A strange new life. [Naruto]

[okashihime]

Even hours into the morning, I couldn't believe it. My face was in a constant state of burning. My ears felt on fire, and my heart sped so much that I was becoming a bit afraid. Not to mention the butterflies, the tingling, and everything else. Somehow, the world looked brighter, more beautiful than it always was.

I still couldn't meet any of my team's eyes.

They knew. I knew they knew. They knew I knew they knew.

Amidst it all, I somehow could feel their chakra better than ever. My ability to sense chakra had been steadily improving, but it was the first time, I think, that their emotions were this strong.

Not even finding the destroyed town had caused this reaction.

Karin's was a mix of flowing and throbbing. From what she'd told me about how chakra behaved, she was content and determined. If I was interpreting this correctly, she was happy for me, and determined… to do something.

Tenten's chakra was troubling. It was chaotic and unstable. Karin told me it mostly meant confusion or some sort of mental turmoil. Was Ino kissing me that wrong in her eyes? I didn't know. Maybe it was something else.

Ino's chakra was another story altogether. It alternated between pulsing, behaving like a stream, and bursting. According to Karin's chakra indexation chart, that was excitement, satisfaction, and joy.

Chakra sensing wasn't something I couldn't always sense, but intense moments like this made it easier to perceive how their chakra behaved.

And somehow, I still had a hard time believing what had happened. Best Girl Ino kissed me! And not a small peck on the lips like last time. My ears burned even more just remembering it. I might have also done a victory dance, maybe. Don't blame me. I felt like the luckiest girl in the world.

Every time I looked at Ino, she had a satisfied, smug smile on her face.

Which only made me blush deeper. Gosh, what was I? A teen in love?

That elated state of being didn't last, however. It started with smoke in the distance. More so because, based on our map, there wasn't supposed to be anything in that direction. From my place ahead of the pack, I stopped, checking with Karin what she could sense.

"Two of those strange chakras, another one that feels like a normal chakra, but—"

"But?" Tenten asked.

"It's someone with a lot of chakra." She looked at me for some reason. "Not as much as Naruto, though."

That pushed out all the in love girl silliness out of me. "How?" I asked. Did we run into another jinchuriki? Or maybe another Uzumaki ninja?

Karin just shrugged. "It's a lot."

I studied my team's face. Karin's uncertain eyes, Ino's determination, Tenten's still looking confused. If it were up to me, I would like to investigate things, but we couldn't take that long to help the people trapped in the mobile fortress.

"Should we investigate?" I asked.

"I think so." "What if they're attacking another village?" "We have to."

That decided it. "Arm up," I ordered.

I considered what to do. I wanted to create more beacons to give the girls, but my chakra was still low from the previous days. I didn't have enough for three beacons, and even if the selfish part of me wanted to create one and leave with Ino, the practical side of me knew that was a horrible idea.

Nothing killed team coherence than differential treatment between team members. That might be a moot point with how Tenten still looked at me and Ino, but they knew what the wood kunai was. Giving only one to Ino was like slapping them in the face, saying I valued Ino's life more than theirs.

Which, ugh, it wasn't true. I was just more afraid now because I didn't want Ino getting hurt.

"I don't have enough chakra to create a beacon for everyone," I admitted, looking at my team. I created one of the kunais, burning through most of the chakra I had recovered through the night. Even though I wanted to give it to Ino, the practical choice was Karin. She was the weaker of us, as well as the one who could heal us from almost any fatal injuries. I tossed her the wooden kunai. Once she caught it, I turned toward the others. "Don't take unnecessary risks."

Preparations made, and we ran toward the potential enemy.

We burst into what once had been a caravan. Big, hulking pack animals, creatures that resembled armored rhinos, lay slain near a series of strange carriages. Each one was a wide, low platform mounted on curved runners instead of wheels, like a cross between a sled and a tank. From the design, they were meant to be dragged across grassy plains, sandy roads, or shallow rivers, not normal roads.

There were a fair number of those carriages, but most of them were destroyed.

The clearing was a mess. I saw a few people crumpled on the ground, craters were everywhere, but they didn't look like explosions; it was more like something heavy had fallen.

But the problem wasn't the strange caravan, but the massive army of metal-clad golems swarming the place, a few carrying the caravan's people away.

It was easy to find the two people with the strange chakra. One looked like a young man, blond hair, face hidden beneath a shining silver metal armor that left the mouth exposed, and hid almost everything else but the red eyes.

Fucking red eyes.

Panic spiked through me thinking I was looking at a Sharingan, but soon noticed there were no tomoes; the eyes just had a strange shade of red.

The other was… a werewolf woman wearing medieval metal armor. Another one of the shapechangers? Her body still looked like a human's, but her face was a wolf's: a maw full of razor-sharp teeth on display. Her fur was almost the same color as her armor, dark blue, aside from her hair. She had a full mane of white hair with white stripes of fur coming down to the tip of her nose. Not to mention the evil-looking red eyes, with dark sclera.

Fighting the two and the army of golems was a single woman.

Not tall, fair-skinned, with blonde hair that parted above her forehead. Even from here, I could see — and feel — the diamond-shaped seal on her forehead. She wasn't wearing the haori with the "gamble" spelled on it, and even if I had never seen the woman before, there was no way I'd mistake her for anyone else. Even more so when Tsunade punched one of the golems into the ground, splattering the thing in a single punch and creating a crater the others had to maneuver around and through.

Well, we found Tsunade. No way that was anyone else but her.

Now we just needed to defeat the whole golem army. Easy.

 

[Edifier]

Tsunade! Yay! Whoo.
From one bit of excitement to another.

 

[okashihime]

I had this moment of indecision about what to tackle first: in practical terms, I had to help Tsunade, even if the slug princess might not need it, but I also wanted to keep the people from being taken. The indecision lasted just long enough until I heard Karin's yell.

"Nerugui!"

I looked back. The ferret had escaped Karin's arms and was running toward the fight. What the heck, wasn't it supposed to be a shy pet? Why the hell was it running toward trouble? But this wasn't the time to worry about that. In the moments I stood there trying to decide what to do, Tsunade splattered another golem, and another person was taken.

I had a hunch, maybe from experience, that if we drove away the two leading this attack, we could push the golems back. With one last look at my team, I signed my plans, then dashed forward. Not toward the slug princess – Tsunade could look after herself, more so because the golems didn't bleed – my target was the werewolf woman.

From what I could see of the fight, Tsunade would be fine if I managed to distract one of the two. The werewolf looked more dangerous than the guy with the sword and the werewolf lady. She attacked indiscriminately, while the guy seemed more controlled in his attacks.

Which was fine for me. I flickered forward, threw an explosive among the golems. No civilians were there, and since the golems were not people, there was no need to worry about collateral damage.

The explosion shook the battlefield, pausing the battle for a moment. Like I had intended, all eyes were on me.

"Hey, mangy mutt, I'm gonna kick your ass," I did my best Naruto impersonation. If the sunshine brat could spout nonsense and still come up on top, I could too, right?

My taunt worked, maybe better than I hoped.

The woman howled, the sound buzzing through my bones, then she charged me. "I'll show you who's the mutt."

She was fast. Faster than the bat woman, but for all that, her attacks were wild and more power than form. Which made it easier for me to counter. It was something I had trained against for years while in the academy. How to redirect the enemy's force against them. She made it easier because her attacks were simple. It was strange, but maybe because I was faster and more experienced now, I could see things in my taijutsu that I could improve.

Not to say it wasn't dangerous. The more I dodged, deflected, and hit back, the angrier she became, and wilder her swings. Like the other woman we fought, this one didn't stay down. Stabbing her with a kunai, breaking an arm, plummeting her head did barely more than slow her for a few moments, serving only to make her angrier and consequently, more dangerous.

At some point, we had stopped a few paces from each other. My breathing was somewhat ragged, but I wasn't that tired. The woman pulled her arm back into place, the same arm that I had shattered the bone. Blood spilling from her maw, there were a few kunai stuck to her, blood slowly seeping from the injuries, but for all the animalistic facial features, she looked like she was grinning, an angry, deranged grin.

"I will enjoy breaking you," the woman said.

Behind us, back at the caravan, the battle still raged on. I felt, more than I saw, a lot of explosives going off. It was nice to know my team wasn't pulling their punches either. That and Tsunade's absurd punches, creating craters whenever she hit something.

I didn't want to be hit with that. No, thank you.

"Fugai," a voice cut the stand off. "We have what we need, we're leaving."

"Fuck off, Temujin." Fugai snarled, never taking her eyes off me.

From the corner of my eye, I saw the blond guy carrying an unconscious old man. "Haido-sama won't be happy."

"Fuck off," she growled again.

Temujin just shrugged, then turned to leave.

Why were they taking the old man? Was this whole attack because of him? Somehow, I knew I couldn't let them. If that was their objective, I had to do something.

I prepared to flicker forward, but maybe Fugai was learning from me as much as I was learning from her. Before I could flicker, the woman howled.

It wasn't like the first time. The noise hit me like a sledgehammer. Not enough to stop me from activating the jutsu, but enough that I arrived in a crumpled mess. I couldn't stay standing. My stomach rebelled, and the small lunch I had eaten met the open air.

For a moment, I thought a genjutsu had hit me, but soon I felt liquid flowing from my ears and noticed the constant ringing. A sound attack? I didn't have time to contemplate what was happening. Fugai was on me again, but she had changed. She was now more wolf than woman, with wicked, sharp claws and even bigger fangs. Her armor had disappeared, and she was taller and faster.

She swung at me. I tried to dodge, but my balance was shot. Claws tore gashes on the arms that I barely managed to raise to defend myself.

Fugai didn't let me; she dashed closer, kicked me. I doubled over with the force of the attack, flying until I hit something hard. I felt something give and break. I hadn't regained my bearings when the woman was on me again. Clawed fingers grabbed me by the neck.

Her monstrous mouth moved, but I couldn't hear the words. Her other hand pulled back, and even still dazed and nauseated, I could predict the movement. The claws would rip my guts. I guess I really pissed off Fugai if she wanted to leave me with a gut wound.

Weren't those supposed to be the most painful type of injuries to die from?

Like it was slow motion, I saw the attack coming. But I wasn't defenceless, was I? I could teleport away, but I had another idea.

With Fugai keeping me in place, I didn't need to rely on my disabled senses to find her. Threads exploded from me, wrapping around the monstrous woman. At the same time, a few pushed through her, and I activated Ino's family jutsu. The one used to paralyse others.

The claws were a few centimeters away from my stomach when it stopped. Immediately, I knew I wouldn't be able to keep this forever. The woman was strong, and I hadn't mastered the jutsu, nor was I used to immobilizing people with my threads.

But with all that, I noticed something else. With my threads touching her, I could feel the strange chakra. Most of it was concentrated near her throat. It was there, but it wasn't at the same time.

Before she broke free and gutted me, I gambled. My threads dug inside her throat and pulled the source out. It wasn't difficult. It took just a small amount of effort to dislodge and remove the thing. There was no resistance when it left the woman's body. It was an oval crystalline stone, maybe the size of an egg. Now out in the open, the strange chakra signature was unmistakable.

The effects were immediate. The woman morphed back to a human-looking appearance, still wearing her armor. And all the injuries I had inflicted while she was a wolf were still there.

Fugai's fist collided with my stomach, but it didn't have any force behind it. Her hand let go of my neck, and toppled on top of me, blood splashing on me from her many injuries. Her eyes were vacant, and the last look on her face was a mix of surprise and despair.

I pushed the still bleeding corpse away, tried to stand, but my balance was still not back to normal. I fell back on my behind, unable to walk. I looked back toward the caravan.

It was hard to see when it still felt like the world was spinning around me, but the battle was dying down, with most of the golems defeated or fleeing. I checked on Karin, Ino, and Tenten through my chakra sense. Their reserves had depleted a lot, but they were closer together. Hopefully not hurt.

I looked back at the stone in my hand. Oval-shaped and bluish-green in colour with the appearance of somewhat white bluish tentacles inside it.

Movement from the corner of my eye caught my attention. I looked away from the stone to see the ferret running in the same direction Temujin had fled to.

What the heck.