"I'm sorry, Ru…" Mei muttered without looking up, her eyes fixed on the empty table in front of her. "We couldn't find anything…"
She had explained earlier how the battlefield was scarred with countless craters of varying sizes, the soil torn apart by overwhelming force. The only clear trace they could find was that Maki had lured Pain away, buying her comrades a chance to live.
"Lady Suikage did her best to save us. If not for her sacrifice…" Illumi Noda spoke carefully, trying to ease the crushing silence, but his words froze the room. Dozens of eyes turned on him, cold and murderous.
"Sacrifice?" Kaoru hissed, his voice cutting through the air. He glared at Illumi as though he was personally responsible for Maki's disappearance. "We don't know what happened to my sister. Until we confirm anything, we must believe that she is alive!"
Illumi held his ground without protest. He had lived long enough in Takimura to know the bond between the Takime siblings was absolute. To him, Kaoru's fury was grief speaking, not true hatred. And he was right.
After that first outburst, Kaoru's tone softened, though the anger still simmered beneath his words. "We must send scouting groups to search for Maki. I'll go as well." His gaze lowered. "But warn everyone… under no circumstances are they to engage the enemy."
The last words were a whisper, dragged from the weight pressing down on him. Guilt lingered in Kaoru's chest. He knew Maki would have charged without hesitation if his life were in danger. He knew she would gladly give up her life if it meant saving him.
And yet, he also knew letting emotions dictate his next steps would doom them all. No matter how much his heart raged, reason still anchored him. He understood the truth: even if every shinobi in Takimura stood together, a single Pain could crush them. And Pain was not alone. Nagato always had Konan beside him.
'Even if the other Akatsuki don't move, just those two… Konan and Nagato… would be enough to slaughter every one of us.' His mind spun in frantic circles, searching for a way out of the trap tightening around them. The more he thought, the darker it became. 'The Leviathans can't fight on land. Itachi is too weak. There's no one else to turn to. Even if Maki is alive… no, she is alive. There's no way she would die so easily. Besides, Mei and Sensei found no blood; there is nothing to prove she suffered fatal wounds…'
Hope refused to die in his heart, though a terrible question pressed harder with each moment, threatening to snuff it out. If Maki had survived, then where was she? Why hadn't she returned?
"Kaoru?" Mei's voice cut through his spiraling thoughts. "Are you… perhaps you should rest for a while."
"No, I'm fine, Mei. Just lost in thought," Kaoru replied, letting out a slow sigh.
Mei studied him, unconvinced, before her expression hardened. "Then explain. Why should we not attack them? They declared war on Takimura when they struck down our envoy. They even attacked our Suikage directly and perhaps kidnapped her."
Kaoru finally raised his head. His eyes were shadowed, but steady. "Mei… how strong do you think a shinobi needs to be to defeat Maki in a one-on-one fight?"
Mei didn't answer right away, but her gaze wavered. She understood what Kaoru was implying, or rather she thought she did.
"Yes. None of us are anywhere near Maki's level, and that man was able to defeat her, or at the very least hold her evenly," Kaoru continued, his lips pressed into a thin line. The words grew heavier as his conscience gnawed at him, urging him to reveal what he truly knew. "And that organization… it's not just one man. It's filled with powerful shinobi. There are at least five S-rank shinobi among them. Maybe more."
"What?" Mei gasped, her eyes widening in disbelief.
"How do you know that? Are you sure?" Ao's head lifted. His voice came strained.
He had remained quiet until now, drowning in his own guilt. It had been his idea to lure out the masterminds by sending Takimura's envoy, and that decision had led them into a trap. The thought weighed on him constantly, and no matter how many times he replayed the battle in his mind, he found no way to undo it. All he could do was accept that his miscalculation had cost them dearly.
"The Leviathans told me," Kaoru answered quickly, almost spitting the words before hesitation could choke him. "One of them encountered that organization. But that's not the important part." His eyes hardened. "What matters now is what we do."
Ao exhaled heavily, then turned to Mei. "We need to reconsider our plans." He looked back at Kaoru, bowing his head slightly. "Thank you, Lord Kaoru. Without this, we would have sent our forces straight to their deaths."
Kaoru gave a short nod, but another question pressed against his mind. "How were you even planning to attack them? Do you know where their headquarters is?"
"No, we don't." Mei finally spoke again, her voice steady though her posture betrayed the unease settling into her. "But Shin is trying to find out through his contacts among the mercenaries. The group calls itself Akatsuki. They often take assassination missions. Remember when we were searching for mercenaries against Kiri? Shin discovered them then. He even tried recruiting one of their members, but they never answered him."
"Mhm," Kaoru nodded absentmindedly, before his gaze refocused again. "We need as much information as possible. If we can uncover their crimes against the other great villages, we might secure support. Even one such powerful ally could make the difference."
The room fell quiet, and in that silence everyone realized what had happened. Kaoru, who was not even fifteen yet, had taken the reins of the council without resistance. No one challenged his authority. In fact, they welcomed it, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
"I'll go to Sensei," Kaoru said suddenly. He pushed back his chair and stood, his movements brisk. "We can't leave him alone. He might do something reckless."
Before anyone could respond, he blurred from sight, his body vanishing in a sharp flicker of motion.
But his true destination wasn't Shin. His thoughts were already racing elsewhere. There was something he had remembered - a method, one that might allow him to reach beyond his limits, perhaps even to stand against Pain.
'I'm sorry, Grandma,' he thought, appearing in his room and kneeling beside a small chest. His hands trembled as he lifted the lid of the old wooden box. 'But I know you'd understand. Breaking a promise is worth it if it means saving Maki's life.'
It was the scroll Suiren had entrusted to him before her death. The very same one that was said to describe the technique she had used to fight against Yagura.
Kaoru's hands trembled as he unrolled it, his heart pounding against his ribs with each word his eyes devoured. He read it in a single breath, his mind clinging to every line as though the ink itself held his sister's life within it. Hope swelled, painful and desperate, choking his chest as he tried to steady himself.
'Shit…' the curse rang in his thoughts as he let the scroll fall onto his lap, his body dropping heavily onto the bed behind him. His breath escaped in a ragged sigh. 'It says my eyes are sealed. But Grandpa Ogashi said they aren't. Still… it explains the method… but the method is about how to remove the seal…'
For a long moment he lay there, staring at the ceiling, torn between disbelief and determination. Then his hands moved again, quicker this time, as he pulled the scroll out of the storage seal on his wrist. He spread it wide before him, his eyes tracing the intricate spirals and strokes carved into the parchment. Even a single glance told him what he already knew, these were not patterns a simple shinobi could comprehend. Yko Uzumaki would have killed for the chance to study them.
Kaoru bit hard into his thumb until blood welled, the taste sharp on his tongue, and smeared it across the parchment. His chakra followed, pouring into the seal with cautious precision.
For a heartbeat, the scroll glowed faintly, the markings pulsing with pale light. But just as quickly, it dimmed, the seal collapsing back into the form of an ordinary piece of paper.
'I hope he responds,' Kaoru thought, his anticipation twisting into something unbearable. Each second that followed stretched thin, drawn out until he felt as though time itself had abandoned him. Doubt crept in, maybe the seal had failed, or worse, maybe Ogashi had no intention of answering.
'Well… I'll have to improvise' The thought barely formed before the world tilted. His body went limp, collapsing into the bedding, while his mind was wrenched free, pulled through a current he could not fight.
The sensation was wrong, unnerving. He was weightless, yet heavy, as if falling and floating at once. His consciousness drifted far from his body until suddenly, he was submerged.
Water pressed around him, endless and deep, yet he realized with surprise that he could breathe, or rather, that he had no need to. His chest rose and fell from habit, not necessity.
He had expected freedom when his mind slipped the tether of his body, some vast sky to wander. Instead, he felt enclosed, as though he had been dropped into a sealed world. The water shimmered with strange clarity, fish darting past in bright streaks, their shapes warping and folding into one another. In the distance, massive Leviathans swam lazily, their immense forms distorting the space, blurring against the edges of perception.
This place was not his. It belonged to someone else.
"Kakaru, everything alright?"
The voice rolled through the water like thunder, drawing Kaoru's head, no, his entire being, to turn. His eyes widened as he found himself facing Ogashi, the colossal Leviathan. Just a single one of its eyes dwarfed his entire body, a vast orb of unfathomable depth gazing down at him.
"Grandpa Ogashi" he said in such delight that made the giant creature's eyes sparkle, although briefly as Kaoru's next words were filled with despair. "I need your help."
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Hello guys,
I'm sorry for not posting for a while. My family needed more of my time, so I had to pause AA for a bit. I'm back now, and the story will continue.
I also want to assure all of you that I won't be dropping AA without finishing Kaoru's journey. This is literally the first story I ever wrote, so I'm very attached to it xD
The Next Chapter on Tuesday
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You can read up to 20 chapters ahead on P@treon!
The link is also in the synopsis