Naruto : A Fool's Errand.

Tachibana woke up with a lengthy *yawn*.

"The hell is that smell.", Tachibana complained but almost immediately shut up since he realised he was facing Naruto's ass since he was asleep on his side of the hard floor bed.

Tachibana slapped it away with a smack but that did nothing to move Naruto away and only caused his cheeks to jiggle in front of his face.

'The hell!!! Why is there jiggle physics on this thi-'

'Why am I thinking about that!'

Tachibana pushed himself out of his small portable floor mattress and walked out of the tent.

They had reached the camp and everyone had already clocked in for guard patrol duty with Tsunade. They were waiting for their resident Yamanaka, Inoichi, to inform them of any detected intrusions that they'd have to deal with at the North Eastern borders.

"Awake already?" Yamato asked while Sasuke and Sakura beside him looked tired and sleep-deprived.

"The hell are you guys so sleepy about? You continuously stuck me with guard duty for the past two days! And didn't even stay awake half the time today since I was out of the tent because Naruto snored too loudly…" Tachibana complained but Sasuke and Sakura were too sleepy to care.

Tachibana then turned his head towards Shizune who was cooking an early meal for everyone and walked over to pick a bowl of soup for himself.

"Shizune-nee-san you're the best person here."

"Oh? Not your sensei?" Shizune asked with a teasing smile, but Tachibana was ruthless.

"No. Not even he is as great as you! His food's so terrible! It felt like he was trying to poison us with that damn abomination that he called tomato soup!!! I felt like I was eating sand!!! And I still haven't forgiven him for leaving me with no place to sleep!! He left me alone to fend for myself!!!"

"Well sorry for not making something that suited your pallet, your highness! And sorry for taking on a secret mission when the stability of the village was at stake due to your actions!!!" Yamato said with a huff before walking over to get a bowl for himself.

Sasuke and Sakura's heads were bobbing because of their lack of sleep, but they soon joined in.

"How do you have so much more energy Tachibana-kun?" Sakura asked while trying to use the warm bowl to heat her face up and stay awake despite the comforting cold that was lulling her into its embrace.

Without even sparing a glance Tachibana said something simple-

"My body is energetic because my great lord blessed me to be strong and sleepless!"

Sakura rolled her eyes since Tachibana had been talking too much about his supposed 'lord' in the past two days they'd been following Tsunade on their journey around the border.

Although they were in a hurry on the first day they'd left the village, hardly stopping to take any breaks in between, Tsuande had slowed down considerably during these last two days since they were on the border.

And no one knew the reason why.

Well except Tachibana, who guessed that Tsuande was just trying to process the warning he'd given all the Kage shinobi he'd summoned from the different villages.

"Why don't you pray to my lord! Then you'll hav-" Before Tachibana could complete his sentence, Sakura stuffed a spoonful of soup into his mouth.

*Cough* *Cough* *Cough* *Cough*

"The hell! Warn me beforehand if you're going to feed me! I don't mind being fed by a girl, even though you're not my type, but please! Do it elegantly!"

Sakura only rolled her eyes and cleaned her spoon with her top before stuffing some soup into her mouth.

Everyone continued eating in silence after that since there were rarely any moments of silence that everyone got to enjoy when Naruto was awake.

Yet a few seconds later, Tachibana felt someone place their hands on his shoulder. But since he had closed his eyes to enjoy the taste of the soup Shizune had made he assumed it was Sakura.

"Oh? You decided to give me a massage?! Finally learnt the greatness of the child of the daimyo of the Land Of Fire!? I'm even more powerful than the sole remaining Senju Clan Princess!!-"

"-I can do anything I want and yet I'm more cultured than the Senju Princess who's known as the Legendary Sucker!!!What do you want from me Sa- AAAHHHH!!! Hell! Stop squeezing my shoulder-"

Tachibana opened his eyes and froze when he laid eyes on Tsunade.

"Oh…I mean… I wasn't talking about you…."

Tsunade's brows twitched and her grip on Tachibana's shoulder tightened but then after a short *sigh* she spoke clearly in a bold tone.

"How do you contact that god of yours?"

"Huh?" Tachibana pretended to be confused, as if he hadn't heard Tsunade right, everyone else did a double take too.

So Tsunade repeated herself once again.

"How do you contact that god of yours!?" Her grip on Tachibana's shoulder tightened too.

Tachibana's external expression showed that he was shocked, just like everyone else around the camp including Inoichi who was sitting a little away and sipping on his bowl of soup.

But internally Tachibana was ecstatic.

'This!'

'Finally!'

'It took her two days to decide to seek me out and find a way to contact the person who'd summoned her into the Sefirah Castle.'

'The others are probably thinking about things in the same line.'

'They should've all started to search for information about the being that pulled them into the Sefirah Castle by now. Trying to figure out exactly what had happened to them.'

'I'm sure one or two if not all of them have at least come across information about me divining things in the capital of the Land Of Fire.'

'Especially those from Kumogakure and Kirigakure, since they were involved in the Land of Waves incident where their shinobi tried to capture the island to make their own port that was close to the Land of Fire.'

'They'd have studied or made a report on all the shinobi involved in the missions and so they probably know about me.'

'There shouldn't be any direct records or reports of my actions in the capital. But they should know that I claim to be a seer blessed by a god.'

'They're probably looking for ways to connect with me right now.'

'I'd expected Tsunade to seek me out immediately after the meeting since she'd obviously connect the dots faster than them all because she's seen my abilities first hand.'

'I expected her to fall faster and try and coerce the information out of me faster within a day or so at most, but I guess better late than never huh?'

'But to think she was so resolved that it took me throwing around words like my blessings from a god for about two days to make her give in.'

What Tachibana didn't realise was that the real reason Tsunade was so disinterested in coming in contact with anything of that nature was because, from Katsuyu's explanation about Tachibana, she felt that things would be too troublesome to deal with for her.

But thinking back to the helplessness she felt when she was pulled above the Grey Fog into the Sefirah Castle by an unknown entity, she finally decided to talk to Tachibana about his so-called 'God'.

Especially with the cryptic warning she'd received from 'Him' with all the other Kages.

Tachibana looked at Tsunade with gleaming eyes, and a wide smile decorated his face.

"You want to know!? Sure!! While I can communicate directly with my God and talk to him whenever I want, you can't do the same."

"So I can't talk to him?" Tsunade asked with a frown.

Tachibana quickly shook his head.

"No. There is an easy way for you to talk to him too, but it doesn't guarantee a quick response."

"Oh?" Tsunade was interested, and so was everyone else.

"Yes, all you have to do is light up three special ritualistic candles with specific fragrances and chant a ritualistic prayer for 'Him'. After you do so, you can just pray to him with your questions and it'll reach him."

Tsunade squinted since the process was rather simplistic.

It involved no seals or complicated chakra manipulations, which meant that it worked in ways Tsuande couldn't understand.

And so she had a hard time believing what Tachibana was saying.

"What do I have to say?" Tsunade asked.

"You have to say the follow-" Tachibana suddenly paused and frowned as he instinctively saw a vision.

He quickly turned towards Inoichi, the Yamanaka in their group as did everyone else who looked at the man who was slurping soup.

Inoichi paused when all the eyes fell on him and he gave everyone a confused look. But suddenly a startled shock replaced his confusion.

He quickly opened his mouth and spoke rapidly-

"Tsunade-sama! There's been a reported intrusion at the right flank of the border! Kumogakure has dispatched two teams fo three hundred shinobi towards the Land of Fire through the Land of Hot water!"

Tsuande's frowned deepened and she looked at Tachibana for a few seconds before she *sighed* and spoke quickly.

"Pack everything up. We're leaving. And you. Tachibana was it? We'll have this conversation again later."

Tachibana nodded as everyone else quickly began to prepare themselves.