Chapter 279

“I am forever cursed by the luck gods.” I hang my head in shame. “I have no idea how I pissed them off but apparently what I did is unforgivable. They throw heaping mounds of bad luck my way then give me just enough good luck to make it out so they can continue to torture my poor soul.”

…

“Seriously you should have died like a hundred times by now.” Sasuke bluntly says, not pulling his words in the slightest.

“I know right?” I whine. Kicker is I already have died once, I’m the only person who gets to die twice.

“So are you good then?” He asks me. “You left in a really bad spot.”

“Am I good?” I repeat the question to give myself a bit of time to form an answer. “No. I’m not good. I’m still kinda fucked in the head about a lot of stuff and am really violent when the situation calls for it. But I am loads better now than when I left. Sureddo of all people talked some sense into me, compared me to both Tsunade and Orochimaru to illustrate my own actions. He forced me to confront who I am becoming. I was too much like Orochimaru for my tastes so I’ve decided to change things up.”

“Good.” Sasuke shares a true smile with me. “I’m tired of taking care of your dumb ass.”

“Oh shut up it’s not like I haven’t dealt with any of your bullshit!” I aggressively point at him. “Which one of us ran off to attack an S-rank shinobi again?”

“And which one of us does Orochimaru call child?”

“Which one of us needed saving from a coma?”

“Which one of us is constantly bumping into other S-rank shinobi?”

“Which one of us is… uh… reliant on a bloodline?”

“Like you don’t massively rely on the Jiongu.”

“Okay how about we agree that we’re both pretty fucked up and have to look out for each other a lot?” I offer a compromise.

“I can agree to that.” Sasuke sharply nods once.

“Cool. So just a heads up, while we were talking I had my earth minion lace the ground with explosives.” Said minion bursts from the ground behind me as I finish my sentence. “So have fun with that.”

“You suck.” Sasuke lamely insults me. “I was waiting until we were done talking to start again! You cheated!”

“If you aren’t cheating you aren’t trying.” I quip to him and he sighs. “Come on, we’re shinobi. It’s literally in the job description.”

“Fine.” Sasuke leaps up from the ground and lands feet first on the ceiling. “I’ll just stay up here.”

“I’m going to guess you didn’t get the ceiling?” I ask while looking at my earth minion. It shakes its head no. “Brilliant. What a waste of seals.”

After pulling my earth heart back inside me I spring up to the ceiling, we’re now fighting upside down. I have the slight advantage though, all of my summons are capable of fighting up here. That alone gives me a huge advantage.

“Let’s take this to the next level.” Sasuke grins superiorly at me as inky marks spread all over his skin. “I want to see how far we can go.”

“Uh that’s a bad idea.” I carefully say. Last time he used the curse seal he stabbed me in the heart.

“Don’t tell me you’re scared. I know last time didn’t go that well but I’ve gained more control since then.” Sasuke experimentally flexes an arm to get used to how he moves with the boost.

“Really? You think I’m scared of you? Please, that’s not it at all. If we really want to see how far we can go we’re in the wrong spot. Sasuke I’ve broken a fucking island. We’re still inside the base. I don’t know about you but I don’t particularly want to explain to Orochimaru why his base suddenly came down around his shoulders. When we push ourselves we get destructive. There’s a reason I haven’t been tossing around my ninjutsu like crazy.”

“Oh. Yeah good point.” The inky black marks recede back to his shoulder. “We’ll have to go to an island or something next time. Seriously though I do want to go all out against you sometime. It’ll be interesting to see which one of us is better at which skills.”

“I guarantee you have me beat in genjutsu. Can’t use them and whatnot.”

“Couldn’t you just limit yourself to one heart? Get rid of the conflicting types of chakras?” Sasuke offers me a solution.

“Yeah that would work but I’d rather have four spare lives. Genjutsu vs not dying when someone kills me? I’ll take not dying any day of the week.” I reach into a pant pocket and pull out a scroll. “Now what should I use against you next? This one?”

I weigh the scroll in my hand and study it. Then I toss it in the air and catch it to taunt Sasuke. But the scroll only went up, it never came back down.

“Huh? Where’d it go?” I look up.

BANG

“AH!” I squeak out and flinch rather badly.

“Holy shit.” Sasuke is staring at me weirdly. “You forgot we are on the ceiling.”

“NO I DIDN’T!”

BANG

“Uh… so we might have a little problem.” I nervously look at the floor.

“They’re all going to go off now, aren’t they?” Sasuke says with a touch of fear.

“Yep. We should run.”

BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG

“MOVE MOVE MOVE!” Sasuke shouts.

…

Konoha, Hokage’s Office

There are currently six people in the office of the most powerful person in Konoha. Obviously the Hokage herself is present and she’s staring down a team that just returned.

She’s very displeased with this team.

“So let me get this straight.” Tsunade leads forward without a hint of mercy in her eyes. “You come in contact with an A-rank missing nin and don’t even attempt to attack him?”

“Well we all did attack him at first, I think only Kakashi didn’t. You did forget something though.” Naruto chimes in with a smile. “The part where we completed the mission.”

“Naruto Uzumaki!” Tsunade roars at the genin and slams her fist into her table. The feeble wood snaps in two, sending everything on it crashing to the ground. Tsunade rises up from her chair and stares down the team before her. “You don’t have any idea of what you’ve done! None of you realize how dangerous Alvarcus is! None of you know what he’s capable of. You all let him walk away.”

“Hokage-sama I accept full responsibility.” Kakashi steps forward to face his Hokage’s wrath. “It was because of my connection to him that I convinced the others to let him go. I couldn’t bring myself to harm my student.”

“You are staying after.” Tsunade snarls at the jonin. “I gave you specific orders to bring him back or kill him. You disobeyed me. You disobeyed your Kage. Because of your mistake more people will die. Our allies will die. My very own shinobi will die. You let one of Orochimaru’s best shinobi return to him without raising a hand against him. Because you couldn’t harm him.”

“Alvarcus is a lot of things.” Kakashi softly says. “He is not -“

“SILENCE!” Tsunade roars once again and everyone flinches away from the enraged woman.

She intently stares down each individual. She rests her livid gaze on everyone in turn, lingering for ten seconds on each. It’s one of the most terrifying experiences some of them have ever had.

“Kakashi.” Tsunade breaks the silence. Her anger has only gotten worse. “Fetch the rest of the Rookie Nine and team Gai. You have ten minutes.”

“Yes Hokage-sama.” No one sees Kakashi leave, one moment he was there the next he wasn’t.

“Hokage-sama?” Anko timidly speaks up, her usual air of confidence is long gone. “Why do you want the rest of the Rookie Nine and team Gai here?”

“Because I will make sure he won’t get away twice.” Tsunade crosses her arms and glares at Anko, daring her to ask another question. Anko doesn’t. “Now shut up and wait.”