Chương 99: Chapter 97 - Trap (2)

The quarry-like pit we were standing in was wet and slick, and, to be honest, I feared it would soon fill with water in this heavy rain. But it wasn't just a bowl, as I kept looking. It had a sloping entrance to my left from where we exited the tunnels, so it wouldn't flood. Walking into the rain, I stopped near the center and looked around, my eyes scanning the chakra signatures that I could pick up on nearby.

"So... This is it?"

"It has more than meets the eye," Yahiko said as he jumped out from the pipe behind us.

"This will be it..." By the time Minato got out to stand with me, Konan did too, and she raised her hand. At the same time, paper began flying out from beneath her cloak as more than a thousand pieces soared outward and disappeared into the stones or just stuck to the walls, merging so well you couldn't tell they were there, not even with my Sharingan. No wonder Obito got caught in her trap, too.

"Yeah... I'm not touching anything anymore." I muttered, now looking at my feet, wondering how many more were hidden in here.

"That would be wise," Konan answered calmly, but her eyes were grinning. As for Minato, he immediately began circling the quarry's rim, touching rocks or whatever he could get his hands on, placing marks down just for extra protection.

"Here," He said, throwing a kunai to each of us, "Keep it on you, just in case."

"I see," Yahiko muttered, examining it, before nodding at the others, who only then pocketed Minato's marked kunais.

"So," Minato looked toward Nagato, "The seal. Is everything ready as you say it is?"

"Of course," Nagato muttered as he moved toward the center of the quarry, and the moment he stood in place, my eyes flinched, feeling a little bit of a prickle inside my brain. Now, with him there, I began sensing some kind of sealing formula covering almost the entire quarry floor. Fuuuck... This looks complicated...

"This is yours?" Minato asked, just as flabbergasted, even though he couldn't see it, only sense it via his own chakra.

"Whose else?" Nagato asked, sounding proud of his work.

"It's mine, and mine alone. I designed it, and there is no other like this in the world."

"How does it suppress contracts?"

"That's not something I'm about to share now, is it?"

"Don't worry about it," I said, already seeing that under his red bangs sticking to his face, Nagato's expression soured by about two factors.

"He likes studying stuff, that's all."

"All he needs to know is that it works, because we tested it." Nagato added, turning away from Minato, "I'm not asking about your teleportation; you don't ask about my methods. Isn't that clear already?"

"Fair, fair, and I said, don't worry about it!" I answered, raising my hands with a loud sigh.

"Let's do our part, and then be away from this eternal water world."

"Yeah, but if this interferes with Hiraishin..." Minato began, while the others were looking at me like I insulted their homeland, which I did, but I was politely doing it.

"It won't," Nagato said, but then Yahiko softened it up at once.

"No." The moment he said it, Nagato glanced at him as he opened his mouth but couldn't interject.

"It shouldn't," Yahiko continued, "But we can't guarantee it... That's a risk we must take."

"Are we?" I asked and then pointed at myself.

"Am I? Haaah... oh well... I guess we are already here, so we will have to."

"We don't have time," Nagato argued, and he was right, because I heard an explosion in the distance. I don't know what it was, but it was probably one of the Kage's work. As I was listening to the noise, Yahiko whistled loudly, and I saw more people appear, wearing black cloaks, surrounding the entire quarry. There were about twenty of them, explaining the signatures I sensed.

"You two should stay here, act as if you're trying to hide in the pipes or something." Yahiko offered, turning towards us.

"Hanzo will find you anyway, and you can lead him into the middle of the quarry. Just get him inside, that's all. No need to be at dead center, just be... in. Okay?"

"Act like you're trying to reconnect with your delegation." Nagato offered, "As if trying to use some kind of jutsu for it, or whatever; just look occupied."

"How?" Minato and I asked, because none of us knew anything like that, which made me think that I would complain when we got back home about NOT HAVING SOMETHING LIKE THAT. Fuck.

"You're a shinobi. Improvise." He answered, shaking his head.

"How will we know when Hanzo is coming?" Minato asked as the trio just froze.

"He's already coming." Konan answered, "The paper tags I spread across the village react to his chakra, and it is heading this way. He already found the trio you were being chased by."

"Then we really don't have much time!" Yahiko sighed, turning serious.

"Everyone! To your positions!" Then he looked at us, sincere in his friendly smile.

"Don't die."

"Wasn't planning to," I grinned, nodding back at him.

"Same to you." After he was gone, I looked at Minato.

"So, Little Brother..."

"Don't." He looked at me.

"I hate this plan."

"Me too, but we are being chased by a glue sniffer who likes little boys, apparently. So look stranded."

"I can't believe you are this nonchalant about it." He said with a defeated shrug, shaking his head, "How are you doing this?"

"I am born this way. What if I told you that I don't fear death?" I asked, being super serious, making him raise his brows.

"I'm honest." I added, looking into his eyes, "Somehow... I don't know. I feel like this is fine... What I know is that I can only do my best in the current circumstances, and that's all. I'm not a planner like you anyway! I just go with the flow... And trust in myself, so I have a good feeling about this too. I'm great, you are great, those three looked great... Thus, my conclusion is that we can get out of this in one piece!" The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"You are unbelievable," He chuckled, shaking his head once more, putting his hands together, closing his eyes.

"Can you sense Sensei?" I asked, watching him reach out towards his marks.

"No... They are too far from here; I can't sense the marks I left on them. You?"

"Nope." I shrugged.

"I can't either. Try Hiruzen-sama."

"I don't have a mark on him."

"That's inconvenient," I muttered, rubbing my chin.

"What about Sakumo?"

"Can't sense him either."

"Ashina?"

"Renji." He looked at me with a flat gaze.

"I would have said if I could sense anyone." It wasn't even an act; we were actually trying to sense them when a figure landed on the quarry rim, without any big crash or grand entrance. We both turned towards him while I watched the sickle in his hand, before moving up to his face, seeing some smoke escape his respirator. Hanzo motherfucking Salamander. This isn't going to be easy...

"Run?" I asked, and it was a genuine question.

"..." Minato only nodded, but by then Hanzo waved a hand and three canisters shot out from his sleeve, spraying thick, purple-gray mist everywhere around us. I stopped breathing instantly as we jumped backward, away from the expanding mist that made all the weed growing between the cracks wither and die. Oh, what a lovely day! Naturally, he didn't care about it and landed inside his own poison, flinging his chain that my Sharingan, even in the smog-like shroud, managed to pick up on.

I ducked at the last moment as it came at me from a blind spot, while Minato threw two kunai, but we only heard the clanking sounds as he deflected them easily. All of it happened in a moment's notice. I could tell he wasn't about to let us try anything, already moving to summon his beast, here to crush us with all his might. The moment he did so, the entire quarry lit up as Nagato activated his own seal.

Even through the mist, I could see black sealing lines lighting up in a dangerous, abyss-like hue, and Nagato's voice echoed from somewhere above us.

"SEAL!" The entire formula fell apart as the summoning jutsu's symbols suddenly warped around themselves, and I swear I heard a loud cry. I didn't need to guess why, because the mist got blown apart as a salamander appeared, but before I could think Nagato failed, I realized that the salamander's death cry was what I heard.

The poor bastard got only half-summoned, its body torn apart, only its upper part appearing; the other remaining wherever it was, cut in half, its intestines slipping out right under Hanzo's hand. If there was a gruesome scene, this was it. Minato said nothing, and neither did I; we just jumped out, up to the edge of the quarry, away from it all. Hanzo looked up from there, and he probably understood what was happening, but sorry, buddy, too late, even for you.

Somewhere, Konan had already activated her paper tags as the whole place turned white, revealing their presence. It was like watching paint peel off an old wall, but these covered everything, the earth, the pipes, maybe even the water, huh... Even if Hanzo tried to move, it was too late; the tags under his feet had already locked him into place as more and more covered him in a cocoon.

"This is going to be a big one," I whispered as I grabbed Minato's sleeve, pulling him down.

"Brace for it!" Midway through my speech, the flash blinded us; then all sound disappeared, or got blown away, as the explosion played out right in front of us. The shockwave rattled me down to my bones, and the ground shook so violently that I expected it all to break apart under us. Still, probably Nagato's seal made it super contained, as the mushroom cloud of pure fire didn't expand outwards, but kept going up, hundreds of meters, vaporizing the rain itself.

However, it was not the end, because I began hearing the shouts.

"FIRE RELEASE!"

"EARTH RELEASE!"

"WIND RELEASE!"

"WATER RELEASE!"

"LIGHTNING RELEASE!" Jutsu after jutsu got poured into the explosion before it had a chance to die down, not leaving it all to Konan's spectacular work. As it happened, I caught sight of Nagato, near the highest ridge, forming a massive wind blade and sending it down, creating a secondary explosion from the fire.

"Well..." I spoke up while my mouth felt dry.

"That's what I would call overkill. Which is nice and warranted in this situation..." The bombardment only stopped a minute later as one by one, all of the Akatsuki shinobi lowered their hands, gasping for air, running out of chakra. We couldn't really see what was going on down there, and even my eyes were misfiring from all the chakra signatures, making it impossible to make anything out, besides a new, super deep crater that was filling up with rainwater.

"Did we...?" Yahiko asked, appearing close to us, gasping for air, his sleeves ruined from the backlash of using multiple jutsus in quick succession.

"That was a superb trap. Congratulations." Too bad the one saying it wasn't who any of us expected to hear. I was already turning on my heels when the first syllable left his mouth, coming through his respirator, in that distorted, hair-raising voice. Was it a Shadow Clone down in the quarry? Maybe. Most likely... I guess. I had no other idea how he managed to survive that.... It couldn't be reverse-summoning, that's for sure. No matter...

Because he was already in the middle of moving, right towards me, with his sickle, aiming at my neck. Too slow... I mean, my body was too slow... I wasn't going to be able to dodge!

"WATCH OUT!" I expected Minato's voice, but it was Yahiko's body that hit me, as he threw his entire frame into me from the side, and with the blade's current arc, he would be done for. Was he trying to save me? Is he this stupid?! Maybe destiny still wants things to play out as they should, huh? Not while I'm here, it won't! My hand grabbed Yahiko's cloak, and we flashed away, reappearing right where Konan was, at the kunai Minato had made them hold onto, crashing into her.

"OW!" She yelled as we tumbled onto the ground, Yahiko already rolling off us, getting back to a defensive position.

"You're welcome!" I grunted, doing the same, but there was no time to exchange pleasantries, because Hanzo's chained weapon was coming at us already. We got out of the way just in time as its weighted end smashed through the ground, throwing dirt everywhere, while I was already holding a proper Supernova in my palm, ready to throw it out.

"Interesting," Hanzo spoke again, looking at the jutsu in my hand, sizzling.

"Yeah?" I spat, intensifying the heat and turning it from orange to blue as I concentrated with all I had.

"You haven't seen anything yet, old man."

"You children can't even understand how much I had seen." I was ready to blink forward, in tandem with Minato, and attack him from both sides, when the ground beneath Hanzo exploded without warning. It was so surprising that even the masked bastard grunted, barely being able to defend himself. Huh? What happened?!

From nowhere, a massive glowing chain shot upwards, chasing Hanzo, who was already in the air, dodging, but just as he finished, another was whizzing towards him from the opposite side, right where he was about to land. Then another... and more... More than ten of them.

"What the—?!" Hanzo grunted as some of them managed to cut his arms before one latched onto his ankle. If not for his sickle and quick reflexes, the secondary chain that shot at his guts would have gone through. But then again, another used the opportunity to wrap around his wrist, trying to disarm him. Now struggling, Hanzo tried to kick off, head backward, and do it with enough force to rip chunks out of the ground, but the chains weren't budging.

Then someone landed between us, making me smile as I slowly drew the chakra back into my body, dispersing my jutsu. Lucky!

"Ashina-sama!" Minato exhaled loudly. When I turned too, to take a look... Damn! He looked like absolute hell. His robes were torn apart, revealing most of his upper body, which didn't really match his age, given how lean and fit he was. I could see blood flowing from multiple cuts all over him, though, mixing with the mud. His hair was loose, sticking to everything, covering half of his face... But... he wasn't breathing hard at all.

"Found you." He said with a smile, glancing at Minato and me, while opposite us, Hanzo pulled against the chains, trying to get free.

"Ashina!" He sneered, but it wasn't as threatening as before.

"You wanted my clan divided, didn't you?" Ashina asked, his smile growing dangerously.

"Well, it looks like... it is going to be me who divides you into individual parts. Let's see what comes off first. Your arms? Legs? Or your head?"