The summons had been absolute, an ANBU operative appearing in a silent swirl of leaves with a single, curt order that had cut through the easy afternoon air. One moment, Hinata had been sharing a comfortable talk with Naruto, the warmth of his presence a familiar and grounding force, the next, she was striding through the corridors of the Hokage Tower, the atmosphere growing heavier and more charged with every step.
She entered the main assembly hall to a scene of controlled, simmering chaos. The large chamber was packed with shinobi, a sea of green flak vests and grim, determined faces. The air was thick with the scent of weapon-oil, nervous sweat, and the low, crackling hum of barely suppressed chakra. Her Byakugan swept the room out of instinct, cataloging the assembly. A significant portion of her own clan was present, their pale, impassive faces a stark contrast to the restless energy of the Inuzuka shinobi, whose ninken partners paced and whined softly at their sides. It was a targeted mobilization of Konoha's finest trackers and sensors.
…A preemptive deployment, Venom observed from the quiet depths of her mind, his voice a cold, analytical hum. …The pack leaders have detected a threat to the nest. They gather their best hunters. Logical. Efficient.
At the front of the hall, standing on the raised dais, Tsunade was a formidable presence. Her usual boisterous energy was gone, replaced by the unyielding authority of the Godaime Hokage. Her voice, amplified by chakra, cut through the low murmuring, silencing the hall instantly.
"Our long-range patrols and intelligence assets have confirmed multiple, coordinated troop movements," Tsunade began, her gaze sweeping over the assembled shinobi. "The largest force belongs to Takigakure, the Village Hidden in the Waterfalls. An entire division, numbering in the thousands, is currently massing less than a day's march from our northern border. We have also detected smaller, but no less concerning, movements from shinobi in the Land of Grass."
A wave of tension rippled through the room. A multi-front war. The words hung unspoken in the air, heavy and lethal.
"We do not yet know their intent," Tsunade continued, her voice hardening. "It could be a coordinated prelude to invasion, or it could be a simple, if aggressive, series of training exercises. We will not wait to find out. As of this moment, every shinobi in this room is being deployed. Your mission is reconnaissance in force. You will move to your assigned sectors along the border, you will use your skills to identify the enemy's numbers, disposition, and intent. You are to avoid direct engagement unless absolutely necessary. Your primary objective is information. We will not be caught blind. Is that understood?"
A thunderous chorus of "Hai, Hokage-sama!" echoed through the hall.
Her gaze swept the room again, a flicker of instinct searching for a flash of bright orange jumpsuit and blonde hair that she knew she wouldn't find. The ANBU had summoned her, and only her. Naruto had been left standing on the street just moments ago, his cheerful wave and promise to meet for ramen later a stark, sun-drenched contrast to the grim urgency of the mobilization. He hadn't been called.
The realization settled in her gut, cold and heavy. Naruto wasn't being overlooked. He was being deliberately held back. He was Konoha's last resort. A living, breathing contingency plan. Tsunade wasn't deploying him to scout the border, she would unleash him only when the walls were breached and the village itself was burning. The thought coiled in her stomach, a sickening knot of sorrow and dread. They, the shinobi in this room, were being sent out to hold the line, to be the shield. Naruto… he was the sword to be drawn only when that shield was broken.
…The orange one is a high-impact asset, Venom affirmed, his thoughts a cold counterpoint to the ache in her chest. He is not for a recon. He is the hammer that shatters the enemy's shield. His deployment at this stage would be a tactical waste. The female Sannin understands this.
Venom's logic was flawless, but it did nothing to soothe the sadness. It only gave it a name. In the cold calculus of war, he was a weapon kept in its sheath, and she prayed to every god she could name that they would be strong enough that he would never have to be drawn.
"Squad assignments!" Tsunade's voice boomed again, and she began reading from a scroll. One by one, squads were formed and dispatched. Hinata listened intently, her posture perfectly still. "Squad Seven: Jounin Yamato, commanding. Jounin Aoba Yamashiro. Chuunin Hyuuga Hinata. Jounin Iwashi Tatami."
Hinata moved without hesitation, her new Chuunin vest rustling softly. It was still a bit too tight across her shoulders and chest, a constant reminder of the rapid, relentless changes her body was undergoing. She located her designated squad near the eastern wall. Three Jounin stood waiting. Two of them, a man with perpetually worn-out eyes and another with a standard, unremarkable face, did a visible double-take as she approached. She was used to it by now. At her full height, she was taller than both of them, and the sheer presence she projected, a quiet, coiled power, was at odds with her youthful face.
The third Jounin was different. He was lean, with dark, impassive eyes that seemed to see everything and reveal nothing. He met her gaze directly, his expression unreadable as he took in her height, her rank, and the strange, subtle resonance of her fused chakra. He gave a single, curt nod.
"I'm Yamato," he said, his voice as level and steady as his gaze. "Welcome to the team, Hyuuga-san."
"It is an honor to serve with you, Yamato-taichou," Hinata replied, her own voice the now-familiar, soft harmony of her own and Venom's. The sound made the other two Jounin shift uncomfortably.
Yamato ignored their reaction, already unfurling a map. His movements were economical and precise. "Our patrol sector is here," he stated, tapping a region of dense forest along the border of the Land of Fire and the Land of Waterfalls. "The terrain is thick. We move fast, we move quiet. Hyuuga-san, your Byakugan gives us the greatest sensory range. You will be our eyes. Report any chakra signature, no matter how small or insignificant it seems. Aoba, Iwashi, you're on flanks. I'll take point. Our objective is information. We do not engage a superior force. We observe, we report, we withdraw. Understood?"
The team gave their assent. There was no room for argument, no space for doubt. This was the cold, hard calculus of a mission on the brink of war.
"Good," Yamato said, rolling up the map with a sharp snap. "Move out."
The departure was a massive event. A thunderous wave of green and blue surged from the gates of Konoha, a river of shinobi flooding the roads and then branching into the dense forests that cradled the Land of Fire. The sound was a rhythmic, percussive roar of hundreds of sandaled feet striking the earth in perfect, powerful unison, a sound that promised violence and spoke of the village's coiled might finally being unleashed. Hinata moved within this torrent, a single, focused point of lavender and black. To a normal eye, the world was a streaking green blur, but to her, it was a pattern of perfect clarity. Her Byakugan was active, rendering every leaf, every branch, every distant bird in stark, three-dimensional detail, a constant flow of data that her mind, and the silent partner within it, processed with chilling efficiency.
…Yes… This is more like it, Venom purred, the sound a low, contented thrum against her soul. Finally he is being released into a new, target-rich hunting ground. The simmering tension, the focused killing intent of the Jounin around her, the sheer kinetic energy of their forward momentum—it was a symphony to him. …The pack moves as one. A glorious hunt. Let them come. Let the waterfalls send their finest. We will show them what true power looks like. We will feast on their despair.
Her squad, was a spearpoint within the larger force. Yamato led with an unnerving, silent grace, his body seemingly flowing through the trees rather than leaping between them. The other Jounin were ghosts at their flanks. And Hinata… she was the eye of their storm, the living sensor array around which their entire formation pivoted. She was a weapon, and for the first time, she felt the chilling comfort of being used for her intended purpose.
More than a day later, the promised storm had not arrived. The border was quiet. Too quiet. An unnatural stillness had settled over the forest, a silence so profound it felt louder than any battle cry. The air was heavy, humid, and utterly devoid of the tell-tale crackle of hostile chakra.
Hinata was perched on the highest branch of an ancient tree, a silent sentinel overlooking a vast, emerald canopy. Her Byakugan was a constant, piercing gaze, scanning a ten-kilometer radius with an intensity that would have blinded a normal Hyuuga. She saw nothing. The rustle of a squirrel, the lazy flight of a hawk, the slow, meandering chakra of a herd of deer, but no shinobi. No army. No threat.
"Status, Hyuuga-san?" Yamato's voice came from below, so quiet it was more a feeling than a sound. He had used his Wood Style to merge with the trunk of the tree, a perfect, seamless camouflage.
"Negative, Taichou," she replied, her own voice a low murmur. "No chakra signatures beyond ambient wildlife. Air pressure is stable. No signs of large-scale movement on the ground."
Below, the other two Jounin finished their sweep of the sector, their movements practiced and ghostly. They had found nothing. No broken twigs, no displaced stones, no scent trails that didn't belong. It was as if the enemy army they had been sent to intercept was a phantom.
A sudden flare of unfamiliar chakra signatures snapped Hinata to attention. Three of them. Moving clumsily through the undergrowth a klick to the north. "Contact," she whispered, her voice sharp with focus. "Three individuals, low-level chakra. Moving without discipline."
The squad reacted instantly, converging on the location with the lethal silence of predators. They flowed through the trees, expecting a forward scouting party, a trap, a probe. What they found was a trio of gaunt, desperate-looking men huddled around a series of crude snare traps. Poachers. Their chakra was thin and ragged, smelling of fear and hunger.
…Pathetic, Venom hissed in her mind, his earlier excitement curdling into pure disappointment. Their chakra is thin and weak. This is a colossal waste of our resources.
After a brief, tense interrogation where the men babbled about their starving families, Yamato let them go with a stern warning to stay away from the border. The anticlimax was a palpable thing. They had been mobilized for a war and had caught three starving civilians.
A few hours later, after a series of coded messenger bird exchanges, Yamato called a meeting. The leaders of three other squads materialized from the forest, their faces etched with the same grim confusion. They gathered in a hastily constructed dome of interwoven wood, a silent testament to Yamato's power. The reports were all identical. Nothing. The northern border was a ghost town. The other frontiers were just as silent. The massive, multi-front threat that had emptied Konoha of its finest trackers simply… wasn't there.
"It was a feint," one of the Jounin, a grizzled Inuzuka, finally growled. "A massive, village-wide bluff. But why? To test our response time?"
"Or to draw us out," Yamato countered, his voice low and dangerous. "To pull a significant portion of our sensory and combat assets away from the village."
The unspoken implication hung in the silent dome. An army drawn away from its fortress leaves the fortress vulnerable.
A single hawk, bearing the Hokage's seal, broke the tense silence. Yamato read the message, his face impassive. "New orders. The primary alert is being downgraded. Patrols are to be maintained with a reduced footprint. They're sending out relief personnel." He looked directly at Hinata. "Hyuuga-san, you're being rotated out. Another member of your clan is en route to take your place. You and the other designated Chuunin are to return to Konoha immediately, report directly to the Hokage, and form a high-readiness reserve force."
The journey back was a tense, high-speed retreat through the deepening twilight. Hinata leaped from branch to branch, flanked by two other Chuunin she vaguely recognized from the exams, their faces tight with anxiety. The initial adrenaline of deployment had long since bled away, replaced by a cold, creeping dread in the pit of her stomach.
This entire endeavor has been a colossal waste of time, Venom grumbled, his boredom a palpable weight in her mind. The orange one's mission reports on toy-related misdemeanors were more tactically stimulating. At least those had a conclusion.
Hinata ignored him, her own thoughts racing, piecing together the chilling mosaic. A massive, multi-front threat that never materialized. A mobilization order that specifically targeted the village's best trackers and sensors. A significant portion of their Jounin-level combat strength, stretched thin across hundreds of miles of empty forest. And Naruto… Naruto, the village's ultimate weapon, kept safe and sound within the walls.
It wasn't a feint to test their defenses. She knew it now, a certainty that chilled her to the bone. It seems to be a misdirection. Someone had wanted them gone. They had emptied the house of its watchdogs, and now… now she could only pray the wolves weren't already inside.
The return to Konoha was a high-speed, heart-thumping retreat through a world that had suddenly become too quiet. The vibrant energy of the initial deployment had bled away, replaced by the cold, metallic taste of dread in the back of Hinata's throat. Every rustle of leaves, every shadow that danced at the edge of her vision, felt like a threat she had been deliberately led away from. The village, when it finally came into view, was an island of unnerving normalcy. The evening market was bustling, the scent of grilling fish and sweet dango hung in the air, and the laughter of children echoed from the streets. It was a picture of perfect, oblivious peace, and it was the most terrifying thing Hinata had ever seen.
…The herd grazes, unaware that the fences have been dismantled, Venom noted, his voice a low, contemptuous rumble in her mind. A most inefficient security protocol. To be lulled by a false threat. Pathetic.
Ignoring the symbiote's derision, Hinata vaulted over the main wall, bypassing the gates entirely. She landed with a whisper-soft thud in a deserted alleyway and moved with purpose, a ghost of lavender and black flowing through the backstreets towards the Hokage Tower. The air inside the tower was thick with tension, a stark contrast to the placid evening outside. She found Tsunade in her office, a half-empty bottle of high-grade sake sitting on the desk beside a mountain of paperwork. Shizune was at her side, her face pale and drawn, her own stack of scrolls seemingly untouched.
"Report," Tsunade commanded without preamble, her voice rough and tired.
Hinata stood at attention. "Negative enemy contact. No signs of troop movement. We encountered three civilian poachers, who were interrogated and released. The designated threat… was non-existent, Hokage-sama."
Tsunade took a long pull from the sake bottle, the glass clinking as she set it down. "Same report as the other dozen squads that have checked in. It was a ghost, Hinata. A lie. The greatest shinobi misdirection play I've seen in decades." She ran a hand through her blonde hair, her eyes hard. "They played us. All of us. Orochimaru played us like a damn fiddle."
The name landed, and a sudden, sharp chill swept through the room.
"While the best of our trackers were off chasing shadows on the border," Tsunade continued, her voice laced with a fury so cold it was almost calm, "Sakura Haruno burst into this office. Sasuke Uchiha has defected. He abandoned the village." She paused, letting the weight of the words sink in. "Not an hour later, we received a report. Two of our border patrol Jounin were ambushed. They survived, but just barely. The attackers were Sound-nin. Orochimaru didn't just want Sasuke. He orchestrated a massive, village-wide feint to create the opening he needed to take him."
Hinata's mind, now a hyper-efficient processor augmented by Venom's cold logic, raced through the tactical implications. The scale of the operation… the resources expended… it felt disproportionate. "Hokage-sama," she began, her own voice the steady, doubled harmony that had become her new normal. "Forgive my impertinence, but… why? Why go to such lengths for a single genin? Even an Uchiha…"
Tsunade looked at her, a flicker of something that might have been grim respect in her eyes. "Because Orochimaru isn't just a rogue shinobi, kid. He's a collector. He's always been obsessed. With knowledge. With power. With jutsu. He wants to master every technique in existence, but he's limited by one thing: a single, human lifespan."
She leaned forward, her knuckles white as she gripped the desk. "When Jiraiya and I fought him… he showed us. His greatest, most grotesque masterpiece. A forbidden jutsu that allows him to transfer his consciousness. To shed his old body like a snake sheds its skin and take over a new one. A new vessel. He's found a way to make himself immortal."
The clinical horror of it settled over Hinata. A life that feeds on other lives to sustain itself. It was a grotesque parody of her own bond with Venom.
…A crude and inefficient form of symbiosis, Venom observed, his tone dripping with academic disgust. He does not bond with his host. He consumes it. A parasite, not a partner. An evolutionary dead end.
"And a new vessel needs to be strong," Tsunade finished, her voice dropping to a near-whisper. "It needs to be able to contain his power. And for years, he's had his eyes on the ultimate prize. The one Kekkei Genkai he could never hope to replicate." Her eyes met Hinata's, hard and unyielding. "The Sharingan. He doesn't just want Sasuke. He wants to become Sasuke. To wear his face, to wield his eyes, to make the Uchiha power his own. Permanently."
The final piece of the horrifying puzzle clicked into place. Sasuke was a sacrifice. He was the lamb being led to the serpent's altar.
"Orochimaru's Sound shinobi, are escorting him," Tsunade stated, her voice regaining its command. "We sent a retrieval team after them yesterday, as soon as we confirmed the line of retreat."
Hinata's heart hammered against her ribs. A team.
"It's the best we could scramble on such short notice," Tsunade admitted, a note of frustration in her voice. "Shikamaru Nara, for his strategic mind. Choji Akimichi, for his power. Neji Hyuuga, for his eyes. Kiba Inuzuka, for his tracking." She paused, taking another drink. "And Naruto Uzumaki."
The world seemed to tilt on its axis. Naruto. Out there. Hunting a monster, protected by a team of his friends who were walking into a deathtrap.
"They're good kids," Tsunade said, her voice heavy with the weight of the decision. "They're all Chuunin-level, maybe higher. But they're walking into a wood chipper. We need to send reinforcements. Someone fast enough to catch them. Someone strong enough to make a difference."
Hinata didn't even realize she had taken a step forward until she spoke, her voice cutting through the tension in the room, absolute and unshakable.
"Send me."
Tsunade's expression didn't hold surprise. It held the grim, weary look of a gambler who had seen the cards on the table and knew the only move left was to bet everything on a long shot. "I expected you would volunteer," she said, her voice a low rumble. She leaned back in her chair, the leather groaning under the weight of her decision. "And I'm accepting. But you are not going alone. This isn't a solo mission, Hinata. This is a rescue and a potential A-rank engagement. You'll need a team."
Before Hinata could respond, the door to the office opened. Two figures stood silhouetted in the doorway, their energy a stark and immediate contrast. One was a vibrating font of pure enthusiasm, clad in a startlingly green jumpsuit, his dark bowl-cut hair gleaming under the office lights. The other was more reserved, her practical brown hair tied in two neat buns, her expression a mixture of determination and nervous energy.
"Hokage-sama, you summoned us!" Rock Lee boomed, his voice echoing with the power of youth. He struck a dramatic pose, his fist clenched. "We are ready to serve the village with every fiber of our being!"
Tenten, standing beside him, gave a respectful bow, her eyes immediately finding Hinata. And then they widened. She had seen Hinata from the stands during the finals, a distant figure of overwhelming power. She had heard Neji speak of her with a strange, new tone of grudging awe, a fundamental shift in his perception of the world. But seeing her up close… it was something else entirely.
It wasn't just that Hinata was tall. She was a living monument. Tenten, who considered herself of average height, had to tilt her head back to meet Hinata's gaze. The Chuunin vest, meant to look functional and slightly bulky, was stretched taut across a frame that was all sculpted power—broad shoulders tapering to an impossibly narrow waist, the clear, powerful swell of her hips. Tenten couldn't believe this was the same quiet girl from the Academy, that this towering, breathtaking woman was a year younger than her.
"Hinata-san," Lee said, his enthusiasm undimmed as he turned to her. "It is a great honor! To be assigned to a mission with a shinobi of your caliber, the victor of such a youthful and glorious battle in the exams! The flames of my own passion burn brighter in your presence!"
Hinata inclined her head, a small, polite smile on her lips. "The honor is mine, Lee-san, Tenten-san."
Tenten managed a small, strangled sound that was meant to be a greeting. She felt utterly dwarfed by Hinata's height, and by the sheer, serene confidence that radiated from her. It was like standing next to a mountain that had just decided to get up and walk.
"Your team isn't complete," Tsunade stated, cutting through the introductions. Her gaze sharpened. "Our political landscape has… shifted. In the wake of Orochimaru's deception, we are in the process of mending our alliance with Sunagakure. As a sign of this renewed faith, they have sent a delegation. Their new ambassador insisted that they provide aid for this mission, to prove their commitment to our shared security."
As if on cue, the office door opened again. The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. The air grew heavy, charged with the sudden, sharp scent of old sand.
Three figures stepped inside.
A collective, sharp intake of breath came from Tenten and Lee. Lee's hand instinctively went to his thigh, a phantom ache from a leg that had been shattered. Tenten's face went pale, a visceral memory of overwhelming wind and the biting humiliation of her defeat flashing through her mind.
Kankuro stood stiffly, his face paint unable to hide the deep unease in his eyes. He avoided looking directly at anyone. Temari was beside him, her usual abrasive confidence gone, replaced by a quiet, wary tension. Her gaze met Hinata's for a fleeting second before flicking away, a silent acknowledgment of the power she had witnessed in the arena and their last battle.
And between them, silent and still as the desert at midnight, was Gaara. His gourd was a hulking presence on his back, but the chaotic, murderous energy that had once surrounded him was gone. His turquoise eyes, no longer ringed with the black of sleepless madness, were clear and calm. They settled on Hinata, not with a threat, but with a quiet recognition.
…The flawed specimens, Venom noted with a detached, clinical interest. Their chakra signatures are… subdued. The chaotic parasite within the red-haired one has been pacified. For now. They present themselves not as aggressors, but as reluctant assets. Curious.
An awkward, suffocating silence descended on the room. It was broken by Gaara. His voice was a low, monotone rasp, yet it carried an undeniable weight. "Konoha's loss is our shame. We are here to help you retrieve Sasuke Uchiha."
Tsunade nodded, her expression unreadable. "Then the squad is assembled." She rose from her chair, her presence filling the room with an absolute authority that dwarfed even the lingering tensions. "Hinata Hyuuga."
"Hai, Hokage-sama," Hinata responded, her doubled voice cutting cleanly through the silence.
"You are the ranking Chuunin and the most accomplished sensor here. You are the team leader," Tsunade declared, her words leaving no room for debate. "Your objective is to locate and reinforce the retrieval squad led by Shikamaru Nara. You are to provide whatever support is necessary to bring Sasuke Uchiha back to this village. The Sand-nin will operate under your command."
She tossed a sealed scroll onto the desk. "This contains the last known trajectory of both squads. Move with speed. Move with purpose. And bring everyone home." She looked at each of them in turn, her gaze lingering on the fragile, lethal alliance she had just forged. "Dismissed."
Without another word, Hinata turned. She gave a curt nod to her new, improbable team, and strode out of the office. Lee followed with burning determination. Tenten, still reeling, moved with a hesitant awe. And behind them, the three Sand Team fell into step, a silent, tense procession.
They moved through the village, a six-person squad of simmering animosity and desperate hope. They passed the main gates at a run, a blur of green, purple, and sand-colored cloth, plunging into the vast, whispering forests of the Land of Fire. A fragile, lethal alliance, led by a quiet giantess, racing to avert a disaster that had been set in motion by a serpent.
The six of them moved as a single, disjointed entity. Hinata ran at the heart of this strange formation. Her Byakugan was a constant, piercing silver light, mapping the world in a patterns of chakra and matter. Beneath that, Venom's own senses provided a deeper, more primal layer of data, the subtle shift of air currents, the subsonic vibrations of scurrying creatures beneath the earth, the faint, lingering taste of fear on the wind.
She could feel the emotions of her new squad mates as clearly as she could see the trees. They were a strange, chaotic mix of intent. Lee was a blazing sun of pure enthusiasm, his chakra practically vibrating with the eagerness to prove his worth. Gaara was a deep, still pool of absolute calm, his focus a chillingly perfect and unwavering line pointed towards their objective. Temari and Kankuro were a low, tense hum of anxiety and grim determination, the raw memory of their defeat and the new weight of their alliance warring within them.
And then there was Tenten.
Tenten was filled with an awkward, flustered energy. Hinata didn't need the Byakugan to feel her gaze. Constant, prickling sensation that roamed over her back, her shoulders, the powerful curve of her thighs. There was no hostile stare, nor was it malicious. It was the wide-eyed, disbelieving awe of someone trying to reconcile a memory with the impossible reality standing before them. Hinata felt the focus shift, cataloging the breadth of her shoulders in the too-tight Chuunin vest, the way her hips flared from her waist, the sheer, undeniable presence she now carried.
The smaller female is conducting a thorough structural analysis of our chassis, Venom observed, his tone a mixture of clinical assessment and smug satisfaction. Her awe is palpable. She correctly identifies our physical superiority. It is a logical, if primitive, response.
Finally, Hinata allowed her head to turn just a few degrees, her silver-lilac eyes meeting Tenten's in the periphery.
The effect was instantaneous. Tenten flinched as if struck, her breath catching in her throat. A hot, furious blush flooded her cheeks, and she immediately snapped her gaze forward, her movements becoming jerky and unnatural. The silence, now charged with her embarrassment, became a suffocating thing. After a few more agonizing seconds of running, Tenten burst, her voice tight and a little too loud.
"So! The-the enemy! What do we know about them?"
Hinata's gaze softened. There was no judgment, only a calm understanding. She returned her focus to the path ahead, her doubled voice a steady, resonant anchor in the tense air, a sound that seemed to smooth out the frantic edges of Tenten's anxiety.
"They are a team of four. Highly skilled. They engaged two of our Jounin patrols during their infiltration and escaped. Both of our Jounin were wounded." She didn't need to add more. The implication was clear: anyone who could fight two Konoha Jounin to a standstill and walk away was a threat of the highest order.
The answer, concise and devoid of accusation, seemed to settle Tenten. The squad fell back into their rhythmic pace, the silence returning, but this time it was a shared focus, not a nervous void. They ran for another hour, the trees growing denser, the light dimmer.
Then Hinata stopped.
She ceased her forward momentum, landing on a thick branch with the silent grace of a predator, one hand raised in a universal signal. Her entire team froze mid-stride, landing silently around her, their expressions tense.
"What is it, Hinata-san?" Lee whispered, his body already coiled for a fight.
Hinata didn't answer immediately. Her head was tilted, her Byakugan pulsing with a faint, silvery light. She could smell it now, a coppery tang of old blood beneath the damp scent of loam and decaying leaves. A disruption. A stillness in the forest's natural rhythm where there should be life.
"Down there," she commanded, her voice a low thrum of authority.
They descended into a small, shadowed clearing. The scene was one of brutal, focused violence. The earth was torn, scoured in deep gouges as if a giant beast had clawed at it. Several thick trees were flayed open, the bark stripped away in long, violent ribbons. And in the center of the devastation lay a body.
It was a Sound-nin. His form was grotesquely large, a mountain of flesh and muscle now still and lifeless, his eyes staring unseeingly at the canopy above.
"Whoa," Kankuro breathed out, his professional tension momentarily forgotten. "Now that's a big boy. Looks like he missed a few meals. Or maybe ate a few too many."
The others ignored him, their shinobi training taking over. They fanned out, assessing the scene. Gaara's eyes were cold and analytical. Lee's fists were clenched, ready for a trap. Temari knelt, running a hand over a deep furrow in the ground. "This damage… it's Earth Style. High-level. But this…" She pointed to one of the shredded trees. "This is different. This feels like Wind."
Hinata's gaze swept over the same evidence, her mind a whirlwind of data. The deep, concussive craters in the ground. The spiraling, gouging patterns on the trees. The faint, lingering traces of a massive chakra signature, one chaotic and warm, another sharp and focused, and a third, heavy and powerful. Naruto. Shikamaru. Choji. A flicker of pride, fierce and protective, went through her. They had fought here and they had won.
"Konoha's retrieval team," Temari concluded aloud, standing up and dusting off her hands. "They were here. And they left one of their pursuers behind."
A grim satisfaction settled over the squad. Their comrades were fighting hard, and they were winning their battles. But they were also expending energy, taking damage. Time was a luxury they didn't have.
Hinata's silver eyes hardened, her focus returning to the path ahead. The trail was clearer now. Fresher.
"We are wasting time," she stated, her resonant voice cutting through the clearing, leaving no room for argument. "Konoha's recovery units can retrieve the body. Our objective is ahead. We move. Now."
Without waiting for a response, she launched herself from the ground, a blur of motion that disappeared back into the endless, whispering green. Her team, their resolve hardened by the grim discovery, followed without a moment's hesitation.
Their renewed pace were faster, thrumming beat against the forest floor. The grim evidence of their comrades' struggle had sharpened their focus, transforming their disparate anxieties into a single, pointed spear of purpose.
The retrieval team is fighting good, Venom commented, a note of grudging respect in his thoughts. They are, however, inefficient. They leave their kills behind. A proper predator cleans its territory.
Hinata pushed the thought aside, her focus absolute. Another twenty minutes of high-speed travel passed in a green-tinted blur before she detected it again. A fresh scent of blood. A pocket of unnatural silence.
"Hold," she commanded, her voice a low hum that stopped her squad in their tracks. They descended from the canopy into another clearing, this one choked with thick, white, and disturbingly resilient webbing. The air was thick with the acrid smell of burnt silk.
In the center of the web-strewn battlefield lay another corpse. This one was even more unsettling than the last. He was lean, with tanned skin, but the most jarring feature was the profane geometry of six arms sprouting from his torso.
"By the gods…" Temari muttered, her usual cynical composure cracking for a moment. "What in the hells is that thing?" She kicked at a mass of what looked like hardened, golden armor near the body. "Looks like he tried to build his own shell."
Hinata's Byakugan was already dissecting the scene. She saw the microscopic tears in the silk, the precise, rotational damage signature consistent with only one Hyuuga technique. She saw the lingering wisps of chaotic wind chakra, spiraling around the impact craters. And slumped against a far tree, half-hidden by shadow, was the desiccated husk of a monstrous, multi-eyed spider, its legs curled in a final death throe.
"Kaiten," she murmured, more to herself than to her team. The evidence of Neji's ultimate defense was unmistakable. And the wind… that was Naruto. They had fought together. They had won. Again.
"He was a summoner," Hinata announced, her voice resonating with authority. "A puppeteer of a different sort. But he is dead. And we are losing time."
Without waiting any other words, she moved, launching herself back into the trees. The others followed, their pace now frantic. They were getting closer. The trail was hot.
And then, through the rushing wind and the drumming of her own heart, she saw it. Her Byakugan pierced through miles of foliage, her mind processing the chaotic swirl of chakra signatures with terrifying speed.
"Contact!" she snapped, her voice sharp and clear. "They've been split. Two engagements!"
She focused her vision, the world zooming in with impossible clarity. To the west, a maelstrom of feral motion. Kiba, his face a mask of bloody desperation, was locked in a life-or-death brawl. His opponent was a blur of grey skin and white hair, a monstrous figure that seemed to fight with the strength and speed of two people at once. Kiba was on the verge of being overwhelmed. He was losing. Badly.
The dog-boy is being outmaneuvered, Venom analyzed coldly. His opponent fights with a four-limbed style. Two entities sharing a single chassis. An inefficient, but effective, partnership. He requires immediate support, or he will be neutralized.
Hinata's mind worked with the speed of lightning. "Tenten. Kankuro," she commanded, her voice leaving no room for argument. "You two will reinforce him. Engage from range. Create a crossfire. Do not let that creature focus on Kiba. Go!"
Tenten and Kankuro didn't hesitate. They broke from the formation without a word, veering west, their own anxieties now burned away by the clear, immediate purpose of their mission.
Hinata's gaze snapped eastward, following the second thread of combat. And what she saw made a cold, furious dread coil in her gut. Neji, Choji, and Shikamaru. They were on the defensive, trapped in a clearing. Neji's Kaiten was a flickering, strained defense. Choji was a battered, heaving bastion. Shikamaru's shadows were stretched thin, desperately trying to pin down not one enemy, but three of them. Giant, grotesque puppets, their limbs jerking with unnatural life, were swarming them. And at the center of it all, perched on a high branch, was a girl with fiery red hair. She was playing a flute.
The sound, even filtered through miles of distance and perceived only as a fluctuation in chakra, was a discordant, piercing shriek that lanced directly into Hinata's mind.
THE… MUSIC! THE NOISE! Venom's reaction was a psychic scream of pure agony, a cacophony that threatened to shatter her focus. It was the same debilitating frequency as the Sound-nin from the exams, but amplified, refined. It was a weapon designed to tear apart a mind from the inside. A wave of nausea and vertigo washed over her, and for a split second, the world swam. Then, the pain coalesced into something else. Something ancient, cold, and utterly furious.
IT BURNS! MAKE IT STOP! SILENCE HER. SILENCE HER. NOW.
The command was absolute. Primal. Every fiber of Hinata's being, her own will and the symbiote's now fused into a singular, murderous intent, focused on the girl with the flute.
"That one," Hinata snarled, her voice a low, predatory growl that made Lee and Temari flinch. "The rest of you—with me."
She exploded forward, her speed a shocking, violent burst that shattered the branch she stood on. Gaara, Temari, and Lee pushed themselves to their limits just to keep her in sight. As they raced through the trees, a living arrowhead of vengeance, Hinata pushed her Byakugan to its absolute limit, the veins around her temples pulsing with a brilliant, silver-Klyntar light.
The cursed seals on the Sound-nin resolved themselves in her vision. They were the same markings that had been on Sasuke, but these were different. They were… alive. The patterns writhed and pulsed, a network of black, parasitic veins that seemed to draw power not just from their hosts, but from the very air around them. She could see the life force of the trees, the ambient energy of the earth itself, being greedily siphoned into them. Their bodies were monstrously enhanced, twisted into mockeries of the human form, but they were also fundamentally unstable. They were biological time bombs, burning through their own augmented life force at a terrifying rate. Imperfect vessels, crude imitations of her own fusion, and their very existence was an offense.
And one of them was making that awful, world-ending noise.
Her lips peeled back from her teeth in a silent, predatory snarl. The hunt was over. The extermination was about to begin.
"Dance, you little shits! Dance!"
Tayuya's voice was a ragged, furious shriek that barely carried over the hellish melody pouring from her silver flute. From her perch high in the canopy, she was a malevolent conductor, orchestrating a symphony of brutal, relentless violence. Below her, the three Doki—her grotesque, giant puppets—were the instruments of her rage. One, a hulking brute with a massive iron club, hammered relentlessly against Choji's defensive stance. Another, a blindfolded horror with chains for arms, lashed out at Neji. The third, was a constant, probing threat, forcing Shikamaru to dance back and forth, his shadows useless against their sheer, mindless bulk.
"What's the matter, you fucking leaf-shinobi?!" she cackled, her fingers dancing over the holes of her flute. "Don't like the music? It's a special piece! I call it 'Get Your Goddamn Faces Caved In'!"
Shikamaru grit his teeth, sweat stinging his eyes. The sound from her flute was a weapon in itself, a grinding, psychic pressure that made it feel like his brain was being squeezed in a vise. Every attempt to formulate a strategy, to find a pattern, was shattered by the discordant, mind-numbing shriek. It was like trying to solve a shogi problem while trapped inside a festival drum being beaten by a madman.
"Neji! Status!" he yelled, barely ducking as a flailing chain whistled past his ear.
"My Kaiten is failing!" Neji grunted, the shimmering sphere of his defense sputtering and flickering like a dying candle. Each blow from the chained Doki sent a shudder through his entire body. "Their attacks have no finesse! It's all brute force! It is… exhausting!"
"I can't hold this much longer!" Choji roared, his arms screaming in protest as he barely deflected another bone-jarring blow from the club-wielding giant. He was a battered mountain, but even mountains could crumble.
"Just hang on! I'm thinking!" Shikamaru snapped, his mind racing, desperately trying to find an opening, a flaw, any damn thing he could exploit. But there was none. It was a perfect cage of sound and violence. The multi-limbed puppet saw its opening, its grotesque arms lashing out, aiming directly for Shikamaru's exposed chest.
This is it, he thought with a strange, weary detachment. What a drag.
WHOOSH-CRACK!
A flash of brilliant green exploded into the clearing. It was a blur of impossible speed, a living cannonball of pure youthful energy. Rock Lee, his face a mask of furious determination, appeared in mid-air, his leg extended in a devastating axe kick. His heel connected with the Doki's head with the sound of splintering timber and shattering stone, sending the massive puppet stumbling back, its head caved in.
Before Shikamaru could even process the arrival, the very ground beneath them seemed to shift.
SHHHHHHHH!
A wave of sand, dense and silent as the grave, erupted from the earth. It enveloped them. A protective, granular dome formed around Shikamaru, Neji, and Choji, the blows of the remaining Doki thudding harmlessly against its surface.
High above, Tayuya's eyes widened in disbelief. She faltered in her playing, the mind-rending music sputtering for a crucial second.
And that was all the opening Temari needed.
FWOOOOOOSH!
A hurricane ripped through the clearing. A colossal gale of wind, summoned by a single, contemptuous slash of Temari's giant fan, slammed into the two remaining Doki. The multi-ton puppets were lifted from their feet like children's toys, sent tumbling and crashing through the trees. The force of the wind hit Tayuya hard, ripping the flute from her lips and forcing her to cling to her branch to keep from being torn away.
The gale didn't subside. It intensified, a roaring vortex that centered on the battered puppets. And into that vortex, a new element was introduced.
VROOOOOM-KRAKOOOOM!
Solid wall of incandescent white fury, the color of a dying star, lancing down from above. The white fire struck the gale, and the two forces combined in a horrifying, beautiful synergy. They fused, creating a roaring, swirling firestorm, a tornado of pure, atomizing heat. The three giant Doki, caught in the heart of the inferno, didn't even have time to burn. They were simply… unmade. Vaporized into black ash that was instantly scattered to the winds.
The sheer, concussive force of the blast wave threw Tayuya from her perch. She screamed, a sound of pure rage and terror, as the edge of the firestorm licked at her. Black markings erupted across her skin, twisting and writhing as her curse mark activated in a desperate, last-ditch defense. Her skin cracked, her hair stood on end, and she slammed into a distant tree, alive, but horribly transformed.
Down below, the sand dome receded, revealing the three dumbfounded Konoha shinobi. They stared at the smoldering, glassed craters where the Doki had been, then at the figures who had appeared as if from nowhere. Lee stood with his fists clenched, vibrating with energy. Gaara was a silent, still presence. And leaning on her fan, a smirk of pure, predatory satisfaction on her face, was Temari.
"Well, well," she drawled, her gaze locking onto Shikamaru. "Look what the cat dragged in. Thinking of forfeiting again, crybaby?"
Shikamaru could only manage a weary groan. "Troublesome woman…"
"That was just the opening act," Temari said, her smirk widening as she gestured vaguely at the devastation. "You can thank our team leader for the fireworks. The real monster is ours."
Shikamaru's eyes narrowed, scanning the new arrivals. The pieces weren't adding up. This level of power… it was beyond anything he had anticipated. "Your team leader?" he asked, pushing himself to his feet. "Who… Where is she?"
Temari's smirk became a slow, knowing smile. She didn't answer. She simply tilted her head back and looked up. Mysteriously. Into the sky.
The curse mark transformation was a brutal, searing agony that Tayuya welcomed like an old friend. It was the power she needed, the rage given form. Her skin darkened to a deep, unhealthy tan, and three sharp, curved horns erupted from her forehead, cracking the skin as they grew. Raw, chaotic chakra, tasting of ash and fury, flooded her system. The pain was gone, replaced by a buzzing, incandescent fury.
"Alright, you fucking party-crashers!" she screamed, her voice now a guttural snarl. She snatched her flute from the ground, its silver form seeming small and inadequate in her now larger, more powerful hands. "Round two! Time for the encore, assholes!"
She raised the flute to her lips, ready to unleash a genjutsu so foul it would make their brains bleed out of their ears.
VROOSH-BOOM!
A projectile of pure, white-hot fire screamed down from the sky, detonating just feet from her position. The force of the blast threw her sideways, and the searing heat vaporized the dew from the grass, scorching her arm. She rolled, coming up in a crouch, her eyes scanning the canopy. Nothing. Just leaves and sky.
"The fuck was that?!" she roared, scrambling for cover behind a thick oak. She raised the flute again.
VROOSH-BOOM!
Another one. This time it struck the tree trunk above her head, showering her with splinters and superheated bark. She dove away, catching only a faint, black blur in her peripheral vision—something vast and winged moving with impossible speed against the clouds.
"Show yourself, you cowardly piece of shit!"
She tried again, a desperate gambit, putting the flute to her lips and blowing a single, sharp, mind-piercing note—
VROOSH-BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
A rapid-fire volley. Three of the white fireballs rained down, bracketing her position in a triangle of fiery death. She was forced to abandon the melody and throw herself into a frantic, tumbling evasion, the heat blistering the back of her neck. The attacks were surgical. They weren't meant to kill her. They were meant to stop her from playing. They were meant to silence her.
Rage, pure and absolute, overwhelmed her tactical sense. "THAT'S IT!" she shrieked. "FUCK THIS!"
Coiling the raw power of her cursed form into her legs, she launched herself into the air in a massive, soaring leap, trying to create distance, to get out of the kill box, to find a moment's peace to retaliate. She was a dark projectile arcing through the sky.
And flew directly into a solid wall of air.
A gale force, summoned from nowhere, slammed into her mid-flight. It was a battering, force that robbed her of all momentum. Her body tumbled helplessly in the air, her limbs flailing, her orientation gone. She was exposed. A perfect target.
The world… stopped.
One moment she was spinning, the next, she was held static in the air, and a figure was just… there. Appearing before her in the space between heartbeats.
It was a towering figure of polished obsidian, skin like living ink that seemed to drink the very light from the air. Its body was a terrifying sculpture of feminine power—a narrow waist, powerful legs, and a full, high bust that was both monstrously alien and hypnotically perfect. Shifting, jagged white markings, like captured lightning, pulsed with a soft, internal silver glow across its form. Its face was a smooth, featureless mask, broken only by two enormous, jagged, dead-white eyes that held no pupil, no iris, no soul, only an ancient, predatory emptiness. And from this alien visage, a cascade of untouched, midnight-blue hime-cut hair flowed freely, a shocking, beautiful, and utterly horrifying splash of humanity on a canvas of impossible nightmare.
"What… the fuck… are you?" Tayuya breathed, the words a raw whisper of pure terror.
The creature didn't answer. Its right arm blurred, morphing into something new. Black biomass, slick and wet, swirled around a core of furious white lightning, coalescing into a sleek, biological conduit that crackled with contained power. A brilliant white tendril of pure Raiton lashed out from its fist, faster than thought, and struck the silver flute in Tayuya's hand. The metal disintegrated, vaporized into a cloud of glittering dust.
Her primary weapon was gone.
Before she could even scream, the main fist followed through. It slammed into her stomach.
The world compressed into a single point of agonizing force. There was a deafening CRACK of impact that was both heard and felt, a shockwave that vibrated through her very bones. All the air in her lungs was violently expelled in a single, choked gasp.
G-GAAAAAHHCKK—!
She turned into a ragdoll. She flew backward, a broken projectile, until she slammed into an ancient oak with a sickening crunch of wood and bone.
She lay crumpled at the base of the tree for a long moment, the world a swimming, gray haze. The curse mark had saved her. The raw, chaotic power had absorbed the worst of the blow, a buffer against an attack that would have turned a normal person inside out. But the cost had been immense. The buzzing, furious power receded, leaving her feeling hollowed out, scraped clean. The dark tan of her skin faded back to its normal pale shade, the horns retracting painfully into her skull. She was trembling, every muscle screaming, her chakra reserves utterly depleted.
She pushed herself up, her body a symphony of agony. And she saw it. Walking towards her.
The monster was gone. In its place was the girl. The impossibly tall, impossibly beautiful Hyuuga girl from the arena. The black armor had receded, leaving only the faint, glowing silver patterns on her perfect, alabaster skin, a terrifying reminder of the monster that lay just beneath the surface. She was walking slowly, deliberately, her silver-lilac eyes fixed on Tayuya with a cold, analytical calm. The battle was over. This was the collection.
A desperate, primal fear, a kind she hadn't felt in years, clawed its way up her throat. She pushed it down with a wave of pure, spiteful rage. She was a servant of Lord Orochimaru! She was one of the elite Sound Four! She would not be broken by this… this freak!
"You think you've won, you freak-show bitch?!" Tayuya spat, the words tasting like blood and failure. She tried to muster a sneer. "You got in a lucky shot! I'll still fucking kill you! I'll rip your goddamn eyes out and—"
She trailed off. The Hyuuga girl just kept walking, her expression unchanged. And in that serene, pitiless gaze, Tayuya saw the truth. She saw the frayed edges of her own chakra. She saw the uncontrollable tremor in her hands. She saw past her own bluster to the raw terror in her own heart.
The feeling was sickeningly familiar. It was the same cold, absolute helplessness she had felt when sparring with Kimimaro. The feeling of facing not just a superior opponent, but a being from a completely different plane of existence. A monster of quiet, absolute perfection, before whom her rage and her power and her very will were nothing more than the meaningless squawking of a dying bird.
The Hyuuga girl stopped, standing over her, a towering shadow that blotted out the sun.
The bravado was a flimsy shield, a cracked and desperate thing held up against an inevitable tide. Hinata saw through it with the piercing clarity of her Byakugan, saw past the snarled insults and the furious posture to the raw terror coiling in Tayuya's gut. The Sound-nin was a cornered animal, ready to tear herself apart in one last, suicidal lunge.
The white-hot rage that had propelled Hinata through the sky, the furious, predatory instinct that Venom had amplified into a weapon, finally receded. It left behind a cold, crystalline calm. Killing this girl would be easy. It would be an act of pest control. But it would be a waste. A living, breathing source of Orochimaru's secrets, a key to understanding the curse mark and the serpent's methods—that was a prize far more valuable than a corpse.
…Her combat effectiveness has been reduced to zero, Venom stated, his own bloodlust sated and replaced by a cold, strategic pragmatism. Her knowledge, however, remains intact. A living asset is superior to a dead one. Neutralize. Do not terminate.
Hinata took a slow, deliberate step forward, her entire posture shifting from that of an executioner to that of a surgeon. Her voice, when it came, was not a growl, but a soft, resonant statement of fact.
"Your struggle is over."
And then she moved.
She was a blur of motion, a dance of devastating precision. Her hands, no longer claws of raw destruction, became instruments of absolute control. Her fingers, glowing with a soft, Venom enhanced, silver-blue light, became needles meant to sever the threads of her opponent's will. She aimed for the major tenketsu points, the junctions of chakra that governed movement and power, intending to shut down Tayuya's body system by system.
Her first strike was a two-fingered jab aimed at the brachial plexus in Tayuya's shoulder, a classic Gentle Fist move to deaden the entire arm. But as she struck, a different lesson, a more recent and far more mortifying one, flashed through her mind. Anko's voice, lewd and annoyingly cheerful, lecturing her on the secret cartography of the human body, the maps not of combat, but of control of a very different kind. Her hand, guided by a whisper of that new, profane muscle memory, shifted a mere fraction of an inch.
The impact landed. Tayuya braced for the numbing pain, the deadening paralysis.
It never came.
Instead, a jolt of pure, white-hot energy, a lightning strike of sheer, unadulterated pleasure, shot down her arm. She felt the terrifying, ecstatic opposite of pain.
"Nnngh—!" The sound was a choked, confused gasp, not a scream of agony.
Hinata saw her seize up and misinterpreted the reaction. The curse mark is resisting, she thought, her brow furrowing in concentration. I need to apply more pressure. Overwhelm the system.
She pressed the attack, her movements accelerating into a dizzying, beautiful, and catastrophically misguided ballet. A palm heel to the base of the neck, meant to disrupt the flow of chakra to the brain, instead landed on a nerve cluster that sent a wave of electric shivers down Tayuya's spine. A precise jab to the ribs, intended to lock the diaphragm, instead triggered a spasm of breathless, helpless laughter that quickly morphed into something else entirely.
"A-ahhh…~"
The sound, breathy and uncontrolled, made Hinata falter for a second. It was… wrong. It wasn't the sound of defeat. But she was committed now, her fluid motions a continuous storm of strikes. Each tap, each jab, each gentle push was a fresh wave of pleasurable chaos, a relentless assault of mind-melting sensation. Tayuya's bravado had shattered. Her rage was gone. Her entire being was being systematically dismantled and reassembled into a single, quivering nerve of raw pleasure.
Her back arched impossibly, her head thrown back as a long, keening moan tore itself from her throat.
"Ah… AHHHHNNN…! Wh-what are you… doing… to meeeeee…?!"
The sounds finally broke through Hinata's combat focus. They weren't screams of pain. They were the sounds Anko had described in graphic, mortifying detail during her lessons on "advanced interrogation and psychological dominance." They were the sounds of a body pushed past every limit of ecstasy.
The realization flooded her senses, bringing a wave of horror. A hot, nuclear blush erupted across her face, so intense it felt like her skin was glowing. Oh no. Oh, by all the gods, no. This is all Anko-sensei's fault!
In her panicked embarrassment, she tried to disengage, to pull back, but her momentum carried her through one final, clumsy strike. A flat-handed push, aimed to simply shove Tayuya away, landed just above her lower abdomen.
It was the final switch.
Tayuya's entire system short-circuited. The last vestiges of her conscious thought evaporated in a tidal wave of pure, overwhelming sensation. Her eyes rolled up into her head, showing only the whites. Her jaw went slack, her tongue lolling limply from her mouth as a torrent of unstoppable, orgasmic pleasure cascaded through her. Her hands, no longer her own, scrabbled desperately at her own body, searching for an anchor in the storm. One hand clawed at the fabric over her breast, her fingers digging in, while the other slid down between her trembling thighs, pressing against the center of the raging firestorm.
She sank to her knees, her body a single, shuddering tremor. A final, world-ending moan ripped through the silent forest, a sound of such loud, agonizing bliss that it seemed to make the very leaves on the trees tremble.
"AAAAHHHHHNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN… nnnhhh…~"
The sound tapered off into a series of soft, helpless whimpers as she collapsed onto her back, completely and utterly spent.
Hinata stood frozen, her hand clamped over her own mouth in sheer horror. Below her, Tayuya lay unconscious, a faint, blissful smile on her lips. Her body was still twitching periodically, small, reflexive jolts of pleasure making her legs tremble as soft, breathy moans escaped her parted lips.
An elegant solution, Venom purred, the sound a low, smug vibration deep within her consciousness. There was no mockery in his tone, only genuine, clinical approval. The subject has been rendered inert through a cascading neurological overload, inducing systemic shutdown via the pleasure centers. A most efficient expenditure of energy with minimal biomass destruction. We approve of this… neutralization protocol.
Hinata's mind reeled. The praise felt more violating than any insult. Her serious, battle-hardened stance had completely evaporated, replaced by the rigid, deer-in-the-headlights terror of a girl who had just done something unforgivably embarrassing in front of the entire world. Her hand was still clamped over her mouth, as if she could hold back the mortification that was threatening to consume her whole. Her glowing markings on her body turned completely pink.
And then, she heard the rustle of leaves.
They had arrived.
Like ghosts, the rest of the shinobi landed in the clearing. The first to appear were the ones she had left behind: Lee, Temari, and Gaara. They were followed moments later by the battered but resolute forms of Neji, Shikamaru, and Choji. Six pairs of eyes, six minds trying to process the scene before them.
The clearing was silent, save for the gentle rustling of leaves and the soft, breathy, and utterly continuous moans of pleasure still escaping Tayuya's blissfully unconscious form.
Their reactions were a silent, horrified symphony.
Rock Lee's face was a mask of pure confusion. His youthful, black-and-white view of combat had no category for this. He saw the enemy, defeated. He heard… the sounds. His brain tried and failed to reconcile the two, leaving him with an expression of constipated bewilderment.
Choji, who had been midway through stuffing a potato chip into his mouth, simply froze. The chip hovered halfway to his lips, his eyes wide, his chewing momentarily forgotten.
Temari's jaw went slack for a single, stunned second. Then, a slow, wicked, and deeply appreciative smirk spread across her face. She looked from the twitching Tayuya to the towering, mortified Hinata and let out a low, impressed whistle.
Gaara was a pillar of stillness. He simply tilted his head, his turquoise eyes cataloging the scene with a chilling detachment. There was no judgment, no confusion, only the quiet observation of an effective, if unorthodox, technique.
Shikamaru just sighed, a deep, weary sound that seemed to carry the weight of the entire world. He rubbed the back of his neck, his gaze flicking from Tayuya to Hinata with an expression that said, Of course. Why am I even surprised?
But it was Neji whose reaction was the most profound. He was a Hyuuga prodigy, a master of the Gentle Fist, an art of pure, disciplined precision. What he was witnessing was a grotesque, sensual perversion of everything he had ever known. His face, usually a mask of stoic superiority, was a warring canvas of disbelief, revulsion, and a deep, horrified embarrassment on behalf of his entire clan. He looked as if he wanted the very earth to open up and swallow him whole.
The awkward, charged silence stretched for an eternity, thick and suffocating. Finally, Neji, in a desperate attempt to impose some semblance of shinobi normalcy on the situation, cleared his throat. His voice was stiff, strained.
"Hinata-sama," he began, studiously avoiding looking directly at the moaning figure on the ground. "Was that… an application of the Gentle Fist's paralytic techniques?"
Hinata's head snapped towards him, her blush intensifying to a shade of crimson that seemed impossible. She waved her free hand in a frantic, dismissive gesture. "I… It appears…" she stammered, her resonant voice cracking with humiliation, "…that I may have mismatched the tenketsu points with some of Anko-sensei's… more recent lessons."
Shikamaru strolled forward, nudging Tayuya's shoulder with the toe of his sandal. She responded with a soft, contented sigh. He looked up at the sky, then back at Hinata. "Well," he said with a deadpan shrug. "At least she stopped swearing."
The simple, logical statement was enough to shatter the tension. The mood in the clearing shifted, the immediate crisis of social horror giving way to the grim reality of their mission. Hinata seized the opportunity, her professionalism a desperate shield against her own embarrassment. Her Byakugan flared to life, the silver veins around her eyes pulsing as she scanned the forest.
"Kiba-san is safe," she announced, her voice regaining its command. "Tenten-san and Kankuro-san arrived in time. Their opponent… is neutralized. Permanently."
A collective wave of relief washed over the Konoha-nin. One less monster to fight.
Shikamaru nodded, his face becoming a mask of tactical focus. "It's a mess," he began, taking over the debrief. "Naruto was the key. We never would have gotten this far without him. He's the one who figured out how to take down the first two. That spider-freak… Naruto's clones with wind kunai and Neji's Kaiten took him apart. But their last coordinated attack… it separated us. Kiba got thrown one way with that two-headed freak, and the rest of us were left with her." He jerked a thumb at the still-twitching Tayuya. "We had the upper hand, were about to finish it, and then… someone else showed up."
His eyes grew dark. "He was different. Stronger. He didn't even bother fighting us. He just… took the barrel. The one with Sasuke in it. He's the one Naruto is chasing now. Alone."
Hinata's blood ran cold. Naruto, alone, against a foe even stronger than the monsters they had already faced.
Her decision was instantaneous, forged in the crucible of logic and a fierce, protective instinct. She turned to the exhausted members of the original retrieval team.
"Shikamaru-san, Neji-niisan, Choji-san," she commanded, her voice once again a solid, unshakable pillar of authority. "Your mission is complete. You will take this prisoner," she gestured to Tayuya, "regroup with Kiba's unit, and return to Konoha. You are exhausted. You need medical attention. Go."
She then turned to her own, fresher team. Her silver-lilac eyes, now burning with a cold, renewed fire, met theirs. "Temari-san. Lee-san. Gaara-san. We are continuing the pursuit. Naruto needs us."
Shikamaru didn't waste a moment. With a weary grunt that seemed to encompass all the troublesome realities of his life, he hoisted Tayuya's limp form over his shoulder. She slumped like a sack of particularly blissful potatoes, a soft, contented moan escaping her lips as her head lolled against his back. Neji gave a final, pained look at the scene, his expression one of visible clan-wide shame, before turning to follow. Choji gave a quick, determined nod to Hinata, popped a final chip into his mouth, and fell into step beside his teammates. In seconds, they were gone, a trio of exhausted victors melting back into the forest, leaving a strange, echoing silence in their wake.
The four remaining shinobi didn't speak. They didn't need to. A shared, unspoken understanding passed between them. Hinata gave a single, sharp nod, and they exploded into motion, a four-person arrowhead of focused intent.
Hinata's Byakugan rendered the world in shades of chakra and matter, a perfect, three-dimensional map. But the Klyntar senses beneath it provided a far deeper, more intimate understanding. She could taste the lingering ozone from her own lightning attacks, feel the subtle pressure shifts in the air that marked the passage of a powerful body, and smell the faint, coppery tang of Naruto's exhausted chakra on the wind. They were close.
Finally, the dense canopy broke, giving way to a wide, sun-drenched river valley. And there, in the heart of the open space, was the battle. Two figures, locked in a deadly, frustrating dance. Naruto, a whirlwind of orange and righteous fury, was darting in and out, his movements desperate but surprisingly effective. He looked battered, his jacket torn, but his energy was a defiant, burning sun.
"There," Hinata announced, her voice a low, resonant hum that cut through the rushing wind. "The valley floor. Naruto-kun is engaged. He is holding his own, but his opponent… is different."
The team pushed their speed to its absolute limit, a blur of motion streaking through the treetops ringing the valley. Hinata focused her vision, pushing her symbiote-enhanced Byakugan to its peak. The world resolved itself in horrifying, biological detail.
The new Sound-nin was tall and graceful, with pale skin and two stark red dots on his forehead. But it was his fighting style, his very biology, that made a cold dread settle in Hinata's stomach. Bones. They erupted from his body as a natural, horrifying extension of his own being. His spine could be pulled from his back to become a flexible, serrated whip. The bones of his forearms could be fired like hardened, deadly projectiles. It was a perfect fusion of offense and defense, a Kekkei Genkai of terrifying potential. It was… familiar. A crude, organic echo of her own Klyntar biomass shaping itself into weapons.
His methodology is similar to our own, Venom observed, his voice a cool, academic curiosity in her mind. He reshapes his own biological structure into weaponry. Crude, but effective.
But Hinata saw more. She saw the cost. With every bone he grew, her vision showed her the raw calcium being leached from his own skeletal structure. She saw the network of micro-fractures left behind, the immense cellular strain. His chakra, while powerful and precise, was flickering, his life force a guttering candle flame fighting against a gale. The bones he wielded were consuming him. He was in constant, agonizing pain, fighting purely on a will.
Flawed, Venom concluded with absolute certainty. He draws from his own well to build his weapons. A finite resource. He is consuming himself. We, on the other hand, are self-sustaining. Perfect. This one is a dying star, burning brightest just before it collapses.
Hinata processed the grim analysis. This boy, this enemy, was the most dangerous kind of foe: one with absolutely nothing left to lose.