Orochimaru gets annoyed.

Orochimaru sat deep within Otogakure, feeling a spike of annoyance when the alarms went off.

A very specific one, only meant to be used in case of an invasion.

Why now? He was already irritated that Sasuke had not reported on time, he wasn't too worried, from his intelligence reports, while the Order of The Watcher was training an army, they had only started doing so less than 2 years ago.

If it wasn't for the fact that one of his spies with sensor-type abilities informed him that they had abilities that did not use Chakra, he would have dismissed Wave and the Order as irrelevant.

And now someone had the gall to attack his base?

It seemed like someone was eager to die. And Orochimaru was more than happy to oblige.

"Orochimaru-sama." Kabuto entered his lab. "We are under attack by unknown forces."

He was already aware, but he refrained from saying anything, instead waiting for Kabuto to continue.

"It's... a large force, over a hundred enemy combatants with unknown abilities, none of them below Chūnin level in strength, along with some giant monsters, according to our Shinobi." He continued professionally. "Shall we evacuate?"

"No, the rejection has not progressed so much that I would run at the first sign of trouble." Orochimaru responded, his voice tinged with a hint of frustration, if only he was in his prime, but this body was starting to reject him, and any hand seals being unusable made it even worse. "Follow."

He got up from his chair and walked out of the room, Kabuto close behind him. As they moved through the compound, Shinobi ran past and by them, Orochimaru was satisfied, they were not the perfected war machine he remembered from his own days as a loyal Shinobi of Konoha, but for the amount of effort he put into them, they were passable.

Once outside, he saw the battle taking place before him.

"Hmmmm..." He let out a displeased hum. This was worse than expected, he quickly analyzed the battlefield.

The enemy combatants were outnumbered, but where higher quality, the weakest of them, the ones only wearing the masks, were as strong as Chūnin, the ones wearing that interesting cross between a robe and light armor seemed to be stronger.

In speed, they were below his average Jōnin, but they were more than making up for it with their unusual Jutsu, while he saw some use hand-signs, most just... did whatever they wanted without any obvious limiters.

That piqued his interest, was this the Order of The Watcher? It did sound similar to the reports he had gotten, he felt a spike of worry, did Sasuke get captured or killed?

He pushed those thoughts away for now, the two most threatening parts of the army were thankfully not very numerous.

The first threat wore slightly altered armor, but what set them apart was the feathered cloak they wore, they were easily at the same level as his best Jōnin, if not stronger, and they seemed to possess extremely powerful bloodlines, one of them was currently sending his army into the sky with simple gestures, only for them to plummet back down with lethal velocity.

The last threat were the monstrous crows, wingless and three-eyed, they were fast, strong, and were shooting explosive beams all over the battlefield, wiping out entire squads.

So far, his Shinobi were being pushed back, the lack of experience in large-scale battles and poor cohesion meant that they were not making use of their numbers advantage, instead trying to rely on individual strength.

Orochimaru clicked his tongue in annoyance. How inconvenient.

"Kabuto, summon the snakes, all of them." He commanded. "And once you are done, get the mortars, gas, Formula 16-T."

Kabuto nodded and quickly bit his thumb, drawing blood before slamming it into the ground.

"Summoning Jutsu!"

A cloud of smoke appeared, and when it cleared, he and Kabuto were left standing behind a massive snake.

Kabuto disappeared in a body flicker, leaving Orochimaru alone, Orochimaru saw him summon another snake on the other side of the battlefield.

"Manda, please eat anyone with a white mask."

The giant snake hissed in annoyance but complied regardless.

Good, he had no time to discipline Manda, as useful as the big beast was, it was far too proud sometimes.

Manda rushed forwards, slamming himself into the enemy lines, the enemy combatants quickly responded by scattering, the one with the gravity ability and one of the Crow Beasts moved in tandem, launching themselves towards Manda.

Orochimaru ignored that fight and looked for a target, quickly finding an interesting one. A blonde-haired woman wielding a Naginata, she was cutting her way through Shinobi left and right, her weapon quite literally flowing like water, was that also one of the odd abilities or something inherent to the weapon?

If his thoughts were correct, then she was a middle ranked member due to her uniform, a good first target.

Orochimaru reached into his mouth and pulled out his sword, Kusanagi. With a simple Body Flicker, Orochimaru stabbed at the woman's heart from her side.

But his sword was knocked off course by a very recognizable blade being thrown into Kusanagi's path. Turning a sure kill into a deep cut across the woman's ribs.

He narrowly dodged a second sword, identical to the first, by jumping backwards.

"Hello there, Orochimaru." Zabuza Momochi greeted cheerfully, a bloodthirsty grin on his face, Orochimaru's eyes flicked from the blade in Zabuza's hand to the one now imbedded into the ground, but as he was looking, the one that was thrown disappeared, not in a puff of smoke, just into thin air.

"Zabuza-sama." The woman shakily lifted her Naginata. But she was stopped by Zabuza.

"Shut it, medic. Now." He growled out, the woman snapped her mouth shut and unsteadily vanished into a Body Flicker.

Orochimaru looked around, seeing that everyone around them had cleared out, leaving the two of them alone.

"My my, how unusual seeing you here, Zabuza-kun." He responded pleasantly. "Last I heard, you were running around the Elemental Nations like a stray dog."

That was completely false, he knew exactly where Zabuza had been in the last year, but he had learned early on that prodding at a person usually resulted in interesting information leaking out.

The man let out a mocking laugh.

"Ah, well, sometimes dogs find themselves an owner."

Expected but disappointing, Zabuza was reputed to be a perfect example of what a Shinobi was supposed to be, before his defection.

Of course, Orochimaru knew that the peak of Shinobi was much higher than some random A-Class Missing-Nin.

He raised Kusanagi and rushed forward, he swung out with some casual slashes, testing Zabuza's reaction speed, but he got slightly confused when Zabuza barely dodged one of the slashes, he should have been able to dodge that.

The blade grazed his skin, but as it touched it, slightly transparent scales erupted across Zabuza's arm, the sword cut into them, but an already light wound was turned superficial.

Ah, testing his defences against my strikes?

Interesting, another odd ability. Orochimaru could not help but be excited, even if he lost the most of his men today, it might be worth it.

The sheer breath of variety on display across The Order's forces was fascinating.

He jumped backwards and let out a chuckle.

"Oh, how exciting." He said pleasantly. "You and yours are fascinating, Zabuza-kun."

Zabuza responded by raising his sword.

"I've heard much about the legendary Sanin Orochimaru... but I think I might be disappointed." Zabuza taunted lightly. "I guess you're really not up to par with your reputation in that broken body, huh?"

Orochimaru narrowed his eyes, how did they know? But he kept his smile plastered onto his face and prepared for another strike.

If Zabuza thought he needed hand-seals to kill him, then Orochimaru was happy to educate him.