Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto nor The Gamer. I own nothing, really.
Chapter 30
I would like to say that as the madman in front of me threw one of the Seven Swords of the Mist straight towards me, I kept a clear head and thought of a plan to fight him.
Sadly, that wasn't the case.
Instead, what happened was that my head screamed at me to get out of the way, and since I was held up in the air by the cutting wire of Nuibari, there was only one way for me to move. I pulled myself up with my right arm, making the steel thread tighten its hold on my forearm. Yet another shot of pain traveled through my body, but I took solace in the fact that the sword had clearly missed me, flying by and piercing through the tree behind me.
"Tch, stubborn lost puppy," The man grumbled before he pulled on the thread that he held on his other hand to bring the Nuibari back to him.
I wasn't having any of that though.
Gulping down, I mentally called for the only jutsu that I could think of to get me out of this situation.
A second later, a ball of fire escaped my mouth and splashed against the branch that held the wire, and thus me. Once I touched the floor, I let out a breath that was midway from a sigh to a groan. I also deactivated the weight seals on my clothes. I really didn't need those dragging me down right that moment.
'Now, I only need to-'
"You are not out of the woods yet, puppy!"
My eyes widened and I instinctively used the Lightning Flicker to the side. As I stopped, I took a deep breath in and then let it out, trying to regain a modicum of calm so that I could fight the bastard properly. Unfortunately for me, the man wasn't having any of that, clicking his tongue he pulled on the wire again, this time making the sword fly in an arc instead of straight back at him. I was barely fast enough to not have my head separated from my body as the blade flew past where I had been standing.
"Will you stand still, damnit!"
'This battle isn't looking good,' I thought to myself as my brain worked overtime trying to come up with a strategy against the man. That I knew nothing about him aside from his use of Nuibari wasn't helping, neither was the fact that he wasn't letting me have even a second to myself. Understandable, but bad nonetheless.
'Ok, fuck this. One of the Seven Swordsmen, unofficial or not, is very above my paygrade,' I decided, steeling my resolve to do something that I had tried not to for the longest time. Not hide my system. Dying wasn't worth that, obviously, and having a disadvantage such as an injured arm was compelling enough to force my hand.
Mentally calling for the inventory screen, I tried to push the wire connected to my arm inside. I could only stare in horror as the screen completely ignored what I was trying to do. Panicking, I used another Flicker just in time to avoid another throw.
"You are starting to annoy me, lost puppy," The man threatened.
I ignored him as I tried to come up with something else quickly. Then I remembered the man's words from before.
"So long as I channel chakra into it, it'll be stronger, sharper, and nobody can mess with it but me."
'Ok, let's test that,' I thought as I tried to channel my own chakra on the threat to try and counter his.
[New Skill Acquired: Chakra Flow: Lightning Lvl 1]
I flickered away before calling the screen to check.
[Chakra Flow: Lightning – Lvl 1
Technique with which the user can channel elemental chakra into weapons to grant them special enhancements.
Increases the cutting power of the weapons affected by 5%.
Weapons have a 5% chance of causing numbness on contact.
Consumption – 10 Chakra Points per second.]
I grimaced. I hoped those effects wouldn't affect me in this case. I seemed to be safe from the numbness effect, but the cutting… was difficult to tell, honestly. He didn't seem affected by it either though, but I kept the skill up, just in case I could take the 'control' of the blade from him.
'In the meantime, how do I deal with this guy?' I thought, doing my best to push aside the pain from my right arm and dodging the sword once more.
"That's it, I'm tired of you!" He shouted, clearly having enough of this little game we had been playing. 'It was good while it lasted,' I thought to myself as I saw him take the blade once more, this time charging at me instead of throwing. Right when he was about to hit me though, I used Substitution with a broken branch nearby.
Instantly, I placed a Basic Mirage on the man and threw out a pair of Sparkling Shuriken at him. His response was a sneer as he blocked both of them with his sword.
"Really, puppy? Shining toys? That's all you got?" He asked more annoyed than anything else. I flickered away, even though he hadn't even done anything yet. "Are you only good at runni-?"
I let out a small smirk as his mocking question was interrupted by an exploding tag. I had thrown that with a kunai hidden both by the Basic Mirage and the distraction provided by the shurikens. I quickly pulled out the Fuuma Shuriken that I had stored inside my inventory and threw it with a Flashing Shuriken.
I clicked my tongue as the man vanished in a cloud of smoke. 'Substitution, most likely,' I deduced.
Once I found him, I had to suppress a small smirk. There was a nick in his cheek. Now, normally, that wouldn't be much, especially with how crappy my situation was. But that little cut was enough to make the guy bleed. And if he was bleeding, then Bloodhound was active, and I was happy with any and every buff I could get.
"You little piece of shit, I'm gonna gut you like the fucking dog you are!"
'I got upgraded to a dog?' I thought idly while keeping my eyes trained on the man. A second later, I gulped as our surroundings started to get covered in mist. 'Hidden Mist Jutsu, or whatever the hell it's called? Wasn't this guy supposed to be a random person that got his hands on the sword? Was our info wrong?' I wondered worriedly as I lost sight of the man.
"I hope you are ready, stupid dog," I heard from everywhere and nowhere.
Not liking my chances, I used the flicker towards where he had been staying when he used the jutsu. It was a gamble, but everywhere else was equally unsafe, really, so I took it. Fortunately for me, he wasn't there. Quickly, I took out several shuriken that had a string of ninja wire connecting them and threw them around, hoping that one would get the bastard. If so then-
I heard him click his tongue and I immediately unleashed Stunning Thread on it.
"Agh, motherfucker!" Once I pinpointed his location, I threw a kunai with an exploding tag on it. I wasn't sure how accurate I had been, but I couldn't second guess myself. I needed to get the upper hand or I was screwed. I was still bleeding out through my arm so every second counted.
When I heard him scream after the explosion, I quickly took out a kunai from my inventory. Wrapping Nuibari's thread around the handle, I gripped it in my right hand. That should prevent any tugs that the madman did from further increasing the damage on my forearm, at the very least. I also wrapped a bandage around my hand, more to keep the grip steady than to treat anything. I didn't have much strength on it to hold the kunai. Hopefully, that would be enough.
Then I decided that I didn't much like the silence that surrounded me, and Flickered towards another place. I needed to keep moving or else I would be screwed. I was sure of that. The problem with that strategy was that I was also burning through my Chakra reserves-
[Chakra Flow: Lightning has gone up a level.]
'That's good,' Noted absentmindedly before sighing and calling for my status screen. I needed to check my chakra reserves.
[Chakra Points: 275/555]
'Half my chakra, and I haven't even done that much to him… this is bad,' I summarized.
"I got you, little dog!" I heard and, a split second later, I saw the man's shadow appear right behind me.
'Running, Free Running, Intermediate Taijutsu,' I activated mentally and turned around to kick him. My eyes widened in surprise and horror as I saw my foot pass right through him. 'Dissipation!' I called out this time, and the shadow disappeared, revealing a grinning man right in front of me with his arm up holding Nuibari. The blade came down like a guillotine, intent on splitting me right in the middle.
I jumped back, but clearly I wasn't fast enough since I felt the thing cut through my right cheek. At the moment, I couldn't have told you if the cut was shallow or not, since I didn't have the time to check and the pain contest was still being won by my right arm. Still, I couldn't come out of the exchange on the losing side, and quickly sent another kick to his stomach, this time connecting.
"Uf, the dog has fang's, hu-?" I interrupted him by burying a kunai in his arm.
He could continue talking if he wanted to. It just gave me more time. He evidently expected me to be more scared and use some hit and run tactics. He was dead wrong though.
"Oh, shit!" He shouted as a small fireball flew towards him and he vanished in a cloud of smoke.
I took a deep breath in.
[Chakra Flow: Lightning has gone up a level.]
Instantly dismissing the screen. I tried to find where the fucker was. Giving up, I sighed internally as I flickered to the side. Then I pulled out a handful of shuriken from my inventory and sent a volley of them as spread out as I could, hoping against hope that one would hit. My body was already growing tired… or maybe it was better to say that blood loss was taking its toll on me.
My limbs felt heavier than normal, even more so than with the weight seals on. I also could still hear the distant explosions that signaled Anko's fight. This battle couldn't go on for much long-
A kick snapped me from my thoughts as the air got knocked out of my lungs and my body was sent flying until I hit a tree. As fast as I could, I Flickered to the side, misstepping and ending up rolling on the ground a good deal. Regardless of that though, I was happy with the outcome as I heard Nuibari pierce through the tree I had been sent against.
As I stood back up, an idea formed in my mind and I looked at my right hand, still pitifully holding the kunai with the wire wrapped around. Without a second of doubt, I pulled out another and did the same thing. This time though, I held it tightly in my other hand.
"Hey, mad bastard!" I called out, a grin forming on my face. I flickered back, away from the man and as far as I could manage. "Let's get out of the mist, shall we?!" I shouted, Flickering again.
This time, I appeared outside the jutsu. But I didn't stop there, no, I Flickered again, straight away from where the thread connected. The wire tugged back stubbornly but I ignored it and Flickered again, putting as much strength as possible in it.
Then I Flickered straight back.
I wanted to cackle as I saw the man flying in the air, clearing having been pulled by the steely string. I pulled out my tanto from my Inventory and slashed at him midair before he could recover. I got him on the thigh, and a pained scream had never sounded so good to me.
[Bloodlust has gone up a level.]
I ignored the screen.
"Where the hell did you pull that sword from?" The man questioned, finally having regained his footing, even if he was leaning on his right leg due to the cut on the other.
"Not grinning so much now, are you?" I asked instead of answering, a smirk growing on my face.
"When I get my hands on you, fucking mutt," The man growled. "You and that annoying bitch. I'll make you watch as we enjoy ourselves. But not before I cut off all your limbs. You better believe me, stupid dog. Because I will."
My smirk froze right on my face.
[Bloodlust has gone up a level.]
'Threatening my sensei, are you?'
"And I'm sure someone else will be sent against us," My expression turned to stone as the bastard continued talking. "I hope there are some girls in the next batch too. Wouldn't want it to be boring."
[Bloodlust has gone up a level.]
"I hope they are your friends too, stupid dog."
Anko's words replayed in my mind.
"And the team that would get the mission afterwards would be Team 7."
[Bloodlust has gone up a level.]
"Just die already..." I muttered.
"Huh? I didn't hear you, dog!" The man spat out. "If you think this scratch will bring me down you are delirious from the blood loss, mutt! I know you are going to run out of chakra eventually. You think I didn't notice how you've been trying to push my chakra out of Nuibari's thread? I'm a fucking Jounin, puppy, you won't win that battle."
"So, what you are saying is that you went easy on me?" I raised a questioning eyebrow at the man, taking a deep breath to try and get my mind to work properly. The weariness was getting worse. 'Jounin? That wasn't on the file…'
"Sure was," The man snarled at me. "You think just anyone can carry one of the Seven? You Leaf ninja think too highly of yourselves. Especially thinking you can just step into something that's none of your business."
'Was this whole thing about the Civil War and what the Leaf was doing?' I wondered.
"But my partner and I will teach you. You, and whoever else comes for us," He spat out.
"You sure about that?" I asked, my voice calm and collected. Nothing like my inner thoughts.
"Oh? Confident are we? You really must have lost a lot of blood."
"No, it's just that your head is overinflated," I countered easily.
"Huh?"
"You really, really shouldn't have threatened my sensei like that," I pointed out. "And you really shouldn't have said that about the next batch either. You see, I'm very protective of those guys."
"Are you out of your mind, mutt?" He asked, this time looking honestly confused.
"A little bit," The immediate answer seemed to take him by surprise. "But that's what dying does to a man."
"What the fuck are you- Agh!" His question was interrupted by a shock reaching his arm, making him drop Nuibari.
[Bloodlust has gone up a level.]
[Chakra Flow: Lightning has gone up a level.]
"One of the first rules about fighting," I said conversationally as I pulled on the steel thread and got Nuibari to travel back to me. The Jounin looked in absolute bafflement at the weapon. I also took that moment to turn off Chakra Flow. "Never underestimate your opponent."
"What the hell did you do?" He asked, somewhere between incredulous and afraid.
"I coated all my weapons in poison," I explained, sparing a glance at the legendary weapon in my left hand. It was beautiful now that I saw it up close and it wasn't being used to fight against me. "It won't do much to you per se. But it'll screw over your chakra control," I added with a lazy smirk.
"If you think I need a weapon or chakra to fight a fucking kid, you have another thing com-" The sound of electricity filled the forest for a second and the man's voice went silent.
He, himself, stood there, mouth opening and closing with his tongue moving. However, no sound escaped his lips. Instead, a second later, the man coughed blood as his hands went to his throat that now sported a deep slash across it, almost reaching his spine.
"No weapon, no chakra control and an overinflated head," I commented, my face turning into a bored expression. "Really easy fight, if you ask me."
I had half expected him to turn to me with fear in his eyes, or anger. Either of the two would have made sense. The complete surprise in them though, was almost funny to me.
"You know," I continued talking, my eyes going back to Nuibari, now coated in the blood of its formed wielder. "I expected my first kill to feel different. I expected to feel remorse, guilt or any such thing. Maybe even feel happy that I had dealt with a dangerous person or whatever… Instead, I feel nothing. Does that make me a monster?"
The man's eyes started losing the light in them.
[Quest Complete: Kill your first person.
Rewards:
+ 5 Bloodlust Levels
+ Perk: Beast of Prey]
[Bloodlust has been Maxed.]
[New Perk Acquired: Unnerving Presence]
[Bloodlust (Active) – Maxed
Projects the user's desire to kill, maim or hurt onto the target or targets. The effect increases with level.]
[Beast of Prey
The user's stats increase by 10% when facing a weaker or injured foe.]
[Unnerving Presence
Targets of Bloodlust weaker or equal to the user have their stats reduced by 10%.]
The distant sound of explosions pulled my attention from the screens. I turned towards the general direction they were coming from, my expression devoid of emotions. Then I turned towards the dead man.
"..." At that moment, I felt like I should have said something.
In the end, I just turned around and left.
[}-o-{]
Anko PoV
'And I thought this mission was going to be bad,' I couldn't help but think to myself. 'I had no idea.'
The whole thing had been cursed, it had to be. Or maybe it was me, or Eiji, that were just cursed to bad luck. Knowing my track record, I was inclined to believe it was me.
How else could one explain this whole mess? Not only had we been forced into this mission, but the whole thing had been set up by the opposing side of the Mist civil war. These two supposedly random guys with swords turned out to be official Jounin of the Mist. How in the hell had both of them escaped the intelligence of the other side of the Mist and Konoha's, I had no idea. And it certainly wasn't the moment to question that.
I was kind of busy dealing with the wielder of one of the Seven Swords and a bunch of mercenaries that they seemed to have roped in the whole thing. 'As if it wasn't enough of a pain in my ass already, right?' Some of them even knew jutsu, for Kami's sake. Granted, they weren't even on the level of Genin, but there was something to be said about quantity over quality. And the wielder was not a weakling, even if he was no match for me in one on one.
'Maybe they were being trained to be Swordsmen and that's why they weren't known?' I considered for a split second as I dodged Cannon Fodder 5's attack. 'He looks kind of young, so, maybe...'
I could only click my tongue in annoyance as I considered my options to deal with this bunch of idiots. The lot of them had taken me by surprise. After all, Eiji and I had been tracking two people, not however many people this were. And so, I now had a useless left arm after being a little too close to the exploding sword at the start. That reduced my options a good deal.
That and the fact that they were attacking relentlessly, which didn't allow for much room for me to do anything.
'I now know why Eiji is so obsessed with getting to use his jutsu without hand seals,' I thought to myself. 'Ok, enough,' Taking a page out of my student, I pulled out a bunch of kunai with tags on them. 'Let's see how many annoyances escape th-'
An unexpected explosion hit me right from behind, sending me straight towards the axe-like sword, my eyes widening for a second before I used Substitution with a rock on the side. It was fortunate that I had reacted fast enough for it not to get my legs or I would have been in trouble.
'This is bad,' I thought worriedly. 'And Eiji's dealing with the other one, if this guy is to be believed. How did they even-'
"We expected the Leaf to send Jounin after us, so we prepared. This whole place is set up with traps to deal with you. We just had to bring you to the right place. So, just imagine how bad your situation will be once my partner comes," The fat bastard mocked. "Might as well surrender, and if you are good, you might even survive."
I felt my skin crawl at his tone. 'Of course it had to be one of those guys, of fucking course.'
My luck was really the worst.
But his speech had done me a favour, and I had a second to myself. A second that was enough for me to summon a bunch of snakes.
"You know what to do, guys," I said simply as my mind raced trying to come up with a way to take this guy out. The snakes wouldn't do much, they were on the weaker side of the summons after all. The Snake Bastard just had to have the loyalty of all the strong ones, after all.
Before I could come up with anything else, the swordsman hit one of the snakes in the middle with his weapon, having the blast take out a bunch of them in one go. I could only grimace. That had been even less effective than I expected it to be.
"Boss!" One of the mercenaries shouted and the fat Shibuki wielder smirked.
"Seems like my partner dealt with the brat already," I felt the blood drain for my face. Had I gotten Eiji killed? He would have certainly expected me to deal with this one and help him out. Had he died waiting for me? The swordsman slowly approached me, grin firmly in place and I could feel my chances slipping by. I had enough trouble as it was, and with another Swordsman... 'I didn't even get a go at Orochimaru,' I lamented.
It was the shittiest thing in the world. I was about to be killed off by a bunch of nobodies that had only gotten lucky. We had been under equipped because of our information gathering, misinformed by our intelligence and ambushed to boot. One of those could get an A-rank ninja killed, let alone three of them. It didn't excuse anything though. It still left a bitter taste in my mouth. And worst of all, my student would die here too.
"Wait, what?" Another voice asked, and the tone made the fat bastard and me pause. "Why do you have the Boss's-" And whatever the man was going to say was interrupted by the wet noise of a blade cutting flesh.
"The fuck?!" The first mercenary shouted. "Get him!"
And then I heard something that made a smirk come to my face.
The now familiar sound of lightning.
"What the fuck are you smiling at?!" The swordsman demanded, his fat face turning red in anger.
"It's my partner, the one that's coming," I said simply as more screams reached my ears. And that's when he made his mistake. He turned to look at the chaos. "Also, you are distracted," I pointed out and instantly threw a handful of senbon straight into the man's neck. To his credit, he blocked them. He didn't, however, block the ones that had been sent to his legs. And they were poisonous enough to be equally deadly. "The bigger they are," I added to nobody, leaving it at that while the huge body of the swordsman fell to the ground with a loud thud.
"You ok there, sensei?" A voice asked, and I felt an ice cold sensation traveling down my spine. I turned and my face went from smirking to horrified at Eiji's visage.
There stood my student, a steady stream of blood dripping from his right arm, a cut on his cheek looking like a scratch in comparison to the state of the limb. His left hand held the other one of the legendary swords. But the most striking feature in sight were his eyes. I had always thought they were creepy. Nothing like Kurenai's bright ruby-like irises. No, his was a shade darker, more ominous. And I had never been able to quite point out why they were so. But now that there was so much blood around the boy, I knew what those eyes reminded me of.
"If you think that you'll get away from this-" Whatever the mercenary was going to say, nobody knew. He had been taken out instantly with Nuibari piercing straight through his head before being pulled back by the threat.
It was then that I noticed that said ninja wire was connected to Eiji's right arm. It was also then that I realized why said limb was bleeding. He had the wire inside his arm. I felt bilis threaten to come out of my mouth as I realized that Eiji had come all the way over here, and probably even fought against the other swordsman like that.
Even worse was that he didn't seem to notice.
"You can come here and try to attack us," He said, eyes locked on the remaining mercenaries. "and die, or you can just go away."
Of all the things for my student to say. That wasn't what I had expected. Maybe a joke about having to rescue me, or a smirk and a taunt to the mercenary. But his cold words brought a realization to my mind.
Eiji had killed for the first time. Repeatedly.
And looking at him now…
'This might be a problem,' I could help but think as I looked at the usually warm boy growing seemingly colder by the second. The mercenaries, thankfully, were smart enough to run for it.
"Aren't you too young to be a knight in shining armour?" I questioned, somehow managing to hide my nervousness. I was almost unnerved when his eyes turned to me, ice cold and bereft of emotion, and then he opened his mouth to speak… but no sound came out as he moved his jaw up and down. A second later, he fell to the ground like a puppet that had its strings cut.
[} Chapter End {]