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A crimson cloak snapped across Naruto's skin feral, burning until Neji planted a heel between his shoulder blades and pinned him to the mud.
Above them, Yamato's wood dragon froze mid-lunge, waiting on Kakashi's signal.
Kakashi gave a curt nod. The dragon receded. Neji lifted his foot. The Nine-Tails' shroud guttered and peeled away like smoke in rain.
Naruto blinked awake, wincing.
"I… really don't wanna lose it anymore," he groaned, clutching his lower back. Same routine: rage out, get floored, get patched up.
Neji's palm flashed green and tapped him once. "Nap time's over. Get up and train. If you slip again, Yamato and I are right here."
Yamato's arms were trembling as he kept the waterfall and suppression up Neji shot him a look that said, Easy for you to say.
Rain drifted in. Naruto slumped, staring through it. "Why can't I get it? Holding the Rasengan already takes everything I've got. Adding nature change on top of that—"
"Idiot," Neji cut in. "How did you learn Rasengan in the first place?"
Naruto froze… then the lightbulb. "Right, the shortcut!"
"Then use it," Neji said. "If you can't split your focus, split yourself."
"Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
Pairs of Naruto formed up, one clone shaping Rasengan, the other feeding wind nature into it. Kakashi and Yamato traded a that'll do it glance.
Neji's eyes slid sideways. A tug in his awareness like a thread pulled taut. One of the safeties he'd handed out had just fired.
Shikamaru.
His vision flickered through the linked charm: rain, a forest trail, Shikamaru sprinting with Asuma over his back. A thin barrier clung to Asuma's body like glassy light, Neji's failsafe, buying time and nothing more.
"Give me yours," Shikamaru snapped to Choji and Ino. They fumbled out identical talismans. "If one drops, another catches keep him stable till Konoha!"
Back at the falls, Kakashi noticed Neji go distant. "What is it?"
"Shikamaru's charm triggered. They're in trouble." Neji's tone went flat.
"I'm going," Naruto said instantly and lurched forward.
Kakashi's hand shot out to stop him. Neji moved first two gentle taps at lightning speed. Naruto locked up, eyes wide. "H-hey!"
"Sorry," Neji said to Yamato and Kakashi, "but he's Akatsuki's target and he's been pushing Kyuubi all day. You haul him to Tsunade. I'll intercept Shikamaru."
Kakashi weighed it for half a heartbeat, then nodded. "Go. I'll alert the Hokage and get reinforcements moving."
Neji vanished in a whisper of rain. Yamato hoisted a fuming, immobilized Naruto.
"Let me goooo—!" Naruto protested as they took off down the ridge.
The waterfall kept roaring, indifferent as ever. On the trail far ahead, Shikamaru's shoulders hunched under Asuma's weight, each step hammering hope into the mud while the barrier around his sensei shimmered and thinned.
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~Support with 200 PowerStones = 1 Bonus Chapter
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