A/N: Okay, you've all read plenty of Naruto fics so you know the drill. Naruto is © Masashi Kishimoto, not me, blah blah blah, on with the show!
---------- Prologue: A Warning Forgotten ----------
Gather round all you who would listen. I come to you all once more with a tale to tell. Some nights before I've come to you all with stories of mighty heroes such as Sabaku no Gaara, Tsunade, Copy Nin Kakashi, and other nights I've told tale of villains such as Orochimaru, Itachi Uchiha, or Zabuza Momochi. But tonight I come to you not with tales of heroes and villains, but instead with a warning; a fear that you would do well to keep close to your heart.
Countless ages ago, a dark and terrible beast crawled forth from the Void. It stared upon the world so new and fresh and saw an easy meal. It made its way East, devouring all in its path, stopping only for the rising and continuing with setting of the Sun. Many great warriors attempted to slay the Beast, but it swatted them aside as though they were flies. The Humans saw the devastation it wrought and they despaired. They begged the Kamis to save them from this Beast, but the Divinities themselves cowered before the creature. Finally, the Beast reached the Edge of the World; before It lay the Sun, and the Humans despaired, for if the Beast devoured that, then the world would be engulfed in an Eternal Night, and nothing would be able to stop It. But when all hope seemed lost, they came forth.
The Nine-Who-Were-Doomed-To-Fall stood forth and did battle with the Beast. Five men saw the Nine, and thought that they would fail as all had before. But then, to their surprise, the Beast fell before the Nine, vanishing back into the Void. The Nine quickly placed a seal over the Void, ensuring that the beast would never crawl forth ever again. They then turned to those who watched them and their last warrior said, "You are the only ones who know what has been wrought here today, and it is to you we entrust this Jutsu," and then they vanished. And so the men split the Jutsu into five parts; five parts, five families entrusted with their safekeeping.
But, sadly, men are mortal, and Time wears away all things. All to soon we forget how the bee stings and the snake bites; the warnings that the elders of the families had always given of the beast became but stories, old wives' tales to be told around the fire, and the seals were forgotten.
The Beast, however, had no concept of time, and with infinite patience, It waited, and waited, and waited… until, to It's eternal delight, the seals were rediscovered…
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When a Shinobi Village is constructed, one must keep in mind that they are made with the intent of being unable to enter, unless the residents wish it so. Kirigakure no Sato, for example, is built among mountains covered in a thick blanket of mist, which makes it very, very difficult to find. Sunagakure no Sato is surrounded on all sides by a vast desert that is harsh to those who were unfamiliar with the dry air. But Kumogakure no Sato is built on the peak of one of the tallest mountains in the world. So if one were to brave the harsh winds, freezing nights, territorial mountain goats, and actually make it to the Village, they would find themselves short of breath due to the thin air that was unkind to anyone who wasn't native to the mountains. So when the two men garbed in black hoods and robes, one thin and one with a sword on his back, stood at the bottom of the mountain range, looking up at the spires that disappeared into the clouds above, they could help but feel that the task they had been given was a little bit extreme.
After a short silence, the thin one rasped, "Well, let's go."
The one with the sword looked to his partner and said, "What?"
"The mountain, time to start climbing."
"Are you off your rocker, old man? It'll take us weeks to climb that thing!"
"Don't call me old. And the sooner we get started the sooner we reach Kumo."
"Let's not and say we did."
"I am in no mood to... persuade you, boy. Let's make this easy on ourselves and start climbing."
"I just don't see why we have to start here. We've got four other candidates ripe for the picking."
"And of those 'candidates' Kumo has the weakest Shinobi. It's just you and me right now, and I for one do not feel like going up against those psychopaths in Iwa until we have some backup."
The man with the sword cocked his eyebrow and said, "Do I detect a hint of fear in 'big bad' Daisuke?"
Daisuke turned to his partner and gave him a murderous glare. Because of the masks that they both wore on their noses and mouths (similar to a certain Copy-nin in Konoha), Sword couldn't know if Daisuke was smirking when he nastily replied, "Well, if that's the way you feel about it, Takumi, I suppose we could try Kiri first. Maybe you could even see some of your old friends there. I know at least three people would be happy to see you."
Takumi sneered from behind his mask and growled, "Shut up, old man."
"Don't call me old. It's your choice, kiddo. Hidden Cloud or Hidden Mist?"
Takumi looked up at the mountain, at his partner, and then back at the mountain. He finally gave a sigh of resignation and muttered, "Fine. We'll do it your way, old man."
"Don't call me old."
And with all arguments and reservations put aside, the two Rogue-nins began to climb up towards Kumogakure no Sato.
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The nighttime silence was so complete that the forest was all but dead. Truly, the stillness was thick enough so that one could have heard an owl flapping its wings.
So when Hachirou sped through the trees in a blind panic, he made more noise than a herd of stampeding pachyderms. While Tsunade couldn't blame him, what with the situation they were currently in, it did worry her, for these were dangerous times, and you never knew when an enemy-nin could be watching. "Hachirou," she called, "Slow down!" To her irritation, he sped up his furious bounding. "Damn kid," she growled.
"Looked on the bright side, Tsunade-chan," remarked a voice behind her, "At this rate, we'll reach Haigara in no time."
She turned back to look at Dan, "Or we could barrel straight into a Rock-nin's trap."
"We're still in the Fire Country; no one is waiting to ambush us," Orochimaru dully stated off to her right.
"See," said Dan, "Don't worry, we'll be alright."
Despite his reassurance, Tsunade was unsettled. She supposed her unease sprung from the caution she always carried with her, lest her loved ones pay the price, but in truth it was born of the poisonous fear that twisted in belly; fear for what they would find once they reached Haigaragakure no Sato. Hachirou had certainly laced it on thick when he had related to them his interpretation of Haigara's current state.
The knot in her stomach tightened when the thick scent of smoke assaulted her nostrils; they had arrived. Even though she had steeled herself when she first caught scent of the fires, Tsunade was still shocked when she laid eyes upon the devastation of Haigara. In all the Village, not a single building was not ablaze. Everywhere she looked, a roaring inferno raged and devoured every home, every restaurant, every school down to its last nail. And yet from among all the tongues of flame that greedily licked the starry skies, not a single scream was heard. Instead they lay silent and still in the streets, more food for the great funeral pyre that the Village had been made into. "Everyone's dead," Jiraiya said slowly, unable to believe what had befallen Haigara. "Sensei," Hachirou whispered and bounded off into the blaze. "Hachirou, wait!" Tsunade called and leapt after him, Dan hot on her heels.
Haigara was not a big village, but nonetheless, Tsunade and Dan lost track of Hachirou amidst the many twists and turns that the streets took, and before long, they themselves became lost among the furious blaze. "Hachirou!" by this time, Tsunade had yelled herself hoarse, and the smoke wasn't helping.
"That's enough, Tsunade," Dan said.
"Hachirou!" she yelled once more.
"Tsunade…"
She sucked in another lungful of air… and then the world turned to ice. Despite the raging fires all around them, there was no warmth left. Though the blaze roared in their ears, there was no sound left. And somehow, it seemed to grow dark all around them. Tsunade felt a shiver run down her spine, and she grew aware of a presence behind them. She turned around ever so slowly... and beheld a monster. It was dressed in a black robe with splashes of scarlet in several places. Its hands were tipped in dagger-like claws. A hole on its garb allowed for a plethora of ink-black appendages to be let loose from the beast's back, some ending in scorpion points, or mouths full of razor teeth, or hooks with gobs of scarlet mass impaled upon them. But it was the creature's face that transfixed her; a stone visage held both their gazes, its wearer unseen behind the slits that allowed for sight, so they could not know if he too smiled the way his mask did: a wide grin full of needle teeth that tipped outward ever so slightly.
"You must not forget, Tsunade-chan," came the voice that had haunted her dreams for so many nights throughout the long years, off to her left. She turned to see her lover, bloodied and mutilated by the beast that had turned Haigara into a funeral pyre, "You must never forget," and then she burst into flames.
Tsunade screamed and tried to beat at the fire on her arms, but found that the flames had vanished. She looked up and saw that she was not in Haigara; she was back in her office, several piles of paperwork surrounding her. Noting the lack of light, she glanced at the clock: Two-Thirty AM. She groaned and massaged her temples; Tsunade hadn't had that dream in years, and now, for the last week, she saw it every time she closed her eyes. She didn't think it was an omen; every bet she'd made this month had left her dead broke.
In her musing, Tsunade became aware of a soft tapping at her window. She looked up and found that a messenger hawk was attempting to get her attention. Curious as to who would contact her at this hour, she crossed over to and opened the window. She removed the message from its back and began to read, her eyes growing wider and wider as they traveled further down the page. As she reached the end of the message, Tsunade reached out to the windowsill to steady herself and just stared off into space, hardly able to believe what she had just read, but when the initial shock wore off, a smile flickered across her face and she remarked to herself, "Naruto's going to have a field day when he gets wind of this."
"And just who, may I ask, is 'Naruto'?" came a voice from off to her right.
The hawk on the windowsill flared its wings and screeched while Tsunade felt a shiver run down her now rigid spine; she knew that voice. She turned slowly, the ruins of Haigara freshly renewed in her mind, and there, sitting in her chair, was the only known survivor of the massacre.
"Masaru…" she whispered.
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A/N: Not bad for a first chapter if I say so myself (which I do). Before I sign off, there are a couple of things I want to clear up:
1: Haigaragakure no Sato The Village Hidden in the Ashes
2: The timeframe for the story begins right after Sasuke finished forming his little cadre of justice.