Naruto: The Lost Phoenix

Chapter 40: The Seal

"I knew it!" Kai called out as soon as his feet his the floor of the lake and the statues started to move. While they did so slowly at first, soon over a hundred of them were sprinting towards Kai, making him wonder if he really was ready for actual combat before his instructors and Noshii landed beside him. And without even a word spoken between them, they all started running forward at the same time in order to meet their new enemy.

"Here goes nothing..." Kai said softly, spinning his glaive in his hands once before running along with his instructors. And while he was nervous before, Kai started feeling excited as he ran behind them, feeling a rush of adrenaline before his instructors finally made contact with the enemy in front of them. And when they did, Kai learned that the golems seemed to be just as fast as any normal human, which didn't bode well for them at all seeing as the instructors were far faster than the ninja that had caused Kai to be here in the first place.

Just a moment later, Kai started facing the statues himself and suddenly found that they were dangerous despite being somewhat slow an predicable. After all, each of them had four arms with a sword in each hand, and Kai felt as if he were facing many more enemies than he actually was as seven of them gathered together to face him. Though in the end, their numbers were their downfall and Kai positioned himself so that they would get in each other's way before he defeated them one at a time.

As Kai finished the last of the statues that had engaged him, he immediately found himself overwhelmed again as more and more statues broke from the army's formation to engage them. Thankfully the other phoenix were holding their own, but when twelve statues started running after him, Kai reluctantly had to fall back before several large explosions detonated in the statue's ranks as Noshii unleashed a barrage of stars from above them. And seeing as he was hopelessly outnumbered, Kai figured that she had the right idea.

"Fire Style, Phoenix Star Jutsu!" Kai yelled, aiming the cloud of fire upwards before making the seventy-some stars hover in the air above the battlefield. Though not all of them did as several hit the ground all around Kai, annihilating the statues and causing Kai to lose an arm before he regenerated and started running forward again. And now that he had all of his stars in the air, Kai began bombarding any groups of statues that started moving towards him, blasting them into small bits of rock until he finally realized that his efforts were pointless.

Walking out of the whirlpool of magma as if it were nothing but the shower, more and more statues appeared to replace the ones that had already been destroyed, and Kai instantly knew that they were somehow being created somewhere beyond the magma as hundreds of them left the lava and immediately started sprinting towards the intruders.

"We'll hold them back, so just go!" One of Kai's instructors yelled, and he immediately turned and followed the instructions, dealing with another two of the statues on the way before he finally had a clear path to the box. However, it didn't stay that way for long as more and more statues started rising out of the floor, somehow being created from nothing but thin air to form a barrier around the box. And while the previous statues had been armed with nothing but long swords, these all had giant rectangular shields in which they formed a wall around the pedestal. All of them were more than twice the height of the others as well, making the shields look like an actual wall rather than just the giant individuals. Though he was reminded that they were still enemies by their other hands reaching up above their shields, each sporting extremely long spears that now that shot out towards Kai.

Dodging the spears, Kai suddenly found himself constantly dodging them as not only the shield bearers but the statues behind them attempted to stab him as well with over thirty spears heading for him at each moment. However, while he'd managed to dodge the first barrage, Kai was soon overwhelmed by the lightning-fast strikes until he finally ended up being skewered by over forty at the same time. And while he might have been close to the box, he soon found himself at the edge of the whirlpool of magma as he revived from the fire.

"How the heck and I supposed to get past that?!" Kai asked out loud as he watched even more statues heft shields above their heads until they formed a dome around the box.

"Try again!" Noshii yelled from above his head, and Kai looked up to see her hit some kind of invisible wall when she attempted to fly over the dome. "You're the only one that can retrieve the box, so try again and I'll make an opening for you!"

Not thinking of any better plans, Kai started running to where he'd died last time before picking up his glaive and knocking aside another barrage of spear thrusts. And while his simple deflection didn't seem to do much seeing as more than double the amount of spear heads were already on their way again, Kai suddenly found himself standing behind two of his instructors as they deflected the next attack for him. And when Noshii blasted a hole in between a few shields, Kai immediately took his chance as he used his instructor's shoulders in order to jump far enough so the he entered the gap.

Yelling slightly as he gave his maximum effort, Kai spun around while holding his glaive as far out as possible, powering through his swing as his weapon wanted to stop whenever it connected with one of the stone giants. And when he finished, he found himself underneath a hail of small rock fragments as he'd completely destroyed the legs of all the the statues around him, which ruined their shield wall. Though in knowing that he didn't have time to hesitate as more statues were most likely already on their way, Kai immediately ran up to the pedestal and took the box, which he only now realized wasn't any larger than a basket-ball now that he was up close.

Turning around and dodging several more spear thrusts as the statues he'd crippled still didn't seem to want to let him go, Kai jumped over them before running through the opening that his glaive instructors were only just barely keeping open. Though as he left the mass of statues that had been attempting to keep him from the box, Kai found himself in an entirely new predicament as new statues were pouring out from the sides of the whirlpool, seeming to be endless in number as they all surrounded Kai to try and stop him.

"Noshii!" Kai called out, knowing that his only way out of his situation would in the air. And thankfully his friend seemed to have the same idea as she dived towards him and grabbed onto his shoulders again with her talons, lifting him into the air before he started frantically waving his glaive around the both of them to deflect all of the thrown swords and spears that were heading towards them.

"Just what kind of throwing arms do these guys have?!" Kai cried as they were nearly level with the temple again and he was still having to deflect the thrown weapons from hitting both of them.

"Hang on!" Noshii yelled, though Kai had nothing to hang onto other than the glass box before they shot forward and she folded her wings so that they could fit through the temple's doorway. And as soon as they entered the structure, Bird Gramps released his hold on the lake of magma, causing the whirlpool to instantly fall on both the statues as well as glaive instructors who were still at the bottom.

"We got it, so what do we do now?!" Kai asked in a panic, showing Etna the glass box while looking at the sides of the temple walls where even more statues were beginning to rise up out of the ground.

"Now that I can see it, just leave everything to me." Etna replied with a smile.