"Sarada," Naruto called out while still holding the suppressed Delta by her throat. "Go with my clone. Drop Kawaki and Himawari with Hinata. If she asks about Boruto, tell her that he's fine. You can stay and tell her what happened if you want. I will explain everything when I come back home after dealing with this woman."
"But Master." She didn't want to go. "I—"
"Be good, Sarada. What I'm going to do won't be pretty. Go home and wait for me there. And don't blame Kawaki for what happened. It had nothing to do with it."
Sarada still seemed resistant, but Naruto's clone appeared behind him and approached her, nudging her away from the battlefield. That left Naruto alone with Delta.
[You locate the chakra signature yet, Ino?]
[I got it. I didn't want to interrupt you in the middle of your battle. It's north of you, in the old damaged watch tower that is part of the area ravaged by Momoshiki's assault.]
[Got it.]
Naruto sent another clone in Kashin Koji's direction. He wanted to talk to his teacher's clone.
"As for you," Naruto let Delta go after he had pumped enough chakra into her to take control of all of her systems. "Don't waste your efforts; it's meaningless."
"W-what have you done?" Delta asked, unable to activate any of her augmentations. She felt even weaker than a normal person at the moment.
"Tricks, tricks." Naruto shook his head and pointed his finger in a random direction in the sky. Immediately, a bolt of lightning escaped his finger and shot forward, striking something in the air. "You should understand just how out of your league you are right now, Delta."
She scowled at him as she clenched her teeth hard enough to create a grinding sound.
"Don't feel too bad about losing to me," Naruto said, holding her chin as he made her look up at him. "I'm about to fulfill your father's greatest wish after all."
"What?" Delta asked with a frown.
Naruto didn't respond and patiently looked in the distance.
"Don't ignore me, you bastard." She may have lost all her strength, but her feistiness was all there. She kicked Naruto right between his legs.
"Really?" Naruto looked at her with an exasperated sigh. "Let's hope the real deal is nothing like you." A Truth-Seeker Orb blocked her attack and wrapped around her leg like a shackle before rising up in the air.
"Hey!" She resisted, but it was useless. She was pulled up off her feet and forced to hang upside down by one foot in front of Naruto. "Let me go, you disgusting bastard! Fucking pervert!"
"Huh?" Naruto looked slightly surprised. "I thought they were just tights, but you are wearing full-on leggings underneath."
"Stop looking up my dress, you creep!" Delta seemed full of energy as she continued cursing him.
Naruto just shook his head and continued looking in the distance, waiting for his clone to lead Kashin Koji to him.
Soon, his clone returned with the Inner in question. Kashin Koji was cautiously following Naruto's clone from a distance, prepared for an ambush.
"Huh?" A very uncharacteristic sound escaped his mouth when he noticed Delta hanging upside down by one foot and cursing the Hokage to no end. He quickly regained his composure, but the impact of the scene was there. He was well aware of her power, and for someone to have rendered her as helpless as a child was a very big deal.
"Kashin Koji," Naruto said flatly. "Tell me. Are you an enemy of the Ōtsutsuki or not?"
"What are you talking about?" The man asked with a confused tone as Delta continued screaming and cursing in the background.
"Mind shutting up, Delta?" Naruto asked. "I'm trying to have a conversation here."
"Let me down this instant if you don't want your entire village to be reduced to —" A black band wrapped around her mouth and chin, forcing her jaw shit and preventing her from making any sounds.
"Much better," Naruto said. "You were saying?"
"What are you planning to do with her?" Kashin Koji asked. "Once news gets back that she's been captured, they will remotely disable her and wake up another clone."
Delta looked horrified at Kashin Koji revealing such a sensitive piece of information so casually.
"I'm planning to do what Isshiki can never do for Amado," Naruto said.
Kashin Koji raised his head, raising a brow. "Now, why would you do that?"
"Because she's going to be my tool from now on," Naruto said. "The only issue is her shitty personality. I'll summon her soul to the world of the living and bring his real daughter to life. Fixing that particular issue."
"What do you want from me?"
"You still haven't answered my question," Naruto said. "Are you, or are you not, an enemy of the Ōtsutsuki?"
"I was created for a singular purpose," Kashin Koji answered after a bout of hesitation. "That is to prevent Isshiki Otsutsuki's reincarnation and the subsequent devouring of all chakra on this planet."
"That's all I needed to know," Naruto said. "Now I'm going to show you something amazing."
"You ready to be reborn, Delta?" Naruto asked rhetorically as he bent forward and grabbed a strand of her hair. He let it fall to the ground and formed five precise hand signs before holding his hands together. "Kuchiyose: Edo Tensei." He announced and slammed his palm on the ground, directly on top of Delta's fallen hair. Immediately, black lines in the form of a seal expanded from the hair at the center. They coiled together and formed an intricate seal with the single strand of Delta's hair as its focal point.
"That's not how it works," Kashin Koji couldn't help but comment. "Delta's cloned body can't work as a sacrifice for this technique."
"Are you going to teach me about Konoha's Forbidden Jutsu now, Kashin Koji?" Naruto asked flatly. "Be quiet and watch."
The seal continued coiling and weaving together under Naruto's concentrated efforts as he poured a monstrous amount of his chakra into it, far greater than what would be required to summon a soul to possess a dead body.
Once the seal was completed, the black lines of the seal started radiating a pure white light, at which point Naruto stepped back, allowing the heavenly phenomenon to continue. The light intensified and soon coalesced into a humanoid figure that slowly gained distinct features. The body was the first to form, followed by the blonde hair and the hospital gown, and finally, her eyes opened with blue pupils in them. Unlike Delta's purple eyes, her real self possessed blue eyes. The look in her eyes was gentle, if a bit confused about her situation.
"W–what's going on?" The summoned soul that had taken the form of a woman in her early twenties asked. "Where am I?"
"You are in the Land of Fire, Akebi Sanzu," Naruto addressed the summoned soul by name. "In Konoha village, specifically."
"Are you the Hokage?" She asked curiously. "I'd heard that the hero of the war had the same hair as me."
"I am. And I apologize, but I need you to return to the world of the living," Naruto said. "It is your father's greatest wish to resurrect you."
"I don't think I can, Lord Hokage," she said. "A soul cannot leave the Pure Land for too long. I can already feel it pulling on me."
"You, as well as your father, have a greater role to play in the upcoming conflict." Naruto didn't directly answer her. "See that woman with the hateful expression? Your father preserved your memories and tried to clone you to bring you back. Unfortunately, he didn't consider your soul. That woman is both you and not you simultaneously."
"I feel a sense of aversion to her," Akebi said. "As if her existence itself is unnatural."
"That's because it is," Naruto said. "Do you wish to be resurrected, Akebi? Your soul will inhabit Delta's body, and you will receive all of her memories and experiences. It will make you a very capable combatant. Because of your identity as Delta, you won't be able to have a completely normal life, but I will employ you as a part of my personal Anbu guard. A special force of shinobi who answer only to me."
"I've always wanted to be a ninja," she smiled sadly. "But unfortunately, I can't stay here."
"You can," Naruto said. "As long as you wish to. I can tether your soul to me and prevent the Pure Land from taking you away. Tell me, Akebi."
"It won't allow you to do it," she said kindly, with reluctance shining in her eyes. "You cannot desecrate the authority of the Pure Land."
"Answer my question, Akebi," Naruto said. "Do you wish to be resurrected?"
"I can't."
"Do you want to?"
"It won't let me."
"Answer me, Akebi. As long as you agree, I will completely eliminate the Pure Land's influence on you."
"It's unnatural." Her words got hurried.
"With power, even the most unnatural thing can be brought to fruition."
"It can't be real."
"It is. I will bring your soul under my authority. If there is a downside, it is that you can never betray me or be free from me."
"The heavens will smite you." She looked stressed as if something dangerous was looming over her.
"I'd like to see them try," Naruto said with a wild gleam in his eyes. "Tell me, Akebi, do you wish to be resurrected?"
"I do!" She suddenly screamed. "I want to live as a ninja."
"That's all I wanted to hear."
***
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