History Fanfic / ADropOfPoison

-->He was now the lead remaining jonin. \\
He made some quick maths in his head. The support forces had already lost more than half their numbers, along with numerous wounded still left on the ground. What little news they had of the situation in the village wasn't pointing toward victory, more like the same thing as here. \\
It was clear. They'd lost. \\
They'd thought the Leaf weak, but it had only been an act. It was clear they'd been prepared for the invasion. \\
Therefore, as a loyal Sand ninja, Otokaze had only a single option. \\
"Stop!" he yelled. "Sand forces, stand down!" \\
It took a moment, but the fighting slowed then stopped. Surprisingly, the Konoha shinobi in those weird masks also stopped, though still keeping ready for combat. He'd been prepared if they tried to profit from the opening, but they hadn't. \\
There was no visible leader, so he turned to the clone right before him. "Who speaks for your group?" \\
The ninja said nothing, clapping his hands and snapping his fingers in various ways. He then disappeared, another clone having taken his place. This one had spiky hair going from yellow to red as it rose, along with a rainbow crown. His mask was half green and half red, cut diagonally, and he had a visibly fake bushy beard. \\
"Talk," he said in a gruff voice. \\
"I would negotiate the Sand forces' surrender," Otokaze said, gritting his teeth. He hated what he was doing, but he had no other choice; if the Sand forces here didn't return at all, Sunagakure was done. There were small clans and lesser villages who wouldn't miss the opportunity, so he needed to preserve whatever Sand forces he could. \\
The crowned ninja made more of these bizarre had signs. "Drop weapons. You'll be bound and blinded, then led to separate holding points," he then explained. \\
Otokaze gulped. "How about... our wounded?" \\
The Konoha ninja looked around. There were more than twenty fallen Sand ninja in sight, and more hidden being the mass of Konoha Shinobi. "Who are your medics?" \\
"Sand Medics, raise hands!" Otokaze ordered, and about a dozen hands went up. \\
The shinobi opposite him nodded. "Five guards to each medic. Everyone healed is to be bound and blinded. We'll let the medics work as soon as everyone else is secured." Ninja behind him started moving, five for each medical ninja. \\
"I accept your terms," the Sand jonin said, reaching down. He unclipped his belt, letting it drop, then pushed both his hands together toward the man in front of him. It was better terms than what he expected; most villages would have left the wounded to die, if they hadn't finished them off right then. Konoha today had proved its reputation handily. It was the strongest, and still the most decent.\\

* EnergyAbsorption: One forbidden technique allows the user to drain chakra from other sources. Ordinarily only those of the Akado bloodline can safely use it, but it's a game-changer for shadow clones, who don't have to worry about ruining their chakra coils, and can now persist indefinitely. It's also handy in combat.

''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/4573620/1/ A Drop of Poison]]'' is a ForWantOfANail ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'' fan fiction by [=AngelOfSnapdragons=]. When the traitor Mizuki strikes down Iruka, his shuriken is poisoned, causing Iruka to fall unconscious and miss Naruto's rescue, so Naruto doesn't get a field graduation from the Ninja Academy. However, with more time on his hands that evening, Naruto realises that some of his clones still have copies of the Scroll of Forbidden Techniques. Armed with a new appreciation of his shadow clones, and a determination to graduate, Naruto launches an epic secret campaign that will change Konoha forever.

* SurvivorGuilt: Muremaru understandably feels this after [[spoiler: Kiritori pushes him out of harm's way and gets killed himself]]; Muremaru is more replaceable and feels that he should have been the one to face danger. Iruka tries to reassure him that [[spoiler: Kiritori]] probably felt the same way, and that there's no way to know if he really could have changed anything.

* SparedByTheAdaptation: With the swarm reaching the Land of Waves before the Leaf team gets there, Zabuza and Haku never have to fight them and are unharmed.

* ThisIsADrill: Gaara's taijutsu is very mechanical and uninspired, but aided by creating sand gauntlets that make his arms unusually tough. Then Naruto does some brainstorming with him, and they strike on the idea of having his gauntlets ''spin'', fast enough to disintegrate thrown rocks (or, more relevantly, an attacker's hands) on contact.

* ShapeshiftingSquick: Jiraiya is immediately in lust when he sees Hiruzen's new secretary who is practically the spitting image of his first Icha Icha book. Only to be immediately disgusted when Hiruzen gleefully tells him that the "secretary" is a disguised Naruto Shadow Clone. (Although he also had an intermediate reaction of "Tsunade will kill me slowly
and painfully if she ever sees this.")

* ShapeshiftingSquick: Jiraiya is immediately in lust when he sees Hiruzen's new secretary who is practically the spitting image of his first Icha Icha book. Only to be immediately disgusted when Hiruzen gleefully tells him that the "secretary" is a disgused Naruto Shadow Clone.

** Special mention goes to ''Akiraka Jigokuhi'', "evident hellfire", which is at the same time same enough that Naruto himself uses it, and yet even more dangerous than other forbidden techniques if it goes wrong. ''Saishuu Houden'' would injure or kill the user, but a charged-up hellfire sphere could torch the whole area.

** The clones who enrol at the academy choose the names Ariko, "ant child", and Muremaru, "incarnate swarm".

* FakeRealTurn: To hide their existence when helping fight the Sand Invasion, the swarm disguises themselves as a previously unknown ANBU branch, the Doukeshi. Afterward, the Hokage starts getting requests from ANBU members wanting to transfer to this exciting new unit. [[spoiler: He actually thinks it's a good idea; Naruto's combination of shadow clones with forbidden techniques has proven to be a highly effective strategy worth teaching to others, and the secretive ANBU won't think it's strange to have clones teaching them.]]

* DangerousForbiddenTechnique: Naruto copies down the entire scroll of them. Turns out that when you can churn out disposable copies of yourself, a lot of harmful or outright suicidal techniques become much more usable.

* MadScientist: Shukuen has been experimenting with splicing animal bodies and mechanical parts together, under Orochimaru's patronage. [[spoiler: When he captures Team 1, he takes Ebisu aside to perform experiments on his pain tolerance, and when the team escapes and disrupts his work, he transfers his mind into a giant cyborg/hybrid monster that they have a very hard time fighting.]]

--> '''Bat''': I am wearing my regulation armor over a black suit, with my sword strapped at my back. [[spoiler:My mask is as usual half lime green and half hot pink, with a blue teardrop on the pink side and a purple star on the pink side, both below the eyes. My regulation poofy nose is in place, as are my exaggerated eyebrows. My multicolor wig is in proper position and still curly.]] Should I go into more detail?