"How did you figure it out?" asked the white-haired shinobi in the bandana.
"Heh…" — the Transformation Technique dispersed, revealing to the rogue chunin the sight of an injured Iruka leaning against a tree trunk.
Mizuki cursed elaborately.
Nearby, also leaning against a tree, a blond boy in an orange jumpsuit was hiding. He was gripping a scroll of secret techniques with all his might. The child still couldn't believe what Mizuki had told him. Yet gradually, everything was falling into place.
He was the demon. That was why everyone around him hated him. Everyone knew. But why hadn't anyone told Naruto? Why had they kept him in the dark?
The conversation between the two instructors didn't last long. He had now fully understood that everything the rogue chunin had said was true. Both Iruka-sensei and everyone else could very well hate him. But then why had Iruka-sensei treated him to ramen, always cheering him on? Why had his teacher saved him earlier, shielding him from a giant flying shuriken? And why was he trying to protect him now?
Suddenly all three of them on that clearing felt a strange, faint tremor. This tremor was nothing like the shaking of the earth during an earthquake — it felt more like the entire surrounding world was rattling. Space seemed to ripple.
After a moment, everything went quiet…
Boom.
Suddenly, deep in the forest, a powerful impact rang out — roughly several miles from the trio. The shockwave reached even this spot. The standing chunin barely kept his footing.
"Bijuu! What was that?" asked a stunned Mizuki, completely forgetting about Iruka.
The sound was like someone had detonated a warehouse full of exploding seals. For a moment the shinobi froze, staring in the direction of the presumed explosion.
No further explosions followed, however — only the distant cries of startled birds and the screams of frightened animals. Mizuki calmed down, though he didn't lower his guard. Time was pressing now, so he needed to hurry with what he had planned and then make his escape. ANBU might arrive at the sound of the explosion soon.
"Hm…" the rogue shinobi narrowed his eyes. "Whatever it was — it doesn't matter. I was planning to deal with you later, Iruka… but I've changed my mind. I'll finish you first, then take care of the kid."
Mizuki bared a wild grin and slowly drew his fuma shuriken from behind his back. The next moment he spun the weapon and charged at the wounded shinobi.
"This is the end for you!.."
Boom.
Space tore apart; out of a portal vortex leaped a bald young man in shorts and a Hawaiian shirt.
"What? It's already night?" Saitama looked around for familiar landmarks, but only forest surrounded him.
The portal behind the hero slowly began to close, and the young man was baffled as to why it had been noon just a moment ago but was now deep into the night.
"And how am I supposed to find my way back to City Z? Damn! I need to figure out what happened to Genos. I'll just have to go blindly, and the faster the better."
Picking a direction, he immediately built up serious speed and ran wherever his eyes led him. Enormous, truly monstrous trees flashed past on either side. Sometimes those monstrous trees were unlucky enough to be in Saitama's way, but the bald hero paid that little mind. After a couple of moments he spotted some people in a small clearing beyond the trees and stopped.
Saitama's joy was boundless. People! Fortune was definitely smiling on him today. It was nothing short of a miracle that he'd managed to run into someone in an unfamiliar forest, and at night no less. This was truly a gift from the heavens.
The next instant, a massive shuriken came flying straight at him, slicing through branches.
"That's…" — the hero only managed to say, stopping the weapon's blade between two fingers… a centimeter from his eye.
This is a problem, thought Saitama. If the people were hostile, he probably wouldn't be getting any directions home. He decided to be polite and return the strange piece of metal to the stranger.
"Who's there? Come out!" shouted the white-haired boy, rising from the ground.
Saitama stepped out with his hands raised, one of which still held the massive shuriken. He didn't want to provoke the strangers, so he plastered the most blank, idiotic expression he could manage onto his face.
What met his eyes was a curious scene. One young man was badly wounded and sitting propped against a tree, with a small log lying beside him. The second, the one with the bandana, was roughed up but standing. Both were dressed in the same strange uniform with green vests. The third turned out to be a scrawny little kid in an orange jumpsuit with blue trimmings.
Well, at least one of them has a normal style, thought Saitama. Though yellow with red would've been better…
What surprised Saitama most was the pose the child was standing in: legs spread apart, fingers forming a strange cross, and the boy's firm gaze flickering back and forth between him and the bandana-wearing guy.
"And who are you?" asked the white-haired one. "And what the hell are you doing with my fuma shuriken? Hand it over right now."
Caped Baldy lowered his hands and stared blankly at the piece of metal pinched between his fingers.
"Oh. Sorry, I'll give it back now…"
Saitama urgently needed to get back to City Z. If he sorted out this misunderstanding, maybe someone would point him the way home. So he decided to be polite and hand the strange piece of metal back to the stranger.
Whoosh.
"Oops," muttered the bald hero.
The white-haired boy barely managed to dodge the shuriken's flight path with the Body Replacement Technique. Who would have guessed the bandana guy had no intention of catching his own toy?
The shuriken sliced through a stump that appeared in midair and shot toward the nearest tree, where it embedded itself halfway up the blade.
"What the hell?! Are you insane?" Mizuki screamed. "You're dead!"
After using the Body Replacement Technique, the shinobi lunged straight at the bald stranger, snatching a kunai from his pouch. His jaw was clenched with rage and his body shaking.
The chunin should have stopped talking long ago and hurried to finish everything. But no — he had decided to play with his victims. And things seemed to be going well, until the chase for the scroll was interrupted by an explosion from deep in the forest. Mizuki had been about to retreat, but after a fairly long silence he had resolved to see things through — kill the instructor chunin, then find the scroll and the brat.
But at some point everything had gone sideways. The little snot had knocked him off his feet and interrupted his attack on Iruka. Some distant rumbling had sounded. And to top it off, his last fuma shuriken had gone flying somewhere into the forest, lopping off branches.
Then, moments later, some bald guy had emerged with his fuma shuriken. The one silver lining for the rogue chunin was that the man looked rather dim and nothing like a shinobi, so Mizuki decided to get rid of this unwanted witness and then deal with the little Jinchuriki and the wounded Iruka.
Thoughts of his failures only stoked the chunin's fury, and he accelerated, landing a precise strike aimed at the bald stranger's eye with the kunai.
"Wh-what?.." Mizuki whispered in shock.
The man had stopped the kunai practically at his own eye. The shinobi tried to yank his weapon free, but couldn't. The kunai might as well have been buried to the hilt in solid rock.
The stranger's blank expression shifted into something sharp and focused, his gaze turning piercing and cold.
"Stop poking sharp things at me," he said grimly. "Just tell me how to get to City Z."
"Huh?.."
The question rang out simultaneously from everyone. Not a single person present on the clearing could understand what this bald man was talking about. What City Z? There was nothing of the sort for hundreds of miles in any direction. There was the capital of the Land of Fire, the Hidden Leaf Village, and small settlements. Such a city might not exist anywhere on the continent.
Snapping out of his momentary stupor, Mizuki tried once again to yank the kunai free. Unsuccessfully.
"Go to hell, baldy!" the chunin snarled.
A powerful wave of killing intent crashed over the clearing, making everyone present break out in a cold sweat.
The corner of Saitama's mouth twitched, and the kunai clenched in his hand shattered to pieces.
There were two things Caped Baldy hated most in the world. First — mosquitoes. Second — being reminded of his baldness. What could he do about it? The grueling training had brought him to this state, and he had lost his hair.
"YES! I'M BALD! YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT?" Saitama roared.
But he caught himself and calmed down. He needed to get to City Z, and if he kept yelling, no one was likely to give him directions.
The white-haired boy, standing in shock, collapsed to his knees a moment later and began to tremble — apparently from fear. Saitama realized he wasn't going to get anywhere in a conversation with this one, and walked toward the others. He hadn't taken more than a few steps before the bandana-wearing guy flashed a cunning sneer, then abruptly rose and attacked him again with a kunai.
"I'm sick of your little knives!" Saitama snapped, sending the hapless chunin airborne with an uppercut.
The white-haired man slammed into a tree from the blow and then slowly slid down, ending up dangling from a thick branch. It was unclear whether he was unconscious or simply dead.
"So, about City Z — will you help me find the way?"
"Of course, dattebayo!" the blond kid answered cheerfully. "Right, Iruka-sensei?"
"Um… yes, Naruto. We'll help him," replied the shinobi after a brief pause. "Thank you. We couldn't have handled that without you…"
Saitama stared at the wounded young man in confusion:
"Handled what? What's even going on here?"
There was no time to answer, because five masked figures dropped to the ground in front of him, and another five appeared to his left. The ten quickly spread out around the perimeter, encircling the clearing. Two more shinobi dropped down beside Iruka and began administering first aid.
The next moment, a man in pale robes and a hat stepped unhurriedly out from between the trees. As he walked into the moonlight, his grey goatee became visible.
"Hokage-sama!" Iruka tried to rise, but a medical ninja firmly pressed the chunin back down and began examining his wounds.
"Old man!" Naruto shouted with delight. "We caught the traitor… and I learned a cool new technique. And we met an awesome bald uncle! You should've seen it — he took down Mizuki with one punch… and also…"
The torrent of information from the restless boy threatened to become a verbal flood. The ANBU began exchanging glances.
"Enough, Naruto," Hiruzen cut the boy off with a stern voice.
The Hokage assessed the situation, looked with interest at the body of Mizuki dangling from the tree, then fixed a piercing gaze on the stranger. A tense silence fell over the clearing.