While fighting on the shore, trying to hold back the advancing Kiri invasion, Jiraiya noticed the bombardment above their heads had stopped before he could realize why. While kicking the enemies back into the ocean, one moment lightning hammered the Uzushiogakure barrier, but the next, it became suspiciously silent. Catching his breath, Jiraiya stood atop a shattered section of pontoon bridge with blood running down one side of his face, which wasn't his at all, as he started staring upward. At the same time, the Kiri shinobi regrouped across the floating platforms, backing off, finally having a chance to gather distance between themselves and the rampaging Sannin.
"What the hell…?" Gamabunta growled from the water beside him, distracted just the same, watching as chaos apparently erupted within the enemy in the sky. "What happened to them?"
"..." Jiraiya knew exactly what: "Hiraishin."
He also knew exactly which two idiots were using it, just as a clay bird broke in half and five shinobi dropped from its back, screaming as they fell toward the dome. Another construct lost a wing and began spiraling toward the sea a moment later, crashing into a whirlpool, shredding it even further. Jiraiya's first reaction was pride, even if he wouldn't acknowledge it to others, because his mind caught up the next moment.
"What are those two doing outside the barrier?!"
"Huh?" Gamabunta's enormous eye shifted toward him. "You're asking me? And who are those, hm?!"
"No matter..." He grunted, grinding his teeth.
A Kiri swordsman charged across the bridge toward Jiraiya just then, wanting to use his distraction as an opportunity. What happened instead was that Jiraiya simply ducked under the man's blade, drove one fist into his stomach, and hurled him into the raging water, never to reemerge above it.
"Push them back!" Jiraiya shouted, shaking his body. "Their air support is distracted! It is now or never!"
The Uzumaki defenders needed no further encouragement.
Adamantine chains flew across the beach in renewed vigor, wrapping around the Kiri shinobi and slamming them down. At the same time, seals detonated beneath some of the remaining pontoon bridges, splitting entire sections and throwing a good chunk of the invaders into the whirlpools. Also rejoining the effort, Gamabunta lifted one massive foot and brought it down on another bridge, crushing several unfortunate shinobi beneath it.
Even then, every soldier on the beach kept looking upward when they had a chance. Sometimes they saw Minato appear behind an Iwa controller and knock him from his bird, or Renji flash beside a construct's head, drive a burning fist into it, and shatter the entire front half.
"They're taking apart the whole formation," an Uzumaki beside Jiraiya panted, feeling like laughing.
"They're going to get themselves killed," Jiraiya answered, biting his lips, but there was nothing to do about it.
Not when another wave of Kiri shinobi rushed across the collapsing bridge, making him look back down from the sky. Without thinking, he formed a Rasengan, as if inspired by their effort, using it for the first time in battle, and drove it into the first man's chest. The spiraling chakra threw him backward through two of his comrades before all three disappeared over the edge. The effect made Jiraiya raise a brow, as he had already summoned a second, feeling a bit braver about the two kids' efforts up above them all.
However, soon, he began worrying again as the enemy had begun adapting and the surviving constructs reorganized into rings, placing observers above, attackers in the middle, and interceptors below to keep watch of each other. Once again he was worried as his boys had lost the advantage of complete surprise. And then... he sensed Renji's gathering chakra, becoming way too active. Jiraiya's head snapped upward, without thinking, as the intensifying light shone beneath one of the clay birds.
"Oh, no!" The light grew without warning, becoming so intense that Jiraiya couldn't see Renji beneath the bird, but he could feel the boy pouring more and more chakra into the technique without restraint. "Renjiro!" he shouted, even though there was no chance his voice would reach him. If he depleted all he had, he would... die.
Then, the light vanished, and for one heartbeat, Jiraiya thought the enemy had managed to stop him... only just for a second... But then the sun had suddenly appeared above Uzushiogakure.
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The first report made no sense... Two intruders inside the aerial formation? How? Who? From where? Approaching from below? That can't be true...
Feeling confused, the Iwa controller pressed both hands against the seal carved into his bird's neck, feeding it chakra while searching the night sky for the attackers, receiving feedback from his own superior. Then... He saw a yellow flash out of the corner of his eye as one of the birds to his left shattered into pieces. What was that?! A jutsu?!
Before he could understand how, a black-haired boy appeared on another construct and drove his heel through its head, right before him... Then... the boy vanished. A clone? No, that can't be right. At that moment, their commander shouted for the formation to spread into a ring, and he hurriedly obeyed, forcing his bird upward while the middle and lower rings separated. They were afraid to spread out too much and get isolated, giving easy pickings to their enemies before detection... Yet it did not help.
Constantly looking around, the Iwa controller watched dozens of shinobi fall, and although he knew nobody from the Kumo side, he was deathly afraid. What if he was next? When would he be next? When would an unknown teenager appear behind him and kick him into the ocean? He was going mad with fright, and the longer he went without being attacked, the more panicked he became, making his bird fly erratically.
"Something is below us!" One of the shinobis behind him yelled... and then attacks began flying towards... him?!
With his panic erupting, he began swerving, almost crying, not even understanding in that moment why his own allies decided to turn on him. He knew nothing; he just knew he wanted to live and get back home... But then some of the bolts struck them, and the construct broke apart below him, making him fall. He felt the world slow down, and then noticed a boy... And... There was a sun in his hand. Weird... Why was he holding it? How was he holding it...? And... Why did he throw it out? Now he was falling too....
Numb from the shock, he watched as the sun suddenly expanded, the bright light blinding him before the heat reached his face. He could no longer see, but he could hear the otherworldly noise that was like the laugh of a shinigami. Death was here, and it came for him... for everyone...
He no longer tried to fight against it; it was futile. He just had to accept death... Everyone had to...
"I just want to... go home..." he muttered before everything went dark, and his body disintegrated, hitting the cliffside down below.
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The Kumo lieutenant survived the growing, fiery expansion because he had been far above the center of the formation, directing the others. If not for the fact that he shielded his eyes, he knew he would have been blinded by the expanding sun. Still, he knew it was a pyrrhic 'victory,' because his armor burned against his skin, and who knows how bad it would be by the time he could see a healer. He may very well be disfigured for the rest of his life. But... he managed to live, and more importantly, the Iwa controller was still screaming as the woman tried to keep the bird level. Good... good... Finally it was over. The red sphere stopped growing.
"Climb!" he shouted, wanting to gather the remaining forces for a counterattack, "Get above it!"
The damaged bird struggled to move, just like the others who had escaped the fire. Starting to regain his confidence, the lieutenant looked down, seeing the massive, red sphere tremble... and... collapse.
"What?!" He inhaled sharply, but his yell was drowned out by the sudden shockwave that reached them first before the sound of the explosion. He could not even hear it because the first wave had already shattered his eardrums. He barely noticed many of the remaining birds getting split apart in complete silence, leaving him with nothing but ringing ears. Then, as if invisible hands grabbed onto him, the lieutenant was torn from his feet and yanked forward. He caught one of the ridges on the bird with both hands as the wind screamed past him toward the quickly darkening center of the previously bright sun that was already gone. He shouted something, even he didn't know what, but nobody heard him. Their bird was already falling towards the epicenter of the suction force, so the lieutenant pulled a metal spike from his belt and drove it into the bird's back. Lightning chakra magnetized the spike to the armored clay, while he tried to find a target to anchor it to outside of the weird effect that caught them... but there was none.
Finally, the bird exploded into pieces under him as the lieutenant fell toward the collapsing sphere, along with everyone else. In panic, he fired a second wire toward another bird, and although the hook caught onto it, that second bird was dragged toward the center too, making it useless. By now, the lieutenant continued falling, and it felt like he was... falling upward. Or sideways? He didn't know; he just watched as the center of the sphere had turned black, looking at him like a hungry maw. As a last resort, the lieutenant formed hand seals, spending all the chakra in him, as he either died by his own hands or... by that monster he was falling towards. A spear of lightning erupted from his mouth, as it struck the black fire, but it just disappeared into it... the same as he did the next moment. He wasn't feeling any pain, only an all-consuming blackness that turned him into... dust.
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The Kiri commander had spent years preparing for the invasion of Uzushiogakure. He had studied their whirlpools, sent people to their deaths to map their positions, and he gained the location of their underwater barriers... He had all the Seven Swordsmen on his ships... Waiting to be unleashed upon the Uzumakis and slaughter them to the last man. Spill blood until nobody remained standing besides their forces... The plan was going as expected, even with the loss of several ships. Even if Jiraiya, one of the Konoha Sannins, were here, it would only mean he dies along with the rest. The Seven would deal with him, and it would have been worth it all, weakening Konoha.
Yet... All that was now a dream. Or, in his view, a brutal nightmare.
The commander stood on their flagship's deck while a new sunrise had appeared across the sea. Every shadow vanished, and the entire fleet became visible inside the fog they had spent months creating. When it exploded, the flagship, being far from its epicenter, still groaned... or maybe it was him who made that noise; he couldn't tell.
"No response from the aerial command." One of the Seven Swordsmen said, standing next to him.
"And the Kumo bombardment teams?"
"Nothing."
The commander looked toward the shoreline, his hands crushing the railing of the ship, just when Gamabunta fired another projectile and another of their warship disappeared behind an explosion of water. He watched as on the beaches, Uzumaki chains surged forward while the invaders stared at the dying black sun, unable to react in time. Jiraiya led the counterattack personally, and this time it meant that the operation was a clear failure. He could send in the rest of their troops, but then what? All those whom the others had sent over were now dead, and Kiri was alone. Was he to risk it all now? Take down the Uzumakis but also cripple their own army? What if the two bastards backstab them because of it? Would they? Of course they would... because he would too.
Cursing loudly, the commander knew when an operation had failed.
"Signal the landing forces," he ordered without hesitating anymore. "Withdraw."
A moment later, a bright yellow flare flashed across the water, followed by more, as the Kiri ships began reversing from the worst currents, getting out of the range of Gamabunta's jutsus. Surviving bridge teams opened retreat routes while shoreline officers screamed at their soldiers to fall back, as in just a moment's notice, the attacking forces began retreating.
"Find out who created that technique." Their commander said with an icy voice.
"The Mizukage won't be happy about this..."
"That is why I want a name before dawn... If we go back without something, I won't keep my head..."