Kaito Akaden Chapter 146
Kaito body-flickered aside, narrowly avoiding the massive weapon. The toad hopped backward to create distance, but Kaito chased it. When he caught up to the massive toad, he launched chakra chains from his back, binding Gamaken's arm and the sasumata—but he hadn't anchored the chains to the ground, allowing the huge toad to yank him along. Realizing his error, Kaito released the chains and somersaulted onto another tree. He created a shadow clone, and together they used more chakra chains—this time anchoring them to the ground—to restrain Gamaken again, successfully pinning him.
"Gamaken-san," Kaito shouted, "I have no quarrel with you. Please leave. I'm only after that perverted old man on your head."
"I'm sorry," the toad replied. "But I promised to protect him. I can't break my word."
Kaito scowled, preparing to bite his thumb. 'I might have to summon Katsuyu myself…'
Just then, Jiraiya spoke up from atop Gamaken. "It's alright, Gamaken—you can leave."
The giant toad sighed in relief. "If you insist…" He dispelled himself in a huge cloud of white smoke that filled the area.
Kaito immediately sensed Jiraiya's chakra rising, becoming much larger than before.
…
Kaito thought, 'That old man… He's gone into Sage Mode, hasn't he? His chakra feels like it tripled in size.'
He stood on the tree branch, his crimson hair fluttering lightly in the breeze as he waited for the white smoke to clear. He could feel the surge of Jiraiya's chakra—much larger and denser than before.
Narrowing his eyes, Kaito remained on alert for any sudden moves. Kaito thought, 'I need to be careful. I don't know exactly how big a boost his imperfect Sage Mode gives him.'
"Jiraiya boy," croaked Ma in an annoyed tone, "you'd better have a good reason for summoning us! You know I was in the middle of cooking! You always pick the worst possible times to call us." She folded her small arms, a ladle still dripping sauce in one hand. "I even left the stove on. If my house burns down, you're gonna regret it!"
Pa sighed at his partner. "Now, now, Ma. Calm down. I'm sure Jiraiya boy wouldn't summon us unless he really needed us… right, Jiraiya boy?"
Jiraiya was busy clutching his wounded shoulder, where blood slowly dripped through his fingers. He let out a nervous laugh that sounded more like a painful wheeze. "Er… right. Sorry, Ma. Sorry, Pa. You see, I've… gotten myself into a pickle."
Ma gave him a sour look. "A pickle, huh? You're all banged up and bleeding. The enemy must be pretty serious if you had to drag us into this."
Jiraiya glanced at his shoulder, wincing. "It's, uh, not exactly an enemy in the usual sense."
Pa frowned, looking at the blood running over Jiraiya's hand. "Are you sure? That wound looks nasty. I could've sworn you'd only call us if you were truly cornered."
Jiraiya cleared his throat and tried to put on a casual grin, though the pain made it difficult. "I, uh, sort of… it's just that this isn't some typical missing-nin or anything."
Ma huffed, glancing around the smoky clearing. "Well, are you gonna explain, or keep stalling? My stew's gonna be ruined by the time I get home!"
As the smoke fully cleared, Kaito came into view, standing calmly on a tree branch and looking at them.
'So I was right,' Kaito thought, noticing the deeper lines around Jiraiya's eyes and the orange pigmentation that often came with Sage Mode. 'He's in Sage Mode… I didn't think he needed them to enter it. I thought he only used them against Pain to help maintain Sage Mode for a longer time.'
Kaito, seeing Jiraiya's shoulder, noted that it had stopped bleeding. He thought, And his injury… It must be the passive healing and durability buff that Sage Mode gives.
Down below, Ma finally noticed Kaito. She squinted in his direction. "Where's the enemy, Jiraiya boy? I only see some kid standing up there."
Jiraiya forced another laugh. "Er, that's the kid I was telling you about, Ma. He's the one who gave me this wound."
There was a brief pause. Then Ma's eyes widened in annoyance. "You summoned us to fight a child?!"
Pa, the older male toad perched on Jiraiya's other shoulder, raised a webbed hand. "Let him explain, Ma. The boy might be stronger than he looks. Jiraiya's injured, too. But, Jiraiya boy, why are you even fighting some young lad from Konoha?"
Ma tilted her head at Kaito. "He does look kinda familiar… Maybe I've seen him somewhere before. Jiraiya, what exactly happened to get you injured like that?" She narrowed her eyes, looking from the wound in Jiraiya's shoulder to Kaito on the branch.
Wincing, Jiraiya mumbled, "It was a misunderstanding, okay? The kid wants to kill me, but I tried to leave. He wasn't having it. I, uh… need you both to distract him a bit so I can slip away."
Pa looked puzzled. "If that's all you wanted—to run away—why didn't you just use reverse summoning to get back to Mount Myoboku?"
"Reverse summoning…?" Jiraiya blinked, looking like a lightbulb had just turned on in his head. "I, uh… didn't think of that."
Hearing that, Kaito couldn't hold in his anger any longer. He raised his voice from the tree branch. "A misunderstanding? A misunderstanding?!" His eyes blazed as he repeated the words. "You never visited us once after my dad died! You called yourself Naruto's godfather—something you asked to be! But you never showed up for him, not even once. You never checked on him, never looked after him. If my mom and I hadn't survived the Nine-Tails attack, you would've left Naruto all alone. You would've abandoned him!"
Kaito remembered how, in another timeline, Jiraiya basically abandoned Naruto, who ended up living by himself, becoming the village outcast, and being manipulated by Hiruzen. That was one of the reasons why he disliked Jiraiya.
"And then you show up," Kaito shouted, "and the first thing you did was go to the hot springs to spy on my mom and her friends?! You call that a misunderstanding?"
Jiraiya's shoulders sagged. "It's not like that, kid…"
Kaito ignored him and turned his attention to the two toad sages. "Fukasaku-sama, Lady Shima, I've got no quarrel with either of you," he said, doing his best to be respectful. "Please leave him to me. I only want Jiraiya. I'm going to teach him a lesson he won't forget."
Kaito reached into his pouch and pulled out six tri-pronged kunai, then threw them around. As he threw them, they multiplied into hundreds, scattering all over the clearing.
Jiraiya, seeing this, tensed and thought, 'That kunai… The kid knows Hiraishin. This is bad, and his face turned serious.'
At this, Ma's mouth fell open. She clutched the ladle tighter, glaring at Jiraiya. "You did what?! Jiraiya boy, didn't we teach you any manners? You're peeping on women again?"
Jiraiya's face turned red. He tried to cover it by coughing into his hand. "It's not like that—I… I didn't know it was her!"
A loud whack! echoed through the clearing as Ma produced a gigantic wok pan from thin air and slammed it over Jiraiya's head. "That's no excuse, ya big idiot!"
"Argh!" Jiraiya stumbled, clutching his head. Blood still oozed from his shoulder, but now he was wincing more from Ma's blow than from the wound. "Ma, cut it out…!"
"It serves you right," she snapped. "Can't believe we taught you all those ninjutsu, only for you to stoop to peeping."
While Ma continued scolding Jiraiya, Pa turned to Kaito with a curious look. "Lad, how do you know our names? I don't think we've met before."
Kaito blinked, not expecting this to happen, then said, "Um… My dad learned Senjutsu from you. He told me about you both."
Pa's eyes widened. "Your dad was our student… Wait a minute." He took a closer look, his wrinkled face softening with realization. "You must be Minato's older son… Kaito. Yes, that's it. You have his face, only with your mother's hair color."
Ma, hearing this, seemed to switch her scowl from Jiraiya to concern for Kaito. "Oh, so you're Minato's tadpole," she said, her voice losing some of its harshness. Then she glared back at Jiraiya. "That's disgraceful! You spied on Minato-chan's wife—your own student's wife! You deserve every bruise you get!"
She whacked him over the head again, this time with enough force to knock him to the ground. Jiraiya fell with a loud thud, sending dust billowing around him. Both Ma and Pa hopped away to land a short distance in front of him. They looked down at Jiraiya as if unsure whether to be disappointed or furious.
"Ow! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Jiraiya yelped from the ground, rolling onto his back. "I wasn't there to—look, I didn't know it was Kushina—"
Pa shook his head. "I'm really disappointed in you, Jiraiya boy. You've crossed the line this time."
Ma grabbed Jiraiya by the ear, twisting it until he yowled in pain. "Apologize to the lad right now. We thought we taught you proper manners, but it looks like you forgot them."
"S-sorry, kid!" Jiraiya managed to say, his voice strained by the pull on his ear. "I won't do it again, I promise!"
Up in the branches, Kaito watched with an odd mix of surprise and confusion. He felt like he was seeing a comedy show. Ma and Pa didn't seem to be on Jiraiya's side at all; if anything, they were more annoyed with him than willing to help him fight.
Kaito thought, 'Here I thought I could test myself against him in Sage Mode.' He couldn't help feeling a bit let down. Part of him had wanted to see how he stacked up against Sage Jiraiya.
From what he knew, base Jiraiya was relative to Orochimaru and was stronger than old man Hiruzen during the Konoha Crush. Not to mention Orochimaru had been holding back in that fight. Sage Jiraiya would be on a whole different level, probably above prime Hiruzen and War Arc Hiruzen. Kaito had been curious to compare his current strength to that power.
Kaito sighed, raising his voice again. "Lady Shima, Lord Fukasaku, let me handle this. I promise I'll make sure he doesn't peep on anyone ever again once I'm done with him." To make his point, he took out a kunai, letting it shine in the last rays of the evening sun. He didn't plan to kill Jiraiya, but he wanted to make sure the Sannin felt some real fear.
Ma sized Kaito up. She seemed about ready to let him proceed, but then Jiraiya—who had reverted to his normal form, no longer maintaining Sage Mode—jumped to his feet in desperation.
"Come on, kid, I said I'm sorry! Cut me some slack," Jiraiya pleaded. "I promise I won't do it again! Just this once, let's forget all about it. I'll even let you sign the Toad Summoning Contract, like your father did. You'd get along great with Gamabunta, Gamahiro, and the others, I'm sure. It's a good deal, right?"
Kaito hopped down from the branch, landing lightly on his feet. He tucked his kunai away. "No thanks," he said coolly. "I'm already a summoner with the Shikkotsu Forest."
Jiraiya's eyes went wide with shock. "Wait. Tsunade let you sign the slug contract?"
Pa piped up, "Well, that's a shame. You would have been a good toad summoner like Minato. It would've been nice to train you in Senjutsu the same way we trained your father."
Ma rolled her eyes, then whacked Jiraiya on the head again. "See what you did? Now he's not our summoner, all because of your foolishness!"
Jiraiya groaned, rubbing his sore head once more. "Give me a break, Ma. It's not like I forced him away from the toads. I just—" He cut himself off with a sigh.
Pa turned to Kaito. "So, lad, is there anything we can do to make this easier on you so you don't have to… finish off Jiraiya boy? He did train your father, after all."
Ma folded her arms, her large eyes fixed on Kaito. "Yes, if there's something we can do, let us know. As for Jiraiya, I'll make sure he learns his lesson when we get back to Mount Myoboku."
Kaito took a long breath, picking his words carefully. Part of him still burned with anger, but another part realized this might be the best chance he'd get to ask for something else he needed. "Yes," he said at last, "there is something I need help with. I think you two might be able to assist me."
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