"We're being followed, onee-sama," Karin suddenly piped up. "Two enormous chakra signatures that aren't exactly human— it's the two people whom you told me to keep an eye on, no doubt about it!"
It had been a few hours since Sakura, Karin, Neji and Hinata had stepped off the lift and left the Hidden Cloud Village, leaving the Raikage's unconscious body as well as the now useless Lord Tsuchimikado behind them.
Until now, Sakura's group hadn't run into any Kumo shinobi— just as the Cloud higher-ups had promised her, the usual sentinels and patrols had been ordered to stay out of their way. But just as Sakura had expected, they did not intend on keeping their promise and letting them go scot-free…
"Range and bearing?" asked Neji shortly, skidding to a halt and whirling around one hundred and eighty degrees. "Byakugan!"
Thick veins bulged around Neji's eyes.
"Ten kilometres, north-north-east," replied Karin urgently. "Wait, scratch that— it's nine kilometres, now— they're closing in fast!"
Neji carefully scanned the horizon, but he didn't have to search for too long before he found their pursuers…
"What in the world are those?" he gasped in shock. "A gigantic cat— and is that an octopus? Have they sent monsters after us!?"
The Hidden Cloud possessed two perfect Jinchūriki, Nii Yugito and Killer B. Judging from Neji's descriptions, Sakura was certain that they had undergone Tailed Beast Mode in order to catch up to them.
Naruto-running was certainly fast, but it remained limited by the human body's physiology— four legs were naturally much faster than two legs, but fortunately, that logical progression didn't seem to apply if one kept adding legs. Despite having twice as many legs, the eight-legged Eight-Tails Gyūki was about as fast as the quadruped Matatabi the Two-Tails…
"Anyone know the Shadow Clone Jutsu?" Sakura asked her companions, looking at each of them in turn. "No? Really? No one?"
Karin, Neji and Hinata shook their heads.
"Only regular Clones," said Hinata apologetically. "I'm sorry, this is all my fault, and I can't even help…"
The way things were going, it didn't matter whether their pursuers had four, eight, sixteen, or even two thousand and forty-eight legs— it was only a matter of time before they caught up to them!
"That's fine," Sakura sighed. "I'll do it myself— Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
One after the other, eight additional Sakuras appeared in plumes of white smoke.
"And now, for the finishing touch!" six of the eight Sakuras shouted. "Transformation Jutsu!"
Six more explosions of white smoke occurred in quick succession, as Sakura's Shadow Clones took the shapes of her companions— four Hinatas, and two Karins…
"Are you almost done messing around?" Sakura berated her Shadow Clones furiously. "Where's my two Nejis? Two of you Hinatas— you and you— turn into Nejis!"
"Ugh, fine," said the two Shadow Clones in question. "You're no fun, original..."
'Is it me, or did they just roll their eyes at us?' said Inner Sakura pettily. 'You can't just let them disrespect us — teach them a lesson!'
These eight Shadow Clones would be acting as decoys to draw away their pursuers. They had effectively been brought into existence for the sole purpose of dying, so it was natural that as exact copies of Sakura, they would be unwilling to throw their lives away…
"All right, you know what to do," Sakura told her Shadow Clones, once they were done fooling around. "Squad #1, you'll continue south-west, down the path we were originally going to take. Squad #2, you lot will head south-east, towards the coast. Got it?"
Neji-One raised her hand.
"Can I swap with Neji-Two?" she said. "This assignment sounds awfully dangerous…"
"Is it too late to change team names?" Neji-Two complained, raising her hand as well. "Being called #2 makes it sound like we're a bunch of concubines…"
One by one, the remaining Shadow Clones all began raising their hands and chattering among themselves.
"The enemy is now eight kilometres away," Neji and Karin simultaneously announced.
"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ANY MORE COMPLAINING!" Sakura hollered. "JUST GO!"
The eight Shadow Clones flickered away, albeit very reluctantly— and with their decoys off to bravely give their lives for them, Team Sakura began sprinting due south.
"It worked!" Karin announced a dozen minutes later. "Yugito went west after Squad #1, while B went east towards the sea after Squad #2!"
Sakura breathed a sigh of relief and patted her chest, causing the soft flesh contained within her dress to tremble.
Hidden within her cleavage, right underneath the First Hokage's Necklace, was a certain scroll that she had found hidden in the Raikage's breast pocket. It had popped out of his clothes when she had removed her hand from his ribcage, and upon opening it to check its contents, she had found a certain coded message and a strange diagram of the human body…
'They'd chase after us whether or not we take the scroll,' Inner Sakura had whispered tantalisingly in Sakura's ear. 'So, might as well take it with us!'
Inner Sakura knew how to make a compelling argument, and so, Sakura had ended up shoving it down her cleavage.
Ding! The System has finished decrypting the contents of the scroll. Would the Host like to hear the decrypted text?
"Go ahead," said Sakura breathlessly.
The decrypted text describes the steps one must undertake in order to train in a so-called Lightning Chakra Mode. It also contains a list of materials one must gather before commencing the training.
'Lucky!' crowed Inner Sakura. 'Kakashi, eat your heart out!'
Half an hour later, Team Sakura came face to face with the sea— in order to return to the Hidden Leaf, they could either follow the coastline through the Land of Frost, or they could skip the Land of Frost entirely and run across the sea to the Land of Hot Water…
"Hinata," said Neji bluntly. "Can you still run?"
"I can still run, Brother Neji," answered Hinata, putting up a brave face.
In truth, everyone was exhausted. They had been Naruto-running non-stop ever since the two Cloud Jinchūriki had started chasing them, and night was already falling. They badly needed to sleep, and luckily for them, so did their pursuers…