Faking Goddess

Aphrodite Meets the One and Only, Zabuza

Finally, you were all on a boat heading towards the island. Naruto sat at the head, then Sakura, then Sasuke, then yourself, and the two oldies stood by the rear. "This is quite some fog," Sakura commented. You glossed over the heavy white mist that lay on the water. "I can't see ahead."

"Neither can I," you said. After a few moments of silence where you all just looked off into the distance of the fog, Tazuna spoke.

"The bridge should be visible soon," he said.

The boat man then spoke. "When we reach the side of the bridge, we'll be in the Land of Waves territory."

You looked back up at Naruto, who stuck his scrunched nose out of the water, glaring past the fog to see the bridge. Then, the bridge became apparent. Admist its building process, it was tall, and clearly had a lot of work going into it. "Wow! It's huge!" Naruto yelled.

"H-hey," the boatman said. "Please keep it down. I took this boat out under cover of fog. And I cut the engine and am rowing by hand. If they find us, we'll be in deep trouble. You all took a moment to glare at Tazuna for such circumstances.

"Mr. Tazuna," Kakashi spoke. "I want to ask you something before we arrive at the pier. The identity of your assailants, and the reason why they are after you. If you don't tell us, our mission may end when you make landfall.

Tazuna took a few moments before speaking. "It appears I have no choice but to tell you. Frankly, I'd like you to listen. Just as you said, this may be beyond the scope of your mission. Actually, I am being targeted by a terrifying man."

"A terrifying man?"

"How terrifiying..." you added.

"Who?" Kakashi added.

"You guys have probably heard at heast his name before. A shipping magnate by the name of Gato," he finished.

"What? Gato... of the Gato company?" Kakashi asked, surprised. "One of the worlds richest men?"

"Who? What?" Naruto asked, leaning forward. You took in Sakura's dead surprised eyes as you looked to watch Naruto speak.

"Yes. On the surface, he's the cheif executive of a shipping company. But underneath, he is into drug-trafficking and deals in contraband using gangs and ninja. Moreover, he runs a dispicable business, ruthlessly taking over nations and enterprises. It was about one year ago, when that man first set his eyes on the Land of Waves. He used his wealth and violence to enter this country, and before anyone knew it, he had taken complete control of the island's maritime transportation and shipping!"

"Damn," you mumbled.

Quite frankly, there's bigger fish to fry than this little Gato. If you wanted, you could loosen that seal a tad and get an overwhelming amount of chakra to take out anyone in your vicinity, Azara said, and you tried not to glare so outwardly.

'Like I'd ever do that. I'm not stupid.'

Keep it in mind when things go to shit, he said, and you blocked him out, realising you had missed a portion of what Tazuna was saying. "...one thing Gato fears, is the completion of this bridge that had been under construction for quite some time now."

"I see," Sakura said. "Since you're the one building the bridge, you've become a hindrance."

"Then, those ninjas from before were Gato's men?" Sasuke asked.

"As well, if they failed, who else would he hire next?" you added. You looked at Naruto, deep in thought to wrap his head around the situation.

"But I don't understand," Kakashi said, airing an obvious question. "Your opponent is a dangerous one who will even use ninjas. Why did you hide that fact from us when you made your request?"