Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve

[Fiction]

Anko swiftly withdrew her kunai from within the Hidden Frost shinobi. Her eyes then shifted to the three-storey U-shaped manor owned by one of the Yu's wealthy blown up by Takuma's clone blast. A lush perimeter of trees surrounded the building, encircling a meticulously maintained shrub hedge maze.

However, as they advanced towards the building, all cover disappeared, heightening the risk of detection. Anko's gaze swept across the windows, a task she had been diligently performing for the past few hours. Her eyes halted abruptly on a window near the far left, where, in a heartbeat, she caught the fleeting glimpse of a man just as he disappeared behind the wall.

They had been seen. The enemy knew they were coming.

"We've been caught," she told Daiki.

"Crap," he muttered nervously.

The two groups converged at the manor's heavy double doors.

Anko informed Team B of the news, to which they responded with heavy nods.

"We're going to take it slow. Stick close, don't disappear from sight, and keep cover."

She maintained a steadfast front as the leader but was nervous about this undertaking. Having left Iori behind, their headcount was reduced to five. According to Aranai, the ROOT team had seven people, and given that one of them had died, their headcount was six, which put her team at a numerical disadvantage.

Moreover, she clearly remembered a bastard of a sensei telling her that ROOT agents were dangerous—not because they were talented, but because of the training the agents were put through. She wasn't concerned about herself. From what Takuma had told her—regardless of how limited his information was—she was confident that she could take out the leader.

However, if their goal were to exterminate the ROOT team, her confidence ended there. Even if she killed the leader, Team-9 would still be outnumbered and for all she knew, the other ROOT agents could far surpass her subordinates in strength.

They were going in with the little information Takuma had brought back from his fight with the leader and his agents. Thankfully, they were only there to take an agent or two away—which was still very dangerous, but she thought her team had a better chance to succeed without casualties.

Though there was no such thing as a guarantee on an active field mission. Things could go south in an instant.

She signalled to Takuma and pointed at the doors. The team quickly fell back, creating a safe distance. Takuma launched a second form augmented punch; the burst of chakra hit the panes, broke the latch on the other side, and forced the doors open. He immediately jumped back, prepared for potential booby-trapped explosives, but the doors remained still and the entryway looked clear.

They swiftly entered the building with full heads of caution and slowly spread out in the expansive three-storey foyer, where the open corridors on the upper floors could be seen from the lower levels.

A doorway in the front led deeper into the house, and a staircase led up in the corner. Anko motioned the team to stay on the ground floor before moving up. Just as they were about to proceed deeper, a kunai with an explosive tag fluttering on its tail descended from the first floor.

Kameko was the first one to notice and yelled,

"Explosion—clear!"

Everyone jumped towards the walls to clear out of the way. The explosive tag burst near the floor, scorching the gleaming marble and ruining the lush carpet, but the warning saved anyone from getting injured.

Anko jumped to the first-floor corridor railings and saw a man making a break towards a corner. She threw a volley of shuriken, but they were deflected, and the ROOT agent disappeared behind the corner.

She didn't rush after them and called the team up. Around the corner was a small corridor with an open room at the end. Halfway through, a ROOT agent emerged before the open door and released a powerful gust of wind from his mouth,

Wind Release: Breakthrough jutsu.

The gust of wind slammed full force into Anko. She flew through the air and crashed out of a window. As she fell to the manor grounds, Anko saw a duo of ROOT agents standing on the walls of the manor above the window she shattered. They hurled volleys of shuriken and kunai at her while she was in mid-air, unable to change directions, and did her best to deflect the rain of metal coming for her.

Two kunai got her in the leg—one only grazed her, but the other one made a significant gash below her knee—a third sliced through her side.

She landed on the injured leg, sending a jolt of pain as she stumbled. The two ROOT agents jumped towards the ground and then rushed towards her as she landed on the ground off-balance—but the moment they moved forward, Daiki jumped out from the shattered window and launched an explosive tag tied to a kunai towards them. The ROOT duo were late to hear the flutter of the tag and tried to jump away, but the tag exploded when the kunai struck the ground and caught the duo at the edge of the blast radius, throwing them to the side.

Anko used the time to find her balance and weaved hand seals for the Fire Release: Dragon Fire Jutsu. She spewed an invisible stream of chakra that struck one agent and jumped to the other, and with a final tiger seal, flames sparked at her lips, igniting the streams.

The flames coalesced into a roaring dragon in front of her and the flames washed over her, surging ahead. One of the agents swept a chakra-coated hand through the stream, saving himself from a fiery death but the other wasn't so lucky. Daiki spat an oil globule at the escaping ROOT agent. It hit his gloved hand and ignited into fumes with the freshly chakra-infused oil.

The fire burned up his hand severely through the glove and his ally had managed to douse the flames in a nearby fountain but now was heavily damaged in the places that weren't heavily covered by gear.

Anko put some weight on her injured foot and hid a wince. The injury by no means put her out of the fight, but it was sure to slow her down, which could make all the difference in a fight. Fortunately, the two adversaries were injured as well, which levelled the playfield to some degree.

She glanced up at the shattered window; the team was now split, and she wasn't close enough to provide immediate help. It worried her, but she quickly returned her attention to the enemies before her. There were two of them, which was perfect in the sense that she could put them down quickly and have Daiki carry them off the property.

Then, she could support the rest of the team and get them away from the ROOT agents.

The combat came to a pause as the four shinobi looked at each other, ready to react in case anyone made a move. Anko looked between the two agents and suddenly rushed towards the more injured one—but the moment she moved, both agents moved towards Daiki.

'Shit!'

Her plans immediately changed. She shot towards the less-burned one and weaved a modified version of the Summoning Jutsu. It simplified the hand seals in exchange for limiting the scope of the summoning.

Hidden Shadow Snake Jutsu.

Half a dozen dark, long snakes, as thick as her arm, emerged from the oversized sleeves of her overcoat and flew towards her target; they bit into him and constricted his legs and body, tripping and temporarily stopping his pursuit of Daiki.

Despite her injury, she was still faster and stronger than the ROOT agent, and crashed into him. They wrestled on the ground, and Anko managed to mount him. She swung the kunai at his heart but an earthen spear struck her hand, knocking the kunai out of her hand Seizing the advantage, he struck her wounded side and kicked her away. A third ROOT agent stood on the manor house's roof with two earthen spears hovering over his shoulders. He sent down another spear with a swipe of his hand; Anko avoided it by rolling to the side.

"Rooftop!" Anko didn't forget to warn Daiki.

The second spear flew toward Daiki, who was moving already in the middle of an attack. He had to haphazardly twist his body at an awkward angle after Anko's callout. The front half of the earthen spear missed him, but the back half grazed his upper shoulder.

Anko jumped and placed herself in between Daiki and the three ROOT agents.

"We should—" Diaki tried to say something, but Anko silenced him.

"I know… just let me think," said Anko, taking in the enemies before her.

There were three ROOT agents to deal with—and only one was injured enough for it to make a real difference. It was clear that they were used to fighting together; the third hidden agent aiming for an opening was clearly a planned action. They were around the level of combat-forward chunin—if any of them got their hands on Daiki, he would be dead, which meant she had to protect him while she fought them.

Moreover, neither was the leader, Kon, which meant that the strongest of them was in the building.

The third agent dropped from the roof, and joined the most injured one. Together, they backed away until they were closer to the building, putting the most injured one on the back.

"Daiki, stay behind me and support me. Don't try to deal with them directly," she said.

The one with the burned hand was their vanguard, supported by the new arrival, who followed after him with his sword drawn. The agent in the back, seemingly not in pain at all, fitted several shuriken between scorched fingers and stood at the ready.

A large commotion induced by an explosion from inside the building reached them, stopping the exchange before it could begin. The ROOT agents shifted into a more defensive position and fell back to see what was happening inside the building.

Anko rushed toward the most injured one, ignoring the throbbing in her left. They didn't turn their eyes towards the building, but the sudden break in their plans was opportunity enough. The ROOT agents tried to put some distance between them, but she was faster. She pushed hard, even on the injured leg, and instantly closed in. She cracked him in the calf with a powerful kick and, in one fluid motion, pulled out three shurikens and threw them at the other two agents to keep them away. Returning to the heavily burned agent, Anko nailed him with two consecutive kicks to the head before pulling him close and spinning around. Using him as cover, she peered at the furthermost agent in the distance who was trying to strike her with an explosive tagged kunai.

The hesitation in his stance was enough for her to throw her human shield at the closer agent. He had a sword in his hands so he couldn't sidestep or catch his ally. The best he could do was make sure he didn't impale him in the collision but they still made full contact and fell.

Anko, now open, kept an eye on the only agent standing, who threw his explosive tag kunai toward her. She was about to jump away to dodge, which would put more distance between the two agents she had just disrupted—but another kunai flew from behind her and prevented it from reaching her.

She smiled as she sprinted toward the two agents, weaving the hand seals for a Fire-Release jutsu. Her left hand ignited with screaming fire. As the two agents rolled to their feet from the fall, she grabbed the scorched one and slammed her left hand into his throat, squeezing as the fire grew white-hot and ate through his neck, shoulders, and head.

His agonised screams died the instant the flames melted his voice box. Leaving his burning corpse to fall behind her, she sprinted towards the second agent, who still managed to maintain his grip over his sword.

"Now, this," Anko looked at the two remaining agents, "this is much more manageable."






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[Fiction]

The combined force of Camp Banana and the Hidden Steam were knocking on Yu's front door. They could hear the emergency warning bells ringing from over the wall in response to their arrival. Several dozen shinobi were already on the far sides of the wall, ready to defend the city, and were converging toward their location.

The crowd of shinobi dressed in Hidden Steam colours respectfully parted as Toridasu walked to the front.

His skin was covered with sweat and his breaths condensed before his face.. For the past thirty minutes, he had been actively rotating the chakra inside his body, warming up his chakra pathway network. As the most senior of the jonin, it was his responsibility to issue the warning to the forces inside the city, even if he didn't believe the warning would do anything.It was standard procedure during war, a common courtesy extended to the enemy, and served as legitimate justification that they didn't need.

"To whoever is in charge, heed this warning and surrender the city of Yu," Toridasu spoke, his voice amplified by chakra. His words travelled far and wide, maintaining their volume without hurting the ear. "This is the first and last warning from our side. We're generously giving you one chance to vacate the city peacefully and keep your lives intact. You have two minutes to respond by opening the city gates for us to enter. Refusal to meet our demands will result in an aggressive response most unfavourable for you."

The countdown began, and the shinobi rushed through their last-minute preparations for the impending battle. Many prayed to the gods and their own weapons for safety and victory; others psyched themselves up by hitting and hugging their comrades to drain away the nervousness; some performed their personal pre-battle routines; and a few crumbled under pressure.

Toridasu turned back to look at Shirakumo standing before the forces he commanded.

He gave him a nod that he returned.

As the clock wound down to the last ten seconds, Toridasu began walking toward the city, putting some distance between himself and the forces. The chakra inside him began to speed up as he commanded it to move faster and more vigorously.

The allotted two minutes ended, and the city gates remained shuttered.

The warning had been ignored, meaning they could officially attack the city.

Toridasu breathed in from his nose, and when he exhaled from his mouth, a cloud of fire escaped along with his breath.

A-rank ninjutsu were considered the pinnacle in the world of ninjutsu; S-rank was 'special' and existed outside the standard structure—but the few that existed were akin to calamities. Most A-rank jutsu were weapons of mass destruction that couldn't be used without deep consideration for one's allies. It was a blessing for the world that only a minority of the shinobi population could learn and use them.

Not all who were able to use A-rank ninjutsu were allowed to learn them, which kept the threat of mass destruction under control. Most people, even the most knowledgeable shinobi, wondered why jonin, who possessed A-rank jutsu, didn't use them immediately at the start to end the battle by decimating their opponents. There were factors like collateral damage, friendly fire, and chakra resource management—but the biggest reason was that:

They simply weren't able to use the jutsu immediately.

A-rank jutsu required a tremendous amount of chakra, and that absurd amount had to flow through shinobi's bodies. Human bodies weren't meant to handle that amount of chakra coursing through their chakra pathway network, which put a harsh strain on the network. Careless attempts to force the use of those jutsu could permanently damage the chakra pathway network in the worst-case scenario.

Shinobi trained their bodies to the limit to endure the stress and strain that the jutsu and chakra exerted—most people couldn't temper their bodies to that level and thus failed to use A-rank jutsu. Even if someone had the physical apparatus to use A-rank jutsu, they couldn't use it thoughtlessly—the body needed to be prepared appropriately before using the jutsu.

Chakra Burn was a condition observed when a shinobi handled a large amount of chakra very quickly. It was common during the use of A-rank jutsu and even happened with B-rank jutsu. Any type of jutsu required chakra to flow through the chakra pathway network; ordinarily, this happened without any problems, but the load on the chakra network brought by higher grade jutsu like A-rank jutsu damaged the network, leading to a damage akin to burning.

Those burns would physically hurt when chakra would flow through the area—which was constantly, as the body produced a small amount of passively mixed chakra as part of the normal physical bodily function. For that reason, the chakra pathway network needed to be "warmed up" before A-rank jutsu could be used.

Shinobi had no choice but to slowly ramp up their chakra usage to prepare their bodies to handle the strain from using an A-rank jutsu. The best and quickest way to warm up the chakra pathway network was to use lower-ranked ninjutsu.

Toridasu was in his mid-fifties. He was old. His chakra reserves had naturally declined from the peak of his youth. It was a waste of chakra to use jutsu to warm up, so he had been slowly rotating chakra around his body and alternating the speed of its flow for the past half an hour to warm up his chakra pathway network.

If he simply moulded the chakra, it would naturally dissipate throughout his body, so methods like Toridasu's only worked outside of combat—though he wouldn't hold off on using jutsu in combat, anyway.

He weaved a complex set of hand seals, and chakra flooded his body, racing through his network. He immediately felt his body strain under the jutsu, but he was used to it, so he proceeded smoothly to apply the nature transformation to his chakra, turning it into the fire nature. He finished the last hand seal and separated his hands for an orb to grow between his palms. With wisps of fire, chakra flowed from his fingertips into the orb.

The jutsu wasn't over; Toridasu focused on shape transformation and pushed more and more chakra into the orb's centre, turning it into a hot white. He looked up at city gates and roughly estimated how much it would take to destroy them, added some more in case there was a counter, and then added some more for the awe-and-fear factor.

His fingers twitched, and the orb bloomed into a small firebird, and with a firm push, it glided away. It scorched the air behind it, leaving dark plumes to trail behind it. As Toridasu expected, a B-rank lightning ninjutsu had been cast from the walls to counter his jutsu, but it was shrugged away, and the firebird slammed into the city gates.

There was no explosion.

A raging fire spread from the point of contact at an astounding speed. In less than five seconds, the heavy city gates were enveloped in flames that quickly spread to the walls. The fire continued to spread, swallowing several dozen metres of the wall, burning so hot that the city gates turned into weak charcoal and collapsed under its own instability.

Toridasu watched in silent satisfaction as even the special walls fortified by ninjutsu couldn't withstand his jutsu's sheer heat, crumbling while the fire ate away the material from the inside. The shinobi on the wall dove off it to escape but not all of them were lucky enough to do so in time.

He breathed a long sigh before turning to face the forces—though he had to hold back a smile at the glaring Hidden Steam jonin.

The damage to the wall was done, and there was nothing anyone could do. It did, however, bring the benefit of reinvigorating his men, who were staring at the scene of carnage in front of them. The fire was so bright that their faces were dyed orange with its light as the sun broke over the horizon.

He gathered chakra into his throat and spoke,

"Don't be scared of the fire. I will protect you," his words gathered their attention, "so charge... CHARGE AND BE VICTORIOUS!"

It was short, but it did the work as the combined forces did exactly as asked, bloodlust saturating the air.

The battle had begun.

———
.

Ebi stared at the flames climbing toward the sky. He wasn't stationed near the wall but was some distance away inside the city. He couldn't see the particulars at the wall from where he was, but he knew that they had just lost at least six to eight people to the A-rank jutsu—and that was the bare minimum.

He wanted to blame the jonin stationed near the wall for their failure to counter the ninjutsu, but he also didn't expect the other side to open with an A-rank ninjutsu. The standard for the situation was using a B-rank jutsu to clear out a section of wall guards, aggressively flood that now undefended area with troops, and use that as an entry point—but using A-rank jutsu was needlessly aggressive, and told him that the jonin who used the jutsu was not a Hidden Steam shinobi as the damage to the city walls was too big of an expense.

Which meant it was a Hidden Leaf jonin.

The fire at the collapsed gate was suddenly snuffed as though someone had cut all access to oxygen, and waves of shinobi dressed in the Hidden Steam colours charged into the city. The fire still burned the walls and even continued to spread slowly, which acted as a barrier, slowing down the shinobi on the unaffected walls from getting down to pincer the enemy shinobi from behind.

"Announce that I'm going forward," Ebi said to the radio comms genin near him.

Without waiting for a response, he leapt from the rooftop and took to the air. He scanned the battlefield for the few seconds he remained suspended in the air, his leaping force acting against gravity, and immediately spotted a few people moving faster than others.

Only jonin had that luxury.

Ebi fixed his gaze on the jonin spearheading the effort and weaved hand seals as he let himself fall from the sky. He spewed water from his mouth and formed a thick ring around his body. Ebi swiped his hand, and the water shot forward in a line at ultra-high pressure. The pressurised line of water cut clean through the side of a building as though it was made from styrofoam, ripped a crevice in the road, and then cut halfway through the building on the other side of the street.

The enemy jonin only saw the water ninjutsu when it sliced off a corner of the first building. He froze on the spot, which required so much force that he cracked the pavement under his stopping foot and slammed to a halt mere inches from the jutsu's trajectory.

Ebi landed in front of the jonin and mentally searched through any matching intelligence reports over the past year before he landed on a name and a face matching the one before him. Dull grey hair tied into a ponytail, a small scar on the right side of his lips, just on the edge, and deep tear troughs under his eyes.

And the most obvious tell of all was the sword strapped across his back—according to his bingo book, it was the cornerstone of his fighting style. Though Ebi took that particular piece of information with more than a few grains of salt. Bingo book entries were by and large exaggerated—or worse, outdated—which helped obfuscate the realistic capabilities of a shinobi.

Still, there was only one man the jonin before him could be. Ebi pulled his lips into a thin, hard line and readied himself by greeting his opponent. "Shirakumo Hayama of the Leaf."

"You're Ebi Wato," said Shirakumo as he pulled an especially thin katana out of the sheath. "I hear you're the one in charge here. Without you, your forces will crumble... so, I'll give you a chance to leave the city and spare us a fight—deny it, and you'll die here today in a foreign country. How about it?"

"And leave my men to die?" Ebi scoffed.

"Respectable." Shirakumo nodded and then, in the blink of an eye, his stance changed, and he swung his katana, releasing a wind blade that spanned the entire street width.

Ebi jumped in the air to evade the wind nature kenjutsu, twisting his body parallel to the ground. The wind cutter howled below him, but Ebi's pupils shrank when he felt himself being sucked towards the wind blade. He was barely a few inches above the wind blade, and the vacuum suction effect of the wind blade brought that distance down to a mere couple of centimetres.

While shocked, Ebi was still a competent shinobi. He kept his eye on Shirakumo and saw him use the Body Flicker Jutsu, momentarily losing sight of him. When he reappeared, he cleared half the distance between them and ripped another wind blade toward him.

Ebi's feet touched the ground just as Shirakumo swung his katana, and he immediately jumped yet again, pushing chakra into his feet to gain more height while weaving hand seals. Shirakumo launched a second consecutive wind blade, but this time, Ebi was ready and countered with a pressurised water cord that neutralised the wind blade.

Ebi immediately put some distance between them so that he would have more time to react to the wind blades.

Again, Shirakumo launched another wind blade, keeping Ebi on the move due to their speed. The width of the wind blades made it even worse and restricted his ability to evade vertically. He jumped again, gaining more than enough height to clear the wind blade and, like before, began weaving hand seals for his next move.

Shirakumo swung his katana again, and out of the blade emerged a second wind blade—one much faster than ever before. The second wind blade hit the first one and changed its trajectory.

It arced at a sharp angle, surging towards Ebi at blistering speeds. He couldn't change direction in mid-air and was barely able to react by covering his body with a dense layer of chakra for a last-second, chakra-extensive, and highly inefficient defence. The wind cutter instantly ripped through the chakra layer, but it absorbed a significant amount of its lethality. However, the front of his armour was already destroyed by the very first cutter, allowing the remains of the blade to cut into his forearm and chest.

When Ebi landed on his feet, he knew he had been set up but could do little except take in the sight of blood flooding down his torso. Shirakumo had deliberately slowed down the speed of his wind blades to mislead Ebi of their maximum speed—because there was reason for him to think otherwise—and then caught him off-guard by unleashing a faster wind blade.

That aside, the wind blade didn't just possess simple slicing power. He felt it flare out at the point of contact, and what he thought would be a cut on his chest that he could fight through suddenly led to his pectoral muscles aching at the slightest flex.

Ebi could endure the pain, but it would hinder his movements.

"I gave you a chance," said Shirakumo.

He looked up at his opponent; while he might have been wearing Hidden Steam colours, the jonin before him was a Hidden Leaf shinobi.

"Now you live with that knowledge until I end your life..."





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[Fiction]

As the Wind Release: Breakthrough jutsu hit Anko, Takuma's instincts kicked in, and he moved in front of her path. Standing beside him, Daiki became an unexpected obstacle, blocking him from reaching her. Despite the hindrance, Takuma's hand shot up in an attempt to grab her, but it was too late. Anko crashed through the window, leaving a trail of shattered glass in her wake.

He saw two kunai thrown by unseen enemies hurtling towards Anko.

"Daiki, go," he shouted, pushing his larger teammate toward the shattered window.

They had barely engaged the enemy in combat and had already been forced to split up. As Daiki leapt out of the window, Takuma swiftly switched the formation, taking the forward-most position. He stepped toward the room at the end of the small corridor before stopping, which puzzled Kameko and Rikku.

He weaved hand seals for the Clone Jutsu and sent an illusory clone into the room. Even though it was easy to spot, an itchy trigger finger was difficult to contain—especially when the enemy was planning an ambush.

The clone stepped into the room and was instantly beheaded by a sword in full view of Takuma and dissipated with an almost silent hiss into thin air. The moment that happened, Takuma charged towards the wall beside the door with his shoulder, augmenting it with chakra. He ran through the wall like it was made of cardboard and body-slammed the agent responsible for beheading the clone. While the wall absorbed significant force, the agent was still hurled to the other side of the large parlour room.

Takuma took in his surroundings and saw Kon and a second agent jump back in response to him bulldozing in. His and Kon's eyes met, and immediately, he was hit by a burning headache like never before. It was worse than the time he tried to force something when he was younger by staring at his scars in the mirror—but he bit his tongue to bear the pain and glared at the man.

He wanted to take advantage of the element of surprise, but the pain prevented him from reacting appropriately.

Kameko and Rikku entered the room and the tension spiked. Too many people were in a relatively minimal space. Chaos would break out the moment anyone moved—and the person to bring it was Rikkue.

He kicked furniture toward Kon and the second agent. Kon jumped up to the wall and stuck to it with his feet while the second agent cut down a cushioned chair, and that was when Kameko went after him with her sword buzzing with chakra.

The second agent was fast and parried her first swing, but she had the momentum and smoothly transitioned into the next strike that the second agent dodged by pulling back, but the sword held out in the front was pushed by an invisible force a moment before the front of his chest gear was shredded and his forearm started bleeding from a cut.

Kameko's Taketori kenjutsu allowed her to increase the reach of her sword with a near-invisible length of wind chakra. It was a dangerous technique as almost everyone got caught by it, and they only tried to avoid the visible sword blade. And many times, one strike was all it took to end the fights and lives.

The opponent had to figure out what had just happened, which was difficult mid-fight. She went for a stab at his throat, but the agent managed to dodge with enough distance to get clear of her invisible extension but then Kameko swung her sword again that he parried and then pulled back once more when she tried to swing for his shoulder.

Just when he thought he was safe, the invisible length cut a long and shallow wound from his left shoulder to his lower right chest. Kon threw a kunai at Kameko from the roof. Takuma countered it by deflecting it with a kunai of his own before following up with another kunai back at Kon, who went for a parry only to have the right side of his body blown back from the sheer force put behind the kunai with his augmentation.

The first agent tried to get up to join the fight. Takuma weaved hand seals as he turned toward him, and his chest expanded as he breathed in.

Water Release: Wind Water Wave

A powerful wave of water slammed into the agent, slamming him into the wall. As Takuma gained skill and experience, the jutsu had become stronger and more vigorous. The pressure behind the wave had increased considerably, and the first agent felt like he had run into the walls as his bones creaked for the second time.

He immediately went into a second set of hand seals for the Water Release: Eight Tentacles jutsu to reuse the water he had just created.

The ceiling cracked under Kon's feet as he shot down toward Takuma, his sword baring like a wolf's fangs.

Takuma felt his headache flare once more as he focused on Kon. He almost lost control of his chakra from the pain—which was so different from the physical pain from injuries that he had gotten used to—but he also was slow to decide whether to stop his hand seals to free his hands for Kon or take his chance on completing the jutsu and just dodge.

Rikku rushed forth and leapt into the sky with her feet toward Kon, who took the hit and let himself get knocked off his trajectory. She went for another hit when he landed, but Kon dealt her a quick kick to her knee this time and then took a step toward Takuma while swinging his sword. By now, Takuma had decided to complete his jutsu and jumped back to avoid the blade, aiming for his life.

Kon missed, but then he swiped his blade upwards and managed to nick Takuma on the side of his bottom lip. As Takuma completed the hand seals, he felt the faint taste of blood on his tongue and snarled from the pain in his head that was now actively hindering him. He charged at Kon, who tried to take out Rikku, the one closer to him. She barely parried one of his strikes but was put in a bad position with Kon swinging his sword down at her.

Takuma moved in hastily, parried the falling sword, and felt his arms strain against the weight. Now, both Rikku and Takuma were in a disadvantageous position. The blade edge of Kon's sword turned a burning red as the metal sizzled and hissed. As he swung down, the water finally arrived at Takuma's back. The water tentacles spurt out, grabbed Kon's legs, and pulled as hard as possible. The sword struck Takuma's kunai and immediately cut halfway through it. Kon's legs were pulled from under him, and he backed away, pulling the kunai latched to the sword along with him.

The tentacle grabbing the legs was cut through, but Takuma wasn't concerned as another tentacle dropped a kunai into his hand, which he threw toward the agent Kameko was fighting. Like Kon, the agent parried the kunai, but there was so much force behind the kunai that he miscalculated, and when the kunai was deflected down, it struck him square in the thigh.

Kameko took advantage of the mishap and switched from being mostly passive to hyper-offensive, her kenjutsu's speciality.

"Rikku, the other one," Takuma yelled.

She pulled back and switched to the ROOT agent hit by the Wild Water Wave.

So much had happened in such a short time that his head would've hurt regardless of Kon being there. Everything was happening so fast, and Takuma was acutely aware that his teammates were not as strong as the ROOT agents; he had already stepped in to support both of them—which was difficult when Kon demanded his attention just to keep him at bay.

His headache just made everything much worse.

"You're not going to escape this time," said Kon.

Takuma would've said something, but he wasn't in the mood and didn't have the mind space to exchange quips with him. The more his head hurt, the angrier he got—the angrier he got, the more he seethed—the more he seethed, the colder his head felt. At the moment, he desired nothing more than to kill the man before him, but he knew he had to get him alive to get information.

The bloody tang on his tongue only made want to spill Kon's blood even more.

His brain felt like it was lagging behind his eyes as he kept an eye on Rikku and Kameko at the opposite ends of the parlour room. At least the limited space allowed him to be a moment away to provide support. He wanted to focus on Kon, but the reality of the situation was that he was part of a team that was currently fighting multiple opponents.

Half of his tentacles pulled out a kunai each from his weapons pouch, while the other half remained free— and were about to make a move when Kon smiled in a way that rang all the wrong bells in his already pounding head. Kon glanced at Rikku and slid in her direction, which immediately made Takuma sprint toward her to get ahead of him so he could protect her—but the moment Takuma took a long stride in her direction, Kon switched his target and moved toward Kameko.

Takuma's combat boots screeched against the marble floor.

"Kameko!" he yelled as he ran toward her.

The feint made him a step behind and a moment late. The tentacles whipped their kunai at Kon, but he deftly deflected all of them, which gave Takuma almost enough time to catch up. The eight tentacles merged into four so that he could have more length and got them ready to give him a little more reach so that he could protect Kameko.

But then Kon yelled,

"Ni help San!"

The ROOT agent, who was on the back foot, suddenly disengaged from Kameko, jumped to the roof and headed in Rikku's direction. He followed the order so fast, almost like a robot completing an instruction.

Takuma's brain, which was running to the point of wheezing on the track, abruptly stopped; for a very long, short moment, he had no idea what to do and how to react. Rikku was fighting a beaten-up agent, which was the most he thought she could handle, but now there was another one heading toward her.

Kameko couldn't follow him because Kon was sprinting toward her, and he would cut her down if she tried to follow. He couldn't turn away to help Rikku, but if he engaged Kon, he would be locked in and unable to leave— and by then, Kameko would be too late to leave.

'What should I do? What should I do? What should I do?' he thought.

The four tentacles merged into two thicker ones and shot up toward the agent on the ceiling. The water flowed and wrapped around his body before Takuma tugged hard, and the agent was snatched and slammed to the ground. But that wasn't enough; the agent could cut himself out of the tentacles, and Rikku would once again be in danger.

As Takuma slid between Kon and Kameko, he weaved hand seals for a jutsu he hadn't used in over a year. With his head on fire, he almost forgot the hand seals, but his muscle memory carried him through.

Lightning Release: Shock

Kon tried to cut him down, but Takuma managed to half dodge while taking a shallow slice on his upper arm from the burning hot sword, which hurt so much that it overpowered his headache for a moment, something Takuma was momentarily thankful for.

Arcs of lightning snaked down his, forming an orb of lightning. On paper, a D-rank jutsu of nature he wasn't proficient in and hadn't used in a long time wasn't a good choice made under pressure—but he knew that water and lightning were complementary—and he had read the jutsu scrolls, the books on chakra theory, to the best of his ability, and even though he hadn't tried it before, he was confident that it would work, so much so he put his and his teammate's lives on the line.

He shot the orb of lightning into his tentacles, and then the magic happened.

Takuma didn't have the liberty to look at the agent with Kon right in front of him, but the screams told him that his gambit had worked.





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[Fiction]

Kon looked at "Ni", who was writhing on the floor from the lightning ninjutsu channelled through the water tentacles. Water and Lightning-release being complementary elements meant both jutsu had been enhanced.

He immediately pumped fire nature chakra into his sword and swung at Takuma, thinking that Takuma's lightning ninjutsu would damage him as well—but he stood unfazed by it as he evaded the blade and countered by jabbing a lightning-charged tentacle at Kon, who didn't want any part of and backed away.

Kon clicked his tongue. The water ninjutsu insulated Takuma from the lightning but it was already depleting so he waited for it to completely disappear before making his move. He glanced at Ni, who was no longer moving and was knocked unconscious by the lightning.

The loss of one team member had shifted the fight's dynamic, tilting the balance towards the middle. Despite this setback, Kon maintained his confidence, knowing his team still held the upper hand. However, the question of whether his men could match Mitarashi Anko's prowess lingered in his mind.

"Take him and get out, both of you," Takuma said to the sword-wielding kunoichi beside him.

She looked hesitant, but rushed Ni and threw him over her shoulder. Kon moved to stop her, but Takuma very aggressively closed in and swung his fist. He felt the phantom pain in his shoulder at the sight of his glowing fist and quickly backed away.

It was the right move as a rush of wind brushed past his ears. Takuma's chakra augmentation was dangerous; he had felt it first-hand and didn't want a second experience.

"Go!" Takuma yelled when he saw his teammates hesitate.

The second kunoichi moved toward the door, and "San" followed after her, but Takuma positioned himself at the door, intending to hold them back while they escaped.

In taking one of his men alive, Kon recognised that their aim was not extermination but capture for information extraction. Measures like anti-interrogation seals were a standard operating procedure for ROOT agents on missions—all of his men, including himself, had them active on their bodies—and ROOT agents were trained to self-eliminate to stop a potential information leak.

However, seals could be broken, and the self-preservation instinct was difficult to beat out of people. As the mission leader, he couldn't allow one of his men to be captured. The correct thing to do was for one of them to take on Takuma while the other chased after the kunoichi. But as Kon gazed at Takuma, his shoulder began to burn and ache, causing a cocktail of feelings to rise in his throat.

"We're taking him out," Kon said to San, venom in his tone.

Takuma's tentacles flared out at his words as though attempting to cover more of the door and the broken wall beside it.

There was a moment of pause as the two sides measured each other before all three shinobi exploded into action. Takuma acted aggressively and moved toward Kon with one of his tentacles swiping a kunai at the latter's neck. Kon jumped back toward the wall and started weaving hand seals. San shifted between them and attacked Takuma with a dagger that Takuma parried using a tentacle holding a kunai and then countered with an augmented palm strike to the chest.

San gurgled out blood and stumbled back. Takuma closed the distance between them and threw a follow-up augmented liver shot that San barely avoided by shifting his body back at the last second.

"Clear!"

In the back, Kon breathed fire between his hands as he pulled his arms apart, creating a burning fire spear that cast a nasty light on his face.

San half-stumbled and half-jumped to the side, clearing the way between Kon and Takuma.

Kon flicked his wrist, and the fire spear raced toward Takuma, who couldn't dodge because they were so close. His tentacles bunched before him just as the fire spear hit him, and he was sent barreling through the wall. The fire spear exploded into a mass of fire, lighting up that section of the room. He didn't let himself slow or stop as he flowed into another set of hand seals while staring at the wall of fire with eyes taut with attention. He knew it wasn't over; that would be too easy, and if it was that easy, he would've killed him the first time they met.

His intuition was spot on as Takuma surged out of the intense fire.

He was soaking wet, and the tentacles behind his back were missing. He instantly slid down into a sliding tackle and kicked a broken piece of furniture in Kon's direction. Kon turned his back to the flying furniture and took the hit to continue weaving the hand seals. Another fire spear bloomed in his hand and was immediately launched at Takuma.

The distance between them was shorter than before; there was no time to dodge or any tentacles to protect him. Kon was sure—this was going to hit, and it was going to hurt.

Their eyes met for two-tenths of a second, and at that moment, Kon saw his fire spear reflect in Takuma's eyes. He expected to see fear and trepidation, but the eyes he met were steady—not even a hint of unease. What he saw was a picture of focus—and the focus was him, which made Kon's heart jolt.

Takuma's half-cocked fist punched out, and the fire spear that was only a foot away from the fist quavered as an unseen force struck and travelled through it.

'Impossible!' thought Kon.

The unstable fire spear lost shape as it broke down, losing its penetrative power, and yet it still exploded in Takuma's face. With only a portion of its intended power, the weakened fire jutsu singed his face and hair. Kon felt his heart ease up at the jutsu still doing damage, but then Takuma's face became visible, and he saw the same focused look persist as though the ninjutsu hadn't affected him at all.

There was an intensity in his eyes that sent a shot of fear up Kon's spine. Even as he got his face blasted by fire, even as he stumbled back, there was a single-minded intent focused on Kon, which alarmed him to his core. It was feral ferocity reined in and harnessed via cold reasoning—and that was a dangerous combination.

Kon had no intention of letting Takuma leave alive, but the last exchange only intensified his desire. The kid before him was dangerous, and all of his instincts screamed that if he was given time to grow, he would become even more dangerous.

He had seen what geniuses were like; Takuma wasn't like them; he was different—and that made him even more dangerous. He couldn't put a finger on it, but the answer came just as quickly and hit him.

The kid before had already seen the darkness, dragged into it, and managed to climb out. This was someone who was willing to do anything and everything to achieve what he wanted. Kon remembered the bombing that had taken out the jonin—and even though he had no proof—he knew that Takuma was behind it.

He had wiped out dozens of civilians to eliminate a jonin and not many people would be willing to do that.

Given that the ROOT had targeted him twice, they had become bitter enemies. There was a chance just now when Takuma could've run away, but he made the choice to come after him, which was enough to show that the grudge ran deep enough for him to risk his life.

Kon had to end him before he became a threat far too big.

Takuma lunged at him, which made him pull back to enough to cleanly dodge an augmented strike—but Takuma faltered with a look of great pain on his face.

'He's injured?' thought Kon—had the fire spear managed to do substantial damage?

Regardless of what it was, Kon took advantage of the opportunity. He took a quick forward step and stabbed his heart. Takuma raised his hand at the last moment, and the sword stabbed through his palm as he pushed the sword to the side, leaving a deep laceration just under his armpit.

———
.

With the unconscious ROOT agent on Kameko's back, her and Rikku sprinted across the manor house as fast as possible. The team wanted to capture more ROOT agents to facilitate cross-checking and verify the authenticity of the information during interrogation, but the mission's minimum requirement was completed by capturing just one.

The team now had to judge the situation and see if they wanted to take their chances by going for a second capture and the final decision was Anko's to make. The two kunoichi jumped out of a window near the side of the manor house so they were visible to Anko and Daiki while still having enough distance between them to allow a quick enough escape in case other ROOT agents tried to stop them.

As they jumped, they noticed Anko was fighting two ROOT agents simultaneously while Daiki provided support from a distance. Anko spotted them immediately. She disengaged and backed away for a moment and then yelled something they couldn't hear. Daiki, who was positioned at a distance, looked towards them and seemed to hesitate but sprinted towards them after being yelled at by Anko again.

Kameko instantly realised what was going on—Anko was going to cover for the three of them to escape.

When one of the ROOT agents tried to go after Daiki, she charged with reckless aggression and put herself between the two agents so they would focus on her rather than Daiki.

"Let's go," Kameko said as she started to run away from the manor house.

Rikku followed, but only a couple of seconds later, she stopped.

"What are you doing?!" Kameko exclaimed while constantly looking toward Anko, fighting the two ROOT agents, scared that they would lose their opportunity to escape with the unconscious agent.

"I'm going back," said Rikku, already back-peddling towards the manor house.

Kameko was flabbergasted for a split second before realising what Rikku was going to do.

"Rikku, no—"

"Takuma will need help. I can't leave him alone when I can support him. You and Daiki go—GO!"

Rikku turned away and sprinted without waiting for a response. Kameko shouted at her to stop but was ignored as she picked up more speed.

"What happened? Why is she running to the house?" Daiki asked the moment he was in earshot and gazed worriedly at Rikku as the distance between them and her stretched.

"....Let's go," Kameko said bitterly as her face twitched with frustration. She stayed still for a moment as she internally struggled with how to proceed until, ultimately, she turned her back to the manor house and started running with a hard stop to vent her feelings.

"We have our orders."





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[Fiction]

Takuma felt as though his head was literally splitting.

There was so much sweat and plaster on his face from running through the wall, along with the fire ninjutsu which had blown up right in front of him, that it hid the fact that he was tearing up from the pain.

His teeth and jaw hurt from over-clenching to bear the pain coming from his head.

Not once in his life had he fought through the intensity of pain he was feeling now—and he had been brutalised several times during his Ring days. Even when he was almost killed by ROOT assassins, he had Sango's painkillers in his system, which, along with adrenaline, made him practically incapable of feeling pain.

But nothing helped as he fought Kon and a ROOT agent trying to kill him. His reaction time was so slow because more than half of his mind was focused on the pain. However, he was glad that he was able to clear Rikku and Kameko out of the room with a ROOT agent for information. The mission was technically over, and he could run away, but then he wouldn't get to know what was happening to him.

He had to capture Kon to get some answers for the headaches, the scars, anything he could.

Takuma locked in on Kon; the only silver lining was that the pain from the fire jutsu and his physical trauma paled in comparison to the headache. He rose toward Kon as chakra flooded his arm for the highest power of augmentation he could manage without injuring his body.

In truth, Takuma had never tested the limit of how much chakra he could pack into his arm because he'd been in enemy territory for months. It was an extremely dangerous choice to make when his ability to focus and think was compromised.

But he had to bet big to win big.

His sleeve and the skin beneath was still on fire as he cocked his arm back, ready to lash out a full contact strike, when all the pain in his head suddenly vanished like it never existed.

It was the most wonderful feeling he had felt in his two lives. His entire body felt light and springy; he clenched the muscles in his arm taut, he was going to take out Kon with this strike.

The feeling of freedom from pain was short-lived because the pain returned just as quickly as it had vanished, and it returned with a vengeance. Vertigo, nausea, breathlessness—everything hit him all at once. The moulded chakra in his arm slipped out of control and dissipated before he could do anything with it.

Takuma wasn't even aware that he had hopped away from Kon on instinct because his vision was overcome by a blinding light.

His sole thought that he managed to muster through the pain was to wonder whether he had been trapped in a genjutsu.

Click.

An intense feeling of fear invaded his heart when a memory he had never seen before flashed before his eyes. He was lying down on a cold, hard metal table with a blinding white glaring down at him. In his peripheral vision, he saw the shadows of multiple men wearing scrub caps and masks.

Split.

The memory shifted to him sitting in a room with white walls, floors, and ceilings. There were only three pieces of grey furniture in the room—a bed, table, and chair. Posters stuck to the wall had writing on them that Takuma couldn't make out as the memory blurred them out.

The him in the memory looked down and saw pairs of child's arms and legs covered in bandages stained with yellow medicine and red blood—so much blood. The feel of the memory was calm, with a hint of tension present in the background. The door to the white room opened, and the memory began to shift as a figure stepped in.

He couldn't make out who they were.

Pop.

The fear and panic returned to the front in full blast as Takuma felt his back pressed against the wall. His chest and shoulders were rising faster and faster—and standing in front of him was undoubtedly a much younger Kon, who seemed to be yelling something at him. The sound was garbled, but the more he yelled, the more dread Takuma felt—to the point that he could neither breathe nor see properly.

Crack.

Takuma jerked back out of the memory into the present to find Kon's sword blade being thrust towards his heart. He barely had the time to react with his hand. The sword stabbed through his palm and then cut just below his armpit.

"Argh!"

Takuma tried to pull back, but Kon jerked the sword, which hooked onto his palm. Takuma screamed and continued to pull his palm free of the sword as it sliced through his flesh. He turned his head back and caught the ROOT agent snuck behind him from his right side; Takuma couldn't defend himself as his right hand was locked in with the sword

Takuma screamed again and continued to pull his palm free of the sword—and heard the other ROOT agent sneak behind him from his right side. He couldn't defend himself as his right hand was locked in with the sword so he raised his shoulder at the last second and received a kunai to the hilt in his back.

He was going to die, thought Takuma.

He didn't think of death often during battles because there was no use in doing so and it was more beneficial to think about the things to help him survive. Now, he was trapped, surrounded, alone, and not in his best form even before he was stabbed in two parts of his body. He didn't even have time to process the mind-breaking memories he had just seen—the first memories of the boy he had ever seen.

'Fuck it,' Takuma cursed.

He had been trying to tone down trading damage in his combat ever since Anko had started to teach him—but it was clear that way of fighting just didn't fit him. He couldn't be an elegant fighter; he had to get in there and get dirty if he wanted to win tough fights.

He was Scars, and he would always be him.

He took a deep breath and instead of trying to pull his hand free from the sword, Takuma stepped in close to Kon, who didn't expect it. Takuma charged his arm and slammed a palm augmented to the limit into his chest.

He felt Kon's ribs break under his hand and channelled all his negativity—rage, fear, hatred—all into that strike. Kon spurted blood into Takuma's face before he flew back like a cannonball into the wall, letting go of his sword.

Takuma had no time to pull it out as he turned around and spin-kicked the other ROOT agent. His form was terrible thanks to the kunai in his back, and the kick had no real power behind it, but the agent jumped back to avoid getting hit which gave Takuma time and space. He took out the kunai from his back and threw it at the agent with chakra behind it.

The agent parried it but stumbled due to its force. Takuma finally pulled the sword of palm with an ugly scream and ran out of the room through a side entrance. Perhaps taking out the kunai from his back was a bad move. He was leaking blood from two spots at a worrying pace. The state of his breathing resembled someone who was in the last stretch of an ultra-marathon, even though it had been less than fifteen minutes since he had killed the Hidden Frost shinobi outside the manor house.

His condition was worsening by the minute and extending the fight was not in his favour.

He half-stumbled into the hallway and tripped on his own feet as he made a split-second decision to change the location. He threw a shuriken to shatter a nearby window, jumped out, and then climbed up to the floor above and used Kon's sword to shatter a window to enter.

Hiding was impossible because the floor was stained by the blood dripping from his hand. So he stabbed the sword into the ground beside him and stood in front of the shattered window. He looked down at his mangled right hand and somehow began to weave hand seals. Ignoring the pain, the fingers in his right hand resisted his commands, but he managed even if barely.

Water Release: Spirit Water Wave

A football-sized orb of water with some of his blood mixed in formed before his fingers. His arms trembled as he took aim at the shattered window. The wait was less than ten seconds, but it felt like an eternity as his arms grew heavier.

The ROOT agent poked his head above the window pane, and Takuma took a shot that missed when the agent ducked down. The shot itself was a smidge to the right. Takuma looked down at the water orb, which still held the shape that had scantily happened during practice and never on-field.

However, Takuma didn't get to shoot another shot because a kunai with an explosive tag flew in from the window, and he jumped through the window before it could so much as blow up.

The water orb atop his finger drenched his hand, wasting three shots worth of chakra.

The window next to the one Takuma was standing under shattered and Kon rushed towards him.

"Free!" Kon yelled.

That message was for the other ROOT agent, who he had failed to shoot and both he and Kon immediately launched a pincer attack.

Takuma pulled Kon's sword from the floor, swung it at the agent, and then ran across the hallway to keep both of them in front of him. His right hand was useless from the damage, and he truly wished that he had the time to create water tentacles, but he didn't have the water or the time for it.

He was sure that Kon understood that as well and was giving him no time or space to remedy his injury. But he had Kon's sword that he switched to his mangled hand. He had no genuine experience with a sword, and it felt heavier in his hand because of his weakened grip; he would've been able to handle a lighter kunai much better. The sword was necessary because he didn't want his opponents close to him because of his injuries.

The ROOT agent rushed in, and Takuma responded by swinging his sword at him. Kon tried to use that time as an opening and even threw in a curve by bouncing off the ceiling, but Takuma was expecting that and punched a second-form augmentation at him. Kon crossed his hands as the chakra hit him and was thrown several feet back, temporarily knocked away from the fight, leaving the ROOT agent.

Takuma stopped backing away and slashed at the agent with the sword, and it was not only easily parried but also knocked out of his hand. He didn't panic and moved in closer and threw an augmented elbow at the agent. While the hand was useless, the rest of the arm still worked; the agent blocked with his arm the strike knocked the wind out of him.

Takuma followed up with a kick to the knee, flooring him—and then smashed his left fist in his face with a second-form augmentation, breaking his nose.

Now he finally had both space and time to use ninjutsu. Seeing that he was fighting alone, Hidden Mist Jutsu was the obvious and perfect choice. He would flood the floor with mist and then use the opportunity to cast Wild Water Wave to create water for the Eight Tentacle jutsu and then use the cover of the mist to mount himself a comeback.

He raised his hands to weave hand seals for the Hidden Mist Jutsu when he suddenly heard something move behind him.

"Takuma!"

Takuma was already turning when he registered the voice that called his name.

All the pain, the chaotic emotions stemming from the new memories, the cold spreading through his body from blood loss, the fatigue that was beginning to set in—everything came to a stop when he saw Rikku standing before him. She was facing him and gazed up at him with a shocked expression that matched his—neither of them expected what had just happened.

"My body just moved," she said, her voice just above a whimper as blood dribbled down the side of her lips.

Takuma looked down and saw a bloody sword sticking out of her body, a little bit too close to her chest. He recognised the sword because it belonged to the ROOT agent Rikku and Kameko had taken away. He watched as the bloodstain grew out from the place where the sword exited her body. He looked up and jolted when he saw Kon behind her with a hateful smirk..

His smirk grew into a grin at Takuma's growing shock.

"You're not the only one who can use clones."

Takuma wasn't listening.

Kon's clone pulled his sword out of Rikku, and she collapsed forward into Takuma's embrace, who grabbed her out of pure instinct.

"Huh?"





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[Fiction]

She was too light...

They had sparred nearly every day when they were at Camp Banana. They had wrestled in mud and dirt; he had tossed her around plenty of times but now, as she collapsed into him, he felt that she had no weight to her. His hands holding her by the shoulder trembled—perhaps for the first time, he felt that a shinobi could be so fragile, so vulnerable.

Why was Rikku here?

By now, she and Kameko were supposed to clear out of the manor house property and get far enough that there was no chance for the other ROOT agents to catch up with them. He had very deliberately sent them both away so he wouldn't have to support them in combat—as much as he appreciated their help, they were weaker than the competition. They were taking his attention to support them while fighting Kon, which was proving to be complicated.

He looked at Kon's clone holding the bloody blade that had just been pulled out from Rikku. That blade was meant for him; if not for Rikku, the blood on it would've been his. His heart plummeted, his body was frigid, and the goosebumps tightened his skin. She had saved his life by risking hers—one of his teammates was now suffering from a life-ending injury because of him.

She was dying because of him.

The world stopped as an overwhelmingly crushing guilt descended on him. It felt like the weight of the sky was suddenly set on his shoulders—every muscle and bone in his body drained; all of his previous desires and intentions vanished like smoke. One second stretched to an eternity; in that moment, his entire world was focused on the girl in his arms.

Takuma's mind had been on the verge of breaking for a while and was being held together by his aim to see the mission through and his intense personal desire to find more about the boy's past unravelled the moment he felt Rikku go limp in his arms.

He had lost teammates in combat before—and he saddled blame on himself that he had continued to carry in the corner of his heart, but they had died during combat at the hands of the enemy while he was busy fighting his own battles.

This was different.

Rikku had jumped to save him. It was his fault that she was dying. His decision to capture Kon for his personal motives was the reason he was in the hallway in a heavily injured state. The mission was already accomplished, and he could've held back the enemy while retreating—but he chose to stand his ground.

It was his choice, and if he hadn't made it, he would've not gotten as injured as he did, and Rikku, who had returned to support him as a true comrade, wouldn't have had to jump in to save him. She would not have not taken the strike meant for him if he had not made the mistake of letting his emotions overtake him.

She wouldn't be dying if not for him.

It was all his fault.

The second of eternity shattered when the sound of metal scratching metal reached his ears as the ROOT agent behind him retrieved a kunai from his weapon pouch.

Takuma's mind was in chaos. He was still reeling and processing the horror before him, but he was mid-combat and didn't have the luxury of taking his time. When he heard the sound, the magma of anger rose up in his heart, flowing through the blood in his veins.

Takuma embraced the rage; he let himself drown in it.

It was easy because the alternative was to bear the unbearable guilt that sapped him of everything.

At that moment, he chose to blame someone else... because it was easy.

Takuma rushed to the wall and leaned Rikku against it. As he pulled back and slid down the wall, he got the first good look at her wound and then noticed her blood on his clothes. He flinched and turned his body away from her, putting himself between her and the enemy.

He looked at the ROOT agent, Kon, and the clone and saw red. The pain that tortured his head in the presence of Kon was absent—the wrath blinded him—and, from that, provided him with a clarity he had lacked since the start of the fight.

The sword that had been knocked out of his hand laid by his feet. Takuma stomped on the hilt, and it bounced into his mangled hand—his grip was solid this time as his blood stained the grip. The rage surpassed any pain he felt in his hand. He bellowed in anger and slashed the sword at Kon's clone, who laughed as he rebuffed the strike with ease.

Cling!

The ROOT agent moved in and swung his kunai. Takuma turned with his hips and put his momentum behind the sword with an upward swing that clashed against the kunai, sending sparks flying.

Clang!

He kicked the ROOT agent in the stomach, pushing him back a few steps before swinging at the clone. The difference in skill was apparent as the clone skilfully redirected the sword with ease as their blades screeched against each other.

Takuma then spat a spittle mixed with blood into the clone's eyes, who was startled by the move and backed away. Takuma didn't pursue him and turned again with his arm cocked and charged with chakra. His eyes met with Kon and just seeing the hateful man's face made him put more chakra through his arm.

He whipped a second form punch at him and felt the bone in his hand crack from overloading chakra. He spread the chakra out to create a blunt force rather than a penetrating one, which forced Kon to slide several metres back. Takuma flexed his arm; it still moved properly, which meant he had gotten away with a hairline fracture. He raised the sword and swung it down at the ROOT agent, who put his kunai up. Takuma raised the sword again and slammed it down again and then did it again. The sound of metal became louder and harsher with each swing as he put more force, channelling his anger.

clang! Clang! CLANG! The agent's knees buckled, and he was half-kneeling by the end of it.

Takuma turned back once again and threw his sword at Kon's clone just as he closed in, who once again easily parried it, and it spun up towards the ceiling.

With his arms free, Takuma weaved hand seals, working through the pain in his hands.

Auditory Genjutsu: Bell Sound Clone— ver. Twice Modified

He didn't have the freedom to use his golden bell to lay the sound for the genjutsu, so he used the sound of metal banging against metal by slamming the sword against Kon's sword and the agent's kunai. The genjutsu was also made for a singler target, but he made a last-minute change which he would've never made during combat if he was in his right mind.

Cling!

All three of his enemies froze up as the genjutsu set in and hit them with full force. The sound of harsh metal against metal pierced into their ears while a dozen more Takumas appeared in the hallway. Takuma snatched the sword from mid-air as it descended and thrust it into the clone's chest, immediately popping him into smoke. He turned with his sword arm outstretched and beheaded the ROOT agent, wrenching the sword free and appearing in front of the final one.

A moment after Kon's clone was killed, he shuddered as the clone's experience transferred to him, and it broke him out of the genjutsu. His eyes widened when the three Takuma illusions before him evaporated to reveal the real one with the bloody sword in his hand. He backed away the moment he got control of his body.

Takuma roared, chakra instinctually coating his voice.

The sword swung and drew blood.

Kon stumbled back and looked down as half his right arm dropped on the marble floor. He flinched when Takuma stabbed the sword into the amputated arm. Silence returned to the manor house for the first time since the team had infiltrated it. The scene in the hallway was the picture of gore with blood dripping and pooling as a decapitated head and an amputated arm lay on the floor.

The two men stared at each other for a split moment.

Takuma felt no joy, no satisfaction, nothing as he stared at Kon's shell-shocked face; even if he had wiped the smirk off his face. It looked like he was still trying to process what had just happened. Despite how potent medicine was because of shinobi and chakra, losing an arm meant losing it forever if it wasn't re-attached quickly—and it practically crashed the shinobi's combat ability to the ground.

Most were never able to recover and those who did were never the same.

Both of them understood that fact. Kon tried to grab his arm, but Takuma shot forward and kicked him away—he wouldn't let Kon take it back. He stared straight into Kon's eyes as he stomped on the arm, pumping out chakra that shattered the bone and turned the arm into a gory mass.

"No!" Kon yelled with bloodshot eyes; for the first time, his voice held genuine emotion.

He coughed up blood from the shock and swayed on his feet before catching himself. He gave one last look to his destroyed arm and then glared at Takuma with pure hatred before jumping out of a window to escape.

'He's injured; you can kill him—'

Takuma ignored the voice in his head and, without a second thought, ran to Rikku, sitting up against the wall.

Kon didn't matter anymore.

He checked her and felt his heart soar when he felt a faint heartbeat in her chest—but her body was cold; she had already lost a lot of blood and couldn't afford to lose any more. He tried his best to plug her wounds which was challenging because the sword pierced her clean, creating two openings.

Their team didn't have an iryo-nin, and the main force was still locked in a battle, which made getting to an iryo-nin risky—all of that stressed Takuma out, but he also held hope because there was a way to get Rikku help. Anko, with her Snake Summoning Contract, could help Rikku by summoning a snake that knew a form of iryojutsu.

While they had never talked about it, and he didn't know if Anko knew a snake like that—he desperately hoped that she did.

"You'll be fine," Takuma whispered as he picked her up in a princess carry and rushed out of the building.

She needed to be fine because there was no longer anyone else to blame.

———
.

Anko gazed up at the manor house in the background. A little while ago, Kameko and Rikku had exited the building. They managed to capture a ROOT agent, which completed the mission's minimum requirement, so she ordered Daiki to go with them because the city was plunged into warfare. Together, the three of them would be better equipped to protect themselves if they were interrupted on their way to the factory base.

For a moment, she thought the worst had happened to Takuma when he didn't come out with the girls but seeing that they hadn't brought his body, he was probably still alive. She speculated he had stayed back to allow the girls to escape with the ROOT agent. Her doubts were confirmed when halfway through, Rikku turned and rushed back into the building, presumably for support and Anko had continued to hear commotion from inside the building since then.

She was brought out of her thoughts as she felt the temperature rise and felt an intense heat coming from a Great Fireball charged toward her like a raging bull, both melting and wrecking the ground in its path. Anko bent her knees and jumped high up in the air as the tongues of flames licked the soles of her boots. She flew straight toward the ROOT agent casting the fire ninjutsu with kunai in both her hands.

The agent jumped away a moment before she landed on the ground and a second agent flew towards her feet first. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and absorbed the contact while her feet uprooted grass as she was forced to slide back.

There was no time to rest as she ducked to avoid a volley of shuriken from the first agent. She bought herself a few seconds by throwing a kunai at the first agent and then used the opportunity to throw her other kunai at the second agent.

She stayed down and leapt forward at the second agent's feet. He kicked her in the face, but she still managed to take him down by his legs, climbed up his body, and pummelled him with half a dozen hits before she was kicked off.

The first agent threw a kunai at her as he closed in. Anko barely avoided it by rolling off the second agent, and it nicked her cheek, drawing a drop of blood. She wasn't able to get up in time and had to push herself back on the ground as the first agent swung his kunai at her.

The second agent sprinted toward them and was about to join in, which would make the situation much worse for her. She managed to get out when she grabbed the first agent's arm and kicked him in the knee while pulling him down. As he fell, she got up and kicked him hard in the stomach.

The first agent flew towards the second agent, who had to catch his partner, forcing him to abandon the chase.

Anko quickly weaved hand seals for ninjutsu to help her ease the situation.

Fire Release: Twin Flame Whips

Two thick whips, twice the length of a standard katana and made of pure flames, appeared in her palms. The grass burned on contact, and the flames spread as the lawn caught on fire.

"Time to get tamed, boys," Anko smiled.

She switched from defence to attack, dragging the whips behind her, leaving smouldering trails in the grass. The flame whips screeched every time she swung and set the grass around them on fire.

The two ROOT agents couldn't come close to her, or they would risk being lashed by her flaming whips.

Anko observed both agents and noticed that the second one seemed to struggle more against the whips. The first agent had to be more aggressive to keep her attention on him so that the second agent would have time to breathe.

She grinned and clenched her whips tighter.

Making an abrupt motion, she completely ignored the first agent and focused her violence on his struggling comrade, moving her hands faster and swinging harder than ever before; she moved closer to him, pushing him back—and then, as she was expecting, he crumbled under the onslaught and stumbled to the ground.

Her cheer was equal parts exertion and elation.

"Ha!"

"ARGH!"

Anko struck him down. The whip cut through his face, chest, and abdomen. She wanted to finish him, but she turned around and swung her whip parallel to the ground just at the right time to keep the first agent away from her. He jumped back and Anko couldn't hold back her smirk. She skipped forward while raising both her hands above her head before swinging the whips down with all her might.

The first agent backed away to keep himself out of the whips' range—but his eyes widened when he noticed the whips coming down at him were longer than before and he froze, the whips melting through his armour and sizzling the flesh beneath.

As the whips weren't made from a physical substance, she could change the length at will.

Anko moved closer and whipped him in the face, ending his life while burning the inside of his skull—and then turned away to kill the other one as well, ending his agonised existence.

With all her enemies dead, Anko stood between the two dead bodies in silence. She heaved deep breaths despite the brunt of excessive adrenaline thrashing through her veins.

She wanted to scream and let her bloodlust flow—but she needed to calm down to retain control over her instincts, so Anko took deep breaths and released the ninjutsu to bring herself back down. The battle-high had its use; it allowed the body and mind to work in conjunction to work like a killing machine—but it erased everything else that didn't have to do with killing the enemy in front of her.

She glanced at the two dead ROOT agents, realising she should've kept one of them alive to properly accomplish the mission.

As she felt herself back in control, Anko remembered that Takuma and Rikku were still fighting in the manor house and ran toward the building, but before she could enter, she saw something that made her feel as though someone dumped a bucket of ice cold water over her.

Whatever remains of the battle high still lingering in her veins died at the sight before her.

Takuma rushed out of the building, holding a limp Rikku in his arms. Even though his face was burnt and bloody, she could make out the absolute terror on his face as he rushed toward her and knew instantly that Rikku was either dead or dying.

"A snake who knows iryojutsu!" Takuma yelled at her. "S-Summon a snake who can heal her! DO IT! NOW!"

He was breathing erratically and had a crazed look in his eyes—his words devolved into something incomprehensible as he screamed and cried the order again. It was like looking into a pit of despair and felt his sole want of her saving Rikku—it was overwhelming because he wasn't one to wear his emotions on his sleeve, so seeing him so animated and hysterical hit much harder.

Anko didn't even notice she had already weaved through the hand seals for the summoning jutsu. She slammed her hand on the ground and felt her chakra levels sink as a bright orange snake big enough to swallow two of her emerged from the mist.

The snake immediately hissed and bared his teeth at Anko as though deeply offended at being summoned by her.

"You dare summon me, girl! You better be able to pay immediately, or I'm going—"

"Three dead humans!" Anko quickly pointed at the ROOT agent corpses behind her. "Heal her now, Kizan!"

The orange serpent's slitted eyes observed the corpses to check if she was lying, which made Anko feel irritated as one of her people was dying—and if she was feeling that, she knew how Takuma would be feeling. She looked at him and saw his bloodshot eyes glared holes into the back of Kizan's head.

"Takuma, go get the corpse from inside the house. Go, quickly, now!" Anko said as she took Rikku from him and pushed him back twice, and only then did he run into the house.

She felt a chill as she glanced at Rikku in her arms. She was cold, pale, and wet from her own blood that had coloured her front in red. She had only just seen Rikku enter the building completely fine, but she was now on the verge of death, and for a moment, she refused to believe it.

She turned to her summoned snake and laid Rikku's body before her.

"Kizan, now..." she said as she pushed Rikku's short hair sticking to her face to the side.

"Alright, alright."

The snake hissed softly as he coiled his massive truck around Rikku's body, completely covering her up.

Anko fought down the instinct to pull Rikku out, fearing that Kizan was crushing her but then saw the familiar green glow of iryojutsu exude out of his long body and held herself back. She was so restless that she couldn't even force herself to stand still and began pacing around; her body physically began to reject the possibility of Rikku's death by making her feel sick. She had lost teammates before and it wasn't something one got used to—it was one of the most terrible things any shinobi could go through.

She grabbed her hair and squatted down as guilt seeped in. What if she hadn't taken the mission? Their team's primary mission was to weaken the forces inside the city; they prepared for it and pulled it off—but they hadn't prepared for taking out a ROOT team, and now it was punishing them. It was her call as the leader to take the mission, and now Rikku was paying the price for her decision.

There was movement, and Anko turned to see Kizan releasing Rikku from his grasp.

"What happened? Why did you stop?" Anko asked with panic in her voice—though she already knew the answer.

"It was too late," said Kizan sombrely.

"No, no, no, you have to save her," Anko stepped to him and pushed his body. "You didn't even do anything! Come on, try seriously, Kizan!"

"It's over, Anko," said Kizan, shaking his head. "The lass is dead."

A dull thud caught their attention, and they saw Takuma, covered in more blood, standing at a distance with a decapitated body lying at his feet as he held half an arm in his grip and a beheaded head tucked under his arm. He had an anguished shock on his face, but as he gazed at Rikku, a hundred emotions contorted his face before colour drained from his face, the light vanished from his eyes, and soon a look of complete and utter loss settled over his face with silent tears streaked down his face.

Anko felt the stifling expansion of grief in her chest as the fires consumed the manor gardens behind her. Thanks to Team-9's intel, the main forces were carrying out a successful raid beyond the manor walls and they had gone above and beyond to give themselves one final mission: to apprehend at least one of the ROOT agents Takuma encountered all those weeks ago. On paper, that mission was a resounding success; not only had they captured a ROOT agent, but they had succeeded in essentially eradicating the team.

However, the price of that success was Rikku's death. Her body lay limp and lifeless between Anko and Kizan. Takuma had crawled to her and now knelt beside her body, the blood from the beheaded corpse pooled and extended until it touched Rikku.

By all metrics, the mission was a success but the devastation of Rikku's death… the loss of yet another comrade… and the sheer sorrow and devastation on Takuma's face… Anko was under no illusion that a mission in hostile territory was one of the most dangerous things a shinobi could do—but after everything they'd been through: posing as courtesans, recruiting the city's criminals, collaborating with the city's rebellious elements, kidnapping a chunin—and as much as it happened without her authorization—killing a jonin and more chunin…

After all of that, Rikku dying at the final hurdle in a foreign land was a pyrrhic victory in every sense.





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[Fiction]

Yu was in tatters from the two shinobi armies battling it out for control of the city. Black smoke rose from the southern section of the city, the epicentre of battles, blotting the sky. The sounds of explosions, metal against metal, and voices of victory, defeat, desperation, and aggression made up the backdrop of the invasion.

Excess chakra saturated the environment from over a couple of hundred shinobi using and pumping out chakra. For civilians who didn't live in shinobi-dense areas like the Hidden Villages, they would feel the effect through the food and water tasting ever so slightly different, their skin would be more sensitive, and they would find it a bit more difficult to fall asleep at night among other side effects.

In the conflict zone, there were spots of inactivity that all genin and most chunin avoided. No one wanted to get caught between the two jonin and die a meaningless death because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. One such spot of death was occupied by Ebi and Shirakumo fighting alongside on a long main street. The buildings on either side of the uprooted concrete street were in varying levels of damage, from huge chunks missing to shattered windows and stripped paint.

Ebi's twin kunai shrieked and sparked against Shirakumo's thin katana as the blades clashed at blinding speeds. The two moved together as though performing an intricate fight choreography they had practised thousands of times—but in reality, they were locked in a deadly battle of anticipating and countering each other's next two moves.

The concrete under Ebi's feet cracked as he pushed Shirakumo away from him while leaping back. He released the two kunai in his hands to weave hand seals. He caught both kunai before they fell below his waist and charged forward. His feet glowed blue, and water splashed with every step as though it was running on water.

Shirakumo loaded chakra into his sword and released a slanted wind blade. It was the one jutsu he could perform without hand seals. Kenjutsu—or any bukijutsu—were known for their low number of hand seals as they were simple in nature, and the weapons were often enhanced with fuinjutsu, which made them quicker to cast. It was an advantage when a shinobi could complete bukijutsu seals before the enemy could complete his ninjutsu seals. Shirakumo understood that advantage and took it to another level, training his wind blade to the point where he no longer needed the hand seals and could release them instantly.

The slanted wind blade rend through the road as it screeched toward Ebi, who dropped to his knees and slid under the cutter before skipping back to his feet. The two jonin clashed again, and Ebi swung his glowing foot at Shirakumo's head, who put his arm up to block. A huge wave of water erupted at the point of contact and hit Shirakumo with an intense force.

He shot to the side like a cannonball and crashed through three buildings. Ebi didn't stop and kicked several more times, releasing massive flying waves of water after Shirakumo, and then took a few steps back before resting his hands on his knees and stared ahead. His battered body was sapping his stamina; he had taken one too many hits to his body and bones. The nearby sounds of battle reminded him that he had to end the fight quickly and go support his men.

Ebi straightened up with a silent groan as Shirakumo walked out of the wreckage. The Leaf jonin, dressed in Steam colours, looked worse than before as he stabbed his katana into the sword and then weaved hand seals. Ebi followed suit and weaved hand seals for a defensive jutsu. He would bear whatever jutsu Shirakumo and then launch a final attack.

His chakra began to rise several dozen feet up in the air, creating a wide and long pillar around him. It was a particularly heavy B-rank jutsu in terms of its chakra requirement—but it was his best defensive ninjutsu, and the cost was more than worth it.

Opposite him, Shirakumo finished his hand seals with the snake hand seal, surprising Ebi as the snake seal was normally associated with the Earth Release, whereas Shirakumo was clearly a Wind Release user. He thought perhaps Shirakumo was going to use an Earth ninjutsu and prepared for it as he completed his jutsu too.

The ground didn't move, and instead, Ebi felt two opposing breezes brush his face before two ferocious surging tempest winds slammed toward him from either side, aiming to crush him in between. Before the tempest winds could touch him, the chakra around him turned into a pillar of water, completely encasing him within. The water was like an immovable wall that kept the killer winds out. However, Ebi felt the power of winds seeping through the water. The jutsu remained stable, but the pressure from both sides made it so that he physically couldn't move around and was being clamped in between. The sounds of screaming winds pierced through the water and announced their intentions of wanting to rip him apart.

All of a sudden, the pressure from the winds partially lifted. Ebi felt the burden lessen and quickly thought about his next move when he heard a voice,

"It's too early to relax..."

The water agitated by the winds blocked his vision, but he could see a glow of green through the bubbly and turbulent. While he couldn't see it properly, he could feel the dangerous presence of concentrated chakra a few metres away from him.

The pressure had decreased because Shirakumo had moved on to his next attack. All other sounds were drowned as the sound of a wind blade, but several times louder. The sharpened wind hit the water pillar and ferociously tried to cut through the water defence. The wind blade was thrice as thick as the normal one and slowly cut through the water pillar, slowly carving it out.

Ebi immediately understood that the water pillar was going to collapse, and he had to get out of its way. And that's when it hit him. He was trapped. The wind on either side constricted him from dodging to either side, creating a narrow corridor into which Shirakumo launched a greater wind blade—there was literally no place to dodge—he couldn't even move back as the wind would be faster than him.

As the thought hit him, a second greater wind blade hit the first one from behind. The two wind blades merged, gaining greater power, and cleaved clean through the water pillar and went halfway through a building along the line.

The water pillar collapsed and drenched the street, creating pockets of water in the gaps of the uprooted gravel. As water flowed, it drew blood along with itself; the red colour stayed in the tiny streams without diluting away. Ebi was no longer standing but was all over the street—blood stained the road, a part of his arm here, a toe there, a chunk of brain sitting in a small plate made from his skull.

A jonin was dead.

A drenched Shirakumo took in the scene and shook his head. He had overdone it. He closed his eyes and took a silent moment to pray for Ebi's soul, hoping that he would find peace and contentment in the afterlife.

The moment of quiet was shattered when Shirakumo felt a heat wave sweep through him. Looking back, he saw trails of orange flame rising up the buildings on several streets. He raised his hands as waves over waves of heat spread out, bringing the tropical to the cool city. He immediately knew it was Toridasu's doing.

Shirakumo listened to the sounds of battle. They had quietened down since the start, as they should have. The battle to recapture Yu was coming to an end.

———
.

It had nearly been two hours since Daiki and Kameko returned to the factory base with the ROOT agent, who they had drowned him in drugs to keep him down. Iori wasn't with them to paint prisoner seals. She hid near the city walls with a radio to be as close as she could be to the main forces on their arrival; Takuma had taught her the basics, and putting her close to the wall eliminated range-related communication.

Even though their job was done, they hadn't been able to calm themselves. Their nerves were just as taut as they were during combat. Kameko couldn't sit still and was pacing around the unconscious ROOT agent while Daiki had permanently positioned near the factory's entrance so he could see the others arrive a few seconds earlier.

"They should be here by now!" Daiki yelled from the entrance.

Kameko didn't reply and continued to pace in a line with her head down as she stared at the floor. She kept telling herself that the three of them had left the manor house and were hiding somewhere in the house to avoid getting caught in the conflict inside the city. Nothing helped, and the miserable possibility that something had happened.

"Kameko, I think we should go check!"

She stopped. The idea sounded good. Why suffer while doing nothing when they could just go have a look? Perhaps their team needed them, and they could be of much-needed help. She was about to respond but closed her mouth as she gazed at the ROOT agent. Even though he was drugged to his nips with no chance of waking up, the slight possibility of otherwise couldn't be subtracted. The mission's objective was to capture a ROOT agent, and if the agent somehow escaped while they were away, everything would be ruined.

She sighed, knowing that they couldn't leave and was about to respond when Daiki yelled again, louder than before.

"They are here! Kameko, they are here! Kameko!"

His words imbibed a new energy in her, and she rushed across the dusty factory to greet them. Her heart beat faster as she could finally put her fears to rest. She was about to reach the gates when she heard Daiki's voice.

"No... no-no-no-no. NO!"

Even before she could see, his tone made her heart sink. She stepped out into the back alley behind the factory they used as entrance and found her heart drop as she saw a body in Anko's arms. It was covered in what looked to be the curtains from the manor house. Her world shattered when she saw Takuma standing beside Anko; he looked like he would fall over any second and had no colour on his face and no light in his eyes—but Kameko didn't see any of that because if the two of them were alive, then she knew who was inside the curtain.

Kameko felt as though someone had pumped thick sludge into her heart and body as a weight settled into her body. Her legs gave out, and she squatted with her body curling into itself. Her fingers slipped into her hair as she grabbed her head—the scene of Rikku running back to the manor house replayed in her head over and over again—and all she could think that she could've prevented, but she didn't, and it was all her fault.

"I... I should've stopped her," she moaned in pain as guilt and anguish flooded her mind and body. The memories of the girl she had spent just a few months short of a year spun chaos in her mind. The time they had spent together, all the times they had laughed and fought, the long silences where they were content to sit together without a hint of awkwardness—everything that she should've cherished more because she would never get to experience them with Rikku.

As the cheers of victory spread through the city, four members of Anko's team stood in the abandoned, dreary alleyway coming to terms with the fact that their occupation—regardless of how much power it brought them—was cruel, cold, and merciless.

It made them question if any of it was worth it.





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[Fiction]

Three of five jonin stationed in the city lost their lives during the Battle for Yu and, after the death of the second jonin, the Frost-Cloud forces began fleeing from the city. The Steam-Leaf didn't give them chase outside the city, and those who chose to flee were allowed to leave with their lives.

The battle officially ended when the horns of victory blared, and the Steam-Leaf jonin announced the death of three enemy jonin loudly enough for the entire city to hear.

But there was more work to be done.

To ensure that Yu was truly free, the shinobi had to comb through every room in every building on every single street to ensure that there were no enemy shinobi ready to ambush them when their guard was down. It was a tedious process with all the shinobi capable of walking ordered to search the city for hidden enemies.

Thankfully, the two sensory-nin from Camp Banana made the task slightly easier.

Iori sat on a bench inside the command centre tent with a kunai in her hand. She had unknowingly carved three grooves in the bench's armrest in her worry for her team. It had been twelve hours since the battle was declared over and her team still hadn't arrived.

It was pre-arranged that the rest of the team would not leave the base until someone from the main force came to fetch them. Iori immediately supplied the location of the factory base to the appropriate people and waited for them to return with her team but nine newsless hours had passed.

It seemed that, in the chaos of the battle aftermath, the command had yet to send someone to fetch her team. Iori had offered to go fetch them herself, but the suggestion was rejected. The team had brought one radio with them to Yu, which was given to Iori so she could communicate with the main forces, but it also meant that there was no way to communicate with her team.

Her ration pack sat beside her on the bench, the food long gone cold. Despite the long day and her physical exhaustion, her appetite had been destroyed by nerves. She could only find solace in the fact that her team had not come out on their own, meaning they were still alive.

…Right?

"Genin Iori, you have been summoned," a genin finally came with the news she had been waiting for. "Your team has arrived."

Iori was on her feet as if she'd been summoned to battle and followed the genin through the temporary camp. The sky was on the verge of night. She looked at the genin guiding her and wanted to push him in the back so he would walk faster, but contained herself.

They arrived at another tent, and Iori was about to enter when the genin said, "I'm sorry for your loss."

Iori froze with her hand clutching the tent flap.

She looked at him with dread filling her from head to toe and ripped the tent flap open. She saw Anko, Daiki, and Kameko standing in the back of the tent with Toridasu. Her legs shook as she walked toward them and she was hit by a wave of weakness when she saw Rikku's body lying on the ground, covered with a white sheet up to her neck.

She couldn't look anymore and turned her back.

Tears began to fall uncontrollably, and even covering her mouth with her hand couldn't silence her sobs. She was the only one away from the team when they went after the ROOT agents—the reason she was given the communication duty was that she was the weakest among the group and would've been a liability. She was sent away for not being strong enough to help.

If she had been stronger, Rikku would've been alive. As she reeled from shock, she was hit by another thought and hastily turned with widened eyes.

Only Anko, Daiki, and Kameko were there.

"Takuma? W-Where is he?"

She looked down at the other bodies, who were all completely covered and locked onto the body beside Rikku, who was the same height as Takuma. Her heartache worsened, and she felt faint as she bent down to uncover the face when Anko pulled her up and hugged her.

"It's not him. He's alive; he's not in danger. The iryo-nin are with him; he lost a lot of blood; he'll be fine."

Relief with Takuma mixed with grief towards Rikku to the point where Iori couldn't take it anymore. She crumpled into Anko's embrace, who held her tight, and wailed without any regard.

———
.

Takuma stared at himself in the mirror inside the medical ward.

He had no colour on his face; the injuries and loss of blood had left him weak. It wasn't a new feeling—he had felt worse and weaker before. He touched the thin scar on the edge of his lips—it was his newest and most prominent scar—the first one on his face. He looked down at his right palm covered in bandages. Beneath those bandages were two bigger, grizzlier scars on both sides of his hands left from having a sword go clean through his palm.

The iryo-nin said he was lucky he didn't break any bones in his hand. Maybe it would've been better if he broke his hand because physical pain was better—temporary—compared to the constant pain in his chest. Takuma combed his hair with his arm, which was covered in a soft cast from below the elbow because of the hairline fractures he had suffered from overloading his chakra augmentation.

Styling his hair made no difference; he looked just as miserable as before. He didn't want to leave his bed but forced himself to do so anyway because lying made him feel like he was drowning.

"Are you ready?"

Takuma turned to see Iori standing at the door of his shared room with four other injured shinobi.

She was dressed in all black like him and had a food tray in her hands. At first glance, Iori looked as usual, but he couldn't find a hint of the small smile she always had. He had spent a whole day unconscious because of his injuries, and when he was awake, he wallowed in misery on his bed with no thought about how others were processing and grieving Rikku's death.

"Yes, let's go," he replied, setting down his comb. He looked at himself in the mirror one last time and decided that it was a waste of time.

"Eat first," she walked to his bed and put the tray down.

Takuma gazed at the plate of fruits and porridge.

He had no appetite but understood that nutrients were necessary for his recovery, so he forced the meal down—he also didn't want to say no to Iori. He couldn't taste anything—the porridge was already bland, but he couldn't even taste the sweetness from the fruits.

"How are you feeling?" he asked as they walked together to their destination.

"Terrible, awful—I don't know," Iori said, turning her face away from him. "I couldn't sleep last night... I just wanted to run away from here," she scoffed, "like that would do anything."

Takuma had been fortunate enough to be unconscious from his injuries. A part of him still wanted to be unconscious so he wouldn't have to completely accept the truth that she was gone—but he knew that he would regret it forever if he didn't participate.

The two arrived at the tent being used as the morgue and found the rest of the team waiting for them. They were also dressed in black, which intensified their dark expressions of sorrow, grief, anger, and pain. Every Hidden Leaf shinobi in the city was gathered there, all dressed in black.

"How's your body?" Anko asked.

Takuma shrugged. His entire body hurt; whatever the iryo-nin gave him wasn't working—but he was grateful for it. The physical pain helped to dull the pain in his chest.

"Let's go then," she said.

The inside of the tent was filled with the bodies of the shinobi who had died in battle. The tent itself was managed by the Hidden Leaf and only held the corpses of Hidden Leaf shinobi—the Hidden Steam had their own morgue. When a shinobi died on the field, and their bodies couldn't be transported back home, they were given the shinobi's funeral, which was always cremation.

Takuma gazed at the bodies of the dead—just like all those months ago in the Gojiro Gold Mines, he didn't feel much about the death of people who were on the same side as him—his comrades.

Death was part of the job.

Those ready to kill were always prepared to be killed and while he appreciated their sacrifice he wouldn't lose any sleep over their deaths. That way of thinking was cold, jaded, cruel, and perhaps even inhumane—but that didn't change the fact that their deaths didn't make him feel anything. They were just strangers who had died doing their jobs.

But then he laid eyes on Rikku and felt that someone had stabbed him in the heart. She was a shinobi, just like everyone else, but her death was the only thing that mattered in this tent of corpses.

It confused him.

Was he supposed to pat himself on the back because feeling anything about her death was proof that he was still somewhat of a normal human?

A deep sense of self-loathing bubbled inside of him—a harsh hatred toward himself—of how much of a piece of shit he was to make her death about himself. He had once thought that he had improved as a person in his new life—he was more competent, he had matured and was better equipped to handle life. He believed that he was a better person—that was an utter falsity—his past self was better and would most definitely reject the person he was becoming.

Takuma curled his lip. His body felt like it was withering from the inside.

Rikku was laid on a wooden platform bed for transportation to the cremation. Team-9 acted as pallbearers and picked her up. Anko tried to talk Takuma out of it because of his injuries, but he refused to listen and put his shoulder underneath the wooden plank with the rest of the team.

The funeral site was the same for both Leaf and Steam shinobi. The funeral pyres were already prepared beforehand, and hundreds of shinobi were already there to bid farewell to their dead comrades. The atmosphere was dull and grim as the team set down Rikku on a pyre chosen by Kameko, who rejected three other pyres that she didn't like, wanting the best for Rikku.

"Say your last words," Anko said to the team. Starting with her, the team went to Rikku's side one at a time and whispered their last words to her. Everyone shed tears, smiled, frowned, and grew angry as they said their final goodbyes to her.

When it was Takuma's turn, he knelt beside the pyre and whispered into Rikku's ear.

"... I don't know what to say to you... I don't want to die, but I know it should've been me and not you. It was a mistake to go after him like I did. It was perhaps my biggest mistake, and I'll never be able to make it up to you. You were my best sparring partner; you fought hard even in practice, which I appreciated. You were blunt and sometimes rude—but I loved that straightforward personality of yours, it was so easy to talk to you and... I'll miss that dearly."

Takuma paused as he felt something catch in his throat. He cleared his throat and rubbed the corner of his eye to gather himself before continuing.

"The bastard ended up escaping, but I managed to take one of his arms. I hope you'll be satisfied with that for now... I'll catch him one day and kill him—I promise you that. If I don't accomplish anything else in this life, I promise you that the bastard will die. I don't care what I have to do, but one day, I'm going to find him, I'll kill him, and I'll make it hurt.... So you rest and peace, and I'll send him up so that you can beat the shit out of him yourself."

Takuma leaned down to kiss her on her forehead. As he rose from her body, he noticed a glistening bead sliding down the bridge of her nose and realised he had unknowingly shed tears. He wiped the tear off her face and gazed at her resting body for a moment longer, swallowing hard.

"Goodbye, Rikku."





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[Fiction]

Team-9 waited until all the pyres were extinguished before deciding to leave the funeral site.

Takuma stared at the smoke in the sky and wondered about this world's afterlife. He vaguely remembered that there was a definite afterlife, but its specifics evaded him. He prayed it was peaceful so that Rikku would be comfortable and happy wherever she was.

"Alright, let's go and get drunk," Anko said as she wrapped her hand around Kameko's shoulder.

"You guys go ahead," Takuma said to the team. "I'm going to see Motohiro."

Motohiro's group had been captured and tortured because of their connection to him. He had received the news about their release and subsequent medical treatment for their injuries after the siege. The least he could do was to go check on them and see how they were doing since he was partially responsible for what happened to them.

"I'll come with you if you don't mind," said Daiki.

"Will you? Sure, that'd be great."

"Then let's go meet them as a team and then go drink at the end," said Anko.

"Yeah, let's do that," Takuma nodded with a small smile.

As the team walked away from the funeral site, Daiki started speaking.

"You know, Rikku had me maintain my gear every other week. Even if I hadn't used anything, she forced me to do it anyway. She made me clean the pouches, re-wrap the handles of the kunai, check all the tags for tears, inspect every inch of the rope for any faults—the works," Daiki said as he remembered the memories with a smile. "She said it was about creating a habit—that once I got used to doing it, it would become easier until I would get uncomfortable if I didn't do it—and that's what happened," by the end his smile, he had a hint of sadness in it.

Takuma silently chuckled as he recalled his first meeting with Rikku. He thought she was needlessly picking up a fight with him as part of some kind of hazing ritual. In truth, she wanted to know him better and decided that a blunt challenge to spar would be the best way to do it. In hindsight, it was probably the best way she could get to know him; there was a lot to discover about a person in their fighting style—she could've done a better job communicating her intentions, but then it wouldn't have been Rikku.

Takuma started to smile as he recounted the story of their first meeting. "The first time I met her was—"

He suddenly stopped walking, confusing the rest of the team. They looked at him to see that he was looking at something—and when they followed his line of sight, they found Gaku talking with some Steam shinobi.

"Takuma, no... Takuma, leave it!" Anko said immediately when she saw the hint of a smile that had just come on Takuma's face slip away and slowly be replaced with a look of mean-eyed rage.

Takuma didn't hear Anko and began walking briskly toward Gaku. His breath harshened with every step toward Gaku as he felt a head of steam build up. The sight of Gaku smiling and laughing with the Steam shinobi made him grit his teeth and walk faster. Anko rushed to him and put her hand on his shoulder to stop him, but Takuma harshly shrugged her off and continued onward faster than before.

Gaku had his back to Takuma and turned around when the people he was conversing with pointed behind him. Takuma charged his arm and fist with chakra—and the moment Gaku turned, he drilled his fist square into his face. Gaku flew metres in the air, tumbling a few metres away after colliding against the ground.

"Fuck... YOU!" Takuma yelled through the pain as he clutched his hand close to his body, having reopened the large wound in his hand. "You fucking coward—traitorous piece of shit!"

"Hey, what the fuck are you doing?" One of the Steam shinobi pushed Takuma hard enough that he almost stumbled to the ground.

"Hey, don't touch him! " Anko ran forward and pushed the Steam shinobi back. "Keep your fucking hands off of him!"

"Oh yeah, what are you going to do about it, huh?"

Anko scoffed and stepped close to the Steam shinobi, and snarled. "I can do a whole lot worse than you can even imagine, buddy. You don't want what I have."

The Leaf and Steam shinobi around them heard the commotion and shouting and began to gather. In an instant, the ruckus grew into a full-on confrontation between the two shinobi groups, who were ready to fight each other. All of them were emotionally charged after the funeral, and the spark created by Takuma exploded into a forest wildfire.

Takuma didn't register what the others were doing and had his attention locked in on Gaku, who got up on shaky footing and spat out a couple of teeth with blood. He looked up at Takuma with a heavy frown as he wiped the blood on his lips

"What are you looking at, bitch?! You want to fight?!" Takuma screamed at him with liquid fury. "You don't want to fight a real shinobi... I don't fight below my level, so go fight civilian women and children; that'd be more your style."

"You think you're a real shinobi, little boy?" Gaku said as he walked toward him.

"Oh, I'm a real shinobi." Takuma laughed as if it was the joke of the century. "You're not a shinobi—you're a pimp. Letting the civilian woman do all the work, and when it came time to do something, you fucking ran with that impotent noodle between your legs! You're not even a real man, you fuck! What kind of man hides when it's time to free his city from the enemy? Fucking traitor!" said Takuma before spitting on the ground.

"Shut your mouth before I break your jaw," Gaku snarled.

"I'll cut out your tongue so I don't have to hear that god awful, ugly voice of yours. I hope you choke on your cigarettes!" Takuma shouted, and a kunai slipped into his hand before he dashed toward Gaku but was immediately pulled back and off the ground by Daiki, who grabbed him by the underarms. "Fucking let me go! She would've been alive if not for that bastard! LET ME GO!"

He even tried to throw the kunai, but Daiki had his arms locked down.

"Yeah, you better hold him," Gaku yelled back.

"Come get me, traitor! I can take you like this, you pussy!" Takuma challenged even as he was being restrained by Daiki.

Tension between the two sides continued to rise, and it got right to the tipping point before a full-on group brawl broke out. The words being exchanged were becoming increasingly heated and the level-headed people who tried to calm things down were drowned out by the words thrown by both sides.

And then it happened.

Someone hit someone who hit back, and that spurred a chain reaction with more and more fights breaking out between emotionally charged shinobi. But before it could truly get out of hand, a chakra-laced voice ripped through the brawling group, forcing them to a screeching halt.

"ENOUGH"

Those who needed more than words felt a faint strain of bloody, murderous intent brush against them. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked to the source to find Toridasu and a Steam jonin glaring at the two groups with anger and disappointment.

———
.

"At a funeral?"

Takuma stood there with all the Leaf shinobi involved in the near all-out brawl with his head bowed as he listened to Toridasu, who was uncharacteristically angry. He was snarky, unreasonable, and overbearing—but he was almost never angry—that emotion seemed to be below him.

"You fight like drunkards in a bar brawl... at a funeral?" Toridasu sneered with anger. "Do you have no respect for the dead? They gave their life, and you mock them by acting like hooligans? Why did you even come to the funeral if you were going to act like this?"

Of course, no one came to the funeral to start a fight, but that was by no means proper to say in the moment. They could only stay silent and listen to their jonin-in-command berate them like they were idiot children. Shirakumo was also present, but he stood behind Toridasu and hadn't spoken a word—which was worse in many ways.

Toridasu turned to Takuma with a furious look, but his expression softened for a moment as he sighed. He shook his head and addressed the group, but Takuma felt that he was speaking specifically to him.

"I know all of you are raw and emotional after the losses, but you are shinobi—grow up and learn to face your emotions like adults," Toridasu said sternly before walking away as though utterly disappointed with them.

Just when everyone thought it was over and relaxed their postures, Shirakumo stepped forward and said his part, which made everyone want to groan. "Everyone here will put in two extra shifts with the clean-up and construction crew. And I agree with Jonin Toridasu—you're all responsible adults; fighting at a funeral was disgraceful, and you need to reflect on your behaviour... Dismissed."

Everyone waited until both jonin were well out of earshot before relaxing as a wave of groaning and annoyed whispers spread out. The general reception of the incident was while what they did was indeed disrespectful to the dead; they didn't regret it.

"It shouldn't have happened, but if I see my teammate in a fight, I'm going to back them," Anko said with her arms crossed. She sighed and patted Takuma on his shoulder. "Postpone that meeting with Motohiro's lot. I need that drink now."

Takuma nodded. His mood was in the shitter, and even though he didn't drink, he could go for a smoke. Fortunately, his emergency-emergency stash was unopened.

———
.

Takuma knocked on the door of a personal room in the city hospital. Inside, sitting on a bed, was a badly injured, fully bandaged Motohiro. Half of his face was bandaged and stained with yellow medicine, one of his eyes was completely covered with gauze, and there was an ugly cut on his swollen lips. His interrogators had done a number on him.

"Come in," said Motohiro when he saw Takuma and tried to sit up straighter, causing his face to twist in pain.

"Relax, you don't need to sit up," said Takuma as he walked inside. He was alone and had come without the team, even though they had offered to come with him the day before. "How are you?"

"As you can see," Motohiro said weakly after falling back down onto his pillow. "Take a seat."

"Family?" asked Takuma as he pulled out a stool from beneath the bed.

"Another room."

The Steam shinobi had picked up everyone remotely related to Motohiro to interrogate.

"I see... Sorry, I came empty-handed."

A hint of a smile cracked Motohiro's face before it went away quickly as his expression creased from the pain.

There was a silent pause in the room as the two men stared at each other. They were two very different people, their lives drastically far apart from each other, but for the past couple of months, they had been working towards the same goal of freeing the city from its oppressors.

For one, it was getting his home back and the life he and others had before; for the other, it was simply a mission as part of his job. But they both had suffered, sacrificed, and lost to achieve their goal—and that's what they had in common.

"Hey—"

"Listen—"

Both of them spoke at the same time and stopped to give the other the chance to speak.

"You go first," said Motohiro.

Takuma nodded and took a moment to compile his thoughts. He wet his lips before starting, "I'm sorry... You, your family, your friends, your employees—they all suffered terrible things because of me. I can't help but feel terrible about what all of you had to go through. Civilians shouldn't be involved in fights between shinobi"

The memory of the sound of an explosion ripping through the banquet hall echoed in his mind.

"And you ended up getting dragged into a situation you shouldn't have been in. For that, I apologise from the bottom of my heart."

Takuma got up and bowed deeply to Motohiro, staying in this position until Motohiro asked him to stand up.

"Thank you," Motohiro said with a smile.

Takuma was taken aback.

It had been three days since the battle had ended, and even though Takuma had been a big contributor in saving the city, it was the first time Takuma had been thanked. He and the team had been praised by Toridasu for completing the mission—he had been heavily reprimanded by Shirakumo for what he did at the banquet to take out the jonin—but he hadn't been thanked for anything yet.

"You saved my home." Motohiro continued, "You saved my children's future. I don't know what environment they would've grown up in if the city was still under the enemy's control. You made sure that my children—all of Yu's children—would grow up in a free place where they could be anything they wanted without any fear. You shed sweat and blood for a place that's not even in your country; I can't see myself doing that..."

"I'm a shinobi for hire. It's my job," said Takuma.

"I don't care." Motohiro coughed a little. "You worked very hard; I don't know very many people who would work this hard for a mere job... So, I will say it again on behalf of my children, my family, and the city of Yu—thank you for saving us all."

Takuma clenched his uninjured fist as goosebumps rose up on his body. He didn't recognise what he was feeling, but it filled him to an almost uncomfortable level and he was deeply disturbed by it.

He knew why he worked so hard on the mission, and it wasn't because he cared about the people of Yu. He worked hard to further his career, but seeing the man who had been dangerously running a rebellious group under the remorseless rule of shinobi while taking care of so many needful people—seeing that man thanking him felt wrong.

He didn't deserve the gratitude.

But he couldn't say any of that when he saw the sincerity in Motohiro's eyes. Takuma stood up straighter and once again bowed deeply to Motohiro, a man who was a far better human being than he could ever be.





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[Fiction]

Motohiro wasn't the only stop on Takuma's itinerary.

He mulled over the decision to visit the Kumi family's estate until the very last moment because he was under no illusion that he would receive a warm, much less a civil welcome after he had murdered Gyon in cold blood. In anger, he'd left behind a gruesome scene that he regretted and the purpose for his visit was to face what he had done.

He had to do it alone, so Takuma chose not to bring his team along despite their offer.

The front gates of the estate were guarded by a single man sitting on a stool. He stood up when he saw Takuma approach, who was covered in bandages and had a soft cast on his arm.

"What do you want?" asked the guard.

The guard didn't recognise him. Even though he had been at the estate previously, not everyone had seen his face.

"I'm here to meet your leader, Hoshiguro," Takuma said calmly.

"Yeah, don't waste my time, kid. If you want to fuck around, do it somewhere else. No one's in the mood for your bullshit."

"Inform him that Takuma, the Hidden Leaf shinobi, is here to meet him."

Takuma looked at the guard and saw a deep fear appear in his eyes. He subconsciously backed away and knocked over the wooden stool he was sitting on, startling himself in the process.

"I-I...I—"

"Relay the message. I'll accept whatever response he gives," Takuma said slowly so as not to startle the guard further. "Go on now, quickly."

The guard slowly approached the door, all the time facing Takuma; he didn't want to turn his back to him for fear that he would die if he turned his back and sprinted the moment he was across the small door in the larger gates.

Takuma sighed and picked up the fallen stool to sit on as he waited for someone to come and see him. They made him wait an entire five minutes before the Kumi lieutenants came to fetch him; he didn't mind the time as he understood they would be apprehensive about inviting Gyon's killer inside. The lieutenant didn't look scared, but Takuma could see that his entire body was tense as he walked beside him—just like the guard, the lieutenant didn't want his back facing him.

The walk from the front gate to the destination was silent. The lieutenant was stiff in fear. Usually, Takuma would've inquired about Hoshiguro's health to get a feel for the meeting about to happen, but he didn't feel like doing that and stayed quiet.

The lieutenant asked him to wait outside when they arrived at a room before stepping inside and closing the sliding door behind him. It didn't do anything as Takuma's trained ears picked up the conversation inside. He picked up at least three people and heard the faint sound of the rustling of bed covers that told him Hoshiguro was inside.

He gathered his thoughts about what he would say to the man while he waited for the lieutenants to call him in.

Four Kumi lieutenants were present in the room; two stood next to opposite walls, while the other two stood in front of a translucent screen backlit with some sort of light source casting the shadow of a man lying down on a futon.

Takuma hid a bitter smile. Hoshiguro couldn't be clearer that he wasn't welcome in his house. There was a singular cushion placed a distance in front of the screen, and Takuma sat on it, tucking his knees below his body. The lieutenants were weak enough that it was fine to put himself at a disadvantage by sitting down even when he was injured.

Takuma opened his mouth to ask about Hoshiguro's health, but the words died on the tip of his tongue. His heart began to race as he was hit by the realisation of him with full force that he was sitting before the father of the son he had murdered. Regardless of Gyon's decision, which led to his demise, a parent's love for their children wasn't something that could be erased or forgotten so easily.

He felt his lips dry up, and the things he had decided to say all evaporated—nothing he could think of was the right thing to say—he had no idea what to say to a grieving father when he was the one to cause that suffering.

"I'm sorry for your loss."

The words escaped his mouth as the silence in the room made him hurry up. He didn't regret killing Gyon—not one bit—it was justified after he was betrayed twice, and the second time directly caused Motohiro and other brave people to suffer under torture because of Gyon's greed. He wanted to give out justifications but knew it would only anger the people in the room.

"... I remember telling you," Hoshiguro spoke from behind the screen, his lying silhouette shifting slightly, "that when bigger nations like yours wage war, smaller nations like mine are forced to serve as battlefields, and the moment Yu was captured, it was destined to be a battlefield... It came true, didn't it? My city was turned into grounds of battle—and I lost my son, my only child, in that battle. I lost my legacy, my heir... and I can't do anything to take revenge against his killer as he sits before me." His voice was weak because of his frail condition, but it couldn't stifle the intense emotion in his words.

Takuma bowed his head, unable to say anything in response.

"He made a mistake, and you killed him for it," Hoshiguro continued, his voice growing hoarse, "and the people I call my family hid the news from me for two days because they were worried about my health because I was... weak. I did not know that my son was dead for two whole days because no one told me—not one person—and I wasn't able to get off this damnable bed to find it out on my own."

Takuma turned to glance at the lieutenants as they bowed their heads in shame. It seemed there was a lot more going on than with the Kumi family; alas, it wasn't something he was going to get involved in.

"I don't know why you came here, shinobi," said Hoshiguro, unwilling to even call Takuma by his name. "I don't know why I invited you in—perhaps I was afraid that you'd kill more of those I love if I denied you, or perhaps it was because I wished to scream in your face... unfortunately, I don't have the energy to even raise my voice."

The words hurt Takuma.

He was a killer, there was no denying it, but a mindless killer he was not. Hoshiguro's words implied that he would kill if he was slightly displeased. His image in the old man's eyes had plummeted to an abominable demon. It felt unfair because the man he had killed caused so much harm to the resistance trying to save the city—and now he was being made to feel guilty about it.

Takuma indeed felt bad about it because of his relationship with Hoshiguro and not because he had killed a good man. It was difficult to empathise when he wanted to defend himself—but he held it in because there was no value to it.

"Leave," Hoshiguro said, and his shadow indicated that he had turned his back to Takuma. "Your presence itself is poison to my heart. In return for killing my son, do my family and I a favour by never again approaching us..." Those were the last words Hoshiguro spoke; he remained silent from then onwards.

Takuma felt awkward, uncomfortable, and ever so slightly offended after having such words directed at him. He had been cursed at plenty by the fighters he fought in the Ring, the spectators who bet for and against him; he had been called a demon by the people he had caught and prosecuted in his time in the Narcotics Task Force—but this was the first time he had faced such cold resentment.

"I've kept my promise," Takuma said as he stared at the shadow behind the screen. "I've talked to the Hidden Steam shinobi, and they'll punish the Goharu Family for their role in supporting the enemy. The Goharu family will be dismantled and cease to exist in a few days, leaving the Kumi family unopposed in the city. The Kumi won't be blamed for the family's brief relationship with the enemy and will be left untouched."

When he had first approached the Kumi family, they had helped after extracting a promise that he would get rid of their opposition, the Goharu family. He didn't have to even do anything as the days were numbered for the Goharu family in case the city was recovered, which happened.

In truth, Takuma wanted to get rid of the chakra-enabled members of the Goharu family on his own—but after the banquet hall explosion incident, he knew he couldn't do that. He was an outsider and lacked the power to punish the people of Yu.

The lieutenants all showed a relieved response when Takuma mentioned that they wouldn't be blamed for Gyon's actions. He also noticed that none of them had shown any negative reaction to his killing Gyon; their reactions were mostly fear stemming from caring for their own lives that he could end in a snap. From the looks of it, Hoshiguro was the only one harbouring deep resentment against him, even though it was he who started all of it by pitting Takuma against Gyon to teach the latter a lesson, but it only served to wound Gyon's ego.

Takuma could've used that point in his defence, but he didn't have the heart to rub it in the grieving man's face. There was nothing more to be said so he stood to leave but stopped at the sliding door and turned back one last time to address the wise old man who hated him more than anyone else in the world.

"I'm sorry for your loss," he repeated. He didn't say "I'm sorry" because that would mean admitting wrongdoing; instead, he simply offered his condolences.

He didn't receive any response.

Takuma walked toward the estate gates, with the lieutenant who had escorted him following him a step behind. He heard a commotion and turned to see a woman he recognised as Gyon's wife running toward him with a crazed, furious look on her face. Her hair and clothes were in disarray and her pale face was marred with tear trails.

"You demon! You took a father away from his children—because of you, they'll grow up without their father!" she yelled with poisonous hatred in her voice.

The lieutenant ran toward her and grabbed her to stop her before she was anywhere near Takuma.

"Go," said the lieutenant, "please."

Takuma stared at the woman spewing hatred at him for a moment before turning away and disappearing from the estate using the Body Flicker Jutsu. He appeared outside the estate and looked at the bright and blue sky with a deep sigh as he contemplated the wife's words.

He remembered his spiteful words to Gyon about his children when he had killed him and wished he hadn't said it.

He shook his head—it didn't matter anymore; his relationship with the Kumi family was over, and he would no longer have anything to do with them. It was better for him to put the experience out of his mind and leave them behind.

However, contrary to Takuma's belief, that connection would be kept alive by a pair of twins through their hatred for the man who killed their father.

And through his actions, a cycle of hatred had been born.

———
.

Takuma returned to the camp after roaming around the city for a while to clear his mind from the two emotionally charged conversations he had. When he entered the room he was sharing with others, he found Kameko waiting for him by his bed.

"Where were you?" she asked with her arms crossed.

Takuma sighed. "I went to meet Motohiro and the Kumi family. I left a note," he said, pointing at the piece of paper sitting on the pillow.

"Yeah, which said nothing except that you were going out and would return in a while. That literally tells me nothing. I've been waiting for you for an hour," Kameko said, rolling her eyes before her tone softened. "How was it? Meeting them..."

Takuma simply shook his head.

Kameko pursed lips and nodded in return, and he was appreciative of her not pushing him to elaborate.

"Why were you waiting?" asked Takuma as he sat down on his bed with a huff and pain.

"The ANBU-nin want to meet you," said Kameko, quieter than usual.

Takuma, who was about to kick his boots off, stopped and looked up at Kameko, who looked restless. A duo of ANBU-nin had arrived with the main forces and had participated in the battle. After the battle was over, they took custody of the captured ROOT agent. The team hadn't seen them or heard from them since then; they weren't aware of their location—and if not for Toridasu telling them that the ANBU duo was still in the city, they would've assumed that they had long left.

"What do they want?"

"They want to ask questions. Everyone has already met with them; you're the only one left."

Takuma looked at his feet. He was physically injured, and the day had already drained him mentally. A part of him didn't want anything to do with the ANBU and ROOT. Unfortunately, a bigger part of him was interested in meeting with the ANBU duo. He had seen—felt—something during his fight against the ROOT team that would've taken over his life if not for Rikku's death. He didn't think he would get any answers from the ANBU duo, but he figured it was the best starting point if he wanted to know what those memories were about.

If they wanted to question him, they would have to answer some questions of his own.





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