undeclared war itself and paint us in a bad light no matter the justification on our end. Unfortunately, one of the only good counters the rest of us had to dust release was the tailed beasts themselves. Powered-up jinchuriki were one of the few things known to be able to resist the destructive effects. Even Susanoo has been known to be vulnerable to it."
"Unfortunately we don't have a lot of better options," Choza said with a frown. "We have no way of knowing if anything we have access to can actually stop him once he's attacking, so it's a risk we can't take. The only other option we have is to assassinate him outright."
"With a half-dozen plans to do so that aren't usable," Tsunade said, gesturing to the pile of papers of discarded plans. "The best we've got is essentially killing him in his office with an explosive seal instead of removing his ability to use chakra, the rest being unworkable due to the paranoia of Iwa right now. Speaking of the plans, we should really ensure that those, and any other notes we aren't keeping, are destroyed. Naruto here is a good example of why this kind of thing shouldn't be left around unless needed."
"I can take care of that," Naruto said, pulling the stack to him with chakra strings and suspending it in the air in front of him. A few others tossed sheets in his general direction that he added to the stack as well. "It's good practice for the failed project destruction technique."
That had the entire room suddenly very interested, and he pulled on his 'anchor' for the technique's first stage. Similar to a chakra net node, but distinct from them at the same time, it was honestly spell-like. A more direct interface between magic and chakra, or so the Tome thought, and one that Yoko had actually needed to form for herself. A basic cube large enough to encompass the papers followed, and settling it around the stack was easy enough. Accuracy was a slight problem though, which is why he was keeping his target in the air with chakra strings. No need to destroy part of the table because he couldn't keep the cube from intersecting it.
It was only after he'd detonated the sphere in the cube and obliterated the papers, leaving only a few remaining particles behind, that he realized that the rest of the room was staring at him in shock. "What?"
"How long have you been able to use dust release?" Itachi asked.
"...that's dust release? But it isn't even a bloodline skill as anyone would understand it, and it isn't that powerful. The Knight Armor spell or having sufficiently more chakra than was put into the technique protects you from the effect. My clones tested that significantly. Drains you noticeably due to the stress of resisting the damage, with or without protections up, but even the academy students in the trial program for the spell tokens should be able to survive two hits if their Knight Armor is up due to it making the chakra necessary more manageable."
"I suddenly find myself with a new plan," Ibiki called from the corner. "Demonstrating that Iwa isn't the only one with dust release should be enough to convince them to back down, especially if more chakra makes it more powerful."
"Definitely," Shisui agreed. "But we need to decide how to best use this to make a proper point."
Naruto had adopted the form of Kyo, a mid-teenaged female with long red hair in three braids. She was dressed in the Uzu Anbu getup and was floating along the road to Iwa at a jogging pace, seemingly unhurried yet also not doing anything to disguise her approach.
With only a day before their invasion forces were supposed to leave, the defenders were very obviously wary of her as soon as they spotted her, gathering between her and the village but looking very nervous about their chances. She made no move to attack...or to slow down. They threw earth walls up in front of her, and she overpowered their chakra to part them. Various weapons and techniques were thrown at her, and she ignored them, letting them harmlessly hit against her Knight Armor. Only three piercing attacks were attempted, and those she took direct action against, bringing trees up from the ground or deploying chains from her back to deflect the attacks while subtly dodging in the process.
From the perspective of the clones keeping an eye on things from nearby, she'd done an excellent job of appearing to almost not notice that Iwa didn't want her to approach the village.
Reaching the village gates, she found them closed and barred. Nobody was in the booth on this side of the gates, so she looked up at the nervous defenders above the gate. "I am Kyo of Uzushiogakure, here to speak with the Tsuchikage. You can either open the gate to allow me entry, or replace the gate after I have gained entry for myself."
She was almost certain that they weren't going to back down, no matter how nervous they looked, and when no sign of anyone moving to open the gate emerged she shrugged and held out her hands. A glowing cube with a sphere in the middle appeared, and she pushed it forward to encompass the entirety of the gates in front of her. The defenders screamed in panic as they moved to get out of the path of the cube, and when she triggered the explosion of the sphere the only thing caught by the technique was the gate itself. Well, that and a little bit of ground under it. Accuracy still sucked despite more training with it.
Entry gained, she floated over the slight divot she'd left behind and into the village itself. Now moving at a walking pace, she headed for the most direct route to the Tsuchikage's office, ignoring that she shouldn't have enough knowledge of the village to know what that route was. Ahead of her, two bridges were cut, and when she reached the first she floated across the gap as though the bridge was still there. Once across, branches exploded from the rock at the far side, reaching across and forming a new bridge out of wood. She paused at a door that had been locked between her and the second cut bridge, pulling keys out and unlocking it before moving on. At the second cut bridge she formed the new bridge as she floated across the gap instead, having made her point at the first one.
The defenders had shifted by the time she reached the Tsuchikage's building, not attempting to obstruct her at all but communicating with those in the building as she made her way through. There was no secretary at the desk when she reached the Tsuchikage's office, but the door was locked. She stopped at it, and pulled out the key needed to unlock it, only for a glowing cube to appear around her. The sphere in the center of it detonated a moment later, and she held back the flinch from the spike of pain resisting the technique caused. Having your chakra suddenly pulled on like that to resist the damage wasn't pleasant even with Knight Armor up, something the clones hadn't been able to properly appreciate until testing had been done.
"That was rude," Kyo said, holding the keys up to show the floating Tsuchikage. "I was perfectly capable of not causing you to need a new door. Unless you honestly thought that Uzushiogakure wouldn't have ways to defend against our own cleanup techniques?"
She used a chakra string to pull a chair over from the side where they'd been moved out of the way, dropping into it. The Tsuchikage looked completely baffled and was very obviously caught off-guard by the complete lack of threatening action, eventually dropping out of the air into his own seat as he glared at her. "What do you want?"
"To convince you to not be an idiot and force us to get serious. Unfortunately, I can tell that what I've already done won't be enough. Luckily, we planned for that." A hand seal was made, and the Tsuchikage's chair lit up as the paralysis seal inscribed upon it activated. Kyo then made a clone, which produced a vial and a kunai. "I could have just killed you, or removed your ability to use chakra entirely. But instead I'm going to check your records for copies of our cleanup technique and remove any found, using a bit of your blood so that the seals don't have to be forced and replaced."
The man fought against the seal, likely not noticing that the binding had been enhanced through use of the Nara's shadow bind technique reaching under the desk. Her clone cut his hand and pulled a small amount of blood into the vial, absently healing the cut once a small amount of blood was present, then used medical chakra to multiply the blood to fill the vial. Some of that was then used to unseal the primary seal on the records in the office, smaller amounts used afterwards to open each individual set of records.
It took two hours to go through everything, and the lack of a fight and the Tsuchikage not being able to signal for aid meant that the orders he'd given his people to stay away were keeping them away. Clones in the bunker were making copies of all of the records, minus the two copies of the 'dust release' instructions and a surprise unprotected copy of the paperwork technique. Though the latter was marked as being the shadow clone, it was still dropped onto the pile with the other two. Those, and the vial of blood, were all floated into the air with chakra strings and obliterated with another cube, then Kyo's clone moved over to the Tsuchikage.
"As a show of good faith," Kyo said as she got up, idly dropping the set of keys for all the important doors in the village on his desk. "My clone will take care of some of your lingering medical issues before releasing the paralysis. I won't be replacing your door, or your gate, though. The door wasn't my fault and I gave sufficient warning at the gate. Besides, the bridges were honestly going further than I had any reason to."
She was summoned down under the village a moment later, her clone giving the Tsuchikage the highest quality healing he'd had in years before disabling the paralysis seal and dispelling. A few minutes later Naruto was himself again, a clone was back in Konoha delivering all the copied information, and the Tsuchikage appeared to be in a state of shock.
"I should've gone for something armor-piercing when dust release didn't work," Onoki grumbled as the medic-nin swapped out for a fourth round of checking him over. "That might've punched through whatever protections she had up to withstand dust release.But they were prepared for me. Somehow got into my office ahead of time and booby-trapped my chair, knowing that I'd be overconfident in dust release even after they demonstrated being able to use it themselves on the gate. If they'd used it against me in defense of themselves then the entire building would've been wiped out, with them just standing there afterwards."
"And they added themselves to your appointment book," Kurotsuchi added, getting a look from him. "Your secretary grabbed it on the way out, but a three hour window for a meeting with 'Kyo of Uzushiogakure' was blocked out for today. Seemingly entered in your own handwriting, which confused those of us waiting and made us wonder if you'd been informed and merely forgotten about it somehow."
"That's just showing off that they could've killed me at any time without me knowing until it was too late, but it also demonstrates that our attempts to keep infiltrators out of the village have been worthless. She knew exactly where to go and apparently had keys for all the doors that might stand in her way other than the main gate itself. Has anyone checked the keyring she left behind?"
"Keys for every secure area in the entire village. A complete set of duplicates, down to security seals on those that need them, but all made out of the wrong metal to have come from our stocks."
Konoha had supposedly provided similar information to Kumo about their own locks, alongside a complete map of their village. But with this information? It was probably Uzushiogakure sneaking in and doing the work, then sharing the information with Konoha. And with others out there that could use, and ignore, dust release? The plan to take out the other villages before they had a chance to team up and take out Iwa was already worthless. Worse, if Uzushiogakure had thought that Iwa needed to be taken out then they could've done so already. But they sent one person who did minimal damage and even got him back into better shape.
...while telling him off for slacking off on exercise and floating everywhere to deal with the aches and pains instead of getting proper exercise so that his body wouldn't have as many aches and pains.
"I have no clue what to think about any of this," Onoki finally said. "She had me trapped in my chair, able to take me out at any time, but she just used a small amount of my blood to remove the dust release instructions from the records and destroy them in front of me. Then she healed me up better than our medic-nin have been able to for a decade or two. She even ensured that the sample of my blood she took was destroyed in front of me. In fact, she went to the effort of ensuring that it never left my sight."
A few days after Iwa didn't launch their attacks on the other villages, and in fact had stood down significantly, Naruto approached the village driving a two-section mobile house. Strapped to the roof of the rear section were two gate doors that should be the right size for Iwa's main gate. Instead of Hinata and Ino, he also had Futo, Miho, and Odoroki with him. This was partially so that he was seen leading teams of chunin but mostly because Yoko felt that the civilian girls needed a break from Odoroki's lessons.
All three had spent the entire trip up until they could be spotted from Iwa working with him to figure out why he still couldn't figure out his Hiraishin seal, along with Matatabi and Ren in the Tome chiming in every so often, and he thought he'd finally figured out what he was doing wrong.
They were met by a group of shinobi that didn't attack immediately, looking like they'd already been defeated in their attitude but hiding it admirably.
"What business do you have in Iwagakure?" the lead shinobi asked after Naruto brought the mobile house to a stop. The man was looking the mobile house over curiously, likely noticing that it was using their village's colors and symbols.
"We come bearing gifts from Konohagakure," Naruto replied. "The Hokage wished to apologize for the rash actions of our allies, so he had blank replacement gate doors and a mobile house prepared for your village. If your people are willing to accept the attempt, I've also been asked to set up a temporary seal that will grant two or three of your medic-nin a medical chakra bloodline, should they be willing to go through the procedure."
They quickly unloaded the two doors from the mobile house and put the mobile house through the preparations needed to seal it away, though they didn't actually seal it away. They did leave the instructions on the seat for the driver, but then they cleared a space to start assembling the seal on. Miho was doing most of the work there, Naruto observing more than participating. That was probably a good thing, given that he was aware enough to dodge when an armor-piercing attack came his way from an older kunoichi, followed by a flow of mud. He misjudged the armor-piercing attack and lost a chunk of his arm, but easily dodged the mud before it hardened where he would've been engulfed had it hit him.
Futo and Odoroki moved to get between him and the attacking kunoichi, but he waved them off with his uninjured hand and brought an earth wall up to block her next flow of mud before pumping medical chakra into his arm. Recasting the Knight Armor spell would be needed to restore the damaged sleeve, but it wasn't going to significantly impact the protection it offered him and could wait.
"I suspect someone doesn't like my family," Naruto noted as another piercing attack failed to overcome his chakra in the earth wall. "The question is which side of the family they're unhappy with. Or perhaps just which side today, since I imagine both sides are a sore point here right now."
Miho had looked up, decided she wasn't close enough to be hit by attacks, and resumed working on the seal. Futo and Odoroki started preparing alternate defenses, and the attacking kunoichi had decided to come around the wall to the side...only to be struck from behind by one of Iwa's shinobi.
"You weren't ordered to attack," the shinobi yelled as he grabbed the kunoichi. "This is essentially a diplomatic envoy. Do you want to start the war we just avoided being obliterated by?"
"He's the son of the Yellow Flash!" the kunoichi yelled back, right into the shinobi's face. "The bastard that took three quarters of my entire family from me!"
"And by all rights you just invited him to send you to join them! You're lucky he decided to defend instead of retaliate! Haven't you heard of the show he put on when he earned his promotion to chunin?"
Naruto dropped the earth wall and swept away the hardened mud, but put more focus into spotting potential attacks. He'd been too complacent and if he'd dodged that attack wrong then instead of taking out a chunk of his arm it probably would've taken out a chunk of his head. The kunoichi was supposed to be one of Iwa's elite jounin, if he recalled their records correctly, and he'd not realized she was about to attack due to the general negative emotions directed his way by everyone currently watching their group.
Ten minutes later the kunoichi had been literally dragged back into the village and a different shinobi approached the group. "I offer apologies for Kikko's unwarranted attack."
"She had a legitimate grievance," Naruto replied. "Though she might need some therapy."
The man blinked, and looked at Naruto's arm. "But she..."
"Didn't tear my arm off and attempt to beat me to death with it in a friendly spar, so I'd say she's doing better than the Raikage."
"That...why would anyone do that in a friendly spar?"
"I took a calculated risk in an attempt to distract him, but forgot to take into account that I was dealing with a Kage. Learned my lesson, won't be intentionally subjecting any Kage to that trick unless they ask me to and I've got plenty of distance from them."
The man blinked a couple of times, then half-looked back at the village. "Honestly, she'd probably try to do that to you too, if you gave her the chance."
"She did seem to be a bit high-strung."
A couple more shinobi came out and approached the group, offering their own apologies for the kunoichi's actions, then started asking for details on what had been brought. Running in and out of the village with questions and messages ate up an hour before the Tsuchikage himself walked out of the village...dressed as a normal jounin, with an attempt at using makeup to disguise his face. It was obvious that the man didn't want to be recognized as the Tsuchikage as he questioned them, so Naruto pretended not to know that this was the village's leader.
"Good morning," the man greeted. "You are Naruto Uzumaki, jounin of Konohagakure and son of Minato Namikaze?"
"I am," Naruto replied. "Along with Futo and Odoroki Uzumaki, chunin of Konohagakure, and Miho, genin seals specialist of Konohagakure."
"Your father isn't well-liked around here."
"The sudden attack from a kunoichi trying to kill me because of him made that clear, but we weren't planning on staying the night anyway. Our plan is to be on our way back home by mid-afternoon, regardless of what's decided here."
"...probably a good idea, as the other side of your family have made their own impression recently."
"So I hear, but that's part of why I was sent out with Futo and Odoroki. The head of the Konoha Uzumaki clan and a couple of its members, delivering reparations for the extended clan being a bit too rash."
"What reparations have you brought?"
"A mobile house, in the same basic configuration as those used by the Hokage and Raikage, for the Tsuchikage's use. Two blank gate doors that are believed to be the correct approximate size for the destroyed main gate, though final fittings and any desired decorative carvings will still need to be handled locally. And an offer of temporarily setting up a seal for two or three of the local medic-nin to be granted a medical chakra bloodline, if they're willing to take the risk."
"Is this mobile house a dig at the Tsuchikage's age, implying that he needs assistance to travel distances?"
"I don't believe so. As I said, the Hokage and Raikage each have one as well. The primary benefit is that it allows a group of shinobi traveling to remain at near full strength along the journey, at the cost of needing to charge it up with chakra to run it ahead of time. There are some comforts included, but half of it is set up as potential office space, meaning that the bulk of those traveling with it still need to camp around it when stopping for the night."
It looked like the man hadn't expected that answer, and seemed to relax slightly upon hearing it. Actually, he'd relaxed at the point of the reiteration of two other Kages having their own. "I see."
He did not actually introduce himself before heading back into the village, and twenty minutes later a new team was sent out to 'take possession of' the mobile house and the blank gates...but they only moved them all closer to the village for deeper examination for now. Naruto had provided the standard warnings about reading the mobile house's manual before storing it if you didn't want to create potentially-explosive problems though, which led to one of them likely not realizing he could hear them commenting on that being a wonderful way to severely damage the village without being able to be blamed for it.
A few minutes later three medic-nin came out of the village to undergo the medical chakra seal. The most junior of them, one that was considered barely-qualified by Iwa's standards if Naruto remembered their records correctly, went first. Presumably they were also considered to be the most expendable. When they immediately demonstrated drastically-improved control over medical chakra the other two were far more interested in undergoing the process themselves. That didn't take long, and all three thanked him and apologized for thinking ill of him.
The group was asked to wait while someone 'fetched the Tsuchikage', but they ensured that the seal was wiped from the ground properly before the man came back out in his formal attire. Floating, as was known to do, especially when he wanted to be ready for a fight.
"Good afternoon, Tsuchikage-sama," Naruto greeted the man. "I see you've decided to go back to floating instead of walking."
"...you're a sensor, aren't you?" the man accused.
"I am, and your chakra was obvious based on how Kyo described it, but even in your disguise you also matched the pictures I've seen of you."
"Figures. And your clan seems...oddly likely to use unorthodox methods of solving problems when killing would probably be faster and easier."
"Killing can be necessary, but it's better to only resort to it when that's the case. Today's enemy could be tomorrow's ally, but only if they live long enough to see the error of their ways. The toads have mentioned that the Uzumaki and Senju inherited that outlook from a common ancestor, in direct contrast with the Uchiha's more violent outlook. Though for some reason the explanation as to why the comparison is always with the Uchiha has been skipped every time it's come up. I keep getting told that it no longer matters and thus I shouldn't be burdened by it."
"That...honestly explains far more of the bad blood between our villages than you probably understand."
Naruto blinked a couple of times. "I'd guess that Madara pissed your village off because he was a power-hungry jerk?"
"...that does sound like a rather apt description, yes, though I don't know why you jumped to that incredibly accurate conclusion."
"Someone at least claiming to be him randomly showed up a few years ago and killed off most of his own clan when they didn't agree with his plans."
It was the Tsuchikage's turn to blink. "That bastard might still be alive?"
"There's a decent chance," Futo interjected. "All signs point to him having been responsible for both times the nine-tailed fox was used to attack Konoha as well."
"I...see...huh. I appear to have a number of things to take care of, and wish you well on your return trip. Thank you for the reparations, even though you know that we were planning on attacking your village and owed none. I will reach out through more official channels for further items, and promise that none of my shinobi will be sent to follow you when you leave."
Naruto grinned, casting the back-anchored wings version of the flight spell. Futo, Miho, and Odoroki followed his lead, and then they all took to the air. "Good luck on them being able to keep up even if you did."
The four of them departed at speed, and clones got pictures of the combination of shocked and incredibly annoyed looks on the various Iwa shinobi. The Tsuchikage was the exception, looking resigned instead. Then again, he already knew that Naruto could fly, so was probably the only one present that had realized that the rest of the group might be able to as well.
Once at the nearest Land of Fire border outpost they landed and called Hinata and Ino to them. Clones left in the bunkers would do the final closing up of them, but a request to hit the rest of the border outposts used by the samurai had come from the Daimyo. Now that the threat of war was no longer a concern they could cycle through those...and give Yoko more time to see how the civilian girls were without Odoroki's presence.
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