Orange, Spirals and Everything Nice

Twenty: Caged-Bird Seal

DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the characters or the setting of the story. They all exclusively belong to Mr. Masashi Kishimoto in all its rights.

Naruto kept the rogue leader busy with his barrage of massive rasengans, while Choji waited for Hinata's signal from a few hundred yards away. They only have one shot at this attack so there shouldn't be any room for mistakes.
Hinata watched with her byakugan as the last of Naruto's clones puffed out of existence with a series of chakra-infused water shurikens.

"Choji-kun." the heiress signaled her teammate and Choji nodded with agreement. He then performed a partial multi-size technique, making his hands grow enormously. Then with a swift scoop of Hinata, Karui and Omoi; Choji roared and threw the trio in the air towards the battlefield.
The trio landed on a perfect spot where Hinata could perform her improved eight trigrams palms technique. Though she'll be using her own version with the water as her weapon. The Kumo pair gave each other a nod before performing a lightning element technique, which they'll infuse with Hinata's water needles to attack the rogue leader.

And without wasting a moment, the group launched their attack at the last rogue.

The rogue helplessly flew in the air after the successful attack. And Naruto ended the fight with a massive rasenshuriken. Because the rogue cannot absorb water energy without any physical contact with the element.
It was Hinata's plan out of her observations and gladly, she was right. She was also amazed that her clan technique worked well with the Kumo ninjas.

The group sighed in relief as Choji came to join them afterwards.

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The frightened villagers slowly came out to welcome the group of ninjas after the long fight.
The enemies have now been tied up and interrogated by the Kiri ninjas who came to help out. It's gonna take a while to find all the pirates at sea but since the leader of the rogues had been captured, it will be a lot easier now to locate them.

Lady Shinju burst out crying as she raced towards her new friends to thank them with hugs.

Everything is alright now.

Shinju is safe and she'll get the chance to start again. And none of their teammates were badly injured. Only a few scratches that Ino can can easily heal in no time. Hinata sighed in relief before glancing at Naruto who was oddly quiet with their victory. She silently approached him and stopped when she saw that he was anxiously scanning the area in his sage mode.

"Naruto-kun? Is something wrong?" the heiress asked worriedly.

"One of my clones in kyuubi mode was sensing danger around the area just before the battle ended. I'm just making sure that we're really safe now." the hero explained.

It was strange seeing how calm Naruto's reacting about the situation. But her instincts went to help him just the same.
Hinata turned towards the seas before activating her byakugan. Her head throbbed at the overuse of her bloodline but she couldn't just ignore Naruto's dilemma. Her veiny eyes used their 360-degree vision and scanned the area and a few kilometers beyond for threats. But maybe because she was exhausted that she couldn't pinpoint where an exact enemy could be lurking. Hinata double-checked all the ninjas around the village before deactivating her byakugan with a sigh. She couldn't be of any help after all.

"Thanks for helping, Hinata." Naruto consoled her and she offered a smile in return. He had also blinked back his sage mode and she now stared up at his ocean blue eyes.

Just how much had he grown in the last four months that her full height could barely reach his chin now?

"Hinata! Naruto!" Shinju called out to the pair and waved at them with the rest of the group.
The pair was about to join the group when Sai's ninja art tigers suddenly appeared out of nowhere and bit both arms of a Kumo ninja who was about to close in on Shinju with a poisoned kunai.