It was a quiet, peaceful morning. The air was still damp from the last night's rain, brining a refreshing chill to the breeze. The village was as lively as ever, even this early. If one would ignore the shinobi, even many civilians tended to wake up early. Most had good reasons- training, work, or even simply enjoying the morning air.
Moving from the village's edge, one would find a sprawling compound, with a smaller one just adjacent to it. The larger one was extremely clean and well looked after, its inhabitants having a keen eye for detail and appearances. A paddle-like symbol, black on the bottom and split by a crimson tip was emblazoned everywhere. Blossoming trees were everywhere, their petals drifting in the morning sun and paining the skies a beautiful hue of orange and pink.
In the smaller compound, things were moving slightly slower. The streets were slightly less spotless compared to that of the Uchiha, but that was to be expected when their main advantage was to spot things others couldn't. But the Kano clan was still respectable. They were a people of both precision and braud strokes.
Shhhk...
A door slid open to reveal a younger man, a rough beard forming on his chin, stumbled from his house. Said house was quite large, in fact it was the largest house in the Kano compound, belonging to their current clan leader- His father. "Uggh, I need to lay back on the soju." He muttered to himself.
The house was humble, despite the family that lived there. Besides the hosue itself, which was walled off, it was surrounded by a few other buildings. See the Kano compound had two layers inside of it. The outer layer for most members, then the inner layer for the head, elders, and of course the jonin.
Sighing, he stood straighter and sent a pulse of chakra through his body, causing a light steam to escape his pores. The headache remained, but at least now he could see straight. Riku, rubbed his temple as he started walking down the street towards a smaller home inside the inner layer.
Knocking on the door, Riku waited a moment, but no one answered. He couln't even hear any movements inside, which caused him to sigh. As one of the rarer sensory-nins, he very well knew that the boy he was seeking was inside, and by his position, he was still curled up in bed.
Gently sliding the door open, Riku stepped inside and closed it behind him. The sight inside was... abysmal was being polite. It was a horrid mess. The ground was covered in trash. Ramen cups, chopsticks, dirty half-eaten plates of food, they were everywhere. Looking up, he saw that the curtains were drawn, leaving the silent house in a solem darkness.
Riku sighed again as he steeled himself to enter the side room. Slowly sliding the door open, the sight inside was even worse somehow. There were thinsg everywhere, and there was even stains on the wall, leaving almost no room to walk, but Riku couldn't bring himself to be dissapointed in the boy curled up in the bed, his dead, gray eyes seemingly peering into his soul.
Even covered by a thick blanket, Riku could see the kid was thin, and he still remembered the state in which he was returned to them. Many years ago, the boy's parents had been slaugtered, and he himself dissapeared for a long while before a passing jonin found him.
What exactly happened to him was unknown to everyone, though Riku knew that his father Genzo and Lord Third knew the truth and kept it hidden, and that meant it had been harrowing for the boy.
When he arrived, his thin, frail body was covered in scars. Not the ones gained from mistakes in battle, but surgical, precise and clean. They hovered above vital places on the boy's body- the heart, liver, kidneys, the spine, along his shoulders, hips, and shins. They were everywhere, and that wasn't even the half of it.
Riku sighed once again, stepping closer and dropping to his knee to meet his eye level. "...Masaru, how are you?"
The boy's dead eyes stayed dead, doing nothing but peering back at him for a very long time. Then the boy blinked.
...
And blinked again. And again, then rapidly. Sweat formed on Masaru's brow as he seemingly sprung to life. One moment he was within the warm coveres of his bed, the next he was on the floor holding his head, having abruptly sprung from his spot.
Riku was shocked. This was more movement he'd seen in the kid since the moment he laid his eyes on him.
Masaru coninued to groan and shake on the floor before going abruptly still, looking up and around himself, confused. "What?" He croaked.
He pulled himself to his feet with the help of the bed frame, holding his head. As his breath calmed down, he looked around the room, from the bed, to the trash on the floor, to the young adult staring at him wide-eyed.
"...Where am I?"
|AN| Hello peeps! This is my second attempt at writing a naruto fic and I'm honsetly exited about my set up! A disclaimer before we go on- I am a college student and I have terrible ADHD, so please don't fret if I forget to update or go a long while without writing. I have a job and many other duties I have to keep up with before I follow my little hobby. With that out of the way we move onto the ovbious: I have created my own original clan. Many will hate this, but know that they are a medium sized clan and are won't have a ground breaking effect on the inner workings of the story.
Okay thats it for now. Love yall, see you when I see you!