Land of Whirlpools, So the Nation May Fall but the Clan Endure

This is a wide valley with towering abysses on both sides, obscuring the view. Some lines can be vaguely seen, probably representing rocks.

"It's so dark here," Tenten said in a trembling voice.

"Tenten, did you hear that just now?" Naruto suddenly said.

"What?"

"Footsteps? There are only two of us, how could there be three footsteps?" he said in a deep voice.

"Ah!!" Tenten's face turned deathly pale. "Where! Where? It can't be there."

"Haha, how could that be?" Naruto waved his hand dismissively and laughed, "It'll be fine if it just brushes against the line, the ghost will be 404."

"You almost scared me to death, Naruto!" Tenten breathed a sigh of relief and patted him on the shoulder. "You're such a jerk, always lying to people."

"Let's go, let's go check that door." Naruto chuckled and didn't say anything, but he wasn't lying; there really was a third set of footsteps.

But he didn't care; no one understood Death Reaper better than him.

Moreover, this is the Land of Whirlpools, a country that has mastered the Sealing Jutsu. Sealing several consciousnesses in this Valley of Sacrifices seems quite reasonable upon closer examination.

After all, the Nine-Tails Prison sealed Minato and Kushina's consciousnesses. If it were in the Land of Whirlpools, even if the war destroyed this place, there wouldn't be nothing left.

The valley floor was pitch black as the two walked forward, their goal the door embedded in the stone wall. A blinding flashlight illuminated a cone-shaped clearing, and their footsteps rustled softly.

"Naruto, was the Land of Whirlpools abandoned because of war?" Tenten suddenly asked.

"Why are you asking this?" Naruto, somewhat surprised.

"Because something was strange, we searched the entire island but couldn't find any weapons." Tenten followed closely behind Naruto, never leaving his side.

She had seen those kinds of films and knew that if the two of them distanced themselves because of shyness in such a situation, they might end up with someone else as they walked along.

Tenten find those scenes of splitting up, or even arguing and growing distant, utterly idiotic. If it were me, I'd want to stick to my teammates.

In this environment, the emotional support that partners can provide is invaluable.

"Maybe they don't fight with weapons. I've heard the Uzumaki Clan is famous for their Sealing Jutsu, so maybe everyone has Sealing Jutsu," Naruto said dismissively.

"Huh, really? But the ninjas attacking them aren't armed either?" Tenten wondered, the more she thought about it, the stranger it seemed. "Is this really the Land of Whirlpools?"

"100% authentic, it's the ruins of the Land of Whirlpools." Naruto continued, dragging Tenten along. "If you don't trust others, don't you trust me, the clan leader?"

"But it's really strange, there's not a trace at all." Tenten lowered her voice. "Naruto, I feel like something's off about this island."

"Tenten is alright, it's safe here." Naruto was now focused on getting his hands on the Anywhere Door and didn't care about anything else. "This place feels like home."

"Go home?"

A gust of cold wind blew by, and Tenten involuntarily shrank her neck. Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced at something and almost screamed. She swallowed hard.

"Naruto! Someone just passed by!"

"Are you seeing things? There are only the two of us here. Where did anyone else come from?" Naruto didn't care and stubbornly continued to hold Tenten's hand and walk forward.

"I really saw it, really!" Tenten was almost crying with anxiety.

"Okay, you're right." Naruto stopped, put his hands on Tenten's shoulders, and said earnestly, "Tenten, they can hear us."

"Ah!"

"Is it really okay for you to be plotting so openly and loudly?" he asked.

I was trembling all Tenten, thinking to myself, how could I know? These things were just subconscious reactions.

But she quickly realized her mistake and immediately pursed her lips and remained silent.

"It's okay, keep talking. I'm not used to you being so quiet," Naruto suddenly interjected, leaving Tenten speechless.

"But."

"We're going to have to talk anyway, so let them hear us," he said.

"Naruto, who are they?" Tenten asked nervously.

"I don't know, why don't you call them out?" Naruto said, pulling Tenten closer to the door without turning his head.

Tenten:"."

Fortunately, Naruto didn't keep Tenten worried for too long, and started to deduce things for Tenten little by little as they walked.

"This is indeed the Land of Whirlpools. Many years ago, a war broke out here. It was probably over the Sealing Jutsu that could control the Tailed Beast. At least two countries sent troops to attack the Land of Whirlpools."

"This happened shortly after the death of the First Hokage. Konohagakure became the target of everyone's attacks, and the Tailed Beast were transformed from natural disasters into controllable weapons of war."

Upon hearing this, Tenten quietly swallowed.

"And then what?"

"Later, then the country was destroyed," Naruto said casually. "The First Hokage was on good terms with the Uzumaki Clan, but times have changed and things are unpredictable."

"There were quite a few madmen in that era. I heard that the Kaguya Clan of the Land of Water was a bunch of perverts. As far as I know, there were quite a few of them before the Second Shinobi World War, and they didn't use weapons."

"Because their weapon is themselves. The Kaguya Clan members all have bloodline diseases, which make them mentally unstable. Their bones can turn into sharp weapons."

"Naruto, do you mean they were thrown into the Land of Whirlpools?" Tenten asked, somewhat surprised. She looked around, more inclined to believe that those hiding in the shadows belonged to the Land of Whirlpools.

So she instinctively became more cautious, afraid of saying the wrong thing and angering the other person, and pounced out of the darkness.

"Do you remember the countries that launched the war against the Land of Whirlpools that I mentioned?" Naruto suddenly asked.

"I remember, you said there were at least two countries." Tenten had a good memory and, even though he was nervous, he still repeated what he had said.

"Which two countries? This part isn't recorded in the Konohagakure archives," she said.

"Well, it's highly likely that the Land of Water and the Land of Lightning have joined the war. Perhaps it's a surprise attack, catching everyone off guard and quickly defeating the Land of Whirlpools."

Naruto was already very close to the stone wall; he only needed to walk a little further to reach it, so his speaking speed naturally slowed down.

"Why?"

"Geographically speaking, Hidden Mist and Kumogakure have natural advantages. In addition, the Third Mizukage, Yagura, is known as the Perfect Jinchuriki, and Kumogakure had developed its Tailed Beast a long time ago."

"Sand, the Tailed Beast of Shukaku, only obeys the old monk Bunpuku. After Bunpuku's death, Sand did not even have the ability to completely suppress Shukaku. Once the Jinchuriki falls into a deep sleep, Shukaku can regain its freedom."

"As for Iwagakure, their method of taming Tailed Beast is similar to that of the old monk Bunpuku, relying on arduous training to build a closer relationship with the Tailed Beast."

Naruto's reasoning was already very clear; Tenten could almost imagine the ferocity of the War of the Land of Whirlpools decades ago, where two superpowers joined forces to launch an attack.

The Land of Water unleashed wave after wave of Kaguya clan members, their eyes fixed solely on slaughter. Laughing wildly amidst screams and bloodshed, they relentlessly massacred the Uzumaki Clan.

The Land of Lightning is known for its martial spirit. With the help of the Land of Water, they landed on the coastline of the Land of Whirlpools and practically annihilated the small island of Land of Whirlpools in an instant.

"We're here," Naruto said, looking up at the stone wall.

The door was embedded in the stone wall, visible as soon as you looked up. It was about twenty meters away from them, and they would have to climb up to reach it.

"Should we go up?" Tenten asked.

"Of course." Naruto took a deep breath and turned to look at the darkness. "Before that, we need to deal with that huge group of troublemakers following us."

When Tenten heard Naruto "a whole bunch," she almost exploded. Her body instantly stiffened, like a piece of wood.

She almost uncontrollably wanted to turn around, and the next second she did. Behind her was a deep, inky darkness, and after Naruto's words, there was a moment of silence.

Then, a creaking sound began, like a surging tide.

"Ah! Naruto!" Tenten was almost crying in fright, grabbing Naruto's hand and shrinking behind him in panic. "They..."

Even though she's done many dangerous missions Tenten, she's still just an eighteen-year-old girl. It's normal to be afraid when facing unknown dangers.

Naruto was much calmer than her, and that's precisely why Tenten subconsciously chose to rely on him. From beginning to end, Naruto didn't seem afraid at all.

"They're here." Naruto remained unusually calm, waving his powerful flashlight around.

By the light of her flashlight, Tenten vaguely saw a horrifying scene that she would never forget. A group of mangled corpses surged towards the two of them from the bottom of the valley like a tide.

Some people were crawling, others were dragging half their bodies, their faces contorted in grotesque expressions—the scene was utterly terrifying. The rustling sounds grew louder and louder.

"Waaah!!" Tenten was so scared that she burst into tears, and her legs almost gave way and she collapsed to the ground. This was her biggest fear.

"Tenten," Naruto suddenly called out to her.

"Huh? Waaaaah, what happened?" Tenten's face was streaked with tears, but she still looked up at Naruto, afraid that he would say something scary again.

"You stepped on my foot," he said.

Tenten was stunned for a moment, then looked down and realized that, in her fear, she had indeed stepped on Naruto's foot. But at this point, why worry about that now!

Upon hearing this, she cried even harder.

Naruto had no choice but to forcibly pull Tenten away, but the harder he tried, the tighter Tenten clung to him. He felt the touch was intense, but Naruto's legs were almost numb.

Helpless, he could only reluctantly bring up the control panel, without even snapping his fingers.

"Impure World Reincarnation!"

With a deafening roar, an even sharper howl erupted from the vast valley floor. Countless coffins sprang up before Naruto, forming a wall of coffins.

Naruto's expression changed. The vast amount of Chakra within him was being Impure World Reincarnation Ninjutsu, as if it would drain him dry in the next second.

Holy crap!

The coffins continued to rise, like giant dominoes. Unlike the others, the coffins stood in rows, almost instantly tearing the horde of corpses to pieces.

Bang bang bang!!!

One coffin after another opened, and corpses dressed in elaborate costumes emerged. Among them were Kaguya Clan, as well as ninjas from Mist Ninja Kumogakure.

They all opened their eyes, their faces first showing confusion, then bloodlust.

Naruto himself hadn't expected that there were so many corpses buried in this dark valley. If this continued, he would surely turn into a dried-up human body. He immediately ended the Impure World Reincarnation.

Fortunately, there were enough corpses produced from the Impure World Reincarnation to at least suppress the inexplicable corpses that appeared from the shadows. The two groups grappled with each other, like a war.

Tenten recovered and apologized to Naruto with a guilty look on her face. She wasn't afraid of anything except this—those things that would be taken down by 404 (a Chinese internet slang term for something that is disabled or deleted).

Fortunately, the other party was just some manipulated corpses, so she was no longer so scared.

"Naruto, what should we do?" she asked softly.

"Never mind that, let's go up first." Naruto glanced back at the stone wall behind him. "Let them fight it out for a while, at least we'll be safe."

"Okay." Tenten was now truly obedient to Naruto.

After all, this is the kind of situation she's least adept at handling. If she were to deal with it alone, she probably would have fainted from fright long ago.

The two slowly climbed up the rock face, reaching the door in no time. Since there were no protruding cliffs to stand on, they had to use Tenten Chakra to firmly adhere to the twenty-meter-high rock face.

The fighting below continued, the darkness obscuring the situation. The agonizing sounds of battle echoed like a tidal wave through the deep valley.

"There are words on that door!" Tenten suddenly reminded her.

"Do you recognize it?" Naruto turned to look at her and handed her the flashlight. "I can't understand it, you can try."

"Okay." Tenten didn't waste any words. She took the flashlight, held it against the rock wall with one hand, and used the other hand to examine it little by little.

"This is the script of the Uzumaki Clan. It was taught in school for a while, but only some basic stuff," she said. "I found it interesting, so I paid to learn it for a period of time."

"Want to buy a book?" Naruto asked.

"No, I'm buying some stone tablets scattered throughout the Land of Fire," Tenten said. "The inscriptions on them are more complete, more comprehensive than those in Konohagakure's archives."

"Money power, wow," he exclaimed.

Tenten ignored Naruto and began to carefully examine the writing on the door. She read it aloud as she looked at it.

With Hashirama Senju's death, the allied nation of Konohagakure was weakened. Seeking Sealing Jutsu, the Hidden Mist and Kumogakure villages launched a surprise attack on the Land of Whirlpools Uzumaki Clan, already small and with a limited territory, was decimated and its members were massacred.

The Kaguya Clan was ruthless, sparing neither women nor children, leaving no survivors in their wake. Their kingdom had fallen, but to prevent the extinction of their race, the clan retreated to Sacred Valley.

"Sacred Valley must be referring to this place, the pit we came down from," Naruto said, then asked, "Is there more beyond this spot?"

"Yes, and it seems there are quite a lot." Tenten's expression was rather grim. "It seems that the clansmen who retreated to the Sacred Valley have written their history on this gate."

Besides