❝𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑺𝒂𝒈𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝑲𝒐𝒏𝒐𝒉𝒂❞

𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓 28: 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑪𝒂𝒍𝒎

"You're getting careless again."

The raven haired man gracefully sidestepped the much less graceful thrust of his blonde counterpart. He parried the blow and delivered a fierce knee to his partner's gut to remind him of who he was fighting. The blonde grunted and attempted to create space between them with a vicious upward slash. Once again the blonde's plan backfired when he felt a powerful hand twist his sword wielding wrist. The sudden pain that only accompanies a broken wrist caused him to drop his sword with a heated yelp of pain. Before he could retaliate the black eyed man brought the point if his sword to rest near the blue eyed man's vulnerable throat.

"God dammit Sasuke! I asked you to help me improve my sword fighting skills, not break a bone every chance you get! I agreed to no abilities but if you wanna play this way I'll kick your ass all around Konoha Teme!" The blue eyed man gingerly held his wrist in place while his jade eyed love healed the newly broken appendage.

"Shut up, Naruto. You wanted to learn kenjutsu so I'm doing just that. But given your...different...fighting style and your hands on learning style, I'd say its safe to throw in ninjutsu. Just don't cry when I beat you Dobe."

The medic finished quickly with the help of the natural healing abilities of the injured boy. Making her way out of the danger zone her annoyance flared remembering she had plans for them. A cocky Naruto smirked and was about to reply with a taunt to his friend when Sakura shouted back over her shoulder, "don't hurt each other too much. I still have plans that require me having energy and Naruto being in one piece."

Sasuke was dumbfounded by the fact that the normally well spoken Sakura would say something like that out loud. Lost in his surprise, he didn't notice Naruto's outstretched hand until it was too late.

Sakura removed the kunai from Naruto's knee and the three shuriken from Sasuke's left and right arms. For each tool she removed she would hit them on their heads much to baby Minato's delight.

"You two bakas just HAD to get carried away didn't you?!" Pull, drop, hit.

"You always get carried away when you two train!" Pull, drop, hit.

"I mean seriously! You destroyed three damn training grounds! THREE!" Crack, pop, hit.

"AND YOU DID IT ALL WHEN A BABY WAS HERE!" Smack, smack, punch.

"Ouch!" Both simultaneously rubbed the newly forming bruises on their already battered cheeks while sheepishly looking anywhere but at the furious pinkette above them. Said pinkette glared at each of them with such intensity that even Tsunade herself would've cringed. The angry woman waited for a response from either of them all the while watching the hand signals they foolishly tried to conceal. As soon as she saw them move to leap into action, she grabbed Naruto's arm while barely missing Sasuke's quick leg.

"Go on without me! Make sure everyone knows I died a hero!" Naruto shouted at Sasuke's retreating form. He waited for some form of a hit or a smack but instead felt her tight grip release from his arm.

"You're not dying. No instead you're just not getting the surprise I had planned," she smiled and turned to begin walking away, baby carrier safely strapped to her back with sweet Minato fast asleep inside.

"Wha- No wait, Sakura-chan! Please let me make it up to you. Pleeeeeeeeease!" He did his best puppy dog eyes and was rewarded with a response.

"Bring Sasuke back and I'll think about it." She began slowly counting down from ten.

Naruto nodded furiously and turned in Sasuke's direction. He heard Sakura say zero just as a purple Susanoo came into existence.

"Daaaaaaamn!"

Jiraiya gazed upon the sight before him in pure horror. Never before had he seen such a vast number of people slaughtered by such a small group. He had been following rumors of an organization hiring mercenaries to build an army for something sinister. This pack of monsters was made of several powerful individuals who were reported to have strange eyes. After following the rumors and the sporadic leaks of information from his network he had closed the distance and was just under a day behind them. Earlier he had seen smoke rising and rushed towards the location to find this atrocity glaring back at him, it marred his soul in a way it hadn't been since the war.

Not a single structure was left standing in this once vibrant town. All throughout the area corpses litter the ground and blended with the rubble. Many were burnt beyond recognition and the ones who escaped the flames all shared one gruesomely puzzling similarity: they were all very recently decapitated. Yet despite this, the heads were nowhere to be found among the carnage. He was about to continue on when he heard a terrified scream. A very close shriek that sounded as though it was coming from the nearby forest. Jiraiya ran as fast as his muscular legs could carry him and soon stumbled across a clearing with a lone woman surrounded by dozens of bodies all face down in the green grass.

However, it was the woman that had Jiraiya's full attention. He knew this woman. In fact...

she was his spy master.

"I'm sorry Jiraiya-sama!" she cried just as a sword punched through the back of her skull and out her open mouth.

"An annoying one, she was," Tenzou quipped as he removed his bladed from the limp body of the dead spy master. He moved causally, as if he was just done training, "but she did play you like a flute. Your spies were very good at what they did. Sadly, I'm better at finding things to use as leverage."

Jiraiya had long since recognized the bodies as the remains of his delicate spy network. Reluctantly, he had also realized that he had already lost this fight before it even started. His foe was another user of the legendary Rinnegan, like two of his best students were. Having seen the power of the Rinnegan first hand, he knew he had to use Sage Mode if he wanted to make it out of the clearing with his life.

"Oh and Jiraiya-sama," Tenzou looked straight at Jiraiya and smiled with sick glee, "Kabuto wants your body intact, mostly."

Jiraiya flooded his feet with chakra to counteract the pull and activated a shortened form of Sage Mode. As soon as the pull stopped he charged.

Naruto felt the presence at the last second before the knock sounded softly on the wooden entrance of his home. He walked to the door and opened it just in time to see the light leave Jiraiya's only remaining eye