A foot smashed into his chest, expelling the air from his lungs and knocking him out of the tree down towards the snakes open mouth.
With a brutal, unreal drop kick that rattled the bones in their chests, the armored form of Han literally batted the Serpent asside with Strength that could rival Tsunade.
Orochi raised an eyebrow. He'd have to stay away from that one's blows.
Rochi landed on his feet, turning with his hands already finishing their seals before he breathed fire on the dazed reptile sending it back to the summoned realm with a screech.
"Go!" He demanded.
Han rushed forward, traps and ninja wire springing from the ground to hold him still before he barreled through them with sheer brute force, snapping branches and crunching through trees.
Ten bunshin's emerged from the shadows of the forest and gave the Jinchuuriki barely a moments pause before steam ruptured from the heavy armored pack behind him, the scalding heat destroyed the six closest ones outright, burning their flesh enough to dispel them.
The remaining four reeled, pulling back before Roshi was on them, fireballs exploding across the forest to blanket the whole place in flames, burning a path that the red armored behemoth barreled straight through.
'Kukukuku. It is you then..' The Sannin laughed, vanishing into the shadows again 'Roshi...you've gotten so old now.'
The fiery headed man grunted. "No older than your master. I'll kill you this time."
"You came close before...but things-"
The Jinchuuriki turned catching a kunai before tossing it away, the explosive tag going off just far enough to not hurt him.
Then he felt pain lance up his extended arm.
Jumping away with a curse the Jinchuuriki grit his teeth against the searing pain now coating his forearm, dispelling the illusion with a fluctuation of chakra, finding the Sannin standing beside the spot he'd just been occupying on the branch, a gleaming sword in his hand, the edge dripping blood.
"-will be different this time I think." He laughed.
Roshi sneered, a searing heat emerging from his skin before the branch he was standing on caught aflame, a thin coating of fire and molten rock rising up from his feat to cover his body.
The Sannin's grin grew delighted. "Oh? Already? I remember that technique well enough. Once upon a time you all but killed me with it."
The old Jinchuuriki frowned. How much of this confidence was a bluff? "My Youton no Yoroi has never been breached, not by you, not by anyone. I'll be sure to kill you today, without your precious Tsunade here to rescue you."
That smile turned psychotic. "Kukukuku. Lets find out shall we?"
The fire rose up past his neck and swallowed up his face, the whole tree now burning as he charged the pale Konoha ninja.
-0-
Han didn't so much as move through the forest as much as he simply plowed through it.
The man's leaps were powerful, snapping branches under his feet, swallowing a distance of twenty or thirty feet in single, powerful leaps that sent the limbs of trees, twigs and needle like pine leaves raining down to the forest floor.
He wasn't trying to be stealthy, he was trying to hurry.
They were only a few miles from Konoha's border.
They couldn't afford to do this too close to the village, if any of the other villages got wind of this the sanctions would be egregious. They couldn't risk anyone finding out until it was done. Then it'd just be a case of Konoha's word against Iwa's and the whole situation could be muddled to the point of obscurity.
For that reason alone did they wait that long.
The window for getting back their primary target, and eliminating their secondary target, the so called Namikaze brat, was absurdly small, a stretch of about ten miles of forest.
That sounded all well and good until one realized it was just two men that had to cover ten miles abroad and more than thirty or forty miles lengthwise.
By the time they'd managed to sense the Gennin's and Orochimaru's suppressed chakra signature they were already nearly through the area of interception.
These Konoha nin only had seven miles to go before they reached Konoha's borderline. Pursuing them any further meant risking exposure to the chuunin, or worse, Anbu, patrols.
The Jinchuuriki's eyes gleamed as he caught sight of red armor ahead of him through the trees.
It wasn't long before shuriken flew out of the shadows of the forest, arcing through the air to punch through armor with sheer brute force that belied their small size, the victim screamed as he was thrown off his horse.
"To arms!"
"In the trees, up there in the trees!"
Seventeen of the eighteen riders left notched their arrows into bow strings drawing back as one as they turned in their saddles, searching for a target.
More thrown weapons flew from the gloom, killing another of the galloping group before two of the men turned, finding their pursuer before firing, watching as the red clad shinobi dodged with a sharp movement, more arrows exploding his way as the rest of the troupe caught sight of him.
Landed on a tree, cursing as an arrow screeched against the armor that covered the lower half of his face. Lucky shot.
Steam vented from the engine at his back, a thickened fog trailing behind him as he sped ahead of the group, the thick, heavy blanket of heated water becoming unnaturally thick behind him, swallowing the group whole as they continued their dead head charge towards the border.
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