The Renaissance of a Blossom
Arc 1 - The Rings
Chapter No. 1
Jewel
"No one had ever known the information within these pages until just recently. It has been years after the events of these files, and only the most necessary people are allowed to read the past history of when I went missing for so long. This is classified to nearly all of the world, but lately, the past has been revealed a known enemy, one that wants to destroy the very thing that they created so long ago. Only a few chosen people can save themselves and the entire world. They thought that it was over, instead it was just the beginning of it all. No one ever thought of this outcome, but it happened. Read these pages and you will learn of new beginnings. Learn the truth that has been kept secret for years. Peace has been upon us, but that is over. This is the start of a new war."
"I think It's funny actually, this is my story, but I never even thought for a second that it would actually be relatively realistic. The future is never entirely clear, but one thing is for certain. This, is the start of new beginnings, but I never said that it was a good thing."
"It started on a month long clock that began to tick after a nightmare was shown to me. It was after that month long timeframe where I realized my life would be changed forever. There was no going back after that day either."
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A color of scarlet. Locks of red, of crimson, the color that's so rightfully identical to what lies coursing within her veins. It was softer to the touch, like feathers. A devilish feather that can manipulate with the ease of a string, and lead her along with the wind until she lost herself in tranquility, or perhaps in her sin's most terrible of desires.
Iris's of chocolate and honey. A perfect mix that conforms together. She felt herself get lost in their beauty, for she stared into them lovingly. He stared down at her with those orbs of amber, as he towered over her petite form.
It was night. The stars shined brightly, but the moon was replaced with the shadows that descended across the land. The wind crossed their path relentlessly, but she almost couldn't feel it as she had him with her at the time.
As he leaned down, she leaned forward, and as their lips met everything became black.
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Sakura awoke with a start. Her breaths were ragged as her heart pulsed at a rate that far exceeded her average. She had broken out into a cold sweat and she was drenched all over her body with it. She clutched her chest, the fear of what she had saw was slowly starting to be replaced by pure relief.
She stared wild eyed out the window of her bedroom, the night as morbid as her dream. The clouds passed by with the grasp that the cold strands of wind, forcing them to retreat farther across the sky. They bypassed the opaque moon, contorting a normally beautiful scene to something filled with the foreshadows of horror. To say the least for Sakura, she was not reassured by such a dour sight.
That dream. That dream. What was that? Why was Akasuna no Sasori there? She had killed him more than seven years ago, way before the Fourth Shinobi World War even began. And the way she and him had acted. It was as if they were in love with each other. Why the hell would that be the case? What was this? She had felt everything so vividly too. She could even remember the colorings that became him to ideally.
She ran her fingers through her hair stressfully, feeling the cold sweat that wetted her long pink locks. She was cold, dreadfully cold. She shivered, and quickly wrapped her blankets around her body. Now that that dream was over she could almost feel the heat that she had lost from after she had broken off from that dream. It was strange, she decided.
She looked up and onto the shining moon above, and nonetheless, it seemed merciless. The moonlight covered her form, creating her skin to become even more milky than originally. She could feel her skin begin to prickle at the sight.
It was times like this that she really wished that Sasuke would simply return her feelings. She frowned sadly at the thought, and let herself drop back onto the bedspread, the thoughts of her dream forgotten. Her back faced the wall toward her large window as she gripped the chilling comforter tighter.
Sasuke. He had returned during the ending stages of the War, becoming Naruto's right hand. He had brought the Edo Tensei copies of the four past Hokages with him on that night. With everyone's combined help, Madara, Obito, and the Ten-Tails had been defeated, the two bodies burned and the Ten-Tails's remaining Jinjuriki sealed in places that only she and the rest of Konoha 12 knew, as well as the Hokage's most trusted advisors and pupils. That day had been exactly six years ago to this day. Todays was the celebration of the ending of the Fourth Shinobi World War, although few thought of it as a celebration.
Five years. She still had the nightmares that enraptured her mind in dark chaos. She could still remember when she had gained the violet diamond mark that embedded itself on her forehead. She could still remember with the upmost clarity as Sasuke had arrived onto the battlefield as she was healing Naruto. She could still remember how it had all ended. She remembered everything.
During the past five years, she had become the third strongest shinobi and kunoichi in the village; third to only the Hokage and the last remaining Uchiha themselves. She had taken the Hospital for the remaining months that Tsunade became Hokage, but she only was there part time, for the majority of her time was spent with Sasuke, Kakashi, Sai, and Naruto, receiving as many missions as possible before the blonde idiot of Team Seven became the Hokage. Those months had been hectic and time consuming, but the best time she had ever had. She wouldn't change or replace a single moment in that timeframe.
After Naruto had officially become the 6th Hokage, she had become the Head of the Hospital with Shizune as the second. Any extra time that Sakura obtained was with the retired Tsunade, teaching her anything that the former Hokage could get her hands on. She had worked her ass off for three whole years before Tsunade had deemed her as stronger than herself, and even she had been shocked to hear such news. When she had told her teammates, they hadn't been surprised in the least. Sasuke had merely stated that she was no longer what she use to be and that she was no longer an annoyance on missions. She was lucky that she had Kakashi-sensei there to hold her back from not completely obliterating Sasuke right then and there.
The charges on Sasuke had been removed almost instantaneously after her had arrived back and everything was settled. For the citizens and shinobi of Konoha, having Sasuke back after three long years was traumatizing. People were weary and apprehensive of Sasuke for months afterward, and some were outraged by him not having any charges after all he had done. She was one of the few that actually helped him return back to a relatively normal lifestyle. Most of Konoha 12 was rather kind compared to the rest of the people out there, but even Ino had her problems with Sasuke afterward.
At lot has happened since that day, and as Sakura thought over it all she thought of the beginning. Of the day that she had met the very man from her dream she only had moments before. Of scarlet locks and amber irises. She wondered why he allowed Chiyo to kill him, by the hands of his Mother and Father puppets no less. One's he had created not by hatred, but of loneliness. The man that had killed the notorious Third Kazekage, and made a human puppet out of him. Akasuna no Sasori.
That name was her last reverie as she drifted off into a crimson dreamscape.
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Akasuna no Sasori. That was the name that he's always had since childhood, many years ago, but he was barely a child when he obtained the beginning of his name. Akasuna no Sasori. Sasori of the Redsand. It certainly had a bloody meaning. The Third Shinobi World War had given him that attachment. Red. Aka. It didn't even matter.
Sasori sat upon his bedroom's window-seat, the moonlight lighting his skin to an even paler complexion that what he already had. Skin. It was something long forgotten, something that he had never cared for, something he had rid of more than twenty-five years ago. But, it was also something that he had just recently gotten back.
He had been revived for five months, as have the other Akatsuki members and servants of the organization. When he had first awoken he found that the rest of the key members had something strange in mind. They were waiting for someone to arrive here. It was one of many things in his life he had come to loath.
Why he was alive was one of few questions that he had no answer to. It was a mystery that he had no idea where to even start. There was a legacy that came with it, he knew that much. He also knew that he was apart of it. There was barely any logic in his assumption, but he still thought it correct. He was usually never one for gut feelings, but this one he was more consumed in than other before.
He could remember when he had been revived through the Edo Tensei. It certainly hadn't been a very pleasant experience, and he had been proven wrong more than once in his thought process. He had thought he had been considered a true puppet, and at first he was glad. But then, when everything was really thought over and proven wrong he didn't want to remain in that state. He wasn't one to be manipulated. He was no puppet. He, was the puppet master. He controlled others, and no one controlled him. It would forever and always be this way, even when he does truly pass on for a final time.
He briefly pondered if that girl was still alive. That pink haired kunoichi who had fought alongside his grandmother more than seven years previous. He could only begin to contemplate how much stronger she could be. Back then she had been fine, exceptional even, and relatively smart to be able to figure out his poison's antidote so quickly. She would be much stronger now, that is, if she was still alive. Being apart of the Fourth Shinobi World War himself, he knew some of the deaths and casualties that would have resulted. However, she was a medical ninja, trained by the great 5th Hokage herself. He had heard from Zetsu of what had happened to him when she figured out his scheme. He had been momentarily impressed, but then again, he had been had the hand of her abilities before as well.
When the Issue was resolved and the organization disbanded, he would find her again. He wanted a taste of just what she could handle now.
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"SAKURA-CHAN!"
With the shinobi reflexes that she had, she was jolted from her dream, and into a sitting position. The sunlight warmed her skin, as the window remained drawn. Her eyes were wide from being suddenly woken, battle ready if need be.
Instead, she was met with two all too familiar chalkra presences. Naruto and Sasuke. As Naruto towered over her with a jolly grin, Sasuke stood behind her, standing on a ledge by her window, his face in its usual impassiveness. She immediately relaxed.
On a normal occasion she probably would've screamed in their faces, but she was far too stressed out from the night before that she didn't even care. Sakura rubbed her eyes tiredly, her lips set in a tired frown.
"Naruto," Sakura said tiredly, before letting her hands drop back onto her comforter. "What are you even doing here?"
"Here to give you guys your newest mission, Sakura-Chan," Naruto replied elatedly. The cheeky grin on his face was enough to say that he had left his office without anyone knowing.
"Well, I'm here," Sakura admitted, dropping back onto her bed. "Spill it."
A pouty frown marred his face at her unenthusiastic response. "Sakura-Chan~"
"Get it over with dobe," Sasuke shot out annoyedly. Sakura could see the irritation in his endless obsidian orbs. His shoulders always tensed up quite tightly when he got annoyed too.
"Oi! Teme!" Naruto yelled, before pointing to himself in an arrogant manner that made Sasuke scoff. "Hokage here."
Sakura smiled to herself at the retorts, annoyances, and yelling, or more so rude comments from her two most trusted companions. She would never take either for granted after what they had all gone though. They were all stronger from their past experiences, yet they were the same in the heart. Perhaps when she was twelve she had taken everything that she had for for granted, never again would she though. Never again. She would cherish what she had. They were her most precious jewels.
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"You've been acting strange." It hadn't been an accusation, merely an observation on Sasuke's part. There was no rudeness directed in the comment either. Of course Sasuke would notice her difference in behavior, if anyone could, it would be him.
Sakura gave him a rueful smile in return. "There's no point in denying it, huh?"
They had been traveling through the trees at a breakneck pace that only few in the village could muster for the last three hours. There hadn't been much for conversation, but Sasuke had noticed the change the moment she had rubbed her hands into her face that morning. He had not decided to act upon it, for he knew that Sakura probably didn't even want to bother him with it, however as time went on, he became curious to the point of insanity. What could possibly be worrying the precious Blossom of Konoha, after all?
Sakura thought over the previous night when she had woken to that dream of Akasuna no Sasori. It certainly had been scary to wake up to such romantic thoughts of a mass murderer that she helped kill. The even stranger thing about it was the fact that it seemed so lifelike, so vivid and realistic that she swore that it was a memory or a future event that was bound to occur. She could even remember the feeling of her hands traveling through his soft crimson locks. She felt a strange sensation of loss after that thought.
She looked at Sasuke, and saw that his jaw was set in a tight clench. That was enough of an answer for her to reply. "I had an offsetting nightmare last night," Sakura decided to say.
She could see a change in his eyes. One of confusion. Then she asked him curiously, "Have you ever heard of Akasuna no Sasori?"
"Aa," Sasuke grunted. "The puppet master of the Akatsuki. You fought him."
"I did," Sakura sighed tiredly, looking back at the forest ahead of them. "It was a dark and dangerous day. In the end he died by the very puppets he created so that he wouldn't be as lonely when he was a child." She paused before conceding sadly, "It's a terrible way to die."
"You speak of him as if your sorry he died," Sasuke replied calmly.
She shook her head uncertainly, confusedly. "I don't know. When I first met him, I hated him. No, I loathed him more than anyone I had ever known. I don't know anymore though. That dream I had was so...strange."
"Dreams can mean many things," Sasuke said with so much thoughtfulness that Sakura's eyes widened considerably. She had never heard him speak like that before. Calmly yes, but almost trance-like, never. She didn't know what to think of it, nor what to say. Instead she turned to the forest again and they once again began their trek in silence.
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Sakura didn't know what happened next. She was picking up water from a nearby river when she could hear the sounds of a thousand birds in the distance. Chidori. Sasuke. Quickly she raced out of the area, the canteens forgotten at the side of the river.
The night was morbid. Like when she woke twenty-four hours before. It was as if it was a sign. Sakura felt panic at that moment. Sasuke was strong, she knew, and yet she couldn't help but worry at the strangeness of the night that followed her around like her own two legs. She didn't know why she felt like this.
Then one moment she was running, the next she was waking up to the color of a beauteous raven. Cold raven. With blinking eyes, she took in what she saw, before they widened. She jolted up, and into a sitting position. She could see Sasuke next to her, lying there. Simply lying there. She then noticed it. There no on chalkra in him. Nothing.
"Wha?" Sakura gasped, horror starting to spread around her. His eyes were closed. "Sasuke?"
There was no response. She checked his pulse, his chalkra flow, even gave him a full body scan. Nothing. Not a trace of anything. Not a trace, as if he wasn't real. As if nothing had happened.
Then she found it. A single bit mark on the back of his neck. A snake bite.
Sakura's eyes widened, and true and undeniable horror washed over her. As tears started to escape her eyes, she gasped, shaking her head vigorously. She wouldn't believe that Sasuke was dead so quickly. But there was nothing else to check. No poison. No muscle damage. No bones broken. No internal damage. Not cuts. Nothing. She felt like screaming, but she knotted her fists into the cold grass that was around them before she looked up to the sky. The white moon stared at her mercilessly.
She pushed chalkra through him then, as if that could do anything to help him. She did this until dawn, but it wasn't until that time that she realized just where she was, and she was drained of chalkra. She was in River Country. She was right next to the cavern where she had beaten Akasuna no Sasori.
Shocked, terrified, demoralized, and drained of energy, Sakura stared at the battle field that had once been the greatest challenge of her life. Her brows knitted together at how much emotion was enraptured in her body and soul. As tears fell, she collapsed next to the peaceful body of her first love.
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She didn't even realize that she closed her eyes until she awoke the next day. A sound of a bird chirping. Trees rustling all around. A gleam of something shined directly onto her closed eyelids. Blinking rapidly, Sakura began to perceive what lay ahead of her. Something was shining from the cavern. It was as if the object was winking at her, trying to entice her to find it.
Dread filled her to the core when she realized what had just happened the night before. She could feel the burning from behind her eyes, but refused to let them fall from her eyes.
She would have to return to Konoha now. She had been foolish enough to simply stay there the entire night without protection of any kind. She was lucky that she wasn't dead too. She hadn't been thinking straight, she knew. She couldn't do anything of it though. Not now. Not when...Sasuke was gone. Forever...Gone. Just the thought alone was almost too horrifying to ever believe.
Just what had happened though? Had she been captured in a Genjutsu of some sort when she had blanked out? A snake bite. It would have to have been a summon for Sasuke to have been bitten. What had happened? The enemy hadn't even given her a trace of the chalkra signature for her to notice. Nothing! The only lead she had was a snake summon, which pretty much any level of shinobi could do.
It couldn't have been from the mission, could it? They were merely going to give another Kage a scroll that could mean better border patrol for them. It hadn't even been considered an A-Class mission. They had to be relatively covert about it, but nothing strenuously difficult that they couldn't manage easily. It wasn't even that big of a mission. It simply had to be something else. But, what?!
Another gleam reached her eyes as she stood up from the cold grasslands of River Country. Her tear-glazed eyes turned to the gleam in the distance that was coming from inside the cavern. Then, after a rustle of wind, the gleam was gone from her line of vision. Her brows furrowed, but she quickly forgot it was ever there. Her emeralds stared helplessly at Sasuke, forcing herself not to cry. Not now. Not here.
Quickly she forged a jutsu that she had learned from Tsunade. At least she had a majority of her chalkra back. Small mercies, she supposed. She twisted and turned her hands in various hand signs, creating a last resource jutsu. It would drain the remaining portion of chalkra she had obtained though. When she arrived, she wouldn't be able to tell her tale right away.
Within seconds the jutsu had worked, but just as Sakura had presumed, she was out of chalkra. Once again, Sakura blacked out.
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A week. A week had passed since Sasuke's funeral. The rain had been pouring each and everyday, as if mother nature herself was weeping for the death of the last remaining Uchiha. Sakura couldn't help crying either. Sasuke probably wouldn't have wanted her to cry. He had never liked it when she cried. It was an annoyance to him, but he always stayed with her during the hard times after the war. When her parents had died was an example of that.
When she had arrived back, she had awoken to the sounds of rain. Awoken in a hospital bed, with a note at her side. Shizune had apparently found traces of a poison inside of her, but removed them completely from her system. It also said that a complete investigation has been in order since she arrived back, and that Naruto would be back later with an ANBU division to question her.
The questioning certainly hadn't gone well, and Sakura had to force herself not to cry when the ANBU team came in. During her one on one time with Naruto though, she let herself fall completely to pieces. She released all the pent-up emotion she had been holding in. Naruto had the same reaction the moment they were alone.
She had Ino come in to question her, as well. Sakura could remember the redness on her best friend's face, and she knew that Ino had been crying over this too. Ino had even gone into her mind to try to piece together anything that could be even remotely helpful with the investigation. Nothing came up though. The only lead was the snake bite on the back of Sasuke's neck. Nothing else.
Sakura had spent the days after the funeral in solitude; asking, praying, and desperately questioning the stone slab of Sasuke's grave for answers that could help. She had let the rain drench her for hours at a time. Let it freeze her until she couldn't feel her own skin anymore. She didn't even care that she could get a cold.
It wasn't until exactly two weeks to the day that the rain had stopped, and there was traces of sunshine breaking through the thickness of the platinum clouds. A large rainbow ascended over all of Konoha, bringing the colors back into the bleak reality.
It was at that time when she could feel the gleam of something in the corner of her eye. When she turned though, there was nothing there. Just a wet street filled with people. Nothing more, nothing less.
This continued on for another week, including when she was inside. A few days into that though, she began to hear the wispy sound of wind that weren't there to begin with. The moment she moved it would vanish from her senses. Then she began to realize that it was the same sound that came with the wielding of chalkra strings. It was quiet, and could only barely be heard when listening finely.
It was when she was at Sasuke's stone that she realized something. Could the gleams and sounds be there for a reason? It simply couldn't be that she was crazy. No, Kami, no, she was not insane for goodness sakes. It had to mean something. Was someone watching her? Was this all apart of something bigger?
With only a glance back at Sasuke's grave, she ran back to her home to get her ninja gear. She had an assumption, one that she would have to figure out alone. One that meant she had to go back to the once battlefield that she helped create.
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Deep gasps could be heard throughout the woods. She was now only a few miles out of Konoha at a constant sprinting pace. Pink strands of hair close in proximity from its owner. She had been running for hours, but she couldn't stop now. Not when she had to get there. To get to that Kami forsaken battlefield.
She had been seeing gleams for weeks after the first time she saw the one in River Country. It had to be because she was there. Taken there for whatever purpose or reason. It had killed Sasuke, but kept her alive. Perhaps it was idiotic to go there alone without backup, or telling anyone of her sudden departure. And yet, she felt drawn, helplessly drawn to whatever had caused those gleams.
For two days she had ran until couldn't anymore, only stopping when she was near blacking out from exhaustion, but finally she had made it to her destination. To that battlefield.
It was exactly the same type of day. The near same temperature as well. The same look to everything around it. The river the same blue. It was as if she was walking back in time, but she knew that she wasn't.
An anxiousness was built up in her, nearly impossible to keep contained after so long of being drawn in. Tentatively she walked onto the water before the opened up the rock-lain cavern. Each step was taken with caution, waiting for being taken into a trap of some sort. None ever came.
She saw it. The gleam. Her breath hitched before she was sprinting desperately toward it, unable to hold in her desire.
A flash went by her vision. A flash of red and black. Of hair as scarlet as blood, and a cloak as black as night. A lazy eyed man that didn't stare at her loathingly, no, actually it was the exact opposite look in his face, in his eyes. Love.
Sakura stopped completely, and her emerald eyes widened considerably at the picture in her mind. Then she saw it, and she cried out. The ring that lay exactly where a puppet body had once been. It shined as the sunlight hit its' form so perfectly.
She dropped to her knees hard enough to bruise right before the little ring. She carefully moved her hand toward it, not wanting to die by merely touching it like she was going to do. When she did touch it though, she cupped it in her hand.
Before she could stop herself, she whispered in the trance-like state she found herself in, "Jewel."
Everything changed in that moment.
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Sasori stopped. Simply stopped. His eyes narrowed dangerously, murderously, at the sky. His bloody locks swayed with the wind as he stood at the top of the mountain-cover of the base.
Someone had just awakened the power they had been waiting for, but unlike what he had suspected, the ring chosen was his. He had simply assumed that it would be another's and that he would be apart of the whole charade, not the entire thing.
Whoever had taken his ring from his initial resting spot better have been someone worthy of his barely comprehensible patience. He knew though, that it would have to be. To be considered apart of all this was an achievement that the Gods themselves would consider invaluable.
"Jewel," Sasori warned into the winds that encircled him. "Don't keep me waiting."
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The Renaissance of a Blossom
Author's Note:
Uploaded: October 6, 2013 (Sunday)
Hey guys! I really hope that this goes well. New Beginnings was my biggest story, after all. Again to all of you that read New Beginnings and loved it, but I simply couldn't stand having to continue it. I'm so sorry!
This probably looks really strange, but everything will slowly piece together chapter by chapter. It'll make a heck of a lot more sense when there's more chapters. The whole story is one big puzzle that will fit together eventually. TRB will also be separated into arcs, and the beginning arc with be around 20,000 - 40,000 words; after that, the real story shall begin. Te he!
Please Reivew! I take them into serious consideration and they are highly appreciated. They're practically presents to me! Ja-ne!
-Cassandra