Chapter Seven: Jiraiya's Capture and Journey to Kami no Kuni

Jiraiya of the Sannin lay huddled on the rocky floor of a cliff cave in the middle of the Kaze desert as he tried to gain desperately needed shut eye after a long day on the run. Ever since Tsunade had learned about his gross negligence and reckless irresponsibility on the training trip, she had deployed dozens of hunter-ninja to capture him to bring back to Konoha to explain his actions. While Konoha's hunter corps wasn't well-known like the one in Kirigakure, they were still a force to be feared. To make matters worse, all of the hunter ninja that were actively hunting him were female.

"What did I ever do to deserve this?" Jiraiya mentally whined as he involuntarily shivered as a cold gust of wind blew over him.

He conveniently ignored the fact that he had brought his current situation down upon himself with his own actions. If there one thing that the toad sage had mastered over the years, it was ignoring the fact that he often created the situations that he often found himself in. In the past, the third Hokage would help him get out of trouble and this created complacency on the sage's part. But now, he no longer had that protection and the consequences of his past actions were now catching up with him.

"This is all Naruto's fault, if he had just drop the issue than none of this would've happened." Jiraiya angrily muttered as he blamed his godson for refusing to remain quiet about not being trained.

To him, the brat's sole duty in life was learning how to harness the Kyūbi's chakra in order to serve as the village's sword and shield against jinchūriki from other villages. Like Ōnoki of Iwagakure, there were many within Konoha that viewed Jinchūriki as little more than slaves to be used as they saw fit. It didn't matter to them that neither of the previous Jinchūriki had been treated as such, but they were gone and they could put their beliefs into practice using Naruto.

"I was destined to be remembered forever as the one that trained the person that would save the shinobi world, not be hunted down like a rabid dog by a bunch of angry and ungrateful kunoichi." The toad sage dejectedly thought as the irony of the situation began to set in.

He had spent the last forty-two years exploiting the appearances of various kunoichi as inspiration for his pornographic novels, only for his actions to give greater motivation for the female hunter-ninja to hunt him. It didn't matter that he was using their likeness without permission or compensation, they should've consider it as a great honor to have one of his characters based on their appearance. To add further insult to injury, Ma toad had found out about his predicament and somehow had forced the other toad summons to not give him aid.

"How could this get any worse?" The toad sage complained aloud.

Just outside of his cave, he heard the sound of a female voice urging someone else to move faster.

"Come on, girls! I think that I heard something over here!" The feminine voice shouted.

Jiraiya quickly shoved a fist into his mouth as he peaked over the side of the cave entrance to see five women walking around the base of cliff. Despite wearing clothing that was heavily-associated with civilian commoners, the toad sage could easily tell that they weren't civilians or commoners. It was a common trick amongst hunter-ninja to dress up as civilians in order to get closer to a target and get into foreign nations without much harassment. Of course, Jiraiya had unsuccessfully tried to convince the third Hokage to make it a requirement that Konoha's female hunter ninja wear clothing that was more slutty.

For the next twenty minutes, he watched helplessly as the five women as they investigated the area at the base of the cliff. After that twenty minutes had ended, the women formed a circle and were loudly discussing their predicament over not finding anything.

"Damn it, I really thought that something had made a noise over here." the woman that had summoned the others.

By the looks of it, Jiraiya figured her to be the leader of the group as the others seem to follow her lead.

"It's alright, Yukina. It might have been a bird or something." one of the other women commented in a sympathetic voice.

Jiraiya mentally started commanding the women to go away as he didn't want to listen to them talk about their feelings and other such bullshit. It's one of the many reasons why that he never got married as the toad sage didn't want to be tied down to a single woman for his entire life. That's why he remained single and spent money on whores and prostitutes in the event that he had a certain itch that needed to be scratched.

"Oh, well. Want to have a lesbian orgy?" Yukina commented before suggesting to her friends.

At hearing the other women agreeing to an orgy, Jiraiya junior began to rise and the toad sage watched as the women began undressing themselves. The toad sage's eyes widened as he saw the large breasts that each woman had on their chests and bound up in bandages. The smallest pair had to be in the lower D-cup range at the very least from where he was currently hiding.

"Oh, I just wish that there was a strong man with us to make us feel a lot more pleasure." Another one of the women said before started kissing one of her colleagues.

At hearing, this Jiraiya lost all control over himself as all of his blood rushed from his upper head down to his lower one. Dropping a liberal amount of smoke bombs and firecrackers, he started his unique introduction that he always used on people that have never met, seen, or head of him before.

"Greetings, Ladies. I'm the gallant Jiraiya of Mount Myōboku and I'm-" The Toad Sage started to say before he quickly found his arms bound next to his chest in chakra-canceling rope.

He quickly looked up to see that the women were fully clothed with kunai and wakizashi drawn at the ready. Each of them had a scowl on their faces that was a mixture between anger and disgust.

"A complete and utter perverted fool that is in a lot of trouble for shirking his responsibilities and ignore numerous summons from Lady Tsunade." The one known as Yukina commented as she walked over the bound toad sage with a sadistic grin on her face that would make Anko Mitarashi proud.

It was just now that Jiraiya realized that he had fallen into a Genjutsu that made him see what the women knew would bring him out of hiding. His own perverted nature had been his undoing and now he would have to suffer the consequences of his actions. He could only whimper like a scared puppy as the various possibilities of what his punishment would be flashed inside of his mind.

Elsewhere

Naruto nervously eyed the monk that team Kakashi had been ordered to escort back to his monastery in the land of the gods without having to pay anything. Something about the man felt off and it was making him feel uneasy about the entire situation. It was common knowledge amongst the shinobi villages that monks treated ninja as a necessary evil at the best of times and a plague on society at the worst of times. But this monk was acting quite friendly towards him and Kakashi to the point that it was unnerving. It didn't help that the former Jinchūriki could sense an almost otherworldly aura emitting from the monk.

"I was hoping that you could answer something for me, Uzumaki-san." The monk asked the ninja of hellfire in a curious tone.

Naruto mentally sighed as he had a gut feeling that he was going to be asked about the current whereabouts of Sasuke Uchiha. When it came to high-profile clans from Konoha, the Uchiha were always at the forefront of everyone's minds as they were descended from the legendary Madara Uchiha. Of course, the village didn't like to mention the fact that the last two remaining Uchiha had betrayed the village.

"What is it, monk-san?" He reluctantly answered.

Despite Sakura's efforts to look like she wasn't paying attention, Naruto could tell that she was eavesdropping on their conversation. No doubt, she doing it in case of someone saying anything bad about her beloved psychopath.

"Is it true that Sasuke Uchiha willingly defected from your village in order to join Orochimaru of the Sannin?" The monk asked with all seriousness in his voice.

Naruto stopped walking for a brief second as he pondered on how to best explain to the monk about the situation surrounding Sasuke. Before his training trip with the pervert and the spent year in Anbu, he would've tried to defend Sasuke's desertion with the explanation that the curse seal on his neck had clouded the Uchiha's judgment. But after talking to Anko about her curse seal, he doubted that this was the case.

"Yes, it's true that Sasuke deserted the village on his free will." Naruto answered in an even tone.

Despite continuing to walk like nothing had happened, Kakashi was stunned that Naruto had openly-admitted to someone that Sasuke was a traitor to the village. Just how much had Naruto changed during his three years away from the village with Jiraiya?

"I see, and what would you do if he returns to the village?" The monk asked in a serene manner.

Again, Naruto remained silent for a moment as he pondered on what he would do. After their battle at the valley of the end, he could no longer trust his former teammate as the bastard had driven two chidori-covered fists into his chest and nearly killed him. From what Ahri told him about the Uchiha clan, they were always a group that would do anything for power. The fact that the Sharingan allowed them to copy the techniques and jutsu of others just solidified the fact.

"If he's court marshaled for his actions, I won't speak in his defense. If he's allowed to rejoin the shinobi forces, I won't trust him and I'll request to be reassigned to another squad." The former Jinchūriki answered honestly.

Everyone stopped dead in their tracks at hearing that Naruto wouldn't defend his former teammate in the likely event that he was put on trial. Even Naruto was surprised as he hadn't intended to say what he truly felt about the rouge Uchiha, but it had slipped out. In Konoha, it was a common tradition for former teammates to protect each other from any repercussions that their actions may have caused. For him to disregard such a tradition was quite revealing about his opinion on Sasuke.

"I see, he must have really betrayed your trust in the past in order for you to turn your back on him." The monk commented.

Naruto wanted to openly scoff at the biggest understatement of the century that he had ever heard. Sasuke had always been a self-centered prick and the undeserved praise that he got from everyone had inflated his ego to the point that he believed that he was a precious gift from the almighty gods. What sickened him even more was the fact that certain people were trying to justify his desertion with the bullshit excuse that the cursed hickey that Orochimaru had given him was clouding the Uchiha's judgment.

"Let's just say the only reason that I won't be killing on sight is due to a promise that I made to my teammate and leave it at that." The former Jinchūriki responded as he shot an angry glare at Sakura's back.

With that said, he continued walking without a care in the world.

"Naruto-san, you have stepped out of the shadows of your parents and begun deviating from the sanctimonious ideals of Konoha to forge your own path." The monk thought to himself as he look on with interest at the retreating form of the new Scorpion.

Back in Konoha

While he wouldn't admit it to anyone and put up a bored façade, Shikamaru was deeply-afraid of the ritual that he was about to undertake in a few days. As a small child, his grandmother used to tell him stories about the storied history of the Nara clan and all of its proud accomplishments. However, she had always been extremely vague and evasive about the clan's dealings during the time before the Sengoku period. It wasn't until he been promoted to Chūnin that his father had finally revealed the truth about their clan.

They were descendants of a deadly assassin that had died in combat and somehow returned to the land of the living as a wraith with powers over the shadows.

"Man, what a drag." Shikamaru thought to himself as he pulled a cigarette and put it in his mouth.

It was no wonder that everyone in the clan took such efforts to conceal such a dark truth about its true origins. If word got out that they were descended from such a repulsive being, they would be hunted down and exterminated to the last man, woman, and child. It was one of the main reasons why the clan had put a stop to turning their members into wraith-like entities.

"Still something big is happening for my father to restart such a horrid practice and force me to join Anbu Black Ops." The lazy shinobi grumbled as he pulled out a lighter.

While he knew that smoking was bad for his health, he really needed something to take the edge off of his shoulders. For the last few years, the clan had been quietly gathering the material needed for the ritual with only the Hokage and the uninformed members of the clan noticing the activity. However, the villagers were starting to get suspicious as the date of the ritual drew near and the Nara clan were becoming less subtle about getting the necessary items.

"We just need one more thing and we'll have everything to carry out the ritual. Is it wrong of me to hope that they don't get the needed item in time?" Shikamaru thought as he lit the cigarette in his mouth.

While the logical part of his brain justified the plan as a necessary evil that would benefit the clan in the long run, his emotion were telling him that it was just plain wrong. However, he couldn't go against the clan as it would lead to him being exiled and his parents being punished for his refusal. Sometimes being a part of a clan was a real drag.

"The only thing that I can do is go along with the plan and hope that everything works out in the end." The Nara heir commented as he took a deep puff from his cigarette and let the nicotine do its work.

It wasn't that great of a plan, but it was the only thing that he could think up on such short notice. But right now, it was the only thing that he could do at the moment.

Okay, a new chapter for you guys to enjoy for the time being. I apologize for the delay as I lost my job and had to go looking for a new one. On the plus side, I just found a new one and I start within a few days. So with that said and done, please leave a review.