36. The Aftermath

Aiko moved towards the baby, which was now sleeping peacefully on the sacrificial altar, The leakage of life force had stopped and in fact it was getting stronger, The other strange chakra was also slowly getting mixed with the baby's life force strengthening and replenishing it.

'It has some similarities with Sasuke's aura' thought Aiko, as they gave him the feeling that they were of the same source, he raised his hand wanting to touch the baby but stopped when he noticed his hand was covered in dried blood.

'He has yellow coloured hair like Minato san' thought the boy looking at the peacefully sleeping baby.

Once making sure the baby was alright, He focused his attention on Kushina who had fallen unconscious on the bed, which had surprisingly survived the encounter relatively unscathed when compared to the ruined house. But the same could not be said for its occupant as Aiko sensed Kushina's condition had worsened, her life force was so depleted that only the constant chakra from the Kyubi which was escaping from the seal was keeping her alive.

Aiko considered loosening the seal further, but finally decided against it because he realised Kushina's body itself was on the brink of collapsing and any more load would do more harm than good.

'What to do?' he thought, gently wiping the blood stains from the corner of her lips as he looked at the unconscious woman.

He sat on the ground leaning against the bed as he scanned his surroundings for any threat, he did not sense the aura of the creature that had attacked them, He looked at the corner of his eyes the timer for the boost was coming to an end with less than 2 minutes left.

He looked at his surroundings with mapping skill, checking if there were any other enemies lurking around as the white half of the creature that had tied him down was nowhere to be seen. But did not find any other dangerous creature nearby.

He soon sensed a lot of people coming in this direction and relaxed a bit when he recognised one of them as the third Hokage. Aiko used transformation jutsu to return to his normal appearance as he waited for them.

...........................................

A few minutes earlier.....

"He teleported with the Kyubi" muttered a ANBU in admiration as he saw the Fourth hokage enter the scene tie down the Kubi with his huge summon and teleport with the demon that had given them lot of trouble.

"Where did he take it?" asked the Third Hokage worried as he looked at the now empty spot, but his question was soon answered as the sky turned bright at the outskirts of the village.

"Let's head out." shouted the third loudly gathering the shinobi's attention as he moved in that direction.

Sarutobi was very worried as he got closer to the destination as the surroundings were destroyed, but there were no sounds of battle, indicating that the battle was over.

He was surprised when he reached the place though as he saw the injured boy, Unconscious Kushina and the baby lying there in the middle of the destroyed house. He quickly moved towards Kushina checking her condition and his expression grew complex as he realised her condition.

" what happened?was Kyubi sealed back inside Kushina again?" he asked the boy who was the only one conscious to explain the situation.

Aiko opened his mouth wanting to explain the situation but a system notification interrupted him.

'Ding! Boost card time limit has been reached.'

'Ding! Host has levelled up

All attributes +1

Free Attribute points +3

'Ding! Host has lev….' his world suddenly grew dark as he lost his consciousness not hearing the complete notification as exhaustion hit him.

....................................…..

The third Hokage looked at the now unconscious boy and decided to take them back to the village first and give them first aid, and stabilise their injuries.

'Where did Minato go?' thought Sarutobi as Minato was nowhere to be found, his head full of questions but he quickly stopped thinking about them and decided to handle the situation first.

........................................

Meanwhile in some unknown place filled with trees and mountains….

"Shima-san, what is this thing?" asked Gamabunta as he stood before a much smaller toad respectfully.

"I don't know for sure, It is sentient and it is trying to possess the body of little Jiraiya's disciple, we must act fast, summon Little Jiraiya here." said another toad which was also a smaller green toad with white hair styled in somewhat of a mohawk.

They were both elders of the Mount Myōboku The one who had just spoken was called Fukasaku, the husband of the other toad Shima.

The smaller toad, Shima had one hand on Minato and was channeling the nature energy into him, stopping the spread of corrosion.

'This is hard' she thought because she was seeing signs of Minato turning into a frog as she tried to input more natural energy.

"BAM" a knocking sound was heard as the other toad took a stick from somewhere and struck Minato's body returning him back to normal.

"Tō-chan, his body is not accustomed to natural energy and we need more to drive that corrosion out." said Shima to the other smaller toad observing Minato's situation.

"Hmmm, we can only stop the corrosion from spreading for now and wait for the boy to regain consciousness, but I think it will take a long time." said the other one, because it realised through natural energy that whatever this was it was, trying to not only corrode his body but was also trying to corrode his soul, turning him into some form of puppet.

'Boy, we cannot help you in resisting the corrosion of your soul, it will depend on your willpower.' thought Fukasaku once again hitting Minato with the stick to dispel the transformation.

"Yo, Gamabunta why did you summon me so suddenly, I was in the middle of imp….." trailed off Jiraiya as he quickly saw the two great sage toads and Minato who was lying on the ground clearly injured.

"What happened? Why is Minato here?" asked Jiraiya quickly moving towards him and sighed in relief as he only saw a wound on his disciple's stomach but quickly frowned as he realised the uncommoness of it.

Gamabunta explained the situation to Jiraiya and the elder toads also told him their speculation.

"I need to head to Konoha as soon as possible," said Jiraiya, looking at his injured disciple and hoping that his family and the village was somehow safe.

"Elders do you have any method to cure him?" asked Jiraiya looking at them.

"We can keep him alive, the rest depends on him," said Fukasuku, knocking Minato once again when he started to transform.

"Ok, for now that is enough, I will think of something" said Jiraiya thanking the toads, his recent trip to Ame had been disastrous and he did not want to lose his only alive disciple.

"Elders I want to use the distant water portal to get to Konoha as soon as possible." said Jiraiya and shima nodded her head indicating for him to follow her as she moved into the deeper part of the forest.

Fukasaku watched them go and lifted Minato effortlessly by one hand carrying him on top of his head and jumped on top of Gamabunta and said, "Let's head to the sacred oil fountain."

Meanwhile Jiraiya and Shima reached a small well filled with water and stopped near it.

"Little Jiraiya, no need to worry too much." said the shima trying to console him. " You should also rest and recover from your injuries." she added looking at him as she prepared to jump into the well.

"I am alright Shima-san, I have to trouble you to travel as fast as possible." he said slightly bowing his head.

"No problem, Little Jiraiya, I will reach Konoha by sunrise." answer the toad before she jumped into the well disappearing from sight.

Jiraiya looked at the well for a few moments and sat cross legged near it waiting to be summoned once Shima reached Konoha.