The fever did not burn like a fire; it burned like ice.
It started in the marrow of Ren Yamanaka's bones, a deep, pervasive shivering that no amount of wool blankets could suppress. He lay on a cot in the overcrowded field hospital of the Forward Operating Base, his body curled into a tight fetal position.
Outside, the relentless rain of the Land of Earth hammered against the canvas roof, sounding like thousands of tiny fingers tapping, demanding entry. Inside, the air was heavy with the smell of cauterized flesh, antiseptic herbs, and the sour reek of dysentery.
But for Ren, the physical world was distant. He was drowning in his own mind.
Digestion.
That was the only word for what was happening to him. His chakra coils, usually thin and modest streams of spiritual energy, were currently gorged, distended by a flood of foreign power. The chakra he had ripped from the Iwagakure Commander, Goro, was thick, heavy, and undeniably earthy. It felt like swallowing a landslide.
As Ren's body fought to integrate this alien energy, his mind was fighting a war of identity.
"Take the left flank! Don't let the Leaf ninjas break the line!" a voice shouted in his head. It was Goro's voice.
"Ren, eat your vegetables," his mother's voice whispered, overlapping the first.
"My daughter… Emi… she needs new sandals for the festival," Goro thought, the emotion hitting Ren with the force of a sledgehammer—a profound, protective love that Ren had never personally experienced.
Ren gasped, clutching the sheets. "Get out," he hissed through chattering teeth. "Get out of me."
The memories were fragmented, dissolving like sugar in hot water. As his own chakra system broke down Goro's spiritual essence, the memories were being stripped of their context, turning into raw data. The emotion was fading, leaving behind only the cold, hard facts of technique and experience.
He saw the hand signs for the Earth Shore Return jutsu. He felt the exact ratio of chakra needed to condense mud into granite. He understood the tectonic stress points of the valley they had escaped from.
But the cost was the nausea. A spiritual purging. Ren leaned over the side of the cot and retched into a metal bucket. Nothing came up but clear, stringy saliva. His stomach was empty, but his soul felt bloated.
"Easy, soldier," a soft voice said.
A medical-nin, a woman with dark circles under her eyes and a blood-stained apron, placed a glowing green hand on Ren's forehead. Her chakra was cool, soothing, like a damp cloth.
"Your fever is breaking," she murmured, checking his pulse. "But your chakra levels… they're erratic. Fluctuating wildy."
Ren looked up at her, his vision blurring. "Am I… dying?"
She frowned, looking at a clipboard attached to the foot of his bed. "Technically, you should be dead. You came in with severe chakra exhaustion, three cracked ribs, and mild hypothermia. But…" She tapped the paper. "Your reserves are regenerating at twice the normal rate for a Chunin of your build. It's almost as if your body received a massive infusion of energy and is trying to stretch to accommodate it."
Ren closed his eyes. Stretch. He felt like a snake that had swallowed a pig whole.
"Where are… the others?" Ren rasped.
"Your squadmates?" The medic gestured to the other side of the partition. "The Uchiha boy and the Inuzuka girl. They're fine. Physical injuries only. You took the brunt of the spiritual strain."
She adjusted his blanket. "Rest. The debriefing officer will be here in the morning. They have… questions. About the wall."
She walked away, moving on to a man with a missing leg who was moaning softly in the corner.
Ren lay back, staring at the canvas ceiling. The voice of Goro was fainter now. The love for the daughter named Emi was becoming a dull ache, a phantom limb of an emotion that wasn't his.
But as the foreign presence faded, something else took its place.
The Hunger.
It wasn't the ravenous, black-hole void he had felt in the cave. This was subtler. It was a gnawing emptiness. The withdrawal. He had tasted the power of a Jonin. He had felt what it was like to be strong, to be decisive, to command the earth itself. And now, as that power was metabolized and settled into his new baseline, the "high" was gone.
He felt small again. He felt like Ren the Battery.
He clenched his fist under the blanket. He squeezed so hard his nails cut into his palms. He didn't want to go back. He didn't want to be the weakling hooked up to a machine.
"I won't," he whispered to the darkness. "I won't be food. I will be the eater."
Morning brought a gray, diffuse light that offered no warmth. The rain had slowed to a drizzle.
Ren sat on the edge of his cot, testing his legs. They held. He felt different. Heavier. Not in terms of weight, but in terms of presence. His center of gravity felt lower. He stood up and instinctively widened his stance, his feet rooting to the floorboards. It was a subtle shift in taijutsu posture—the influence of the Iwa Commander's muscle memory.
"You're awake."
Ren looked up. Kaito Uchiha stood at the entrance of the partition.
Kaito looked better than he had in the mud, but his spirit seemed broken. His arm was in a sling, and he had a bandage wrapped around his head. But it was his eyes that drew Ren's attention. They were dark, flat, and filled with a mixture of confusion and jealousy that made Ren's heart ache.
"Kaito," Ren said, offering a weak smile. "You made it."
Kaito didn't smile back. He walked into the small space, closing the flap behind him. He stood there, looking at Ren as if seeing a stranger.
"Sora is sedated," Kaito said quietly. "She kept trying to summon her dog. The medics had to put her under."
"That's… probably for the best," Ren said.
"They're calling it the Miracle of Sector 7," Kaito said, his voice hard. "The report says Unit 44 was ambushed by a hunter-killer squad. Captain Taizen died. Hideo died. We were cornered."
Kaito stepped closer, his good hand clenching into a fist. "And then, Ren Yamanaka, the 'battery,' the guy who passes out after two hours of sensory linking, conjured a Class-B Earth Style defensive wall. A wall strong enough to divert a mud river."
Ren looked down at his bare feet. He had rehearsed this lie in his head a dozen times during the fever dreams.
"Adrenaline," Ren murmured. "I don't know, Kaito. I was terrified. I just… slammed my hands down and pushed everything I had."
"Don't lie to me!" Kaito snapped, his voice cracking. He looked around to make sure no one heard, then lowered his voice to a hiss. "I know chakra theory, Ren. You have Yin release and Water release. You don't have Earth. You can't just 'adrenaline' your way into a nature transformation you've never practiced!"
Ren looked up, meeting his friend's gaze. He saw the pain there. Kaito, the Uchiha who couldn't awaken his bloodline, had just been saved by the "untalented" friend who suddenly performed a feat of genius. It was a slap in the face to Kaito's entire worldview.
"I can't explain it," Ren said, keeping his voice steady despite the guilt churning in his gut. "Maybe it was a dormant trait? My grandmother was from a civilian family in the Earth region. Maybe… maybe the fear just unlocked it."
Kaito stared at him, searching for the lie. He wanted to scream. He wanted to call Ren a fraud. But he couldn't deny what he had seen. The wall was real. They were alive because of it.
"You have it," Kaito whispered, his shoulders slumping. "You have the spark. The genius. You were just hiding it."
"No, Kaito, I—"
"I was so arrogant," Kaito let out a bitter laugh, running his hand through his hair. "I was pitying you. 'Poor Ren, the human generator.' And all this time, you had that kind of power sitting inside you? You must have been laughing at me."
"I never laughed at you," Ren said, stepping forward, reaching out a hand. "Kaito, we're friends. We survived. That's what matters."
Kaito flinched away from Ren's touch. "Friends tell each other the truth. Friends don't hide their power while the other one struggles."
"I didn't know!" Ren pleaded. This part, at least, was true.
Kaito looked at him for a long moment, his face unreadable. "The Anbu are coming for you. They want to know about the wall. If you're smart, Ren… you'll get a promotion. You won't be stuck in the mud with the rest of us failures."
Kaito turned and walked out of the tent, leaving the flap swinging in his wake.
Ren stood frozen, his hand still outstretched. He felt a sharp pang of loss. He had saved Kaito's life, but he had killed their dynamic. The camaraderie of shared misery was gone. Now, there was a hierarchy, and Ren had accidentally stepped on top of it.
The worst part was, Ren felt a flicker of contempt. Not for Kaito, but for the weakness Kaito represented. The weakness Ren used to have.
He doesn't understand, the inner voice whispered. He thinks it's talent. He doesn't know it's theft.
Ren lowered his hand. He needed to get ready. Kaito was right. The wolves were coming.
The interrogation took place in a reinforced bunker dug into the side of a hill, away from the prying eyes of the main camp.
Ren sat on a wooden stool. Opposite him sat two men.
One was Jiro, the brute from the intel tent who had used him as a battery. He looked skeptical, his arms crossed over his thick chest.
The other man was different. He wore the standard Jonin vest, but his undershirt was black, and he wore a porcelain mask on his hip—Anbu. He had long, pale hair tied back in a ponytail. His eyes were sharp, analytical, and terrifyingly intelligent.
This was Raidō Namiashi (senior relative to the canon Raidō), a specialist in assassination and field interrogation.
"Let's review," Raidō said, his voice raspy, like dry leaves skittering on stone. "You claim that during the ambush, you experienced a moment of extreme lucidity."
"Yes, sir," Ren said. He sat perfectly still. The Iwa Commander's memories had taught him how to sit during a briefing—spine straight, eyes forward, breathing controlled.
"And in this moment," Raidō continued, tapping a scroll on the table, "You utilized Earth Style: Earth Shore Return. A jutsu not recorded in your file. A jutsu not taught in the Academy. A jutsu that requires precise chakra control and specific nature transformation."
"I… I mimicked them, sir," Ren lied. It was a risky gamble. "I saw the enemy using Earth Style. I have… always been good at memorization. The Yamanaka clan is known for mental acuity. I just… copied the signs and poured my chakra into it."
Jiro snorted. "Bullshit. I've been inside this kid's head. He's a mediocre sensor with a soft ego. He can't even handle a Mind Transfer without getting a nosebleed. Now you're telling me he's Hatake Kakashi, copying jutsu on the fly?"
Raidō raised a hand to silence Jiro. He leaned forward, his dark eyes boring into Ren.
"The Medic Corps analyzed your chakra network this morning, Ren," Raidō said softly. "They found something interesting. Your chakra pathways have permanently expanded by 18%. That kind of growth usually takes years of training. You achieved it in one night."
Ren's heart hammered against his ribs. They know. They know I'm a monster.
"But," Raidō continued, "there is no evidence of forbidden seals. No curse marks. No drugs."
Ren exhaled slowly. They didn't know how. They only saw the result.
"War changes men," Raidō said, sitting back. "Trauma can unlock latent potential. It is rare, but we have seen it. The desperate mind forces the body to evolve."
He picked up a stamp and pressed it onto the scroll. APPROVED.
"However," Raidō said, his tone shifting to something colder. "You are an anomaly. You performed a Jonin-level feat, but you lack the experience, the tactical training, and the proven loyalty of a Jonin. We cannot send you back to be a battery. It would be a waste of resources."
"Does that mean I'm being promoted?" Ren asked, hope and fear warring in his chest.
"It means you are being reassigned," Raidō said. "We have a backlog of enemy corpses from the northern offensive. Intel Division is overwhelmed. We need processors. People who can handle the dead, extract information, and dispose of the bodies."
Ren felt a chill. "Corpse Processing?"
It was the lowest of the low. The Gravediggers. It was a job for the mentally unstable, the disgraced, or the expendable. You spent your days in cold rooms, sawing open skulls and diving into the fading brains of dead enemies to scrape out the last bits of secrets before the brain tissue rotted.
"Your chakra control is now… enhanced," Jiro grunted. "And you survived a mind-breaking ambush. You have the stomach for it."
"Is that an order?" Ren asked.
"It is," Raidō said. "You report to Unit 0—The Morgue—at 0600 tomorrow. Do not disappoint us, Yamanaka. If this power of yours was a fluke, you'll wash out. If it's real… well, the morgue is a good place to hide secrets."
Ren stood up and bowed. "Understood."
As he walked out of the bunker, he felt a strange sensation. It wasn't relief. It was anticipation.
Corpse Processing.
Dead bodies. Fresh dead bodies.
Bodies full of secrets. Full of chakra. Full of… food.
Ren stopped in the mud outside the bunker. He covered his mouth, horrified by his own train of thought. I shouldn't want this. It's cannibalism of the soul. It's evil.
But the hunger in the back of his mind purred. It didn't care about evil. It cared about survival. And Ren, the boy who had been weak his entire life, suddenly realized he had been given the keys to the candy store.
The rest of the day passed in a blur of administrative hostility.
Ren packed his meager belongings from the squad tent. Sora was still asleep, moaning softly in her drug-induced slumber. Kaito was nowhere to be found. Ren left a note on Kaito's pillow. It just said: I'm sorry. Survive.
He walked to the edge of the camp, where the black tents of the Corpse Processing Unit were set up. The area smelled of formaldehyde and incense.
He was met by a hunched old man with one eye, the head of the unit, who simply pointed him to a station.
"Don't steal the gold fillings," the old man wheezed. "And don't vomit on the scrolls. That's the orientation."
Ren sat at his new desk. It was a slab of stone covered in dried bloodstains. In front of him lay a body bag.
He unzipped it.
Inside was a Mist ninja. Pale skin, sharp teeth. He had been dead for maybe six hours.
Ren placed his hand on the cold forehead.
He hesitated.
This was the crossroads. He could do the job the normal way—use standard Yamanaka techniques to skim the surface, get the intel, and go home. It was safe. It was moral.
Or…
He could eat.
He could take the water style jutsu this man knew. He could take his sword skills. He could take his chakra to permanently expand his own reserves again.
If I do this, Ren thought, I lose my humanity. Step by step.
He looked at his reflection in the metal tray next to the body. His eyes looked older. Harder.
He remembered Hideo dying on the rock. He remembered Taizen being crushed. He remembered the feeling of helplessness.
"I will not be disposable," Ren whispered.
He closed his eyes. He opened the gate in his mind. The hunger roared to life, grateful and eager.
CONNECT.
He dove into the corpse.
The sensation was colder than with the live Iwa Commander. The soul was fading, tethered loosely to the decaying brain. It tasted like stagnant water and blood. It was bitter.
Ren didn't care. He feasted.
He pulled the memories of Hidden Mist Jutsu into his mind. He drank the residual chakra, feeling his coils burn and expand, pushing past the 18% growth, aiming for 20%.
He saw the Mist ninja's life—a brutal training academy, killing a friend to graduate. It was a dark, jagged memory. Ren swallowed it whole, suppressing the urge to gag.
When he opened his eyes ten minutes later, he was sweating profusely. His nose was bleeding.
But he knew the Water Style hand signs. He knew how to move silently in fog.
He wiped the blood from his lip and picked up a quill. He began to write the official report, detailing the intel he had found. He left out the part where he had consumed the source.
Outside, the war raged on. Explosions lit up the horizon. Men were dying by the hundreds.
Ren Yamanaka sat in the dark, surrounded by the dead, and for the first time in his life, he didn't feel afraid of the future.
He felt like a predator who had finally found his hunting ground.
He reached for the next body bag.
"Next," he whispered.
End of Chapter 3