"We are being followed."
The muted browns and greens of the forest blur around us as we sprint forward at top speed. The wind screams in my ears. I scowl.
"We can make it to the finish line before they catch up."
I squint through the haze of wildlife into the distance for the hundredth time in the last five minutes, searching for the end of the task. The northern end of the forest, they said. It can't be much farther, can it? We've already covered so much ground.
"… We do not know where the finish line is."
"Shut up Samui, we can do this."
It's been a few hours since we grabbed our Honor scroll and started running, and about ten minutes since I first noticed the shinobi pursuing us. Going on my brief bird's eye view of the forest and stopping for minimal breaks, we've covered a respectable distance. I had even begun to hope that we'd gotten out of the danger zone that I'd created with the unintended backlash of the Great Breakthrough.
Samui figured it out the same time as I did, glancing up and to the left of us at one of the pursuers with a narrowed gaze, but up until now she had kept quiet while I desperately searched for a sign that we were at least close to the end. Just waiting to see if the big dumb Konoha genin could pick up on it by himself, I bet.
Fortune is not shining on me today, though. There's still no signs of the finish line, which might be because I don't know what the finish line even is, and the enemy genin are gaining on us. God, but we're so close. We got the other scroll, we agreed not to kill each other, and I proved that I'm not useless in combat like Samui thought I was.
Is it too much to ask that we finish this stupid task on a good note? Like not being maimed. Or killed.
"They're going to catch us in the next five minutes, if that," Samui says.
"I love your optimism, Samui," I growl, bouncing off a tree branch and twisting in midair to fit through two tangled ones up ahead. I guess there's no helping it. We're going to have to figure something out, depending on how many genin are following us. Joy.
"I would be more optimistic of our chance of escape if you knew the Body Flicker," My partner replies, the disdain practically dripping from her mouth. Man do I hate being looked down on.
I open my mouth to issue a witty and/or scathing retort, but find myself dodging to the side instead as a shinobi lands in front of me. I ram into a different tree, grabbing hold of a branch and hanging. I watch as Samui is forced to veer off as well when another shinobi blocks her path, followed by another shinobi, and another, and another.
I crane my head around, counting out the genin one by one and trying not to cry.
Six. Six genin. We are so unbelievably fucked.
"Well, well, well," The genin that cut me off drawls. He's sporting close cropped brown hair and dark blue eyes, and he's decked out in red shinobi gear with the Iwa headband to match. He grins at me, and it definitely isn't a nice grin. "Looks like we lucked out. Five days to spare and we already found one of the Konoha brats."
I look around again, counting headbands this time. Six Iwa nin. Even better.
"Which scrolls do you need?" Samui suddenly asks from her spot on a tree branch, surrounded by enemy genin. When Blue Eyes doesn't answer, opting to bore holes in my head with said eyes, she continues. "We have several extras that we can give to you without resorting to-"
"Quiet. I'll get to you and your tits in a second, Kumo girl," Blue Eyes says, waving her off. "First there are some things that need to be settled between us and your partner over here."
"What things?" I ask, starting up a loop for another Great Breakthrough. If I time it just right I should be able to hit at least four of them, which might be enough of an opening for us to get the hell out of here. As long as I can stall him with an explanation. Please let me stall him with an explanation.
"The headband you're wearing, and your face." His grin becomes downright vicious. "The Yondaime Hokage killed all of our parents, you see, and you look kind of like him. So I think we're going to do a little venting on you, if that's cool."
Then without another word he lunges at me.
I immediately let go of the branch, falling down towards the ground a painful distance below, focusing on the loop in my throat. I won't be able to hit four of them now, but if I'm smart about it I might still be able to nail three. Two at least.
A different shinobi slams into me, knocking me into a tree and disrupting the loop. My eyes fly wide open in panic and I hurriedly eject it from my mouth with a serpent seal. Not a second after it flies out of my mouth it explodes, hitting me right in the face and sending me spiraling away from the tree I just got thrown against.
I howl. "I hate Iwa nin!"
I land on the ground in a tangle of limbs and pain. I grit my teeth, bracing myself against the earth and pushing off, spinning away right before Blue Eyes drops down on the spot with a brutal leg drop. I pull my tanto free, bringing it up to block as the other genin descends on me with some sort of staff in his hands.
I hop back after a brief clash, mind racing. I need to find a way to get off a Great Breakthrough and take these two out, and fast. Samui isn't going to last long against those other four shinobi.
Blue Eyes allows me to make some distance and then begins to form hand seals. I tense up, ready to dodge for all I'm worth, but instead of spikes or pillars or anything like that the ground beneath his begins to rumble. Two hands reach out of the ground on either side of him, followed by two more hands, and finally two more Blue Eyes pulls themselves out of the dirt.
Mud clones. Really, really durable, and really, really stupid. I can work with that.
All three Blue Eyes rush forward as one, with the other genin close behind. I hold my tanto out in front of me and breathe deep, Hatake's voice echoing in my head.
The purpose of this kenjutsu style is almost identical to your taijutsu style. Dodge, deflect, and keep away. Anything to keep your opponents from touching you. And in turn, pull, attract, and draw towards. Anything to throw your opponent off balance and bring you within striking distance. There are no dances for this fighting style. It is not elegant. It's purpose is plain and simple:
To avoid as much damage as possible while dealing dirty damage.
Blue Eyes himself is the first to reach me, as his clones are slower than him by their elemental nature and the other guy is plain slower. He wails on me with a kunai in each hand, doing his best to smack my sword right out of my hands. Each of his strikes glances off my blade, and I allow him to push me back step by step as I deflect the blows.
The other genin arrives next, staff in hand, and I find myself spinning and ejecting wind chakra from near every tenketsu in my efforts to keep both weapons away. Then the earth clones enter the fray, and it becomes straight chaotic.
I feel shallow cuts being opening up on my arms and torso from the three Blue Eyes and their kunai, along with bruises forming where the other genin whacks me with his staff.
I'm beginning to see doubles from all the spinning when I spot an opportunity, and lunge for it.
One of the earth clones tries to grab me up in a bear hug and I juke around it before it has time to register what happened. Blue Eyes and the other mud clone converge on me in a pincer attack and after a split second of doubt I dodge away from Blue Eyes, taking the kunai from the mud clone in my right thigh. Seething pain erupts from the wound, and I almost stumble.
The genin with the staff staggers back, shouting in alarm as I sprint towards him. He raises his staff and I swing as hard as I can at it, knocking it clean out of his hands with a burst of wind. Then I twist, spin, and slash my tanto across his throat.
He drops like a sack of bricks, and outrage appears in Blue Eyes' blue eyes. The Iwa genin snarls, flashing through seals again and slamming his foot into the ground, prompting two more earth clones to claw their way out of the ground.
I take a step back on my good leg, yanking his kunai out of the other and wondering if that gambit was even worth it. Blue Eyes charges forward with his gang of clones not far behind, hurling all sorts of Konoha-themed obscenities at me.
Yeah, I probably should have gone for this guy instead.
As soon as we clash again it becomes painfully clear that I'm not going to be able to dodge for long with my injured leg.
I can still fight on it, thank god, but it's losing blood fast and getting more and more agonizing to put weight on by the second. I duck under a lethargic slash from one of the earth clones and juke aside from another's axe kick. If only the original were as slow as these guys.
...
Don't forget to write a review and throw power stones for the story :)
...
if you want to read ahead of the public release you can join my p atreon :
p atreon.com/CarriePoppins