Naruto: Tales of Ashihara
Prologue – Arc 2: The Daitengu
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Chapter 15 – Against the Yamabushi
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In the forest near the frontier of the land of Wind, the mercenary Naomi Yuki just locked herself in an ice dome with Tsubai Minamoto and one of Sojobo's servants. The yamabushi, Tokiwa Hotoke, looks around and sees how well done Naomi's ice trap is. She can't liquefy theground to swim through if the temperature causes it to quickly freeze and go solid again. Maybe Sasuke Uchiha warned this woman about the abilities of the tengu. Or maybe she simply has an incredibly fast ability to adapt and overcome a problem, figuring out a way to counter Amabie's power just by seeing her swim underground for a moment…
"That's a well thought trap. You must have prepared thoroughly to fight me." says Tokiwa.
"Not at all. I just saw the samurai run after a dirt wave and decided to stop it in my way." explains Naomi. "Turns out you dodged it and revealed a weakness."
"So it's my stupid mistake then…" remarks Tokiwa.
At least, she notes that Naomi doesn't have any intel about her powers. She knows about Mutai, her jutsu to swim in solids, but she probably doesn't know about her other abilities. Still, before engaging in battle, she stays careful. Her opponent is a mercenary and an outsider from the laws of the 5 Great Nations, just like Chuji. Tokiwa knows how ruthless these people can be, so she first tries to talk this out.
"You know… We don't have to fight." she proposes. "You could just let me go with the handsome guy sitting behind me. Neither I nor Lord Daitengu intend to hurt him at all. Seriously, I really have no interest in a battle with you."
"Good for you…. Unfortunately, I don't really care about that guy, and I have very much interest in killing you." answers the mercenary.
Tokiwa sighs, realizing she has no way out of this trap. Behind her, Tsubai stays sitting on the ground. He sees the tall woman in her dark blue dress from behind and observes her shape, voice, clothes and long hair over her back to figure out what makes her so singular. What makes him feel so confused when he sees her? In his inner world, Daikoku is ashamed of his yamabushi, as he realizes what bothers him. He is ashamed, because Tsubai really managed to fall in love at first sight with an enemy. He sighs in despair for him, which Tsubai feels.
"You're a dumb ass, Tsubai. You know that?" says the tengu.
"Just what am I supposed to do right now?" asks Tsubai who prefers to ignore Daikoku's judgment.
The caped ghost doesn't answer. He knows that Tsubai will obviously not go against the mercenary and isn't stupid enough to join Tokiwa's side. He'll probably just sit and watch. But what will he do when the fight comes to an end? He can't let Naomi die, but would he leave the other woman to death? Meanwhile, neither of the women did a single move. They hear muffled sounds of colliding blades that are coming from outside the ice dome, where the samurai Daisuke is fighting Moritaka Minamoto.
"This Kekkei Genkai… Are you from the Yuki clan?" asks Tokiwa, observing the frozen structure in which they're trapped.
"…" Naomi stays quiet, noticing that her opponent's outfit appears to be from Kiri, the village that led to her clan's extinction.
"That's odd. You're all supposed to be dead." adds Tokiwa.
"Well I'm right here… Won't say as much of you in a few minutes." answers the mercenary.
She pulls out two kunai from her pocket and throws one to Tokiwa, but not to stab her. She throws it for her to catch, which she does.
"Let's fight properly." says the mercenary before going forward to her enemy.
The two women go against each other with their kunai while Tsubai simply watches. Since none of them minded him, he supposes that his abstinence is acceptable. So he simply spectates the kunai confrontation. It takes not even a minute for Naomi to disarm Tokiwa, as she's simply more skilled in short range combat. Now facing an unarmed opponent, she steps forward and aims to slice her stomach with the kunai, but Tokiwa jumps back quickly to dodge and joins her hands to throw a jutsu at the lost Yuki.
Suiton – Suiningyodan
She spits water from her mouth to the ground. The water splashes and rises to shape into a mermaid that heads to Naomi. But before the mermaid can completely leave the ground, the water puddle freezes. Naomi steps toward the frozen ice mermaid and strongly hits it with her leg. The statue breaks in half and the detached piece flies toward Tokiwa who jumps over it. While her enemy's mid-air, Naomi poses her hand on the ground.
Hyoton – Hyowana
Just where Tokiwa is about to land, an ice circle forms and captures her leg as soon as she touches it. Now unable to move, she sees the ice crawling up her leg as Naomi slowly walks toward her with a smile on her face.
"Guess I'm just better than you." she says to provoke the one she's about to kill.
Tokiwa, not yet resolved to lose, joins her hands to make the monkey hand seal. Naomi who wants to finish this right now jumps toward her with an icicle emerging from her hand, ready to impale her. But Tokiwa can trigger a new jutsu early enough.
Ningyo no Uta
Seeing her adversary quickly come to her, Tokiwa screams "Stop!" while still holding the hand seal. At these words, Naomi stops straight with the icicle pointing at Tokiwa's chest. The voice she just heard was so soothing, gentle and pleasant to hear. She's dazed and confused. She feels totally crushed, manipulated. She can't even move her eyes around anymore, and sees everything go dark and blurry in front of her. The last thing she sees is Tokiwa grabbing the ice spike that's handed to her and breaks it to use it herself.
Under the spell, Naomi concentrates to evade this numb feeling and break out of its influence, like she would break out of a Genjutsu. Out of pure will, she manages to slightly move her foot forward for it to make contact with the ice trap that blocks Tokiwa's leg. This way, she pushes the trap to grow faster on her enemy's body. The ice reaches and freezes Tokiwa's arms before she has time to use the icicle.
Tokiwa just looks surprised at the mercenary woman breaking out of the mermaid song's grip. Naomi gazes back at her opponent straight in the eyes and steps back. She's glad that she escaped this but is also frightened by the ease of use of this jutsu. Tsubai, who was stressed by the close confrontation that was happening under his eyes, stood up and got a bit closer in order to intervene if needed. He slowly walks to get closer to them. Considering Tokiwa's current position, he estimates that the fight is over.
Suddenly the ice dome breaks under a rain of feathers. The fight between Moritaka and Daisuke grew violent enough to break the intimacy of the two women's confrontation. Tsubai, Naomi and Tokiwa look up to see the shattered ice pieces and blades fall on them. Daisuke, seeing his allies at risk because of his opponent, makes a move.
Yawarakai – Issen
He uses the same technique as earlier in front of the wall and slices through the air. All the sharp falling objects are broken by the shock wave and pushed away. Tsubai and Naomi still hold their forearms up to cover their faces from the potential harm. Tokiwa, unable to move, just hopes for something to save her from this lethal rain. After making sure his friends were safe, Daisuke looks back at the flying foe and reacts quickly to dodge another range of feathers aimed at him.
He flips back several times to get out of reach with ease,… suspicious ease. He doesn't realize he did exactly what Moritaka wanted. By dodging like this he only helped his enemy to get him away from his friends. The flying yamabushi faces down toward the three people who were blocked in the dome earlier and closes his wings around him.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" screams Tokiwa to her ally, not sure if he realized that she's there.
"Taking care of them." calmly answers Moritaka.
He then violently redeploys his wings to shoot a much larger wave of feathers to them. Daisuke is too far away and the blades are too many for him to stop like earlier. Tokiwa can't move and just looks at death coming from a supposed ally's hand. The rain is too large for Naomi to do anything either. So Tsubai makes his move.
Jikanteido
He stops time and looks at the feathers falling on them and thinks. He looks at Naomi, and then at Tokiwa. He comes to have a closer look at her still in the trap's grip. Tsubai just contemplates her while wondering what he should do about her.
"What are you waiting for?" asks Daikoku.
"I don't know." says Tsubai, still disturbed by his unjustified feelings for this woman.
"You don't need an explanation. I feel you enough to understand what is happening." says the tengu. "You'd feel bad if you don't, so save her too. Just… Keep in mind that to her, you're just a target who refuses to join the Daitengu."
"I know… Crap, that's only because she has one of the tengu. If I get her rid of it, she won't be attached to Sojobo anymore." says Tsubai who inexplicably tries to find a way to have Tokiwa by his side.
"We have ways to learn how to manipulate the tengu, so we could, indeed, take the tengu out of her, but how do you know she won't be mad if you kill Amabie?" answers and asks Daikoku.
"… Then I won't kill it. I'll take it from her and keep it in my body." decides Tsubai. "This way it will survive. Sojobo did say that I could handle many of you at the same time."
"I have nothing to say against this."
"Settled then, I'll learn how to manipulate the tengu from Sojobo's memories, and take Amabie to free this woman."
Tsubai makes a confident face and unleashes his darkness cloak on his back. He goes to stand behind Tokiwa and leans forward to cover her with the cloak. He then grabs Naomi's arm and pulls her closer to him and Tokiwa, under the cloak too. By touching Naomi, he deactivated the time pause, but moved fast enough. The three of them are hidden under the cape and all the feathers that fall on them turn to black and are sucked inside the dark hood when they make contact with it.
Tokiwa makes a reassured but hesitant face when she sees the cover around her and Naomi standing close against her. The Yuki makes the same confused face as her. Moritaka, still flying, discovers the aftermath of his killing attempt and is frustrated to see that the three targets are well and alive standing close to each other. This outcome unsettles him, and he tries to understand what happened. Without realizing it, he totally forgets about who his adversary was and, in this moment of inattention, offers to Daisuke just the opportunity he needed.
Kinton – Kochu
A wide steel pillar emerges from the ground under the samurai's feet and elevates him high enough to reach Moritaka's altitude. He leaps forward and firmly holds his unique sword.
Yawarakai – Yojinbo
In the blink of an eye, Daisuke is up in the air, over and behind Moritaka who makes a shocked face. He dashed through the target and sliced through at extreme speed. The yamabushi's left wing and arm promptly detach from his body, causing him to crash. Naomi and Tsubai look up to see the scene and both look with admiration at Daisuke who perfectly nailed the move.
Tokiwa, unable to turn around, sees Naomi's face and understands that the last blade sound defeated Moritaka. She isn't sad though. That man just tried to kill her. She's glad he's beaten but is now unsure of her own fate.
Tsubai comes closer to Moritaka who fell down, still conscious but unable to move. He asks himself if his uncle knows the jutsu to unseal a tengu. To make sure of it, he gets on his knees and makes contact with him to take his memory of it… Nothing. Neither Moritaka nor the tengu inside of him knows how Sojobo does this. Tsubai still tries to reach his uncle's mind, to speak.
In there, he and Daikoku meet Moritaka and Tenshi, a light-blue skinned feminine shape with long white hair. She has the same blue eyes as Akashita, and a strangely human face. Her hair falls down along her upper-body and flies in the wind with a light-gray mist covering her lower body, making it look like she doesn't have any. Most remarkably, she has two large white angel wings replacing her arms.
Even in this inner world, Moritaka is lying down and struggling to stay conscious. He makes an effort to turn his head to the two intruders.
"Get out of here…" he says, with a muffled voice.
"Why were you trying to kill me?" asks Tsubai. "I thought Sojobo wanted you to bring me back to him."
"He… wants. I don't." answers the defeated uncle.
"… Did he ask you to kill your brother?" questions the nephew.
"I killed Riku because it suited me… With your father dead, there's only you in the way to stop me from taking over the clan and Ryuka. If I succeeded to kill you here, I'd just have flown away and waited for the Uchiha to kill the Daitengu."
"So that was your plan…"
Daikoku looks at Tenshi who's silently flying over her yamabushi.
"What about you, Tenshi, messenger of the skies? Do you feel like this is right?" he asks his fellow tengu.
"I don't feel at all…" she answers before looking right into Tsubai's eyes. "Do you think us tengu have a choice? If I don't comply with this man's will, what am I supposed to do? I don't have any power over his choices and behavior, and if I want to leave him, I'm dead. All I can do is stay and watch while he uses me as he pleases."
Tsubai is unsettled by her words. The only reason the tengu are acting as enemies is because of their yamabushi. He only mentioned to Sasuke the possibility of sparing the yamabushi, but those's lives he should preserve are the tengu, not the hosts. Sasuke will never accept it. Not killing the tengu means leaving their powers to Sojobo, and this is what Sasuke works to prevent. Daikoku looks at his hesitating yamabushi and tries to think about it too.
"What now?" asks Moritaka, curious about what Tsubai is willing to do about him. "What will you…"
He's interrupted by a sudden lethal pain. Tsubai and Moritaka's focus is brought back to the real world where Naomi, standing behind Tsubai, has her hands against the ground, on an ice trace going from down her palms to under Moritaka's back. An icicle emerged from this ice and went through the uncle's chest, causing a fatal injury. Tsubai is outraged by Naomi's action and stares at her with anger and surprise.
He sees her looking at him with a serious face before she flies away like she was violently punched away by something she didn't see coming. This surprises Tsubai as well, who suddenly feels something in Moritaka's fading inner world. Between him and Tenshi, there is a white humanoid shape standing, wearing the same body tattoo as the Daitengu on the right half of its body.
This thing just gently catches Tenshi by the chin and makes her whole body turn into the mist that covers her lower part. This mist is then completely sucked into the white body shape. Tsubai and Daikoku try to take a step forward to this strange, huge and thin form, but are pushed back. As Moritaka is dying of Naomi's attack, his inner world fades away and everyone is forced out of it.
Back to reality, Tsubai crawls away from Moritaka's corpse when he sees who's sitting right next to him. Inosawa Yamanaka, or rather Sojobo still in control of his body, takes his hand out of Moritaka's chest with a gray mist crawling on his arm and being absorbed into him. Tsubai looks around and sees Naomi behind a line of shattered trees, laid in a hole that was formed by her body flying in another tree. She was sent fluttering through the forest and is already knocked out, taken by surprise. When all the gray mist is absorbed into Inosawa's body, the Daitengu gazes at Tsubai.
"I made it in time." he says, before noticing something coming toward him.
Kinton – Kodangan
Sojobo raises his hand, followed by a white flash trail, and catches a steel bullet that was aimed at him between his fingers. He looks at where the bullet came from and sees Daisuke running toward him with his sword out. He lets him come close enough until he leaps over Moritaka's body. At this moment, Inosawa's body starts glowing, ready to attack the samurai. But a sudden other swordsman's entrance changes his course of action.
Ameno Tejikara
Unexpectedly, Daisuke disappears and is replaced by Sasuke who throws his sword down to cut through Sojobo just like Daisuke was going to do but faster. Sojobo slides back at incredible speed with his glowing body and evades Sasuke's strike.
Sasuke sets foot next to Tsubai who gets back on his feet. Sojobo stands up too and makes a pissed off face, gazing at Sasuke. The Uchiha doesn't show it, but he's also pissed, he was certain that this surprise attack would work. He's particularly bothered by the tremendous speed at which his target just dodged this. Sojobo stands before them and briefly looks around to see Tokiwa, trapped in the ice that crawled up her body. It now even reached her face and started to slowly choke her to death. The woman has already passed out, but still lives, and was fortunately saved as the progress of the ice was stopped by Naomi's defeat.
Koton – Kosen
Sojobo shoots a light beam from his hand that hits the ice trap, making it strongly glow and blow up, without causing any harm to its prisoner. Sasuke sees the yamabushi who's been freed but doesn't care. He stays focused on the enemy leader.
"Sasuke,…" says Tsubai. "I know you'd like to end him as quickly as possible, but I have to get his memories first. I need the jutsu to unseal a tengu."
"… Ok, but make it quick." answers Sasuke, clueless about the reason for this demand, but too alert to care.
He turns around and holds his sword down, then suddenly pulls it up toward Tsubai, setting up a simple but deadly trap with his left eye.
Ameno Tejikara
Sojobo is teleported between Sasuke and Tsubai. Sasuke's sword, which was going toward his friend, stabs the Daitengu in the back and pierces through his abdomen. Sojobo makes a surprised and annoyed face. Tsubai sees the enemy who suddenly appeared there and hurries to take action and do exactly what he just told Sasuke. The Daitengu sees him perform a hand seal and does the exact same thing at the same time but one handed.
Jikanteido
Tsubai stops time and sees Sojobo motionless before him. Not wasting a second, he raises his hand and touches his arm to take what he needs.
Kioku Kyuin
He absorbs Sojobo's memories of the jutsu to seal and unseal the tengu. There! He got it! Now they can kill him and end this. As this goes very conveniently, he even questions the point of assembling that whole team. He feels relieved and puts his hand back, but is forced out of his joy when he sees Sojobo tilt his head, while time is supposed to be standing still.
"I'm offering you friendship, Tsubai. Family." the Daitengu says. "If you just accept to join me, you'll be safe, with Tokiwa, Saori and all the tengu. But you persist to stay on the Uchiha's side."
Tsubai steps back and tries to deactivate the time pause, but it doesn't work. In fact, he didn't stop time, but Sojobo did when he performed the same jutsu at the same time. All Tsubai did was allow himself to keep moving like in his own time pause. Moving way too fast for Tsubai to do or see anything, Sojobo lightly hits him in the stomach with his knee and grabs his shoulder to take back the knowledge he just lost. Unable to remember the jutsu he just learned, Tsubai gets angry and tries to simply punch Inosawa in the face. Sojobo catches his hand and squeezes it.
"Please, don't make me give up on you, Daikoku." he says as he holds the yamabushi down.
With his superhuman strength, he lifts Tsubai up by the hand and throws him away. Still in the stopped time, he takes two steps forward to pull Sasuke's sword out of his chest. He then turns around to face the Uchiha.
"You just teleported me there. You come and go as quickly as you want. You're really annoying, Indra." he complains. "And I know you can see me, even in my world. This left eye is really the biggest of my problems, so I'll just destroy it."
Sasuke, unable to move or say anything, just witnesses everything with his Rinnegan, and gets ready to react as soon as he can. Sojobo moves with the speed of Koton and raises his hand. A claw grows on his forefinger and he plunges it to stab Sasuke's almighty eye. At the exact moment where the tip of the claw slightly touches the surface of the eye, the time pause breaks and Sasuke immediately reacts as he prepared.
Shinra Tensei
He generates a powerful force that pushes Inosawa far away. The foe goes through the forest that's crushed by the repulsion too. Sasuke limits his jutsu'srange to affect nobody else than Sojobo, so Tsubai and Naomi are safe, and Tokiwa too since she's further than Tsubai.
Once rid of his enemy, Sasuke checks his eye to see that the Daitengu left a scratch, but it's still intact. Sojobo stands up after this with his body badly injured, deeper in the woods. Since he is moving the body he possesses, he doesn't feel weakened by its state, but still makes sure that this blow wasn't fatal. The host body's destruction would kill him, and he knows that the Uchiha knows this.
"Of course, why did I think I could destroy such a thing this easily…" says the Daitengu, about the Rinnegan. "You'd spent your life only hoping you could get this eye's power… You wouldn't let it be taken from you so easily."
Sojobo uses his chakra to heal Inosawa's body and prevent him from dying. He then uses his sensory abilities to locate his opponent… And he finds him right next to him. Sasuke just used the Shunshin to get closer, and arrives right above his target to behead him. Sojobo feels it coming and moves fast enough to dodge by stepping aside. Sasuke lands before him and doesn't take a break. He charges again and tries to kill him with each of his moves.
Sojobo, with his body glowing, manages to dodge every single attack but is angered by the lack of openings that Sasuke gives. The Koton gives him the speed advantage, but it doesn't help. He doesn't see any opportunity to strike back, and if he stops dodging he'll die. He is totally at the Uchiha's mercy. Even now that he has Tentoki's powers, he still loses to him.
So rather than looking for an opportunity to counter-attack, he waits for a chance to get away. With his bigger legs, he steps back and gets out of Sasuke's sword range for a moment. He takes advantage of this small moment of respite and tries to go further away, but Sasuke sees what he's trying to do and uses his left eye to stop him.
Bansho Ten'in
Sojobo is pulled back closer by a pulling force, as Sasuke throws his sword up and grabs his prey by the shoulder to throw him down. With Inosawa lying face to the ground, Sasuke presses on him with his foot and raises his hand to catch his sword falling back at him. But Sojobo, who carefully analyzed his opponent's moves, ceases an opportunity.
"Indra, I know how this eye works." he quickly says. "You just used a Tendo jutsu. I have 5 seconds before you can do it again."
Mutai
Sasuke catches his sword but Sojobo gets away with Amabie's ability to swim in solid matter. He sinks underground and heads toward Tokiwa. The Tendo of the Rinnegan has a cool-down time of 5 seconds between each use. Sasuke just used Bansho Ten'in, so Sojobo knows he can't pull him back closer with it for now. And by going underground, he's out of Sasuke's sight and stops him from using Ameno Tejikara again. Sasuke won't be able to do anything until he gets out of the soil.
Still, thus far in the fight, Sojobo saw enough to consider that he can't defeat Sasuke now. His only choice left is retreat. He'll just hurry to grab Tokiwa and Tsubai to run away with them. He prepares for another attempt by Sasuke, because he knows the Uchiha won't let Tsubai go easily. His Rinnegan can even follow the movements of the Koton – Shunshin.
Sojobo grabs Tokiwa by the foot and pulls her down with him. Sasuke didn't intervene, so he must be focused on Tsubai, as expected. When Sojobo grabs Tsubai by the foot too, that's when Sasuke makes his move.
Ameno Tejikara
Sasuke switches places with the Minamoto right when he sees the Daitengu's hand emerge, and is grabbed by the ankle instead. He forces Sojobo out of the ground by pulling his leg up. His opponent now has his left side busy with holding Tokiwa, and has to face him with only his right side. Since both of the fighters are extremely fast, all this happened in less than 5 seconds, so Sasuke still can't use the Tendo. He has to act wisely. He goes with a short range attack..
Chidori
Sasuke tries to strike Sojobo in the back through the chest and finish him off quickly. But the Daitengu, who thinks just as quickly and wisely as Sasuke, lets Tenshi's chakra wing emerge from his back and block Sasuke's jutsu. The lightning blade still pierces the wing but doesn't reach its target. Sojobo pushes him back by deploying his wing. Sasuke doesn't give up. Even while fluttering back, he doesn't intend to let his enemy go.
Amaterasu / Kagutsuchi
A black flame appears on the chakra wing and shapes into fire blades that destroy it rapidly. They touch the man hiding behind, causing him to burn. But Sojobo knows how to evade it. As his skin is already melting, he holds Tokiwa against him to shield her from the fire in his back. He dives into the ground, leaving the flames on the surface. Badly injured by the burns, he decides to retreat for now. Staying longer would only result in his death. He'll have to wait to achieve his original form before coming back.
"I'll be back, Indra!" he shouts as he combines his best skills to get away.
Jikanteido / Koton – Shunshin
Time stops and when it resumes, Sojobo has vanished from the place. Sasuke looks at the black fire on the ground, and gets frustrated. He tried his best, but Sojobo is just too fast for him… But he has to stay positive. He looks at the black flames and extinguishes them with Kagutsuchi.
He has to check on Naomi, and go back to Tsubai. Then he'll find Daisuke with whom he switched places earlier. The samurai should now be by the side of the last member of the team, the young medic-nin that he went to find in the land of Wind before arriving in the middle of this battle. At last, he has to get back Kobo, Minaa and Z, who are still fighting against the two other yamabushi, Ritoru and Chuji.
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End of Chapter 15 – Next Chapter: Karasu