Naruto moved slightly in his spot, it almost seemed like he was slowly spinning on his own axis.
Finally, after almost making a full turn, he found Devan among those present, the boy once again was left stunned, his eyes focused on Devan, "The evil aura in bro is incredibly… dense," the boy almost let out a mouthful of saliva in surprise.
He could see, not only the necromancer's physical body, but also something denser, darker, and slightly red swirling inside him, inside Devan's body. That thing was dense, and almost glowed with its own light.
Naruto stepped back by pure instinct, his eyes fully dilated, "That's not the bro I know, it's not him, it's not him," he muttered under his breath, his body starting to tremble from the fear he felt.
Before Naruto could escape, the Anbu in charge of him quickly grabbed him from the back, moving him slightly to reposition him properly in the line of boys.
However, the Anbu noticed Naruto's state, his strangeness, the fear running through his body and the sweat on his forehead. He narrowed his eyes, he knew the boy was searching for Devan, it was… almost too obvious.
"The funeral needs to continue, don't move," the Anbu said as he patted Naruto's back. The boy nodded his head a couple of times.
The Anbu then left, not without first glancing at the necromancer, "What exactly is it that scares the boy?" he couldn't understand it, if he looked at the necromancer, he was completely normal, "Can the boy see something I can't?… Impossible!!!" he shook his head before returning to his place in the shadows.
Soon, the speech ended and people began to lay their flowers near the coffin and take one last look at Kurenai's face.
The flowers were being placed little by little, piling up. Naruto had a small bouquet of yellow roses bought by the Anbu ninja. When it was his turn, he was simply thinking of doing the same as everyone else.
However, "What?" Naruto muttered quietly, his steps stopped near the coffin, his eyes focused on the woman inside, "Evil aura in the corpse?…" Naruto stared at Kurenai's face for a moment. He bent down to place the flowers on the ground and almost at the same time, he felt a chill in his bones.
"No, I must be hallucinating," he didn't believe it himself, he stood upright again and looked once more at Kurenai's face, "There's nothing, no trace of evil," he let out a small sigh.
Everything went on normally for the following hours.
Devan stayed at the cemetery to finish some pending work he had, so the Anbu had to take care of Naruto.
"Do you remember Altair?" Kakashi approached Devan, who was contemplating the place where Kurenai had been buried. The necromancer listened calmly and shook his head, "The boy who died trying to assassinate Naruto?" he replied with a question.
Kakashi nodded, moved slightly forward, crouched down to feel the texture of the freshly moved earth while smiling slightly, "Me and some guys have been trying to figure out why he acted that way, you know, it was strange, and we found something interesting…"
Devan observed Kakashi from behind, the man was completely defenseless in that position. He narrowed his eyes, "Investigate?" he repeated in his mind, "Altair, the boy I told about the dream I had about Naruto, hmph," he smiled slightly, "If I launched a bone spear from this distance, and with your guard down, even you couldn't dodge it, Kakashi…"
The necromancer thought of several scenarios: one where Kakashi discovered that he had spoken with Altair some time ago, and another where he killed the white-haired ninja and then escaped from the village—neither convenient.
"So far it's known that Altair was an orphan and that the incident with the nine-tailed fox killed his parents, but, I was checking Altair's coffin last night, and…" Kakashi rubbed the back of his neck, slightly unsettled for some reason.
"Well, I, dug up Altair out of curiosity last night, and his body wasn't there, it disappeared…" Kakashi said in a grave voice. Devan listened, stopped the hand that was about to lift, blinked a couple of times, and then simply let out a slight smile.
"Some grave robber? It wouldn't surprise me, the village's medical department always needs bodies to experiment on…" Devan was about to continue when Kakashi interrupted him by raising a hand.
"No, Devan, there's something else, I found this in Altair's empty coffin," Kakashi tossed him a kind of shiny golden coin, then stood up and turned halfway to look at him.
Devan, for his part, grabbed the coin and began to examine it: It was golden, slightly shiny, with smooth edges, strange decorations on the face, and letters written on the back.
On the back it said, "Fractured Mind."
…
The necromancer quickly let out a small gasp of surprise, his eyes dilated slightly, his body loosened a bit, and despite the surprise, he quickly composed himself on the spot.
"Fractured Mind," Devan spoke almost in disbelief, "W-What does this mean?" he continued aloud, "It's a coin, gold from the looks of it, but, I don't understand…" Devan looked at Kakashi, but he also shook his head, showing he didn't know either.
"Fractured Mind: this suggests a broken mind, fractured, something like," Kakashi raised his hands to explain as he spoke, "Something like a descent into madness, I don't know… exactly who did this. Altair was an orphan, Do you understand? Nobody should even be interested in mocking him or his death," Kakashi let out a sigh before turning around.
"I'll be leaving on a mission with Guy, there are problems at the border with the other nations. Apparently, a supply shipment from the Hidden Cloud Village ended up in our territory. If you can… umm, find out who left that gold coin and stole Altair's body," Kakashi began stretching.
Devan watched his back for a moment with genuine curiosity, the golden Fractured Mind Coin, he let out a long, restrained sigh before cracking his neck.
"Maybe you can find something interesting, besides, the Hokage's elite Anbu are investigating how or why Altair acted that way, this is probably helpful too. See you and take care," Kakashi disappeared thanks to his great speed after saying those words.
The light cold wind hit Devan's face as he toyed with the gold coin in his hands, "Does this have something to do with the counter?" he asked himself, but there was no need for him to wonder that, deep down in his heart, he believed it was the counter who had done this, but, How?
Devan smiled, looked at the place where Kurenai was buried, "Maybe, your body will also disappear leaving behind a golden Fractured Mind coin," he thought, but then simply turned around, ready to go to his office in the cemetery and finish the paperwork here.
"Fractured Mind, descent into madness, broken mind, it seems Kakashi has more intuition about this shitty counter than I do, he guessed it with just a single gold coin," he thought to himself.
Chapters Ahead on: [email protected]/tgthegoodd
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