Pre-AN #1: I will try not to post notes at the beginning of any more chapters unless something is important for the chapter itself. There will be very few notes at all as I wish to display the seriousness of this story more than anything else. This is not a funny story in any way. I put my heart into this.
Pre-AN #2: Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura are about 17 at this time.
Pre-AN #3: Emasi(OC) often calls Hakai (OC) 'chiisai-hito.' This is a rough translation of Japanese meaning 'little one.'
Pre-AN #4: For those of you reading my other Naruto fic, Ano San Taiyoo, it has been permanently abandoned due to plot interference. I am sorry.
Genres and Warnings: Blood, angst, mystery, possible limes, character death
There are several OCs in this story, but not too many, as a couple apparent OCs are canon characters in hiding. I can't really do a story without OCs, and as I really support the use of Original Characters, I'm not really going to try not to.
When the Black Fire Burns
Prologue
My name is Uchiha Sasuke. Over the past few months, I have learned more than I could have ever believed would affect my life. Hard to believe it's only been a few months. Seems like years.
I could go on forever, but you probably want to know the whole story...so here goes.
A long time ago…
The Uchihas were debatably the greatest of the Konoha shinobi for their kekkai genkai, but three stood out from this great clan.
The first was second only the Shodaime. He died saving the First Hokage's life in their last mission together.
The second was a student of the Hondaime. He went on a suicide mission to save the entire village from a mad scheme of a massed group of missing-nins.
The third was the most well-known, for he didn't die for some noble cause, and he didn't have the most popular missions a shinobi could get. He was an assassin, and one of the best.
He was known as Hokuro, for the color of his chakra.
It's not known how he died. Some say he committed suicide. Some say he failed an assassination attempt. Some say he never died.
One thing is known for certain. The Uchiha clan passed down a secret jutsu which would seal the user's power, their knowledge, their experience, and their chakra, into a small crystal that their descendents could call upon in hours of need.
Only these three used this secret jutsu.
The descendents of these three Uchihas guarded those stones with their lives, unable to call on the gift, unwilling to use the power, for once it was tapped, it was gone, never to be used again.
One man came up with a brilliant plan. His peers were bound speechless as he told them of it. They decided that they would do it.
They would take one of their own, a child, and they would take parts of the power from each of the stones and fuse the cumulated chakras with the infant's own.
They would create the perfect ninja, a shinobi able to access the power of the greatest Uchihas ever born, a ninja to represent the Uchihas in the world, a guardian to protect them from their natural rival, the Youma, or Tailed Beasts.
They began to practice, to experiment as to just how they were to mold these chakras with others. They did not use the ones from the stones, oh no, but others. They learned and they tried…and they failed.
Time and time again, the chakras unwound and killed their host. Until those trying to succeed had nearly given up.
Then…they had a successful generation. They knew how to mold the chakras now. They felt sure that now…the sacrifices of earlier years would not be in vain.
The researchers had learned that they could not mold all three chakras into one being, one Guardian, but two chakras? They could be fused with ease.
And so, three Guardians were carefully chosen from the generation born that decade.
One was an orphaned girl found on the edge of town.
The second was the son of a prestigious Uchiha family.
The third, and the one to inherit the blood of Hokuro, was also the son of a strong family, well-known and expected to be a great shinobi.
From birth, and from the fusion of their chakras with that of their ancestors, these three were trained to be the perfect ninja they were created to be. They were assembled into an elite team of shinobi, the only team comprised fully of Uchihas. They could not be challenged.
But…somewhere along the way…the Uchihas who created them forgot that man is not supposed to play god.