Chapter 55.1- Gamer of the Desert

“Gaara of the Desert, Jinchuriki of the Ichibi no Tanuki” I looked around me, counting the people that surrounded me. Not people necessarily. I’d hesitate to use that word to refer to the glorified puppets that were the Six paths of Pain. It was an impressive jutsu, yes. Even more so to people like me who understood just how puppeteering worked. At least Suna puppet control. He could use. This jutsu of his from miles away. No chakra strings, no way to get access to him unless you had sage mode has on your side.

Doujutsu were just fucking cheating, man. I looked between the animated corpses, counting them. Five. That means one was missing. One with a power that I wouldn’t know. I knew the one in the center was Tendo, but that was as much as I remembered from the anime. Wasn’t the one who summoned shit a woman? They all seemed to be male to my eyes. Was that the one missing. The bald one. That was Ashura, right. I remembered the panel of him opening his head to fire some powerful canon from the series so that had to be him. Was Jigokudō long haired or short haired? And Nintendo? What about Gakido? There was no way for me to tell without fighting them and finding out.

I turned to the boy beside me, and noticed him slowly inching his way so he was hiding behind my form. Smart. I wasn’t about to let him get killed. I’d quite liked his character from the anime, and I liked the way he’d betrayed his Kage. Something about the plan just reminded me of myself.

“Surrender yourself to me for pain has come for you”All voices spoke as one. Creepy.

“Do people normally get scared when you do that?” I asked with mirth in my voice. This was fine. This was perfectly fine. Pain was a threat I’d spent years worrying about. In a lot of ways, I’d spent more time worrying about him than Madara. I had a million and one plans ready for the second he showed himself through these puppets of his. I could deal with him.

I just had to find the last one. I summoned Dark Sister to my grip with a single movement and smiled at the silence my words caused.

“Do you think yourself amusing, Ant?” Tendo asked alone this time.

“Not really. I just find this entire thing very comedic. There’s a bug I’m chasing but I can spare the time to deal with you first. So which one of you will feel my blade first?” I pointed my sword right at Yahiko’s body when I said that. I felt very confident about this fight. I’d finally figured it out a month ago. The seal that made this entire thing a formality of a fight. And then I had both senjutsu and Bijou mode to lean into if the seal failed. I doubted it was likely.

The only reason I wasn’t already attacking was that I needed the Sixth one to show up. Either that, or I needed to know for certain what each of them did. If the sixth one turned out to be the Naraka Path, Jigokudō, then all my efforts could wind up being for nothing because he’d be able to bring the rest of them back to life in virtually no time.

“You will die for your impudence. Normally, this is only a duty to me, but I will enjoy ripping the tailed beast from your body.” Tendo said, and the rest of them moved in on the attack.

First things first, I turned behind me and pushed Shikamaru away, sending his body flying into my sand mausoleum that stood where the Hokage tower once did. Sand from my gourd poured over his position to hide and protect him. The one from the left reached me first. I bent down to avoid a powerful punch. When I rose, it was with the intention of slicing through his hand with my blade but the hand of the large bald man transformed into a blade that clanged against my own. Shurado. It was good to have confirmation.

I jumped backwards to prevent being pincered as the next one appeared on the scene with a metal rod in hand. The metal rods could mess up chakra control, I remembered. Good thing I wasn’t planning on getting stabbed by them in the first place. I reached out to some iron sand around me and forced the mass to slam into both of them as they jumped at me.

One of them placed a hand on the sand and I felt my control over it disspear as it collapsed into a useless clump on the floor. Gakido. Two down, I thought to myself. I ran at Gakido directly. He would be annoying since most of my arsenal was ninjutsu and he was the one who could make all of that useless.

Another one jumped and landed between me and Gakido, slamming its hands on the floor. The Rhino with purple ringed eyes appeared in a puff of smoke and wasted no time in running right at me. I jumped in the air for a second or so, allowing the beast’s charge to miss, before I stopped myself and landed right on its head. Funnelling chakra into Dark Sister, I stabbed down with the blade, allowing wind chakra flow to extend it far enough for it to go straight through the creatures entire brain. I pulled the blade out, deactivating the wind flow as the Rhino began to fall to its death. Another puff of smoke appeared, but this time I dove right in the middle of the dog’s two heads, allowing them to snap at thin air as they failed to get at me before I was in front of Chikushōdō.

The body jumped backwards, and I feigned chasing it before suddenly shifting my lower body into sand and allowing to carry me past the animal path and right at my target. Gakido swiped at me with his black rod, and I blocked with Dark Sister, before making a single movement Dragon had taught, using the blade to disarm him of his own. Pain had clearly failed to study Kenjutsu properly. I moved before any of them could interfere and rushed it with a flood of chakra enhanced speed. In less than a second, Dark Sister was in his skull.

“You know more about my technique than you should” Tendo spoke now. There was a malice in his tone that wasn’t there previously. He was pissed to see one of his own killed so easily. The others swarmed me to force me away from the body, but I covered it in sand as I jumped backwards with it. They landed at my previous position.

“Universal Pull” Tendo said with an outstretched hand. I felt it then. An irresistible force pulling me towards him. Me and the sand coffin containing one of his most useful paths. I flooded my body with Shukaku’s chakra and manifested his seal around my arm before I slammed them on the sand coffin as it flew towards him. As for myself, I wrapped my entire lower body in hyperdense sand that didn’t let me move an inch.

Suddenly, one body jumped to join the others. Over its shoulder was a familiar old body. I guess I wasn’t the only one out for Danzo.

A/N: It’s a bit of a time jump backwards since Tsunade’s stuff happens after all this but I didn’t just want to start with Nagato and Gaara fighting without showing how we got here.