Zapticuno's massive wings slowly relaxed as the sky began to knit itself back together, clouds dragging reluctantly into place.
The Eight-Tails' chakra cloak flickered as the Jinchūriki's body emerged before falling to the ground.
"…Oi." The Eight-Tails' voice rumbled inside him. It sounded tired and exhausted. "…Don't die after all that noise."
The Jinchūriki coughed, blood and dust splattering his chin as he forced himself onto one elbow. His whole body was screaming in pain. His skin was a lattice of burns and half-healed fractures, flesh knitting itself together slowly under residual chakra.
"Heh… guess… I didn't waver." He laughed weakly.
"No," the Eight-Tails admitted. "You didn't."
It felt as though both of them had developed a sort of understanding with each other after the ordeal they been through.
Kuro released Zapticuno's beak and drifted downward. He looked at the Jinchūriki, then the craters and what remains of the Cloud military encampment.
"…Well," he said mildly. "That escalated quickly."
Zapticuno ruffled its feathers, sending stray arcs of lightning snapping into the sky. "You stopped the fun."
"You were about to turn a valuable asset into vapor," Kuro replied. "That's bad manners."
Zapticuno turn it head and pouted.
After a while, the air rippled as the Third Raikage appeared at the edge of the crater, limping. His single eye took in the scene, seeing many surviving Cloud shinobi as well as the Jinchūriki safe.
The Raikage was silent for a long moment before exhaling in a deep sigh.
"It would take a while for the Cloud to withdraw. I hope you can understand." The Third Raikage said as he looked at the devastation in front of him. "But I will return to the village and talk with the Elders."
"Hmn," Kuro nodded. "Make sure the Elders are not being manipulated. It's too much of a coincidence that all the villages start a war with the Land of Fire at the same time."
The Third Raikage's eye narrowed slightly at that.
"…You noticed it too," he said.
Kuro didn't answer right away. He looked past the Raikage, across the broken land, the wounded shinobi being pulled from rubble, the scorched earth still humming with residual chakra.
"I'd be the most stupid person if I hadn't," Kuro replied.
The Raikage folded his arms, massive frame still radiating quiet menace even in exhaustion.
Kuro looks at him before jumping onto Zapticuno's back.
"Let go," he patted it back as the bird gave a screech before zapping away toward the west.
…
Meanwhile, back in the Hidden Leaf Village.
The sun had just set on the horizon as people went back toward their homes after a long day of work.
Patrols went about their way, keeping eyes out for disturbances. The Uchiha patrols, as usual, were haughty and egotistical while ANBU shifted through shadow and branch.
A few Shadow Warriors kept watch for safety around the Nara Clan.
Near the Forest of Death, four figures emerged. They were cloaked with their faces obscured and their chakra sealed so no one would take notice of their presence.
The leading cloaked figure raised a hand before bringing it down.
"Proceed," he said before the cloaked figures spread out and moved toward the village.
Inside the village, the civilians slept. Unaware of the intruders.
A shopkeeper dreamed of tomorrow's sales. A genin muttered through combat forms in his sleep. Somewhere, a newborn cried and was gently soothed back into silence.
The first death happened in a sealing archive.
An elderly records keeper looked up from a scroll, sensing the pressure change behind him. A hand closed over his mouth. A needle slid cleanly between his vertebrae.
A cloaked figure appeared before shifting through the scrolls. After a few moments, it gathered the scrolls and sealed them in a sealing scroll before disappearing.
Elsewhere, in the Intelligence Division, candlelight flickers as it casts shadows on the walls. A junior analyst frowned, rubbed her eyes, and kept working, unaware that three classified reports had disappeared.
Near the civilian district, two ANBU crossed paths on a roof.
They nodded to one another.
Neither noticed the third presence standing near them. When they moved on, the presence followed one of them.
Unbeknownst to the intruders, their presence had been noticed by a little white fox. It cracks its eyes as annoyance passes through its eyes.
"…Tch," Kirama thought, irritation bleeding through its otherwise lazy posture. "Not even subtle."
It yawned, stretching delicately, claws scraping the floor. "So it's that kind of night."
It hopped out the window soundlessly.
…
The intruder following the ANBU took another step, only to find the world tilted.
"What?" He thought, but that was his last thought before his world went dark.
The intruder's body fell to the ground, missing a head as blood sprayed out into the surroundings.
The ANBU, feeling the disturbance behind him, turns around. Seeing a headless, cloaked figure, he was shaken. However, his years of training paid off.
"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!"
Flames roared from his mask and arced into the sky, detonating in a brilliant bloom of orange and red.
Movement answered immediately.
Multiple ANBU shifted through the rooftops. Figures flickered into existence, one after another, surrounding the headless intruder.
One ANBU crouched beside the body, blade ready as gloved fingers checked for seals, traps, or false death.
"No pulse," he reported. "Intruder. Immediately alert the Hokage."
One of the ANBU vanished in a flicker of body-flicker, racing toward the tower.
None of them noticed the small white fox perched on a nearby tree, tail swaying lazily as golden eyes observed the scene.
"Took you all long enough," it muttered under its breath.
Its gaze flicked toward the other intruders in the village, who were trying to escape after seeing the signal.
"Let's end this and go back to sleep." It said, yawning.
Across the village, escape routes folded shut.
A cloaked figure leapt from a rooftop before he slammed face-first into an invisible wall. His body rebounded violently, bones cracking as he tumbled into an alley that should not have been there.
Another intruder tried to melt into shadow, only for the shadows to reject him, spitting him out like a foreign body.
The fox yawned.
"Honestly," it said, hopping down from the tree, "did you really think you could infiltrate the Leaf with me around?"
ANBU flooded the rooftops now, signals flashing, orders snapping through hand signs and encrypted chakra pulses.
One intruder managed to reach the treeline at the village edge, only to freeze as a white paw rested gently on his shoulder.
He screamed as his chakra collapsed inward, veins burning as if packed with ice.
The fox leaned close, voice soft and almost kind.
"Hello there," it whispered. "Want to play a little game?"
The intruder's scream cut off as the world snapped shut around him.
…
Kuro arrived at the northwestern border, only to see the Hidden Stone shinobi begging on their knee.
It did not take long to know why, as he could see Yonshi experimenting with some weird spells that turn the shinobi into a tree.
Kuro's eyes narrowed.
"Yonshi."
Yonshi faltered the moment he heard his Lord's cold voice.
Niji, who was standing nearby, immediately knelt before Kuro.
"I tried to stop him, my Lord," Niji said, shaking. "He just wouldn't listen."
Kuro looks at the growing "forest" in the rocky cliffs and valleys.
"Uh.." Yonshi raises his hand. "I only did it because I don't want to kill them. They are more useful as a tree than being dead."
Kuro shook his head at the absurd ideas of Yonshi. "So, where is their leader? You don't turn him into a tree, too, did you?"
Yonshi looked away in guilt as Niji pointed toward a towering tree over in the distance.
"That's the Tsuchikage."
There was only one thought that came to Kuro's mind when he saw the towering tree.
'So the Shinobi World now also has a World Tree.'
"Can you turn them back?" He asked, only for Yonshi to shake his head.
Kuro sighed. "Now, how the hell am I going to solve this without their leader?"