Chapter 26
Losing was part of his life. It was just how it was. At some point, he knew that even if he could try, he would still fail. In the end, he would always lose. Maybe it was because he didn't even belong to this world, or it was just how it was, and there was nothing special about it.
It wasn't just about his talent, but his luck sucked, too. No matter what he did, some complications would come out to hinder him. Always, not a single time, was he able to do things as he planned them.
False or outdated information was just one of the many things that could go wrong with his missions. But most of the time, it was his own failure to predict his target's moves. His failure to see through the infinite things his target could do while trying to reach him.
But Danzo was probably the easiest to predict of all. He wasn't one to fight a direct battle if it was possible. Maybe because Iruka knew of him from his past life, he wasn't surprised to see him surrounded by shinobi and waiting for him.
And yet, knowing or not didn't change much. From the very start, Iruka wasn't prepared for this battle. Even though he might have recovered his skills and peak condition while training with Might Guy, he never had much skill to begin with.
At best, he was as capable as any of these shinobi he was now facing. And he used shadows and speed to catch his opponents by surprise till now. But from the moment he had to fight directly, it was over for him.
Maybe because he knew what would happen next, Iruka wasn't nervous or worried. From the very beginning, he knew that there was nothing he could do to change anything. That was the kind of existence he was. Death was the only thing in front of him, and that maybe made it easier for him to look at it without wavering.
From the medicine effects, he probably wouldn't even feel his own death. A pointless and useless life should just end pointlessly like this. Of course, he wasn't satisfied with it, but that's why he drank every day. He had long accepted it.
"I must say, I have underestimated you," Danzo said as he looked at Iruka, more specifically at his white mask. "If I knew you were this skilled from the very beginning, I would have done more to recruit you."
"I have only one question," Iruka replied, not interested in anything else. "Who did you want to kill while using my body?"
"Can't you guess?"
"Anko Mitarashi," Iruka guessed.
That was the only sensible part about all this mess. Anko stumbled into something she shouldn't have, and now she had to die. But once again, Danzo didn't take direct action. He used all and any means, but not the direct ones.
So, he used Anko to kill Mizuki, getting rid of any ties he might have with him. Then it wouldn't be hard to dispose of Anko without anyone even questioning him. But he failed to predict Iruka's movements, and he so happened to stumble into it all.
Now, to cleanly get rid of this mess he created, he wanted to use Iruka to kill Anko before Iruka himself was killed. Tying all the knots, leaving nothing Danzo would trip over in the future. And yet again, he failed to predict Iruka.
He let Iruka make some preparations, and that's what led Iruka to come here and face Danzo eye to eye. The very fact that he was here should bring Danzo a lot of trouble in the future, so maybe Iruka's death today wouldn't be that meaningless.
But then again, Danzo had enough power and influence to get away with it, as long as whatever Anko had found out didn't reach the ears of the others. And even then, if the Hokage doesn't make a move himself, Danzo doesn't have many people to worry about.
They were tense, as tense as he was. Looking at each other and trying to see something in each other. They were now overestimating him, not daring to make the first move. Iruka couldn't let such a thing pass. From his pockets, he unfurled sealing scrolls while he had time.
"Let's end this, Danzo."
Iruka threw the scrolls into the air as the shinobi rushed at him. With one hand sign, thousands of weapons exploded from the scrolls, temporarily occupying his enemies as they deflected or dodged the weapons falling on top of them.
"Earth Release: Dust Cloud."
Iruka was in a place where he couldn't use his best weapon, his ninjutsu. So, he fixed that by using the earth elements fused in the weapons. It made them a bit heavier and unbalanced to use, but he got used to it, and for now, he didn't need to use them for their intended purpose.
After all, it wasn't his first time fighting somewhere where he couldn't use his Earth Release. From the first time he had to fight in the middle of a lake, he promised never to be put in that kind of situation ever again.
From within the dust that now covered the whole area, two shinobi emerged. The shadowy figures didn't seem to be disturbed by Iruka's little trick. But even a fool could realize that what Iruka did was nothing but setting up the stage. So, they were now in a hurry to kill Iruka before he could use it.
Blades clashed with each other as Iruka used both of his swords to parry his enemies. Iruka never underestimated his enemies, but it seemed there was a level of difference between those who stayed close to Danzo and those who didn't. And now he could feel it.
Even Fu and Torune weren't this good. Well, more specifically, they were too young to be this good. They were talents that Danzo nurtured himself; it just so happens that he used them too early, and now he has lost one of them.
Iruka's wrist was kicked, making him drop one of his blades, and using another blade to block the second enemy left him wide open. A slash through his torso ran quite deep as Iruka tried to jump back, but he was too late to dodge the slash and only managed to avoid a fatal injury.
But there were far more enemies than those two. Somehow, someone got behind Iruka without him noticing and delivered a kick to his temple, throwing him to the ground. Iruka could only use his momentum to roll away and dodge the kunai flying at him.
Only to roll under another shinobi as he descended on him fast. Using every ounce of his strength in his legs, he jumped away at the last moment to avoid being crushed. The ground where he had been a second earlier was now nothing but a crater.
Iruka tried to weave a hand sign, but he was stopped by a palm hitting his chest, knocking the air out of him. Even when heavily medicated with painkillers, he felt the slash on his torso hurt like hell, making him choke on his saliva.
Blocking another palm strike, Iruka was locked in a hand-to-hand fight, not able to use any hand sign to turn the fight around. And he wasn't even winning the hand-to-hand fight before he felt another two presences coming from behind him.
Taking a punch to his stomach, since he had no other choice, Iruka grabbed the elbow of his opponent before kicking his feet under him and throwing him into the two approaching him from behind. But that punch almost made his knees go weak.
"Earth Release…" He didn't finish making hand signs to control his chakra when two hands came from within the dust and grabbed his shoulders before dragging him away. The stretched-out arms retracted as Iruka now saw who was holding him.
Before Iruka could even think of a way to get out of this situation, his opponent's body stretched out again, and like a snake, his legs wrapped around Iruka's legs and his arms wrapped around Iruka's arms in a complete hold from which he couldn't escape.
A second later, a shinobi came at him, thrusting his sword at Iruka's heart. He couldn't even move as he watched the sword come closer to him. It would be the end if his wrist and fingers were as restricted as the rest of his body.
"Pit of Despair." It took longer to finish the hand signs; not able to connect his two hands together, but he did it just in time.
It wasn't a stage that Iruka created with all the dust, but a pit. Surrounded by the earth from all sides, there was no escape as the dust solidified into thin and sharp spikes. He didn't even need to shoot them down for the spikes to pierce everyone who was within the dust.
And since it so happened that someone was behind and in front of him, they blocked the spikes with their bodies and protected Iruka from most of the damage. But he still got his foot pierced since he couldn't have any control over his jutsu in this kind of situation.
Collapsing on his knees, Iruka looked at the carnage he had created. Bleeding heavily, he looked at six shinobi whose blood ran down like a waterfall, quickly creating a red and sticky surface that he touched with his hand to support himself.
For a second, he didn't even understand why he was down here, why his vision was blurry, and why his breathing was so heavy. It could be his exhausted body, or the wounds and the loss of blood finally catching up to him. But no, it was the end of his chakra that brought him down.
There were still six shinobi standing with Danzo. Though two of them were injured, the rest had completely avoided any damage. Even as his head wanted to fall, he continued to look at them. Even as he took out pills from his pockets, he didn't let his eyes wander off them.
The green and yellow pills tasted bitter as he swallowed them and lowered his mask once again, not showing his enemies how sickly his face was. He felt his chakra return to him, even as his body contorted in unnatural ways and pain ran through his muscles.
Slowly standing up, he pulled out a spike stuck in his foot and brandished it as a weapon since, along with this mess, he lost his blades. Danzo looked down on him but let him get back on his feet. Out of pity or respect, Iruka would never know. Maybe he thought it didn't matter.
To him, all these shinobi who had died were nothing but numbers. With time, they would be replaced, no matter how regretful it was to lose them. To him, Iruka's struggle was meaningless and worthless. Just a pointless refusal to accept his fate.
But he was wrong. Iruka had long since accepted his fate. He was just a spiteful fuck who wanted to bring down as many people as he could with him. And it so happened that Danzo was right before his eyes.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball."
A giant stream of fire rushed towards Iruka as he moved to his feet and, wrenching his barely responding arm back, threw the spike in his hand. He felt his arm burning before the fire abruptly stopped, as the spike he threw pierced through the shinobi's mouth who tried to fry him.
"Earth Release…" Iruka felt his blood and other nasty things rising to his throat as he joined his hands into a hand sign, but he swallowed it back. "Hedgehog."
The shinobi with a spike in his mouth barely let out a sound as the needles extended from the spike, piercing through his head, and he dropped to the ground dead. Five were left before he could get to Danzo.
"Come at me," Iruka extended his burned arm forward, beckoning them to finish what they started.
It would be far easier if they came to him rather than the other way around. Though he recovered a bit of his chakra, it was at the cost of his physical strength. The pills he took weren't made for someone like him.
The calories that were supposed to give him energy to move were now completely burned, and he could only keep his body functioning with the chakra he had regained. Moving was quite a difficult ordeal for him right now.
A.N. As always. Thanks for reading and supporting me. If you want 7 more chapters of this story and 42 chapters in total with all my current stories, please consider supporting me on pa treon ironworlf852. Thanks in advance.