Hidden on the branch of a tree, Tachibana continued to hound his mind for figuring out why it was safer for them to be in their current position than it was for retreating safely.
'Is it because of the teleporting explosives?'
'No…keeping aside the fact that Tsunade gave us seals to protect ourselves from it, if that was the case it would've been dangerous here too since Tsunade's no longer alive and her large seal is gone.'
'Fighting a Jinchuriki is safer than retreating for some reason…but why?'
'In what world would facing a nuke be safer than simply not engaging in war?'
'...there's something even more dangerous for us on our way back?'
'Some kind of threat that we would encounter that would be lessened if we encountered it while we were with Kumo?'
Tachibana's mind scanned for such 'threats' based on his knowledge about the world of Naruto and he almost slipped off his branch when he found one.
'Akatsuki!'
'The Akatsuki is out to hunt for Jinchuriki!?'
Tachibana's nerves tensed.
'So they're moving to this battle site to capture Naruto? And if we leave this place alone, we'll meet them on our own? And if we stay here, we'll have Kumo's support to fight them off.'
'Someone strong enough in the Akatsuki that would pose a threat while we have Yamato-sensei with us…'
'Hidan, Pain, Konan, Obito and last but not the least Itachi.'
'Since they travel in pairs it would be one of them with their partners…Konan, Pain and Obito probably didn't move directly, so between Hidan and Itachi.'
Neither person was someone Tachibana wanted to fight right now since he had absolutely no way to counter them in any way.
He could avoid small injuries using a paper figurine and 'heal' himself, but what about the blood that Hidan got from his wounds? He could also possibly weaken the 'curse' that Hidan might use on him but knowing nothing about what Hidan actually did made Tachibana not want to risk his life.
And Itachi was even harder since he wasn't someone like Guy who could fight someone as strong as him without even looking in his eyes. Plus, he wasn't fast enough to escape the Amaterasu, and he couldn't stand to fight against the Susanoo, which was armed with the Totsuka Blade and the Yata mirror.
'The only thing we can do in that situation would be to sacrifice Yamato-sensei and run away.'
'But with Killer Bee around when they appear we can just sacrifice him and run away unharmed…'
'But Killer Bee will probably want to sacrifice us in the same way once he learns just how impossible it is to directly fight someone like that.'
'But we will have the upper hand since I can simple tell Yamato sensei that I had a vision that we wouldn't survive without running away.'
Tachibana didn't have any more time to figure out what was going on since he heard a sudden loud *crunch* in the loud silence of the dense forest around him.
The whole forest trembled as Tachibana recognised that Yamato had started his attack.
Tachibana wasn't the only one who heard it however, Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto had all heard it and became prepared to fulfil their roles to the best of their abilities.
On the other side of the fight, the Kumo shinobi screamed in pain.
In the short time that Yamato had spent waiting for Kumo's team to arrive, he'd spread his chakra all around the forest through his underground fortress.
So as soon as the Kumo shinobi were in range with all of them having suitably stepped over land that was sitting on the underground fortress, the trees all around them suddenly grew long limbs that grabbed any shinobi they could before thrashing them into the ground.
Some died just from that, but they were just genins.
The stronger ones among the genin that tried to rebel weren't given time as they were simply dragged underground, into the fort.
Their *screams* echoed out of the ground for just enough time that everyone present heard it to give them shivers before the ground grew back and sealed their hopes for any exit.
All that was left was an eerie silence.
"Wood release?" Darui asked himself, jumping away from the trees he was around, but inside a forest which was literally a conjugation of trees, he was left on edge, making sure to keep all places he could be attacked from in view at all times.
Killer Bee looked underneath his legs with interest too.
"Gyuki says he doesn't like whoever did this."
Darui looked around them, only about fifteen more shinobi were left from the fifty that had marched towards Konoha, about fifteen were swallowed by the ground, and so he clicked his tongue at their apparent weakness-
'Tsk.'
They had worked hard to evade the senses of the patrolling Konoha shinobi at the borders, it wouldn't have been very difficult with a small group since the ANBU of Konoha were recalled after the sudden defection of two of Konoha's own Kage shinobi, but since they were a large group, even they had a little difficulty entering unnoticed.
But they hadn't expected such resistance.
Especially when the Raikage A had promised them that they would be able to move unhindered.
Yet, even though A hadn't shared what he was going to do to give them safe passage, given that their enemies were still alive and kicking on this pathway it meant that they were against someone formidable.
"Do we know anything about it from the 'new' sources, Darui?" Killer Bee asked but Darui just shook his head not having gotten any news from HQ about a shinobi who would use wood release.
"I see…" Killer Bee nodded, "Then let's just get this over with quickly."
Silence settled in the forest once again, but before any of the Konoha shinobi could rejoice at the thought of victory, however, they heard an explosive-
*BBBBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM*
A single large chunk of the land flew up into the air after that, visible to everyone above ground before crashing right where Yamato and Shizune were standing.
*Cough* *Cough* *Cough*
"Yo! Thanks for the help Gyuki!" Someone spoke from inside the cloud of dust that had risen up from the explosive landing of the chunk of earth.
Within moments the sudden intruder was revealed.
"Yo! Yo! Yo! It's Killa Bee!!! Your one favourite enemy from the North East!!! Let's all go ham on yeast because that shit is a beast-" B was holding a notepad and scribbling on it as he walked without any care in the world.
But he suddenly stopped.
"Huh? Why did ya stop way back there Darui!?" Killer Bee asked Darui who was standing on guard, along with the few remaining strong Kumo shinobi.
Just as everyone thought that B had missed Yamato and Shizune, who were standing right in front of hi,m he spoke again.
"Scared by a bunch of nobodies?"
Everyone from Konoha who heard almost coughed up blood since both Yamato and Shizune had Bingo Book entries with high bounties even though their abilities had never been widely revealed.
But B's words seemed to infuriate Shizune to the extreme since it was Kumo that had taken away Tsunade from her so ruthlessly.
As such, before B could say another word, everyone heard a loud *clash*.
Shizune had moved in using the body flicker technique to slash B with her chakra scalpel, but he defended by summoning one of his short stiletto-like swords.
Shizune's chakra blade was an inch away from B's neck yet he looked completely calm.
He looked at Shizune and spoke in a soft tone.
"You're one angry kitten! Did I step on your tail?! Not even Gyuki was as moody as you when Big Bro sliced off his horn!!"
Except before B could do anything else, the ground trembled once again.
Yamato had made a move.
*GGGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR*
But the Kumo shinobi were better prepared for the wood release attacks this time.
Killer Bee too had his eyebrows raised in surprise as he looked at and evaluated Yamato in a different light.
Putting strength into his sword, Bee pushed Shizune back as he jumped just as a sharp wooden spike pierced the ground under him before he landed beside Darui.
The Kumo shinobi had all gathered around Darui, unsure of where they could put their feet next, but Darui solved that problem for them immediately.
"Make a platform using the earth! Fill it with as much of your chakra as you can!" Darui shouted for the other shinobi who had affinity with the earth around him to follow.
Yamato didn't need a pair of sharingan to see that Darui wanted to pull something off and hence quickly replied by pushing chakra into the ground as he controlled the entire field to spawn sharp wooden spikes underneath the entire group of Kumo shinobi.
He didn't want to give them enough time to react in the way Darui had asked them to.
But the ones left above ground were Jonin and were strong enough to immediately dodge the spikes as the earth shinobi quickly controlled the earth to rise out of the ground and obey their command to make a platform above the wooden spikes.
And since they were filled with their chakra Yamato found it difficult to make his wood pass through them without a focused attack. An attack that would likely take more chakra than it was worth since Killer Bee who was a Jinchuriki was still around.
The fight came to a temporary stand still with Shizune and Yamato on one side facing Darui and Killer Bee on the other.