A God Amongst Men

A God and the Changes

Naruto stood still at the foot of the mountain, surrounded by trees. His senses stretched out wide as he sensed two people tailing him. He had been minding his own business before this. These people had been tailing him as he walked through the forest. It was interesting. He normally kept track of his movements and sometimes teleported to different places to avoid being followed.

He had never been successfully tailed when he was avoiding detection. Ttoday, someone... No some people had actually managed to catch up to him. Almost as if they knew where he was headed.

''I don't have all day,'' Naruto called out to the two suspects who had stopped after him. Perhaps waiting for him to let his guard down before attacking.

He had important matters to deal within the capital – the Emperor had requested him to do a secret mission. The details were sent to him, as well as the pay. The man really did expect him to succeed with the mission. The upfront payment sent a clear message: under no circumstances was he to fail. The mission had to be completed no matter what.

Naruto wasn't going to fail. He would succeed. He was going to be dealing with mere insects anyway. Success was guaranteed; He was a God amongst men.

In a blur, to figures appeared on both his right and left sides. Naruto recognized them quickly – he had seen them before. That one time he went all Kyuubi.

''Oh my, oh my, I didn't think that I would end up being hunted by the prey.''

Their appearance of course raised a question: how did they know he was going to use this route? His dealings with the King of Fiore were kept a secret and he hadn't told anyone in Fairy Tail that he was going to end up heading to the capital. He'd merely told them he was going to blow off some steam and get some fresh air. They didn't have to know what didn't concern them.

Of course that had brought him Erza's ire. The red haired was angry that he didn't do any missions for the Guild. It wasn't particularly true. He did do missions, just not often as the woman liked of him. Who could blame him though? There weren't any suitable missions for him and Makarov still refused to grant him the ranking of S-class to be able to do the S-rated missions. He was told to wait for the S-class exams or until the Magic Council decides to give him an official ranking.

''Prey? We are your prey?'' Cobra wasn't amused that a nobody thought they were his prey. He didn't allow that to get to him though. His mind focused on the business of the day instead of pursuing needless talk. ''After your little show, we decided that it was best to look for you.''

"Not unexpected," Naruto said, looking up into the sky, instead of either his soon-to-be opponents. "That was a little embarrassing for you and fun to me."

''Our guild master has a proposal for you,'' Racer said, ignoring Naruto's response.

''Join your Guild? No, I will pass,'' Naruto said with a dismissive wave of his hand – he did so nonchalantly.

Despite his nonchalance in the proposal, Naruto's eyes narrowed ever so slightly. He hated how things were going on at this stage. The flow of things wasn't something he had expected. The fact that they were willing to give him a chance to join them meant that they had obtained information about him. Intel that has made him much more attracting to them. That just told Naruto that someone else had pulled the strings here. If they hadn't found any Intel, they wouldn't have chosen to talk, they would have outright attacked him without a word. He had embarrassed them with that sneak attack.

''I see,'' Cobra said, as if the rebuff had been expected. ''Let's do this Racer.''

The orders were to bring him back alive. They'd tried to solve things without fighting, but this seemed to have been unavoidable. Of course, if he couldn't be brought alive they had the go ahead to just kill him. If the Intel was correct, and if what they had seen hadn't been a fluke, then this man would be a problem for them in the near future as they seek to bring into fruition their end goal.