Author's Note:

I've been practicing writing through fanfiction for years, and I've never actually finished one of my stories. And I'm sorry about that. I've still got Secret Fire moving though so don't worry about that. But I figured I'd go "back to the basics" so to speak for a second active story. I cut my teeth on fanfiction writing Naruto fanfiction back when I was in middle and then high school. So now that Naruto is nominally over (Boruto...counts as...eh) I figured I might want to take a shot at my old stomping ground with something that is as far as I can tell completely unique.

I'd like to dedicate this story to my old beta Mackiestingray whose feedback over the years when I was younger helped me develop as a writer even though I never finished any of the stories we were working on.

Canon note- The Naruto canon timeline before the 3rd Shinobi World War is a mess so I am going to take a lot of liberties with time and ages, but those will be at least somewhat explained in the story.

Chapter 1: Let Slip the Dogs of War

It was supposed to be a quick skirmish to help defend an allied village, Kusagakure, from some low level ninja, Team Orochimaru had not anticipated running into the Iwagakure Explosion Corps.

As Nawaki felt a strange texture permeate his chakra as he released a Water Encampment Wall to protect himself from the mine he decided not to question it, as his defensive jutsu had been stronger than normal and it had likely saved his life.

The young genin flew backwards through the air with his clothing smoldering, straight into the arms of one of his teammates.

"Damnit Nawaki, don't just charge ahead like an idiot!" Katsumi Kurama chided his exuberant teammate as he let him down back onto the ground.

The Senju heir groaned in acknowledgement as he looked up at the taller boy. Katsumi was much heavier built than Nawaki and his dark auburn hair was tied back by his forehead protector in a ponytail.

He turned to face the unknown opponents, "Well Nawaki, let's see who set that trap, yeah?" He fell into a defensive taijutsu stance as their third teammate landed nearby.

"They're Iwa-nin I think," Shiori Uchiha spoke, her single tomoe Sharingan spinning, "I think this mission was either a betrayal by Kusa or they were pretending to be bandits to draw a ninja team out into an ambush."

Their sensei formed quickly out of the ground, releasing his headhunter jutsu, "Likely the second Shiori-kun. Good analysis, however. I also believe this is the Explosion Corps so leave this to me, you will all primarily be support. Shiori intercept any attackers that get past me with your katon jutsu and weapons. Nawaki you are long range elemental jutsu support. Katsumi you are the least suited to long range so use what few ranged genjutsu you have and strike with your melee genjutsu only at distracted or restrained opponents. Understood?"

The three young genin nodded at their sensei.

"Good. Hajime!" With that Orochimaru melted back into the earth and a few seconds later a mix of poison gas and explosions flared up fifty meters further into the tree line.

With her Sharingan Shiori saw the first Iwa-nin to break through their sensei's combat zone and flung a full brace of shurikan.

The bulky enemy deflected every single shurikan, but it was just a distraction for her teammates to have an opening. A quick Water Bullet jutsu form Nawaki hit the ninja from his exposed flank and blasted him straight into Katsumi's fist as he replaced himself with one of Shiori's shurikan from earlier.

The touch-based genjutsu of the Kurama clan-member put the enemy ninja straight into a coma that would be impossible to awaken from without outside interference for a day or so.

Quickly they fell back into a defensive formation as more explosions rocked the forest and they heard the enraged hissing of a snake summons.

"So uh...how many do you think there are?" Nawaki gently questioned his teammates as they held position listening to the sounds of combat rage in the distance.

Shoiri frowned as she scanned the tree line for any sign of nearing movement, unfortunately at her one tomoe stage her Sharingan all she could do was vaguely see chakra and speed up her sense of perception slightly.

"I'm not sure, Nawaki. Orochimaru-sensei could have taken out any number of them by now. And we don't know how many there were to begin with."

"Pfft...well we know it's at least one less now," Katsumi joked dryly as they kept alert.

"Ow! What was that for?" He yelled as Shiori shifted her foot to jam it down on his toe through his combat sandles.

"This is no time for jokes. This was supposed to be a C-rank mission and almost all Iwa ninja that use Explosion Release like that mine that almost killed Nawaki are high chuunin level. We're in way over our heads. And this kind of ambush could be considered a declaration of war!"

The young Uchiha brushed a loose strand of hair back into place under her forehead protector and continued scanning for foes while her teammates digested her words.

"Incoming chakra source, three o'clock!"

Nawaki nodded and began flying through handseals, finishing with Dragon and expelled a massive amount of water from his mouth with a cry of, "Suiton: Snake's Mouth!"

Luckily the lone alpine forest which stood on the border between the Lands of Grass and Earth where the plains turned to the foothills of the Land of Stone's mountains had enough moisture this late in the evening that he could supplement his natural water source, the water quickly shaped into a serpent's head and slammed past tree branches and towards the incoming enemy.

"Ha!" The enemy cried out as he dodged and came into view, "Strong attack for a genin but still just a genin!" The enemy stood on the tree branch closest to the clearing and wore a chuunin flak jacket and an Iwagakure headband. He cracked his knuckles and they began glowing with chakra.

"So you dodged some of our landmines but can you dodge my explosive fi...huh?"

The enemy ninja was confused as Nawaki formed a Ram seal.

"Release!" The water technique explosively broke its cohesion and swamped the entire region of forest in water forcing the Rock ninja to leap up higher in the tree.

"You brat! What was the point of tha-shit!"

Orochimaru had taught his team to keep talking to a minimum during fights against superior opponents. Talking was for psychological warfare only. To that regard Shiori had quickly launched as many shurikan as she could at the enemy to force him off balance, and used ninja wire to have the windmilling blades return for a second strike from strange and oblique angles.

The chunin was put onto a mild defensive much to his annoyance. Kunai out he blocked a dozen shurikan before growling in annoyance and turning to punch the tree he was on with chakra, causing a massive explosion which covered his position with a smokescreen of wood pulp and shrapnel to throw the shurikan off course.

"He used a replacement! I can't see where!" Shiori cried out as the three genin quickly searched around.

It was Katsumi who came to the correct conclusion, "Jump!"

The other two genin reacted instantly and took to the air as the Rock ninja burst out of the ground with his explosive fist thrust upwards.

Now the genin team was scattered and out of formation, but also had the enemy trapped between them. A fundamental aspect of the three man genin team was the idea that a well trained genin team could take out most chunin in straight combat with the use of teamwork and misdirection.

And while a member of the Iwagakure Explosion Corps wasn't a normal chunin neither was this a normal team of genin. While they had only been training under Orochimaru for a month or so he was one of the strongest members of Konoha's jonin and a member of the Sandaime Hokage's own trained team. Not to mention that all three were members of powerful and prestigious clans.

Nawaki was a Senju, and the grandson of the Shodaime Hokage who had founded the ninja village. He specialized in mid to long range elemental ninjutsu and had a relatively large chakra reserve from his Uzumaki grandmother to back it up. He had mostly water jutsu like his great uncle the Nidaime Hokage, but also had a few surprises under his belt to exploit that.

Katsumi was a member of the Kurama clan, a family of genjutsu specialists who also had an infrequently appearing kekkei genkai, which he did not possess. In fact he barely possessed his family's skill in most genjutsu, however he had a strange proclivity towards touch based genjutsu and thus focused on those and a taijutsu style based upon causing distracting pain to an enemy to have them not notice the activation of his touch based genjutsu.

And finally Shiori was a member of the Uchiha clan. Descendants of the traitorous Madara Uchiha who had helped Hashirama Senju found the village and the police force of Konoha. They also possessed the powerful dojutsu, the Sharingan, which had multiple stages of maturity of which Shiori only had access to the first. Her clan also focused on katon style ninjutsu and shurikanjutsu exploiting the predictive skills of their kekkei genkai.

All of this said, a chunin's speed could often make the difference if there was not enough misdirection and teamwork between the genin in such a battle.

And Tatsuki of the Explosion Corp had to be fast to make and escape his close range explosions.

Katsumi was not prepared when the ninja suddenly burst towards him in a cloud of dust with a body flicker technique, but he was not caught so off guard that he took a direct hit.

The area explosion from the explosive fist however caught him completely by surprise. Rocky shrapnel burst in all directions and skewered and shattered his leg.

"Ah!"

"Katsumi!" Both of his teammates cried in fear and rage.

"Grr...that's it! I'm done with you Rock guy!" Nawaki screamed as he ran through handseals and gathered chakra, "Shiori cover me!"

She nodded and flung another brace of wire controlled shurikan out to lock down their foe.

And indeed the chunin was hard pressed to defend from the barrage all in the few seconds he had before Nawaki finished his jutsu.

As he finished gathering chakra and landed on his dragon seal once more the crystal on the necklace around his neck began to glow and he sensed something extra get added into his chakra once more, "Raiton: Electromagnetic Murder!"

Using the puddles and pools of water from his earlier jutsu the lightning chakra jumped from pool to pool locking down the enemy's movements and eventually striking him directly and running tens of thousands of volts through him, frying him to a crisp.

Nawaki let out gasps of breath at how much chakra he had put into the technique as Shiori ran over to check on Katsumi.

She cursed under her breath, "Nawaki we need to retreat! Katsumi can't walk on this!"

With a grunt he moved over to begin helping them move back as the explosions in the distance began to quiet.

Three days later they had returned to Konoha with their sensei and gotten Katsumi into the personal care of Nawaki's older sister and Orochimaru's former teammate, Tsunade Senju.

Two days after that the official declaration of war between Konoha and Iwa was sent out.

A day after that Orochimaru was sent back to Kusagakure by himself to lead that front of the war, while Jiraiya headed off to make sure that Amegakure did not side with Iwa, nor did Iwa break through that smaller nation to attack the Land of Fire.

Team Orochimaru would remain in Konoha training with their families until Katsumi's mangled leg was fully healed.

Shiori would spend her days training in the Uchiha compound to hopefully evolve her Sharingan, and at the very least gain better control of her fire release techniques.

Nawaki on the other hand was a member of the Senju clan, which consisted only of himself and his sister at the moment. And of course their grandmother by marriage into the clan, Mito Uzumaki.

And Mito had decided that since there was no Senju around to teach Nawaki the techniques of Hashirama and Tobirama, she would teach him the ways of the Uzumaki.