Naruto: The Lost Phoenix

Chapter 78: Punishments and Grim Tidings

"Bee there or Bee square! Come and get you're tickets to Lord Bee's upcoming concert!" Kai called out as he walked down the street while trying not to notice everyone's stares.

"Mommy? What's he wearing?" A nearby little girl asked while pointing at him.

"Don't look." The mother replied instantly while pulling her daughter away, and while he'd been trying not to notice all of the attention, Kai was crying inwardly as he was once again being forced to sell tickets as a punishment. And once more, he'd been given a stupid costume to wear. However, rather than a clown's outfit, it was a chicken suit this time.

"Don't be stricken by this chicken! Come and buy a ticket, but I don't sell to crickets!" Kai continued down the street, facing his humiliation head on even if he thought that it was an unjust punishment.

"Hey Kai, that's a good look for you!" He suddenly heard Emon shout from somewhere, and Kai looked above of him to see that the jerk was laughing hysterically while hanging by his waist from a rope. Though he wasn't alone as the rest of his class that had participated in their 'battle' were suspended from ropes as well while cleaning the windows of every building on the street.

"Shut up, Emon!" Kai yelled back. "But why are you guys being punished anyway?"

"It's because we accidentally hit Reguia-sensei with a stray bolt of lightning." Hisa answered from directly above Kai with a loud sigh.

"Sorry guys! I completely forgot to put a barrier around him too!" Ruki apologized to everyone from the other side of the street.

"Don't worry about it Ruki!" Hisa replied. "If anything, it was our strategist's fault for not including our sensei in his predictions!"

"Yep! It's totally Akihiro's fault!" Emon agreed eagerly.

"No it wasn't! How could I have known that the guy would rush forward and try to stop us all of a sudden?!" Akihiro called out in his defense. "Besides, none of us would be in trouble if Kai had just admitted defeat!"

"And just how did you defeat me, exactly?!" Kai asked towards him.

"Well... because! That's why!" Akihiro replied, and suddenly Kai didn't know if it was a good thing or not that the boy was one of the smartest in their class.

"Don't mind him Kai, he just hates losing!" Hisa laughed. "But hey, are you going to join us later? We're all going out for barbecue after we get done washing windows!"

"Sorry, but I'll have to pass." Kai replied. "I plan on going to library before the day's over!"

"You know what they say about all work and no play, right?!" Hisa called down.

"Come and join us Kai! What are you afraid of?!" Emon asked while snickering to himself. "You chicken?!"

"One more time, Emon, and I'm cutting that rope that's holding you up!" Kai threatened, though it didn't seem to have any effect at all as the boy continued laughing. However, he almost joined the idiot in laughter when he finally spotted Futoshi, who was gently swaying in the breeze behind Emon as the kid was sleeping while suspended from the rope.

"Yeah, he can't join us. He's going to the library. He's not a chicken, he's an egghead!" Emon burst out laughing at his own joke despite no one else thinking that he was funny. However, seeing as he'd continued despite Kai's warning...

"Wha-? Hey, Kai?! What are you-?! Ahhh! Help!" Emon suddenly started shouting as Kai used his chakra strings to lift the boy up until the rope had enough slack that he tied it around the idiot's ankle. After which, he lowered Emon back down, content with himself as the boy was no longer being suspended by his waist but was rather hanging upside-down by his foot.

"But anyway, you guys did a really good job. Better than I'd expected anyway!" Kai suddenly smiled as he turned towards everyone else. "I didn't realize that everyone was so skilled, but you're going to have to find a way past my chakra strings if you want to fight me again, alright?!"

"No way!" Several people shouted at once.

"Do you really think that we would try again after witnessing that jutsu at the end?!" Hisa asked in shock. "I, for one, plan to stay on your good side!"

"Me too!" Daishi seconded.

"Me three!" Fumi continued.

"You guys could at least train until you catch up to me." Kai mumbled to himself before turning away. "But anyway, I have to go sell some tickets or I'm going to be stuck in this outfit all night, so bye everyone!"

"Hey Kai!" Emon shouted. "What came first, the chicken or the egg? You seem like an expert on the matter!"

"Shut up, Emon!" Everyone yelled at him this time.

-     -     -     -     -

Somewhere on the Northern Coast of the Land of Lightning...

"Does anyone recognize the emblem on those flags?" The leader of the patrol team asked as he and his two men concealed themselves inside of the foliage on top of a cliff that overlooked the sea. Beneath them, the beach was completely covered in tents and fires as thousands foreign soldiers gathered with more and more arriving every hour from the hundreds of ships that covered the water.

"No."

"I don't remember seeing it at all." They both answered before he turned towards the man on his right.

"Go as fast as you can and report this to the Raikage. We'll stay behind and-" He was in the middle of ordering before the man he was speaking to suddenly reeled backwards, crying out in pain as an arrow buried itself in his chest. "Go, now!"

"Go where, exactly?" A deep voice spoke from behind them and both ninja jumped away from each other, separating so that they wouldn't be caught together. And after hearing his last surviving subordinate's cry of pain from somewhere in the forest behind him, the patrol leader moved as fast as he could towards Kumo before he suddenly felt a flaring pain in his chest. He'd been travelling so fast and had been looking behind him so much that he hadn't seen the spear thrown at him from the front. And as it hit him, he found himself being thrown backwards from the force of the impact until it eventually made him hit a tree behind him. Though when he hit, the blade managed to pass through him before burying itself into the tree, leaving him impaled and suspended on the tree with nothing to lift the weight from his wound save for his desperate attempt at pulling himself up with his hands from the spear's shaft.

"So this is the quality of the warriors in this 'ninja world' of yours?" The same deep voice that had spoken before asked, and the patrol leader looked up through darkening vision to see a man in strange black armor standing on the shaft of the spear that was currently impaling him. "I am not impressed."