FicWad

As the man in front of him tried to slash him to pieces with his claws, Naruto couldn't keep himself from grinning widely under his mask. As he said before, Rigardo was fast...but he fought faster and tougher opponents than him. Keeping up with him out of Sage Mode wouldn't have been easy; if he wasn't using it, he would have trouble just keeping one step ahead of him! But, Sage Mode boosted his reaction time, reflexes and awareness so much that keeping up with Rigardo using reflexes and reaction time alone was a simple task.

Hitting him, on the other hand, was fairly difficult because he was moving so fast… Though the Frog Kata would probably solve that little problem if Naruto was using it. And he wasn't, for one simple reason: he wanted Rigardo to lower his guard. He was certain that the Awakened One before him was holding back as well; he was merely testing him; to see if he (Naruto) was worth bringing out all of his yoki to bare.

"Odd eyes aside, this human's reflexes are impressive. And he is fast enough to keep up with me, even when I have Awakened just my arms." Rigardo was impressed, very impressed, and for him, it was very rare for someone to impress him. He couldn't land a hit on the human and even when he manages to get behind him, the Youma Hunter has enough awareness to realize where he is and uses his reaction time to get out of the way before he can strike, and that ends up with the ground getting marred with deep claw marks.

Because of this little back and forth exchange - or rather a cat and mouse chase - the ground around them was filled with deep claw marks, upturned chunks of the earth - from when he tried to throw pieces of it at the Youma Hunter - and a lot of foot tracks.

Then Naruto slipped up and Rigardo managed to land a solid hit on him with his claws. A slash to the torso had thrown the blond clear off his feet, sending him through the air. Naruto righted himself mid-air and landed on the ground in all fours. The blond let out a pained grunt and put all his weight on his right arm as he held his chest. He hissed in pain when he felt a stinging sensation where he was hit, and withdrew his hand almost immediately. He saw his blood on his hand.

Naruto immediately looked down and saw a rather nasty looking gash and a tear in his shirt and mesh armour. It looked superficial though, and thankfully not too deep.

"I see…he's strong enough to cut me in Sage Mode, huh?" Naruto thought. He looked at the silver-eyed man and thinned his lips when he saw his life-fluid dripping from his claws. "I could have achieved a similar result in a less life-threatening way, but letting him get a hit on me was the fastest way to know for sure." His wounds hissed and steamed as his Sage Mode enhanced healing factor kicked in, healing it in a blink of an eye. Then Naruto stood up with rolled his shoulders with a low, drawn out grunt. "Pervy Sage was right, I need to treat him as a Kage Level Opponent."

Rigardo quirked an eyebrow in surprise when he saw Naruto slowly getting to his feet. "You're still standing?!" Then the man's eyes grew wide in genuine surprise when he saw unmarred, unblemished skin on his opponent. "Im...possible!" he breathed out.

How was this possible! He drew blood! He felt it! He could see it on his claw! This human should be bleeding out!

"Agh… That, that actually hurt." Naruto inhaled and exhaled and shook the blood off his hands. "My chest still stings…" he grunted, then once he was standing completely Naruto gave Rigardo a dead-serious look. "Still, letting you hit me has confirmed one thing: a lot of women protecting Pieta will die if they end up facing you." No one, except maybe Miria and definitely Flora, will be able to react to him in time if he was to suddenly show up in front of them. If he wasn't using Sage Mode when he tanked that hit, he would be a corpse right now.

"Now…" Naruto slowly raised his right fist. "Let's see how you can take a hit!"

His image flickered before he suddenly appeared right in front of Rigardo with his fist already in motion and thoroughly caught the man by surprise. Rigardo spat up purple blood when he felt Naruto punch his sternum, and he was knocked back like a rocket by an unbelievable amount of raw physical force. The wind was ejected roughly from his lungs when he felt the fist hit him, and when he was sent flying into a snow-covered boulder. His body broke through the boulder before he continued his path before going with the momentum and rolling onto his hand and feet. He coughed up blood. The man was pretty sure he felt a rib or two snapping. A brief spike of his yoki and his bones mended themselves, leaving him good to go once more.

He was not going to let this man do that again; Rigardo dashed forth at full speed and attempted to slice Naruto to bits. Naruto hopped, dodged and waved away from his attacks.

"Want to hear something interesting?" the blond casually asked while leaning back to avoid getting impaled.

"No." Rigardo deadpanned with a vicious snarl on his face.

"Too bad!" Naruto said with a faux cheer. "An interesting thing about our fighting styles: you need to hit me…" Then Naruto threw a punch that Rigardo easily dodged, and the man saw the smirk growing on the blond's face. "...I don't."

That was when Rigardo felt something punch him on the cheek, even though he clearly dodged that attack. He was once again knocked backwards, this time towards the rest of the Awakened Beings who were observing the fight. As much as they wanted to try and dogpile the Youma Hunter, the fact he was keeping up with Rigardo hitting him with little to no effort on their point of view, gave them pause; the Silver-Eyed Lion King was an Awakened who could kill them before they could react so for a mere human who can't use yoki match him in speed and blow for blow made them pause.

"Come on!" Naruto cried out. "I know you can do better than this Rigardo! This fight is barely making me sweat!"

Suddenly there was an explosion of yoki from Rigardo and he appeared before him once more, only he was no longer a man. Rigardo was now a muscular silver-eyed lion-ish creature, with a wolf-like elongated snout, a mane of hair, and was now taller than him by a few meters.

This was exactly what he wanted out of the man.

Naruto quickly dodged and hopped away from the transformed Rigardo's extended claws, that were now moving at high speed. Backflipping midair, Naruto quickly threw several shivs at the Awakened Being, only for them to bounce harmlessly off his skin and into the snow, and several more to be shredded by a mere swipe of his claws. It didn't do much other than giving Naruto a fraction of a couple of seconds to grab his trench knives; that was all he needed to arm himself.

Landing in a kneel with both trench knives held in a reverse grip, Naruto eyed the Lion-like being in front of him with squinty eyes. Rigardo's yoki was no longer suppressed he was like a beacon to him now. And that made it easy for Naruto to track the man as he moved.

The lion-like humanoid bent his knees and a trail of snow followed after him as he dashed towards Naruto. The blond in question flipped himself out of the way and tried to get a couple of shallow cuts in while he was at it. But the man's reflexes were impressive because Rigardo managed to get out of arm's length of the knives just as they were about to slice through his skin.

He ended up being behind Naruto himself, his claws posed to impale him through the back. The blond was aware of the Awakened One, being behind him and so as Naruto was falling to the ground he spun around in midair to face the oncoming threat. In a blur of motion, the blond quickly parried the extended claws before they could impale him using hand-eye coordination. But the Silver-Eyed Lion King was pushing him back with his vicious, never-ending assault. The Awakened One was trying to make him slip up, to get him to leave an opening for himself to take advantage of.

It was a solid idea if nothing else; anyone but Naruto would probably have kicked the bucket by now. Unfortunately for Rigardo, though, Naruto is not the type to leave an opening in a fight unless it was a part of his plan to win. Then Rigardo got up close and personal prompting Naruto to get himself in a deadlock with the Awakened Being with his trench knives.

"You're pretty good, for a human." The silver-eyed Awakened Being said begrudgingly.

Naruto smirked under his mask. "Heh… you're not bad yourself." he complimented.

Both Naruto and Rigardo were busy trying to outdo the other in strength, and neither one was giving way. As a result of the very ground, they stood on started to crack as Rigardo brought out more and more of his yoki to overwhelm his opponent. Naruto, in response to this, used chakra to reinforce his arms and stick to the earth in order to hold.

//

Back in Pieta, a serious-faced Jiraiya was standing with crossed arms while the Task Force used their yoki sensing to observe the fight. For them it was hard not to; the second Rigardo pulled out his yoki, it was like a beacon had been lit.

Outside of Jiraiya, the task force was understandably nervous and fidgety and worried for Naruto. None more so than Flora. The poor woman had to physically restrain herself from running after her man and it showed.

Jiraiya looked at the worried woman from the corner of his eye for a brief moment, before letting out a sigh and stare ahead of him. "Worrying about him won't help." He told Flora.

"How can I not?!" Flora almost snapped at him out of pure worry for her man. "He's my boyfriend! And he's out there all alone with no one to help him if he gets in trouble!"

"Your worry is unfounded. He won't lose." Jiraiya told her with absolute confidence.

"What makes you so sure?" Queenie asked with many of the other women nodding in agreement.

"Simple: he's a stubborn brat and never gives up no matter what." The white-haired man had a fond smile on his face now. "If anyone can pull a victory out of the most hopeless of situations, it'll be him. He's done it plenty of times in the past."

"I can believe that," Lily muttered. He took out three Awakened Beings by himself, and he is capable of making physical copies of himself. Not to mention there was that explosion of fire that killed one of them in a matter of seconds. The Youma Hunter is someone she wouldn't want to face at all.

"He can still lose though." Veronica pointed out.

"Of course he can lose," Jiraiya said with a snort. "But if there's one thing Naruto's a master at, it's deception."

"Deception?" Miria asked as that peaked her curiosity.

Jiraiya glanced at the Commander from the corner of his eye, "Naruto can make elaborate battleplans on the fly when he's fighting. If something doesn't work, he'll change it and adapt in the middle of fighting. If he loses, it is probably to deceive and misdirect his enemy. I saw him do it to people who have decades worth of more experience than he does." Then he looked ahead again. "If he's not bringing out his more destructive techniques it's most likely because of one thing."

"And that is?" one of the other women asked.

"...Information gathering." Flora eventually deduced and drawn everyone's attention to her. "He's trying to get intel on the enemy by holding back and forcing them to show their hand." She then gestured to Jiraiya and added. "Seeing as you're a Master spy and he was your student it's the only thing I could think of."

"And you're most likely right," Jiraiya said with a nod. "Right now, Naruto is most likely refraining from using his more powerful techniques for the sake of getting information." The Toad Sage looked at the women and said, "Seeing as your commander mentioned Rigardo to him, Naruto is most likely seeing if your claims about him are true and then some."

"Just, how strong is your apprentice?" Jean asked the man. Ever since he defeated Riful she, along with Clare and Flora was just wondering how strong Naruto really was.

At that, the man gave a helpless shrug. "I was dead for a while, but the last I saw him he could hold his own. So it might have been years when I last saw him… though he looks younger now."

That garnered the man some odd looks. "...Looks younger?" It was Cynthia who voiced her incredulousness.

"Yeah, when I died Naruto was 16 going on 17. He was a lot taller too and came up to my shoulder." Jiraiya said with a nod before he shrugged and added, "I have no idea how he regressed in age, though. There's a lot of techniques back home that lets you do lots of things. Disguising yourself as someone else, revert your appearance to a younger age, stuff like that." Then the Toad Sage adopted a confused look, "Though from what I saw Naruto is not using any technique to revert himself to a younger age. He is for all intents and purposes, 15 years old again."

The problem with that possibility was that Naruto had no reason Jiraiya could think of to be using such a technique… unless it had been a good few decades since he last saw the brat.

"Interesting…" Flora muttered thoughtfully.

"You can disguise yourself as another person?" Miria asked with intrigue.

"Yeah. I and Naruto can." the man answered with a confirmed nod. "You will probably see it sooner than you think though if those things get past him…" and if that happens, he'll have to bring Shima and Fukusaku back down again, but he needs to gather a lot of chakra to summon them… a lot more of it to be perfectly honest. Thankfully for him, he has got that in spades since he is a reanimation.

Then Jiraiya looked to the women. "If that happens you may want to get yourselves ready a fight for your lives. Literally." He advised them with a serious look on his face.

The women all nodded, though several looked more nervous than others.

"Any advice you can give us?" Natalie asked him; being a Number 37 she is among those who are fairly weak so she was all for hearing advice. Any advice really.

"Just one: work together. I'm sure there are a few ladies among you who don't get along with each other, but you all have a higher chance of surviving as a team rather than as a single individual."

Everyone took his words into consideration; while some looked like they were swallowing a nasty pill quite a lot of them were agreeing with what the man had said. None more so than Miria, since that was the reason why she got everyone into a balanced team in the first place.

//

As he fought Rigardo to a fairly reasoned standstill, Naruto was in a little bit of trouble. It's nothing he can't handle though; Naruto had been in far worse situations than this. However, the problem is that Sage Mode is about to run out and he will revert back to normal. That would give the Awakened Being he was fighting with an advantage - a major advantage if he was to be honest since he would be exhausted as a side effect of using it all up.

He probably had… half a minute? Maybe less? It was around that time before he loses Sage Mode. Rigardo had gotten a few good hits on him, his clothes had tears on them showing skin and blood. His blood. Fortunately, his buffed up durability kept the Awakened Being from tearing him a new asshole and then some, and his healing factor had regenerated him from the wounds given to him.

That was the main cause of him about to exit it actually. He took too many hits. Fortunately, Naruto has a plan up his sleeve and if he played this right…

As for Rigardo, while he didn't show it, the lion-like Awakened One was in awe of Naruto. No matter how grievous a wound he was given, the bond simply regenerated from it and kept on going, even managing to slice back a few times though he had regenerated from the wounds the blond had given to him. And those daggers of his, odd as they are, were more durable and sharper than he thought. There was some type of… energy, around the blade, that made it sharper and the sharp end of the blade managed to slice off the sharpened tips of his claws when he elongated them to try and catch him off guard!

Not only that he was freakishly strong; fast too; simply put Rigardo had never seen anything like this before. To have a mere match him blow for blow, match him in strength and even surpassing him, was inconceivable...yet here it was.

He was amazing!

However, Rigardo was eagle-eyed enough to notice that the Youma Hunter, despite all his strength, stubbornness and durability, was beginning to slow down. The wounds he dealt to the masked blond was beginning to take their toll on him.

Inwardly, he grinned. The human was a good fighter. But… despite what he is capable of he was still only human.

Naruto frowned under his mask and steeled himself. One way or another, this fight was going to be over soon. ...Ten seconds left until Sage Mode runs out. The blond narrowed his eyes and put one of his trench knives away into its holder under his Sage Coat.

He still had a plan…

Then he grunted and leaned over, panting in exhaustion his Sage Mode ran out of nature chakra to sustain it. The toad-like irises and orange pigmentation around his eyes faded away reverting him back to his normal state.

"D-Damn it!" Naruto growled, almost wheezing in exhaustion. Something that Rigardo took note of immediately.

"...I see. You're no longer able to maintain that state you were using to fight me…" it was here that Rigardo gave him a rather… disturbing, toothy grin, "using it to long tires you. And you took too long to defeat me." If whatever that empowered state was, is what allowed this human to fight him blow for blow and he no longer able to maintain it… that just made things easier for Isley's Awakened Army.

The ground beneath Rigardo shattered as he dashed forth, claw poised to impale Naruto through the stomach. In response, Naruto quickly held up his free hand and formed a Rasengan before dashing towards the silver eyed lion king.

20 yards, they closed the distance.

15 yards, Rigardo sharpened his claws as a wide, toothy grin spread across his maw. Despite being exhausted, Naruto just narrowed his eyes and sped up.

10 yards, Naruto reared his arm with the Rasengan back, and the one holding the trench knife he brought it close to his face.

5 yards. The two were just about to enter the striking distance.

Then Rigardo threw his arm out to spear Naruto through the stomach; the blond in question, on the other hand, leaned down and under his arm before driving his Rasengan into the middle of the Awakened One's pelvis.

"Gwah!" Rigardo roared in agony as he felt the spiralling ball of energy grind through his flesh and muscle. It even went down to the bone! Blood was gushing out as the ball of energy ground away at him! It was agonising! What kind of ability was this?! Baring his teeth, the Awakened Being glared down at Naruto before sticking his claws deep into the blond's side; he took sick satisfaction from Naruto's pained cry before throwing him clear across the clearing almost like a rocket; sprays of blood, red blood, flew across the air as well leaving a trail in the direction Naruto was tossed in.

The masked blond spun through the air, to fast for anyone to notice what his hands were doing before landing in the ground with snow, and dirt shooting up around him.

When the cloud dispersed, the Awakened Beings saw a small trench of snow and blood in the ground, with Naruto lying at the end of it face down. He was motionless.

After a breath of silence, Rigardo let out many-a-pained grunt as he slowly limped on over to the motionless blond. Whatever that technique that thing was, it hurt him so much it hurts to move. That doesn't mean he can't though. When he got to him the Awakened Being leaned down with a painful grunt and slowly turned the blond around on his back and found his lifeless eyes blankly staring up at him.

He was dead.

Isley's second in command stared into the corpses lifeless eyes for several moments, before slowly standing up and walking away.

"We've been delayed long enough! Let's move before Isley gets impatient!" Rigardo barked.

"But what about…" One of the male Awakened Beings trailed off, looking pointedly at Naruto's body with a look of hunger in his eyes.

"Leave him be," Rigardo said, warningly. While he was pissed off that Naruto had managed to wound him in such a way, he did admit that fighting him was rather fun. He enjoyed himself and as such felt the boy deserved enough respect not to be desecrated. He may not be a warrior anymore, but he still has honour in him and this boy, this human boy, had earned his respect. And that is something not a lot of warriors can boast about. "Touch him and I'll kill you, myself."

The male Awakened Being who spoke before huffed but did as he was told. There was more opponents coming soon and an entire buffet of townies to eat afterwards!

"Now, let's go. Wipe everyone in Pieta out!" Rigardo barked before wincing in pain when his pelvic region flared. Strange… he couldn't heal himself there? No. No, he can, it's just taking a bit longer than he was expecting - his regeneration isn't that good anyway if he loses an arm or a leg and is unable to reattach them then that limb is lost forever.

His muscle and flesh were literally ground off by that attack and it would take some time for him to regrow it. That human managed to cripple him. What a devastating technique…

/

Meanwhile, back in Pieta with the Task Force, the women were all looking off into the distance where they could feel Naruto's battle with Rigardo taking place. There was a tense atmosphere around them and then...

"...They're coming this way." Tabitha announced, gravely.

Flora trembled, hoping her boyfriend was okay but so horribly worried for him that she was about ready to throw up!

"That means they either killed Naruto, or he was forced to retreat… it's most likely the former given who he was up against." Miria said with a trembling hand. She took a deep breath and exhaled to calm her nerves.

Flora visibly flinched at her words, though no one could blame her.

"Damn it…" While she didn't know the Youma Hunter personally, Undine didn't like the fact that they practically let the kid wander out there alone with no backup, even if she didn't say anything about it. And for their blunder, he paid the ultimate price!

"Didn't he kick Riful's ass?" Helen asked in utter bewilderment. "Sure, this Rigardo-guy is fast, but still!"

"There's more to a fight than raw power," Jiraiya lectured, a solemn look on his face, hoping Naruto had managed to pull out of there in time. "Even the strongest man in the world can be beaten by someone faster than him. If they're faster and more nimble than you, then it doesn't matter if you're stronger; your strength is useless if you can't hit your opponent."

"Is that what happened to you?" Undine asked him with a deep frown, looking at the Toad Sage from the corner of her eye.

Jiraiya shook his head with a heavy sigh. "No. I faced a former student of mine who had taken a dark path. I had little to no information on what he could do, and that was what got me killed in the end. I did manage to get a coded message back home on what I learned before I croaked, though. And two people I trust were with me when I fought him so they had valuable information on what that former student of mine could do."

Flora knew who that former student was: Nagato Uzumaki, or Pain, as he was known at the time. Someone powerful enough to flatten an entire city, make a miniature moon, and take on an entire army by himself. He was also someone Naruto succeeded in getting to believe in his master's ideals again since Jiraiya's ideals were inspired by his own.

"He might not be dead though," Zelda reminded everyone. "That man did say the Youma Hunter is good at deceiving, so there is a possibility he is unconscious but alive."

That gave Flora some hope.

"If they haven't eaten him that is," Deneve added. And just like that, her hope was somewhat dashed. "But because they are coming here almost immediately after he was defeated, it's also possible they left him alone." And once again, Flora felt hope welling up inside of her that Naruto was still alive but unconscious.

Udine grit her teeth and couldn't keep it in anymore. "...Damn it! We shouldn't have let him go alone!" She gave Miria an accusative look - because she was the highest ranking Single Digit here, Miria was the one who was in charge of them all. Everything she said they had to follow. "Why didn't you stop him before he left?! He could've helped us out here!"

Miria remained stoic faced, but her closing her eyes was telling.

"You all better get ready." Jiraiya reminded them as he clasped his hands together to gather chakra. "Now that… now that they got past Naruto... they're going to head here en masse. Get into your teams, and work together." He made sure no one could see or hear the anguish on his face or in his voice. He should have gone with him. He should have gone with him. But, until a body has been found, he will keep thinking Naruto is still alive. He won't make the same mistake he did with Nagato and Konan.

"And protect the Captains," Clare added remembering Jiraiya's advice from earlier. "Miria, Jean, Flora, Veronica and Undine are the strongest among us - they're prime targets for the Awakened Beings."

Miria took a deep, calming breath and then addressed the crowd after opening her eyes. "Team Flora, Team Jean, you're on reserve. Everyone else is on the front lines; that includes my team."

"I'll be there with you," Jiraiya chimed in. "I'll see what I can do to help." He just needed to gather a little bit more chakra and he would be able to summon some help. They don't like being in the biting cold, but if he wanted to find his godson after this fight then desperate times call for desperate measures.

Miria stared at him in surprise. "That's… good. That's good." She said, visibly relieved. Having an immortal, constantly-regenerating zombie on their side will be a huge boon. "What will you be doing?"

"Taking some of them off your back." The man answered. "But first…" Then the man got down on one knee and slammed his palm against the ground with a cry of, "Summoning Jutsu!"

A puff of smoke enveloped the kneeling form of Jiraiya, to the surprise of the 24 women who were watching. The five teams all watched with bated breath as the smoke cloud slowly dispersed into the air.

But what surprised them was that they heard another voice.

"It's that time already, Jiraiya-boy?" He sounded like he was in his late 70s, though no one has managed to live that long to any of the women's knowledge. They tend to die to youma when they're in their mid to late 50s.

"Apparently, boss, ma'am," the man replied with a humourless chuckle. "As of right now Naruto is either MIA or KIA and the situation is grim."

"Wha!?" The woman all heard a third person speak, she too sounded like she was in her late 70s. "The lad's missin'?! When did that happen!?"

"A few minutes ago, ma'am," Jiraiya answered. "Naruto confronted the things we detected on our way here, and now they are now heading this way as we speak."

That was when the smoke cloud finally dispersed into the air and the women all saw… two small toad-like creatures sitting on Jiraiya's shoulders. The first toad sitting on his right shoulder had dark green skin and had white hair styled in somewhat of a mohawk of all things, and very thick eyebrows and a small goatee were also wearing a high-collared cape. The second toad sitting on his left shoulder had light green skin with purple marking around her mouth. The top of her head looks as though she is wearing a hair net with hair-rollers underneath, which had given her a look that reminded the women of an old woman for some reason. She too was wearing a high-collared cape.

These two are Fukusaku and Shima, the Two Great Toad Sages of Mount Myoboku.

"I see… and if you summoned us, then you're planning to use Sage Mode." It wasn't hard for Fukusaku to guess; most of the time they were summoned out of Mount Myoboku by Jiraiya was to help him go into Sage Mode against some very tough opponents.

Jiraiya nodded. "Yeah. I'm going to need all the advantages I can get." As much as he dislikes to use it, Sage Mode will be useful for this upcoming battle.

"Well... they can't be any tougher than that student of yours with the rinnegan," Shima said in an attempt to sound reassuring. "Alrighty; let's get crackin'!" She and Fukusaku clasped their hands together in front of them as she said, "Pa an' I will gather the nature chakra, you balance it!"

"Got it."

And with that Jiraiya, under the eyes of 24 Claymores started to balance the nature chakra with his own as best he could. Almost immediately the women saw the physical changes. Jiraiya's appearance now had a number of toad-like traits when he went into Sage Mode; his nose had grown bigger with many warts, his teeth sharpened, and he grew a goatee. His irises became toad like and now has a reg pigmentation that extended almost across his entire face.

When he entered Safe Mode, Jiraiya's eyes grew wide almost immediately as he gasped, "Do you two sense that?"

"...Naruto-boy is still alive!" Fukusaku said after a moment of concentration.

"His chakra is worryingly low, though," Shima added before she turned to address Jiraiya directly. "Lad, we need to get to him as soon as possible!"

"I know. But there's a problem since there are 24 of those things between us and Naruto…" Jiraiya told them with a heavy frown. Then he turned to face the other women completely, and many of them recoiled from his new appearance. "Naruto will have to wait and hope that his healing factor will keep him alive. In the meantime, we will be helping these women."

Fukusaku looked up at the partially transformed man. "I'd rather find Naruto-boy… but once you get an idea, you're too stubborn to change your mind."

"The sooner these 'Awakened Beings' are out of our way, the sooner we can search for Naruto," Jiraiya pointed out. He had to hope that Naruto's healing factor will keep him alive long enough for one of them to find him.

"How long until they get here?" Miria asked him after she finally managed to take her eyes off of the talking toads on his shoulders.

Jiraiya turned halfway to look off into the distance for a moment, before turning back to face Miria. "Five minutes tops."

Five minutes until they get into a fight for their lives? That gave them enough time to get themselves into position.

Miria nodded before she turned to address the teams, "Team's Flora, Jean you're on reserve, everyone else spread out into your teams; that will force the Awakened Ones to separate and will make them a little easier to deal with!"

The four teams nodded before they dashed off to take their place. Jiraiya on the other hand turned and took a spot on one of the rooftops, and turned himself invisible in order to ambush an Awakened Being or two when he gets the chance.

This was going to be one hell of a fight...